You've heard about "Julie & Julia."

How about Laurie & Dorie?

In 2002, Julie Powell cooked her way through Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" for a blog and book that in 2009 became a movie starring Meryl Streep.

Starting Oct. 1, Pittsburgher Laurie Woodward is leading a group online effort to cook through the new "Around My French Table" cookbook by well-known food writer Dorie Greenspan, who divides her time among New York, Paris and Westbrook, Conn.

The project, called "French Fridays with Dorie," just posted at frenchfridayswithdorie.com. Ms. Woodward, a mother of three in Pleasant Hills, also moderates a group that since 2008 has been baking its way through one of Ms. Greenspan's earlier books, "Baking From My Home to Yours," at the site tuesdayswithdorie.com.

In announcing French Fridays on that site earlier this month, Ms. Woodward wrote, "We welcome everyone to cook along as much or as little as they can with the group. Recipes will be decided on by member voting and author/staff selection and will be posted on Fridays. We want this group to be fun, enthusiastic, and most importantly, hungry."

Already, nearly 700 bloggers and others have registered to bake and post their results on their own blogs or social media sites, so Ms. Woodward says she's "kind of scared" and not needing more participants. "It would be nice to have some people from Pittsburgh though."

Such "cooking the book" collaboratives flourish on the Internet, and Ms. Greenspan is understandably delighted about these two. She has promoted them on her own blog, doriegreenspan.com, where she wrote, "I can't wait to cook along with the group. It's going to be a great adventure for all of us."

For a story on her and the new book, with three tested recipes from it, go to post-gazette.com/food. A paragraph that included the cooking times for the Tomatoes Provencal was dropped in last week's Plush section, but is now restored online.

Tomatoes Provencal

PG tested

A paragraph was dropped from this recipe when it was published last week in the Post-Gazette's Plush report. Here's the recipe in its entirety. It's a good one, usable as a side dish or a sauce. You can cook the tomatoes to whatever consistency you desire.

-- Bob Batz Jr.

• About 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
• 6 ripe tomatoes, about 4 ounces each
• Salt and freshly ground pepper
• 2 garlic cloves (more or less), split, germ removed, and finely chopped
• 2 to 3 tablespoons minced mixed fresh herbs, such as parsley, basil, rosemary, oregano, thyme, and/or chives

Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Use a little of the olive oil to grease a 9-inch pie plate or other baking dish that can hold the 12 tomato halves in a single layer. (It's OK if the halves jostle one another and tilt on their sides a bit -- precision isn't crucial here.)

Core the tomatoes and then slice them crosswise in half. If you want to scoop out the seeds, go ahead, but, again, it's not necessary. Season the cut sides of the tomatoes with salt and pepper.

Toss the garlic and minced herbs into a small bowl, season with salt and pepper, and, using your fingers, mix to blend. Sprinkle the topping over the tomatoes, making sure that each tomato gets its share, then drizzle the tomatoes and topping with olive oil. Don't drench the tomatoes, but don't be stingy either. You want the topping to be lightly moistened, and it's good to have some oil in the bottom of the pan.

Roast the tomatoes for 25 to 30 minutes. Spoon some of the accumulated juices over the tomatoes, and continue to roast for another 20 to 30 minutes, until the tomatoes are very tender and easily pierced with the tip of a knife. If you like your tomatoes firmer, take a look at them at the 20-minute mark and decide if they're done enough for you. When you remove the pan from the oven, baste the tomatoes again.

Makes 6 servings.

-- "Around My French Table" by Dorie Greenspan (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Oct. 2010, $40).

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