Image: Harvard Common Press

The book, the brainchild of Wini Moranville of Chez Bonne Femme, is “authentic French cooking without fuss or fear, the way real French families eat today. Now that the typical French woman, the bonne femme of the title, works outside of the home just like her American counterpart (and now that French men, like their American frères, are often in charge of getting dinner on the table), the emphasis is on easy techniques and speedy preparation.”

It’s a user-friendly (though I missed illustrations or pictures of the dishes, to be honest) manual of up-to-date French classic recipes, demystified for today’s busy cook which includes a ton of time-saving tips.  The over 250 recipes are short and sweet – not intimidating at all – and just about every page contains a recipe I want to try. Ahem.  Moranville’s writing is lighthearted and conversational – it’s kind of like having her in your kitchen chatting as you cook – a lovely trait for a food writer to have!  You can read more about the book here.

For my little “apéro“, I made delicious “Croques Jeune Homme Amuses Bouches” – ham and cheese in buttery puff pastry. Mmmmm… So much easier than a croque monsieur and so much easier to handle at a cocktail party!

Also, continuing in the buttery puff pastry theme – Flaky Green Olive and Cheese Spirals… (though I used black olive tapenade but you get the idea!!)

And last but not least, Frenchified wings – Lemon Saffron Rosemary Wings to be exact!  These were delightful – unlike most “Buffalo” wings that you get here in North America. Fresh and elegant tasting – well as elegant as finger food can be!

I whipped up these three dishes in around an hour – not bad for three different cocktail snacks! I can’t wait to try more of the recipes from the other chapters in the Bonne Femme Cookbook!

And hey, what’s a party without presents?  Well thanks to Harvard Common Press, I have one copy of the Bonne Femme Cookbook to giveaway to one lucky reader anywhere in the world.  HCP will cover the shipping within Canada and North America but if you happen to win and you live elsewhere, I will pick up the tab for the remainder of the shipping. Just my way of saying “thanks” for reading over the past three years – I hope you will stick around!

To enter? Simply leave me a comment telling me what your favourite cocktail snack is.

Bonus entry? Tweet the following message:

Celebrate @eatlivtravwrite ‘s blog birthday and win a copy of @winimoranville ‘s cookbook http://bit.ly/Kb6VL4 Open to anyone/anywhere!

Then come back to leave me a separate comment telling me you did.

Contest closes on Tuesday May 22nd at 9pm EST and winner will be announced Wednesday May 23rd. Good luck!

Disclosure: I was provided with a complimentary review copy of the Bonne Femme Cookbook by Harvard Common Press. I was not otherwise compensated and was not obligated to write a post about it. HCP will provide one (1) copy of the Bonne Femme Cookbook as a giveaway prize and will cover shipping costs in North America and Canada. Should the winner be from elsewhere, I will cover the remainder of the shipping costs myself.

A panel of culinary luminaries, including celebrity chef Thomas Keller, former restaurant critic of The New York Times Ruth Reichl, and food writer Amanda Hesser, has selected their most beloved 100 Julia Child recipes.  Each Monday, in the 100 days leading up to Julia’s birthday (starting May 7th), I’ll be receiving one special JC100 recipe to bake/ cook if I choose. I am only obliged to make one but hope to participate a few times in the next 100 days.

For Julia, a simple lunch of sole meunière – her first meal in Paris — was life changing and inspired her 40-year love affair with food and the start of a cooking revolution in America.  The first recipe of the JC100 is Julia’s classic Omelette Roulée (Rolled Omelette) — “dinner in half a minute,” as she described it on “The French Chef.”  This one’s all about technique, but the opportunities for garnishes and fillings are limitless.

Having just returned from a whirlwind trip to Bangkok (there and back – that’s TWO 20 hour flights! – in 7 days) I chose to go simple and yesterday morning, having had a weird night’s sleep, woke up needing something a little substantial for breakfast. True to the recipe, this was, indeed a quick meal – less than 5 minutes’ from rolling into the kitchen to sitting down to eat. And yes, it took me a couple of goes to get this right. The “mistakes” were chopped up and went into some fried rice

Follow the JC 100 on:

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/JuliaChild
Tumblr:  http://jc100.tumblr.com/
Pinterest:  http://pinterest.com/knopfbooks/jc100/
Twitter:  https://twitter.com/#!/JC100 

Fougasse is meant to be a pretty leaf shape, made just so by the tears and slashes in the dough but mine closed up in the oven – I think my tray was too narrow to allow it to stay in the shape I created and it all puffed together when it baked. Nonetheless, it was a tasty treat to have with a glass of wine and some olives as an apéritif snack and the next day it was even better as I toasted it ans slathered it with some more tapenade and melted some cheese on top. Oh my, THAT was good!

French Fridays with Dorie participants do not publish the recipes on our blogs, rather, we prefer if you purchase Around My French Table for yourselves (trust me, you definitely want this book!) which you can do here on Amazon or Amazon Canada. Or for free worldwide shipping, buy from The Book Depository. Go on, treat yourself and join us this year! And guess what – you’re in luck because the recipe for this week can be found here.

Did you know? I am leading a foodie tour of Paris this July! Read all about it here. Only one spot left!!!

Stand up for REAL FOOD with me on May 19th. Find out how here.

For more beautiful pictures of this event, check out Green Fuse Photography.
Check out the complete list of winners on the Callebaut Canada Facebook Page.
Thanks to the kind folks at Cacao Barry/ Callebaut for inviting me to be a media judge. It was just like watching real-life “Kings of Pastry Chocolate”

Basically, it’s a VERY thin crust pizza topped with lardons (bacon strips), white onions and a cream-based sauce made with fromage blanc and crème fraîche. So, uh, yeah, not exactly low-fat or low-cal…. President’s Choice have recently come out with a pretty good version of flammekeuche but it has been on my list of things to try to replicate since we got back from our trip.

To be honest, I knew I could figure this out pretty easily actually – it’s not rocket science. But what I wanted to do was lighten it up a bit since it can be pretty heavy, so this was the perfect opportunity to see whether Liberté’s Plain Greek yogurt 0% could make a suitable stand in for the fromage blanc (which we can’t really find here anyway – I would have been using sour cream mixed with mascarpone or something like that…) in this, my sixth post for Liberté.

For this recipe, I used pre-rolled butter puff pastry (another President’s Choice product that I am in love with!) but if you have a thin crust from-scratch pizza base that works for you, go for it. My way is wonderfully simple and I was thrilled with the results – the puff pastry makes it even lighter than the thin crust pizza it is supposed to be made with. I understand that making it with puff pastry makes it not as authentic but having had the real thing, I think this measures up pretty well. With just a few ingredients, this was a perfect weekend lunch… Onions, bacon, puff pastry, Liberté Plain Greek Yogurt 0%, crème fraîche and a little nutmeg and pepper – doesn’t sound like much but it tastes amazing.

Tarte flambée preparation and ready to bake...

Tarte flambée ready to eat!

Oh this was so delicious! I made it twice in one day actually – once to test it and once to photograph it and test it again. Both times it came out wonderfully, though I was not able to eat much of the second round. I was excited to discover that it re-heats well at 300˚F for about 15 minutes.

Not that you would have any leftovers though….

I can see all sorts of possibilities for this but you should try just the basic recipe first. You won’t believe that those few simple ingredients could taste so good. And no, you would have no idea that the “sauce” is lightened up. Trust me.

For more fabulous recipes and to discover their Greek yogurt line, visit Liberté now.

Stand up for REAL FOOD with me on May 19th. Find out how here.