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Posts tagged ‘recipe’

Oct 14

Caramel Dutch apple pie

Did I just realize, after writing this post, that this is the third apple recipe in a row? Yes. That said: yesterday no fewer than 10 different people came into the store where I work specifically to get gear for making things with their overflowing apple stores. There were cider makers and people drying apple rings and everyone giving recommendations for apple picking places and so many conversations about apple pies that I could barely find the time to figure out what type of apple pie I was going to make upon returning home from work. It is apple season, everyone, and Wisconsin takes that seriously, and I will definitely not let you forget it (apparently). Apples apples apples.

But really, I will try to write the next post about something other than apples. Seriously. 

Caramel_apple_pie

I’ve been taking photos of food for a few years now, and for the most part it’s been going pretty well. Lumbering the tripod around the kitchen can be a bit of a hassle and the idea of taking out my camera at restaurants makes me pretty uncomfortable, so I primarily take photos only when it’s a recipe I want to document (for here or elsewhere) or when something looks particularly pretty (like the onions Brett browned today to put in the venison stew we made). I knew absolutely nothing about photography before I started this website and would only claim to know a very small amount now, but I’ve been learning a lot and it’s all worth it for that moment when a shot seems to grasp everything I wanted it to – the way the light looked, the feeling and intention I had in making and serving a dish, or the spirit of the food.  Read more

Oct 8

Fall Cocktails: The apple picker

Cocktail_ingredients

Two months in and we’re settling into our new life here in the Midwest. After a while of time with things sort of up in the air, I have my situation fairly figured out (more on that in a bit) and Brett’s pretty entrenched in his first semester of his PhD program. We’re slowly meeting people and finding folks to share our time with, and we’re trying to bite off snippets of time to go explore our new town and the surroundings.

And, it’s fall. Even in the first few days of it, it’s the sort of fall I’ve been waiting for since I left Minnesota over a decade ago. That first fall away was a big swirl of college freshman activity and I didn’t have a chance to think much about it, but by sophomore year I would catch myself lingering over photos – photos of anything, from anywhere – that somehow reminded me of the falls I was used to. This continued and intensified for years, and one time just a couple of years ago I caught myself fawning wistfully over a photo of what amounted to a fairly barren park, all leafless and windswept and well into its waning pre-winter days. I couldn’t stop looking at it and feeling nostalgic, and I knew it was time to go back. Fall is one of the things I missed most about being in California, and one of the main reasons I’m happy to be back.

It also means I can add more to the Fall Cocktails category of this website, woefully neglected amongst the palms.

Cocktail_closeup Read more

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

Sep 16

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Classic frittata recipe (with smoked salmon, fresh corn, and herbed goat cheese)

A frittata is a beautiful, easy meal to make. Combine eggs with meats, vegetables, herbs, cheese, or pretty much any other prepared ingredient you have around, and within 20 minutes you have a delicious, healthy, fancy-seeming meal. As an added bonus it’s perfect for making ahead, since you can wrap and freeze it for up to 1 month or at the very least save the leftovers (which are equally good room temperature or warm) for breakfast or lunch the next day. (A slice of frittata and some bread make a pretty delicious sandwich, I might add.)

Salmon_frittata

Cooled

And this is exactly the sort of dish I’ve been thinking about a lot lately. I’ve mentioned on the site before that I’ve been putting together a guide to these sorts of basic, foundational recipes, all of which act as a backbone or a stage for whatever vegetables, proteins, grains, or other items I happen to have in my kitchen or that look good at a market stand. These recipes make it easy to eat seasonally and help me avoid the sort of puzzle-piecing anxiety that results from grocery shopping without a plan in mind, and for most people having these sorts of recipes around can open a new world of quick, easy, healthy home-cooked meals. I love to talk about these sorts of “anything goes” recipes because they do wonders at making people more interested in cooking, more comfortable in the kitchen, and more at-ease with letting go of recipes and diverging from planned-out shopping lists.

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Sep 13

Late summer cocktail: Aviation

Aviation

First: Welcome to all new readers who have found this site through the Capital Times article published yesterday! I’m excited to make contact with a new audience in Madison, and would love to hear about things you’re interested in, either for new classes or new site content. Stay in touch! I look forward to meeting many of you as I settle into this new part of the country. (Also, know that I don’t usually post recipes with such uncommon ingredients … this is a slight diversion from my normal sort of recipes. Stay tuned for a simple smoked salmon frittata recipe, coming soon!)

First Second: I can still post a “summer cocktail” recipe, right? I’ve started organizing my photos into a “Fall 2013” folder, as I usually do after my birthday, but here in Madison the intense heat of the end of summer is only now threatening to break, and I know Southern California is still feeling the heat.

Second Third: I generally do a pretty good job of picking recipes to post here that would be easy enough for most people to make at home, whether it’s a matter of finding the ingredients or of the complexity of the techniques involved. Today, however, I’m breaking that rule.

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