Are any of you hooked on The Canal House? Have Melissa Hamilton and Christopher Hirsheimer (no relation) reeled you into their culinary world? Each weekday I receive an e-mail, accompanied by the most gorgeously enticing photograph, describing these ladies’ lunches.
This week’s recipe, Cheating-on-Winter Pea Soup, pairs perfectly with cornbread slathered in honey and Black Mountain Vineyard’s Pinot Noir.
MEH?
Absolutely not. Check out Canal House Cooks Lunch and get back to me on that.
This week’s French Fridays with Dorie recipe choice, Cheating-on-Winter Pea Soup, presented the perfect opportunity for me to play house like Melissa and Christopher. I returned to Nevada last weekend, after spending the week in Colorado organizing my March move. So, for the next month, most of my days are revolving around sorting and tossing and donating and selling and packing and not having any fun at all. (Okay, that last part is a fib.)
As you can tell from the Mise en Place, The ingredients for this simple soup are probably already in your pantry, refridgerator or freezer.
So, for Lent, instead of giving up something, I’ve promised myself I will stop each day and make a nice, nutritious lunch. Nothing fancy. Nothing difficult. Just lunch. A catch-up-with-yourself moment. And, thanks to Dorie, Thursday’s lunch was quickly created and delicious.
“The soup, made in about 15 minutes, is the liquid version of a classic French dish, peas with lettuce and onions,” Dorie explains.
Everything in this soup was already in my cupboard and fridge – no last-minute trips to the grocery store. The bag of frozen peas, found at the back of my freezer, were just begging for attention. I melted some butter to soften the coarsely chopped onion. After seasoning, I poured in the chicken broth, bringing it to a boil. Then I added the peas and the trimmed, sliced romaine lettuce to the broth, asking it all to simmer while I made corn bread.
Warm Corn Bread is always a treat. Drip a little honey on top, even better. This was a perfect opportunity to sweeten up my lunch menu.
Don’t you think corn bread slathered with honey goes well with just about anything? I decided to go all Pioneer Woman and make it in my cast iron skillet. Just loved smelling the aroma while I pureed the soup in my blender. Because I wanted a smooth, silky texture, I then strained it. Rather than garnish my pea soup, I browned and added some pancetta bits before adding a dash more of pepper. A civilized, tasty meal break during a busy day.
PART TWO: COEUR À LA CRÈME
The End of the Story: For last week’s FFWD recipe dessert, we made Coeur à la Crème, and I used Dorie’s recipe as well as the Barefoot Contessa’s (Ina Garten) for my two Coeurs. Both desserts were admired and willingly devoured, calories be damned. Because Dorie’s Coeur was refrigerated for three days, Ina’s, only 24 hours, it was firmer. I preferred that. Otherwise, the two complemented each other and we noticed little difference.
Admittedly, my friends would rather cook than pose but they indulged me for the sake of FFWD. Charlotte (l), is smiling, kinda, but worried about her garlic burning (it didn’t). DonnaG (middle), our always generous hostess, helped me make the dessert. DonnaC’s, (r), task was to add the panache to DonnaG’s and my Coeur à la Crèmes. As you will see, that lady can work wonders with raspberry coulis.
THE MOHAIR MOMENT.
Our hostess pulled out some special plates, beautiful heirlooms from her family, for serving and to honor this special dessert.
It took a village to produce these two Coeur à la Crèmes but aren’t they pretty? Note the bow (r) which DonnaC recycled from our earlier present exchange.
“If you really want to make a friend, go to someone’s house and eat with him… the people who give you their food give you their heart.” Cesar Chavez
To see what’s cooking with the other Dorista’s, go to our French Fridays with Dorie link. .
You seem to have everything so organized, which I know you love Mary! Glad to know it´s all going smooth with your move. That cornbread, and with honey, is my favorite part of this post. Very nice party coeurs a la creme to share with friends! And they all contributed, so it´s extra nice. Have a great weekend my friend.
Wonderful post! I have a Canal House cookbook and had forgotten about it until you mentioned it – I just found them on FB.
Next Friday will be something special!
It certainly was a quick soup, good for lunch.
so great to have this dinner party immortalized on the internet. I also want to make the pea soup. We are getting more snow and I have to hike the Highlands Bowl tomorrow!!!Yikes.
Michael McClain says:
As nearly as I can judge, my recent weight gain of 1 1/2 lbs. is due entirely to your dessert. Thanks for sharing.
Mary – I strongly believe that you could make fun out of any task. But, wow, moving is a big job – hang in there!
Glad to see your soup and your hearts both came out so beautifully.
I love the photos from your ladies catchup – made me smile. And those two desserts – be still my beating heart! Your soup looks cosy with its cornbread accompaniment.
Those coeur à la crème came our really great!! And the soup looks good too!
Blanca O’Leary says:
I especially loved your Cesar Chavez quote, so beautiful and true. Gives new meaning to Cesar’s photo in our kitchen!
Will you make the Creme Heart here sometime? I will never make it, but would love to taste it!
Also, be sure to pack up on frozen butternut squash, there is none even in EL Jebel!!!
come prepared to enter pioneer land again!!!
thanks again for posting!!
xooxox
Blanca
I am totally hooked on my Canal House Cooks Lunch emails. Usually they arrive around dinnertime, making me hungry for my next meal. They eat better than anyone I know. I love the way you decorated your coeurs. So very festive.
Best of luck on the moving. I so dread the next time I have to do that. I’ve been trying to get rid of/organize stuff lately, but I have so far to go. I know it’s not easy, especially with a deadline.
Have a great weekend!
Mary, Just loved this post! I actually wrote a post about Melissa Hamilton and Christopher Hirsheimer when I was doing the series on Gourmets 50 Women Game Changers. The Canal House is in New Hope Pa. One of my favorite places to visit!
Your pea soup looks like the perfect lunch with your beautiful cornbread! Love how pretty your table looks! Your coeur a la cremes are magnificent….so very pretty with the raspberry coulis drizzled over them!
Mary, Just a comment to the message you left me…It has been raining for several days and pretty cold for Florida…I won’t have to worry about a suntan! However, there is no snow, and we get outdoors everyday and walk. Bill has even gotten out to play a round of golf.
Thanks for getting me in the loop…I need to get those Canal House emails 🙂 You’re right about my prosciutto garnish…I had to wedge it under the creme fraiche to keep it elevated. I never thought to do one of those photography filler tricks beforehand, so that worked nicely. I love to cook with my friends…and looks like you have some dear ones, too. I think I need to pretend I am moving and shovel out all the stuff I’ve tucked away in our basement :/ Hope you have a wonderful weekend, my friend.
This was a delicious and quick soup. Both of your dishes look lovely. Hope you have a good weekend.
Your soup looks delicious. It was nice to have a recipe that came together quickly and didn’t require a treasure hunt:) Cornbread makes everything better! I went all Pioneer Woman last week and used my cast iron skillet to make corn bread and it stuck!!! So I reseason the pan and make corn bread again the next day…and it stuck!!! I don’t know what happened to my old cast iron skillet but its on the stove glaring at me! Your coeur la cremes are gorgeous. Good luck on your move Mary! It must be bittersweet….
I love that quote from Cesar Chavez. Your coeurs are stunning, Mary. What a wonderful dinner you must have had! So glad that you enjoyed this soup. John has also been eating it with cornbread. Cornbread just goes so well with soup and chili. I hope you have a great weekend.
Mmm, warm cornbread IS always a treat! It looks fantastic, and I bet it did go well with the soup (which also looks fantastic, but cornbread is a weakness of mine, and it attracted nearly all my attention). The cream hearts also look spectacular and delicious and now I want to eat it all over again. Lovely work, Mary!
Well I am in love of course with those plates and bowls! I love stuff like that! Thanks for the tip on Canal House. I think I will enjoy that site and photography.
Mary, first of all, your cornbread together with the soup looks wonderful, love the “French presentation” – I have to get a new cast iron skillet, there are hard to come by in EU and I have not used one in ages but I love the way you can use them to cook and bake. The two versions of your Coeur à la Crème look stunning, the raspberry coulis and the fresh raspberries much have been so good with that creamy dessert (s). Then there is your wonderful Valentine cards that are still gracing the wall of our living room, we were all so very happy and thankful to receive them and have written you a Thank You letter (now that I read that you are back in Nevada, I will to re-address the letter…) – I love love the idea of your project to visit and write about the Presidential Libraries, I cannot wait for your “tour” to start. And lastly, I want to apologize for commenting so very late, hubby was “putting together a film” on the weekend for his school and I could not even get into the vicinity of any computer…
Have a good week – filled with light lunches and a healthy dose of fun!
I love how you decorated your hearts! So pretty!
Oh, I so enjoyed this post. I wanted to see the coeur a la creme party and it didn’t disappoint. And I did chuckle at the “mohair moment”. Hilarious. Nana surprised me this week by getting me a set of 6 individual little heart molds for the coeur. Yep- it was a huge hit in our house even though I made a “bombe” a la the colander. I think the individual servings will show me how much I am actually SUPPOSED to eat in one sitting 🙂 Speaking of gifts- last year I was in a Wms Sonoma outlet outside of DC and came upon the Canal House series. Linen bound hardcover books- I kid you not I think they were like $3.99 each or something ridiculous. Of course I gifted Nana with all volumes after I got a set for myself. We used to live not far from the Canal House in central NJ so the ladies and their business are very interesting to us. Lambertville is such a special town. Come spring I am going to road trip with Nana- perhaps they will have a Canal House event (doubtful) but we will have fun regardless. And yes, great soup :)My expectations were pretty low since I am not a fan of peas. I liked this but will go for a thicker version next time. Dorie definitely inspired me to play around with more soups as this was truly easy and hard for me to rationalize not having time to knock out. Apologize for the late comment- I had too much fun running around seeing the Barefoot Contessa and cooking and ended up with a miserable cold (but it was worth it).
Both you and Kathy have talked about being near or at The Canal House It’s on my List for the future.
I love the Canal House approach to food and I love that your presentation of this soup is an homage to them and to France. I’m eating the next soup on our roster, after just having finished the post for this week’s chicken and finally looking at everyone’s pea soup posts.
Though your presentation for the pea soup is lovely, I think the prize goes to your two coeurs! They turned out beautifully. It’s especially lovely that you shared them with friends.