17 March 2016

I’m ashamed to admit that I completely overlooked the fact that this post would fall on arguably the most widely-celebrated holiday in the western Hemisphere: the 171st anniversary of the invention of the rubber band. And of further disgrace, not a single one of the recipes presented below contains even one little rubber band, green or otherwise.

But in better news this week :

If you’re not sure what you’re looking at, these are two (2) empty crates! That puts us at roughly halfway through the apples and exactly 50% done with dirty carrots.

On the menu:

Hachis Parmentier (Potato pie)

Heringtopf (Marinated Herring)

Please note : If you feel so compelled, I strongly encourage you to add peas or spinach to the following, or any one of your favorite, Chez Maureen dishes today…

Here I blew another chance to make amends with my Irish-American heritage. The following recipe could almost have been a fitting tribute to the second-most important holiday celebrated on March 17th (the 260th anniversary of the first celebration of Saint Patrick’s Day in New York City, Ireland) had I gone with the Irish interpretation of this well-loved dish. But alas, here is Cottage pie in its French form:

Hachis Parmentier (Potato pie)

First a history lesson on this historic day:

Hachis parmentier is the mother of all French potato recipes, named after the French founding father of the potato: Monsieur Parmentier.

Until the end of the 18th century, when Monsieur Parmentier came on the scene, the potato was considered inedible. In fact in 1748 the French parliament issued a law prohibiting the cultivation of the potato, grown underground and therefore classified at the bottom of the “scala naturæ”. But then, according to French lore, Monsieur Parmentier had the fortune of being a prisoner-of-war (the Seven-year War of 1756-1763) in Germany where the potato had a bit of a better reputation. He returned home convinced that the potato could save France. If this isn’t a testament (and a compliment) to Germany’s culinary potato prowess!… (see Kartoffelpuffer, Heringtopf, Kartoffel-Möhren Gratin, or ask a German if you’re still not convinced).

Finally in 1786 (nearly 200 years after the Spanish found the potato in Peru and brought it home to Europe) Parmentier presented his tubers to Louix XVI and Marie-Antoinette. Luckily they used their handy guilllotine to chop the potatoes into thin slices for frying (the French fry is born!) instead of on Monsieur Parmentier’s head.

And on the seventh day, Monsieur Parmentier created Hachis Parmentier.

Potatoes, 2 lbs (1 kg)

Beef, for stew or ground, 12 oz. (350 g) (The recipe called for stewing beef, which I used chopped into small pieces. In the end, however, I think that already ground beef would have not only saved me five precious minutes of preparation time, it would have been better fit for the recipe.)

Sausage meat, 5 oz. (150 g)

Parsley, 1 small bunch

Chive bulb (for lack of a more accurate translation: the small onion bulb out of which grow chives. This might be called a “spring onion” but my internet search of the topic was inconclusive… in French “ciboule”), 3

Beef bouillon (in France « bouillon de pot-au-feu »), 2 cups (50 cl)

Dry white wine, a bit less than 1 cup = measure out a cup, take a generous taste, use what’s left (20 cl)

Breadcrumbs, ¼ cup (30 g)

Butter, 4 Tbsp. (60 g)

Salt and pepper

Peel and cook the potatoes until done. (25-30 minutes, though hardly need to tell you that now that we are all potato cooking experts.)
Preheat oven to 410°F (210°C).
Chop the chive bulbs (ciboules). Combine with the parsley, beef and sausage meat.

In a large pan, heat 1-1/2 Tbsp. (20 g) of butter and add the meat mixture. Cook for 5 minutes. Add the white wine and pepper. Cover and let simmer over low heat for 10 minutes. Stir in between parenting and finishing the rest of the bottle of wine.
Drain the potatoes. Mash them together with 2 Tbsp. (30 g) of butter and enough of the beef bouillon to make a thick purée. Salt and pepper. (I had never made mashed potatoes with bouillon instead of milk. It’s worth noting that they are really much tastier than you are imagining.)
Place half of the mashed potatoes into the bottom of a buttered casserole dish.

Top with the cooked meat-wine mixture.

Cover with the remaining mashed potatoes. Sprinkle with breadcrumbs and small knobs of butter. If you’re feeling festive, mix some grated cheese (gruyère, please) with the breadcrumbs.

Bake 20 minutes.
Since you’ve max-ed out your protein, carbohydrate and (unless you’re French, Italian or Spanish) wine quotient for lunchtime, accompany with a side salad.

Ingredients

Potatoes 2 lbs (1 kg)
Beef for stew or ground, 12 oz. (350 g), see Note below
Sausage meat 5 oz. (150 g)
Parsley 1 small bunch
Chive bulb 3, see Note below
Beef bouillon in France « bouillon de pot-au-feu », 2 cups (50 cl)
Dry white wine a bit less than 1 cup = measure out a cup, take a generous taste, use what’s left (20 cl)
Breadcrumbs ¼ cup (30 g)
Butter 4 Tbsp. (60 g)
Salt and pepper

Instructions

Peel and cook the potatoes until done.
Preheat oven to 410°F (210°C).
Chop the chive bulbs (ciboules). Combine with the parsley, beef and sausage meat.
In a large pan, heat 1-1/2 Tbsp. (20 g) of butter and add the meat mixture. Cook for 5 minutes. Add the white wine and pepper. Cover and let simmer over low heat for 10 minutes.
Drain the potatoes. Mash them together with 2 Tbsp. (30 g) of butter and enough of the beef bouillon to make a thick purée. Salt and pepper.
Place half of the mashed potatoes into the bottom of a buttered casserole dish.
Top with the cooked meat-wine mixture.
Cover with the remaining mashed potatoes. Sprinkle with breadcrumbs and small knobs of butter. If you’re feeling festive, mix some grated cheese (gruyère, please) with the breadcrumbs.
Bake 20 minutes.
Since you’ve max-ed out your protein, carbohydrate and (unless you’re French, Italian or Spanish) wine quotient for lunchtime, accompany with a side salad.

Notes

Beef: The recipe called for stewing beef, which I used chopped into small pieces. In the end, however, I think that already ground beef would have not only saved me five precious minutes of preparation time, it would have been better fit for the recipe.

Chive bulb (for lack of a more accurate translation: the small onion bulb out of which grow chives. This might be called a “spring onion” but my internet search of the topic was inconclusive… in French “ciboule”)

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Heringtopf (Marinated Herring)

Finally a good German favorite, after all those fussy French dishes. And this truly is one of my favorites. It’s a classic over the holidays in my mother-in-law’s kitchen and since it includes apples and potatoes, it was clear that Heringtopf would eventually find its way onto our menu.

So, um, herring, right. If you live in the US and you like searching high and low for impossible to find ingredients mentioned in foreign cooking blogs, fresh herring will keep you occupied for a while. If you live in Germany this is straight-forward. There one can buy already-fileted and ready-to-use herring in bulk. If you live in France, it turns out that getting the herring from its market-fresh whole fish form to a delicate filet ready to be marinated is a whole family affair. Next time, and yes, there will most certainly be a next time, we will be so sweetly begging the fishmonger to filet the herring for us.

Economist by day, fish filet-er by night

The following recipe uses fresh herring filets. If you find smoked herring filets (called “matje”) you can also use them but rinse them first and make sure you marinate all the ingredients together for at least 12 hours. Another polite note on fresh herring: they say that it only keeps 1-2 days in the refrigerator. I read this when we were already on day 3 and counting. We went ahead and used the fish anyway but I’ll be honest that we were a bit on edge wondering which bite would be the one that would send us to examine the tiles around the toilet for the rest of the evening. In the end, we came out just fine, but next time I will use the herring sooner.

Herrings, fresh, 2 lbs. (1 kg)

Lemons, 2

Salt

Onion, 3

Apples, 14 oz. (400 g)

Pickles, from a jar, 5 oz. (150 g)

Whipping cream, 1 cup (200 g)

Sour cream or crème fraiche, ¾ cup (150 g)

Lemon juice, 3 Tbsp.

Pepper

Filet the herring. Rinse and dry the filets. Place them in a single layer in a baking pan or dish. Salt the filets. Pour the juice from the two lemons on the filets. Cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight. (The lemon juice “cooks” the fish. If you find the result to be too acidic, pour a little bit of olive oil on the filets before the lemon juice next time around.)
The next day… Bring 1 cup (250 ml) of water to a boil. Add ¼ tsp. of salt. Peel, halve and thinly slice the onions. Blanche the onion slices in the boiling water. Remove and let dry.
Peel, quarter and slice the apples.
Slice the pickles.

Mix the whipping cream, sour cream and lemon juice together. Salt and pepper.
Add in the onions, apples and pickles.
Add the herring cut-up in pieces. Cover and refrigerate at least 2 hours if using fresh herring, at least 12 hours for smoked herring. You can’t go wrong with a little extra marination so error on the side of overnight.
Serve with cooked, peeled potatoes.
Yum!