Jun 6
The favorite meat choices for December holiday roasts are beef and poultry. I’ll be dealing with the other meats in the future, but now, I’m just giving a couple of options aside from the usual stews, stir fries and frittatas. These are company friendly, and not time consuming. Read more
Like most children, making desserts was a big incentive in my learning to cook. For me the lure was Pecan Pie. For some reason it’s served in the South and in New England, but never in the Mid-Atlantic States and I love Pecan Pie! The old adage; “If you want something done right –or even at all— do it yourself” held true. The search for my ideal Pecan Pie started me on the road to exploring cooking at a young age and though I concentrate on “more serious” food now, I still find desserts the most fun, maybe because they’re the most appreciated offerings. Other courses can be received with approval, appreciation and even enthusiasm, but none make eyes light up the way desserts do. Read more
Dec 6
Two weeks ago I confessed that Thanksgiving really snuck up on me, but Christmas dosen’t stand a chance of doing that. From the moment I turned on the car radio Thanksgiving Day, I’ve been bombarded by Christmas music, especially in the stores. I hate to disappoint the promo departments, but starting this early on dosen’t put me in the holiday mood so much as it raises my anxiety level, particularly when I’m shopping, by reminding me I’m facing a deadline. So much to do, so little time!! Read more
Aug 16
No matter where you live, or what produce is available in your markets year round, nothing tastes so good as local fresh fruits and vegetables, and the best time to enjoy this bounty is the middle of summer, the height of the growing season. Everything seems to ripen at once, and the perfect way to enjoy it all is to make salads combining several ingredients. These cold salads are the ideal solutions to dinner planning on hot summer days. The neatest thing about salads is that they’re so open to adaptation, innovation and interpretation. Nearly any salad can be modified to accommodate the ingredients on hand, most allergies and individual taste. They can also be altered to fit most budgets. In fact, often one salad recipe can range from expensive to economical just by changing price categories of the ingredients. Read more
Independence Day! A day to celebrate freedom! Here’s hoping this post will make you freer to enjoy the holiday by helping to liberate you from the kitchen. For guests dessert is, pardon the pun, the topping on the cake, a sweet ending. For the hosts, it’s often the last hurdle to get over. If the meal is outdoors, that hurdle is higher. In addition to presentation and serving, melting and spoiling become considerations. If you plan a recipe that requires garnishing, labor and timing become problems too. The solution is to have a desert ready to be tabled in advance; if it can hold up for awhile and is easily served, even better. Read more
Sauce for the Gander”; is an old saying. What should be added is that the sauce is, by doing double duty, saving time and money. A modern twist would be to say that sauce for the chicken is for the turkey; is for the pork; is for the veal. Actually, that may be in reverse order. The concept of substituting other meats in sauce show-cased dishes began during the ‘70s and ‘80s when eating veal became very un-PC. Always more expensive, the resultant lack of demand, drove the price up, and veal off the home and most restaurant menus. However, there are many popular dishes that people still wanted Marsala and piccatta to name two. Chicken, presented skinless and boneless, became a happy stand-in. Read more
Fathers’ Day already, and with the warm weather, it’s usually another occasion to cook out. After acting as busboy, dishwasher and sous chef for three generations of men in my family, while they grilled, I’ve concluded that for most men, grilling is less about cooking than it is about enjoying the company and the setting, and they have the right idea. They’re willing to watch over the starring entrée, but don’t want to fret over the sides, especially with guests present. Those are better magically appearing on the table, but there’s no reason they can’t be ready in advance so those who do make them can relax and have fun too. Read more
The morning after I wrote my last posting on summer soups, I turned on the T.V. to see Chef Mark Bittman recommending chilled soup as a dinner entrée on a hot day, and realized my idea might be in sync with a trend. In case it is, I decided to write the first of a few planned sequels right away, rather than wait until later in the season, as intended. The more you know, the easier it will be to take advantage of fresh produce as it comes to market, and to tap into all the resultant sales on related products that follow a trend. For this, they would be broths, herbs, seasonings, condiments, some dairy products like sour cream, cream, and shredded cheese, as well as salad dressings and breads; anything that goes with, or into soup, and that opens a whole world of possibilities. Read more
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