Une affaire de gout

Last night we watched Une Affiare de Gout, a film by Bernard Rapp which was original and interesting. It was not a masterpiece, but was a good movie and we enjoyed it. Nice to see a few French movies in a row, and bonus for me they all had French subtitles available.

Le bonheur est dans le pre

We watched le bonheur est dans le pre last night - a very enjoyable French film from 1995 which was funny, entertaining and touching all at once. A great film to let go of the stress from the week and cuddle together while laughing.

Highly recommended.

Veal Paprikash

I made veal paprikash tonight and it looked remarkably like this picture. Onions, red peppers, veal, tomatoes and lots of paprika. Creme fraiche and ricotta gave it the creaminess (not much of either).

Delicious, served over spaghetti squash.

It was an easy stew dish and I'd add it to the rotation in a heartbeat if E likes it...

All the President's Men

We watched this 70's classic when we should have been sleeping, but the movie was really good and I hadn't seen it since high school.

Redford was so cute when he was young, and the 70's haircuts and corduroy suits were fun to watch.

Star-studded cast and a good way to relax after a stressful couple of days.

Roasted Garbanzo Beans with Swiss Chard

I made this recipe tonight looking up swiss chard on a foodie website, as many of my culinary adventures begin, having an ingredient on hand and looking up how to use it. I'd actually started looking for swiss chard and ricotta, but found this with good ratings and decided to go for it.

It was good and surprising - even my husband liked it, hard to imagine for a vegetarian dish! I didn't use nearly as much oil as the recipe called for, and I used a cookie sheet to roast the chickpeas instead of an 8x8 pan, which I think ended up with the chickpeas overcooked and chewy - almost crunchy. It wasn't bad, but it was kind of weird, and in the future I'd use a lower temp oven, a deeper dish as they recommended, and pay more attention to the cooking time, as the French garbanzo beans are considerably smaller than the American ones, which might also explain the over-cooked phenomena.

To the swiss chard I added beet greens, and the combo was really good. There was a strange sweet smell in cooking which I didn't like and could taste a little - either the beet greens or the bay leaves. Next time I'll try without bay leaves and see... beet greens are a rare delicacy, hard to predict if they'll be around in the future or not...

I'd make it again!

Richard Serra - Monumenta @ Grand Palais

Yesterday I went to see the Richard Serra exhibit for Monumenta at the Grand Palais.

It was high on my must-do list this season, as I still can't stop thinking about his exhibit at the MoMA last summer, so I was hoping to have another dip into that atmosphere.

I enjoyed the work "promenade" that he did here in Paris, but found it much less powerful than any of the large-scale steel works from the MoMA expo. Clearly there was a huge challenge, and the space is really vast and over-the-top with the curves and curlicues. He did do a decent job of making you feel the height of the building and of changing perspective as you approached and distanced the 5 plates, but I still found it less interesting than I had hoped.

I'd imagined dragging my husband to see it (as I regretted a lot that he did not see the MoMA expo) but it didn't leave me with a need to see it again or share it, as the other had.

Still, a nice hour in the afternoon, and the Grand Palais space is pretty cool overall. And the weather was perfect for it - neither too hot nor too cold, which isn't often the case in that hall.

Roasted Vegetables!

Tonight I went crazy with roasting vegetables (and then eating them).

I started with roasted curried cauliflower which I mixed with 2 onions.

Next was zucchini, also with an onion, but with Greek spices.

Finally, I had a big bunch of celery and was curious, so I did that (but just with salt and a little sugar).

All were good, the cauliflower was best, the celery is interesting. In terms of prep it doesn't take long, the cooking is easy but takes a while. The veggies shrink a lot in roasting - it was easily half the volume you get with steaming, but VERY yummy. Also more calorie-dense, as you add oil to the veggies before roasting, but not huge amounts.

Definitely something I'll keep doing!