Around My French Table by Dorie Greenspan

It's a hollowed-out pumpkin stuffed with bread, cheese, garlic, and cream, and since pumpkins come in unpredictable sizes, cheeses and breads differ, and baking times depend on how long it takes for the pumpkin to get soft enough to pierce with a knife, being precise is impossible.Īs Catherine said when she turned this family favorite over to me, 'I hope you will put the recipe to good use, knowing that it's destined to evolve.

Catherine sent me a charming outline of the recipe, and as soon as I'd baked my first pumpkin, I realized that an outline is about the best you can do with this dish. The idea for it came from my friend Hélène Samuel's sister, Catherine, whose husband grows pumpkins on his farm just outside Lyon.

Hundreds of other recipes are remarkably easy: a cheese and olive quick bread, a three-star chef’s Basque potato tortilla made with a surprise ingredient (potato chips), and an utterly satisfying roast chicken for “lazy people.” Packed with lively stories, memories, and insider tips on French culinary customs, Around My French Table will make cooks fall in love with France all over again, or for the first time.Shortly after I was given this recipe, I started keeping a list of whom I'd made it for-because I loved it so much, I was sure that if I didn't keep track, I'd end up serving the dish to the same people over and over. Julia’s praise was echoed by the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times, which referred to Dorie’s “wonderfully encouraging voice” and “the sense of a real person who is there to help should you stumble.” Now in a big, personal, and personable book, Dorie captures all the excitement of French home cooking, sharing disarmingly simple dishes she has gathered over years of living in France.Īround My French Table includes many superb renditions of the great classics: a glorious cheese-domed onion soup, a spoon-tender beef daube, and the “top-secret” chocolate mousse recipe that every good Parisian cook knows-but won’t reveal. When Julia Child told Dorie Greenspan, “You write recipes just the way I do,” she paid her the ultimate compliment.

Around My French Table by Dorie Greenspan