TUESDAYS ARE WHEN WE DO OUR NEW POSTS EACH WEEK. Except this past Tuesday was Valentine’s Day. Instead of cooking and talking about cooking, we wanted to eat restaurant food and feel all festive. So it seems somehow appropriate to dig into the archives and share a recipe that brings genuine restaurant flavor home. And as a bonus, it is crazy easy to make. So enjoy Marion’s Egg Drop Soup—and happy belated Valentine’s Day.
White wine and two French mustards give this meaty roast a surprisingly light finish. Recipe below.
OUR FRIEND RONNIE ANN SAYS POT ROASTS ARE “LIKE A WARM HUG FROM HOME.” We agree. So when we found chuck roast on sale recently, we snatched one right up. And looking for something new to do with a pot roast, we thought of one of the oldest culinary tricks up our sleeve: add mustard. Two mustards, actually. Continue reading “The dependable comforts of home: Pot Roast with Mustard”
This lemony bright, nicely substantial cake is infused with rosemary syrup for a subtle herbal sweetness. Recipe below.
A FEW MONTHS BACK, OUR EXCELLENT FRIEND LIZ, the person who encouraged us to create the feature we call Liz’s Crockery Corner, moved away. She and her family now live on one of our favorite places on earth, Whidbey Island in Washington state. Sweet, huh? But we really miss her. The other day, thinking of Liz and her family’s new world, I was poking around in The Hedgebrook Cookbook: Celebrating Radical Hospitality, the lovely book of recipes from the Hedgebrook writing retreat on Whidbey, and came across a recipe for Lemon Polenta Cake with rosemary syrup. Continue reading “Friends and subtle sweetness: Lemon Cornmeal Blueberry Cake”
A FORECAST OF SNOW GOT ME THINKING OF WARM, HEARTY MEALS. Comfort food, preferably oven-braised or roasted. And that got me thinking of the British Isles, places well-versed in homey dishes to take off the chill on cold, damp days, food to make you happy to be indoors at a kitchen table. These four dishes came to mind. Continue reading “Four cozy winter dishes from the British Isles”
Thoroughly pureeing this simple soup of mushrooms, potatoes and caraway seed makes it velvety smooth and elegant. Recipe below.
A NUMBER OF YEARS BACK, WE WERE ON A ROAD TRIP THROUGH ILLINOIS AND IOWA, noodling around as is our way, and happened upon the Lincoln Cafe, in Mount Vernon, Iowa. Before launching into rhapsodies about its many wonders. I want to start by saying that the Lincoln Cafe has been closed for nearly ten years now. In its heyday, it was that rare place that achieved things which, in America, often clash—providing high-quality, honest, delicious fare and doing it at a modest price. It was neighborhood joint done right, and its location, right on the Lincoln Highway in the heart of tiny Mount Vernon, made it even more lovely. Continue reading “A simple soup elevated: Mushroom Potato Caraway Soup”
Goat cheese adds a lively tanginess to spinach and bacon quiche. Recipe below.
WE GOT A NEW FOOD PROCESSOR LAST WEEKEND and wanted to test drive it. Two things we expect a food processor to do well are puréeing stuff and making pie crust dough. Next week, we’ll share a puréed mushroom potato soup that showed it could do the former. This week, we’ve made a quiche in a crust of well-made dough. Continue reading “Changing up cheese gives quiche a tangy twist: Spinach, Bacon and Goat Cheese Quiche”
Baking a banana bread in a bundt pan cuts down on the baking time and makes it more show-offy. Recipe below.
ONE EVENING OVER THE HOLIDAYS, on a night when we were rich in guests and enjoying ourselves immensely, I was looking for a way to add something extra to our evening and ended up knocking together a Vaquero cocktail for us all—it was a nice, bright, peppery change and big fun to think about, and make, and drink. Continue reading “Banana bread made faster, fancier: Pineapple Banana Bundt Cake with Vanilla Glaze”
BLUE KITCHEN IS CLOSED FOR THE HOLIDAYS. We’ll see you soon. Wishing you a joyous season and a happy, healthy, prosperous new year.
COOKIES—AND BROWNIES—MAY BE THE PERFECT HOLIDAY TREATS TO BAKE. You can make them ahead in batches, ready to serve to guests or take to a party, scaling the amount up or down as needed. With a cake or a pie, once you’ve cut into it, you can only offer it to family or really good friends afterward without looking, well, overly thrifty. Here are seven recipes for you to bake and share. Or keep for yourself, no judging here. Continue reading “Seven cookie (okay, and brownie) recipes for the holidays”
THE ARRIVAL OF COLD WEATHER HAS US THINKING POT ROAST. Hearty, flavorful, soul-satisfying slabs of meat, usually accompanied by root vegetables that have cooked with it, everything swapping flavors and becoming better for it. And usually, an excuse to have the oven on for hours, warming the kitchen and filling the house with divine meaty smells. If you’re thinking this sounds good, here are seven recipes to try. Continue reading “Seven pot roast recipes make the most of cold weather and our favorite cheap cut of beef”