For the inauguration of my food blog, I’m featuring a plum clafoutis. Why? Because I made one.
And that right there is the purpose of this blog. After reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle,my focus on food became sharper. The idea of the slow food movement and a thoughtful and ethical approach to food appealed to me in a deep way. As a society, we’ve lost our connection to food and cooking. I believe that has reverberated in ways not yet understood. And because of this, I’ve tried to create a community of food in my own family, focusing on local food, new recipes, and the importance of sitting down to a good meal and connecting.
One part of the book that stuck with me was to make recipes from the food that you have, not to hunt for ingredients, which is why I named my blog Hunt the Recipe. Not only can this foster creative recipes (or desperate ones), but it can also train one to cook seasonally, utilize leftovers, and learn what ingredients that can be kept on hand.
On with the clafoutis…
Clafoutis is a French word that, out of my mouth, sounds something like, kla-foo-tie (kaflooie?). Though I learned from the often-suspect Wikipedia that a clafoutis is only called as such when it’s made with cherries, as it traditionally is. When it’s made with other fruit, it’s called a flognarde (i’m not even touching that one).
I troll food blogs daily in what is probably a form of mild OCD. I’m ever searching for better pictures (I can only hope to not put fuzzy pictures on this blog), easy recipes, and good results. I came across Ceres & Bacchus the other day and was entranced by the plum clafoutis recipe. The ingredients were so simple: (Eggs! Sugar! Milk! Butter! Flour! Vanilla! Plums!). The directions were so simple: (Mix! Pour! Bake!). I had recently bought a bunch of plums at the Ferry Building Farmer’s market ( my first time buying plums. EVER.) I had all the ingredients on hand. What was the catch? Probably the 1/2 cup of butter that made the recipe so good, that I ate it for breakfast and dessert. I have seen a recipe somewhere with no butter, which I thought was an accident. No butter? Dear GOD. Maybe someday I’ll try it.
Meanwhile, I need to go get something from the fridge…
Parsnip’s first clafoutis.
Parsnip – I’m certainly glad that my plum clafoutis recipe inspired you (contrary to wikipedia’s information, it is called clafoutis no matter what fruit you use, French people mostly don’t know the word flognarde, which is a similar confection using a higher ratio of eggs). Your photo looks great.
Since posting, I’ve tried a few other clafoutis recipes, and yours is by far the best. It’s definitely going into the permanent recipe book.