Fresh Tart

Happy Valentine's Day!

For someone who digs the savory over the sweet, it's not my usual to post two desserts in a row. But I couldn't resist sharing these perfect Valentine's Day chocolate souffles, from Alice Medrich's marvelous chocolate cookbook BitterSweet.  Despite their decadent, chocolate-y goodness, these souffles are really rather light (around 200 calories without whipped cream), which makes them the perfect end to any menu you can dream up.  No flour (gluten- and grain-free!), a small amount of butter, and a splash of milk mean these are mostly chocolate and eggs.

Everyone - and I mean everyone - adores them, hot from the oven, topped with a dollop of whipped cream.  If you have leftovers, make sure to reheat them in the micro for a bit, since they really must be warm to shine.

You can make these up to two days ahead of time - I'm not kidding.  Just cover and refrigerate, then bake for 15 minutes before you serve.  I make them so often that I have the recipe memorized.

Recipe for Not-Too-Heavy Chocolate Souffles at Dara & Co./Minnesota Monthly Magazine.

Let me say this right away so that you don't stop reading: Souffles are so easy to make! I made this version with rhubarb but you can use almost any juicy fruit - local strawberries are finally happening!

Soon there will be cherries, blueberries, peaches, plums... Play away.

This recipes uses four egg whites. Don't toss the yolks! Just cover and refrigerate and make Old-Fashioned Vanilla Pudding with Crushed Strawberries the next day (or the day before - you choose). My recipe for Warm Fruit Souffle (in this case, rhubarb) at Dara & Co./Minnesota Monthly Magazine.

Hey friends, how's it going? I've actually had a couple of kind inquiries about my health due to my two-week bloggy absence - rest assured, everything's fine here, in fact great. My excuse? Um...total and complete obsession with the presidential election. I confess, I got bit hard by the political bug this cycle. I just love absorbing it, the strategies, the moves, the ins and outs, ups and downs. I have a limited amount of time each day I can allocate to being online and well, er, the election won over my blog. So not moderate, I know. But I'm back now, my guy won and since he seems to be moving on pretty well without my strategic advice, I'll let it go now. (In my next life I'll have to be a political operative, though, yeah...)

I wasn't all politics, all the time, however - I did actually feed my family. Even my extended family, when my cousin Peter, his wife Kristin, and their adorable twin daughters Erin and Emily came for a visit from Sheboygan, Wisconsin. My aunts Mary and Marge drove in too, and my cousin Kim, and we had a grand time last Saturday night catching up. Erin and Emily are two - yes, twin two-year olds, busy and clever and everywhere all at once, just as you might imagine. They both love to sing, especially Erin, and the stereo effect of twin toddler song is beyond cute. They regaled us with song and chat for more than a couple of hours at the dinner table, an impressive feat for two busy two-year olds. It was a complete blast.

I made beef burgundy, inspired by a lovely coq qu vin that John and I split at Salut Bar Americain last week (I believe it's their Monday night chicken special - I recommend it very highly). Great do-ahead dish, beef burgundy, although lengthy to prepare - split it into two days of prep and you'll be sitting pretty for your next dinner party. We opened with a simple salad, with parsleyed potatoes alongside the beef, and my aunt Marge's apple crisp for dessert. Uff da that was a meal. (Recipe posted in comments, below.)

John and I in fact hit Salut twice in three days, no lie. Somewhere between Politico and Pollster, we fit in a lovely lunch at Salut's bar - steak frites with a glass of burgundy. Romantic, delicious, just lovely all 'round. I've had a French thing ever since - beef burgundy on Saturday, followed by a simple cheese souffle on Monday night. So airy and pretty, souffle, and so easy too. Tres bien.

Moderate it: if I'm serving potatoes, I don't also serve bread, although I did bend that rule a bit and put croutons in the salad I served as a first course.

What's this you see? The sorry banquet (wedding, fundraiser, church dinner, you name it) side-dish we've all had a million times, green beans with carrots? Yep, it is indeed - and it was deeeelicious. The green beans and carrots both arrived in my CSA veggie share today, so I simmered until just tender and tossed with a little butter and minced chives. So fresh, wow, the way they're supposed to taste. How...fun!

No, I didn't serve a baked chicken breast alongside (I can only go so far with the banquet kitsch), but instead made these pretty little tomato souffles. I found the recipe online (recipezaar), adapted from Earl Peyroux's book Gourmet Cooking. Peyroux had a long-running cooking show on PBS (although I've never seen it) and the book looks actually pretty fantastic. Funny the things you discover when you google "tomato souffle" (as you can tell, I'm still reaching, looking for inspiration, more than a bit tired of my usual fish& veggies). The souffles are so simple - hollowed-out garden-ripe tomatoes, filled with a tomato-egg filling (I added a bit of goat cheese as well, but I think any cheese would be nice), baked until puffed and browned. Next time I'll add a bit more cheese and salt. As constructed, less than 200 cals/tomato, nice.

Speaking of veggies, I had a great idea tonight, in the vein of one of my (unfulfilled) fantasies...living close enough to everything I love to bike and walk to-and-from. Restaurants, grocery shopping, oh heck even a farmer's market (it's the France/Italy fantasy, where one markets with a basket, buying fresh bread, bottle of wine, cheeses, and fresh veggies on the way home from work... Photo, also a fantasy, I neither bike in the city without a helmet, nor with a fedora, hahaha...)

Since I can do exactly none of those things from where I live, I decided to bike to pick up my CSA veggie share, just a few blocks away. All went well on the way there (although it was a tad tricky getting on my high-bar bike with jeans on, strreeetch), with my last-week's empty box flattened and tucked under my arm. I uber-ungracefully hopped off my bike, deposited the flattened box, and picked up my new box, chock-full of veggies. It was...really heavy! WAY too heavy, in fact, to handle with one arm on my way home, although I gave it my best shot (getting up on my bike, lifting the box, and quickly realizing there was no-way, no-how to balance it with one arm). So I had to put the box back, bike home, and drive back to pick the thing up. Talk about un-fantasy! If anyone watched the whole event, you're very welcome for the entertainment (my attempted box balancing on my neighbor's driveway must have been...completely dorksville at best).

And hey, I have to mention because it's a deliciously good deal, we enjoyed a glass of - get this - Virgin Vines Chardonnay before dinner. Virgin as in Richard Branson, yep, we learned of it from John's parents (you can buy it easily in NYC). As far as we know, it's not available locally, but it sells online for less than $13.00/bottle. And it's tasty, I'm rarely a fan of domestic Chardonnays (I just do not dig the oaky Chardonnay thing) but this is completely simple and clean and crisp, very food friendly.

And Happy Birthday Dad!!!

Moderate it: souffles are really so easy, and pretty, and not heavy at all. And oh, they're delicious to boot! With an average of one egg and a couple of tablespoons of grated cheeseper person, they seem so much more decadent than they really are. Enjoy!