What I love about cooking my way through Dorie's Around My French Table is that I am building a working reference to all kinds of new ingredient combinations and food creations. This week's recipe is a quick wonderful cheese dip or spread. While I didn't have fresh parsley or tarragon :-(, I did use some dried bouquet garni (Penzeys), fresh garlic, shallot, and chives, red pepper flakes, red balsamic vinegar, extra virgin olive oil, and Hawaiian sea salt with ricotta. I found the part skim ricotta nice and dry so I skipped the 'waiting for the cheese to lose some of its water step' and mixed everything up right away. I let it chill in the fridge for about an hour. Served on petit toasts, topped with a green olive, it was delicious. Husband and I ate it as our appetizer before dinner of sea bass with roasted cherry tomato and vidalia onion, lemon and thyme. Delish! But I didn't take a picture of the fish, guess I should have. I can't wait to see how everyone else served this cheese.
Kathleen, Your spread looks so pretty served with those little toasts! I love your idea of using balsamic vinegar instead of the red wine…I just like the taste better. I bet the red pepper flacks were good in this, too…great ideas! Have a wonderful Memorial Day!
ReplyDeleteI like your combination of ingredients, they seem to work well. Using the balsamic is a great
ReplyDeleteidea, so much more flavor. We enjoyed this too. Happy Memorial Day.
Great rendition with the bouquet garni!
ReplyDeleteI like the olive on top idea. Yum.
ReplyDeleteWe changed up the herbs on ours as well - this recipe was definitely more of a concept than hard and fast rules.
Have a great weekend.
I think you really added so much to the spread by adding the extra herbs and seasoning. Anything with a dash Penzey's spices in it IS great. My spread definitely needed more punch. Liked your photo.
ReplyDeleteI love Penzey's! I'm lucky that they have an actual "brick-and-mortar" store in the town next to mine. Easy shopping. Nice job on the cheese spread. Glad you enjoyed it.
ReplyDeleteI like your inspired take on the cheese... the red pepper flakes and balsamic vinegar would make this great as stuffing for a lasagna. Yummy!
ReplyDeleteYour spread looks delicious! I really like your flavor combos!
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