Dîner avec des amis! c’était délicieux!
I’ve been wanting to do a Fall French dinner for friends and I wanted my southern influence to be a part of the meal. What better time than in the middle of Round Top’s Fall Antique Show. (WARNING: Long Read)
From the beginning I knew I wanted to make duck confit and my southern twist was going to be the parmesan stone ground grits.
A French 75 made with Empress Gin had to be the cocktail for the ladies and my husband came up with a Southern Manhattan cocktail for the guys. To go with those cocktails I simply used a box or two of Boursin cheese and stuffed it into two tiny pumpkins that I had removed the tops and scooped out the seeds. I drizzled the two pumpkins with some honey and inserted a couple of sage leaves in the top and served this with some sliced fresh figs, assorted crackers and some pistachio nuts and served this on my beautiful Woodlab board. I even bruleed a few fig slices to try with the cheese. “délicieux”.
I went back and forth on the appetizer (“First Taste”) which I wanted to serve as a first course. It was either going to be a mushroom tart or escargot. The escargot was not going to be your ordinary run of the mill escargot; this one had snails, lobster and shrimp. Instead of using French bread to dip into the garlicky/wine butter that melted all over the dishes I baked some puff pastry circles to put on top of each well on the dish. The escargot won over the mushroom turnover. This turned out very nice but timing that with the duck confit was a little stressful.
(I said it was long.) I’m posting the escargot recipe next week.
The salad course was mixed greens, blood orange, rosemary Marcona almonds, cucumber and avocado. I used a lemon vinaigrette dressing and then topped with roquefort cheese which I forgot to add while plating salads but quickly passed the bowl for everyone to help themselves. My bread had a southern influence (cornbread) but made in madeline pans. Cornbread with lots of soft European style butter — the best.
So, to the duck. I had been stressing all week on getting the duck skin crispy. I watched hundreds (not really) of YouTube videos and even listened to my new AI friend for suggestions. First the duck was salted/spiced and refrigerated for two days then totally covered in duck fat. I used 5 jars of duck fat and in the end I had 7 jars of duck fat after baking for three hours in the oven. The duck sat covered in it’s own fat for 4 days before it’s time to show up for the meal. The fat got wiped off the duck leg quarters. Baking the duck in the oven at a high temp did the trick of crisping the skin even though with the other courses being served prior to duck’s appearance it probably overcooked a little. Next time I would probably skip the escargot course since it put the duck in the oven a little longer than it should have been. The skin was delicious, nicely browned and beautifully crisp.
The duck leg/thigh was served on top of the creamy parmesan grits with a sour cherry sauce and my southern touch for the “greens” on the plate was sauteed red chard and blistered tomatoes with Herbs de Provence.
Dessert was a profiteroles with chocolate sauce with raspberry garnish. I’ve been making this same profiterole recipe from one of my first cookbooks I bought as a newlywed –Good Housekeeping.
We had plenty of wine being pass about the table and one friend brought some of his homemade Syrah which was delicious with the duck.
What a truly delightful evening it was — filled with laughter, good friends, lively conversation, and a table full of French/Southern-inspired dishes and flowing wine. The evening was everything I love about gathering around the table
jusqu'à ce qu'on se retrouve à ma table. BLAST FROM THE PAST: Fromage Fort is an appetizer you need to try if you have a lot of leftover cheeses in your refrigerator.The beautiful Lobster, Shrimp, Snail Escargot.
My table. Menus beside each plate, French lavender and some southern cotton were party of my table decor.
To begin I used my favorite board from Woodlab to serve the Boursin cheese stuffed pumpkins, crackers, nuts and fresh figs.
Cornbread baked in madeline shapes.
Profiterole filled with pastry cream and surrounded by chocolate sauce and fresh raspberries.
Take home treats of macarons. (I have to say even though I have made macarons before, I did not those.) My good friend Marhsall's provided them.
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