What's Cookin' Wednesday!

I've always fancied myself to be a fairly good cook, and more importantly I really enjoy being in the kitchen.  I think my interest and love of cooking stems from two different places.

Number one of course is my mother.  She may be modest and say she is no Michelin star winning chef.  Which is actually true (sorry mom)! Mainly because she does not run a restaurant, and she's not such a fancy chef.  Michelin may not give here three stars, but I would!  Three stars for making simple tasty food, and for always making sure our family sat down together every night at the dinner table while growing up.

The second influence which helped to cultivate my love of food and cooking was my time spent in France during a semester abroad in college. I can distinctly remember how much richer, fresher, and simply better the food tasted over there. My waist line remembers too, I gained 15lbs that semester!  On top of that, my host mother was an amazing chef!  A trip to the butcher, baker, and candle stick maker, farmers market was a part of her everyday routine.  Much like France, life here in Ireland affords me the opportunity to go to the butcher, fish monger, or farm stand daily and select the freshest ingredients, as mentioned in my recent English Market post.

So drawing on the simplicity of my mother's cooking, memories of France, and the amazing resources available to me here in Ireland I am aiming to further cultivate my skills.  I am trying to branch out and cook new things, while also working to perfect and tweak the tried and true recipes.   

I've been an obsessive blog reader as of late, and I got to thinking about what makes for a successful blog.  Many of the blogs I read have a weekly post dedicated to something specific.  Because going to the English Market, cooking, and eating have been such a large part of my time here I've decided to designate Wednesday as "What's Cookin' Wednesday"  I hope to post pictures, stories, and maybe even recipes of what I've been up to in my Irish kitchen.  I say maybe recipes because I'm not much of a recipe follower, except when it comes to baking which usually requires very specific measurements.  That's the beauty of cooking, things can really be adjusted to taste, and I subscribe to the phrase "a pinch of this, and a dash of that!"

Here's a little taste (pun intended) of what I been up to this past week...

French Onion Soup

recipe adapted from Smitten Kitchen

The trick is to caramelize the onions.  

It helps develop depth of flavor.

Homemade Giant croutons!

Don't skimp on the cheese!

Here I've used a mix of Edam & Parmesan.

Baked in the bowl until bubbly and brown!

Served with a steak baguette with grilled peppers, onions,

and horseradish mayo!

And for Desert!

 Rustic Strawberry Rhubarb Tart

A La Mode of course!

Adam couldn't wait for it to cool so it was cut a little prematurely
 hence the runny goodness, and melty ice cream!