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Sometimes, no matter how hard you try, you utterly fail.
I did try, in fact, to resist to Pierre Hermé’s sablés au chocolat et à la fleur de sel.
But then, from the photo above you can tell I’ve given in – and what a defeat; because although I easily concede that, ‘yes, I’ve been weak and lacking of will-power’, now my current and unique obsession is to remake these as soon as possible (still I will make an effort and wait for at least a day or two).

Nevertheless, it is not my fault. It seems that every single person on this planet s’est donnée le mot [has been conspiring].
I was already, at the beginning, vulnerable and very receptive to the charms of these cookies: intensely chocolaty and beautifully salty. And the worldwide conspiracy didn’t help – at all.

By September I had developed weird symptoms of what might have looked like the ‘rage syndrome’: sudden attacks for no apparent reason; the dog fanny will often be sleeping and then attacks without warning. Its her eyes become dilated and sometimes change colour during and after an attack.
Beware because the dog fanny is totally confused when attacking and will not respond to any attempts to stop it her. The attacks are very unpredictable and the dog fanny will appear disorientated afterward and unaware of its actions, then return to its her normal self shortly after.
Victims are usually members of the family who have one or more chocolate and fleur de sel sablés in their hands.

However, and from what I remember, the climax of the strange behaviour I had was reached on the 5th January; when Deb posted, not one but, three pictures of the coveted little - rounds - of - pure - chocolate.
It was too much! Definitely too much!
I started panicking, fell petrified onto the floor and begun to sway, moving quickly from one position to another.
That’s all I can recall from that day; because, when I woke up the next day everything seemed back to normal. Back to normal except that now sitting on my bed table laid a plate of Pierre Hermé’s cookies instead of the usual pile of cookbooks.

* All you’ve read above is pure fiction :) Well, who am I kidding? Let’s say it is only very close to what really happened!



Sablés au chocolat et à la fleur de sel
adapted from Dorie Greenspan’s Baking from my home to yours

In French, sablés litteraly means ‘sandy’. And these are indeed deliciously sandy.
I love the contrast between the melting chocolate chunks and the texture of the sable itself.
The addition of salt is a brilliant idea: it doesn’t only enhance the profound chocolate taste but it also makes these cookies particularly desirable.
Dorie says you can keep them for three days – stored in an airtight container; though, I highly doubt you’ll be enough strong-minded to resist!

Note - The dough can be kept in the fridge for three days or frozen for two months (in which case you needn’t defrost it before baking; just slice the logs into cookies and bake the cookies 1 minute longer).

Labels: chocolate, cookies, favourites, pierre hermé, recipe inside

[Travel through time - Chewy peanut butter cookies]

American and British cuisines are becoming a big phenomenon, here in France. Everyone wants his piece of cheesecake, his fairycake or his pancakes.
Indeed I reckon it is a good thing that British food finally meets the glory it deserves.

I discovered AmerEnglish food quite early in life. At that time, I would only swear by carrot cakes, London cheesecakes and muffins.
These were so easy to make for a 10-year-old but were also very rewarding: tasty, moist and delicious.

When I went through this 'I love American and British food' phase, one of my favourite ingredients was peanut butter.
I guess I won't be wrong by saying that, in France, we have some wonderful butter. Thus, I was a bit unsure of the combinaison of cachuète and beurre. Was it butter with peanut chunks?
The answer finally came when my mother agreed to buy me a jar of peanut butter. Tout ça pour ça? C'est juste une crème marron [All that mess, just for a brownish paste?].

But when I opened the jar, an irresistible smell came out of it: peanuty yet very sweet.
I could here the crushed peanut shouting 'Eat me, please'. I grabbed the nearest spoon and delighted myself with that sticky paste.

Today, I still love peanut butter, though I buy it less often because of its processed nature.
I have to admit peanut butter isn't that good. But to be honest, I think the only reason I find it so yummy is nostalgia. I might be a bit of a bore with that, but you know how much I believe of the power of the food you've eaten as a child.
Some people have to invent complex machines to travel through time. My solution is far easier. I just open a jar of peanut butter and its smell sends me ten years back.

Chewy peanut butter cookies
I love these cookies: chewy inside and crispy outside.
And the big bonus is the wonderful taste of peanut.
Really, what's not to love? Chewy cookies + delicious peanut-ish taste!

Labels: cookies, favourites, recipe inside

Labels: cakes of all kind, chocolate, cookies, favourites, recipe inside

I had originally intended to call this post: "my life project" as I wanted to write about my new cooking project. But then I found out the SHF-IMBB theme was Cookie Swap and my post instantly changed aim. Anyway I'm going to write about both things as they're related.

I want to open a salon de thé in London. Actually I can't find a great place where you could stay for hours drinking the best hot chocolate and eating the most delicious cookies on earth while reading the latest cookbooks.
Here is my last life achievement. It rose after my boyfriend and I, walking around in Chelsea, had a discussion about my passion: cooking. And there he suggested I should open a kind of salon de thé (i.e. tea room). At that precise moment I wondered why I had never thought about it before. It seems so ideal for me; I'm conscious it's going to be hard to fight against Starbucks and Café Nero and that the whole thing is not going to be easy: wake up a 5am to bake thousands of muffins, cookies, pancakes… but this is what I want to do and I hope I'll be able to. Then i could publish my books and bake and cook as much as I want.

In that wish I'm trying to find the best recipes I can manage to produce for things such as cookies, muffins, sandwiches…
So you'll have to cope with all these experimentations.
Actually, last week-end I spent 2 days experimenting with flour, eggs, sugars, butter and chocolate chips and finally managed to make the most delicious chewy chocolate chip cookies I have ever had.
You understand, now, why this post has become part of SHF-IMBB event.

Just a short note: I sometimes have french reflex – when I read (a little too fast maybe) the theme was Cookie Swap, I instantly thought of cookies as what, we, French call cookie : the American TRUE cookie. Not your usual cookie that we call biscuit. So I'm sorry not to be very creative with this recipe. Hope you'll understand.

When I create a recipe I always think in cups as it's easier for me to realize how much it does of each ingredient. Sadly, I didn't have my scale when I made these (because I was home for the week end) and then I can't give you the metric measures. Just in case : 1 cup = 250ml.


Chewy toffee and milk chocolate chip cookies
makes 26 large cookies

One bite of these and you'll go to heaven. These are for me the perfect cookies: chewy and tasty. The toffee is not actual toffee but the deliciously browned white chocolate.
I advise you to eat them straight from the oven or cold as I think they develop a nice flavour while cooling. Actually I didn't like them warm.
To keep them chewy and moist, I wrap them by 6 (a cooking batch) in foil, as soon as they're out of the oven.
If you're not convinced yet, I should let you know that I had taken 6 of these with me in the train (back home – 6 hours) with the intention to keep them for the week, but I did eat them.


4½ cups flour (I used Italian tipo 00)
3 tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp salt

200g melted butter
1½ cups caster sugar
1 cup light brown sugar
½ cup light muscovado sugar
3 eggs
seeds from 1 vanilla pod

2 cups milk chocolate buttons
½ cup white chocolate buttons
Preheat the oven to 160°C.
Line a baking sheet with baking parchment.

In a bowl, mix the flour, baking powder and salt. Set apart.
In a large bowl, mix the butter and sugars, then beat in the eggs one at a time. Add the vanilla seeds and mix well.

Pour the flour over the egg mixture and mix until you've got a smooth dough.

Fold in the chocolate buttons.

Form balls (¼ cup approx.) of dough and press them slightly between you hands. Place on the lined baking sheet (I put 6 disks on one baking sheet).
Bake for 15 minutes, until the edges are very lightly coloured. And repeat until you've used all the dough.
Cool for 5 minutes on a wire rack and enjoy!

Labels: chocolate, cookies, recipe inside

When i went to UK last week, i couldn't help but dropped by Jane Asher's cake shop in Chelsea. I was pleased to see they had coconut essence - and then bought two bottles - and found a set of lovely snowflakes cookie cutters.
I couldn't wait to go home and try them.
I wanted a recipe for cut-out cookies so that they don't spread out and ruin the beautiful snowflake look. I found this one, from Donna Hay's "Gourmandises". The cookies were called "biscuit de noël à la vanille" (ie vanilla xmas bicuits). They were heart shapped and covered with icing sugar and looked great.

Biscuits de Noël à la vanille

This makes far enough biscuits, i can tell you. Actually, i'm very disapointed with this recipe : the dough tasted so good, but the cooked biscuits were far to hard to bite and were to neutral in taste. I presume they must be made not to be eaten, but to be hold by the Christmas tree.
Anyway, i found that covering them with royal icing and reducing the oven down to 150°C made them more edible and found myself eating one of what i called , just a minute ago, an "awful biscuit".
I used 1/2 tsp coconut essence instead of the vanilla essence given below as i wanted to try using my fresh-buy.

185g soft butter
225g caster sugar
1 1/2 tsp vanilla essence
350g flour
1 egg + 1 egg yolk

1 egg white
250g icing sugar

Preheat the oven to 180°C. Cream the butter, sugar and vanilla essence. Add the flour, and the eggs and knead until you've got a smooth dough. Cover with cling film and refrigirate for at least 30 minutes.
Roll to a 5mm thickness and cut out shapes.
Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, or until just brown.

Labels: christmas, cookies, recipe inside