A new look at cooking and home decorating...with an attempt to add more greens to the plate, more vegetarian options & hopefully lots of new ideas to explore

Sunday, August 10, 2008

The Spinach Twins


Recently, I became rather interested in re-creating a particular recipe. I had seen it first on a DVD of The French Chef with Julia Child. The episode started in the kitchen with Julia. Julia demonstrated the Turnover dough then, the shot switched to France where Simaca filled the dough with spinach ham and mushrooms. The Turnover was then baked in the oven.

I thought perhaps this would be a great dish to bring to a wine tasting being held by a friend. I set out to find the recipe and it was not in any of my Julia Child cookbooks. Distressed, I went to the local Library to see if I had missed a Julia cookbook in my collection. It turned out that I had. I was missing what some say is one of her best books called From Julia Child’s Kitchen. The section called Pastry turnovers and covered tarts contained just what I was looking for.

Once home, I started on the sauce called Sauce Soubise au Gruyere. Things went rather well and I felt quite confident.

I then drained and cooked the chopped spinach. Sautéed the mushrooms and the ham and set it all aside.

Rolling out the pastry dough was easy enough since I had chosen to use puff pastry rather than the dough suggested in the book. Assembly was my next step.
The puff pastry was then filled with layers of filling and decorative touches were added to my creation. Then it dawned on me. I had rolled out the dough a bit larger that Julia instructed and the Turnover would just barely fit into my oven. Plus, since I was bringing it to someone else’s house it would be best if freshly baked- in my friend’s oven! I cleared out the top of my refrigerator then baked the turnover at my friend’s house the following day. I cannot wait to re- create my own version of the turnover on a smaller scale. Who else but Julia could inspire all of this work.

3 comments:

DavidAndHisMini said...

THANK you for posting this! I have been looking for this recipe ever since i saw the Spinich Twins on the DVD as well.

It looks tasty and glad to read about your experience and the issue with the size!

Anonymous said...

Whoever put the "chain posts" got on my nerves. It does not good for the blog site! ;(

As for the turnover, I would love to make it. I just watched Spinach Twins today, and it was very informative! :D

Holly Safford said...

This recipe comes from Julia's cookbook "From Julia's Child's Kitchen". It is on page 65. I have been making this tart for 40 years. I always made it with roast chicken, a mix of swiss & cheddar and I never cooked the spinach. I just thawed the frozen packages and used that. My clients clamored for it as well as my extended family. When Julia and I became friends in the early 90's I told her that I owed her a small fortune in commissions as I sold this tart and her beef carbonnade a la flammande to every customer who booked with our catering firm for many years.