Thursday, November 15, 2012

White Pizza

Hey there.  I know, I'm not posting as much as I used to.  There's not much to say, I could go on diatribes against the French Government...there is a lot to say about it.  But my blog is supposed to be light and enjoyable to read right?

So on to the real subject of this post : Pizza!  

Before coming to France, I've never done a pizza from scratch.  I learned that from my MIL.  My in-laws had a huge garden, with tomatos full of sun and they were so sweet.  The tomato sauce was a delight.  My MIL used a store-bought kit (Pâte à pizza F.r.a.n.c.i.n.e) to make the dough.  When you read the ingredients: wheat flour, vegetable oil and yeast, for more than 2 euros!  Ridiculous when you think about it.  A pack of flour is only 0,60 euros and dry yeast isn't expensive either.

So about the white pizza, I never really had one before arriving here.  French love their pizza with "chèvre" (goat cheese) and other stinky cheeses.  Some even have potatoes on it.  The crusts may be thin but the toppings are quite heavy.



The Dough (yields 2 medium size crusts, thin ones)

300g of flour
150 ml of lukewarm water
30g of vegetable or olive oil
7g of sugar
8g of dry yeast
pinch of salt


In the warm water, dissolve the dry yeast.  The water must not be too hot otherwise the yeast will no longer be active.
In a mixer (food processor) put the flour, and the water-yeast mixture, add the oil, sugar and salt and start pulsing.  Pulse until it makes a nice ball of dough.  Of course, if you don't have a food processor or mixer, you can kneel the dough by hand for about 10 minutes.

Let the dough rest for 1 hour.  Cut the dough in half and roll with a rolling pin and scretch the dough on a pizza pan.

White pizza topping
Instead of the tomato sauce, you put sour cream (crème fraîche).  Add your favorite cheese and vegetables and meat.

Making your own pizzas is satisfying.  You choose your own toppings and it is really cheap to make.  I would say less than 2 euros for each.  Making your own pizza dough is not difficult at all and doesn't take forever to make.

Enjoy!




Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Totally Forgot about the candies for the Trick or Treaters

I totally forgot about the candies! our little neighbour rang this evening and we didn't have any treats to give him and his friend. I gave some business pens.  How can I forget!? all the anglophone blogosphere is about Halloween.  

In my defence we don't really celebrate Halloween here, only la Toussaint (All saints), which is on November 1st.  They even have a day off tomorrow.  And lucky for the Frenchies the Holiday falls on Thursday and this is their opportunity to get Friday off as well, so a 4 day weekend.  Gosh! so of course, all the highways will be jam-packed tomorrow, they all heading South of France.  As for us, we will be going to the Netherlands.  Since we are d trying to save up for our trip to South East Asia this December, we won't be going anywhere too far this time around.

Happy  Halloween!.  Make sure to donate to Unicef and stock up on treats!

Monday, October 15, 2012

Brioche aux pommes

We drove by every week near an apple orchard.  I have always enjoyed fresh apples, I don't eat them off season.  I bought 3 kg of cox apples from the orchard but they weren't really good, but they are fine for cooking.  I miss the lobos and Mc Intosh from Canada.

I've done a batch of rolled brioche with those apples.   I was tired of making tarts. 



You must try this!

Have a great week!

Monday, October 8, 2012

Guess who's back?




I've been a bad blogger.  I just don't have anything "blog worthy" to write about.  October has arrived without notice.  We had some pretty warm days a few weeks ago, but now it's raining all the time.  Since we are working on roofs, it is hard to work without being annoyed by the bad weather.

On a totally unrelated subject, two of the male cats are back at the farm.  The "hot" season is gone, and there's no more female cats to chase.  They could disappear all summer long.  They come and they go, I have to let them be.


                                Toby!  I wonder who's feeding him when he's off for 2 months.

Now on the the last subject, I've been scrutinizing the web for months now, to get the best rate for 2 tickets for Thailand.  The prices are pretty steady since May, so I had to buy them on October, or the prices will go up just before Christmas.  It's gonna be a long ride, 11 hours of flight.  I won't be sticking around Bangkok for long, my real destination is going to be my birthplace : C.a.m.b.o.d.i.a!!! I haven't returned since I left 34 years ago.  I'm sure it's going to be an emotional journey.  We'll be going at the end of December, so for now, we must save up every little penny!  

 I wonder if it's necessary to get some vaccines before going there? if anyone has an answer please let me know.



             

Monday, September 24, 2012

Festival de la bière artisanale

As I have already mentioned before, I live in the French Flanders, in the North Region.  We are very close to the Belgian border, so beer is part of the culture.  We didn't have much to do on a Saturday, so we went to beer festival at 2 km from our village.  The weather was nice and warm so it was really pleasant.

Festival de la bière artisanale, Micro brew beer Festival, at Ste-Marie Cappel, France
Houblons in French, Hop flower
 Hop vines are hung all over the village for the festival
Hop flowers, it really smells like beer
 
 Hmm fries!  To sponge off the beer you need fries.
                                                                  Municipal garden at Ste-Marie-Cappel

The festival was well organized.  We had to buy a small beer glass and we got 3 vouchers for 5 euros, you get to taste 3 micro brew beers from producers.  So people would not get drunk.  I shared the glass, I'm not a beer fan, but overall I really enjoyed it.