I’m always on the lookout for yummy vegetable sides that add interest (but also aren’t too fussy). Where most veggies taste very, very yummy just tossed with olive oil, seasoned to perfection with salt and pepper, and roasted in a hot oven, sometimes it is nice to have something a little different, especially for special occasions. So when it was my husband’s birthday recently, I tried out this recipe from The Silver Palate Cookbook.
Read MoreSo as a mom of two with a third on the way I got to this point of being fed up with buying granola bars. Sure, they are convenient. But do they have any real nutritional value?
Read MoreOk, so Joy of Cooking just calls these Basic Milk Muffins, but since you can also use cream, or buttermilk, or add any kind of fruit - dried or fresh - or nuts or spices or any variation thereof, I figured I could get away with calling them “endlessly variable”.
These really are just a simple muffin - not heavy and bready, not fluffy and cakey; moist but not dense, and juuuuust sweet enough. They are delicious. Sometimes I make them plain Jane with nothing at all. Sometimes I add a bit of cinnamon and chocolate chips; sometimes I add fruit and/or nuts. In the variation pictured above, I added orange zest, fresh cranberries, white chocolate chips, and walnuts.
I have never made these and not liked them.
Read MoreI have to thank my sister-in-law for finding this recipe. She was hosting for a family birthday and had a bunch of asparagus that wasn’t going to stretch far enough for everyone. The original recipe was only potatoes and asparagus, but she threw in some salad greens and now we are forever grateful. My husband grows organic greens for a living, so salad is an everyday thing. But we can get into a rut of the same old, same old. This was a welcome variation, and so dang delicious! Even the pickiest salad eaters enjoyed it. (The blended onion is sort of a revelation to me, and I want to play with it more.)
Read MoreOne of my favorite challenges in reworking or rethinking or creating a new recipe is to minimize waste. So, for instance, my preferred method of making macarons is to use a French buttercream as the base for the filling—which uses up all the egg yolks leftover from the macaron shell’s egg whites. (On that note, Sophie does have two great posts offering tips on using up leftover egg yolks and egg whites.)
Read MoreI’ve loved these cookies for years. Though only five ingredients (six with the chocolate), they are interesting and addictive. They just happen to be gluten and milk free. I sometimes add spices like cinnamon to them to vary them up. They are thin, crisp, and almost melt-in-your-mouth.
Read MoreThis is about the most basic you can get with salsa. As you can see, the cast of characters is almost embarrassingly simple. But for that same reason, I can basically always whip up a jar of salsa in a matter of seconds.
There’s nothing fancy about this but it makes a great salsa both for chips and dip and adding onto all your favorite Mexican foods. Give it a try, and maybe even adapt it to your tastes!
Read MoreI received a subscription to Christopher Kimball’s Milk Street for my birthday and after a couple of months decided to set the goal of cooking two recipes from the magazine each week. Otherwise, the issues come and go, I page through the recipes and lust after them, and nothing ever comes of it.
Read MoreGone are the days of french fries being a hassle to make.
I thought about titling this post “French Fries, Every Day,” because this method is truly that easy. And dangerous for the waistline. You can get piping hot, crispy french fries ready to go in 30 minutes or less, in the convenience of your own kitchen, every night your heart desires.
Read MoreCubanos are the basically the best thing to come out of a pot of carnitas. Much as I love a good taco, sandwiches are my favorite food form. And of sandwiches, the ones that get griddled and crispy and melty are at the top. That’s why these Cubanos are a long-standing family favorite. They’re simple as anything but so delicious.
Read MoreDo you ever use pickled red onions? If you don’t, you’re missing out. If you do, you know how good they are - how much they add to such a wide variety of dishes. They are magical. I can’t technically call them a secret ingredient because they’re added after the fact, but they really do an amazing job of ramping up flavor and providing a delightful contrast and bite to an otherwise muted or rich or creamy dish. Off the top of my head, I put them on: bagels and cream cheese; scrambled eggs; toast with goat cheese; sandwiches; salads; most any Mexican food (put them on carnitas!) or Mediterranean food or Middle Eastern food. Need I go on? You can change up the pickling spices a bit if you wish to adapt them to a particular flavor profile, but the recipe I have below is basically good for everything. Also, sometimes I add thinly sliced carrots and/or jalapenos. The carrots keep their crunch a bit more and the jalapenos add some kick.
Read MoreHands down almond is my favorite flavor. I can vaguely recall a time as a child when I didn’t like marzipan, but those days are far behind me. Something happened and now I can’t get enough of anything almond-flavored.
Read MoreI found this recipe many years ago. A friend came over after school, and we paged through my family’s cookbooks for baking inspiration. We hit upon this one, and it has remained a beloved recipe ever since.
Read MoreArtisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day (or ABIF) was something of a revolution when it first hit the market just over a decade ago (in fact, the word “revolution” is present in its very title). It was the bread-baking technique that first got me, and countless others, baking bread on a regular basis. The notion was simple: bread baking shouldn’t be prohibitive; it’s a basic human activity. How can this ancient tradition be reintroduced to the modern home? With a recipe that takes roughly “Five Minutes a Day,” Artisan bread was back on American tables.
Read MoreShortly after we started the blog, I posted my recipe for homemade flour tortillas. I continue to make them whenever we’d like to have tortillas at a meal. They simply taste so, so much yummier than typical grocery store brands. Having made them many more times since originally posting, I thought could refresh my recipe with tips and notes I’ve picked up along the way. I’ve definitely found ways to make them turn out more regularly shaped and to roll out nice and thin, but also stay soft enough to wrap and fill. The more I make them, the less work they seem too! For your first time making them, however, plan for them to take an hour or more.
Read MoreI’m always on the lookout for vegetarian meal ideas because I try to plan three meatless dinners each week. My kids (and husband) would almost certainly be happy with a pasta dish on each of those days - and honestly I wouldn’t be too bothered about it either - but for the sake of variety and creativity and (probably) a trimmer waste, I usually mix it up with other vegetarian staples like eggs or beans and lots of hearty vegetables and grains. But beans and rice and frittata all get a little tired, no matter how many variations you try, so when I saw Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything Vegetarian at the library, I was so excited at the prospect of freshening up my meatless menus. And this book definitely delivers!
Read MoreApple Pandowdy may very well be better than apple pie…and I’m someone who really likes apple pie.
It’s not an elegant dessert—I think the name speaks clearly to that. But it’s the name, “Pandowdy,” that first got me hooked, and the baked dessert lives up to it every inch.
Read MoreIt’s the season for apples, cinnamon, pumpkin and all things autumn, and there’s really no better accompaniment for all those good things than a salted caramel sauce. It’s so versatile and adds another dimension to dessert with its more complex sweetness and buttery smoothness. Drizzle it over cheesecake or pie, swirl it into brownies, sandwich it between cake layers - there’s so much you can do!
Read MoreSeptember is a great month for baking and cooking. I love the squeezing in of summery recipes I didn’t get around to earlier and the slow trickle of cooler days that let you start dipping into comforting, cozy favorites. Here are the notables from our homes and ones we are itching to try in October.
Read MoreI’m not crazy about making all things pumpkin the moment Fall begins. BUT, I’m not one to complain about cinnamon rolls either. So, when my little sister visits and requests that we make these, I don’t object.
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