Bourdeille's Festival Committee

Scenes from Bourdeille's festival committee:

Even though the location has been the same for fifty years, committee members discuss where to put the barbecue.

Among the many things to set up, never set up the bar tent first.

To keep peace, decide upon only one dessert concession.

Fruit Fruit Fruit

Every evening we walk Jolie up one side of the river valley or the other. This time of year the walks take a bit longer than usual as we nibble our way along the route. All those beautiful trees that we saw blooming in the damp, mild spring are now laden with fruit. The walks we take lead past old gnarly fruit trees planted years ago to provide winter apple sauces, pears for jams and liqueur, and plums for tarts. Oh, and plums to make eau de vie, which is a fancy French name for what we would call moonshine. Apple tree branches are bent to the ground, pears are hanging like golden decorations, plums carpet the ground. 

We feel comfortable sampling the many varieties and making comparisons of texture and taste. We make notes of which ones we’ll snack from on future walks. The best is when we find a plum called a Mirabelle. We are sure that these plums were the ultimate reference for the nectar of the gods. They have be eaten hot off the tree, literally heated by the sun, and taste of honey, apricots, brandy, life, love, happiness, and indescribable deliciousness. 

The weekly markets are also overflowing with the summer’s abundance.The vendors have boxes stacked up next to their already laden tables. Here there are peaches, nectarines and apricots brought in from the countryside just south of us. There must be a lot of homemade preserves being made to spread the taste of summer through out the winter.

 We can only eat so many tarts and pies so I’ve taken to trying out varied recipes for eating up luscious sun ripened fruit in as many ways as possible.

Here are my two favorite discoveries from this season. One sweet and one savory.

Ricotta, Apricot and Crisp Proscuitto Tartine 

Renee Erickson, Seattle from the Richmond Times Dispatch

Quick easy and such a wonderful summer lunch or dinner treat. I’m looking forward to a few more lingering summer days to share this for a lunch time treat. 

olive oil

4 fresh apricots, halved and pitted

Sea salt

 Four 1/2-inch thick slices country bread (of course here I used a baguette)

4 thinly sliced slices of prosciutto

1/2 cup of ricotta, at room temperature

pepper

mint leaves, roughly torn

What To Do:

Set a grill pan over medium heat and brush lightly with oil. Brush apricots lightly with more oil and season with salt. Once grill pan is hot, lay in apricots, cut-side down, and cook until charred on both sides and just tender, 3-5 minutes total. Remove apricots from pan and set aside. Lay bread into grill pan and cook both sides until golden and charred i spots, 3-4 minutes total.

Meanwhile, swirl 2 tablespoons oil into a medium saute pan set over medium-high heat. Once hot, add prosciutto and cook until darkened in spots, less than 1 minute per side. Transfer to a paper-towel-lined plate.

While toasts are warm, spread generously with ricotta. Top with apricots and prosciutto. Garnish with oil, salt, pepper and mint.

Peach Pie     easy easy easy!

Joy of Cooking  Rombauer  Becker

Preheat oven to 400

*9 inch single-crust *

Combine and blend well:

1 egg

2 tablespoons flour

1 cup granulated sugar

1/3 cup melted butter

Pour this mixture over 6 peaches halved and place cut side up in the pie shell.

Bake 15 minutes at 400, then reduce the heat to 300 and bake about 50 minutes longer. Serve hot, or if cold garnished with whipped cream.

*crust:   preheat oven to 400

1 cup flour

1 tsp sugar

1/4 tsp salt

mix with a fork

1/3 cup oil

3-5 tbsp milk

mix

mix together and press by hand into pie plate.

bake at 400 for 10 minutes

Friday's Petite Aquarelle

Summer Flower Vendor
12" x 16"
$120 including shipping
available at www.tomviethsketches.com

www.oohlalafrance.com

The Gauls Trojan Horse

The ancient Gauls (they were French before there was the real French) had their own version of the Trojan Horse:

"Behold, Caesar, a great big box of pastries!"

The Box

The nondescript box began to exert it’s magical powers as soon as it left the bakery. A smallish, square, flat carton, decorated with too perfect fruit across the cover. It had been tied shut in standard french bakery efficiency by a very prim young woman. If I looped my finger into the bow just so, in the crook of my finger, the box could swing gently and yet remain horizontal, which was ever so important to the precious contents. Nothing what so ever indicated what might be inside.  And yet within minutes people’s curiosity and attraction for the box and it's contents became apparent. 

We’d made a tactical error in our morning’s outing. Any self respecting french market goer knows that the bakery is the last stop. We’d made the mistake of being drawn into the bakery and then doing a tour of elegant, city boutiques. This meant that the box was on parade.

The very first store clerk suggested that I leave the box on the counter while I browsed - and then suggested that it might be a good idea to just leave it with her.

She was not the last shopkeeper to make that suggestion.

Then there were the passersby that suggested that maybe the box was too heavy and they could help by taking it off my hands. Or less subtly just blurting out, "oh I’ll take that...."

Couples drinking coffees at cafe tables looked longingly as it passed by and one gentleman brazenly asked that it be dropped off at their table. “Oh that’s for us? How wonderful of you.”

Heading home on a quieter back street each neighborly passerby eyed that simple box. Twice there was an hmmm, once there was “oh you’ve brought something along for our afternoon tea.”

Finally the box was placed on our kitchen table. The tea kettle was set to boil and plates and forks were set out. 

The bakery box string was cut and the lid propped open. Voila the hidden treat, a simple elegant apple tart. Hard to believe that something so plain was worth the oohs and ahhs of the afternoon. But let me just tell you this tart was deliciousness itself. Perfect apples, flaky, buttery crust all melting in your mouth.

No wonder anyone recognizing that simple box and the amazing bakery it came from were chasing us all over town.