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Posts tagged ‘herbs’

Sep 23

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Herbed (or not) rum apple cake

What if I said I made three of these cakes in two days?

Apple_rum_cake

There was a reason, see, and a pretty good one at that – a waxed cardboard box full of apples from Minnesota, bequeathed to us by my grandmother on Labor Day and rapidly softening thanks to the hot streak that followed. (Even Midwestern basements can’t store apples well in 95-degree heat.)

So I made 16 cups of apple pectin stock and 3 different types of apple jelly (Jameson, chili, and red wine/bay leaf), each of which was re-branded a glaze after utterly failing to set (whoops). But even that project used up only about half the apple stores, and with only a few days of usability remaining I turned my eye to desserts. So I opened up the usual suspects – a few favorite websites and books – to find inspiration, only to be almost immediately questioned by Brett as to why I would make anything other than this apple cake that I first made a few years back. It’s actually been on this site since back then, but tucked in the archives under the relatively unassuming name “Simple Apple Cake,” and after this binge I figured it deserved an updated page and a new title. Read more

Aug 22

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Marinated goat cheese, with endless variations

I’m always looking for good ways to make something special out of an everyday ingredient, especially as we enter our grad school budget phase of life, and marinated goat cheese is definitely one of those things. I’m a little obsessed.

Goat_cheese_ready Read more

May 27

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Simple garlic-herb yogurt dressing/sauce

Salad

This is another one of those deceivingly simple recipes that came about from improvisation and immediately wriggled its way into regular circulation. Some of the best ones happen that way, another testament to how important and fun it can be to develop and then rely on those kitchen instincts.

When we arrived in Vienna we had no olive oil or good vinegar in the apartment, but after a week in the Czech Republic I was dying for some salad – something cold, green, and crisp to counteract day after day of stews and dumplings and potatoes. So I combined what we had that seemed right – yogurt, garlic, parsley and thyme, and plenty of salt and pepper. It took two minutes to make, and we ended up cleaning the bowl out with our fingers, wiping up the last streaks and drips and smears. It was tangy and fresh and delicious and I’ve made it half a dozen times since, completely forgetting about oil and vinegar and switching entirely to this. Each time we remark on how it’s possible that something so simple could be so fantastic. Read more