FFwD: Citrus-Berry Terrine

Anybody know what a Citrus-Berry Terrine (pg 399 of Around My French Table) is? Anybody? Yeah, neither did I. It sounded tasty, but looking up the word terrine in the dictionary (defined as a casserole dish made of pottery or a pate of meat, fish, or vegetables that is baked in a dish and served cold) didn't help at all. Best I could figure after reading Dorie's intro and studying the picture, this was a recipe for orange gelatin with pieces of fruit in it. I have no strong feelings about Jell-o, one way or the other. I convinced myself that this was Dorie Jell-o, and so, must be a more delicious, more sophisticated version of the familiar neon dessert.

The oranges around here have been dried out and awful lately, so I swapped them for tangelos. They're a little tarter and more acidic, but they were juicy, so I'm glad I deviated. The recipe calls for two grapefruit. I hate grapefruit. Matt and my mom both insist that Ruby Red grapefruit are sweet, but they're wrong. Dumping sugar on it doesn't count. As far as I'm concerned, grapefruit ruins everything it touches, so there was no way I was adding it to this dessert. On the chance that omitting it altogether would also omit a vital sour element, I cut a lime into very fine pieces and added those. Otherwise, I stuck to the script, and tossed blueberries, raspberries, blackberries, and the tangelo and lime bits in with the orange juice gelatin mixture.

One of the ongoing inconveniences of being a military family is that every time we move, things get lost and things gets broken. When we moved to Texas, six wine glasses and two lovely Pyrex loaf pans disappeared. I'm sure they weren't the only things in the box, but we still haven't figured out what else went missing. (In case you're wondering, a bookcase was our "something broken." How do you break a bookcase??) As such, I only own one crappy metal loaf pan now, and it's too small for all this gelatin. I used my souffle pan instead. It might as well get some use.

I'm fighting a cold, and think I've found my new immune-boosting secret weapon.

I'm officially fascinated with the idea of making my own gelatin. The hardest part of this recipe was resisting the urge to poke it during the hours it sat in the fridge. It's gorgeous (until I cut it, that is. How in the world did they manage such a neat, clean slice of it in the book's photo? Mine was a pile of glop.) Apart from the gelatin and the 1/3rd of a cup of sugar that you dissolve in with the orange juice, it's nothing but fruit, so I have no guilt about eating as much as I want. I also feel a whole lot better feeding this to my son than I would feeding him powdered, artificially flavored and colored Jell-o.

Conclusion: Love it. Light, refreshing, and vitamin-packed. I never would have tried this recipe on my own, so thank you, French Fridays with Dorie, for choosing it this week! It's a new favorite, and I can't wait to try variations.