From the category archives:

French Culture & Cuisine

Scallop Ceviche with Pummelo and Fennel

03.03.2010
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SICK OF WINTER? So am I. Earlier this week, the sun shone in a blue sky. The temperature climbed about ten degrees, and spring seemed almost within reach. Of course today we’re back to gray skies and chilly rain. At least the snow’s been washed away. But that brief hint of warmer days was enough [...]

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Sweet Matcha Ladyfingers (Savoiardi)

02.27.2010
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Steep some lady’s-fingers nice in Candy wine [ . . . ] And sponge my forehead,—so my love doth make me pine.
— John Keats, “The Cap and Bells; or, The Jealousies: a Faery Tale – Unfinished” (1820)
LADYFINGERS: remedy for the lovesick heart? Perhaps, if you’re a fairy king enamored of a mortal lady, as is [...]

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Mardi Gras Tradition: oreillettes à l’orange

02.15.2010
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MARDI GRAS, Fat Tuesday. Here in the States, our minds wander to parades, floats, masked balls, beads, revelry and the last bit of raucous enjoyment to be had before Lent—that pre-Easter season of deprivation—sets in. We think of New Orleans, especially with this year’s SuperBowl win, and celebrate with them in spirit if not on [...]

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Crêpes Not Groundhogs

02.03.2010

YESTERDAY I WAS FRENCH. Double nationality is nice that way: you can opt in and out. Sort of. If not in all bureaucratic matters, then at least culturally. Certainly in terms of cuisine. Yesterday, the second day of February, provided the perfect opportunity for me to jump the American ship, don a beret (no, not [...]

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Leek, Lemon & Feta Quiche

01.22.2010

LIFE GOES ON, and I write about food. It feels a little strange, after the outpouring of charity on the Helping Haiti post (and with haunting images of earthquake rubble still in my mind), to return to a celebratory meal, and yet . . . It’s also true that the best thing to do—once you’ve [...]

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Epiphany: the Galette des Rois

01.05.2010

I ALWAYS ASSUMED that Christmas ended a minute past 11:59 on the night of December twenty-fifth. I grew up, probably like most American children, thinking that the Twelve Days of Christmas started in mid-December and built to a climax on the day we opened gifts and (not always) dragged ourselves out in the cold to [...]

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“Bonne Année” Du Puy Lentil Soup

12.29.2009

WE LAUGH ABOUT lentils, but it’s like laughing with them, not at them. We laugh because one year a box burst open in my mother-in-law’s luggage; we spent twenty minutes picking tiny green bits out of her sweaters, skirts, shoes, and undergarments, and even then I think some made it back home with her. For [...]

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