Coq au vin.

On Saturday night Michelle and I donned our gingham aprons and decided to try out our first ever Julia Child recipe. Michelle has the cookbook Mastering the Art of French Cooking by Julia Child, and we decided to make her classic Coq au Vin (literally translated to Chicken in Wine).

The recipe was very complicated and involved using every frying pan and saucepan I own. We followed her instructions to the letter, even the part where we boiled, iced, fried, then boiled white onions! It seriously took almost an hour from beginning preparations to serving on the table, but oh it was worth it!

The dish has chicken and bacon - yum!

A printed copy of the recipe...

In the middle of the cooking, we had to flambe! This is when you pour in brandy (or any alcohol) and set it alight! You can see we are exploding with excitement!

A classic French dish, complete with bread, white linen table and French candles.

If you would like to try making this dish yourself, either purchase Julia's book, or visit this link below for the recipe:

http://whatscookingamerica.net/Poultry/CoqAuVin.htm

Sam xox

Home.

I had a bit of a 'homey' day yesterday. I spent the morning writing a job application, and then shared a lovely lunch with Michelle down at our local beach. I love that it is the middle of May but the weather is still warm and sunny enough to spend a day at the beach.

We then went back to her apartment and spent two hours on YouTube watching original Julia Child 'The French Chef' TV episodes - very funny!

I arrived home to find our first delivery from Aussie Farmers Direct. Prada seemed excited about it too.

Lifting the cardboard lid, I was delighted to find this....

Cooked with the potatoes, corn and carrots last night, and they were super fresh! Better than our local supermarket (I swear the stuff our supermarket sells has been frozen for half a year before they put it out for sale)!

Oh, forgot to mention, look at the beautiful Sweet Peas Michelle gave to me! I have had a very difficult week with personal matters, and she knew just what to do to brighten my day. Aren't friends so special like that?

I had fun putting a few stalks into a little vase I picked up at a second hand shop for 50c.

Continuing on with my 'homey' mood, I managed to rope my husband in to spring cleaning our kitchen with me. He was not happy about it at first, but after a while I think he really got into it, re-organising the electrical cords on our appliances, setting up a more functional coffee making area, and generally being the heavy lifter when I wanted big objects moved.

Here is the beautiful clean site that greeted me this morning...

Prada seems impressed with the new setup too but "Get off the bench you filthy thing!" It would appear that I still have some work to do on pet discipline...

Sam xox