Dinner with Kirsten

I was browsing Amazon.com for cookbooks, when I had an amazing idea: Why not test-drive these books before buying? So, I went to my library’s Web site and requested every cookbook on my Amazon wish list. A few days later I was trekking home (in the rain) with 50 pounds of borrowed cookbooks, ready to start testing away.

Dorie Greenspan is a regular contributor to Bon Appétit magazine, and I’ve been wondering if I’d like her book, Baking: From My Home to Yours, but it seemed a little too cliché. After all, there’s a whole blogging culture around this baking book and I wasn’t sure if I wanted to join the crowd. But, I couldn’t help but be seduced by the friendly prose, stunning photography and simple-yet-special recipes. This is a home bakers’ book, with a collection of Dorie’s personal favorite recipes – the kind of book I feel like every baker can only produce once in their lifetime. After just a quick flip-through, I couldn’t wait to jump in. I’m looking forward to adding a few of Dorie’s recipes to my own baking repertoire. (And this book is definitely staying on my Amazon wish list!)

The first recipe I tried was Dorie’s Molasses Cookies. They’re chewy, a little crispy and oh-so flavorful. I ate almost the entire batch on my own (DANGER: They’re completely addictive!), and I’m making a fresh batch this week to take home for Thanksgiving. It’s a wonderful all-purpose, “anytime” cookie, easy enough to make for no reason at all and special enough to make for occasions of all kinds. I love it!
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I’ve been so busy lately that cooking has devolved into a dirty game of survival rather than a hobby. (Seriously . . . last week I burned a frozen pizza because I cranked up the heat hoping it would cook faster.) But, as I’ve seen my free time dwindle away, I’ve become more and more obsessed with building an arsenal of the quickest, easiest most effortless recipes possible. And this one’s a keeper.

I’m trying to break away from my Mom’s American-style spaghetti with meat sauce, and this recipe is the perfect substitute. You do start with a pasta, but then you create the sauce (I know what you’re thinking . . . “No jar?!”) with chopped veggies, a little tomato paste and a splash of pasta water. Then it’s finished off with a handful of Parmesan and a drizzle of olive oil – so simple, but completely and utterly delicious. [Read more →]

I always say my favorite pie is rhubarb (without strawberries), but when I happened to think about it recently, I couldn’t remember the last time I had baked or even eaten a rhubarb pie. And with the ultra short rhubarb season upon us, I knew I had to get baking!

So, I was thrilled when a friend asked me to make dessert for his weekend dinner party. I would have 7 people eagerly awaiting a sweet finale. Then the challenge was finding the right recipe. [Read more →]

I was so amazed by this dessert – it’s unlike anything I’ve ever eaten! The base is a meringue that’s crisp on the outside and marshmallowy on the inside. To use the leftover egg yolks, you make a lemon curd to spread on top. Add in whipping cream and your berries of choice, and it’s all absolutely divine. [Read more →]

Me: “Do you think we can get a smoker?”
Geoff: “We can’t really smoke inside!”

We went on to debate smoking meat in the park or propping a grill out on the fire escape, but for now, indoor oven-braised baby-back ribs are the closest I’m going to get to home-made BBQ.

I’ve had my eye on the Fairway meat counter’s beautiful ribs for a while – I’m always tempted to buy, but never know what the heck I would do with them. So, I was excited when I saw that Alton Brown’s rib recipe, one of the “Top 100” recipes on FoodNetwork.com, is made in the oven. Yay!

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This is one of those stand-by recipes that I’m always craving. I remember devouring this issue of Bon Appétit, way back in February 2005. I had just returned from a trip to Europe, where I ate my way through Paris and completely fell in love with the food. Would I ever taste food like that again, I wondered? This issue gave me hope with a collection of simple French dessert recipes – the traditional ones learned at grandmothers’ elbows in kitchens all over France. These recipes were just the tools I needed to re-capture a little bit of the French food magic in Omaha, Nebraska.

A couple things I love about this cake: subtle lemony flavor; an extremely moist crumb; Is it breakfast, dessert or a snack? All of the above; yogurt instead of butter = the lighter side, as far as cakes go. [Read more →]

I have to admit that I hardly ever make brownies from scratch. I usually make whatever mix is handy, most recently a Betty Crocker version from the local grocery store, bought in a craving-induced after-work stop. They were bad. So now I keep an emergency mix of my favorite variety on hand – Trader Joe’s Truffle Brownies.

When I was invited to bring a dessert to a recent dinner party, I eyed my box of stand-by mix in the cupboard. I knew they were good, but I had a whole Saturday afternoon and a few brownie recipes in my Web site recipe boxes. I decided to go for scratch brownies. [Read more →]

I love meatballs, but I hardly ever make them. Left to my own uninspired devices I’m more likely to quickly brown beef, add a jar of marinara sauce and call it dinner. It’s my Midwestern version of “Pasta Bolognese” – my “again!?” dinner that Geoff is continually forced to veto. So, I decided to put in some extra effort and make meatballs.

Mario Batali is my all-time favorite celebrity chef. I love his restaurants, his cookbooks and, when they were still on-air, I loved his cooking show, Molto Mario.  I remember him saying once that American meatballs were ruined by an over-abundance of wealth. In Italy, meatballs were invented to make meat stretch further when times were tough – cheaper ingredients like eggs and bread were added as fillers. [Read more →]

I first heard the name “Clementine Paddleford” last year, as I uploaded old article to the Gourmet Web site. She wrote a column called “Food Flashes” in the 1940’s. Today, they’re great to read because of the history – the country was a very different place back then. You can check them out here. [Read more →]

The undisputed pancake and waffle king in my family is Grandpa Chuck. Now, Grandpa has been making breakfast feasts using the same tried-and-true pancake recipes for as long as I can remember. So I was amazed when we got into a conversation about pancake recipe experimentation – debating the merits of sour cream vs. buttermilk and whipped egg whites vs. non-whipped.

And I was even more shocked when he recommended a recipe from Gourmet. Grandpa? Grandpa making a different waffle recipe?! My mind reeled! But now, having made these Cardamom Sour-Cream Waffles myself, I have to admit that the recipe was a great find.  [Read more →]