Blue Cheese Pasta Sauce Recipe

Blue cheese sauce isn't what you would call low-calorie, but it's certainly very tasty. Instead of the usual Gruyère cheese, I used roquefort cheese in a Mornay sauce, which is basically a béchamel (creamy sauce made of flour, butter and milk) with cheese. It's not the authentic French sauce but my husband Lulu and his little sister Sunny loved the strong flavor of blue cheese.

I poured the blue cheese sauce over riccioli pasta and topped with a brunoise, which is a blend of similarly-sized and shaped diced vegetables (I used orange bell peppers, crimini mushrooms, zucchini, jiacama and carrots). The addition of the jicama adds body and crunch to the vegetarian pasta meal. I also finished the dish with crumbled blue cheese as a reminder of the flavor from the creamy pasta sauce.

Croque-Monsieur: A Perfect Back To School Lunch Recipe

In France, the croque-monsieur sandwich is as much a staple of school children's lunches as the PB&J is in America. I grew up with them, and they are still the ultimate comfort food for me. 

The girls are going back to school today and I wanted to share with them one of the fondest culinary memories of my childhood. When I was in middle school, I would come home early on Wednesdays. Since I didn't eat lunch at school, I would always make myself a croque-monsieur.

Croque-monsieur is super easy to make. All you need is a few ingredients such as sliced white bread, emmental cheese and ham (I used smoked turkey). To make it fancier, I bind all the ingredients together with a Mornay sauce, which is basically a béchamel with cheese. I use béchamel a lot; it's really just a white sauce made of flour, butter and milk.

Canapes au Camembert (Camembert Tartlet Shells)

Canapés au camembert are the perfect palate teasers. They have a flaky, buttery shell and are covered with a camembert sauce mornay, which is béchamel and some cheese. The key to a good homogenous spread is a ripe, gooey, aged cheese. The addition of mustard and a hint of red chili pepper make it slightly piquant.

You can serve them as appetizers, as a first course accompanied with a salad or bake in a large tart pan and serve it as a main course for a light lunch.

Making this dish took me back to my time in Paris just before I got married. I was working non-stop, and after work, my boss would often take me for dinner to a brasserie. We would always get some amuse-gueules to start our meal. Amuse, in French, means entertainment in a playful, casual way, and gueule is slang for mouth. Those wonderful appetizers were a perfect way to whet the appetite before a nice meaty main course. Amuse-bouches, like the canapés au camembert I made today, are just a more sophisticated name for the fare I had so often in those brasseries.