Linseed and orange biscuits

Click on the flag for the French version

There come some nice biscuits that I made to accompany my India dessert the other day and that I presented in my previous post (here).

The idea of mixing linseeds and orange came from some biscuits I bought in an organic shop with a mix of flavor from orange biscuits that I bought at my work place.

They are also very good with tea or coffee.

I like to eat some of those biscuits for breakfast, doing like French use to do with croissant: dipping it into the hot coffee.

Linseed and orange biscuits

Ingredients:

300 gr / 10.5 oz flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
125 gr / 4.5 oz softened butter
100 gr / 3.5 oz sugar
1 egg
1 egg yolk
half an orange juice
1 orange peel
40 gr / 1.5 oz linseeds

Preheat the oven to 180°C.

Sift together the flour and baking powder,
and add the linseed and the orange peel.

Cream sugar and butter
and add the egg, the egg yolk and the orange juice

and mixed all together.

Stir the flour mixture into butter mixture until well blended and smooth.
Roll the pastry into sausage form and put it into a plastic film,
And put in the fridge for an hour.

Cut the pastry sausage into biscuits,
And bake for around 10 minutes.

India orange and rose tea

Click on the flag for the French version

Here comes a light dessert deriving from a Philippe Conticini's recipe that we have tested last week-end.

I did not have all the ingredients to make the original of it. But I had some nice others that appeal to me. Some flavors which can be perfectly associated.

I wanted to have a light and fresh dessert. Even if the weather looks like winter time actually, I wanted to have some this fresh but warm in flavor, like some Indian dishes.

After tasting : it was what I expected. A real good surprise !

I hope you will enjoy it as we had.

India orange and rose tea

Ingredients:

4 oranges
350 ml orange juice
1 lemon juice
1 tablespoon cornflour
1 tablespoon shredded coconut
1 teablespoons rose tea (or jasmine tea)
1 teaspoons cumin seeds
1 or 2 tablespoons blanched pistachious
1 cinnamon stick
2 tablespoons suggar (optional: there is no suggar in the original recipe)

Peel totally the orange skin and take only the orange pulp
Divide among dessert cups.

Put the orange and lemon juice with the suggar into a saucepan
and bring to simmer.

Add the cornflour to the pan and stir until it thicken like a syrup.
Take off the heat and add the shredded coconut,rose tea,cumin seeds,cinnamon stick and blanched pistachious (except some of of them which should be kept for decorating)
Leave to cool.

Divide the mixture among dessert cups contaning the orange peels.
Place into the fridge for a couple of hours, until set.

Serve it fresh with little cakes.

Curry mussels cappuccino

Click on the flag for the French version

At this time of the year, mussels are not quite tasty. But the other week-end, I wanted to eat some. Therefore I needed a recipe which can give the mussels a real good flavor.

I turned to a very pleasant website presenting some French chiefs recipes (France Chef) and found the Alain Gilain's recipe of an amazing cappuccino with curry mussels.

So good ! We loved it. It is so sophisticated in presentation, and the must : it is very easy to make.

Curry mussels cappuccino

Ingredients :

800 gr /29 oz mussels
250 ml white dry wine
2 shallots
1 carrot
2 celery sticks

For clarification of stock:

1 egg white
2 celery sticks
1/2 apple
1 tablespoon tomato purée
chili

For the curry whipped cream:

150 ml heavy cream
1 teaspoon curry powder
salt

Put butter in a kettle.
Mince shallots.
Cut the carrots and celery stick into pieces.

Add the shallots, carrot and celery in the kettle and let them cook a little.

Add the washed and rinced mussels and the white wine.
Do never salt the mussels while cooking.
First because during the cooking they will reject salt sea water, and secondly because it makes them rubbery.

Cover tightly and boil quickly.
In about 5 minutes their shells should swing open which means that they are done.
Put the mussels in a bowl and reserve the mussels cooking liquor.
You can keep the cooked vegetables which can be eaten separately.

In parallel :
Wash and cut in very small cubic pieces one celery stick.
Cut also in very small cubic pieces a quarter of apple (without peeling it).
Put the celery and the apple altogether in a cup.

Cut the other quarter of apple and a celery stick into small pieces,
put it into a bowl
add the tomato purée and the egg white.

Whip the heavy cream with the curry powder.

Shell the mussels
Throw away the unopenned ones,
and split them up equal part into all the service glasses.

Put the mussel cooking liquor into a saucepan with the cut vegetables mixed with the egg white and the tomato purée and some pieces of cooked carrots,
Whip it quickly while boiling.
Strain the obtained soup,
and split it up into the glasses containing the mussels.

Put some curry whipped cream on top of it,
and finally some small cubic pieces of apple and celery.
Sprinkle it with some chili powder.

Serve immediately.

Black forest panna cotta

You may say that I am again making a panna cotta recipe : and you are right.

Panna cotta is one of my favorite dessert. It is easy to make and can be made in advance. Moreover, it can be perfumed or composed in many many various ways.
Therefore I found that panna cotta would help to have the taste of black forest cake, but not the creamy texture which I do not like at all.
This idea to make a black forest panna cotta comes to my mind while coming back home the other day. I am working in the center of Paris and live in the suburb. Even if my workplace is not so far considering the distance from home : traffic around Paris implies most of the time to spend more than an hour in public transportation or traffic jam !
So it allows me to read, but also to elaborate recipes or ideas.

Black forest Panna cotta

The different recipes composing this dessert are noted hereunder in the order as they need to be prepared.

Chocolate panna cotta

Ingredients:

4.5 fl oz / 125 ml heavy cream (or panna which can be found in Italian delicatessen)
4.5 fl oz /125 ml milk
2 and a half gelatine leaves or 0.4 oz of agar-agar
5 gr / 0.17 oz cocoa powder
10 gr / O.35 oz black chocolate
20 g / 0.7 oz sugar

Soak the gelatine leaves in cold water until soft.
Place milk, cream, cacao powder, black chocolate and sugar into a pan
and bring to simmer.
Heat until the black chocolate has melted.
Squeeze the water out of the gelatine leaves.
Take off the heat and add the gelatine leaves to the pan.
Stir until the gelatine leaves have dissolved.
Divide the mixture among ramekins and leave to cool.
Place into the fridge for a couple of hours, until set.

Before preparing the vanilla panna cotta, it is better to wait until the chocolate panna cotta sets. Note that if you are using agar-agar instead of gelatin leaves, the panna cotta will set faster, but the texture will be more as gelly than real panna cotta prepared with gelatin leaves.
I like both, but as for me, really panna cotta original taste is the one prepared with gelatin leaves.

Vanilla Panna cotta with cherries

Ingredients:

4.5 fl oz / 125 ml heavy cream (or panna)
4.5 fl oz /125 ml milk
2 and a half gelatine leaves or 0.4 oz of agar-agar
half vanilla bean, split lengthwise
20 g / 0.7 oz sugar
some syrup cherries

Drain the cherries.

Proceed as for the chocolate panna cotta,
but replacing cacao powder and black chocolate by the vanilla bean.

Wait until the panna cotta has cooled,
divide the mixture among ramekins to cover the chocolate panna cotta.
Put the drained cherry inside,
and leave to cool.

Place into the fridge for a couple of hours, until set.

Before preparing the cherry jelly, it is again better to wait until the vanilla panna cotta sets.

Cherry jelly

Ingredients:

80 gr / 2.8 oz syrup cherries with juice (so totally around 150 gr /5.2 oz)
10 gr / 0.3 oz sugar
1/4 teaspoon of agar agar

Make a coulis of the cherries and the juice.
Place the cherry coulis, sugar and agar agar into a pan
and bring to simmer for 2 or 3 minutes.

Leave to cool (but not too much)
and divide the coulis among ramekins in a thin layer to cover the vanilla panna cotta.
Leave to cool,
and place into the fridge for a couple of hours, until set.

Genoise chocolat

Ingredients:

3 eggs
60 gr /2 oz flour
60 gr /2 oz sugar
1 tablespoon of cocoa powder
1 salt pinch

Preheat oven to 180°C.
Line a 15 x 10 x 1-inch roll pan with waxed paper.
Grease and flour lined pan; tap out excess.

In a bowl, using an electric mixer set on a medium speed,
beat egg yolks and sugar until fluffy.
Fold in delicately the flour and cocoa powder.

In another bowl, using clean beaters,
beat egg whites with a salt pinch until stiff.
Fold in beaten egg whites into the egg yolk and flour mixture.

Pour batter in pan; smooth top.
Bake until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, about 12 minutes.

Leave to cool.
Cut round cake forms having the same siez than the ramekins.

Soaking syrup

In a small saucepan,
combine water and sugar,
and bring to a boil.
Reduce to a simmer, and cook, stirring, until sugar dissolves.
Remove from heat and add some cherry syrup or some kirschwasser.

Sprinkle each round cake form with the soaking syrup.
Put them on top of the ramekins as the last layer.

Place into the fridge for a couple of hours.

Before serving,
turn out delicately the black forest panna cotta on a plate.

Decorate as you like.

Sweet spices salmon in parcel

Saturday is market day !

We have a nice little market near by and every saturday we take advantage of having a very good fish-monger to buy and prepare really good fresh fish.
This saturday I was in the mood of fish in parcel, especially to taste some spices blend that I bought. To tell the truth, I do not remember when buying this spices blend for which purpose it is dedicated... but anyway I wanted to taste it. This spices blend is called "Plancha". But unfortunately I do not have the composition of it.

However, if you are not living in Paris or around, giving you the name of that spices blend will not be very useful.

But this simple and quick recipe can be made with the spices blend that you would like to use (dedicated or not to fish). It is just a method of cooking.

Now that I had the fish, I needed something to accompany. And when I found those small round yellow courgettes : I knew that they would perfectly do. Aren't they irresistible ?

In any case, you can use any kind of courgettes or squashes as the taste of it are not so different. But if you have the choice, round courgettes might make the difference in your dish presentation.

I also cook some buckwheat, which can be found in organic food shops - but you can use brown rice.

So now here comes the :

Sweet spices salmon in parcel

Ingredients:

4 skinless salmon fillets
2 tomatoes
1 lemon
spices
salt
8 small round yellow courgettes

Preheat oven at 180 C
Cut out 4 sheets of baking paper about 30 cm by 30 cm (12 in by 12 in)

Wash tomatoes, and cut each into slices.
Lay 3 or 4 tomato slices on one half of each paper square.
Season well with the spices,
then top each with a salmon fillet.
Again season each fillet with the spices and salt.

Wash the lemon and cut it into thin slices.
Lay 2 lemon slices on the salmon fillet.

Fold the empty half of each sheet over the salmon fillet and crease
and fold over the edges several times until you have sealed parcel
(no juice should leak once the salmon is cooked).

Transfer each parcel to a baking tray.

Wash the courgettes, and cut their bottom.
Make a cross incision at their bottom to ease their cooking,
and put them directly on the baking tray.

Cook the parcels in the oven for 25 minutes.

When cooked, put the parcel in each plate accompanied with courgettes and buckwheat or rice.

Violet flavor Panna Cotta

Here comes the recipe of the day deriving from the Kikilatoque's blog (here for the orginal version). Click on the above French flag for the French version.

But first let me present you a French south-west marvellous sweet coming from Toulouse : the candied violet.

Yes, I am talking about this nice little flower.

In France, we are using many type of flowers essence or candied petal for cake decoration or for their taste (i.e. rose, lavender, poppy, nasturtium...). In the past, flowers flavor were use to make medical syrup tastes better, but they were quickly used for cooking.

Today, some French chiefs are very popular for cooking flowers whether candied or fresh. I would say that in France : it is fashionable !

Since more than a century, Violet has become a real tradition and a symbol of Toulouse city (know as the "Ville rose" due to the pink color of its buildings walls) for perfume or candies.

Crystallised violets are mainly used for cake decoration. Nowadays, there are a lot of deriving sweets and syrup made from the violet flowers.

Outside France, it can be found in specialised pastry shop or on the web.

When I found this recipe on the Kikilatoque's blog : I did not hesitate to taste it, as I have always candied violet at home.

I hope you will enjoy it.

Violet flavor Panna Cotta

Ingredients :

25 cl / 9fl oz milk

25 cl / 9 fl oz double cream

3 and a half gelatine leaves

50 gr /2 oz candied violet (or you can use violet flavor : in such case add some more sugar)

20 gr / 1 oz sugar

Soak the gelatine leaves in cold water until soft.

Place milk, cream, violet candied (or flavor) and sugar into a pan

and bring to simmer.

Heat until the candied violet has melted.

Squeeze the water out of the gelatine leaves,

Take off the heat and add the gelatine leaves to the pan.

Stir until the gelatine leaves have dissolved.

Divide the mixture among ramekins and leave to cool.

Place into the fridge for a couple of hours, until set.

Decorate with crystallised violet or violet sugar or any nice sweets or color sugar that you may have.

Macaronette & Cie - English Version

First sorry for the English ! I will try my best to write as proper English as I can.

I am French and created a culinary blog called "Macaronette et Cie" some months ago to share my cooking passion, but also plenty of other things : such as cooking recipes, adresses, tricks... and personal favorites.

I love discovering new tastes, amazing products and ideas... Most of the time that means that I am virtualy travelling through blogs from all over the world (even not in French or English !)

and YES, cooking is not the French exclusivity ! It is universal and carried all over the world a sharing mindset.

Because of my job, some of my friends... I have to speak English almost daily... and believe it or not : I love that.
Even if people are speaking more and more what I would call "International English" (as I do), it is most of the time very useful for sharing things like ideas, cultures, discoveries... to speak English.

Since I created my French blog, I received some virtual visit and messages from non-French speakers. Therefore, making a parallel English version of my blog appears to me to be a good idea for sharing more.

However, it cannot be only a translation except for recipes, essentially (and I don't know why) what I express myself in French and in English, I never say the same thing.

So here comes Macaronette & Cie in English.
I hope you will enjoy

Totchie