Aran Goyoaga stands amidst a sea of chuckling chickens and the occasional braggart rooster. In her hand, she holds a tan-colored egg, whose warmth has nothing to do with the summer sun. A few seconds earlier, the egg was under the contented bottom of a Rhode Island Red hen, one of two flocks of chickens living in dirt-scratching, insect-eating, free-range bliss at Farriss Farm in Palm Beach Gardens.

Owner Robert Farriss has just threaded his way through roaming chickens, as well as goats and a pair of strutting, vainglorious tom turkeys, to round up a basket of eggs for his regular customer.

“They’re so much richer tasting than commercial eggs,” says Goyoaga, trying to shake off the baby goat nibbling her cotton espadrilles with gustatory zest.

As a former Ritz-Carlton pastry chef – a job that is the very definition of perfectionism – Goyoaga is fastidious about her ingredients, although she no longer cooks in restaurants. Her customers these days are her husband, Chad, and her two children, John, age 4, and Marin, 8 months.

Well, that’s if you don’t count the thousands of avid readers around the world who follow her blog, Cannelle et Vanille (French for Cinnamon and Vanilla.) In it, Goyoaga illustrates her musings on food and family with photographs so mouth-wateringly beautiful it’s hard not to lick the computer screen.

Even the names of her recipes are swoon-inducing: chocolate and passion fruit creme bars; chocolate and Meyer lemon mousse cake; peach, basil and lemon thyme sorbet; coconut milk, roasted plum and pink peppercorn risotto. Don’t read it with an empty stomach.

A food stylist as well as a chef, Goyoaga taught herself photography to do justice to the food. From a makeshift studio in a second-floor bedroom, she turns out photos worthy of the arty Anthropologie catalog.

Martha Stewart’s editors took notice, scooping up Cannelle et Vanille for their coveted Martha’s Circle network of lifestyle blogs. Goyoaga has also contributed to the Martha Stewart Weddings site, and was included in The Times of London’s 50 Best Food Blogs. Since she started her site in January 2008, she’s garnered the attention of magazines and newspapers from Norway, Australia and even pastry-proud France as well as American publications such as Saveur and Real Simple Online.

Yet all the gorgeous gateaux, pots de crème, fruit tarts, salads and sorbets that leave readers drooling originate in an ordinary Abacoa townhouse filled with children’s toys and a kitchen most foodies might deride as minimal.

“I hate food gadgets,” she said, standing in front of a counter clear of culinary clutter. “All I need is my knives, my two stand mixers and a good cutting board.”

Recently, she cooked lunch for a Post writer and photographer. Her menu included a Spanish tortilla, using eggs gathered the day before, and a fruit tart. What could be simpler? Yet Goyoaga’s technique and perfect ingredients elevated what she called “rustic” food to the sublime.

Butter, flour and sugar are in her genes, says Goyoaga, who grew up in northern Spain’s mountainous Basque region. San Sebastian, sometimes called “the best food city in the world,” is nearby on the Basque coast.

“My grandfather has a pastry shop, which he opened in 1949, in a little town called Amorebieta, near Bilbao,” said Goyoaga, concentrating on piping bright green pistachio frangipani into a tart crust. “My uncles all worked there and my mom and aunt worked the front of the house. Everything was made in the classical tradition with local ingredients. My grandmother even pasteurized her own milk in big kettles.”

That pastry shop is Goyoaga’s nostalgic template for living close to the land, with local, wholesome ingredients.

“Culinary school gave me technique but my heritage gave me the understanding,” she said, placing pluot (a plum-apricot hybrid fruit) slices on the tart with the precision of a jewelry-maker.

She starts dicing potatoes and slicing onions for the tortilla, a staple of tapas or pintxos restaurants, as they’re known in the Basque region.

Goyoaga grew up speaking Basque, an ancient language that predates the Roman conquest of Western Europe. (Izquierda, Spanish for “left” and “bizarre” in both English and French come from Basque.)

She learned English during teenage summers as an exchange student, living with American families. Today, she has a faint earthy accent, the auditory version of what a touch of truffle oil can mean to a dish. At home, she speaks Basque to her children, who call her amatxu, which means “mommy.”

This quiet, serious woman with the black curls and the milkmaid complexion yearns for the simple pleasures of a rural European upbringing, with daily farmers’ markets and artisan cheeses. In tropical South Florida, she tries to emulate that life by visiting green markets in season, and farmers such as Farriss.

Now that the potatoes are cooked, she ladles them into the whisked eggs, then pours the mixture into a well-oiled pan. After the bottom of the tortilla sets, she turns it out onto a frying pan lid, then slides it back into the pan to cook the other side.

Goyoaga found her way to the kitchen after earning a business degree from a Bilbao university, at her parents’ insistence. Only after marrying an American man and moving to Palm Beach County did she return to her sugary roots, specializing in pastry at Florida (now Lincoln) Culinary Institute in West Palm Beach.

“I’ve never had a student as intense as Aran,” said chef Manfred Schmidtke, her pastry instructor and close friend. “She is unbelievably meticulous with everything she touches. My dream is to have 20 students like her in class.”

After stints at Cafe L’Europe in Palm Beach and the Ritz-Carlton in Manalpan, Goyoaga left the business to raise her family. Two years later, she started Cannelle et Vanille.

“It’s like someone who needs to paint. I needed to cook and to write about it,” she said.

At first, her food reflected the complicated desserts she made in restaurants.

“It’s simpler now,” she said, indicating the homespun tortilla, “reflecting where I am today, as the mother of two young children who cooks for her family every day.”

Yet she scoffs when her readers assume she is a laid-back earth mother pureeing homemade baby food.

“That’s not me at all,” insists Goyoaga, who gives a concise, professional tutorial on the three types of butter cream (American, Italian and her preference, Swiss) before putting the tart in the oven.

Health issues following the birth of daughter, Marin, required Goyoaga to eliminate wheat from her diet.

Yet living gluten-free also presented a way for Goyoaga to channel her intensity. Using her training, she devised sophisticated gluten-free recipes using grains such as brown rice, quinoa, millet and amaranth. If judged by the pluot and pistachio frangipani tart, she has created a new niche of luscious gluten-free gourmet desserts.

By now, the tortilla has become a delicious melding of potato and egg, which Goyoaga pairs with a beautifully composed salad of watercress, figs, crisp pancetta and a Basque cheese called Idiazabal.

“I like this combination of pungent, sweet and salty,” she says.

The tart is both sweet and well, tart, with a buttery, crumbly crust. Perfect, in other words.

Goyoaga and her children will spend most of August at her parents’ home in the Basque country. While she’s there, a chef friend has invited Goyoaga to cook on his food show in San Sebastian, a prospect she says makes her proud – and very nervous.

With food like this, she should probably get used to the attention.

PLUOT AND PISTACHIO FRANGIPANI TART WITH GLUTEN-FREE CRUST

(Makes enough for two 9-inch tarts)

FOR THE GLUTEN-FREE CRUST:

2 sticks of butter, room temperature

1 cup powdered sugar

1 egg, room temperature

Zest of 1 lemon, grated

2 cups superfine brown rice flour

1/4 cup potato starch*

1/4 cup tapioca starch* (also called tapioca flour; do not use tapioca pearls)

1/2 teaspoon xanthan gum*

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking powder

In the bowl of a stand mixer, cream together the butter and powdered sugar until light. Add the egg and lemon zest and cream until incorporated.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients and add them to the mixer. Cream until it comes together. Divide the dough into two disks and wrap them in plastic wrap. One of the doughs can be frozen for another use for up to 3 months. Chill the other one in the refrigerator for about 1 hour.

Roll out the chilled dough, dusting the surface with some gluten-free flour. Fill the 9-inch tart pan with the dough. Shape it and cut off excess. Refrigerate this crust for about 30 minutes.

*Potato and tapioca starch and xanthan gum are available at Whole Foods and some Publix Greenwise stores.

FOR THE PISTACHIO FRANGIPANI:

1 stick of butter, room temperature

1/2 cup sugar

1 egg, room temperature

3 tablespoons superfine brown rice flour

3/4 cup pistachio meal (ground pistachios, measure after grinding. Stop grinding before nuts become a paste.)

1/4 cup almond meal (ground almonds, measure after grinding)

Pinch of salt

6-7 pluots

Sugar, for topping

Cream together the butter and the sugar until light. Add the egg and continue creaming. Add the salt, almond and pistachio meal and mix until incorporated.

Remove the tart base from the refrigerator and spread the pistachio frangipani inside evenly.

Halve about 6 pluots, pit and slice them. Place the slices on top of the frangipani. Sprinkle the top with a little sugar.

Bake the tart at 350 degrees for about 45 minutes or until frangipani starts to turn golden.

POTATO AND ZUCCHINI SPANISH TORTILLA

(Makes one 8-inch tortilla)

1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

1/2 medium onion, medium dice

2 medium russet potatoes, medium dice

1 medium zucchini, medium dice

1 teaspoon salt

4 eggs

1/2 teaspoon salt

In an 8-inch nonstick skillet, heat the olive oil in medium heat. Add the onions and sweat them for about 2 minutes. Add the diced potatoes and zucchini and the 1 teaspoon of salt. Keep the heat on medium for about 2 minutes and then lower it to medium low for about another 15 minutes. The point here is that the potatoes must poach in the olive oil, not fry. We don’t want crispy potatoes inside the tortilla. Toward the end, take a fork and gently mash them a bit so the olive oil gets inside the potato as well.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the eggs and the 1/2 teaspoon of salt. Drain the potatoes slightly and add them to the eggs. It’s OK if they are hot and the eggs scramble a bit.

Remove most of the oil from the pan. Leave about 1 teaspoon of oil. Turn the heat back to medium. Add the egg and potato mixture and using a wooden spoon, stir the center so the egg starts to cook. When the center starts to scramble, let it be and don’t stir anymore. Tuck in the edges nicely with the spatula and cook for about 2 minutes.

Flip the tortilla with the help of a plate and finish cooking the other side. Some people like the center a bit runny, others all the way cooked. Personally, I like it when some of the egg is still a bit runny but not too much.

MIXED GREENS, FIG, PANCETTA

AND IDIAZABAL CHEESE SALAD

(Serves 4)

2 cups of mixed greens

1 cup of watercress

2 ounces pancetta

12 figs, halved

1 ounce Idiazabal cheese, shaved*

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard

2 teaspoons apple cider vinegar

2-3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

Pinch of salt

Cook the pancetta in a skillet over medium heat until crispy.

In a serving bowl, whisk together the mustard, salt, vinegar and olive oil until lightly emulsified. Add the greens and toss them in the vinaigrette. Add the crispy pancetta, figs and shaved Idiazabal.

*Idiazabal cheese is available at Publix Greenwise stores. Or, substitute Manchego cheese.

VANILLA AND RASPBERRY SWIRL ICE CREAM

2 cups whole milk

2/3 cups heavy cream

3/4 cup sugar

1 vanilla bean, split and scraped

6 egg yolks

1 cup raspberries

2 tablespoons sugar

Place the whole milk, heavy cream, vanilla bean and half of the first amount of sugar in a saucepan. Bring to a boil. In the meantime, whisk together the egg yolks and the other half of sugar in a medium bowl.

While whisking, add the hot milk mixture into the egg yolks very slowly to avoid curdling. Return this to the pan and cook until slightly thick but do not let it curdle. The mixture should coat the back of a wooden spoon.

Strain the ice cream base through a fine sieve into a clean bowl and chill over an ice bath. When cool, cover with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 8 hours.

In the meantime, macerate the raspberries with the 2 tablespoons of sugar (even mash them a bit) until sugar dissolves and juices come out.

Churn the vanilla ice cream base in the ice cream machine. When finished, add the raspberries, mix and transfer to a container and freeze.

FOOD editor: Liz Balmaseda,

(561) 820-4416 pb_accent@pbpost.com