A tartiflette is a gratin with potatoes, lardons and onions topped with melted savoyard cheese called Reblochon. It is a traditional mountain recipe and a perfect dish for cold weather !

It is particularly nice served with an Apremont, savoie wine.

Ingredients :

• 1kg potatoes
• 250g smoked lardons
• 2 large onions
• 150g crème fraîche
• 1 whole reblochon cheese
• 1 clove of garlic

Method :

1. Preheat the oven to 200°C
2. Pre-cook the potatoes in a saucepan of salted water (traditionally the potatoes are sautéed but this dish is rich enough so I prefer to boil them)
3. In a frying pan gently fry the onions until they are soft and translucent and then add the lardons and continue frying
4. Remove from heat and add the creme fraîche or liquid cream and mix well
5. Chop the potatoes and mix in with the onion and lardons
6. Salt and pepper as necessary
7. Cut the garlic clove in half and rub the cut sides around an oven dish
8. Place the potato, lardon and onion mix in the oven dish
9. Slice the cheese down the middle and place the two round halves crust up on top of the dish
10. Bake for 20 minutes until golden brown and nice and crispy
11. Serve with a green salad

A gougère is a baked savory choux pastry made of choux dough mixed with cheese, usually gruyère or comté but you can use emmenthal or any hard cheese really – even cheddar!

Ingredients :

• 4 eggs
• 100g grated gruyère (or you can use any hard cheese you have – cheddar, parmesan etc)
• 60g unsalted butter
• 150g flour
• 1 pinch of nutmeg
• 1/2 teaspoon of salt

Method :

1. Preheat oven to 210°C
2. Pour 25cl of water into a saucepan and add the butter, chopped in cubes and the salt
3. Bring to the boil
4. Add the flour and stir well with a wooden spatula
5. Continue stirring constantly for a few minutes until the dough pulls away from the side of the pot and forms a ball
6. Remove from heat and add each egg , one by one, mixing well between each one (Don’t worry if the batter separates and looks curdled at first, keep beating, and it will come together eventually!)
7. Add the grated cheese and nutmeg
8. Using two teaspoons make small balls of dough and place them on an oven tray covered in parchment paper (dip your spoons in a bowl of hot water between each scoop to avoid dough sticking to them)
9. Bake for 15 to 20 minutes until well golden

Madeleines are one of France’s  favourite small cakes. In this recipe I’ve used a madeleine tin to make savoury bites for an aperitif – perfect size to eat with drinks and a little surprising for guests to see madeleines cakes that are actually savoury!

This recipe uses jambon cru, which means cured ham. You can use one of several types of cured ham – parma ham from Italy, Serrano ham form Spain etc. Obviously being in France I alway use Bayonne ham!

Ingredients :

• 3 eggs
• 150g self-raising flour
• 10cl sunflower oil
• 12.5cl hot milk
• 100g grated gruyere (or cheddar or any hard cheese you fancy!)
• 175g cured ham
• 75g green olives
• Salt and Pepper

Method :

1. Pre-heat oven to 180°C
2. Slice ham and olives
3. In a large bowl beat the eggs with the flour, salt and pepper
4. Slowly add the oil and the hot milk, mixing all the time with a whisk
5. Add the grated cheese, ham and olives
6. Spoon the mixture into a madeleine tin and cook for 15 minutes

Endives are a great winter vegetable and can be eaten raw in salad or cooked, see this previous recipe from myfrenchtable for Endives au Gratin

They are really crunchy but can be slightly bitter so they work well with something sweet such as pears as I have used here but also lovely with avocado for example!

Ingredients:

• 4 endives
• 1 pear
• 50g emmenthal cheese
• Handful of walnuts
• Vinaigrette

Method :

1. Slice the endives lengthways, remove the base and chop
2. Peel and quarter the pear and then slice the quarters
3. Chop the cheese into small cubes
4. Place the chopped endive in a bowl and add your vinaigrette
5. Top with the sliced pear, cubed cheese ad a handful of walnuts

Ready!

Vinaigrette?

Everyone has their own preference regarding vinaigrette so the best thing to do is find one that you really like by trial and error. My basic vinaigrette is as follows :

1/2 teaspoon dijon mustard

1-2 tablespoons of vinegar (red wine or balsamique usually)

3-4 tablespoons of oil – olive oil or rapeseed oil

A good dose of both salt and pepper

Taste and add more vinegar/oil/salt etc if necessary until you get the taste you are looking for . 🙂

This is another savoury loaf (or cake as they say in french!) which is perfect as an aperitif or finger food for a buffet. Personally I prefer the ham and olive loaf, the recipe for which you can find here, but this is a good alternative if you are cooking for someone who doesn’t like olives 😉

Ingredients :

• 150g flour
• Even teaspoon of baking powder
• 3 eggs
• 1 tablespoon of wholegrain mustard
• 100ml milk
• 125ml sunflower
• 150g ham
• 75g cheddar
• 75g grated gruyere (or other hard cheese)
• 5cl beer (blonde or pale – not sure what the correct term is in english!)
• Salt and Pepper

Method :

1. Pre-heat oven t 180°C
2. Chop the cheddar and the ham in small cubes
3. Place in a bowl and mix in the wholegrain mustard and the beer, mix well and leave to marinate for at least 30 minutes
4. In a large bowl beat the eggs with the flour and baking powder
5. Slowly pour in the warm milk and oil mixing all the time
6. Add the grated cheese
7. Add the ham and cheese mixture and mix well
8. Season with salt and pepper
9. Pour into a non-greased loaf tin and bake for 45 minutes at 180°C

Leeks are in season! And this leek and potato tart makes a lovely evening meal or lunch with a green salad. I made it with lardons but it is also lovely with smoked salmon.

See the following for some similar recipes : Quiche or Courgette Tart

Ingredients :

• A short-cut pastry (recipe here) or a puff pastry
• 5 medium sized potatoes
• 3 leeks
• 3 eggs
• 150ml of milk or creme fraîche
• 200g bacon lardons or 4 slices of smoked salmon
• 100g grated cheese (I use gruyere but any hard cheese works)
• Salt & Pepper

Method :

1. Wash and peel potatoes
2. Wash leeks, remove any withered outer leaves and trim off then end of the roots and the green leaves (leave a little green as this will have more colour to your dish)
3. Chop potatoes and leeks and cook in salted boiling water for approx 20 minutes (until cooked)
4. Roll out pastry and press into a quiche tin, prick the base with a fork
5. If using lardons fry in a pan, when cooked spread on the pastry base, if using smoked salmon cut into strips and do as for lardons
6. Beat the 3 eggs with the milk or creme fraiche, salt, pepper and grated cheese
7. Strain potatoes and leeks and add to the lardons
8. Cover with the milk and egg mixture
9. Cook in oven for approx 35 minutes at 180°C until nice and golden

I was trying to think of a suitable name in english for this dish but couldn’t so I just stuck to the french one. Endives are mostly called chicory in english but are also called endives too.  A gratin means when a dish is topped with a golden crust, often using cheese or breadcrumbs by baking or cooking in the oven with an overhead grill.

And guess what? Endives are in season so are really plentiful at the moment – and are great in a winter salad too!

Ingredients :

• 6 endives
• 6 slices good quality ham
• 100g grated gruyère cheese (or any other hard cheese you have)

For the béchamel :

• 90g butter
• 45g flour
• 500ml milk
• Salt, Pepper and Nutmeg

Method :

1. Chop the ends off the endives and remove any discoloured leaves
2. Steam them or boil them until well cooked
3. Leave the endives to drain in a colander (to try and remove some of the excess water contained in the endives)
4. Melt the butter in a saucepan
5. Add the flour and mix well with a whisk
6. Season with salt, pepper and a pinch of nutmeg
7. Slowly pour in the milk whisking vigorously all the time to avoid lumps and to get a nice smooth texture for your sauce
8. Once all the milk is added continue to cook over a medium heat mixing all the time for another 5 minutes
9. Butter an oven dish and place each endive wrapped in a slice of ham on the bottom and pour over the béchamel sauce
10. Top with grated cheese
11. Bake in a pre-heated oven for 25 minutes at 180°C and the pop under the grill for another 5 minutes to get it nice and crispy on top

*  If you find the endives too hard even after all that cooking, you can also cut them in half lengthways, lay them on the bottom of the dish and simply cover them with the ham slices.

A breton galette is a large, thin pancake from the Brittany region made with buckwheat flour, usually with a savoury filling – also known in France as a “galette complète” (or complete galette). Here in France you can buy ready-made galettes to which you can add your filling but you can also make your own easily enough.

One word of warning with the buckwheat flour – it has a very short shelf-life so you need to use it fairly quickly after buying – I have been caught out before!

Ingredients :

For the galette 

• 330 g buckwheat flour
• 75 cl water
• 10 g coarse salt
• 1 egg
• Butter

For the filling (per person)

• 1 egg
• Slice of ham
• Grated cheese

Method :

For the galette

1. Add the salt to the flour in a large bowl
2. Make a well in the flour and very slowly add the water mixing energetically all the time with a wooden spoon to obtain a thick liquid batter
3. Add the egg and mix well
4. Leave the batter in the fridge to rest for at least 2 hours

For the breton galette

1. Heat a large pan and add some butter
2. Add a ladle of the batter and move it around to completely cover the bottom of the pan
3. Cook both sides of the galette for 1-2 minutes each side
4. Add your grated cheese and then the sliced ham leaving a space in the middle for the egg
5. Add your egg in the middle of the galette (if you want a well cooked egg you might want to fry it in a separate pan and add once cooked)
6. Once the egg turns white you can fold in each side of the crepe leaving just enough space for the egg yolk.

*You can always chop and change the ingredients with mushrooms, bacon, tomatoes etc.

Auvergne is a region in south central France, home to the city of Clermont-Ferrand. This recipe is from the region, hence the name,  and uses the local Cantal cheese.

Ingredients :

• 400g potatoes
• 4 ripe tomatoes
• 10cl olive oil
• 25g butter
• 1 pate brisée or short cut pastry, see here
• 150g Cantal cheese
• 100g lardons
• Salt

Method :

1. Wash the potatoes and cook them for 15 minutes in salted boiling water, then strain
2. Pre-heat oven to 210°C
3. Place the tomatoes for at least 30 seconds in boiling water, then immediately put them in cold water, this will make it possible to peel them
4. Once peeled, slice the tomatoes and place them in a dish, add salt and pepper, then pour the olive oil over them
5. Roll out your pastry and then transfer it to your tin (24cm round tin) and prick the base with a fork
6. Remove the rind off the cheese and slice and slice it in fine strips
7. Put the lardons in boiling water for a few minutes until they are cooked, then strain
8. Spread the lardons with 1/2 of the cheese evenly on the pastry base
9. Peel and slice the potatoes and place them on the cheese and lardons
10. Cover the potatoes with the tomato slices  and then pour the tomato marinade over them
11. Use the rest of your cheese on top of your dish
12. Cook for 30 minutes at 210°C
13. Allow to cool for 10 minutes before eating and serve with a green salad

*  Depending on where you are it may be difficult to source cantal cheese but you can replace it with a different hard cheese – cheddar would work really well with this recipe!

Yes I know that the name cake will usually conjure up images of something sweet with a cup of tea but in France the word ‘cake’ really refers to the loaf form, be that savoury or sweet. This is one of my staple recipes – great as an aperitif or as a light meal with some salad. There are lots of variants to the basic ingredients which I will share in the upcoming months.

Ingredients :

• 3 eggs
• 150g flour
• 1 heaped teaspoon of baking powder
• 10cl sunflower oil
• 12.5cl hot milk
• 100g grated gruyere (or cheddar or any hard cheese you fancy!)
• 200g of cooked bacon or ham or lardons etc
• 75g green olives
• Salt and Pepper

Method :

1. Pre-heat oven to 180°C
2. Chop bacon/ham and olives
3. In a large bowl beat the eggs with the flour, baking powder, salt and pepper
4. Slowly add the oil and the hot milk, mixing all the time with a whisk
5. Add the grated cheese and then the bacon/ham and olives
6. Pour the mixture into a loaf tin and cook for 45 minutes

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