Come to the Table

Spinach in Puff Pastry

I have a cookbook holder that keeps "the cookbook of the moment" on the top of the bookshelf when the holder is not in active use for making a recipe.  Whenever Ina Garten's Barefoot in Paris is on display, my husband and I laugh about the subtitle: "Easy French Food You Can Make at Home."  It's the emphasis on "can" that gets to us.  What would the alternative be?  "Difficult French Food You Have Absolutely No Chance of Ever Making at Home"? 

Even as I laugh at the subtitle, the message has worked on me. I have tried a fair number of recipes from this book.  I recently attempted "Spinach in Puff Pastry" (p. 66) for the second time.  The recipe isn't difficult, but both times I wanted to cut it in half which is a challenge with the puff pastry.  This time the experiment was more successful.

Supper Onion Pie

"You're making what kind of pie for dinner?" my husband asked incredulously.  While he likes to add onions to everything, I'm the one that always says "hold the onions" when ordering a sandwich or gyro or pizza. 

But I was in the mood to make a savory pie and to use Nigella Lawson's cookbook, How to Be a Domestic Goddess.  So "Supper Onion Pie" was on the menu.

Besides, there is a big difference between raw onions on your hamburger and red onions that have been cooked in olive oil and butter for 30 minutes!

While we enjoyed trying this unusual pie, I think it's a recipe for our occasional file.  The biscuit layer was delicious with Gruyere cheese and the flavors worked well together.  It's just that, well, it's a lot of onions!

Chowder from 101 Cookbooks

Thank you, thank you, Heidi of 101 Cookbooks for your Rustic Potato Chowder recipe!

We made a batch of the chowder recently after coming home from the gym on a rainy night.  This chowder was perfect for a cozy supper.  The flavor was wonderful.  I especially liked the combination of onions, shallots, and garlic in the base.  We didn't have Gruyere on hand so I used Cabot smoked cheddar instead. It tasted great, but next time I want to see how the Gruyere and the potato flavors come together. Plus, with Dijon mustard, (real) bacon, and fresh chives, it couldn't turn out to be anything but delicious!

So run on over to Heidi's blog or buy her cookbook and try this chowder before the winter is over!

Apricot & Walnut Chicken

Wow!  A new recipe that is quick for a weeknight dinner and involves dried fruit and nuts!

I don't think I've had dried apricots since I went on a backpacking trip many years ago.  Now I have a new reason to return to the dried fruit section of the grocery store: "Dried-and-True Apricot Chicken with Rice."  The recipe follows.

This recipe is another newspaper find.  It is easy to make and uses things that you probably already have in your pantry, fridge or freezer.  The apricot, walnut, and chicken combination is delicious with interesting textures.  It's sweet but not overly so for a dinner dish. 

We had it with sauteed zucchini sprinkled with lemon juice and Trader Joe's "21 Seasoning Salute."  Some friends gave me the jar of seasoning when I stayed at their place while on a road trip down the West Coast.  But that's a story for another day.

Grains + Nuts + Butter = Yum!

One of the signs of a successful dinner party is when one of the guests end up at the kitchen table after dinner feverishly copying one or two of the host's recipes from the evening.  That is how I came to have a recipe for a favulous "Mixed Grain Pilaf."  I was living in Minnesota and part of a dinner group that met each month in different homes.  The host kindly shared her recipe with me.  This pilaf was wonderful for a Minnesota winter.  I have made it many times since in various climates.

Beer & Beef

What could possibly be better than drinking a good beer?  Cooking with a good beer!

Recently I made one of my few tried-and-true slow cooker recipes.  (I am always hoping to increase my Crock Pot repertoire!)  It's called Spicy Brisket and it makes a tender and flavorful roast with hardly any effort.

The beer I used this time is our seasonal favorite, Frederick Brewing Company's Wild Goose SnowGoose from Frederick, Maryland.  It's wonderful for drinking and cooking.  We hadn't been able to find SnowGoose for the past couple of years, so we were delighted to rediscover it in time for the holidays.

Sake Steak & Rice

While browsing through Nigella Lawson's Feast, I stumbled on her recipe for Sake Steak and Rice.  It's found in the chapter called "Ultimate Feasts."

I wanted to try it for several reasons:

1. Who can resist Nigella's declaration, "I cook this more often than I cook anything else, bar the roast chicken, in my repertoire." 
2. Cooking with sake sounds like a fun adventure. 
3. As a rule, marinating meat is a good thing to do.

We weren't disappointed with the results.  I was unable to find a few ingredients, namely cardamom pods and fresh cilantro.  (The grocery store tried to trick me into buying parsley, but it's just not the same as fresh cilantro, so I'll have to try that addition to the recipe next time.)  I also couldn't find fish sauce (nam pla) or brown rice vinegar.  That leaves me with some items for future gourmet grocery store quests. 

The recipe is fairly simple and the meal was delicious.  I was glad to learn Nigella's method of cooking the steaks briefly on a ridged griddle and then resting them on a wooden board in double-wrapped aluminum foil packets to finish cooking.  The meat turned out very tender and the juices within the packets were used to make the sauce.

The recipe can be found on p. 342-343 of Nigella Lawson's Feast: Food to Celebrate Life.