Tartare de saumon

Easter brunch 2013 continues, with salmon tartare. This is a sort of French ceviche, where lemon juice "cooks" raw fish. It's really really good. It made a nice little starter for us, before the quiche.

This is another lightning dish if the fishmonger (butcher here in Iowa) dices or minces the fish, as the friendly folks at Fareway did for me. Don't dare use a food processor, as it mangles the fishie's tissues.

I suppose verrines are really supposed to have layers. That's easy to do, such as Thomas Keller's with a layer of red onion crème fraiche, or one I did yesterday with capers. A red layer of marinated roasted pepper, drained from the jar and chopped would be nice too.

These "verrine" glasses are actually votive candle holders from Walmart, 88¢ each.

Serves 4

8 ounces of salmon filet (belly if possible) cut into 1/8 in dice or minced
10 chive spears or 2 green onion tops
2 teaspoons of Dijon mustard, preferably Maille
1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
3 tablespoons lemon juice (about 1 medium lemon)
salt and pepper

1. Chop the chives or green onion tops very finely
2. In a bowl, beat the chives, mustard, olive oil, and lemon juice into an emulsion.
3. Toss the salmon into the dressing and season.
4. Cover and refrigerate for 30 minutes. 
5. Serve in small "verrine" glasses, garnished with chives or green onion tops.

Melon and champagne soup

The bubbly is Segura Viedas Brut Reserva 2011 cava

We had a champagne brunch for Easter, just the three of us. Salmon tartare, Maddie's quiche. And to start this melon soup. It's lightning fast. I bought some melon cubes (Chilean) at the store, popped them in the blender with the juices and bubbly, and -- ZAP! -- summrery froth.

I found some little airplane bottles of bubbly, so it's possible to make an ordinary day special by making this speedy soup. This is a another dentist waiting room special, adapted from Shape magazine. But it's really elegant, and it sort of tickles the nose. Or maybe that's my imagination.

Serves 4

2 cups cantaloupe chunks
1/4 cup orange juice
1 tablespoon juice
1/4 cup champagne
fresh mint

1. In a blender, puree all the ingredients except the mint until frothy. 
2. Garnish with chopped mint

Spinach, pear, roquefort & walnut salad

I had this sweet salad first in a little restaurant in Edmond, Oklahoma, my home town. It was in the space where I had my first job, a clerk in a doughnut shop. We clerks got all the doughnuts and ice cream we could eat. Great perks. I lost the job when my hair got too long and I refused to cut it. Ah the Sixties! The restaurant is now kind of shishi. Like Edmond now. Now I eat sweet salads instead of doughnuts. Ah, my sixties!

If you have the walnuts and bacon ready, this is five minutes to put together. If you don't--and have an oven on for something else--you can cook the bacon and the walnuts while other things are going.

Sugared walnuts are kind of a pain to make, and messy gooey to clean up. So an easy (and easy clean-up) method is to simply put eight ounces of walnuts (whole or pieces) on a Silpat in a baking pan, spray with cooking spray, and toss with two tablespoons of sugar. Bake in a 370 to 450 degree oven (depending on what else you are cooking) for five to ten minutes, shaking once or twice. Check them after 5 minutes. They will be crisp and only slightly sugary. Slide the Silpat out of the baking pan and cool. You can add salt or a bit of cayenne pepper or Cajun seasoning.

5 minutes
Serves 4

• 3 tablespoons vinaigrette
• 1 tablespoon honey
• 8 ounces spinach leaves, from a bag--or if not, washed! (romaine works too)
• 4 strips oven-cooked bacon, crumbled or minced (place bacon on a sheet in a preheated 400 oven for 15-30 minutes)
• 1 cup crumbled Roquefort or other good blue cheese, such as Maytag
• 1 pear, cored and cut into eight sections. (An apple corer will help here.)
• 1 cup toasted or sugared walnuts (or pecans or almonds)

1. Combine the vinaigrette and honey and microwave until warm. Start with 10 seconds on high. OR if the honey is too cold to pour, microwave the honey jar until it is warm (start with 15 seconds) and pour the warm honey into the vinaigrette, stirring with a fork to combine.
2. Chop the pears sections, crumble or mince the bacon, and toss with the dressing.
3. Add the spinach, the Roquefort, and the walnuts and toss again. 

Salade de tomate ou/et concombre / tomato/cucumber salad

The best things are the simplest. I write this in early March, when there is a lot of snow on the ground. And it is barely above freezing days. And I hate Iowa. Next pic, please.

And I do dream of summer tomatoes. Heirlooms, sure. But also just Burpee garden variety tomatoes. With some basil. No vinaigrette. Maybe some salt and pepper. Maybe not.

And then maybe some cucumbers. On the deck. (next pic please). Overlooking the miserable tomato vines that I try to grow almost every year, from the glorious smelly young plants the farmers at the market sell before there's anything else to sell, except maybe rhubarb or greens.

And then, about the fourth of July, I realize, again, that I am no farmer, nor even a vegetable gardener. I am just a tomato eater. And a pretty good one.

I am, however, an excellent tomato slicer. And that is really all it takes. Some say it doesn't even take that. Some eat tomatoes like apples, whole, just biting into them, and letting the juice go where it goes.

Not me. I am civilized. See the pics?

Timbales de foies de volaille -- Chicken liver custards

This is very much a Ladies Who Lunch kind of thing. 1950s hats and white gloves. I love it. Definitely a Madmen thing. But then MAFC is really an early 60s thing: published in 1961 (vol. 1 p. 174).

It reminds me of when we went to this time warp French restaurant in midtown Manhattan called Le Périgord a couple of years ago, with my daughter-in-law. Founded in 1964, it looked like it had the original carpet and the original waiters. I loved the dessert cart, with classics never seen today, like floating island. The fixed price lunch menu had a dish very much like this one.

Just rich enough to whet the appetite yet light; easy to make; stays warm well; inexpensive ingredients; elegant presentation. And less than 10 minutes into the oven. It also has a million variations, with (and I quote from Julia, p. 174) "ham, turkey, chicken, sweetbreads, salmon, lobster, crab, scallops, mushrooms, asparagus tips, or spinach."

Serves 4 as a first course

Preheat oven to 350º

1 tablespoon butter
1 tablespoon flour
1/2 cup boiling milk
1 cup chicken livers, pressed down (about 8 ounces)
2 eggs
3 tablespoons heavy cream or crème fraiche
1 tablespoon port, Madeira, cognac, sherry, etc.
cooking spray

1. Heat water in a kettle
2. In a small saucepan, make a béchamel sauce by melting together the butter and the flour, stirring until they foam, without coloring, about 2 minutes. Off heat, beat in the milk and seasoning. 
3. In a food processor or blender on high, puree the livers, eggs, and seasoning for 30 seconds.
4. Add the béchamel sauce, the cream, and the wine and blend for 15 seconds.
5. Spray four 1/2 cup ramekins and place them in a skillet or baking pan. Divide the mixture into them and pour boiling water around them, so it comes at least half way up the sides of the ramekins.
6. Place in the oven for 25 minutes or until a needle or knife comes out clean and the timbales have just begun to shrink from the ramekins. 
7. Run a knife around the edge of each ramekin to loosen the timbale. Invert a serving plate over each and invert to unmold. 
8. Garnish with one of the sauces below. 

• Coulis de tomate: The sauce in the pic is a simplified coulis consisting of summer tomatoes cored, seeded (not peeled) then food processed and frozen. 
• Sauce Aurore: Double the amount of béchamel (step 2) and reserve half of it. Add 1 tablespoon tomato puree or tomato paste, and optional chopped fresh herbs. (MAFC I p. 62)
• Sauce Madère ou Porto: Add 1 tablespoon Madeira or port to 1/2 cup demi glace, brown sauce, or leftover sauce from braised meats (MAFC I p. 75)
• Sauce Estragon: Stir one tablespoon chopped tarragon into 1/2 cup bdemi glace, brown sauce, or leftover sauce from braised meats (MAFC I p. 75). Off heat and just before serving, beat in 1/2 tablespoon butter.

Stephen Yang for The Wall Street Journal