{"id":1094,"date":"2021-05-31T20:03:19","date_gmt":"2021-06-01T03:03:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/fnerk.com\/?p=1094"},"modified":"2025-06-25T10:47:29","modified_gmt":"2025-06-25T17:47:29","slug":"international-meals-france-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/fnerk.com\/?p=1094","title":{"rendered":"International Meals – France, Part 2"},"content":{"rendered":"

We decided that France simply couldn’t be just one meal, so we planned one more.\u00a0 This one was substantially less complex than the first one, but still consisted of dishes that (we hoped) were quintessentially French.<\/p>\n

For our entr\u00e9e, we decided to go with\u00a0Magret de Canard,\u00a0<\/em>or “Duck Breast.”\u00a0 As we’ve mentioned in the past, we are far from the first people to have the “cook the world in alphabetical order,” idea.\u00a0 There’s a number of blogs dedicated to similar projects, probably the most famous of which is “United Noshes.”<\/a> We consult the various blogs for ideas, but try hard not to simply copy any one of them.<\/p>\n

That said, when that blog describes a dish as “I’m not sure I’ve ever made anything this delicious before”, we decided it was definitely worth a try.<\/p>\n

So we headed back to our favorite butcher where we got the demi-glace and the ostrich, and bought ourselves a duck breast.\u00a0 The recipe calls for first scoring the fat in a crosshatch pattern:<\/p>\n

\"Duck<\/a><\/p>\n

Next a marinade in honey, orange juice, and thyme.\u00a0 A quick trip outside to the planter box for some fresh thyme, and the duck was ready for its overnight soak.<\/p>\n

\"Duck<\/a><\/p>\n

The next day, the duck was dried off, and then tossed into a skillet to render off much of the fat. One duck breast produces a LOT of fat.\u00a0 This picture is still early in the process – there was plenty more coming.<\/p>\n

\"Cooking<\/a><\/p>\n

Which is fine – duck fat is amazing, and we used it to make potatoes later in the week.<\/p>\n

What is SUPPOSED to happen at this point is that you flip the duck breast over, and the other side is a lovely golden color.\u00a0 What ACUTALLY happened is that the other side was pitch black.\u00a0 Oops.\u00a0 The good news is, we’re moving soon, and our new place has a gas range, which should allow for better heat control.<\/p>\n

Either way, once flipped, the duck gets seared briefly on the meat side, then tossed into a hot oven to finish.\u00a0 Once again, a thermometer is your friend.<\/p>\n

\"Wireless<\/a><\/p>\n

This is a Bluetooth grill thermometer we picked up last year, and let me tell you, it’s amazing.\u00a0 Especially when your oven sucks and takes three times as long to get things to the proper temperature as the recipe says it will.\u00a0 Did I mention we’re moving?<\/p>\n

At any rate, once the duck came back out and was sliced, it was absolutely\u00a0gorgeous<\/em> inside, and the slightly (ok, very) singed crust didn’t hurt the flavor at all.<\/p>\n

\"Sliced<\/a><\/p>\n

For a side dish, we went with a very simple m<\/em>ushrooms proven\u00e7al.\u00a0<\/em>What makes something unambiguously proven\u00e7al?\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>Well, obviously,\u00a0Herbes de Provence.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"Herbes<\/a><\/p>\n

I’ve made various versions of this blend in the past, but they had it at the duck store, so we decided to just get it pre-made.\u00a0 The actual recipe couldn’t be simpler – saut\u00e9 mushrooms in butter and herbs until done.<\/p>\n

\"Sauteeing<\/a><\/p>\n

And here was the meal, including a cheese plate that probably looks\u00a0awfully<\/em> familiar if you read last week’s entry. We also bought a nice French Pinot Noir, since that’s the wine everyone says you should drink with duck.<\/p>\n

\"Second<\/a><\/p>\n

And it was pretty darn good.\u00a0 Not life-changing like last week’s meal, but better than a lot of things we make.\u00a0 The duck, in particular, while it didn’t pick up as much of the flavor of the marinade as one might hope, was a lovely texture.\u00a0 The herbs did a nice job of accenting the mushrooms.<\/p>\n

We did also make a classic French dessert,\u00a0tart au citron.\u00a0<\/em>The crust for this is a\u00a0pate sucr\u00e9e,\u00a0<\/em>or “sugar crust.”\u00a0 It’s got a LOT of butter, so it gets rested for a while in the fridge before you roll it out, and then rested for ANOTHER half an hour afterwards, because you don’t want the butter melting out too soon.\u00a0 It needs to be COLD when it goes in the oven.<\/p>\n

We didn’t take any pictures of mixing the dough, because it’s not very exciting, but here’s the crust all rolled out and ready to bake:<\/p>\n

\"Unbaked<\/a><\/p>\n

And here it is filled with random desi chickpeas, because we don’t have any pie weights.\u00a0 Sorry, chickpeas, but you were rendered inedible for a good cause!<\/p>\n

\"Pie<\/a><\/p>\n

The chickpeas are part of a process called “blind baking”, where you weigh down the crust and bake it first in order to stop it puffing up too much.\u00a0 You also want to bake it before you put the filling in so it doesn’t get soggy.<\/p>\n

About that filling.<\/p>\n

The filling for this tart is technically a custard, so it used eggs.\u00a0 LOTS of eggs.\u00a0 Four whole eggs, AND four more yolks to boot.\u00a0 Plus butter, a metric ton of lemon juice, and the zest from two whole lemons. (It’s French, it HAS to be metric.)<\/p>\n

\"Lemon<\/a><\/p>\n

This gets cooked until it’s thick, and then poured into the tart crust for a final bake.\u00a0 And here’s the final product.<\/p>\n

\"Lemon<\/a><\/p>\n

It was SUPER tart and delicious.\u00a0 If you’re looking for a dessert to impress people once it’s safe to once again impress people in your region, this is an\u00a0excellent<\/em> choice.\u00a0 Also, it looks like Pac Man once you’ve cut a few slices out, so there’s that.<\/p>\n

And that’s it for France!\u00a0 We could obviously cook for months and never finish exploring the whole country, but we do need to move on.\u00a0 The pace may slow a bit here as we get ready to move, but we HAVE finished the Fs, so next up, Gabon!<\/p>\n

Recipes:
\nMagret de Canard<\/a>
\nMushrooms Proven\u00e7al<\/a>
\nTart au Citron<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

We decided that France simply couldn’t be just one meal, so we planned one more.\u00a0 This one was substantially less complex than the first one, but still consisted of dishes that (we hoped) were quintessentially French. For our entr\u00e9e, we … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1102,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1094","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-france","category-international-meals"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/fnerk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1094","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/fnerk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/fnerk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fnerk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fnerk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1094"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/fnerk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1094\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1107,"href":"https:\/\/fnerk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1094\/revisions\/1107"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fnerk.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1102"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/fnerk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1094"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fnerk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1094"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/fnerk.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1094"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}