Coucou, coulibiac !

I dreamed of a mini-coulibiac in a buttery flaky crust…

… with salmon trout, spinach

…rice, quail eggs.

There were eggs everywhere.

2011 Easter

Yep, it’s a seasonal thing.

Mille-citrons, the Meyer lemon mille-feuilles

Not perfect like those in the shop. It’s hand-made style. Taste is great.
Over the perfection of shape, I prefer the freshly mounted ones, especially with freshly baked feuilletage.

The refreshed cream is not easy to spread, it should be piped (I’m too lazy). Adding it on the freshly baked tiles is ideal as they keep crispiness and caramel has not the time to melt.

Recipe :
(2 to 4 pieces, depending on size)

200 g of butter pie sheet (home-made or bought, it can be a left-over)
20 g yellow cane sugar
…
30 g corn starch
200 ml milk (or water + skim milk)
2 small eggs (or 4 yolks)
2 tbs cane sugar (or more)
2 tbs unsalted butter
1 organic Meyer lemon
vanilla extract

Custard cream : Beat well the eggs with the sugar. Wet the starch with a part of the milk. Add to eggs. Bring the milk to a boil. Pour on the egg mix while beating. Transfer back in the pan, and simmer slowly while stirring with a wooden spatula. When it thickens add almond essence, the juice and grated skin of the lemon, and then the butter cut in small cubes. Let the cream cool. Then cover and chill it in the fridge.

Pie : Spread the pie sheet, on silpat or parchment paper, cut set of 3 identical rectangles. Bake between 2 pie mold (or 2 sheets of metal), so it stays flat. Put in the hot oven at 220 deg Celsius, about 15 minutes. Take away the top mold (sheet), spread with cane sugar and bake a few more minutes (about 5) under the broiler to get caramelised.

Finish (do not in advance, otherwise the caramel would in contact with the cream) : Spread with a fork (or pipe) the cream on one layer of pie, add second layer, add cream, third layer.
Serve !

Bouchées doubles : two bites of dessert, fruit, pie and cream

Maybe food blog readers love desserts too much… Sweets are the most visited pages, the most “browsed” food.

You can have many dessert this week because it’s Easter. I could fill this blog with sweets mostly. That wouldn’t be honest. I don’t want them to appear more frequently here than they should on my table.
Many people want to read that it’s possible to eat decadent cakes and sweets everyday and it will be healthy. I’d want that too. That’s not really the case.

Let’s devour them for occasions.
Small bites of dessert are a lesser evil. Fruits are healthy.

It’s a small nest of home-made pie sheet, with a little cane sugar on top and a stawberry.

Very milky crème anglaise, flavored with vanilla sugar and a little grated lemon peel. It’s like as I use “concentrated” skim milk, and a little starch to add thickness (there is a small egg yolk).

Hiding the little eggs in the herbs…

The eggs are somewhere in this nest of …

…coulibiac. It’s round because I need a dish to shape it.

Here !

Home-made pie sheet, brown rice, slightly stir-fried spinach and onion, boiled quail eggs, poached salmon, salt, pepper…close, return, paint with egg yolk, bake.