Country Ham and Cheddar Tartine with French Hot Chocolate.

I bet you thought baguettes were only good the day you bought them, all hot and crusty. Mais non! I made baguettes over the weekend, today is Fat Tuesday, and I've got some leftover French bread that's still pretty nice because I bagged the extra and stored it in the fridge.

A tartine is simply the French version of an open-face sandwich. Last week, on an orange and chocolate tear, I made one with brioche, orange jam and Nutella. It was mighty good.

For my savory tartine, the process was much the same.

Except the ingredients were:
baguette
1 red onion, caramelized
1 thin slice of country ham
a good quality cheddar
honey mustard

Caramelized onions are a good thing to keep around - they're easy and add a lot of flavor. Cut one medium red onion into rings and sautee in a tablespoon of olive oil or half oil and half butter. Throw in some ground black pepper, sage and a bit of salt and stir while they go translucent over medium heat. Let them go another 15 minutes and you've got a sweet, savory sandwich or meat accompaniment.

My leftover baguette was big, so I only used half, slicing it longways and using only the bottom half of that. I toasted the crusty side first, for crispness, then buttered the bready top half and broiled that just a bit.

While the baguette was toasting, I cooked the country ham with a bit of water in my sautee pan. When the baguette half was toasted, I plated it and applied one of my secret pleasures.

I know. I know. Don't judge. Look at those happy honeybees on the label!

Next, the caramelized onions, country ham and several slices of serious cheddar (today it was Boar's Head). I slid this back under the broiler to melt the cheese into the ham and generally warm everything back up. Et voila - salty, savory, tangy and sweet!

Now the only thing missing was something decadent to wash it down. Enter my friend Carol and her amazing French Chocolate recipe. I refer you to her witty and delicious blog --
Cambria Cooks at http://www.calindstrom.com/cambriacooks/2010/08/05/beverage-french-chocolate/, but the recipe goes like this:

Ingredients:
2 1/2 squares Baker’s unsweetened chocolate, cut in pieces
1/2 cup water
3/4 cup sugar
Dash of salt
1/2 cup cream, whipped
6 cups of hot milk
Directions:
Combine water and chocolate and cook over low flame until smooth, stirring constantly for about four minutes. Add sugar and salt; continue to cook stirring until thick for about four minutes longer. Cool. Whip cream. Fold chocolate mixture into cream.

(Try to keep from licking the bowl until after you're done.)
Put two heaping tablespoons of mixture in a mug. For a bit of flare, add a peppermint stick as a stirrer. Chocolate mix can be doubled or tripled easily for larger gatherings. The chocolate mix can also be made the day before and stored in the refrigerator for use, in a covered container.

Thanks, Carol!

This is the creamiest, most decadent hot chocolate I've ever had and really, not much trouble to prepare when you consider how many servings it yields.

Now, if you'll excuse me, with dinner and chocolate out of the way, I've got a date with Dennis Quaid.

Cobbler, the humble pie.

I don't know about where you live, but in the Blue Ridge, we've had a lot of this lately:

I admit to having grown weary of driving in the snow, but when I saw this beautiful old barn in my recent travels, out came the camera. Later, I would want to pull up that photo of claret-colored boards and heavy silent snow and remember how scenic the Tennessee mountains were that day, how much I enjoyed having lunch with my boy, and the drive home to Virginia with my thoughts and gratitude for company.

Sometimes a recipe card is like a piece of history or a photo, with its memories attached. Take this one, for example.

It is written in my former mother-in-law's hand, butter-stained and well used. The recipe outlives her and belonged to her mother-in-law. It reflects a thrift that comes of feeding many mouths with few resources, but also a dependably good flavor. Great-Grandma Speaks raised her family on cobblers and such, but mostly a large pan of biscuits baked every morning to get them through long days of farm work. As humble as her recipe, I still remember the tears she cried when we delivered a new range to replace her worn-out old one. I like to think about all the homegrown and canned fruit she added through the years - peaches, apples, berries - and my own compromise version with one fruit on each side of the baking dish, to please any divided household.

The recipe really could not be simpler and starts with a stick of butter melted in a 1-1/2 quart casserole or 8 x 8 baking dish while the oven preheats. Then, make a batter of:
1 C. sugar
3/4 C plain flour
2 t. baking powder
1 t. vanilla (my addition)
1/2 t. cinnamon (my addition)
pinch of salt
3/4 C. milk
Pour this over the melted butter. Stir 2 cups of fruit with 1/2 to 1 cup of sugar, as desired, and pour the fruit over the batter like this:

Today, I chose tiny, wild Maine blueberries and, because they're so sweet and I'm trying to be good, I did not add any sugar (though I sneaked in several raspberries looking for a home).

Bake at 350 for one hour, until golden and bubbly. I found these adorable heart-shaped baking dishes on another trip to Michael's for an unbelievable 99 cents and note that I divided one recipe in half and cut the baking time to 45 minutes:

Now, as if this wasn't sweet and warm and gooey enough, I took a quick Google trip, looking for chocolate cobbler recipes and found the amazing and mouthwatering blog: http://cherryhillcottage.typepad.com/cherryhill_cottage/
Go there now - it will make you smile. But come right back, because there's more.

Anyhow, I'd always fancied trying chocolate cobbler and their proportions were close enough to Great-Grandma Speaks' recipe that I felt comfortable taking it for a spin. I therefore substituted Ghirardelli 60% cacao chips, leftover Madagascar milk chocolate, and some southside Virginia pecans instead of fruit, plopped in a tablespoon of Nutella for good measure, and about that, let me just say this: