True, reliable vs. sexy, fanciful have been competing in my kitchen recently. The score to date is: “the guy who always knows what he’s doing” 2, “the tease” 1.
Jacques Pepin 2; Yotam Ottolenghi, the British cookbook author and owner of "Ottolenghi," the "Haute Couture To Go” food shops, 1.
From Jaques Pepin’s Fast Food My Way I made corn and hominy soup: spicy, sharp as barbed wire - in a good way - with southwest flavors, sweet with barely poached fresh corn, and surprising with the round, creamy textures of hominy, this was a winner. Score one for Jacques.
I also made Pepin’s tomato tartar, pictured above, nothing but uber-seasonal chopped fresh tomatoes stirred together with diced bread, good olive oil, salt and pepper. Pressed into a tin (an old tuna can with both ends cut out works well; I used an oval cookie cutter.), and the tin lifted off, the whole stands alone looking impressively chic. The “tartar” round stands in a pool of nothing but pure, strained tomato juice from the chopped tomato, mixed again with a little olive oil, salt and pepper. This dish looks like you worked very hard, but is little more than a great homage to the local star of September, the sweet, sun-urged flavors of real tomatoes. Pepin, 2
A browse through both books feels a little bit like, here’s the Sears catalog and here’s Vogue. Pepin’s photos are pretty, but tidy. Ottolenghi’s photographs send you running for post-it notes; soon the book is fluttering with yellow tabs marking twenty different recipes for dream dinner parties. You’re checking the calendar for dates and imagining guest lists just so you can make the tomato, semolina and cilantro soup, the crusted pumpkin wedges with sour cream.
I couldn’t stop myself, and made the goat cheese souffles with vanilla poached peaches. They were the stuff of food dreams: warm fluffy goat cheese topped with cool, vanilla-y peaches. My only problem was that I couldn’t figure out quite where and how Ottolenghi intended to place the peaches. He simply said “serve each souffle with a few slices of peach,” but sitting on top was a little precarious, not easy to do without peaches tumbling off. They were a little awkward, with no help from Mr. Ottolenghi.
I also made from Plenty on often photographed “Surpise Tatin,” a caramelized potato, cherry tomato, onion and goat cheese tart. The photo in the book is gorgeous, very easy to instantly love. My version looked remarkably similar - it’s always satisfying when yours looks like the one in the photo, but when I tasted it, I decided the caramelized potato part was just weird. The cherry tomatoes lost their freshness in the caramel and baking party; the goat cheese seemed to be the only flavor left standing beside a whiff of burned sugar.
My grandmother called certain people “French Pastry People” - they look great on the outside, but once you get to know them they’re kind of blech. I could update her expression and call them “Caramelized Potato Tatin” people.
Score: Pepin 2, Ottolenghi 1.
Jacques Pepin’s Tomato Tartare with tomato water sauce
serves 4
Ingredients
Tomato Tartar
1 large tomato - about 12 ounces
2 tablespoons finely chopped sweet onion, such as Vidalia
1/2 cup diced (1/2 inch) day-old bread
3 tablespoons good olive oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Tomato Water Sauce
tomato juice or V-8 if needed
5 tablespoons good olive oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh tarragon or chives
2 chive flowers for garnish (optional. I used snipped basil leaves.)
Instructions
- Cut the tomato in half crosswise, and squeeze the halves into a strainer set over a bowl to release the seeds and juice. Press with a spoon to extract as much juice from the seeds as possible; set aside. Cut the tomato flesh into 3/4-inch pieces. (You will have about 1-1/2 cups.) Put the tomato pieces in a bowl and add the seeds in the sieve. Add the remaining ingredients to the bowl and stir to mix.
- Measure the tomato liquid; if necessary, add enough of the tomato juice, Bloody Mary mix or V-8 juice to bring the liquid to 5 tablespoons. Combine the tomato liquid and the remaining ingredients in a bowl, whisking to emulsify the sauce.
- At serving time, divide the sauce among 4 plates. Place a 1/2 cup ring mold (or a tuna fish can with both ends removed) in the center of one plate and spoon one quarter of the tomato tartare into the mold. Carefully remove the mold. Repeat this procedure on each of the 3 remaining plates. Sprinkle with the chopped tarragon or chives, decorate with the chive flowers, if desired, and serve.
Goat Cheese Souffles with Vanilla Poached Peaches from Plenty
serves 6-10
Ingredients
2/3 cup each water and white wine 3/4 cup sugar ½ tsp black peppercorns ½ vanilla pod, split and seeds scraped 3 medium peaches, peeled 1/2 cup ground hazelnuts 1 cup plus 2 tablespoons milk 1 bay leaf ½ onion, studded with a few cloves 5 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature, plus more for brushing 1/3 cup all purpose flour 6 ounces goat's cheese, broken up 5 eggs, separated, plus one extra white ½ tsp salt
Put the water, wine, sugar, peppercorns and vanilla in a pan and bring to a simmer. Add the peaches, cover and simmer for 15 minutes - they should be soft, but not so much so that they start to disintegrate. Set aside to cool.
Preheat the oven to 190C/375F/ gas mark 5. Pour enough cold water into a large roasting tray to come 2cm up the sides, and put in the oven. Brush butter over the insides of six 8cm-diameter ramekins. Sprinkle some hazelnuts into each, turn to coat, tip out any excess and chill.
Put the milk, bay leaf and onion in a pan, bring to a boil and immediately set aside. In another pan, melt the butter on medium heat. Add the flour, cook for two minutes, stirring with a wooden spoon, then remove the bay leaf and onion, and pour the milk into the butter paste, still stirring. Cook and stir for three minutes, until it thickens and leaves the sides of the pan. Off the heat, stir in the cheese - it should melt in quickly - followed by the egg yolks and salt. Transfer to a bowl.
Whisk the egg whites to soft peaks, then fold into the cheese bowl. Divide among the ramekins, filling them almost to the brim. Put in the water-filled tray and bake for 10-12 minutes, until golden brown and well risen.
You can serve the soufflés directly from the oven, still inside their ramekins. Alternatively, turn off the oven and leave the soufflés inside for 10 minutes. Remove the tray, leave the soufflés to cool down a little, then run a palette knife along the sides of each ramekin and carefully take out the soufflés. Place on a paper-lined oven tray. When ready to serve, return to the oven, preheated to 160C/325F/gas mark 3, and reheat for eight minutes.
Serve with a few pieces of peach and a tablespoon of their juices.