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Posts Tagged ‘Cook’

English: Cauliflower Ελληνικά: Κουνουπίδι

Cauliflower

Tastes good, looks good, and is good for you!  What more could you ask for? Oh and it’s a very economical side dish too!  “If you thought you didn’t like cauliflower, try this! It’s an awesome treat for a festive table.  Beautiful presentation and something out of the ordinary” – I believe the quote is from the woman who submitted the recipe, her name is Ariela.

BAKED WHOLE CAULIFLOWER

1 large head cauliflower

1/2 cup seasoned bread crumbs

2 TBS grated Parmesan cheese

1/4 cup margarine, melted

1/8 tsp garlic powder

1/8 tsp salt

1 pinch red pepper flakes

1 pinch dried oregano

Clean cauliflower, and trim off leaves and any brown spots. Place the whole head of cauliflower into a steamer basket, place the basket in a large pot, and add one inch of water.  Cover, and bring to a boil over medium heat.  Cook for about 20 minutes or until tender.

Preheat the oven 375 degrees.  In a medium bowl, mix together the bread crumbs, Parmesan cheese, melted margarine.  Season with garlic powder, salt and red pepper flakes, and oregano, and mix well.  Place the head of cauliflower into a baking dish, and coat with breadcrumb mixture.  Bake for about 10-15 minutes in the preheated oven or until golden brown.

Recipe from all recipes.com

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Did you know that in Manhattan all the coffee shops serve certain soups on specific days?  I learned this when I moved here and now I know if it’s Thursday, then it must be pea soup day!  So bearing that in mind, I made some Vegetarian Pea Soup this morning. It bears no resemblance to what would come in that thick crockery cup served within a minute of ordering it.  My soup is thick and chunky and it was delicious and the perfect meal on a night like tonight as the temperature dropped into the 20’s.

VEGETARIAN PEA SOUP

3 TBS olive oil

1 medium-size onion, finely chopped (about 1 cup)

1 rib celery, finely chopped

1 medium-size carrot, finely chopped

1 clove of garlic (I use 2) pressed or finely chopped

1 cup dried split peas

6 cups of vegetable broth

1/2 cup orzo or other small pasta shape

Kosher salt

Freshly grated Parmesan cheese

Heat oil in large saucepan over medium high heat.  Add the onion, celery, garlic and carrot. Cook till onion begins to soften, about 2 minutes.  Add the split peas and broth; bring to boil.  Reduce the heat to medium-low. Cover and simmer until peas are tender and the soup is thick and smooth.  

Raise the heat to medium-high. Stir in pasta  Cook until pasta is tender but firm, al dente, 7-10 minutes longer. Season with salt to taste. Serve with Parmesan cheese.

Pea soup 3

Pea soup 3 (Photo credit: Dvortygirl)

Recipe from Pasta Verde cookbook

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Candy Canes - A Christmas Icon

Candy Canes – A Christmas Icon

Before today I had never heard of Candy Cane Dust or Peppermint Powder.  However, once I read how ridiculously simple this was to make and the number of ways you could use it, I knew I had to blog it.  There is only one ingredient and only one step!

CANDY CANE DUST

Put candy canes in a food processor and pulverize them to dust.

Candy Cane Dust is delightful sprinkled on your hot cocoa and your coffee.  Sprinkle it on ice cream, yogurt, cupcake frosting or add to your cake and cookie batter.

Crushed Candy Canes

Crushed Candy Canes

Peppermint Power your way through the next 16 days!

 

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NO Time to bake? Too busy shopping, writing out your Christmas cards, finding a grab bag gift for the office?  Still and all, everyone loves a good cookie at Christmas and these are right up my alley because they are made with chocolate and peanuts!  This is an excellent NO BAKE cookie recipe. I’m planning on making some this weekend with Finley Ray, my little helper.

No-Bake Chocolate, Peanut Butter, and Oatmeal Cookies

Ingredients

Directions

  1. In a large saucepan, melt the butter over medium-high heat. Stir in the brown sugar, cream, and cocoa, then boil for 1 minute.
  2. Remove the saucepan from heat, add the peanut butter and vanilla, and stir until smooth. Stir in the oats and peanuts.
  3. Drop heaping tablespoonfuls of the batter onto wax paper–lined baking sheets, spacing them 1 inch apart, and let cool until set, about 20 minutes.
  4. Storage suggestion: Keep the cookies at room temperature, between sheets of wax paper in an airtight container, for up to 3 days.

By Gina Marie Miraglia Eriquez , December, 2011 -Real Simple Recipes

NO BAKE and YUMMY

NO BAKE and YUMMY

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Tasty Tidbits Tuesday

Ocean Spray brand dried cranberries

Ocean Spray brand dried cranberries

This is a great dish on its own and could also be served over couscous

1 large butternut squash-peeled and cubed

2 TBS extra-virgin olive oil

4 chicken leg quarters

coarse salt and ground pepper

1 red onion, cut into 1/2″ wedges

2 TBS chopped fresh sage

4 tsp ground coriander

1 tsp ground nutmeg

2 cups low-sodium chicken broth

1/2 cup dried cranberries

In large Dutch oven or heavy pot, heat 1 TBS oil over medium-high.  Season chicken with salt and pepper and in two batches, cook skin side down until skin is golden and crisp, about 5 minutes per batch.  Transfer chicken to plate; pour off fat from pot.

Add 1 TBS oil, squash and onion to pot and cook until vegetables are beginning to soften, about 5 minutes.  Add sage, flour, coriander and nutmeg and cook, stirring until fragrant, about 2 minutes.  Add broth and cook, stirring and scraping any browned bits with a wooden spoon, 1 minute.  Nestle chicken, skin side up in squash mixture, add cranberries, and bring to boil.  Reduce heat, partially cover, and simmer till chicken is cooked through and squash is tender, 20-25 minutes.

Recipe from Martha Stewart Every Day Food

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Place cards for Thanksgiving dinner 2008.

Place cards for Thanksgiving dinner guests

So if you’re not cooking, you are either dining out or better yet invited to share the annual feast at someone else’s dinner table.  Either way, the end result is still the same because you….

  1. Do not have to spend hours grocery shopping for myriad ingredients for dishes you make only once a year.
  2. Do not have to spend 3 x what you normally spend at the grocery store each week, buying weird items like persimmons, figs, chestnuts, turnips and a 14 lb bird.
  3. Do not have to pull the giblets out of the cavity of an ice cold turkey and then clean its inside  and cut off its rear end also known irreverently as the pope’s nose.Do not have to pull the giblets out of the cavity of an ice cold turkey and then clean its inside  and cut off its rear end also known irreverently as the pope’s nose.
  4. Do not have to get up at the crack of dawn to stuff the turkey and put it in the oven so it is ready at 2:00pm
  5. Can actually go to the Parade if you wish or leisurely sit in your living room with a cup of coffee all warm and cosy and marvel at the balloons and how cold everyone seems to be at the Parade.
  6. Can have breakfast with the family instead of peeling potatoes.
  7. Don’t have to wonder how you are really going to get everything baked and cooked with 1 oven and only 4 burners.
  8. Will have time to get appropriately dressed  without an apron and even be able to put on makeup.
  9. Will probably be offered some leftovers to bring home for tomorrow’s supper (bring your own containers)
  10. BEST of all, you won’t be in the middle of any unresolved sibling or parent-child issues from your own family!!

 

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The softer, orange-fleshed variety of sweet po...

This is actually a YAM and not a Sweet Potato

I said I wasn’t going to post another recipe today because I am supposed to be preparing my own culinary contributions to the Thanksgiving Day dinner and so I’m not.  However, I just noticed in the New York Times that Mark Bittman wrote an article extolling the virtues of sweet potatoes.  In my 9 days till Thanksgiving recipe posting, I included two recipes for sweet potatoes.  His article is listed below.  Sweet potatoes-Thanksgiving and beyond!

 

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Sweet potatoes Ελληνικά: Γλυκοπατάτες

Sweet potatoes Ελληνικά: Γλυκοπατάτες (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Well it’s a week away and I still don’t know what I’m bringing as an hors d’ouevres since that is my assignment for Thanksgiving dinner.  This year we will be sharing the annual feast  with my daughter’s in-laws and other relatives of her husband.  It’s seems like there will be  a lot of famiglia!

But I digress, this post is about delicious and not quite ordinary side dishes.  I really wish I was supposed to bring one of them instead because most appetizers don’t travel well and it’s a 2 1/2 hour trip!

Since oven space is always at a premium Thanksgiving Day, you can make this dish ahead of time and reheat covered in microwave at dinner time.  

SWEET POTATOES with HONEY and LIME

Preheat oven 450 degrees

1 TBS plus 1 tsp coarse salt

6 sweet potatoes, peeled and quartered lengthwise

6 TBS honey

1/4 cup freshly squeezed lime juice

1 small fresh red chile pepper, thinly sliced

2 TBS unsalted butter, melted

1/4 tsp freshly ground pepper

2 TBS fresh cilantro leaves

Bring a large sauce-pot of water to a boil, add 1 TBS salt.  Add sweet potatoes and boil 4 minutes.  Drain and set aside.  

In a bowl combien honey, lime juice, chile, butter and remaining teaspoon of salt and the pepper.  Add the sweet potatoes and coat with the marinade.  Put potatoes and any excess marinade in a 17″x12″ roasting pan.  Roast in oven 20-30 minutes, turning occasionally, till tender and caramelized.  Garnish with cilantro. 

Serves: 6-8  – Recipe from Martha Stewart Living

 

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With only 8 days left to Thanksgiving, I hope you have ordered your turkey already, made out your grocery lists and then gone over them again because running out on Thanksgiving morning for an ingredient is usually a good way to start a fight with your husband!

Today’s side dish is again an old favorite – like anyone would want to have Thanksgiving dinner without Mashed Potatoes! So of course we are having some and believe me no one savours the flavors of butter and cream more than me (and I have the hips to prove it) so when I found this recipe and tried it, I knew it was going to be a hit with everyone at the table including those who are always on a diet  or watching their cholesterol.  AND read the recipe thoroughly because I’m going to also list the ingredients that make it NOT SO HEALTHY and where to substitute them.  Either way, these are delicious mashed potatoes and actually I think the techniques used are probably what makes the potatoes even better than the recipe ingredients themselves.  And the best part is you can make them a day ahead!!!!

GARLIC-AND-CHIVE MASHED POTATOES

1  1/2  cups skim milk  (1  3/4 cup half & half)

2 garlic cloves smashed   (omit)

3 lbs Yukon Gold potatoes, peeled and cut into 2-inch cubes  (4 lbs )

3 TBS unsalted butter (4 TBS-1/2 stick)

1/4 cup 2% or 0% Greek yogurt (omit)

1 TBS chopped fresh chives (I always use more)  (2 TBS chopped chives) and (2 TBS chopped parsley)

Coarse salt and freshly ground pepper

Garnish: 2 tsp chopped fresh chives  (and 2 tsp chopped parsley)

Bring milk and garlic to a boil in a small saucepan; remove from heat and let stand.  Meanwhile, place potatoes in a medium pot, and cover with water by 2 inches.  Bring to a boil.  Cook until tender, 10-12 minutes.  Drain, and pass through a ricer or food mill.  Return to pot.

Heat potatoes over medium heat, stirring constantly with a wooden spoon, until slightly dried out, about 2 minutes or less.  Strain milk mixture into pot .  Discard garlic.  Stir in butter.  Remove from heat.  Stir in yogurt, chives and 1 tsp salt;  season with pepper.  Garnish with chives. Do NOT garnish if you are storing for a day.

Serves 8 – recipe from Martha Stewart Living

Cook potatoes in cold salted water, bring to boil, reduce heat to medium-low and simmer till potatoes are tender 15-18 minutes. Drain, return potatoes to pot.

Stir potatoes over medium heat until dry, a film of starch will form on bottom of pot. Remove from heat.

In small saucepan, combine half & half and butter;  bring to a simmer over medium.  Pour half of hot liquid over potatoes.  Mash just until smooth, adding more liquid to reach desired consistency.  Stir in parsley and chives.  Season with salt and pepper. Garnish.  Do NOT garnish if you are storing for a day. 

Serves: 8 – recipe from Martha Stewart Every Day Food

NOW here’s the good part.  Put your mashed potatoes into a bowl that you know will sit in large pot as if it were a double boiler.  The bowl must be able to withstand some heat although it will not be in boiling water.  Cover your potatoes tightly with Saran wrap and refrigerate overnight.   On Thanksgiving Day, place the unwrapped bowl of potatoes over a pot of soft-boiling water.  Do not rush the process. Let the potatoes warm through while you go about the other hundred details of a Thanksgiving Dinner.

Martha Stewart, Whole Living, Thanksgiving dinner, mashed potatoes, garnish

Heart Healthy Mashed Potatoes

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Gone are the days of the green bean and Campbell’s soup casserole, known in my house as White Trash Green Beans.  SOOoooo politically incorrect – my kids named it, not me. 

I grew up with the usual suspects on the Thanksgiving table.  It was Mashed Potatoes, Mashed Turnips, Candied Sweet Potatoes, Stuffing, Green Bean French Onion casserole,  Creamed White Onions,canned jelled Cranberry Sauce.  Not too exciting, but oh so familiar 

I said good-bye, farewell to those dishes years ago!!  And I love side dishes so over the years I have collected a lot of recipes.  If you are making the BIG meal at home, you might find one or two to try out and if you’ve been invited to a feast, why not bring a really special dish?

Old habits die hard so here is a modernized version of the traditional Green Bean Casserole.  It is Green Beans with Carmelized Onions and Tarragon. 

1 TBS plus 1 Tsp extra virgin olive oil

2 large sweet onions such as Vidalia, thinly sliced

coarse salt and ground pepper

2 lbs green beans trimmed

4 tsp chopped fresh tarragon leaves

In a large nonstick skillet, heat 1 TBS oil over medium-high.  Add onions and season with salt and pepper.  Cook, stirring often, until softened and just beginning to brown, 10 minutes.  Reduce heat to medium; cook, stirring occasionally, until onions are deep golden brown and very soft, 30 minutes.  (Refrigerate in an air-tight container, up to 1 day.  Bring to room temperature before using).

Meanwhile, in a large pot of boiling, salted water, cook green beans until crisp-tender and bright green, about 6 minutes.  Drain and toss with tarragon and 1 tsp oil; season with salt and pepper.  Transfer beans to a platter and top with onions.

Recipe from Martha Stewart‘s Every Day Food

Green Bean Casserole with French Onions

The OLD Green Bean Casserole with French Onions (Photo credit: Moomettes)

martha stewart, every day food, white trash casserole,

The NEW Green Bean Casserole – Martha Stewart Every Day Food

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