Where have I been? I’m not quite sure… I think after I got busy in April I simply got out of the habit of blogging. It didn’t help that my husband was working insanely crazy hours the last few weeks while I held down the fort.
As usual, I managed to keep up with my French Fridays with Dorie cooking, even though I wasn’t writing about it. That’s means I have a lot of catching up to do. Let’s get to it!
Cod & Spinach Roulades
This was a very interesting dish that turned out to be quite delicious. Basically, the cod is pulverized in a food processor with egg whites and cream to make a fish mousse. The mouse is spread onto plastic wrap, filled with a tasty spinach mixture, then rolled into “sausages”.
The fish sausages get steamed until cooked through, then they are served on a simple tomato sauce and garnished with pesto. The tomato sauce and pesto were optional, but we felt they were necessary. The whole family liked this one, including my daughter, though she managed to avoid most of her spinach while eating all of her fish.
Swiss Chard Pancakes
Savory pancakes made with Swiss chard! This is a tasty way to eat your greens! I really liked these pancakes (I served them as a side with pork tenderloin), though they were a little oily. The last few batches I cooked were not as oily because there wasn’t much oil left in the pan, but they also weren’t quite as delicious.
Creamy Mushrooms & Eggs
Dorie serves this dish as a starter, but I made it as a special breakfast for one. Toasted brioche (or challah in my case) is covered with a savory mix of sauteed mushrooms fortified with cream and topped off with an egg. The recipe calls for a poached egg, but I’m not a big fan of runny yolks, so I made a fried egg instead. Delicious!
I liked the mushrooms so much I made them again that night and served them with steak.
Coupétade
I really thought I was going to love this one. I couldn’t wait to make it! French toast, baked into a bread pudding with a vanilla custard base. How could I go wrong?
I should have gone with my first instinct by omitting the prunes and raisins. I didn’t like the taste of them in the pudding, which isn’t surprising since dried fruits in baked goods isn’t a favorite of mine.
I also didn’t care for the texture. It’s almost like the custard didn’t soak into the bread enough.
The day I made this I ate it at room temperature for dessert (it had not been refrigerated at all). The next morning I ate some cold for breakfast. I liked it better cold, but I still wished I had left out the prunes and raisins.
Asparagus Soup
This is one of those magical soups where it tastes rich and creamy, but is actually light and healthy (well, maybe except for the crème fraîche, but there’s only a little bit so it doesn’t count). It’s a very simple mixture of cooked asparagus, butter, leeks, onion, shallot, and garlic, pureed until smooth and topped off with a dollop of crème fraîche.
We loved this soup! So creamy and flavorful, yet virtuous. This will likely make a yearly “celebrate-asparagus-season” appearance on my table.
Whew, all caught up! I hope to be back next week with my regularly scheduled posts!
From Scratch 
Wow. That is quite a catch up post! I think the general consensus on the coupetade was the same as yours with regards to the absorbing of the custard. Still, its brioche…so the complaints weren’t very loud.
You have certainly been busy, great catch up. Everything looks so good
and your photos are lovely.
Lovely photos and an all around nice catch up post. I really liked the soup and creamy mushrooms, but I wasn’t a fan of the coupetade. I’ve already made next week’s recipe, and let me just tell you, I don’t know how I’ve lived all these years without pistachio oil!
What a great catch up post! I especially love that you made the mushrooms again and served them with steak. Yum!
Wow – caught up indeed!
Have a great holiday.
Impressive!!! You did catch up. A lot! I have to agree with your notes: loved the mushrooms and eggs (I didn’t actually make the first two), not so much the coupetade, and your soup looks delicious!!
wow! I love these catch-ups!! I’ve done a few over the years and they always make me feel like I’ve got a ton of stuff off my “to-do” list! 🙂 you did great!! i added dried cranberries to my coupteade and I thought they went really well, especially since I plumped them up a bit in hot water before adding them in and they didnt taste like dried fruit anymore which probably made one heck of a difference! I think if you let yours soak a bit more in the custard you would have liked that one better. I still have the fish mousse to make, but yours looks great and makes me swoon to make mine! 🙂
Yes, it does feel good to get caught up! Now I just have to manage to “keep up”… 🙂
LOL I’m still struggling with that one a bit now…
Great catchup, Karen! Good for you to keeping up with our cooking too. The blogging, photos, etc. steps are always more time-consuming that I expect them to be. I think my favorite of the recipes you recapped was the mushrooms and eggs. I LOVED that sauce. I am in the middle of multiple knitting projects this month, so I was wondering what you are making these days.
It’s easy for me to keep up with the cooking since we have to eat anyway, but you are right about how time consuming the rest of it can be. I only have one knitting project going right now: the sweater I have been working on for quite some time. I am really close to finishing! Just about a quarter of the second front left to go, and then I can sew it up and add the collar. What are you working on?
You have done an amazing job! You’ve completed so many recipes and they all look great.
I’m so far behind, you’ve inspired me 🙂