Pasta with tuna and roquefort

Since it's all I could assemble from my fridge and cupboard tonight, and I haven't found it on Google, I will assume I invented this recipe (yeah, right) and I will share it with you.

Ingredients for one person:

3 handsfull of pasta -- I use penne for these kind of things, I find them more appropriate
1 can of tuna pieces "nature" (100 grams) (in water that is, not in oil)
40-50g of roquefort
5 green olives from the can, "nature" -- not spiced or anything
1 table spoon of olive oil
20-30 minutes of your precious time

Boil the pasta by your own method, but make sure the method doesn't include cooling them in cold water at the end. I personally boil them in a lot of water (so that they don't get stuck) and with the table spoon of olive oil (with a little bit of salt as well usually, but in this recipe the roquefort is already salty enough).
In the mean time, prepare the plates to serve on. For this recipe (and its sister recipes, see below) I use relatively deep bowls rather than shallow plates, it helps better achieving the purpose of the recipe. Put a layer of tuna and cheese cut in little cube pieces (or whatever shape your roquefort takes -- if you manage to cut it in cubes please post a comment and explain me how :) ). Have the rest of the tuna and squared cheese next to you. When the pasta are done, drain the water and put some of the hot pasta over the fish and cheese layer in your plate. Then put some more tuna & cheese, then another "layer" of pasta and so on, as many times as you feel necessary (the idea is that the heat of the pasta will heat a bit the tuna and melt the cheese) -- I for one had only 2 layers of pasta and cheese. On the top, throw in the olives and a little spread of cheese.

Here's a picture of my dinner:



The recipe feels rather light, although the sensitive souls might not like the combination of roquefort cheese and tuna (the roquefort is a little "strong" for tuna). For those (and not only), I should mention that I did the same in the past with goat cheese (the light, "tartinable" one -- like the one in the wikipedia picture), and my cook nose would say it should work fine with feta cheese or danish white cheese as well, which are lighter and combine better with tuna. For these lighter versions, I would even go that far and spread a bit of basil on top -- fresh or dried -- it will do miracles for the appearance.

Bon appetit!

P.S. Wow that was long, it took me a full year to post again!

Soup blog

This weekend I am visiting Marta and Sergiu in Lille, in the short French Easter break.
We spent today visiting the city, through the rain, so that our visit degenerated into shopping at one point: sweets, iPod (yeeey, I got a Shuffle), music, films...

One of the planned things for this weekend was to cook a 'ciorbă rădăuţeană' (Rădăuţi soup) with Sergiu and maybe, Marta, but with some restrictions: use french ingredients, don't use meat, use fish instead (not that bad though) so we came up with a new one (we ALL contributed to it), which I share with you – remember that it's derivated from the great "ciorbă rădăuţeană":

XWiki Geek Soup Lilloise

Ingredients (for 4 portions):
- 2 medium carrots
- 1 medium to large parsnip
- 1 medium celery root
- 1 medium onion
- 1 kg salmon
- 2 eggs
- 0.25 l sour cream
- vinegar
- salt, chervil, dill, garlic
- 3 hungry geeks

Preparation:

Husk the carrots, parsnip, celery and onion, cut them in large pieces, and boil them in a pot in approx 2.5 litres of water. DO NOT put salt at this point ("Patientia est mater sapientia"). When the veggies are half boiled, add the skinless salmon cut in large pieces (you should have the 1 kg in 3-4 pieces).
When all these are boiled, remove from heat, take the salmon out, remove the bones and cut it into smaller pieces (about the size of a nut). In the mean time, blend (or mash through any other method) the veggies in the hot water. You can choose the quantity of veggies to use for this operation dependent of the final aimed consistency of the soup. Put the minced salmon back in the pot and place it back over low heat.
Add salt as you consider suited. Add between 4 and 8 table spoons of vinegar, depending on the desired sourness and stir them well into the soup. You can also add some garlic too, preferably pieces (3) but if you don't have, powder is good as well, or you can leave it to the choice of the user.
Personal advice for the brave adventurers who will attempt to reproduce the Easter Lille miracle: TASTE the soup all through this spicing process, don't just follow my instructions, use your own better judgement and taste (remember Ratatouille? Anyone can cook!)
Stop heat and let it cool for the time you execute the next and final step: whisk eggs with a little bit of salt together with the cream and then stir it into the soup. Scatter chervil and / or dill on top of it, and let it cool to eatable temperature.

Your masterpiece is now done, bon appétit!

This recipe is available under Creative Commons.

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