The last few months in my kitchen.

Lemon Bars

Pepperoni dough boobs.

 Spinach Feta pie.

                                                                         

 

Lemon Graham Cracker Pie

 Banana Tartlets

        Cinnamon Bread 

 Curry with rice noodles

           Mmmint syrup

 Sweet and sour pork

  

Tuna Patty casserole with tapenade 

Turkey burger with homemade bread

Herb and Garlic Pull Apart Bread

 

OK here is the easiest bread you'll ever make. It's the "easy dutch oven bread" or "no knead bread" recipe made popular in the New York Times a while ago. This is impossible to screw up. You can add stuff, change how long you let it rise, ...how long you let it rest, it always comes out great.

1/4 teaspoon dry yeast mixed with 1 1/2 cups warm water. Let it get happy for about 10 minutes.( If you're going to add herbs like I did, now is the time to do that so the leaves soften in the warm water. I used a big fistful of basil and Italian parsley and a tablespoon of minced garlic.)

Stir in 1 1/2 teaspoon salt and 3 cups of flour. It will be shaggy and sticky. Cover the bowl with plastic and let it rise for 8-20 hours.( I cut these up into strips after about 3 hours, rolled them in a lot of flour and let them rise for about 2 more hours, then combined them on a sheet of foil in little wads, all cozy so they bake together.) But normally you'd just take that sticky wad after whatever amount of time usually at least 8 hours so it's all big and poofy, flour it really well, fold it over ONCE and then let it rise another 2 hours covered in a lot of flour and a towl- not plastic. Total, you spend about 10 minutes actually "doing something" with this bread, time it out how you want. But the less you touch it the softer it will be. Do not knead this bread!

Once you've done the 'flour and let it go another two hours' part, turn the oven to 475 with a dutch oven IN the oven and preheat thoroughly, you want it to be reallllllly hot when you put the dough in. I use a big ceramic bowl covered in foil as I have no dutch oven, works fine. Place the dough either directly onto the dutch oven or on the foil so you don't squish it. Cover and bake for 25-30 minutes. Take cover off and bake another 5 minutes to brown the top. Yum.

Honey Breakfast Bars

This is an old recipe my mom got from Sue Bee Honey. Of course I tweaked it a bit to make it my own. This is an easy and versatile recipe. You can use any kind of cereal and dried fruit, chunky or creamy peanut butter, even flavored honey would be good. This time I used three kinds of cereal: Special K Fruit and Yogurt, Kix, and Cheerios. It's a great breakfast, snack, or dessert.

6 cups cereal tossed with 6 ounces of dried fruit. I used a trail mix with cranberries, raisins, sunflower seeds, slivered almonds and peanuts. In a saucepan combine 1 cup honey, 1 1/2 cups peanut butter, a tablespoon of butter and 3/4 cup of dark brown sugar, stirring constantly til just boiling. Quickly mix with cereal mix and press firmly into buttered (not spray, good old salted butter) pan. Cut after completely cooled with a sharp knife. I pressed a few yogurt raisins into the top to dress it up.

Orange Bow Knot Rolls

This recipe has been a family favorite for years. I used to help my mom make these as a child and recently tried my hand at it solo. Somehow I got into my thirties and still had not ventured into yeast doughs, intimidated by the process. It couldn't have been easier. Well, except for the elbow grease it took to knead for ten whole minutes, this is an easy recipe.
The recipe calls for two tablespoons of grated orange zest. My mom had always used the smallest grate for a fine, unnoticeable texture, but when I went to grate my oranges the skin proved too thin and the fruit too soft so I just used the large grate. The result was lovely flecks of orange throughout the dough which, after baking, were soft and added random bursts of flavor.

To finish the recipe calls for the still hot rolls to be brushed with butter. I had some orange juice left over so I combined melted butter, orange juice and a bit of honey to make a sweet glaze. I also did not strain the orange juice so there were little bits of pulp atop the rolls which I thought went nicely with the "rough cut" of the orange zest.

Tuna patties with cucumber slices.

Today I had some leftover rice and decided to make an old fashioned favorite, tuna patties. I love them because they are easy to improvise. Like meatloaf, they become whatever is in the fridge, and are deliciously different every time.

I used three cans of albacore drained of their liquid, about a cup of cooked rice and three small potatoes boiled and soft with the skins. Mashed together with two eggs,green onions and orange bell pepper diced finely, I added poultry seasoning and some fresh ground pepper. After chilling for about a half hour I rolled them into patties and coated them in some bread crumbs I made from a half a baguette covered in sesame seeds. They fried up beautifully in some olive oil and butter, but these can be baked also. I just love the crunch you get when you pan fry them.

I still had some pesto left over from last night so I used it to top one patty. The other mysterious sauce is yes, ketchup. Tuna patties can seem so unsophisticated with their ketchup topping, but paired with the pesto and topped with asiago cheese it tasted very gourmet. On the side I sliced some cucumber and drizzled with a honey mustard sauce.

Pesto chicken and sesame glazed carrots and homemade donuts.

Last night Paul made pesto from our huge basil plants. It didn't even look like he picked any! Sauteed chicken in olive oil and butter. I made sesame glazed carrots with brown sugar and hot chili sesame oil.



For dessert I made donuts from Pillsbury biscuit dough! They turned out really light. Next time I will fill them with pudding or maybe jam. They kind of look like little jelly donuts. I coated them with sugar, and we ate them with chocolate pudding. Yum.

Next Day Curry

So yesterday it was potroast, which was of course way too big for just two people. Today I simmered the leftover fatty hunks of meat for 2 hours and trimmed off all the remaining fat, cutting the beef into small pieces which largely shredded up. Most of the liquid reduced and I added peas, onion and bamboo pieces. To this I added about a 1 1/2 cups coconut milk and simmered it for another hour til it reduced. Some nice madras curry paste made this a lovely aromatic pot.