I love baking and cooking, so Banquet of Lies was a lot of fun for me to write. I can promise that I’ve made all the recipes in this book, and they are delicious. If you’d like to try them, and let me know how they turned out, please do! I can be contacted through the Contact form on my website, or you can connect with me on twitter or Facebook. Happy baking! (Cup measurements are given for the metric-system challenged.) 😉

Reine Claude

I stayed in France with a really wonderful family many years ago, just outside Paris, and they had a Reine Claude tree in their garden. I ate homemade Reine Claude and brioche almost every morning of the month I lived with them, and you can tell from some of the reactions of the characters in Banquet of Lies how much I loved it!

Reine Claude (Greengage plum) Jam

One part sugar to two parts Reine Claude / Greengages
(1kg / 2 pounds sugar to 2kg / 4 pounds Reine Claude is a good amount)
2 vanilla beans

Put a small plate in the freezer. Remove the pits from the greengages, then chop roughly. Add them to a pot with the sugar and then split open the vanilla beans and scrape in the seeds. Throw the vanilla pods into the pot as well. Add the juice of a lemon for a more tart flavour, if you like.

Stir in the sugar, making sure it is dissolved before bringing to the boil. Then allow to simmer until the mixture becomes thick. Test for readiness by placing a small amount on the cold plate from the freezer. If the mixture forms a skin when you run a finger through it, it’s ready. Pour into sterilized jars.

Brioche

My recipe for brioche comes from French chef Emmanuel Mollois’s Et Voila! I have been to a cooking workshop run by him at the University of Western Australia, and he is truly a master pastry chef, with a very keen interest in where the recipes come from and how long they’ve been around. According to him, recipes for brioche can be traced back as far as 1404.

Ingredients:

500g (4 cups) plain flour
3 tsp dry yeast
200ml (2/3 cup plus 2 Tablespoons) lukewarm full cream milk
1 egg yolk
65g (1/4 cup + 2 tsp) sugar
1 tsp salt
2 eggs
250g (2 cups) unsalted butter (softened to room temperature)
egg wash (1 egg and 1 egg yolk, beaten with 50ml (3 Tablespoons plus one teaspoon) milk)

Method:

Put the flour into a bowl, making a well in the centre and add the yeast and about 1/3 of the milk. Add the sugar and salt and then add the eggs one at a time, mixing after each addition, and then alternating with adding the extra milk.

Mix on low speed, until you have a smooth, elastic dough (about 10 minutes in total).

Add the butter a tablespoon at a time on medium speed, making sure it is completely incorporated before adding the next amount.

Flour a work surface and then bang the dough hard onto it 5 or 6 times, then put it in a bowl and cover with a tea towel. Leave to rise in a warm room for an hour. Take it out and bang it again a few times until its back to it’s original size. Cover in plastic wrap and put in the fridge overnight.

Preheat the oven to 200 deg C (392 deg F) and lightly grease brioche moulds or muffin tins. Divide the brioche dough into ten pieces and place them in moulds. Leave to rise, uncovered in a warm room, for about 25 minutes. Brush with egg wash and then bake for about 10 mins. Take them out the oven and turn them upside down (careful of burning yourself!) and then put them back in at a reduced heat of 100 deg C (356 deg F), for a few minutes. Don’t overbake these, as they are most delicious moist, not dry.

Courgette & Almond Soup

(There are a few variations of this recipe floating around, but I first encountered it in the Avoca Café Cookbook. It is subtle, elegant and sophisticated.)

Ingredients

50g (one quarter of a cup) butter
1 onion, peeled and chopped
1 potato, peeled and chopped
600ml (two and a half cups) veg stock
3 courgettes, finely chopped
25g (one eighth of a cup) ground almonds
125ml (half a cup) double cream, plus extra to serve (I use single cream with no ill-effects)
125ml (half a cup) milk
Flaked almonds to serve

Melt the butter in a large pan, add the onion and potato and cook over a very low heat for 5 mins. Add the stock, bring to the boil, then reduce the heat and simmer for 20 mins or until the potato is cooked. Add the courgettes, bring back to the boil and simmer for 5 mins. As soon as the courgettes are cooked, remove the pan from the heat and stir in the almonds, cream and milk. Purée with a hand-held blender or in a liquidizer, then reheat gently and season to taste. You can garnish this with some flaked almonds and cream, if you like.

French Onion Soup

There are so many variations of this recipe — it’s a classic for a good reason. The one I make most often is from Ainsley Harriot’s Gourmet Express, because it is fast and delicious.

Ingredients (enough for 2)

50g (2 oz) butter
3 large Spanish onions
1 Tsp caster sugar
2 garlic cloves
150ml (1/4 pint) dry white wine
600ml (1 pint) hot fresh chicken or vegetable stock
1 Tsp Worchestershire sauce
1 small baguette
100g (4oz) Gruyère, finely grated
salt and pepper to taste

Method:

1) Slice the onions and add them to a saucepan with the melted butter. Sprinkle over the sugar and cook on a high heat for 10-15 mins, stirring frequently. Your onions should go a caramel brown colour. Add garlic and cook for a minute.

2) Add the wine and cook vigorously for 1-2 minutes. Stir in the hot stock and Worchestershire sauce, bring to the boil and then let simmer for 15-20 minutes until the onions are tender.

3) Pre-heat the grill to high. Cut four diagonal slices of baguette and grill for 1-2 min on each side. Reduce grill to medium.

4) Pile the cheese on top of the toast and place under grill until bubbling and golden.

5) Using a slotted spoon, divide the onion between the two bowls, place the baguette slices on top of the onions and then ladle over the hot soup.

Lamb & Artichoke Stew

This recipe comes from one of my favorite French cook books, The Beautiful Provence Cookbook. I’ve made just about every recipe in this book, and they are all wonderful, but my copy always falls open on the page with this recipe on it. I can’t think why . . .

Ingredients:

3 Tablespoons olive oil
1 slice lean salt pork (salted but not smoked bacon), about 100g (3 oz) cut into small strips
1.5kg (3 pounds) boned lamb shoulder, trimmed of fat and cut into 4cm (2 inch) pieces
salt
1 large tomato, peeled, seeded and coarsely chopped
4 cloves garlic, crushed
1 cup white wine
bouquet garni
4 young, tender artichokes, trimmed, quartered and chokes removed if necessary
250g (1/2 pound) pickling onion
(Baby new potatoes, if you like, to add 10 minutes before the end, or you could serve this with pilaf, noodles or potatoes in a separate dish)
(Serves 4)

Method:

1) Warm 2 Tbsp of olive oil in a heavy sauté pan over medium heat. Add salted pork and sauté until coloured on all sides (10 mins). Set aside. Add lamb pieces to the pan, sprinkle with salt, and sauté for 20 mins.

2) Drain liquid from pan, then add tomato, garlic, white wine and raise the heat. Stir and scrape the pan bottom with a wooden spoon to dissolve any browned bits. Add the bouquet garni, reduce the heat to low, cover and simmer gently for 1 hour.

3) Meanwhile, warm 1 Tbsp olive oil in a large flameproof casserole over low heat. Add the artichokes and the onions and salt lightly. Cover and sweat over very gentle heat, shaking the pan from time to time, for 20 minutes. Add the pork you set asied earlier and pour in the contents of the sauté pan. Cover and continue to simmer over very low heat until the artichokes and the meat are tender – another 20-30 minutes.

Beef Bourguignon

This is a classic for very good reason. There are literally thousands of variations of this recipe out there. I use French-born (now Australian) chef Guillaume Brahimi’s one.

Ingredients:

125 ml (½ cup) extra virgin olive oil
1 kg (2 pounds) beef (preferably wagyu but any braising beef, such as rump, topside or chuck steak is fine), cut into large chunks
2 carrots, halved lengthwise and sliced
2 celery stalks with leaves, halved lengthwise and sliced
1 leek, halved lengthwise and sliced
1 onion, chopped
5 French shallots, halved
10 thyme sprigs
7 bay leaves
300 g speck (bacon), diced
500 ml (2 cups) red wine, boiled briefly to reduce acidity
salt and pepper
300 g button mushrooms
1 bunch flat-leaf parsley, chopped
Carrot puree (made from 5 carrots, chopped)
salt

Method:

1) Heat the oil in a large heavy-based saucepan over medium–high heat. Brown the beef in batches. Remove the final batch of beef from the pan, leaving the oil, and add the carrot, celery, leek, onion and shallots. Sauté for 5–8 minutes.

2) Place the beef and vegetables in a large baking dish. Stir in the thyme, bay leaves and speck. Pour over the red wine, season with salt and pepper and cover with a lid. Bring to the boil then reduce the heat to very low and cook for 40 minutes.

3) Meanwhile, prepare the carrot puree by boiling the carrots with salt until just soft. Puree.

4) Add the mushrooms and carrot puree to the bourguignon and cook for a further 10 minutes. Sprinkle with the parsley.

5) Serve the bourguignon with the starch of your choice.

Crème Brûlée

This is always a favorite in my house. It is simple to make and wonderfully decadent. The only trick is to make it enough in advance to allow it to set perfectly. This recipe comes via Gordon Ramsay and has never let me down.

Ingredients:

300ml double cream (I usually use whipping cream instead because that’s what I have most often to hand, and it works just as well)
120ml milk
4 egg yolks
40g vanilla sugar (If I don’t have any vanilla sugar, I add a teaspoon of vanilla paste to the cream and milk and use ordinary caster sugar – confectioner’s sugar if you are in the USA)

Preheat the oven to 180 deg C (356 deg F) and take out a roasting tin and place either 4 or 6 ramekin dishes (depends on the size of them) in the tin. Put the kettle on to boil.

Heat cream and milk on stove with a dessert spoon of the sugar until almost boiling. Set aside to cool. Lightly beat the rest of the sugar and the yolks together. Put the cream and milk back on the stove and again bring almost to the boil. Add the yolk mixture, and whisk together. Take off the heat and pour into a jug through a sieve.

Pour the boiling water into the roasting tin, until halfway up the sides. Pour the mixture into the ramekin dishes and bake for 10 to 15 mins until just set. Take out and allow to cool, then put them in the fridge until you need them.

Before serving, sprinkle a thin layer of caster sugar over the top of each brulee, and using a chef’s blow torch, caremelize the sugar until it is golden in colour. If you don’t have a chef’s blow torch, put your oven grill on high, and place the brulees under it for 1 to 2 mins, until the sugar is golden.

Sabayon au Muscat

This is from one of my favorite recipe books, The Beautiful Provence Cookbook.

Ingredients:

1/2 cup sugar
4 egg yolks
3/4 cup Muscat de Beaumes-de-Venise

Method:

1) Choose a small, heavy saucepan in which to make the sabayon. Place a tripod in a larger saucepan, place the smaller saucepan on the tripod and pour water into the larger pan until the smaller pan is immersed by half. Remove the smaller pan and bring the water to a near boil. Adjust the heat to low. In the smaller pan, whisk together the sugar and egg yolks until creamy. Whisk in the wine and set the saucepan on the tripod in the hot water. Whisk until the sabayon is thick, foamy and more than double in volume, about 10 minutes. Raise the heat if necessary, but the water should not boil.

2) Pour into glasses and cover and chill before serving.

Navettes de la Chandeleur

And finally, I give you a recipe that didn’t make it into Banquet of Lies, but which I would have loved to include. Think of this as the out-takes recipe 🙂 . Unfortunately, as far as I could tell, navettes de la chandeleur weren’t invented at the time Banquet of Lies is set, and anyway, they are traditionally made in Marseilles around Candlemas. I think because they have a lot of orange blossom water in them, and that is a flavour I truly adore, I have a deep love for these little boat-shaped mouthfuls of heaven.

I originally came by the recipe in The Beautiful Provence Cookbook, but there are numerous versions online. I naturally make them any time of year, and often!

Ingredients:

1 teaspoon active dry yeast
2 Tbsp lukewarm water
4 cups plain flour
pinch of salt
60g (1/4 cup) unsalted butter
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
3 Tbsp orange blossom water
grated zest of 1 lemon
1 tsp olive oil
1 egg yolk beaten with 1 Tbsp water

Method:

1) In a small bowl dissolve the yeast in the lukewarm water and let stand until creamy (10 min)

2) In large mixing bowl stir together 3 cups of flour and the salt. Make a well in the centre.

3) In another bowl, mash together the butter and sugar until soft and crumbly. Beat in the whole eggs, dissolved yeast and orange blossom water and grated zest. Empty the egg mixture into the flour well and stir with a fork, working from the centre outwards to gather in all the flour. Sprinkle over more flour as needed to create a firm but supple dough.

4) Knead the dough in the bowl, sprinkling over a little more of the flour as needed to reduce stickiness. When the dough is smooth and no longer sticky, form it into a ball in the bowl, cover with a towel and leave to rest in a warm place for at least 30 minutes or for up to 1 hour.

5) Rub a large baking sheet with the olive oil. Turn the dough out onto a floured surface and cut it into 3 equal portions. Using your hands, roll each portion into a log about 2.5 cm (1 inch) thick. Cut each log crosswise into pieces 6 cm long (2 1/2 inches). Roll each piece between your palms, tapering the ends, into a boat shape. Place the boats on the baking sheet leaving space between each one, and cover with a tea towel and leave in a warm place for 2 hours.

6) Preheat the oven to 190 deg C (375 deg F) and using a sharp knife, make a slit in the length of each boat, about 1/3 in depth. Using a pastry brush, paint the surface of each boat with the yolk-water mixture.

7) Bake until light golden brown, about 25 minutes. Remove and allow to cool before eating.