Joyeux Noel

As I sit here snacking on Christmas candy that I really shouldn’t be eating (okay, I’m done now) and trying to keep Sydney happy (who is bit cranky because she just got in two molars and is getting two more – poor, teething girl! – AAAAH, she’s trying to get her hands on the keyboard and take apart the mouse – oh, now she’s trying to follow Jessica outside and crying because she can’t – hopefully the wet washcloth I just gave her to chew on will keep her happy for a few minutes), I want to tell you about our fantastic, French Christmas dinner!

But first I have to share the most awesome Christmas present I received: a Nikon D5000 camera! Never mind that I picked it out myself, bought it, wrapped it, and put it under the tree. I was just making life easier for my hubby. My goal is to actually take some good pictures with this thing.



Each year when we invite my side of the family over for Christmas dinner, we pick a country and attempt to make an authentic meal from that region. In the past we have cooked up cuisine from Korea, Jamaica, Germany, China, Italy, and Mexico. This year we picked France. I was inspired to try French cooking after reading: The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry: Love, Laughter, and Tears in Paris at the World's Most Famous Cooking School by Kathleen Flinn.

The author writes about her experience at Le Cordon Bleu in France. Her story about roasting a duck is hilarious! (The duck ends up in the floor, but the chef doesn’t see it happen. She plates it anyway...) Fortunately, our ducks made it from the roaster to the table safely.



(There's also a chicken on the table because I wasn't sure the duck would be enough food for everyone. It turns out it was, so I have a whole chicken leftover.)

Have you ever had duck before?

Me neither.

I was pleasantly surprised at how delicious it was! It’s juicy, all dark meat, a slightly different flavor than chicken, wonderful with orange sauce, but not much meat on one bird.

But Duck a l’Orange was only the main dish...

There was also Brie pane avec ses deux sauces for an appetizer. Translation: fried Brie cheese with two dipping sauces. They looked like tater tots, but tasted mildly cheesy with a crunchy coating and a creamy inside. Yum!


Salade Chevre Figue was a green salad with goat cheese and figs. The figs were fresh-picked from a tree in my parents’ backyard. How cool is that? And the goat cheese was fresh from my uncle’s goats ... kidding. I do have an uncle who owns goats, though. Heck, when I was growing up we had goats, too! I had to milk one of them every morning.

Okay, moving on.

The bread was pain ordinaire, a.k.a. ordinary French bread, or, in our case, EXTRAordinary French bread. I used a recipe from one of favorite cookbooks: Kneadlessly Simple: Fabulous, Fuss-Free, No-Knead Breads by Nancy Baggett. Raising the dough took place over the course of two days, but the work is minimal and the results are superb (much better than store-bought loaves in my opinion). We took the advice from the cookbook to tear the bread instead of slicing it.

The sides were aligot, which is cheesy mashed potatoes, and carrottes vichy, glazed carrots. The potatoes had so much flavor that gravy was not needed, and the carrots provided a lovely splash of color.

And dessert? Mousse au Chocolat. Mmmmmm.

The meal was rich (in more than one way): we didn’t have to eat a lot to be satisfied and it cost a lot of money to make - $11 per duck, three kinds of cheese at about $10/pound, 6 bottles of sparkling cider, etc. At least the carrots and bread were cheap.

Everything was quite tasty! It’s fun to expand my cooking repertoire and try new dishes. Maybe you will be inspired to do the same!

Thanks to Bryan, Jessica, Marie and Mark for helping prepare the food! And thanks to easy-french-food.com for the great recipes.



I hope you all had a Merry Christmas!