Yesterday I received another nice package from that terrific company called Amazon (my new best friend), and I got 3 new books which is great because I already ate the two I got last week! I started reading the first one last night and it's really funny and rather cute. Perhaps you've heard of it if you're a blogger- it's the book based on the blog called The Julie/Julia project wherein Julie blogged about her experience of cooking her way through Vol. 1 of Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child. It's an easy read and kept me up well past midnight.
When I got up this morning I had this brilliant idea of taking my copy of this cooking classic off the shelf and trying the first recipe in the book Potage Parmentier (Leek and Potato Soup), just as Julie did. Now I'm sitting here and my house is stinking with the smell of leeks boiling away in the kitchen. I thought I'd cook this while P is away because he doesn't much like potatoes and I know he'd scrunch up his nose at the smell of leeks. The recipe is dead easy- boil some potatoes with a bunch of sliced leeks for 40-50 min and then mash with a fork, add cream and butter and enjoy. I'm waiting now for the 'enjoy' part!
By the way, it's the first time I've ever bought leeks, and the friendly Ferdinand (my local shopkeeper) told me that leeks are called 'PRAS' in Albanian, and that they have a saying "He was caught with a leek in his hand", which translates in English as "He was caught with his hand in the cookie jar!" Imagine that!
Tuesday, October 18, 2005
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7 comments:
Mmmm...leek and potato soup is the BEST. I never had much to do with leeks until I came to Germany, but now I love them. They're so versatile.
That's what I ate last night! Hmm...
Anyway, if you go to Choclate & Zucchini, Clotilde has an idea for a leek salad that I tried and it was wonderful.
Leeks in Italian are porri.
Ah, how it reminds me of my first apartment as a student. I had basic home cooking knowledge, and my roommate knew only two recipes: cheeseburgers and spaghetti carbonara. When shame got the better of him, he found all three volumes of Julia at a garage sale, and then it was my turn to be ashamed. But what a delicious shame!
Well howdy! I had a dickens of the time trying to find you, as your link that you had entered led me to a dead end. Now several days later I figured that its a typo and voila! I add an s to the address and ti ho trovato!!
I love that saying in Albania about the leeks. I'll have to ask my husband if there's something similiar in italian. ;-) Thanks for your kind comments on the blog!
I love potato and leek soup, I am making some autumn soups too. I love the simplicity and the taste of course.
That recipe works even better if you use a blender, and indeed it's a fantastic hearty winter soup.
Albanian language is richer in idioms than any other language I know... (meaning a lot).
Another leek inspired idiom goes like "he flies with a leak up his behind" which means the person is all talk and no work.
P.S. Don't you love how cheap the leaks are in Tirana?
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