I'm In Love

Yes! I'm in love! I'm in love with the most amazing, beautiful, deliciously enchanting, wonderful -- sauce! Yes, a sauce!

I've been voraciously devouring Julia's Child's autobiography (which, incidentally, I purchased from The Strand in NYC a few weeks ago) "My Life In France". Its the greatest book I've read in a while because everything from her personality to her talent with words shines through. Its a book that just leaves you intrigued and enchanted and -- HUNGRY! Her descriptions of the path that led her to fall absolutely head over heels in love with French cooking, is just as effective to read as it is to eat. My mouth waters every time she describes something and its left me with this driving ambition to go home and try stuff out myself. I am NOT a fish lover at all, but with her writing, I suddenly have become madly obsessed with le poisson!

So - when I got home last night, I decided that I was going to match my ambitions and hit the market and stock up for some cooking. I spent WAY too much money and found the other MOST amazing thing EVER! At this big, cheap supermarket that I go to every so often (I have to drive about 30 minutes to get there but you often save quite a bit), I was looking for a fresh mozarella cheese and so I wandered into the dairy aisle. I passed Kraft cheese and some yummy sounding Wisconsin cheeses, but I am a complete and utter cheese snob so only imported or rather exotic sounding cheese tempt me. I didn't find what I wanted, but I noticed another aisle that a few people were perusing and so I pushed my cart over and, lo and behold, the heavens opened and big beam of light and the sound of singing filled the air! There was a whole other aisle with IMPORTED cheeses! Cheese from Italy, from France, ones from England... and my favorite ever -- this cheese imported from Ireland called "Dubliner". I madly threw block after block of interesting and delicious sounding cheeses on top of my pile of goods. I'm in HEAVEN!

Ok - so back to, what I'm apparently discovering now, is my other love.

I had bought some Alaskan Haddock because it looked the freshest and a few other fine ingredients, including some wonderful imported Irish butter, and I had decided that Saturday night I was going to experiment with Julia's Beurre Blanc sauce. It sounded so decadent and lovely I just had to give it a whirl - or actually, a whisk.

I pan-fried the Haddock in some of the imported butter with shallots and some chives -- turned out beautifully. Then, while that was frying up, I started the adventure in my tiny pot of fish stock (which I made a cup of and then meant to take only 1/4 cup out of but forgot and ended up having to dump some and was quite sure that my recipe was ruined but it wasn't..), added some white wine vinegar and more shallots. Then for the piece de resistance! I added almost a cup of the imported butter, piece by piece, and whisked my heart out. I believe it should have been a little thicker had it not been for my fish stock mistake, but all in all.... well.... like I said.... I'M IN LOVE!

Mom never hardly ever finishes her dinner anymore but we both ate like mad, starving wolves. Mom kept on saying how good it was and Calvin got a drop and then I gave him a little piece of fish with the sauce and by the time I got the dishes to the dishwasher, he was literally climbing into the dishwasher to get to the small saucepot I had put in the back which still had sauce on the sides.

Of course, you say, anything would be utterly divine with almost a cup of butter in it -- but, you'll never ever imagine how absolutely divine it is until you try it!

So - now, not that I'm going to mimic some sappy, feel good movie that is on the DVD shelves (not to name any names), but I am determined to find Julia's book and try a few more of her recipes. Reading her autob really makes me more curious about the book and all. I've never seen it and have only heard her enough to mock her, but I've never really experienced the joy of cooking with Julia.

I'll keep you posted along the way as I track down, purchase, read and experiment with Julia's book. I'm sure I'll have more love stories to come!