Homemade Dijon Mustard

Who could have ever guessed that it would be difficult to find mustard in the grocery stores?!? But here, in France, that's what happened this year. Drought, War, Covid, Supply-chain problems, you name it. But there's no mustard or cooking oils in the grocery stores (except for olive oil and sometimes sunflower oil).  So when I was thinking about what to make for little gifts this year, I thought of this after finding an interesting handful of recipes. So, here's my take on Dijon Mustard. I have to say it's Very tasty! 

I made a lot, for gifts. But this recipe, with amounts listed, will make about a cup. 

Ingredients:

1/2 cup mustard seeds (I used yellow, but you can find white, yellow, brown or black) 

1/2 cup white vinegar + 1/4 cup water - for soaking

3 Tablespoons white vinegar - separate

2 Tablespoons dry white wine

2 teaspoons salt

Directions:

Soak your mustard seeds in 1/2 cup vinegar and 1/4 cup cold water. Cover loosely and allow to sit for 24 to 48 hours. 

After soaking, strain your seeds, throw away the liquid. 

In a blender, blend your seeds with the 3 Tablespoons vinegar and white wine. Add salt and continue blending until very smooth. You may have to scrape down the blender sides to keep it in the reach of the blades. Mine got smooth and fine, but it also thickened nicely. Mine is scoopable, not squirtable. If you prefer your mustard thinner, just add a little bit of water at a time. Maybe a teaspoon at a time. 

Once your mustard is finished, allow it to rest in the fridge for a day before using. You will taste it right away, but the flavor will become richer the next day. It's a wonderful thing. So easy. I may never buy mustard again. Next, I'll make yellow mustard. But for now, I have Dijon for a year! 

By the way, it keeps a VERY long time! Years. There's no ingredient in it that spoils. But it's so good, you'll finish it in no time! 

I found my seeds in the bulk spice aisle of the Asian grocery. 

Combine seeds with vinegar and water and allow to soak for a day or two. Longer soaking makes it easier to get a nice smooth grind in the blender. I saw some recipes that didn't soak long, or not at all. I soaked mine for 24 hours. 

The seeds plump nicely and absorb much of the liquid.

Use a very fine strainer to strain out the soaking liquid. 

I had so much that I had to strain it in two batches. 

The seeds absorbed quite a bit. There's not a lot of liquid to throw away.

Not many ingredients; seeds, vinegar, wine and salt. 

The only other thing you might need is a little bit of water 

if you'd like a thinner mustard in the end. 

Adding my premeasured vinegar...

And the white wine.

I added the salt and hit the button!

After 30 seconds, blended a lot, but chunky, not smooth. 

You may like it that way, it's up to you!

A total of about 90 seconds and it's smooth! 

If you only make a single batch, it may come together much faster for you. 

It is thick, but it's smooth. I like it. I'm not going to add any water. 

It's really tasty and has a nice kick to it, like Dijon should. 

Vanilla Snowflakes

 

This is a pretty cut-out cookie that you can decorate in a snowflake pattern very easily. You can use any cookie cutter and let your creative side come out to play! 

Makes about 3.5 Dozen cookies - it depends what size you cut them. 

Ingredients:

3/4 c. Butter

3/4 c. Sugar

1 egg

1 Tablespoon Vanilla extract

2 c. Flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon Baking Soda

1/2 teaspoon Cream of Tartar (See P.S.)

P.S. If you don't have Cream of Tartar, you can use 1.5 teaspoons of Baking Powder in lieu of the baking soda & Cream of Tartar

Royal Icing to decorate  (See link below)

https://whats4dinnerbymarie.blogspot.com/2020/12/royal-icing.html

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350*

Cream softened butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add egg, vanilla, salt, baking soda and cream of tartar. Mix well. Add flour slowly and continue to mix until homogenized. 

The dough will be soft, so refrigerate for an hour before trying to roll it out. After an hour, I rolled out 1/2 of the dough at a time, leaving the other half in the fridge to stay cold. You can gather scraps and re-roll, but give them a little time back in the fridge to stiffen up. 

Roll out the dough to 1/4 inch thickness, on a well floured surface.  Dip your cookie cutter into flour before cutting the dough. Place cookies on parchment lined cookie sheet with an inch between. Allow cookies to rest in the fridge for 15 or so before baking. Bake 10-12 minutes, until edges start to brown. 

Cool completely before storing or decorating. 

I started rolling out on parchment, 

but working directly on the counter worked better. 

Just use enough flour. 

The cut out cookies need to rest in the fridge for a time before baking. I stacked them in there on sheets of parchment that I just slid onto the cookie sheet before popping into the oven. 

After baking, I slid the parchment off the cookie sheet and onto the counter to cool. That way you don't have to handle soft cookies before they cool and you can immediately use the cookie sheet again. 

The next day, I decorated with Royal Icing sprinkled with sugar, as well as some colorful sprinkles I have. It was a nice variety of color and textures. 

I had leftover Royal Icing, so I made some little colorful candies to add to the cookie plates I give away. I don't like to waste anything. 

The round button candies were much easier to lift from the parchment than the thin designs. I really liked the snowflakes, though. 

They turned out really cute!

Ready to store before plating out for friends and neighbors. 

The candy buttons.

The thicker designs worked out well. 

The thin ones broke when I tried to lift them off the paper. 

Amaretto Cookie Balls (No-Bake)

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  A nice "adult" addition to the cookie plate!

Makes about 3.5 dozen

2 1/2 cups crushed vanilla wafers

1 cup ground almonds

1 cup powdered sugar

2 Tablespoons + 2 teaspoons cocoa powder

1/2 cup amaretto

3 Tablespoons honey

Additional powdered sugar and/or cocoa powder for rolling

Directions:

Mix together cookie crumbs, almond meal, powdered sugar and cocoa. Combine amaretto and honey; stir into crumb mixture. Shape into 1-in. balls. Roll in additional confectioners' sugar or cookie crumbs. Store in an airtight container.

Make these ahead to allow the flavors to meld together. Substitute flavored vodka or rum in place of amaretto and ground pecans in place of almonds.

The dough is sticky but very easy to handle.

Arrange sugared balls on parchment paper to dry. Remember, no baking. 

I used my favorite small scoop and they come out nice and round and 

regularly sized. I rolled in white and red sugar to create some variation. 

You can also roll in extra cookie crumbs or cocoa powder.

I let these dry (uncovered) overnight before boxing them up. 

They felt a little too soft to stack before drying overnight. 

Cheesecake with Sour Cream Topping (Sort of!)

 

Cheesecake is not supposed to be complicated, 

even though it takes a couple days to finish it. 

But making it in France adds a bit of complication, as everyday grocery items 

are not always available here. 

So, come along for the adventure!

Please note: European measurements and exchanges in BLUE.

Ingredients:

Crust (Couche inférieure)

* 3 cups graham crackers crumbs

* (En France J'ai utilisé des cookies Lotus Biscoff, 1 paquet entier)

* 12 Tablespoons melted butter

* (170 grammes beurre)

* 3 Tablespoons sugar

* (38 grammes sucre)

Filling (Garniture de tarte)

* 32 ounces softened cream cheese

* (900 grammes Fromage à Tartiner Nature)

* 4 Large eggs

* (5  œufs)

* 1.5 cups sugar

* (300 grammes sucre)

* 3 Tablespoons flour

* (23 grammes ma farine de blé)

* 1 cup EACH, milk and heavy cream

* (250 ml de lait et 250 ml de crème fleurette entiere)

* 1 teaspoon vanilla

* (1 cuillère à café de vanille)

Topping (Couche supérieure)

3 cups sour cream & 6 Tablespoons sugar

* (750 ml de crème fleurette entiere

+ 60gr de lait

+ Jus de 2 citrons moyens, environ 90 ml

+ 4 sachets d'Agar-agar)

* (76 grams sucre)

******************************************************************************************

Instructions (Pour les instructions en français, voir ci-dessous):

Preheat oven to 325*F (163*C)

In the US, Crush your cookies and mix with sugar and melted butter, and press into the bottom of a buttered 9X13 rectangular baking pan. Set aside as you make your filling. 

Écrasez vos biscuits et mélangez-les avec le sucre et le beurre fondu, et pressez-les au fond d'un moule rectangulaire 28X36cm beurré. Réserver au fur et à mesure que vous préparez votre garniture. Les cookies peuvent être écrasés dans un sac très facilement.

 I tried using parchment paper, I wouldn't do that again. It got too wet and wasn't helpful. 

J'ai essayé d'utiliser du papier cuisson, je ne referai plus ça. C'était trop humide et ce n'était pas utile.

For your filling, in your mixer cream the cream cheese, adding eggs one at a time, then sugar, flour, vanilla, milk and cream. Adding ingredients slowly so they mix well but don't splatter out of the mixing bowl. Scrape down the bowl with a spatula as needed. 

The bowl will be very full, so move slowly. 

Pour votre garniture, dans votre grand saladier, mélangez le Fromage à Tartiner Nature en ajoutant un à un les œufs, puis le sucre, la farine, la vanille, le lait et la crème. Ajouter les ingrédients lentement pour qu'ils se mélangent bien, mais sans éclabousser du bol à mélanger. Racler le bol avec une spatule si besoin. 

Le bol sera très plein, alors déplacez-vous lentement.

Pour filling into your baking dish with unbaked crumb crust. 

Versez la garniture dans votre plat allant au four avec la couche inférieure non cuite.

Smooth evenly. 

Lissez uniformément.

Bake in 325*F preheated oven for about 50 minutes or until set. 

Cuisez au four préchauffé à 163*C pendant environ 50 minutes 

ou jusqu'à ce que le tout soit pris.

Cool and then refrigerate at least 4 hours. 

Laissez refroidir puis réfrigérer au moins 4 heures.

Combine the sour cream and sugar and spread over the top of the cold cheesecake. 

Allow to firm up overnight in the fridge. 

Mélangez la crème aigre et le sucre et étaler sur le dessus du cheesecake froid.

Laissez raffermir une nuit au réfrigérateur.

To serve, cut into squares with fresh fruit or preserves on top. 

The parchment paper was messy. Don't try it. 

Pour servir, coupez en carrés avec des fruits frais ou des conserves sur le dessus.

Le papier cuisson était salissant. N'essayez pas.

I used blueberry preserves and fresh blueberries. 

J'ai utilisé de la confiture de myrtilles et des myrtilles fraîches.

Pour mes lecteurs français :

Il y a une complication, la crème aigre n'est pas disponible ici. Alors, nous allons fabriquer la nôtre. Je n'ai essayé qu'une seule fois et je n'ai pas été très impressionnée par les résultats, alors je continue à perfectionner cette étape. Juste pour que vous le sachiez, le gâteau au fromage est délicieux même sans la garniture de crème dessus. N'hésitez pas à le servir avec des fruits frais sur le dessus.

Voir ci-dessous, comment j'ai fait la crème aigre. Pour que la creme ait le temps de devenir "aigrer" commencez de la veille de commencer quoi que ce soit d'autre.

Ingrédients:

* (750 ml de crème fleurette entiere

+ 60gr de lait

+ Jus de 2 citrons moyens, environ 90 ml

+ 4 sachets d'Agar-agar)

***lorsque vous mettez la crème aigre  sur le dessus du gâteau, vous ajouterez du sucre. 

Ne l'ajoutez pas maintenant.

Ajoutez le jus de citron fraîchement pressé à la crème.

Ajoutez le lait.

Incorporez l'agar-agar. Mélangez ensemble.

Versez dans un récipient que vous pouvez fermer complètement et secouez bien.

Après l'avoir secoué, il aura l'air un peu mousseux.

Couvrez avec une serviette en papier, pas avec du plastique ou un couvercle scellé. L'air doit pouvoir pénétrer à l'intérieur.

Laissez reposer sur le comptoir de la cuisine pendant au moins 24 h pour la crème devienne "aigrer". Tout comme le pain au levain, il faut du temps aux microbes pour faire leur magie.

Comme je l'ai dit plus tôt, l'expérimentation continue. J'essaie de faire devenir aigre d'autres produits laitiers, de la crème fraîche et aussi de la ricotta. Je pense que je vais aussi essayer le marscarpone. Il doit être un peu plus épais que ma première tentative.

Savourez!! 

Merci Corinne et Thibaut pour la relecture et les NOMBREUSES corrections grammaticales !