--So Ina, we asked one recipe that you should have in your cooking arsenal ... --Yeah --... and you said
vinaigrette. --It should be vinaigrette, because I think people are afraid
of vinaigrette. They think it's some esoteric recipe. But, in fact, it's faster
to make it than it is to go to the store and buy a bottle of dressing, and it's so much
better. So you want me to show you I made my
mustard vinaigrette. So the first thing is you need good vinegar. I'm going to need some
garlic -- you're a cook. Do you want to mince it for me?
One clove of garlic
So I'm going to do three tablespoons of champagne vinegar or white wine vinegar, whatever you like.
You can use red wine vinegar, whatever your taste is. And, I'm just going to
flavor it with lots of good stuff. So first is mustard. So half a teaspoon of mustard goes right in.
And I actually do it in a measuring cup, so you can measure and mix at the same time
instead of it in a bowl. And so the next thing is salt and pepper and
perfectly minced. Want to put it right in? Got three-quarters of a
teaspoon of salt, some pepper. And then I actually put a raw egg yolk in. If you don't want to eat raw
egg yolk don't do it.
Some people get weirded out by it.
I know. It emulsifies it. So what I do is I
buy organic eggs and I use the egg yolks. But everybody has to decide that
for themselves. So one egg yolk, and it has to be room temperature.
Is there a good substitute in case people don't want to use it?
--Just leave it out. --Leave it out? --Yeah. Actually if you use a little more
mustard, it emulsifies it a little bit too. This is particularly good. So just whisk it
together like this, and then what I do is I pour the olive oil in slowly and then
you'll see -- it's going to emulsify it, which is really like making mayonnaise, but much thinner.
So, actually, I serve
salad, not so much as a first course. I never serve it with a main course because I think
it's kind of too messy on the plate. But I serve it the way the French do: after the dinner with a little piece of
cheese and a baguette, just a great sort of way to pace the meal. Should we taste this and
see if it's the right balance?
--It's delicious. --Delicious. I think it needs a little more salt because you want it to be really
highly seasoned. A little more pepper. --So balancing the acid in there.
Yeah, exactly. And you can use really anything. I make vinaigrettes with lemon juice and olive oil,
salt and pepper. It's my favorite. It goes on everything.
Okay, so, now next thing is to
make a salad, which is pretty easy, right? So, you want to bring over the bowl? I always use a
wooden salad bowl, and I like to mix them. So this is arugula. [inaudible]
It's washed. It's dried. It's very important for it to
be dry, and then we're going to put a little mesclun mix in. It's so nice that it's all washed already.
I like that you use different types of lettuce.
I do. I just think it's great flavor and it's
great color. It looks more interesting, doesn't it? And then sometimes, I'll add endive,
which has a little bite to it. Just slice it right across like that. Just add that to it.
And maybe some radicchio. It adds a little bit of bitterness, which I kind of like.
Just like this straight-across, and you can do torn leaves, any way you like it. That's just fine. There's no
right way or wrong way to do salad. Isn't that prettier?
Toss it all together like that. A little vinaigrette on it, just enough to moisten
the leaves and this is why it's so important that the leaves are dry because
water on the leaves--
Yeah, you want to toss that? An expert salad-tosser. A little touch of salt on
it, just gives it a lot of flavor. A little extra
pepper. Now, wasn't that faster than
going to the store and buying a bottle of dressing?
And then, what do you have?
Bottled-up dressing. This is just delicious. Should we taste it to make
sure it's good? Isn't that good? --That's delicious.
It's really simple and [inaudible]. Okay, so now we're going to make
course out of it. So a little bit of salad. This is called Delice. It's a wonderful
creamy cheese, and I'm just going to do a little slice.
Do you want to put the salad on the-- some salad on the plate?
And a little slice of cheese
So we can put the cheese right on top, how's that? Just like that. So that's the cheese, a little baguette.
Just a big slice of baguette, and you have a whole course and, basically, there was no
cooking at all. Isn't that amazing? Just like that. How nice is that? Salad and cheese.
Absolutely.
--My favorite ingredients all together. --All the major food groups.
Thank you so much.