Julie & Julia and Delia (With Gratin Dauphinoise)

This must be first time ever that I was struggling to finish reading a book. As I have mentioned earlier in numerous posts, I can read anything & everything, then why did I have to keep counting the pages remaining, and wondering when I will be able to reach the end?

The answer might lie in the way Julie Powell writes -  totally haphazard, without any organisation or sequence and too many unnecessary and minute details.

I am talking about Julie & Julia, by Julie Powell which was the Book Club’s pick this month, well actually last month. As you can see I am quite late with the post here, but my hectic schedule for the past couple of weeks combined with my lack of interest in the book after a few pages, are to be blamed.

The prior knowledge that this book didn't really have a story but it only chronicled the experiences of someone who work in a government organisation by the day & tries to emulate the legendary Julia Child when she is cooking, did not help either.

I would not have even minded that, if her experiences were something out of the ordinary or even if they were written with a little more flair or if the food references were appealing. I did not find any of these in the book and so was totally uninspired in both the culinary & the literary sense.

I am only hoping the movie is much better than the book itself because I really want to see it, the sole reason being Meryl Streep, who I find absolutely amazing.

Although the book didn't inspire me to cook anything, the mention of Julia Child’s ‘Mastering the Art of French Cooking’ led me to try something french.

I have spoken about this book earlier. This has become for me what MtAoFC was to Julie Powell I guess. I have been trying out recipes one by one although I dont have a set target like her. I am hoping to make all the recipes given in the book.

I found this Gratin Dauphinoise recipe in this vegetarian collection by Delia Smith. See, now do you see the reason behind the title of this post, I just couldnt resist it!

The first thing that struck me about the recipe was its simplicity but still I knew that with this combination of the ingredients, the end result was sure to be delicious. The original recipe was to serve 4-6 people, I scaled it down to make it for 2.

Gratin Dauphinoise

Serves 2 as a side dish

Ingredients

1 Large Potato or 2 medium ones
1 small clove of garlic, crushed & chopped finely
30 ml Cream

30 ml Milk
1 tblsp Butter + extra for greasing
Salt & Pepper
Some nutmeg

Method:
Pre heat the oven to 150 deg C. Generously butter a baking dish, approx 4” in size, and keep ready.

Wash & peel the potato. Slice it very thinly preferably using a mandolin or the slicing blade of a grater. I dont have a mandolin and my grater badly needs to be replaced as its gone very blunt, so I achieved the impossible of sorts by slicing it by hand with a knife. Although the slices were not comparable to mandolin ones, they did nicely.



Keep these slices immersed in cold water to get rid of some of the starch. Drain and then wipe them dry on a kitchen towel.

Arrange some potato slices in the baking dish, slightly overlapping. Sprinkle some crushed garlic, salt & Pepper.

Arrange the next set of slices and repeat the process until all the slices are used up.

End with a sprinkle of salt & pepper. Now, mix the cream & milk together and pour into the baking dish.



Lightly sprinkle some freshly grated nutmeg over this. Dot the surface with the butter and bake in the pre heated oven on the top most rack for about 1.5 hours.

Yes, you read that right. It is 1 1/2 hours, it takes that long for the potatoes to cook to perfection, with the flavour of garlic permeating and the cream & butter working their magic.

This being such a rich dish, I served this alongside a soup, the recipe for which is coming soon. Together they made a very hearty dinner for us.

My Notes:

Although I scaled down the recipe, I also used a bit of judgement on my part when using the ingredients, so follow accordingly. This can easily be turned into a main dish by just increasing the quantity. I wouldn't really mind it on its own if I can ignore the amount of calories in it.

It was really delicious and made me understand why Julia stressed so much on the butter & the cream in most of her recipes. They really do wonders!

Shortbread Triangles

This month’s read for the Book Club was Sophie Kinsella’s Can you Keep a secret? While I am not particularly a fan of this genre of books called the chic-lit (I am more of a mystery, thriller, espionage reader), I was intrigued when I had read about this book. Her earlier Shopaholic series had gone by, with me barely knowing about them. 

I knew what to expect when  I started reading this book. Nothing heavy just plain entertainment. I was glued to it till I finished it. It is about Emma Corrigan who is a normal ‘nothing-special’ kind of a girl who like any one else has some secrets. Nothing in the league of CIA, MI5 or any other world changing issues but simple facts about herself that she has hidden from the people in her life. Her boyfriend doesn't know that she is a size 12 instead of 8. Her friend from the office doesn't know that she hates crochet. Her flat mate doesn't know that she borrows her clothes when she is not around. Her office colleague doesn't know that she pours orange juice on her plant everytime she is irritated and so on. And then one day she spills out all these tidbits to a complete stranger and the story is all about how that changes her life completely in all aspects. For the better in many ways, but not before she goes through the usual nail biting, tense moments about what will happen and how she will cope.

The stranger turns out to be her top boss and this leads to a lot of hilarious  & embarrassing situations for Emma. The biggest one being when all her secrets are revealed on the TV accidently by Jack Harper. But it turns out that he has his own vital secret too!

I couldnt help but think of Bridget Jones while reading this book, specially in the initial chapters when nothing is going right for Emma!
It was quite an enjoyable book and a good change from the ‘serious’ stuff that I am used to reading most of the times.

Scotland was a central part of the story – Emma is returning from Scotland when she tells all her secrets on the plane, Jack Harper’s secret involves the city of Glasgow in Scotland etc. So I made these Scotch Shortbread triangles.

But there is a secret about this too! When I tried to make them the first time some time last week, I failed miserably. I don't know how I made a mistake but the end result was too crumbly and wouldn't hold shape at all, although it tasted great. But I made them again 3 days back & this time they turned out very good. Not perfect yet but I will keep working on that.

Shortbread Triangles

Ingredients

1 & 3/4 cups Plain Flour

1/2 cup Butter (chilled)
1/4 cup Caster Sugar + extra for sprinkling (Increase if you like it sweeter)
a pinch of salt

Method:

Pre heat the oven to 150 deg C. Keep an 8” round fluted pan ready.

In a mixing bowl, sift the flour, sugar and salt together.

Add the cold butter to this and mix with your fingertips till the mixture looks like bread crumbs.

Now bring together the mixture to form a soft dough. Press this dough lightly into the pan with your fingertips.

Using a sharp, thin knife mark the dough into 8 equal portions and prick with a fork all over. Sprinkle some sugar on this and then bake in the pre heated oven for about 50 min or until the edges start to brown up.

Remove from the oven and cut along the markings to give you 8 shortbread triangles. Let them cool in the pan for sometime and then later transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely.



My Notes:

As I have mentioned, my second attempt was far better than the first one but I still feel it could have been better. After I had mixed the butter in the flour it was still a little dry and I could not make a dough out of it. So I had to add a few drops of Milk to it.

The shortbreads were delicious but the texture could be better so thats what I will be aiming for next time.

This book makes me cook: Kathrikai Bhaji (Aubergine Fritters)

Finding this month’s book in my local library proved to be some thing of a task for me. Finally I managed to get the book called for me from another library.

The book chosen for this month was Ladies Coupe by Anita Nair. There are essentially 6 stories, involving – of course 6 women, tied together by the central story of Akhila, who is a single woman at 45 yrs, having worked hard to keep her family (mother, 2 brothers & a sister) afloat after the sudden demise of her father. She is trying to find the answer to the question – does a woman need a man to cope with life? The other 5 women, her co travelers in the train to Kanyakumari, try to help her arrive at the answer by sharing their own life story with her.

The first thing that struck me about the writing was the extensive use of adjectives & similes, specially in the initial chapters. Although the vivid description of a railway station & platform left me feeling nostalgic, as if I was standing on that very platform, some times I felt she had delved into too much of a detail, which took away the spotlight from the story.

The story itself did not work for me either. I could not identify or even empathise with any of the characters. Their discontent towards life sounded hollow to me, except may be for Akhila & Mari. Even in the case of Akhila, there were some aspects which were beyond my understanding. It might be that I couldn't really appreciate the position she was in, but that is where I thought the writer had failed to make me feel for Akhila. For example, I saw no reason for her to put up with her opportunist & ungrateful sister while she pretended to be the one making sacrifices!

As for the food part, I did not find too many culinary references and being the serious kind of book that it was, no dish sprung to mind immediately. But there was the mention of Kathrikai Bhaji, which caught my attention and so that is what I made.

Kathrikai Bhaji (Aubergine Fritters)

Serves 2 as a side

Ingredients

• 2-3 Aubergines, cut into thin slices
• 1/2-3/4 cup Besan (Chickpea flour)
• 2 tblsp chopped onion
• 2 tblsp finely chopped fresh coriander
• 1 tsp Red Chilli powder
• salt
• Oil for frying

Method:

Combine all ingredients except for the aubergine slices and oil in a mixing bowl. Prepare a medium thick batter (slightly thinner than Dosa batter) using a little water.

Heat the oil and then lower the flame.

Dip the slices of aubergine into the prepared batter and fry in the hot oil turning them every now & then. Remove them out of the oil when they turn light brown and are crisp. Drain on a kitchen towel.

Serve hot on their own as a perfect evening snack with Tea/Coffee or as a side with the meal.

My Notes: This was the first time I has included chopped onions in the batter for the fritters, only because they were mentioned in the book. I thought they might add an extra crunch but there was no real difference, so its perfectly OK to skip them.

On another note, hope all of you had a lovely Christmas and are looking forward to the New Year!

Bread Alone with Scones

‘This Book makes me Cook’ will be a regular feature on this blog from this month onwards and I have already started wondering why I had not joined it earlier. First of all as I have mentioned a lot of times earlier, I love reading and in spite of the busy schedule now or earlier when I was working, I have somehow always managed to squeeze in some reading. But most importantly the Book Club gives me an exposure to a lot of good books which otherwise I might not come across.

Take for example, this month’s Bread Alone by Judith Ryan Hendricks. If I had passed this one on the shelf in a library I don't think I would have actually picked it up, but having read it now, I am glad I did.

Its all about ‘Wyn’ who is jolted out of her ‘too good to be true’ comfortable life, which in turn makes her realise that there is more to life than being tied to a single person (her husband in this case). The writing itself was very interesting, changing between past & present tense with ease. The separation from her husband proves to be beneficial to Wyn as she realises her long lost passion for baking bread. Once she has it in her, for baking bread, she is not deterred by various hurdles, the main one being the tough Linda, in the bakery where she takes up work.

The most striking part of the book, for me, was the friendship between Wyn and CM. I completely identified with them and felt fortunate to have experienced a similar kind of relationship with my friends. Its funny how your friends sometimes know you better than yourself and can actually predict how you will react to a certain situation. This was a good read although I would have liked some more ‘action’ in the end.

It looks natural to be making a bread inspired from this book but I settled for Scones. Scones are mentioned on more than two occasions in the book and everytime the vivid description made me want some :) So I decided to make Cherry Scones, following a recipe from the Home Baking Cookbook which is the latest addition to my fast expanding Kitchen bookshelf!

Cherry Scones

Makes 8-10

Ingredients

• 225 gm (2.25 Cups) Plain Flour
• a pinch of salt
• 85 gm (0.4 cups) Butter, chilled
• 1 Egg, lightly beaten
• 1 tblsp Caster Sugar
• 3-4 tblsp Glace Cherries, chopped
• 2-3 tblsp Milk

Method: Pre heat the oven to 220 deg C and grease a baking sheet.

Sift the flour and salt into a mixing bowl. Add the butter and rub the flour & butter between your palms till the mixture resembles breadcrumbs.

Stir in the sugar, cherries and add the beaten egg. Mix along with 2 tblsp of milk, using a spoon to form a soft dough.

Sprinkle some flour onto the work surface and knead the dough very lightly. Roll out very lightly to a thickness of about 2 cm. Using a cookie cutter, cut out 8 rounds and transfer them to the baking sheet. Repeat with the remaining dough to form more scones. Brush lightly with milk.

Bake the prepared scones in the pre heated oven for about 8-10 min until well risen and golden. Transfer them to a wire rack to cool and then serve with butter.

My Notes: This was our breakfast last Saturday and we loved it. The original recipe has Sultanas along with the cherries but I skipped it as GM is not too fond of them. If you want to use them, add about 2 tblsp of Sultanas along with the chopped glace cherries.

Make sure that the rolled out dough is quite thick otherwise you will end up with cookies instead of scones! Exactly what happened to my second batch of dough :)