I’ve recently told you about my new love of French cuisine, and after my Saturday night, I can confirm that we will not be breaking up anytime soon. Things just got serious.
On Saturday night, seven girlfriends joined me to celebrate French cooking. You may have followed our other gourmet nights, where we have tackled Thai, Greek, and Italian cuisines. This time it was French. The girls arrived armed with tarts, cheeses, soup, French wine, and desserts. And a tin of escargot.
Basil Palmiers
Leek and Camembert Tart
We started with handmade basil palmiers, a caramelized onion and gruyere tart, and a leek and camembert tart, before moving on to the cheese course. We couldn’t help putting it out first, even though traditionally it ends the meal.
Escargots
Next up were escargots which sent a ripple of fear through the group. I was surprised to discover that almost half of the girls had never tried escargots before. That was soon rectified and we introduced escargots to all but one of the girls.
French Onion Soup
We were already filling up but we made room for the next dish, which was a sweet French onion soup, made completely from scratch.
Bouef Bourguignon
My bouef bourguignon was the final savoury course. I was pretty happy with this dish. I made it the night before so that I only had to re-heat it before serving and I highly recommend doing this as there was no stress whatsoever. I was free to drink wine and kick back with my friends whilst it warmed up in the oven (great for a dinner party). The meat was tender as a result of a long, but gentle, cooking time and the sauce had a strong, meaty flavour (from the bacon).
We moved on to desserts and finished our meal with a decadent chocolate mousse and freshly cooked crêpes. What a feast!
Ooh la la! If this was just a small sample of the extensive collection of recipes that France is known for, then I can’t see my love for French cuisine dying anytime soon. Bring it on, I say! I can’t wait to see what other French dishes I can try my hand at.
Reblogged this on xoxocriseldalovestowrite and commented:
my mouth’s watering. haha. these dishes are so enticing
Thanks! I think most of them pretty easy to make as well. At least, the beef was really easy. I think the soup took a lot of time.
French cuisine does take a lot of time to prepare. And it’s kind of pricey
I agree on both points. Lately though I have managed to find some really good and quick recipes. I find that you can cut corners a bit which means that it saves you time and money.