Zucchini Chèvre Soup with Basil-Mint Croutons

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Zucchini & Chevre Soup with Basil-Mint Croutons
It feels like I did little more than blink and somehow summer came, went, and we’re back to the sort of days that are just meant for soup.  Cloudy and drizzly outside always translates to chopping and stirring inside.  It’s time to get back into my kitchen and back into my soup game.

This is a really simple zucchini soup that’s swirled with creamy goat cheese.  Crunchy baguette croutons, smeared with fresh basil and mint oil, garnish the soup and distinguish one bite from the next.  It’s a celebration of late summer produce, with a good dose of fall comfort. 

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Sour Cherry Cornmeal Clafoutis

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Cherry ClafoutisSometimes being a homeowner can feel like such a drag.  The furnace fails, guess who’s on the hook.  And when the walk needs to be shoveled, the lawn needs to be mowed, or the caulking around the shower starts to brown and peel?  Yep, my problems, no one else’s.

And then there are times when I’m reminded that having a house and a yard to call my own are major blessings.  This sort of thing is usually pretty easy to recognize on a mid-summer day when I realize I’ve got a tree full ripe cherries and I’m no choice but to make an impromptu dessert on a Tuesday.  Ah, the importance of perspective.

So for my impromptu weekday dessert, I chose to make clafoutis.  Clafoutis (or clafouti…) is a dessert with a fancy French name that couldn’t be simpler to make or more delicious to eat.  It’s a custardy little cake baked in a pie pan, packed full of cherries.  I snuck a bit of cornmeal into mine and a splash of amaretto to bring out the flavor of the cherries.  

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Asparagus & Gruyère Croque Madame

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Croque Madame with Asparagus
Here in Minnesota, it feels like we’ve endured more than our fair share of rain this spring.  I’ve gone weeks wearing nothing but ugly, green rain boots.  I’ve never wiped up so many muddy paw prints, nor have I’ve ever wanted to spend more time napping.

It’s not all bad though.  The grass is vivid, the trees have started to bud, and I feel completely justified in eating my favorite comfort foods–bowls of spaghetti showered with Parmesan, brothy bowls of soup with crusty bread, and grilled cheese sandwiches.  

My latest (and arguably greatest) grilled cheese concoction was this open-faced asparagus croque madame sandwich.  A croque madame, if you’re unfamiliar, is a croque monsieur topped with an egg and a croque monsieur is a delicious French sandwich made with béchamel-smeared bread, a slice of ham, and cheese.  You pop it under the broiler and let the cheese melt and the edges get toasty-crunchy.  It’s pretty wonderful whenever, but as lunch on a rainy afternoon, it’s absolute perfection.

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Asparagus, Spinach & Chèvre Tart

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Asparagus, Spinach & Chevre Tart 3I’ve been really into brunch the past few weeks.  Life has felt a bit frantic lately and carving out time for a leisurely morning meal on the weekends is a good way to make the day at least feel like it’s stretched out in front of you, even if the minute your plate is empty you’ve got to run off and go about other business.

This tart is the latest addition to my brunch repertoire.  It’s basically a compact quiche that’s heavy on green vegetables and goat cheese.  Spinach is whisked into an eggy custard, topped with spears of asparagus and rounds of chèvre, and baked in a flaky crust.  It’s a great thing to linger over with a second cup of coffee on a spring morning or, should the weather cooperate, perfect for a patio lunch with a salad and a glass of wine.

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Parisian Gnocchi with Arugula Pistou & Crispy Prosciutto

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Parisian Gnocchi 2

When people discover you have a food blog, suddenly everyone has a great idea for what you should cook next.  I get a whole lot of (well-intentioned) requests for things like gluten-free baking ideas, cute holiday treats, and homemade girl scout cookies/bloomin’ onions/pumpkin spice lattes/etc.  In other words, I often find myself gently reminding folks that I’m capable of eating an entire baguette on my way home from the grocery store so gluten-free baking is really not something I have a huge interest in, that “cute” is something I do very poorly, and there’s this special place called Pinterest where I’m sure those “top-secret” recipes you want me to recreate already exist.

So when my boss approached me with, “d’you know what would be great for your blog?” I braced myself and started thinking of ways to let him down easy and hold on to my job.  But he followed it up with, “Parisian gnocchi.  I think you readers would really like it.  Do you want my recipe?” 

Umm…yes, absolutely!  Finally, a suggestion I didn’t have to politely turn away! 

(Okay, fine. If you don’t know me in real life and you’ve never wandered over to my about page, I suppose it bears mentioning that my “real” job is waiting tables, so it helps that my boss happens to be the chef of a French restaurant.)

So armed with Vincent’s recipe, I went home to make Parisian gnocchi.  Parisian gnocchi are unlike the Italian gnocchi you’re probably more familiar with.  Instead of relying on potatoes, Parisian gnocchi are made with cheese-enriched pâte à choux, which is the same type of pastry dough that’s used make gougères, profiteroles, and other such treats.  Yup, copious amounts of cheese, butter, and egg–leave it to the French.  The cheesy choux pastry is piped into simmering water and poached.  From there, you can go ahead and eat them or shock them in cold water, then sauté and sauce them later.  I’ll walk you through the how-to and show you how I served mine.

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