Vegetable galette! Yum!!

Silpin Silicon Rolling pin

OK, admittedly, it has been awhile, and I have stored up some great food memories to record. If only I can remember all the pertinent details! So I guess I'll start with the most recent! I have always been intimidated about pastry. My grandmother was a fairly lousy cook--being British and all-- but she made flaky, melt-in-your-mouth pie crusts. I did get her recipe and I tried. Combination of lard and butter.

But the harder I tried, the more leaden my crusts. I just didn't get it. I watched videos and read Julia's bible. But to no avail. Until today. First I got a super-duper rolling pin from Marsha for Christmas. Then, Ray gave me a subscription to Cooks Illustrated. Cooks Illustrated is a text-laden and glossy photo-free magazine for geeky science cooks. Like me! The article on making galettes explained my pastry woes in a comprehensible and fascinating way. And even though I did not (or could not) follow every step perfectly, my leek and mushroom galette was far superior to any pastry I have made.

The recipe called for gorgonzola, but although I am pretty much a fan of the general category of blue cheese, my last experience of spinach and gorgonzola ravioli from my beloved Venda Ravioli in Providence was not great. Bitter, to say the least, and the cheese did not marry well with the spinach or the sauce. So I substituted gruyère. I used far fewer mushrooms than indicated, and I used more leeks. I didn't measure the crème fraiche or the mustard, but other than that I tried to follow the recipe. The key is in leaving big chunks of butter unblended and not over-incorporating the water. Letting the dough rest allows the water to soak in without breaking down the little globs of butter that will eventually make the pastry flaky. At least that's the theory. Probably my globs were a little too big. And I didn't let it rest quite long enough. When Ray breezed through the kitchen I was my typical snarly I-suck-at-making-pastry self. He headed straight to the man cave. Wisely. But although I did struggle with the folding and the rolling again process, the result was amazing. The pastry recipe, which will eventually appear below, has a little whole wheat flour for crunch and body, a little sugar and a little vinegar. The presence of each ingredient was carefully explained. Of course I don't remember much except the butter and water part. But it did hold up the to the vegetable filling and was flaky and crunchy and, oh yes, very pretty when the whole thing came out of the oven. In our younger days, we would have served this as an appetizer, but these days we don't quite have the capacity, so with a glass of Campuget and a nice little salad, we were ready to say. "Bon appétit!"