Passover and a winner

The winner of the See's Candies gift certificate is Suzy!

I wanted to share some pictures from Passover with you. I hosted, and decided to go with a relatively simple menu - somehow most of the dishes ended up being adapted from Barefoot Contessa recipes. I didn't get pictures of everything, but here are some of the highlights.

This is a pretty traditional matzo ball soup. I took the idea of the fresh dill and parsley from Barefoot Contessa Parties.

I decided to splurge and go for rack of lamb as the main course. I used the recipe in Barefoot Contessa Parties which involves a crust of dijon mustard, fresh rosemary, balsamic vinegar, garlic and salt.

I boiled these baby yukon gold potatoes until tender, them flattened them under my palm and baked them with some olive oil, salt and pepper until crispy.

More of those delicious green green spring vegetables from Barefoot Contessa at Home.

This dessert was inspired by a meal I had at the restaurant Perbacco. I made meringue shells, which I filled with passion fruit curd. I put the meringues on a pool of raspberry sauce and garnished with fresh raspberries. The meringue and raspberry sauce recipes came from Barefoot in Paris. For the curd, I just substituted passion fruit puree for lemon juice in a lemon curd recipe.

I was really happy with this meal, everything came out about as well as could be expected.

Thanksgiving 2008 - dessert

This thanksgiving was a little bit different than other years. My grandmother recently turned 80, so we celebrated her birthday at the same time. I was in charge of the birthday cake. I almost never make layer cakes - for some reason, they intimidate me a little bit. I wanted a foolproof recipe that wasn't too complicated, since I had to split my time between the cake and other thanksgiving dishes. Who better to turn to than Dorie Greenspan? I pulled out her cookbook and settled on devil's food white-out cake, which looks beautiful on the front cover of the book. Here's a link to the recipe.

The recipe calls for baking the cake layers in 8"x2" rounds. I only had 9" rounds, so I went with that, and my layers came out a bit flat for obvious reasons. I wanted a tall, dramatic cake, so I went ahead and doubled the recipe, making a total of 4 layers and twice the frosting. Since my layers came out fairly thin (about 1") and flat, I decided not to slice them in half. The frosting is meringue based and pretty simple to make.

In the recipe, one of the cake layers is crumbled and used for decoration on the sides of the cake. I skipped this step, instead opting to use all 4 layers in the cake. I stuck a couple of skewers into the cake for some support, because I had to transport it later. I coated the outside of the cake with mini chocolate chips. I think this was a good move; the chocolate chips added a nice textural contrast.

Here's grandma with her cake:

She was thrilled, and I'm happy to say that the cake tasted as good as it looked. The meringue frosting kept it from being too heavy and rich. Everyone finished their piece after a huge thanksgiving meal, and a few people commented that it was the best cake they'd ever had.

We also had a pumpkin pie and some chocolate frosted pumpkin bars, but I didn't get a chance to get pictures of those.

Thanksgiving 2008 - the main event

Our thanksgiving menu doesn't vary much from year to year. That being said, I love to experiment with new recipes, so I try to change up at least one or two of the sides each time. I didn't make all of the food pictured, so I'll fill in details where I can.

My mom's roasted turkey
Flaky dinner rolls - I make these for every holiday

This is a pretty traditional stuffing - cubes of no-knead bread, mushrooms, celery, water chestnuts and fresh herbs.

This dish of sweet potatoes with caramelized apples was one of the new recipes I made. I combined recipes from Ina Garten and Martha Stewart to come up with what I think was an outstanding sweet potato dish. I think this will be on the menu for years to come.

Cranberry sauce with cardamom and vanilla bean - this is another recipe that's become a tradition.

Brussels sprouts with pomegranate and walnuts - I made these a few weeks back, and we liked them so well that they were added to the thanksgiving menu.

Also on the menu but not pictured here - classic gravy, mashed potatoes, peas with pearl onions, berry jello and romaine salad with pears and walnuts.

Stay tuned for tomorrow's dessert recap!

Thanksgiving 2008 - the appetizers

I hope everyone had a great thanksgiving! I've decided to recap my thanksgiving over a couple of posts, because I took quite a few pictures. I didn't make all the dishes pictured, so I'll mostly provide details on the items I brought.

It's a family tradition to have a mexican layered dip on thanksgiving. Start with refried beans spread onto a plate, and add layers of sour cream, guacamole, salsa and shredded cheese. You can garnish any combination of chopped tomatoes, olives and green onions.

Here's a vegetable tray my mom made, it was quite colorful.

I made this white cheddar cheeseball. The recipe is from How to Cook Everything Vegetarian, and it couldn't be any easier. It's a block of cream cheese, 8 oz of shredded white cheddar, 2 T butter, 1 T lemon juice, a dash of cayenne, salt and pepper. The cream cheese and butter need to be softened ahead of time. Throw all the ingredients into the bowl of a stand mixer and blend. Shape into a ball and roll in chopped herbs or toasted nuts.

Next up - the main event!

Mother's Day Dinner

This year, instead of going to a restaurant, I cooked dinner for my mom. For the main course, I made hawaiian snapper with an orange sauce. I served it over farro and black rice with pea shoots and green garlic. The recipe is from Sunday Suppers at Lucques. For most of the fish recipes in this book, the fish is seasoned with lemon/orange zest, thyme and parsley for at least 4 hours ahead of time. I think this technique adds a lot of flavor to the fish.

On the side, I served some baby artichokes that I caramelized in a little butter. For dessert, I made a pear and rhubarb cobbler. I used the recipe from Dorie Greenspan's baking cookbook. Her recipe calls for cherries and rhubarb. I originally planned to use cherries, but then we received a gift of pears from Harry and David, so I went with those instead. The biscuit topping is unique because it uses half whole wheat flour for a little bit different flavor and texture. I sprinkled coarse sugar over the top of the cobbler and served it with vanilla ice cream.

Passover 2008

Last night we celebrated Passover with my family. The seder was at my house for the first time. I always love an excuse to use my wedding china and crystal! I couldn't decide what to serve as a main course - I had narrowed it to down turkey ossobucco and braised lamb shanks with lentils. My husband suggested I combine the two dishes and make braised turkey legs with lentils. It came out great.

The table

My mom's matzo ball soup

My mom's charoset

Braised turkey legs with curry and lentils

Baby summer squash with chive vinaigrette and ricotta salata

Steamed leeks with sherry vinaigrette and capers

Meringues with ice cream, chocolate sauce and toasted almonds

Thanksgiving 2007

Here's what I made for Thanksgiving. I'm looking forward to leftovers tomorrow!

Mexican seven layer dip

Ina Garten's roast turkey

Mushroom and prosciutto stuffing

Cranberry sauce with vanilla bean and cardamom

Flaky dinner rolls

Vegetable salad with lemon vinaigrette

Peas and pearl onions with brown butter and tarragon

Horseradish mashed potatoes

Pumpkin and chocolate cheesecake bars

Mini pecan pies

Birthday presents

My birthday was last week. Here are some of the food-related presents I received:

Modern Greek

Patricia Wells at Home in Provence

Baking with Julia


The New Spanish Table

Global 8 inch chef's knifeVintage (1920) cast iron cornbread molds

Christmas Antipasto

Here's a picture of the antipasto platter I put together for Christmas:

From left to right: artichoke hearts, olives, salami, asiago cheese, roasted red bell peppers, caper berries

I arranged the antipasto on a bed of radicchio to add color. Other possible items to put on the tray could be prosciutto, grilled or roasted fennel, small mozzarella balls, pepperoncini or fresh figs.

To go with the tray, I made a batch of my favorite pizza dough and cut it into small rounds to bake. The rounds got pretty puffy in the oven, so the bread turned out more like pizza rolls than flatbread, but it was still good.

Thanksgiving in December

I had another turkey in the freezer, so I decided to roast it for dinner. Here's what we had:

Ina Garten's Roasted Turkey

Buttermilk Biscuits

Roasted Fingerling Potatoes (smoked paprika, chives and parmigiano reggiano)

Roasted Beet Salad (arugula, gorgonzola and tangerine vinaigrette)

Sauteed Broccoli Rabe (balsamic, olive oil and red pepper flakes)

Cranberry and Quince Compote

Butterfinger Brownies

Chocolate Covered Orange Peel