herbs – Page 27 – Myfrenchkitchen

Rosemary and lamb. A perfect combination.

Suggestions:

Other/or mixture of herbs can be used along with rosemary. Rinse them and use them wet to line your oven pan.
Chicken and pork can be used the same way, cut off excess from pork.
It is worth it to invest in a meat thermometer. It gives you your desired stage of cooking and keeps the guessing and disappointment out of oven roasted pieces.
A piece of meat does shrink alot when roasted at high temperature. But it is still tender and juicy. If you want less shrinkage, bake for longer at 150-160 °C.
Temperatures for lamb: (taken from “La grand Larousse gatronomique)

rare: from 60-62 °C (very pink with pink juices still running)
medium: from 62-64°C (pink with clear juices running)
well done: >64°C (slightly pink to completely cooked/gray)

“You smell like rosemary“, said our daughter when she hugged me at the train station. I bloomed. I liked the thought of smelling like rosemary. It says…mother. Care . Childhood. Home. Remembrance.

Later that night, after our dinner of rosemary lamb and catching up on her life as a young working woman, I lay in bed dwelling on her words and my thoughts drifted off. I dreamed how wonderful it would be if our daughters would talk about us one day along the lines of something like this:

“My mother was cook in the kitchen. My father was cook at the barbecue. And between them grew a rosemary bush. I have my own rosemary bush now and when I walk past it and feel my legs brushing the leaves, a heady fragrance envelops me making me feel lightheaded with memories. I smell my mother after her fiddling in the garden among her roses and herbs and I see my father bending over the rosemary bush, cutting and snipping leaves for his lamb cutlets. Our mealtimes were festively spent around a table in the garden, or in the summer kitchen by die barbecue or under the walnut tree overlooking hills or elegantly candle lit in the dining room or simple and homey around the kitchen table. I recall hours of inventing new recipes, cooking and preparing, tasting wines, all the while eating at pretty set tables around laughter and jokes, teasing and chatting and many a times heart-to-heart talks.

I have no doubt, that there where they are now, they still reign as queen of the kitchen and king of the barbecue. And between them, a rosemary bush grows high and lush”.

…Hartman’s handmade rosemary brush- a piece of copper piping, a string pulled through to the other side with a loop…

…snip some rosemary branches and tie the one end of the string around…

…pull at the other end of the string, fix the stems inside the copper pipe and cut the tips to form a firm brush – baste your meat with melted butter, marinade…

…voilà a fresh rosemary brush…

…some rosemary folie for a home- in teapots, in a jug, on a door, on linen, as a kebab, on oven roasted vegetables, with preserved quince…

..until next time!!..

Ice cream versus salad

How I love painting. And tennis. And I do love my garden, my house. Shopping. What else. Oh yes, and I love eating! Good food, healthy food, bad food, ordinary food, new food, traditional food, adventurous food…all food.

I am sitting here right now, licking a huge Magnum ice cream. A double caramel! Sweet and nerve rackingly rich, deliciously creamy, luscious, sticky, voluptuous and sensual…and far too small. While I am indulging in my ice cream I have a healthy menu for you, a great one for a long, lingering lunch on a hot summers afternoon around a huge table with great friends!

To start off: make a tomato mozzarella salad, using nice small vine tomatoes, some buffalo mozzarella torn into bite size pieces… stuff some in your mouth while you’re at it. Tear some basil leaves and lastly, sprinkle with olive oil, balsamic vinegar, salt and mill some fresh pepper and then add a sprinkling of finely chopped sun dried tomatoes.To finish off, mix gently with your hands and then lick off those fingers, serve on a pretty plate and enjoy with crusty bread.

For the main meal you dig your beautiful platter out of the back of the cupboard, give it a rinse and then fill it with…crispy green leaves of your choice, mesclun, spinach, rocket and other herbs and don’t forget somecrunchy red cabbage sliced finely for great color and crunch….

In the middle you stack some cooked quinoa, first sauteed in coconut oil with some red onions and then cooked until just done.

On top of that, beet cut into chunks, hand fulls of organic grated carrot and around the rim, little bundles of steamed asparagus wrapped in prosciutto or parma ham. And finish off with a little sweetness; a handful of golden raisins and pumpkin seeds and a Calamata olive or two. I like some green peppercorns sprinkled too. Finish off with a vinaigrette of your choice, some more crusty bread, a bottle of good Rose and you’re off to hear all the Oohs and Aahs from your hungry, anticipating guests waiting at the table! And do enter with flare…why else have you gone to so much trouble!

Dessert. No can’t do without dessert. To keep to the theme of health, you take lots and lots of strawberries…do the usual, and cut them roughly into chunks. Using a large fork, you crush them until pulpy but not to a puree. Then you add a large handful of chopped mint, which you ventured into your garden for early morning, with your hat and herbs scissors and gloves…and of course you pulled out some weeds while you were there. OK, the mint..you add this generous handful of mint to your strawberries and follow up with some balsamic vinegar and if you like your strawberries a bit sweeter, add some honey. Just before you put this beautiful dessert in the fridge, take a big spoonful to taste…you should be able to just sigh with pleasure, if not, then start over. Serve it in some beautiful glasses where its beauty can be seen. Top with a dollop of Greek yogurt, drizzle with some honey, a swirl of syrupy reduced balsamic vinegar, a dash of milled black pepper and of course, a small mint leaf…and please, don’t plant a tree!