Pain de fromage et d’olive
It’s my theory that the recipes found on the back of food packages are worth trying. In fact, Best Recipes, From the backs of Boxes, Bottles, Cans and Jars, by Ceil Dyer, is a cookbook that celebrates just that. Leafing through this 589-page book is a stroll down memory lane. While I no longer whip up Lipton’s California Dip or Hershey’s Fudge Cake, our family holidays would not be complete without a triple batch of Chex Party Mix and a Barcardi Rum Cake.
Grated Comté
Dorie originally spotted this week’s recipe on a card distributed to fromageries throughout France by the Comté cheese producers. After a twist here with a tweak there, our leader adapted their recipe into her own and published Back-of-the-Card Cheese & Olive Bread in Around My French Table.
The ingredients tell a tasty story – tapenade, coarsely grated Comté, chopped oil-cured black olives and grated lemon zest. Toss these together with the usual suspects, flour, baking powder, eggs, milk and olive oil, for a bread loaf that is distinctively different from the usual. Serve it as a pre-dinner nibble with white wine or Champagne, as Dorie suggests, or, with a salad.
This was a perfect addition to a dine-with-your-mind dinner party I attended this week. Our hostess, who had just finished reading Catherine the Great, Portrait of a Woman by Robert Massie invited some friends to choose a monarch, prepare a short presentation about the royal, and make a dinner dish representative of the ruler’s country.
Game on!
A “French Fridays with Dorie” make-up recipe, Dauphinois Pommes (potato gratin)
I choose Eleanor of Aquitaine, the wife of two kings, mother of three kings, and a key political figure of the Middle Ages/twelfth century. Since my hostess asked me to bring a side dish, this was a perfect opportunity to also make Dorie’s Pommes Dauphinois (pages 360-361), a potato gratin made before my joining French Fridays with Dorie and arguably the most traditional potato dish in France. What’s not delicious about heavy cream, russet potatoes and Gruyère? Caloric? Yes. Artery-clogging? You bet. But, delicious.
A salute to five centuries of female monarchs: the baubles tossed on the table were genuine. The diamond tiara holding the flowers was on loan from the Tower of London.
Mind-dining is fun. We each learned much we didn’t know about Eleanor (1122-1204), and also, Queen Isabella of Spain (1451-1504); Mary, Queen of Scots (1542-1587); Catherine the Great, (1729-1796); Queen Victoria (1819-1901); and, Queen Elena of Italy (1873-1952). As you see in the picture, we also had fun, each of us was crowned with the diamond tiara when we presented our monarch and our recipe.
Whoops! We needed a bathroom break. Francine, who is ready to dish on Queen Victoria and dessert (Frambroisie St. George) waits patiently (#%@&%).
Although our hostess assigned us specific courses, we did not coordinate our evening’s menu. To our surprise every course from the antipasto platter to the salmon to the dessert, Framboises St. George, meshed together beautifully. Because so much thought was put into this dinner by each of us, the evening translated into a very special gathering that I might urge you each to try.
Today, Friday the 14th, the 31st Aspen Food & Wine Classic begins. I’ll be sharing it with you next week. Dorie recently mentioned on her Facebook page that her company, Beurre & Sel, shipped 2750 cookies to Aspen for this event. I think, it’s just my guess, that Kobrand Wine & Spirits is going to serve her cookies with their products. Although it’s not official, I understand that Ms. Greenspan is also going to be in town. Stay tuned…………
The two recipes featured this week can be found here (Pommes Dauphinois) and here (Pain de fromage et d’olive). To see what my colleagues created this week, go here.
Beautifully written Eleanor. As one who shared the evening (Queen Elena) it was a brain food event. No empty mind candy for this group of surrogate royals who rose to the occasion.
We must thank Donna/Catherine for her vision….
Hear! Hear!
That. Sounds like a fun evening. Your monarch choices sound like the content of most of my senior year(s) of college (Middle European history major) 🙂
And I love those potatoes – they have been remade many times in our house.
Have a great weekend!
What a fun evening with fun friends!
Great reminder that many of the classic recipes were first published on the back of a box. I think I’ve made all of the ones you mentioned at some point or another.
And this is the first I’ve heard of “mind dining”. Sounds like fun!
Your party looks like it was a smashing success…hope the potatoes survived the drive! And I remember all those tents in the park when the Food and Wine Festival was in Aspen…I think my mom would walk the streets, looking for celebrity chefs…but that was before FoodTV made so many of them household names/faces! I can’t wait to hear about the food demos…and if you caught sight of Dorie. Such fun!
PS…your loaf looks perfect.
This was lovely bread. Best Recipes sounds like am interesting cookbook. Love the photos from your dinner party!
What a fantastic dinner party! I love the concept!
Both your dishes look amazing.
Love the photos 🙂
Mary, what a wonderful theme for a party – this looks like it was so much fun (and some history lessons too) – I like parties with a theme but I think peolple/guests are not really into that around here, unfortunately becuase this all sounds like you all enjoyed a wonderful evening together! Your pommes dauphinoise and your olive and cheese bread both look fabulous and delicious! I am sure that you will have a terrific time at the Aspen Food and Wine Festival, I have read a lot about this food fest, it certainly looks like a festival I would attend if I were in the neighbourhood! Enjoy and have lots of great food and fun!
That sounds like a fun dinner party with a great menu. I can’t wait to hear about the Food
and Wine classic, I’m sure it will be an adventure. Both your olive bread and those potatoes look so delicious. Hubby is always asking for a scalloped potato dish so I am definitely going to look
up that recipe and try to make it. Have a great weekend.
Fabulous idea for a party… off the top of my head I was always found of Queen Elizabeth I but English food… not very found of..hmm. I feel like I’ve missed out an American tradition of making recipes off of the backs of boxes… Italians just don’t do that and any way I don’t think my grandmother, who I did the most cooking with, could read English enough to even make a Lipton onion soup dip. Really, fun,,, please tell me more about Mario when you get a chance.
I really shouldn’t poo poo recipes found on boxes or cards. They just make me think of the worst of my grandmother’s cooking and, of course, Ritz mock apple pie. I do have that recipe somewhere…perhaps I should make it? Anyway, these look great! Also, you could not have known this but I am a HUGE Eleanor junkie. Huge. Fell in love with her in college. Wouldn’t SHE be a great dinner guest? 🙂
I don’t think it’s a party without California Dip. I love the idea of mind-dining. What fun! The potatoes you brought are one of my favorite recipes in the book. Can’t wait to hear about the F&W Classic and whether you’ll meet Dorie. Have a great time.
Wow Mary! Your friends are much more inventive and ambitious than mine:) Sounds like a fun evening but its make me giggle to think of planning an event like this and telling my friends what they are supposed to do. It might be a party of one! You cracked me up with your comment on my blog about Mississippi! My husband and I are from Memphis and also lived in Columbus, Mississippi for a few years so the deep south is someplace we are comfortable. Of all the places I’ve lived Mississippi was my favorite. I loved the people. We had so many fun and funny experiences there. My friend is from Mississippi. She’s been gone for almost 40 years and wants to see if Thomas Wolfe was right about not being able to go home again! I’ll be looking forward to your post about the Aspen Food and Wine Classic and Dorie and her cookies! Also glad to hear the fires in CO are coming under control!
Oooh, not like I need another cookbook but Best recipes sounds intriguing! What a FUn event you had and all that Dorie yumminess to boot? Excellent!
What a fantastic idea and theme for a dinner party! I will definitely try it! I will be looking forward for your post about the Aspen Food & Wine Classic. I hope that I will be able to attend it sometime in my life!!!
OMG, Eleanor of Aquitaine, one of my favorite ever since I read the whole series of Accursed Kings when I was 15. I love Gratin dauphinoise almost as much…jaja
That party is an excellent idea Mary, and I insist you have the best neighbours everywhere, which is probably because you`re such a great person. Lovely bread!
Paula, I am very fortunate, lucky, really, with my friends and neighbors. Remember the good neighbors I had in Henderson?
Fantastic looking loaf!
how on earth were you able to loan a tiara from England??? thats crazy! what a neat party though! 🙂 your bread looks good too *wink*
My hostess knows the Queen. It was no problem.
Comté and olives! sounds rich indeed, so good that you shared at a royal party! actually, looks like loads of fun and the menu came together too. hope you enjoyed Aspen F&W; can’t wait to hear about it!
What a fun idea for a dinner party! You have such a fun, interesting group of friends! I’m looking forward to hearing more about the Aspen Food and Wine Classic. It sounds like such a fun event.
Your dinner party sounds like such a fun evening! What a great idea! Your bread and Pommes Dauphinois look fantastic! And I love the table setting!
How nice of the Queen to loan you the tiara! Have a great weekend!