home decor and garden are very famous in the world

It is a shame that blogger doesn't have a 'smell' button I could attach to this post!

I am making quince jelly, and the whole house is perfumed with their delicate flower-like flavour.

Large, rock hard, chunky sort of fruit, tasteless raw, yet when it is cooked it shares

 all sorts of secrets, and its jelly turns a beautiful deep pink colour.

It takes ages to make, but still has to be one of my favourite jellies to spread on bread, 

or use in  tarts with other fruit.

Here is the recipe, but believe me , this jelly is quite hard work!!

For about 3 lbs or 1.5kg of quinces.

Wash the qunices well and cut away any pieces that are damaged or discoloured.
Cut the rest of the fruit into cubes, don't worry about  peeling or taking out the core.

Thrown into a big preserving pan with 1/2 litre (1 pint) of water.

Cook for 60-90 minutes until well tender.

Find a way to let the fruit drain overnight.
 I have a rather 'heath-robinson' affair with a stool turned upside down,
and a muslin strung over a big mixing bowl to catch the juice.

The next day measure out how much liqud has come from the fruit pulp.
Resist the temptation to squeeze the muslin too hard, if you want a very clear jelly.

For each half litre (1 pint) of juice, you can add 350 grammes (12 ounces) of sugar.
Heat gently and simmer for about 15 minutes.  Quinces contain a lot of pectin,
so there isn't usually a trouble with this jelly setting.
The best way to test for setting is on a plate kept cold in the fridge.

When setting point is reached, pour into jars and ... admire!





And if you love the flavour and hate to see the fruit pulp wasted, you could always make quince

jelly squares, quite yummy with cheese!

After extracting the juice for your jelly, push the remaining soft fruit through a sieve, and mix equal weight of sugar to the sieved fruit paste.  Cook until thick enough to 'write' in with a wooden spoon and turn out onto a greaseproof paper lined baking tray.

Let it rest for 24 hours then cut into squares,
YUM!

Wishing you all a happy autumnal weekend.

 It is tipping down with rain as I write and I find myself longing for a romantic rainy day in Paris.

 Paris in the rain makes me feel comforted and lazy and warm ...

above all, paris in the rain makes me long to drink hot chocolate .....

To make a very special, very French hot chocolate, you have to forget about

 hot chocolate in powder form.  You need the REAL THING! 

 Here is how I make it for those special afternoons.  Warm a pint of milk slowly in a pan, then break about 100 grammes (half a large bar) of good quality dark chocolate into the warm milk and stir carefully until all the chocolate is melted.  Now add some thick cream and keep stirring, then sugar to taste.  Here you can take a whisk and give some froth and softness to your warm perfection.

Pour into individual cups or bowls, add a little chantilly, or whipped cream to the top if you wish , and sprinkle with cocoa powder and some finely grated chocolate.

Some people favour a little cinnamon in the warm chocolate mix, I personally prefer it simple.

How we love the autumn!

In normandy we are now in the season for the smallish purple blue plums called Quetsches.  They are nice eaten off the tree, but to my mind they are best in a tart.  Some like the tart with a cream base on the pastry, I prefer the simplest way, just pastry, sugar and the fruit.

Individually for dinner parties, large and round for family meals, or long and chic for special moments, this recipe is quick and easy and sure to please.

To make the perfect tarte aux quetsches, simply roll out your favourite pastry and fit to whichever mould you choose to use.   Cover with baking or waxed paper, and weigh the paper down with baking beans, then pop in to the oven to bake blind, or pre-bake for about 15 minutes.  Remove the paper and bake for a further 5 minutes until the base is very slightly golden.

While the pastry is cooking, cut the plums in half and remove the stones.  You need enough plums to cover the pastry in a generous layer of fruit.

Remove the pastry base form the oven and sprinkle with sugar.  Some people add a little ground almond at this stage.   Lay the plums carefully overlapping the fruit pieces.  Sprinkle with more sugar.

Bake in a hot oven, around 190° until the pastry is well cooked and the fruit is well tender, and looks slightly shrivelled.

 A Quetsche plum tart is a favourite dessert here, served just warm with a pouring of creme anglaise.  Yummy!

Many of you will be familiar with the traditional French upside down apple tart called Tarte Tatin, but you may not know that the same principal can be used to make a delicious savoury tart as a first course, or to accompany a meat dish.  Le Tatin aux Echalotes  - a shallot tatin!

When cooked slowly in a pan, the shallots develop a deep sweet caramelised flavour that is quite delicious.   The tarts can either be made individually and served as a first course as above, or made as a large tart and slices served to accompany a meat such as a roast lamb.

This recipe works just as well with onions, I have a preference for the long red shallots, mostly  because they are so pretty!

To make the tart you need a pastry base, (either short or flaky, depending which you like best);  enough shallots or onions to cover the base of a heavy pan; olive oil and seasoning.

Peel and cut in half the shallots or onions.  Cook gently in a pan with plenty of olive oil, salt,  pepper and  a little sugar to help them caramelise.

When they are turned a deep rich brown and smelling totally delicious, place the onions into a deep tart mould, or several small moulds and cover with your pastry.  Pop the tarts into the oven at 190° and cook until the pastry is golden brown.  Remove from the oven, and turn them upside down onto your serving plates.  You serve the tart pastry side down, the tops can be decorated with some fresh herbs if you wish.

Another very simple recipe that looks chic and oh so French!  Bon appetit!

And now to the winner of the beautiful oil painting, generously donated to the giveaway by Carolina Elisabeth,   who painted this lovely rose picture especially for readers of my French Country Home.

The lucky name to have emerged from the random draw is Sarah, who writes the blog Hyacinths for the Soul   congratulations Sarah!  If you would like to contact me with your address I shall pass it on to Carolina.  And for everybody who longed to win the giveaway, don't forget it is always possible to order one of Carolina's beautiful paintings from her site.

        

Our short break in the South was spontaneous, hilarious and exactly what I needed after a long summer and before a busy fall.

Less than  a week before we left, I was still searching for somewhere to stay for ... me .... my dear husband ..... our four children ..... their friends .... and two dogs!!  YUP!

This holiday was meant to be.... as a few days before our leaving date, a huge house materialised, complete with a ton of bedrooms, a pool, space for the dogs to run around, easy access to a sleepy little village and bikes for everyone.  For a week we forgot about internet (well almost) forgot about the news, practically forgot about the car, and wandered from pool to table to river to pool to table in a happy haze.

If you are feeling weary, I can recommend no better remedy than heading off with a bunch of youngsters aged between 15 and 21. 







To make a peach tart for a bunch of hungry teenagers, first make a delicious sweet pastry, I'm sure you have your favourite recipe, I like mine rich in butter, sugar and maybe some ground almonds.

If you are feeling like a saint, you'll blind-bake your pastry base.  This is a good investment of time, because the peach gets so juicy, if the pastry isn't pre-cooked, it will just go soggy.





While the pastry is in the oven, pour yourself a glass of wine, press PLAY on anything by Bob Marley and wash and slice your peaches.  I don't even skin them, because the fruit looks prettier with the skin still on (even if you go for this year's fashionable char-grilled look !!)

Take the pastry out of the oven , choose another CD,  sprinkle a little sugar over the base, quickly arrange the slices of peach, sprinkle more sugar and pop the whole lot into the oven.

Keep an eye on the tart  because there is a danger of it - ahem - caramelising.  I'd say about half a CD and two glasses of wine and the tart will be done!

Voilà  - I hope you also have some happy carefree moments to remember from the summer.  Thank you for reading me!

To make enough sorbet for 6 people, I first freeze about 6 cups of fresh blackberries.

Then I make a light syrup using 1/2 cup of sugar and 1/2 cup of water.    I drop a couple of handfuls of fresh mint into the pan containing the sugar and water, and bring everything to a boil.  As soon as it boils, I turn off the heat and let the syrup cool down.  This step could easily be done the day before.

I am also informed that lavender works very well in the place of mint.

When ready I strain out the mint leaves and pour the delicious smelling syrup into a shallow tray, and pop it in to the freezer.

The next step depends on whether you have an ice cream maker, and also how smooth a texture you wish the sorbet to be.

I therefore pop the frozen berries and almost frozen syrup into a blender and whizz away for a few minutes.  When I think it is blended enough, I pour the mix into a deep tray and return to the deep freeze.  Every 30 minutes I remove the tray and stir it well with a large spoon.  After four stirs I declare my sorbet 'done' and leave it in peace in the deep freeze until we are ready to scoop out tasteful little balls of sorbet into tiny bowls.  Add a couple of fresh berries for decoration, and a snippet from a passing mint leaf and I am in business.

I'm telling you: this is a breeze, and  -  providing nobody spills sorbet down their new white linen trousers (let's not go there !)  -  it is a dessert that is generally acclaimed by all and sundry.

One day, when I grow up, I shall attempt this rather wonderful looking swirly combination of blackberry sorbet and vanilla ice cream, and that really would impress!

oil for frying

200 gram or 1 1/2 cups of flour

3 eggs

20 g or 2 tablespoons of dried bakers yeast

glass of warm water 

salt and pepper

Dissolve the dried bakers yeast in the glass of warm water.  Put the flour into a large mixing bowl, add salt and pepper and drop the eggs in to the centre.  Using a whisk, start to mix the eggs into the flour, then add the dissolved yeast and beat well until totally combined.

Leave the batter to rest for an hour.

Check the flowers to make sure they are clean and remove the central pistil, and cut the stalk off fairly short.

The battered courgettes are best eaten hot, so don't start cooking until shortly before your meal.

Heat the oil in a deep pan.  Gently dip each flower onto the surface of the  batter, rolling it a little, so that the flower is well covered.  Lift and place carefully into the bubbling oil.   Repeat for all the flowers, turning them over so they are golden brown on all sides.

Before serving, lay the flowers on absorbent paper for a few minutes to take away any excess oil.  Once on the serving dish, sprinkle with a little salt.

If you find yourself with more batter than required for the flowers, simply slice a couple of zucchini, coat them in the batter and deep fry them too.  

I even use my last drops of batter to deep fry sage leaves, fantastic nibbles with a glass of wine!

bon appetit!

I beat the whipping cream until it would hold in soft peaks.  My meringues came from our local baker, who sells his home baked meringues in small packets, and they are so pretty and regular in their size and shape that I don't see the point in making them myself.  For this dessert, some meringues are left whole to decorate and the rest are cut or broken into pieces.

So when it came to bringing my dessert to our friends I decided to have some fun, they all looked so pretty in a row.  I laid them out on an old French teacloth, with a red monogram in the centre, to match the  strawberries.   The overflow of strawberries were piled into a small tureen from my collection, and I took them over with some roses cut from the garden just before we went.

What can I say?   I have such fun putting together a few pretties, especially when I can gift them to a friend.

I wish you all a wonderful weekend, whether you are at the height of a hot summer or heading into fall, may you find something lovely to share with a friend!

These little cakes are a speciality of South West France, Bordeaux in particular, and for many people they represent a summer pleasure, enjoyed while on holiday.

They have a slightly thick and caramelised crust but inside they are moist

Ingredients to make about 12 cannelés

- 1/2 litre (2 cups) milk
- 25 g butter (2 oz)
- 2 egg yolks
- 1 whole egg
- 250 g (1+1/4 cups) sugar
- 125 g flour (1 cup)
- 1teaspoon vanilla essence, or the grains of a whole vanilla pod in the milk
- 60 ml (1/4 cup) rum

Boil the milk (with the vanilla grains if you are using a pod) add the butter and leave to cool.

In a large bowl beat the egg yolks, the whole egg and the sugar.    Add the flour, mix well then little by little add the milk.  Add the rum, and the vanilla essence if using it.  The mixture should have the consistency of pancake batter.  Leave overnight in a bowl in the fridge.

Fill the moulds to 3/4 level.   Cook for 15 minutes at 450°F (250°C), then drop to 355°F (180°C) and cook for an hour.

Instead of making this size cannelés, you can also make mini versions which only need about 40 minutes to cook.