A French Christmas

I am back on the beautiful shores of Dublin for this post. This was not the plan. I repeat; NOT the plan. The following paragraph is a low down of how Emma had hoped things would pan out for this week.

After a moonlit walk on the rocky shores of Nice with my oh so chic (...and then there's me) friends, followed by tea and hella lota meringue in a cute little bistro a few weeks ago, something wonderful happened. My friend Marie (pronounced that seductive French way) said she would share her grandmothers treasured Christmas recipe of Coquilles Saint-Jacques with me, and, annnnd, help me to cook it also. This was the perfect night for me; good friends, good food and exciting prospects of real French cooking in the looming future. We set the date, 17/12/2014, the day before my departure. Of course this was cutting it close should anything have gone wrong, which, of course, it did. But I didn't give it a second thought! What could go wrong!? - wondered naïve Emma of Christmas past.

Well, this is what went wrong:


Emma + Snowboard = WRONG



 

Yes, I went snowboarding! It was amazing....well, it became amazing after numerous tantrums, a few regretful tears and many, many (cannot stress this enough), many falls. Why did this affect my cooking plans? You see the way I'm not standing in the picture above? Yeah, that is a very accurate portrayal of how my day went. I was parallel to the ground for nearly the entire thing. When I did stand though, it was the best feeling ever!! Even if only for 3-7 seconds at a time, give or take. As this was my first slope venture, I didn't bring any extra clothes to change in to. So I spent the 2 and a half hour bus journey back in freezing and soaking wet jeans and jacket. The wetness seeped into my bones slowly, I actually felt this on the bus journey, it was most displeasing, and left me voiceless, achy and unable to move for the better part of 3 days. Cooking plans ruined. Bed and hot tea for Emma instead.

I did manage to get the recipe though, and got to cook the whole thing with my little sister in a fully stocked and decorated kitchen in Dublin. Things aint so bad like.

So what do French people cook for Christmas dins? Well this is what one northern French granny makes for starters: Coquilles Saint-Jacques avec Champignons (and wine and whiskey and cheese and butter and butter and butter). Eh, yum.

Coquilles Saint-Jacques or scallops as we call them are a very typical French Christmas staple. I was nervous about cooking the scallops as I know how easy it is to make them rubbery, but after watching many youtube tutorials on the subject and downloading an online timer for the occasion, everything I am pleased to say, turned out deliiiightfully.

So here's the lowdown on the awl coquille wockies.

Les Ingraydayants

 

• 30g flour
• a hayp of salt
• pinch of curry powder
• teeny pinch of cayenne
• 40g butter
• 2 tbs of melted butter
• 20g truffle butter
• 200g of crimini/shiitake mushrooms (sliced)
• 25g of dried wild mushrooms (soak these in warm water NOW for 25 mins)
• 1 chopped onion
• 160ml of dry white wine (pino grigio is gouda - food pun)
• 2 tbs of good whiskey
• 35g of grated comté cheese
• quarter of lemon ready to squeeze
• ALMOST FORGOT - SCALLOPS! v important here, about 1 - 1 1/2 pounds

C'est tout!

What to do

1) Mix all zee dry ingredients together (flour, salt, curry and cayenne) in a bowl
2) Throw in the scallops and coat them in the dry stuff
3) Heat your pan (not too hot, but hot enough...) add the butter and truffle butter. When melted, add the scallops. IMPORTANT -  1 minute 30 seconds for each side of scallop then off the heat, rubberiness is not our friend

you can't sit with us rubber!

4) In the same pan add the onion and fresh mushrooms (add more butter if you dare, and you do.)
5) Drain the dried mushrooms and keep the yummy water, chop shrooms and add to pan (add little bit of the water too, just cos)
6) After about 5/6 minutes of frying, add the white wine and reduce the sauce till it looks like this:

errbody wanna look like me

7) Take off the heat, add the good stuff (i.e whiskey) and the stars of the show (i.e scallops)
8) Scoop the mixture into 6 ramekins (if you have the scallop shells, scoop them into these instead, if you're into pretty thangs)
9) Mix together the bread crumbs, melted goodness and cheese and sprinkle on top of pots, they should look a lil something like this


perfection! (self proclaimed..)
 

10) Put your oven on the highest broiler setting and stick them in until they're all bubbly and the cheese gets nice and brown (brown cheese.... surprisingly delicious)


in the oven, like a boss

11) Remove from oven. DISCLAIMER, wear protective hand-wear such as gloves cos they're hot little feckers, drizzle with lemon and bob's your uncle!

eaten, like a boss

Even though I didn't get to make these in the setting of a real French kitchen with a real French madam, I did not despair. All clouds have a silver lining, as the saying goes and I got to share this beautiful occasion with my little sister (who took all the photos). We sang Christmas songs and laughed a bunch. The spirit of Christmas was alive in our kitchen and our hearts today.

Yes, I did cringe writing the above paragraph. I hope you did too. MERRY XMAS xoxoxo