Wed 3 february

Okay, I have a serious problem; I keep on spelling February without an R! Is this gonna continue for a whole month? Ok, jokes aside. I am officially half way through my Julia Child book, but more on that later. Today, for breakfast I made a tomato gratinated omelette. Yeesh. To do this, I made an omelette, cut a slit down the middle, filled with tomato puree, added some grated cheese and cream, and stuck under the grill. It was disgusting, don’t grill omelettes, please I’m begging you. I then for lunch made a large brussels sprout custard with a tomato sauce, then for supper I made Boeuf a la Catalane.

To make it, I blanched some sprouts, drained ’em, I fried some onions, and boiled some milk with butter. I put the onions, the milk, some eggs and some breadcrumbs into a bowl and beat. I added the sprouts , placed in a mould, and put in the oven. Meanwhile, I fried some onions, added some tomatoes, some saffron, some orange peel and some garlic, and boiled for half an hour. I strained it and poured it over the timbale (which I turned out onto a plate). It was okay, If you like overcooked omelettes and weirdly perfumed tomato sauces. Seriously, orange and tomato do not mix! Okay, next I made ma stew. I fried some bacon, then some beef and then and some onions and rice in the same pan, removing them as I go, then I deglazed with vermouth, added all the meat and onions, some stock and put in the oven. Then, after an hour I added some tomato. an hour and a half later, I added back in the rice, cooked for 20 minutes more and added some parmesan. It was okay, I think she’s a bit confused about cooking…

Ok, this is where I’m at. I’m half way, and frankly, I’m bored. I feel like I’ve topped out on how much I’m going to learn with this challenge. It’s all so samey. I don’t think that Julia has a very good palette, there are things that I as a chef would never do because they just don’t work. Plus, a lot of these recipes aren’t particularly French, or at least are an american’s take on french. That is why, I’ve decided to switch books. That’s right. We have bought a book, called La grand cours de cuisine FERRANDI or the big cooking lesson by the ferrandi cooking school. I feel like I’ll learn more this way, I’ve done the American take, now for the French take. The problem is, that there are only 143 recipes. But that’s okay, I’ll just do less. SO what I’m going to do, is try and close the gap as much as possible whilst waiting for the book to arrive, and then sign off Julia with her famous boned duck pâté. This is no longer Julie/Julia, this is Ferrandinigo. See you next time!