Recipes
Grilled Polenta and Vegetables Provencal
Summer = grill = good times. Especially when it comes to fresh vegetables. Throwing your vegetables onto a hot grill gives them that "je ne sais quoi" you can't get any other way. And when you add a touch of our Provencal Seasoned Salt, well, it's enough to make the most reluctant veggie eater sit up and take notice. The bright, lively flavors of this seasoning salt can turn the most mundane zucchini and eggplant into a French-inspired masterpiece. Now, those nice crispy veggies need somewhere to bed down, so why not throw a firm piece of creamy, luscious polenta, also spiked with Provencal Seasoned Salt, onto the grill with them? The Provencal Seasoned Salt, featuring a blend of fennel, garlic, chervil, tarragon and other spices carries beautifully throughout the dish. There you have it, a perfectly matched set. This easy method for cooking polenta comes to us from the folks at America's Test Kitchen. Adding a pinch of baking soda to the boiling water serves to soften the outside of the polenta grains, allowing them to quickly break down and release their starch, eliminating the need to stand over a hot stove, stirring constantly for 25 minutes. What's not to like about that?
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Melange Classique
This fanciful French blend combines nutmeg and pepper with a healthy harvest from the herb garden, to satisfy all your taste buds. Melange Classique is an all purpose seasoning for stews and roasts, pate, stuffing and bean dishes. Melange Classique will work well as a rub on any meat, particularly lamb, duck and pork.
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Herbes de la Garrigue
Herbes de la Garrigue is similar to the more famous herb blend from Provence but with the hearty additions of rosemary, fennel, mint and Turkish bay leaf. Try it on grilled meats, to flavor home baked breads, in a pot of soup, or anywhere you'd like some of the rustic flavors from southwestern France.
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English Beef Rub
English Beef Rub offers up a bold combination of cinnamon and juniper along with salt and pepper for incredible flavor! Influenced by medieval beef rubs, the intense flavors stand up to and takes the edge off of gamey flavors in meat. Perfect for elk and venison, as well as beef.One technique for tenderizing tough cuts of meat is to season them liberally and then apply weight, like a cast iron skillet, and allow the meat to sit for 24 hours before cooking. The results are tender and delicious!
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Provençal Vinaigrette
Romantic visions of the south of France never disappoint and neither does this playful provencal vinaigrette. Our Provencal Seasoned Salt is the star, throwing in a burst of salt and herbs that makes the other ingredients dance. I had the pleasure of growing fresh chervil in my garden this year and it was a sweet addition but don't skip the recipe if you can't find it. Marjoram is delightful as well. Enjoy this vinaigrette on your favorite summer salads - green, potato or bean!
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Heavenly Béchamel and More Fun with Mace Blades
Of the five classic French "mother sauces," béchamel gives us some of the most rich "small sauces". Although béchamel may be the most simple to prepare, that doesn't mean it can't also show off some pretty complex flavors. Taking the time to create layers of flavor in the building blocks of a recipe ensures that the sauces and dishes created from those blocks will build palaces of flavor. As the recipe below demonstrates, there are not many ingredients in the basic béchamel sauce; just milk, roux, and the onion cloute. An onion cloute is an onion studded with cloves and a bay leaf, and although I've seen some recipes call the cloute optional, it is not. The onion cloute is essential, as it is the only flavor added to the milk besides butter. An Italian chef I once worked for insisted that a béchamel was never complete without a bit of nutmeg, an ingredient that was conspicuously absent from béchamel recipes in my traditional French culinary education. Once I tasted his version, I never again made my béchamel without a dusting of freshly ground nutmeg to finish it. Never, that is, until a few weeks ago when we were lucky enough to get the first shipment of mace blades we've been able to secure in years. I had always used a mixture of mace powder as well as a little extra freshly grated nutmeg when making creamed spinach from a béchamel base, but I had been reluctant to to try including mace powder in every batch of my béchamel for fear of the flavor being overpowering. This is a perfect application for mace blades! By adding a nice mace blade or two to my onion cloute, I could get the subtle mace flavor I was looking for without overshadowing other flavors. Béchamel itself is used in many recipes for lasagna, croque madames, or soups, but there are quite a few other sauces that can be derived from a basic béchamel, often by adding just a few ingredients. The French call these "small sauces" and some of my favorites are: Cheddar cheese - add some shredded cheddar cheese, Mustard Powder, and Worcestershire sauce or Worcestershire powder. Mustard sauce - add some prepared mustard. Crème Sauce - just whisk in some heavy cream (I also like to add a heavy pinch of Piment d'Espelette.)
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Quatre Epices Cake
This recipe from our friends at Sunset Magazine promises a citrus and sweet taste, followed by a glow or a kick — depending on whether the signature French four-spice blend is made with white or black pepper. Well, our Quatre Epices delivers the best of both, with prized white and black peppercorns!
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