Channeling my inner Julia

My wonderful husband (who gave me some unexpected but wildly appreciated flowers this week) is a bass player in Flip City Live. The band is playing on Halloween at the Ferry Crossing in Merrimac. I have decided to go as Julia Child this year.

I ordered a wig on eBay last week and it arrived yesterday. I plan on stopping at Goodwill for a blue or green blouse and dark blue or black straight skirt. I have pearls and pear earrings already, as well as an apron. I will wear flats as Julia always did. So I'll be a pretty short Julia, but true to her style. I found the Ecole des 3 Gourmands design on the patch she wore, so I'll do an iron-on transfer of that and wear it as a pin. Manifique!

So....after I tried on the wig, I decided to make one of Julia's recipes - finally! We were planning on having ribeyes, so I thought I would just look for a sauce to go with it. I left the wig on, added pearls and pearl earrings, and an apron with a towel hanging from it. Let the cooking begin!!

I made Bifteck Saute Marchand de Vins on pages 294-295 for those of you following at home. Basically, you pan-fry the steaks in oil and butter. When done, take the meat out, salt and pepper, and set aside. Pour out excess fat from pan. Add finely chop scallions or green onions and a tablespoon of butter. Cook onion/scallions for about 1 minute to soften. Add one cup of red wine and boil quickly until reduced to an almost syrup consistency. I may have had mine a little runny.

Remove from heat and add 4-6 tablespoons of butter, one at a time, incorporating thoroughly before adding the next piece.

By this time my steak was cold. Didn't realize it, however, until we started eating. So we had to pop in the microwave for a bit. Just ladle a few tablespoons over each piece of meat.

French cooking usually calls for unsalted butter... I didn 't have that, so used regular salted butter. The sauce was a bit salty to taste right out of the pan, but seemed to work well on the meat.

End result....it was good, but not spectacular. I wanted it to be so good that I just wanted to drink the sauce...alas, it was not.

So my first experience was just OK.

Next up, however, is a delightful scallop dish - Coquilles St. Jacques a la Parisienne on pages 216-217.