All Recipes
Rhubarb and Black Cherry Crostata
“Genuine recipe” is because the chowder in the last post wasn’t exactly conventional in the instuction department. “Extremely Easy” is because I’m feeling a little guilty about the fabulous-but-you-do-need-a-stand-mixer Celebration Bread.
So. This free-form fruit and jam tart takes about 10 minutes to put together and is impossible to screw up. The crunchy crust is made in the processor, rolls like a dream and is child’s play to handle. The rustic look means it always looks great; and although the post title says “rhubarb cherry,” you can also make blueberry peach
or just about any other combo that takes your fancy.
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This all started because for those of us who love baking, Easter is an ideal holiday; it’s just so doable. Instead of the glorious but daunting Christmas panoply: cookies, tortes, cakes and breads all clamoring for time and oven space, there’s only one thing you absolutely have to make: sweet yeast bread with eggs in it.
Hybrid Spring Celebration bread, yeast raised eggs and butter, basically, with lots of vanilla and citrus zest and a crunchy macaroon crust.
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Last week’s maple syrup celebration (pie included) went up in some haste, because I was being rushed by the weather. Day after day the same: sunny and pushing 70 degrees. Not suggestive of syrup season. I felt there was no time to lose.
Then – what else is new? – it proceeded to back around so cold the loss seemed more likely to involve blooming crocus and hellebores, swelling buds of narcissus and hyacinth and early peonies. I spent a lot of time running around with heaps of straw instead of attending to maple posting.
Fortunately, in the event, Friday’s predicted low of 14 did not materialize; almost everything came through ok, and it’s once again March, chilly enough to talk about syrup.
Down East Company Coleslaw – a cabbage-taming touch of maple makes all the difference
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Seems like only a moment ago this was shaping up to be the best maple syrup season in years. Alternation of frosty nights and mild days? Check. Saturated ground pushing the sap flow to gusher dimensions? Check. Buckets everywhere? Yup. Blogger testing maple recipes? Night and day.
Ricotta with maple syrup and oil-cured black olives, a trio from heaven
And then – Hot Snap. Enemy of syrup making. Instant wilter of species crocus.
in cool weather, three weeks of delight. If hot, not.
Who knew the drearier aspects of March could be something you’d miss?
The person whose crocus those are, of course. On the good side, I finally figured out how to get a crisp bottom crust on a maple walnut pie without pre-baking the shell, my very least favorite part of pastry making.
Walnut Maple Tart looking tipsy (‘twas the camera, not the tart) and Maple Walnut Pie
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Spicy Messy Coconut Shrimp – Thai(ish) fast food from Maine
Good News! Maine shrimp (Pandalus borealis), is starting to get around. Delicious, affordable, wonder of wonders sustainable, the only thing that has ever been wrong with it is that you pretty much couldn’t get it unless you lived in coastal Maine – or ate in extremely expensive restaurants.
That’s changing. More and more high end fish markets are carrying Maine, aka pink, shrimp, and it’s getting a little easier for those far from the shrimp boats to miss a few of the middlemen. Port Clyde Fresh Catch, a fishermen’s marketing cooperative, is now selling in Brooklyn, New York and (go figure) Pawtucket, Rhode Island.
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I swear this has nothing to do with Valentine’s Day. If you love someone you will NOT make them these killer cookies, a frighteningly addictive combo of all four basic food groups: sugar, salt, fat and crunch. Plus chocolate.
half candy, half cookie - all good
I got the recipe from my friend Carol (no, not the Wine Colored Dahlia and Barbecued Shrimp Carol, another Carol), who calls them Aunt Emma Lee’s Heath Bar Cookies “The exhaltation of lowly saltine.”
Not sure if that’s Aunt Emma talking or Carol herself, but either way the description is accurate. Only mystery is why the title doesn’t mention “easy” and/or “quick.”
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That would be Lafayette, Louisiana, not Lafayette, Indiana. The style would be that of the city’s Junior League, circa1967, and Talk About Good! would be the title of said Junior League’s classic fundraising cookbook, a spiral bound journey to the South that was popular long before the food of New Orleans achieved nationwide cult status.
At this point T.A.G is more of a cultural artifact than a source of great recipe ideas, but there are a few gems that still shine with undiminished luster. A “Congealed Avocado and Chicken salad,” for instance, contributed by Mrs. Jacque Puken, of Eunice, LA, doesn’t sound all that promising, but in fact it’s absolutely delicious and a perfect make-ahead for a crowd. It’s hearty enough to be a main dish, light enough to play well with all the chili, boudin and/or brats, easy to serve and easy to eat – with or without a fork.
Molded and served like pate; no fork needed
Molded into a loaf and sliced; fork needed. Also chips. (Crunch must not be overlooked.)
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One thing I love about plants is the way they tie the world together, stitching continents and time in an ever-changing tapestry of free association. Eric puts up a post on Cyathea cooperi, a tropical tree fern so unfriendly its keepers need hazmat suits to move it, and next thing you know, in comes a question from Louisa about fiddleheads, the delicious baby fronds of the circumboreal ostrich fern, Matteuccia struthiopteris.
This foragers’ favorite doesn’t appear until mid-spring, roughly in synch with the morels, but it’s never too early to get ready for collecting.
Pasta with fiddleheads, morels and garlic chives
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It is a truth well-known that commercial chicken bouillon cubes are useless for making bouillon – or anything else you might want to eventually eat. But the concept itself is great: put a cube in a cup, add boiling water and presto! chicken broth, curer of colds, foundation of soups – I’m thinking good thoughts about egg drop at the moment – and sauces too numerous to contemplate.
That’s why our freezer is always stocked with the homemade version. They aren’t as tiny as the salt bombs but they do squeeze a gallon of broth into a pile of little squares about the size of a yogurt tub (which is a very convenient thing to keep them in.)
The chunk in front is about 1 1/2 cubes' worth. I cut it big to show off what it looks like ( admittedly not much; but that's more or less the whole point). The one in the cup is bulked up by the wrapper.
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Winter is orange city around here. Quantities of peel get candied. The zest adds flavor to stews, enhances the stuffing of roast fowl, perfumes custards and cheesecakes and lends its zing to pastries from pound cake to gingerbread. Result: the fridge is frequently full of naked oranges needing to be used up.
Orange and Avocado salad, one way to use up the oranges.
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