Friday, April 23, 2010

the test kitchen: tomato mustard pie (a french savory tart)

i was bored with my usual food ideas and i tend to add at least one new recipe per grocery shop. this time around it's french food, specifically this interesting looking concoction from recipezaar.
now this seems to entail first making the french mustard and letting it mellow in the fridge overnight. i have no idea where to get tarragon vinegar so we'll use white instead and add, um... i have no tarragon. ok google, what does tarragon taste like? kind of like anise? but i hate anise. ok so what else might work? people say basil has a slightly anise-y flavor. i don't think so but that's ok. maybe we'll go with a bit of that and a bit of....rosemary? sure, why not. first i need to do something about this mess of a kitchen. will check back later.

the mustard was easier then i thought it would be. it's cooling now. smells mostly like vinegar right now so we'll see in the morning.

right, so that's just a big pile of bitter. even with added sugar and salt and stuff it's just nothing but bitter. i may have damaged my tongue. i think i'll use half regular mustard and half good dijon instead.

and 6 tomatoes don't fit in a pie crust you silly people! how small are your tomatoes? how big are your pie dishes? i squeezed in 3 and now i have a ton of sliced tomato to use up before it goes bad. that really is a *lot* of mustard. i hope to hell they're right and it changes as it cooks or this is going to be really "interesting". at least it smells good cooking. i let it cook a little longer then called for to let all that mustard mellow and had to drain off a lot of liquid after cooking but probably because it's april and tomatoes are out of season. the mustard did mellow out but it's still a lot. half a cup of mustard in one pie? it has no other flavor at all. this is food but only just. i'm beginning to think i just don't like french cooking.

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