STEAM OVENS

Well back to food.  Yesterday was a long day as I had been awake since 230 in the morning, this jet lag plus aching knee plus plus.  So I thought I would walk more.  Went with the little children to school, it is not a long walk, about 1.5 kilometres.  The other school children all rush to see Anna.. which pleases the twins, for a while they, or rather dog, are the centre of attention.

My daughter bought one of those large flat screen tvs.. about 6 weeks ago and altho everything seems to work it has a tendency to lose sound.  One has to unplug everything , like rebooting it.
The repair man came, a gentle giant of a fellow, who said, well you bought the extended warranty, which he is said was a good thing to do with these new tvs, so we have two options.  One if I take it back and replae the mother board then it will be 3 weeks(?), so I recommend instead that we get a new one.  The shop was called and they are now on sale , so  an agreement  was reached, return this one and get new one and receive 300 euros .. it was as the saying goes a "no brainer".

But back to food, children come home for lunch which tends to be their big meal of the day, so in the past few days they have had roast lamb , always with broccoli, potatoes, carrots.. teriyaki chicken, with rice etc.. and duck breast stir fried.  Veal chops stewed and roast pork.

Last night my daughter cooked us a maigret de canard.. which is duck breast.. each breast weighs about  a pound and has a thick layer of skin on one side.  You score this skin and ordinarily put it into a  very very hot pan, skin side down.  There is always a lot of spatter and smoke, but the result is a beautifully piece of cooked rare meat with very crispy skin, the layers of fat has disappeared as it has bathed the breast .  But with her new steam oven and with the cooking lessons about how to make the most of this new oven, she put it into the oven on a rack, beneath that on the tray below were garlic potatoes, and then the fat from the breast dripped down onto to the vegetables below and the result was delicious without the spatter .

If I was to change anything in my wonderful kitchen on the island I would add this steam oven.  It is made by Zug.. and they are very expensive .