This may not look like much. Is a vinaigrette just a vinaigrette? For sure, no. This one is a stand-out.
A post from Carolyn. It’s been awhile now that I’ve been a fan of Erin French, the not-classically-trained chef from Freedom, Maine. Have I been to her restaurant, The Lost Kitchen? Uh, no. It’s a bit of a fur piece for me to get there, so I haven’t tried. Would I like to – oh yes. I wish my DH Dave were still alive – he’d be “all in” to fly across the country to go to dinner there, then we’d visit some other Maine sites we’ve not been to. The website says there are still reservations available for this summer season. But you don’t just call to get a reservation – you have to send a postcard to the restaurant in order to eat there – and the staff picks postcards. They receive thousands of postcards – in fact they get so many it’s kept the Freedom, Maine post office open when it was about to be closed for lack of business. All of her employees are ordinary folk, none of them experienced in the restaurant trade. She trained them and they’re a really good team. She’s married again – to a wonderful guy, I think.
I believe a couple of her TV segments appeared on Magnolia, but I could be mistaken. I subscribe to Discovery+, and that’s where her seasons of shows appear. I believe I’ve watched them all. She’s so very creative, using lots of local ingredients. She has quite a story to tell. A few months ago I was gifted her cookbook, The Lost Kitchen, and I’ve read the book, cover to cover. Then I ordered her memoir, Finding Freedom – that one’s the story of her life, working in the family diner, learning how to flip burgers and fries at a very young age; about some of her disastrous decisions, having a son out of wedlock, marrying the wrong man, conquering her addiction to pills. There’s a section about outfitting a derelict Airstream trailer which became her re-start to this new restaurant – and her phenomenal success. My guess is it’s very expensive to eat there. And by the way, they now have a few tiny cottages for people to stay in for one night, if you’re fortunate enough to get a phone call from them saying it’s your lucky day. The cottages were private dining rooms during a part of Covid, then they were converted to cottages. The Lost Kitchen is open in the late spring to mid-autumn only. The tv show chronicles the restaurant’s bare survival during Covid. But above all, Erin French is a genius in the kitchen. I have about a dozen recipes flagged in the cookbook, to try. Beyond this one, of course.
Her shallot vinaigrette comes up often in her food presentations – as a drizzle on roasted vegetables, or featured in some kind of salad. And this dressing is so terrifically simple. I prefer it once it’s allowed to sit for awhile – so the shallot mellows a little bit – they (shallots) aren’t quite so stringent if you let them bathe in the vinegar for half an hour. The seasoned rice wine vinegar adds just a touch of sweetness (it does have sugar in it, but not much). And that’s where I veered off just a tiny bit – I added a little bit more sugar. Like a half a teaspoon, or even less. Use your own judgment about this. Or if you’d prefer, make it her way before you add more sugar. Picture above showing one of my frequent green salads (dinner) with carrots, celery, sugar snaps, radicchio, Romaine, tomatoes, radishes. My salads are about equal part vegetables to Romaine.
What’s GOOD: so easy and very tasty dressing. So easy, in fact, that once you make it you’ll not have to use a recipe – just drizzle and pour in the rice vinegar over the shallots, and then oil.
What’s NOT: nothing I suppose, except that you need to have a shallot on hand – I always do. They keep on my kitchen counter for weeks.
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Erin French’s Shallot Vinaigrette
Recipe By: Adapted very slightly from Erin French’s cookbook, The Lost Kitchen
Servings: 4
1 medium shallot — finely diced, then chopped further
2 tablespoons seasoned rice wine vinegar — approximate
1/4 cup olive oil — approximate (I use EVOO)
salt and pepper to taste
1/2 teaspoon sugar — or less (optional)
1. Mince the shallot into the tiniest of little pieces. Once you do the original mincing, continue to mince using a large chef’s knife until it’s almost mushy.
2. Place shallot in a glass jar. Add seasoned rice wine vinegar just until the shallots are covered. If you’ve used a large shallot you’ll need more vinegar (and therefore, more oil also). You will use twice as much oil as you use vinegar, a different proportion to most salad dressings. Allow to rest for 30 minutes if time permits. Add sugar and salt and pepper to taste and shake. Add olive oil or EVOO and shake well, then taste for balance.
3. Pour onto greens (or over roasted vegetables) and make sure you serve some of the shallots also – they sink to the bottom of the jar, so you’ll need to spoon them out.
Per Serving: 126 Calories; 14g Fat (95.3% calories from fat); trace Protein; 1g Carbohydrate; trace Dietary Fiber; 0mg Cholesterol; 30mg Sodium; 1g Total Sugars; 0mcg Vitamin D; 1mg Calcium; trace Iron; 8mg Potassium; 2mg Phosphorus.
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