A Teaspoon of Curry

My new blog

2011-08-23T10:15:00.001-07:00

As most of you know, my new blog is http://www.teaspoonofspice.com/! Come join me (and my business partner Deanna Segrave-Daly) on our fun new food finds and recipes and kiddie kitchen adventures!

Royal Wedding Tea

2011-04-30T12:54:00.000-07:00

Princesses at tea

I was just a little girl, but I remember watching Princess Di's fairy tale wedding on TV with my mom and sisters. We weren't up at 4AM to watch the royal wedding of Prince William and Kate; but my girls and I and a dear friend did don big hats and pearls and watched internet clips last night. Then we sat down to a tea party (for dinner!) The food wasn't 100% British. But it was absolutely delicious. Here's what we ate:

Radish and thick butter teas sandwiches with Union Jack toothpick flags

Pimento Cheese on white bread sandwiches

Tea with crumpets

Crumpetts with Lemon Curd Napa Cabbage and fennel salad with lemon vinaigrette

Prince Williams Imposter Biscuit Cake (we didn't have time to make the cake, so spread tea biscuits with Nutella)
Strawberries and brown sugar
Ginger tea
A sunset orange cocktail of Tanqueray's London Dry Gin with a splash of fresh orange juice and a drop of Angostura bitters

One final note, the crumpets were amazing; even though we accidentally added the baking soda with all the other dry ingredients - instead later with the milk. Any Brit would've recognized them as a homemade crumpets: Golden and chewy on one side and spongy and blond on the other side with holes (similar to English muffins) throughout. Warm and spread with butter, they were royally delicious.

Imposter Prince William's Biscuit Cake and crumpets with strawberries

Royal Cocktail ingredients

Smoky (as in smoke-alarm) Artichokes

2011-04-23T21:04:00.000-07:00

I’ve always known my three kids to be good sleepers. But tonight my cooking set off the fire alarm after they were in bed and nobody woke up!

I’ve been trying to pre-cook Easter dinner this week. The hope is that I can spend more time hiding eggs tomorrow instead of cooking. So I was making these chili, oregano and garlic olive oil infused Roasted Artichokes tonight.

At first the roasting vegetables filled the entire house with the heady smell of garlic and vegetables caramelizing. But at a roasting temperature of 500 degrees, caramelization eventually turns black. Thus, the smoke and the smoke alarm.

I threw the roaster of artichokes out on the back deck and ran upstairs to open all the windows and fan the air near the alarm with a big blanket. Then I heard my neighbor yell in the open window, “Everything ok in there?” “Uh, yeah, thanks Bill. Just doing a little cooking.” Ironically, Bill told me earlier today that he was smoking salmon tonight….outside. Guess I should’ve paid more attention to the headnote on the Roasted Artichokes recipe; in Sicily, they roast their artichokes over an open fire…outside.

Yes, I tasted them. They are amazing; smoky (go figure), garlicy, spicy and caramelized with tender leaves.

Roasted artichokes cooling on my back deck

Prize-winning Pico de gallo

2011-04-03T12:43:00.000-07:00

Strawberry Pico de Gallo salad

Now that the California Giant Berries “Reciberries for Life” healthy recipe contest has officially closed, I can share what I’m sure will be the prize-winning recipe. Now, there, I just jinxed myself.

I created the recipe after eating at a little Mexican taco restaurant in south Tucson a couple weeks ago. There were no paper menus; the menu board listed – all in Spanish – fish tacos, bean tacos, chicken tacos and every-part-of-the-cow tacos. We tried almost every delicious variety (except beef tripe - I once had a very bad experience with tripe during the throughs of morning sickness several years ago.) The soft corn tortillas enrobing each taco were warm and freshly handmade. Food was served very simply on paper plates – but the simplicity of fresh corn and tomato salsas, lime juice contrasting richly sauced meats, and striking white Mexican crema was beautiful.

Tacos at Pico de Gallo restaurant in Tucson

However, the most striking dish – and the possibly the most delicious part of the meal was the restaurant's namesake, Pico de Gallo. It was fruit, spice, salt and sour lime. It was a super refreshing way to counter to the fiery spices in the tacos. Here are some photos of the Pico de Gallo and the recipe I created.

Pouring horchata, a sweet rice drink at Pico de Gallo

Horchata and Pico de Gallo salad: Fresh coconut, mango, watermelon

Strawberry Pico de Gallo
1 pound strawberries, washed and halved
½ cantaloupe, peeled, sliced in 8 slices
1 mango, peeled, cut in bite-sized chunks
½ lime, juiced
½ tablespoon sweetened flaked coconut
1/8 teaspoon kosher or sea salt
1/8 teaspoon chili powder

Arrange fruit on a serving platter by mounding berries and mango in center and cantaloupe slices fanning out around platter.
Sprinkle lime juice over all fruit. Sprinkle fruit with coconut, salt and chili powder.

My recipe for Pico de Gallo salad

Spring has sprung cupcakes

2011-03-23T12:44:00.000-07:00

In honor of spring, we made cupcakes. I discovered these amazingly creative rainbow cupcakes on Collaborative Curry’s blog in honor of St. Patricks Day. But since we had three sick kids on St. Patrick’s Day, no one really felt like whipping up six-colored cupcake batter. Additionally, since we used up all the red food coloring in the pantry on the red velvet birthday cake, the full rainbow of colors wasn’t really an option. Four-colored cupcake batter was created: Yellow, green, blue and the most beautiful and springy lime green color. (In fact, the lime green was exactly the color of the crocus leaves popping up in my front yard!)

We followed Collaborative Curry’s directions to pour the (rather runny) batter in the center of each cupcake wrapper and not stir.

The coloring turned out great. However, as you can see, the cakes fell. I believe I should have added the full 1 ½ teaspoon baking soda. I may have under-baked them slightly so they would retain the amazing moistness Collaborative Curry wrote about – this may also have contributed to the fallen cakes.

Lastly, you may want to add those two additional tablespoons of sugar in the recipe to keep the cakes from being a bit tough. But with all those colors, what kid will notice the cakes are less-than-super-sweet. And with the delicious aroma and taste of 1 ½ teaspoon of vanilla, adults too will eat every crumb.

Happy Paczki Day

2011-03-09T19:56:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was Fat Tuesday; or in any place where wonderful Polish bakeries exist, it's Paczki Day. These traditionally Polish raised donuts are filled with a super-sized amount of jelly and are usually sold only one day a year - the day of feasting before a traditional fast on Ash Wednesday.

It makes me smile to ponder that no one seems to know that the singular form of paczki is paczek (according to the Detroit Free Press tweet yesterday.) Obviously, no one else can eat just one either.

We certainly didn't. My dear husband was at Kirschbaum's (a local German bakery which has embraced the Polish tradition) by 7:30AM for a box of these fried yeasty yummies. They were fresh, thickly sprinkled with powdered sugar and filled with poppyseed, strawberry, blueberry, cheese (a cream cheese custard) and Strawberries & Cream fillings. The blueberry was terrible - the filling was fake food chemicals. (My kids still ate the sticky sweetness.) But the poppyseed was amazing.

The best coffee house: Macys in Flagstaff, Arizona

2011-02-17T20:10:00.000-08:00

Last night we returned from a winter get-away to Arizona. While it was luxurious to escape the three feet of snow blanketing our back yard, it was 43 degrees at the Grand Canyon and 45 degrees when we arrived home to Chicago. Luckily the snow was nearly gone after a week away. And fortunately, while in the desert state we were able to visit Macys European Coffee House & Bakery in Flagstaff; my vote for the very best coffee house bakery in America.

Blueberry Danish, Sticky Bun, Coffeecake

Macys may not be the most traditional European bakery; case in point, the macadamia nut sticky bun made with buttery whole wheat sweet dough and saturated, not sprinkled with macadamia nuts. The unconventional Blueberry Danish was topped with rich, sweet tofu “cream” cheese that tasted nutty and rich in the way that only a very good baker can magically make tofu taste. The Danish dough was not cloying and white-flour; instead, it too was made from whole wheat flour and was somewhat hearty – though not too thick to disqualify itself from being a delicate Danish. We also tasted a super moist Blackberry Peach Coffeecake that was heady with almond and sprinkled with the darkest and most molasses-y brown sugar-butter crumbles. Somehow, the fruit in all the baked goods was rich and flavorful, despite the winter weather outside. And that is why this place is the best: Quality ingredients and deliciously creative recipes.

Oh, and then there was the coffee. My husband thought it was the best he’s ever tasted. They don’t do Americano drip. Only espresso. And they make beautiful latte art in the top of your steamed milk foam.

Macadamia Nut Sticky Bun

Oatmeal Pancakes on Snow Day 2011

2011-02-02T08:08:00.000-08:00

These pancakes are hands-down the best pancakes I’ve tasted: Nutty from the whole wheat flour, hearty oatmeal, yet with the deliciously tart flavor of buttermilk. Thus, I had to get them posted immediately so you might have the opportunity to serve them for lunch or dinner on this Snow Day 2011. Isn’t it rather incredible that all of America is snowed in on the same day?

This Whole Wheat Oatmeal Pancakes recipe is from Epicurious and I followed it exactly. If you have it, use fresh nutmeg and grate it straight into the dry ingredients. The fresh nutmeg makes the pancakes ultimately rich. And when you serve them, pull out the real maple syrup. (Those Vermont or Wisconsin maple farmers work very hard to produce it – that’s why it costs a good $7.00-8.00 a bottle.)

In fact, these were so good, we might have them again for dinner with some sunny-side-up eggs and a salad of fresh apples, frozen blueberries and bananas.

And now, since this is the most severe snowstorm we’ve experienced since living in Chicago, here’s a snapshot from the Chicago Tribune.

As of 6 a.m. the National Weather Service reported 17.3 inches of snow at O'Hare International Airport, 17 inches at Midway Airport… “Just about every main road through here is impassable,” said Lake County Sheriff’s Sgt. Curt Gregory. “People were getting stuck and requiring rescue all night, he said, but some people are still trying to drive. “You’re not going to stop that,” he said around 8 a.m.. “For the most part we’ve got the majority of it cleaned up. Now it’s just sporadic. When people leave home and think they can get through in a Honda Civic, we’ve got to go rescue them.”

-- The inbound Stevenson Expressway remains closed at Martin Luther King Drive due to the shutdown of Lake Shore Drive.
-- As of 3:45 a.m., state officials were telling motorists to stay off I-290 from St. Charles Road to I- 90 and I-57 south of I-80.

An A+ in Nutrition

2011-01-28T04:05:00.000-08:00

For an easy ego boost, try offering kiwi slices to a classroom full of fifth and sixth graders. I was rewarded with a standing ovation! This week I had fun teaching a few nutrition classes at my kid’s school.

After explaining that your body needs 40 nutrients every single day to grow and be healthy and that the way to do this is by eating according to the Food Guide Pyramid, we tasted several “new” foods. Here are a few of the highlights:

• Every single kindergartener tasted and LIKED grapefruit. The trick was to tell them it’s a tricky fruit because it’s yellow on the outside and “super pink” on the inside. I also sliced it into wedges so the kids first tasted sweet/sour juice instead of pith.

• My kid – daughter of a dietitian – knew the answer to every single nutrition question.

• The fifth and sixth graders were presented with a tray of fruits and veggies and asked to identify the following for extra credit: Persimmon, fennel, guava, kiwi, pomegranate, Bosc pear, star fruit, cactus paddles. One kid got eight of 10 correct.

• One sixth grader told me his mom de-prickers, slices, and fries cactus paddles for dinner. And she’s not Hispanic, she’s Irish.

• There was not a single kid in grade K, five or six who refused to taste the star fruit.

• The fifth graders kept trying to get me to okay soda: “What if you drink it alongside a glass of milk.” “Can you have pop just once a day?” “But if my mom sends it in my lunchbox, it must be ok.” Ugh, I can’t argue with that last comment: Moms – if you put it in their lunchbox, you’re giving it an inherent stamp of approval.

• But I did get the 10-year-olds to utter , “Oh gross!” when I held up a bag of Skittles…by simultaneously holding up a bag of 9 teaspoons of sugar – the amount in the Skittles.

In summary, it’s cool to wow kids with starfruit.

Chicago-isms: Stopping for "some Bakery", "coffee, and"

2011-01-13T20:27:00.000-08:00

We stopped off for some bakery yesterday. That’s right. “Some bakery” is a Chicago-ism, that in most parts of the country – and in proper English – would translate to “some baked goods.” Maybe it’s because this city is so rich in bakeries with the tradition of preparing such incredibly delicious baked goods that the phrase implies that one would take home the entire bakery. Or maybe it implies a bakery is an integral part of a neighborhood. Either way Weber’s Bakery on Archer Ave is not to be missed. Erich is the third generation in his family to be turning out most delicious German ‘bakery’in the city.

In fact, Weber’s poppyseed pastries or apple fritters would be perfect to have at your next “coffee, and.” That’s another Chicago-ism and it means coffee klatch or coffee break.

Yesterday, while returning our delightful guests to Midway Airport, we had the opportunity to stop at Weber’s to pick up some bakery for today’s coffee, and. Specifically, we ordered fresh rye bread, a chocolate donut, poppy seed Danish, apple pastry, prune Kolacky and butter croissants. It was all placed lovingly in a box by one of many helpful counter attendants and tied with an old-fashioned twine stringing machine. (My girls loved watching this machine that whipped the string around the box and tied it snuggly!)

Weber’s lists their signature items as buttermilk poundcake, Banana Split Torte, Kolacky, chocolate cake donuts, Grandpa Rye Bread, Cinnamon Raisin Cylinder, Fresh Strawberry & Cheese Coffee Cake, Raisin Houska, Sauerkraut Rye Bread and brownies. All that bakery is good. My list would also add: Poppyseed Danishes and apple pastries. But I would scratch out the chocolate donuts; while they have dense delectable frosting made with two different chocolates, the cake donuts always taste like they’ve been fried in old grease. (A downfall of places that fry A LOT of donuts…like Dunkin.)

The apple pastry is a unique masterpiece. It is a few paper-thin layers of pastry dough wrapped around a large mound of spiced-cooked apples and walnuts that have been sprinkled with sweet bread crumbs.

The poppy seed Danish is rich buttery sweet dough stuffed with ooey-gooey poppy seed filling and drizzled with just enough creamy glaze.

Unfortunately the Saurerckraut Rye bread is not made every day. (That’s right sauerkraut is baked right into round loaves of crusty rye.) Instead, we took home a beautiful loaf of plain rye that must have been stuffed with 2-3 tablespoons of caraway seeds. Caraway can be a questionable flavor for many kids, but mine think it tastes like peppermint sprinkles. The dark black seeds do have a zing-y quality! And my eight-month old baby had his first taste of rye bread today. He loved it – another testament that introducing strong flavors early on can lead to wide-ranging kids’ palates! (That’s what I’m hoping!) The rye bread is delicious when lightly toasted and topped with aged Wisconsin Brick cheese; a German classic that started with some classic German bakery (the bread) from a classic German bakery (Weber’s)! Got that?

Icebox Cake - Still a little confused

2010-12-31T10:32:00.000-08:00

Garnish with dried cranberries

Looking for a super simple, show-stopping dessert to make for a party tonight? This festive Lemon- Raspberry Icebox Cake is also an opportunity to take pleasure in eating spoonfuls of whipped cream straight-up! I prepared this beautiful dessert from the December issue of Relish Magazine for a Christmas party.

The prep was effortless and almost therapeutic. After whipping the cream and folding in Dickinson’s delicious jarred lemon cream, just smear raspberry jam atop graham crackers and assemble layers within a springform pan. Start now, it has to chill 5 hours.

One note: (And if I could make this “NOTE” enormous and flashing red, I would) You will still have plastic wrap adorning your serving platter – unless you can determine how to remove it. I could not! I read the recipe instructions numerous times: “Gently lift cake by the plastic wrap to remove it from pan bottom and peel away plastic wrap.” How? How do you remove the plastic wrap from beneath the pie without the disassembling the dessert into a messy heap? I found myself wishing I could do that trick you see in cartoons where the guy pulls the tablecloth out from beneath the plates and silverware and leaves the table settings undisturbed! But after reading the many comments about troublesome plastic wrap by Relish’s recipe reviewers, you may become enlightened with a solution. One suggests: Use parchment paper on bottom and spray the sides of the springform pan with cooking spray. Had read this before making the dessert I would've tried it.

Despite the plastic wrap malfunction, the Christmas party guests somehow managed to enjoy eating sweet-tart lemony whipped cream straight-up almost as much as me.

A few bites of leftovers

Magical 3rd birthday and Red Velvet Cake

2010-12-23T20:15:00.000-08:00

Birthdays are magical. But I do believe that the third birthday is the most magical of all. At three, you awake from beneath your lavender sparkle quilt – just like you do any other day – but this day, you get special birthday smiley-faced pancakes with Wisconsin maple syrup and peanut butter. And for the rest of an entire day, things get better and better! And since you don’t really have any frame of reference for this wonderful day (because you don't really remember your second birthday), it’s like your third birthday just happens on day by magic!

I’ve been concerned that my little ‘Christmas’ baby born three years ago would be slightly traumatized by having a birthday amongst all the bustle of this season. Her birthday might feel forgotten. But this year, as we drove out of town to cut down our Christmas tree on my little girl’s birthday, we saw house after house covered with twinkling lights. If that’s not magical, then it’s got to make her feel festive at the very least.

As you may know, I put a fair amount of thought into my kids’ birthday cakes. I’ve never made a Red Velvet cake, but have always wanted to recreate my Grandmother’s recipe. Just this year she dictated it to me over the phone from Montana where she is a spry 92. I ended up combining Grandma’s recipe and this one that I found for Red Raspberry Velvet Cake from Cooking Light. The Cooking Light recipe notes that Red Velvet cake is said to have originated at the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in the 1950’s.

So now I picture my little three-year-old dressed in a mid-twentieth century period frilly dress, white gloves, her golden curls just peeking out from beneath her proper hat...she's having tea and Red Velvet Cake with me in the lobby of the Waldorf-Astoria all decorated for Christmas. Magic!

Party Decorations- $6, Festive Taco Bar Party- Priceless

2010-11-15T20:14:00.000-08:00

I’m still finding salt in every corner of our home. Thus is the result of our Make-Your-Own-Margarita and Taco Bar party over the weekend. It’s my new favorite party theme; talk about simple!

All I did was set out a little buffet of: 1) Taco meat- Sauté some hamburger with lots of cumin, chili powder, Mrs. Dash Extra Spicy and a little salt. 2) Black beans- My friend Rebekah gave me the following set-it-and-forget-it Slow Cooker Black Beans recipe. (I’ll be cooking garbanzo, pinto, and all my beans this way from now on.) 3)Condiments in festive little bowls: Chopped cilantro, sliced green onions, crumbled Queso Fresco cheese, a jar of nopalitos (spicy cactus pickles,) chopped lettuce and salsa from a can with the addition of fresh cilantro and tomatoes and frozen corn.

The margaritas were a breeze: Sauza makes a great pre-mixed variety that comes in an easy-pour box; we also put out a bottle of Sauza Tequila Silver (it has a clean, fresh, lovely fruit flavor/aroma), ice, lots of lime wedges and for dipping the rims of glasses, a wet paper towel on a plate with another plate of kosher salt. While this was probably not the most authentic Make-Your-Own-Margarita set-up, guests were happy to mix in tequila and limes to their liking. And most folks would rather chat than stand at the bar trying to remember the correct proportion of Triple Sec to tequila and lime juice.

But I was most happy with my $6.00 decorations. They were all edible! I filled an old straw hat (that looked rather sombrero-ish) with produce from our local Hispanic grocery store: Cactus paddles (nopales), prickly pears, chayote squash and peppers of every color and shape. (Emeril's Cactus Salad is delicious!)

Slow Cooker Black Beans (adapted from Rebekah)

3 c. dried black beans

1 red onion quartered

2 cloves garlic, chopped

1 jalapeno pepper, seeded, chopped

2 teaspoons kosher salt

¼ teaspoon cumin

¾ teaspoon black pepper

9 cups water

Combine all ingredients in slow cooker. Cook on low for 8 hours.

Pumpkin and Chayote squash

Real Popcorn

2010-11-04T19:57:00.000-07:00

Popcorn with Baby's pumpkin hat!

Of course all pop corn is a real whole grain. In fact pop corn is one of the easiest ways to get more whole grains into your diet. Even smothered in salt and butter, it's still a whole grain with about 2 grams of fiber per cup. And who eats just 1 cup. So before you've finished a bowl, you've consumed A LOT of fiber.

According Jolly Time there are two types of kernel shapes: Mushroom and butterfly. Interesting.

Unpopped cob in front of popped corn

It was rather difficult to discern if the kernals on these cobs from the Farmers Market were mushrooms or butterflies. But I can tell you that popping them was absolutely the most exciting two minutes of kitchen fun the girls and I have had! We just threw the cob into a glass bowl and covered with plastic wrap, venting 1/2 inch. Then we all watched the show through the microwave door as the kernals shot in rapid fire off the corn cob blowing and stretching the plastic wrap like a balloon! (The dear farmers forgot to give us cooking directions - so it was an experiment!).

The taste was so fresh and sweet! It didn't even need salt.

To find your own fresh pop corn fun, try Whole Foods or this Big Red Popcorn: I can't personally vouch for either, but I've heard both are good.

It was fun to pull some of the remaining corn right off the cob

Ultimate Comfort Food

2010-10-27T20:37:00.000-07:00

Today was one of those days I just never got a chance to sit down to enjoy any sort of satisfying meal. So tonight after the kids were in bed, I still felt really hungry. Another Pumpkin Cupcake would be tasty, but not very filling. And there’s no way I was going to cook or clean up another dish. Solution: Eggs and avocados. While this recipe will probably not win the Amazing Avocado Recipe contest which ends tomorrow, it will become your new ultimate comfort food. (If you have a favorite avocado recipe, submit it and you could win a $100 grocery card!)

The rush began early in a mad dash to get the house straightened/decorated for our morning Halloween party. My cereal was eaten while standing and frosting cupcakes.

The Halloween party was a success. Then again, when does dressing up as a duck and eating Pumpkin Cupcakes before noon (and drinking mulled wine if you’re a mom) not guarantee success?

The afternoon was filled with feeding kids lunch, cleaning costumes and feeding the cereal to the baby (a long ordeal since he’s still learning.) Bites of lunch were taken while cleaning up and searching for the piles of mail, etcetera, I’d stashed in drawers to clear clutter. I prepared dinner and ate a few spoonfuls of it while again trying to aim the baby’s spoon into his mouth.

But a few minutes ago, I finished a very satisfying bowl of Eggs & Avocados. Yum! This is the fastest, easiest and tastiest way you’ll ever cook eggs. They come out smooth and custardy because they’re cooked on low microwave power; and the mixing dish is also the baking dish that’s popped into the dishwasher. The creamy avocados on top make the egg seem even richer. (But because I’m I dietitian, I know the entire dish is only about 140 calories!)

Eggs & Avocados for One

1 egg
Splash of milk or water or cream
¼ avocado, diced

In a glass custard cup, mix together egg and milk until thoroughly combined. Top loosely with a paper towel and cook on 50% or 60% power in the microwave for 1 minute. Stir. Cook for another 30 seconds to 1 minute on 50% or 60% until eggs are set. Top with avocado and a dash of kosher/sea salt and ground pepper.

Eggs&Avocados for One

Perfect Persimmons

2010-10-26T19:46:00.000-07:00

Wild persimmons growing among yellow leaves

Bright orange Persimmons grow wild in southern Illinois! Who knew? I knew autumn was persimmon season and I usually buy one a year, taking a gamble that the fruit won’t be too bitterly tannic to enjoy. The trick is to let the fruit ripen until so mushy it feels rotten. I’m impatient. So I usually cut into it too early. The result: It's so bitter it makes your teeth hurt!

The fruit is about 1 1/2" in diameter

On our camping trip over the weekend to the Shawnee National Forest, we discovered tall persimmon trees dotted through parts of the forest. But they were hard to spot as the orange fruit blended in with the gorgeous orange foliage of other trees. When we did find a persimmon tree, the best part was that Mother Nature had already done the ripening for us! The most delicious persimmons were mushy and so ripe that they turned a blue-ish hue, that’s right, blue!

Biting into the soft fruit was heaven; they were rich and super sweet with a heady honey aroma and flavor. The girls and I ate a lot of them; many right off the ground. This year we enjoyed more than our one-a-year persimmon – foraged not from the supermarket, but from the surprisingly rich bounty of Land of Lincoln.

Hiking in Shawnee Nat. Forest

Thanks Martha

2010-10-12T18:57:00.000-07:00

I’ve been cherishing these days of 80-degree weather; I love summer and it’s given me a chance to make it to the bottom of my summer To-Make-Recipes pile. (Although I've been itching to try all the autumn pumpkin recipes I've been stumbling upon, like Pumpkin Creme Pies.) “What’s at the bottom of the pile?” you may ask. Martha Stewart. Often, I’m less than lucky with Martha Stewart recipes; in their attempts for brevity, I find important details are left out. But tonight, Martha's FOOD magazine came through for me. And how! It was especially glorious that this recipe used the last of the bounty of tomatoes still ripening on my vines.

The squishy crust that bakes toasty

At first, I was intrigued by the crust of this Tomato-Ricotta Tart. It’s just fresh breadcrumbs mixed with olive oil and squished into a tart pan. I adapted it to use whole grain soft sandwich bread, and that worked very well because it was very squish-able. This simple crust may work for other quiche-like dishes.

The basil plant is all dried out, so I used my fresh mint and it brightened the dish. And I grated a deliciously aged Vella Dry Jack cheese instead of Parmesan.

Here’s my version of a super supper dish that goes together quickly. The girls loved hearing we were having tart for dinner and they liked eating it too.

Tomato-Ricotta Tart

2 cups course fresh whole wheat bread crumbs

3 tablespoons olive oil

1 cup whole-milk ricotta

½ cup Vella Dry Jack cheese (or Parmesan), finely grated

2 eggs

3 tablespoons fresh mint, chopped

1 ½ pounds thinly sliced beefsteak tomatoes (about 2-3)

Preheat oven to 400°. In 9-inch springform pan, toss breadcrumbs and oil; press evenly into bottom.

Whisk together ricotta, grated cheese, eggs, mint and season with salt and pepper. Spread over top of crust; arrange tomatoes on top.

Bake until tomatoes are almost dry, about 35 minutes. (The edges will get dark and crispy.) Cool. Unmold and serve warm or at room temp.

If they shuck them, they will eat them

2010-10-08T13:36:00.000-07:00

Aren’t these beautiful beans?! Dark purple. Deep green. Mottled green and purple. They’re fresh lima beans and purple pole beans from the farmers market. The girls helped me shuck them; and they really were a big help. Even the two-year-old was able to sweep her fingers down the pod to slide out the beans. The tricks were to give them each their own container; also, I cracked open the pods for my younger daughter. Her big sister snapped and shucked like a champ.

We tossed them into this infinitely versatile recipe from the infinitely versitile Meal Makeover Moms cookbook. (Their new cookbook is due out any day and I'll be ordering a case of books for my friends!) The original recipe calls for broccoli and corn. But I always swap in the veggies I have. My cupboards were also bare of hoisan sauce; I substituted chili sauce, lime juice and fish sauce. So here’s my version of a kid-friendly dish with real Asian flavor:

Mixed-Up Tofu (adapted from The Moms' Guide to Meal Makeovers)

6 oz angel hair pasta

One 14-oz pkg extra-firm tofu, drained, and cubed on a paper towel covered cutting board (or a couple hot dogs, sliced, if your fresh tofu is fermented when opened!)

2 tablespoons lite soy sauce

1/2 teaspoon sriracha chili sauce

1 tablespoon lime juice

1/2 teaspoon Asian fish sauce

1 tablespoon cornstarch

1 tablespoon canola oil

1 sweet potato, peeled and diced in 1/2-inch cubes

1/2 cup shucked purple pole beans

1/2 cup shucked fresh lima beans

1 puple pepper, sliced in thin strips

2 teaspoons garlic, chopped

2 teaspoons fresh, peeled ginger, chopped

1/3 cup roasted, unsalted peanuts

1. Cook pasta according to package directions. Drain and set aside.

2. Whisk together the soy sauce, chili sauce, juice, fish sauce and corn starch. Set aside.

3. Heat oil in large non-stick skillet high heat. Add tofu (or hot dogs,) vegetables, garlic, ginger and stir fry for about 2 minutes. Add 2/3 cup water, cover and steam until veggies are tender. Stir occasionally.

4. Give the soy sauce mixture a stir and add to skillet, cook until liquid thickens about 2 minutes.

5. Serve in individual bowls over pasta, top with nuts.

Boozy Lollicakes

2010-09-30T17:26:00.000-07:00

Cakes brought home for my kids

My cousin Jessica is hip. Yesterday’s blog from New York blogger Small Bites chronicles the recent trendiness of boozy desserts. (Thanks for the reTweet TspBasil!). And what dessert generally gets the instant attention of lots (over 150) hungry guests? Wedding cake. Over the weekend, I attended Jessica’s wedding in Denver and her wedding cake hit the trendiness meter on two points: Boozy cake and a cake of individual portions, i.e., the small plate thing that makes a diner/guest feel special.

Inside of a strawberry Lollicake

Here’s what she served: Lollicakes! Specifically, they were Guiness stout doused dark chocolate cake with Bailey's cream cheese frosting. How's that for boozy?!

Individual Lollicakes are fresh cake crumbs mixed with creamy frosting all inside an adorable candy shell. The best part: The Lollicakes were the classy centerpiece of dining tables. So we all got to indulge in them before dinner. And that makes a dinner occasion just a little more special...when adults get to eat dessert before dinner just like the kids!

By the way, my cousin also chose a Mexican fiesta theme for her wedding feast! The delicious buffet included cheese empanadas, beef and bean burritos, make-your-own-tacos and lots of pickled jalapenos! Maybe she's ahead of another trend!

My niece eating dessert before dinner

The Pixy Stix Fountain of Youth

2010-09-20T19:36:00.000-07:00

Chocolate-covered Caramel Corn

Yesterday we discovered the Fountain of Youth. It’s in the next town over, in Riverside, it’s…(drum roll, please)…Aunt Diana’s Candy Makers.

We know it’s the source of a food that will help you live ‘forever’ because we took the kids to sing ‘Happy 90th Birthday’ to a sweet elderly lady from church yesterday. And she told us she’s eaten Aunt Diana’s chocolates regularly for the last 37 years of her life. (It was established in 1973.) If fact, while she was pontificating about being 90, we were interrupted by her friend who brought over her favorite Aunt Diana’s peanut butter fudge.

Chocolate Fangs

Upon leaving, we sped to Aunt Diana’s. We emerged from the cozy, Halloween-decorated shop with chocolate-covered caramel corn (salty, sweetness enrobed in rich milk chocolate), chocolate vampire fangs, a gum cigar and Pixy Stix. Soon, I’ll be returning to the old fashioned candy counter for chocolate- covered peanut butter pretzels, chocolate-covered apricots and homemade butter toffee topped with chocolate – all in the name of lengthening my life expectancy, of course.

Eating a Pixy Stix is tricky

The Pixy Stix were for our little girls. My husband and I were curious to see how they’d like a quirky candy we loved as children. Plus, small 6-inch straws of powdered artificial flavor seemed the appropriate amount of sugar for a 2 year old right before lunch.

Pixy Stix & PB Sandwich

But, neither my 5-year old, nor the 2-year old got it…the whole sprinkle-powder-on-your-tongue- thing was too complex. Then, my husband remembered the Pixie Stick sandwich scene in the movie The Breakfast Club. We set the girls up with bread and peanut butter and they had great fun sprinkling the powder over their peanut butter sandwiches – really not a bad lunch if you wash it all down with milk. But if you remember, Ally Sheedy had a Pixy Stix AND Cap’n Crunch sandwich, washed down with Coke. We didn’t tell the girls about the cereal/Coke part of the lunch. However, if you care to try it, I found a legit YumSugar recipe. And here's the clip to make all moms who pack lunches shudder:

Chocolate Zucchini Cake

2010-09-11T04:52:00.000-07:00

This last week was the second week of kindergarten for my 5 year-old. Whew! We made it! I think it was crazier than the first week of school. Thus I've been remiss in providing the requested Chocolate Zucchini Cake recipe to a reader. Let's hope you still have lots of zucchini hanging around. I do. And this recipe from dear old cook I once knew is worth making again and again. It freezes beautifully; just refrigerate it first and then lay plastic wrap directly on the frosting top and freeze in any container for no more than about 6 weeks. (Laying plastic wrap on it keeps it from getting freezer burned.)

Chocolate Zucchini Cake
Cream together:
1/2 c butter
1/2 c oil
1 1/2 c sugar
Add:
2 eggs, beaten
1 tsp vanilla
In a separate bowl, whisk together:
2 1/2 c flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cloves
4 Tbsp cocoa powder
Combine liquid and dry ingredients and mix just until combined.
Fold in:
2 c grated zucchini
1/2 c buttermilk
Pour into 9x13' pan and bake at 350 degrees for 40 minutes.
Frosting:
Bring to a boil:
1/2 c butter
2 Tbsp cocoa
3 Tbsp milk
Stir in:
1/3 - 1/2 pound powdered sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla
Pour onto cake immediately.

Pear Caramel Surprise

2010-09-10T19:37:00.000-07:00

The flavor combo of pear and caramel is glorious. In fact I was just talking to my mom on the phone about it last night. She’s on vacation in Washington and stumbled upon a small little chocolate shop and was offered a sample taste of a rich pear caramel sauce. Upon swooning when she tasted it, she told the owner of the shop that it reminded her of a sauce made near her home in Montana, King’s Cupboard Pear Cinnamon Caramel Sauce from Red Lodge. The owners response surprised Mom, the sauce was in fact the same sauce from King’s Cupboard that the Washington chocolate shop found to be so delicious and high-quality that they bottled it and sold it under their own label!

Similarly, today in my own kitchen, I was surprised to discover a swooningly delicious pear caramel sauce from a rather astonishing source.

You may remember that I mentioned a Pear Grumble in my list of to-make pear recipes. I was fascinated by the name “grumble”; I’ve heard of fruit slumps and bettys and of course, cobblers and crisps. I was also intrigued by the recipe directions which described mixing up a cobbler-like dough and then folding in the pears, followed by pouring boiling water and melted butter and brown sugar over the whole grumble. Amazingly, I found the recipe in a children’s fairy tale book that I happened to pick up for my five-year-old. She loves fairy tales from around the world and she enjoys cooking. The book combined both her loves: Fairy Tale Feasts: A Literary Cookbook for Young Readers & Eaters; tales retold by Jane Yolena and recipes by Heidi E.Y. Stemple. Recipes accompany each of the delightful stories in the book. The grumble story was The Magic Pear Tree tells the story of a wandering poor Chinese priest who asks for a simple pear from a miserly farmer. The farmer refuses, but the priest is finally given a pear by a town guard. The priest eats the pear and then with the seeds proceeds to grow a magical pear tree and then distributes the fruit to townspeople. The greedy farmer is left with nothing.

She refused to wear a shirt today

My two-year old did an amazing job of dicing the pears with her kid’s knife after I peeled, cored and sliced them. While she took eons to dice, I mixed up the recipe which I adapted to include nutty whole wheat flour, more pears and spice, and less sugar and butter.

The recipe is actually entitled “Magic Pear Grumble.” And not only does it magically produce golden brown bready tufts atop thick syrupy spiced pears (thanks to the ‘magic’ ingredient of the hot water poured on top before baking,) but the amazing buttery pear caramel produced around the edges of this Grumble is cause enough alone to run to your kitchen and start creating some fairy tale magic. (Make certain YOU get an edge piece!)

Magic Pear Grumble (Adapted from recipe by Heidi E.Y. Stemple)
2/3 c white flour
1/3 c whole wheat flour
2/3 c sugar (scant)
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/8 tsp. salt
1/8 tsp. ground cloves
1/2 c milk (fat-free is fine)
6 ripe pears, peeled, cored and diced
1/2 c packed light brown sugar
3 1/2 tblsp butter, cut in chunks
3/4 c boiling water
DIRECTIONS:
1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
2. In large bowl, whisk together dry ingredients.
3. Add milk and whisk until smooth. Batter will be thick.
4. Fold in pears.
5. Pour batter into ungreased baking dish.
6. Place brown sugar and butter in a heat-proof bowl and pour boiling water over; stir until melted.
7. Pour hot water mixture over batter in baking dish. Do not mix.
8. Bake for 45 minutes. Do not overbake, grumble will be syrupy.

Good Housekeeping Not-Approved

2010-09-05T19:54:00.000-07:00

I love to try out new recipes. When I cook for my family, I retrieve recipes from a variety of sources: Favorites include Cooking Light magazine or Meal Makeover Moms for their healthy but yummy and fun-to-try selections; and for especially seasonal cooking in the summer and fall from our weekly farmer’s market bounty, I go to Relish Magazine. When I entertain, I also have favorite recipe receptacles – but I match the source to the character of the guests. For foodie friends, I go to: Epicurious or Food52 for trendy, conversation-starting fare; for relatives from the Michigan or Montana country: Tried-and-true Mark Bittman or Betty Crocker or the spiral-bound community/church cookbooks fit the bill; and for new friends (or for folks yet-unknown whom my husband invites over after church,) I have a stack of recipes-to-try that are a little modern but “triple-tested with the Good Housekeeping seal of approval.” I assume they have mass-appeal and they are from Good Housekeeping magazine. Well, unfortunately, today, Good Housekeeping failed me.

Leftovers- actually quite delicious!

My husband invited four fresh young undergrad students home for lunch after church today. (He met them on Wednesday but forgot to tell me they were coming over for lunch today until last night.) No worries – I’d planned to make Chilled Corn & Bacon Soup for dinner tonight anyway, so I just rushed around before church to prepare it a couple hours early. We had lots of fresh corn in the house and we always have bacon.

So around noon, as the young scholars were sitting in the other room chatting with my husband and daughters, I was struck with a bit of horror while dishing up the soup. I had known that “chilled” soup was possibly a stretch for college students – but it was a Good Housekeeping recipe – tested to appeal to the masses, right? However, the appearance of the cold soup may have escaped the Good Housekeeping testers. You see, there are two sorts of guests for whom you should probably not serve any soup with the look of, well, throw-up: College students and mothers of preschoolers. (This was especially top of mind since my 2 ½ year-old threw up on her dress not FIVE minutes before we were supposed to walk out the door to church this morning. In true inexplicable two-year-old fashion, she was fine 10 minutes after her mishap. We were late for church.)

Well, as the poor co-eds sat down to our table, I announced the menu: Warm sourdough bread with our own Ginger Pear Preserves, lettuce salad with red peppers and chick peas and home-made basil vinaigrette, and Chilled Corn & Bacon Soup. Silence.

In the end, I surmised that two of the dear guests liked it (seriously!) One guy was just really hungry and ate the soup and lots of bread. And one poor invitee choked down as much as was polite to do in the home of a strangers. My own little girl was familiar with her mother’s cooking style and her mother’s fondness for chilled soups this past summer; she asked for a second helping. Her father promptly emptied his soup into her bowl. (By the way, here is a recent success in the cold soup department, with my families' own seal of approval: Chilled Thai Squash Soup.)

I feel badly for the person who finds themself in a situation in which they feel obligated to eat something they detest, especially when the detested item came from my kitchen. So luckily, I served large pieces of dense chocolate cake for dessert. I did not tell my guests it was Chocolate Zucchini Cake. They ate every bite.

Sweet Ginger Pear Preserves

2010-09-03T11:57:00.000-07:00

The other day, I invited myself over to the friend of a friend of a friend’s house (actually the son of our neighbor) to pick pears off their tree. They were happy to have us use the fruit. The tree was nothing short of majestic. It was heavily loaded with green and golden D’Anjou pears and it was gigantic, as a result of the rich compost pile at its base. This bumpy compost pile, however, made stabilizing a ladder very tricky. Still, the girls had fun climbing up and down the ladder and plucking pears off the tree.

In the end, we had about 3 bushels! How glorious to be able to have copious amounts of pears to cook and eat. On my list of To-Make Recipes: Pear Cake, Pear Slump, Pear Chutney. And we’ve just finished canning Ginger Pear Preserves.

My 2 ½ year old daughter was most interested in helping with this preserving project. I didn’t plan to peel the pears – only core them – but my little girl was eager to help, so I handed her a fairly blunt peeler. I figured she couldn’t hurt herself too much; no more than riding her sister’s Razor scooter in bare feet, which she also insists on doing daily. Sometimes there are tears, but they never last. She’s tough. Case-in-point: The good amount of blood she drew from her finger after handling the peeler and a pear for about five minutes. She was fine after kisses and a Hello Kitty band-aid.

Eventually…the Ginger Pear Preserves turned out perfect; thick and rich, caramely and gingery – but not overpowering with sweet limey ginger. Disappointingly, the recipe made only about 3 cups, instead of the specified 7! I even padded the amount of pears and started with about 6 1/2 cups. (I may have boiled/reduced it too long - yet I turned the heat off when it reached the specified gel stage.) Since I didn’t peel the pears, I used the immersion blender just a little at the end of cooking to avoid big chunks of skin. The result was just right: Smooth with just a few chunks of fruit for texture. MMmmm, can’t wait to slather the preserves on my toast this winter! By then, my two-year old will be three and probably past her sweet klutzy stage. Sigh.

Intriguing Tomatoes

2010-08-19T18:56:00.000-07:00

Tomato cobbler. I was intrigued too. Cobbler is made with fruit. But I guess tomatoes really are a fruit…so it should all work out right? Would it be sorta tomato-saucy? Or maybe the ‘fruit’ would turn sweet. The recipe has been on the very top of my To-Make-Recipes pile ever since it received all the Tweets from others who were also intrigued by the thought of Mark Bittman’s Tomato Cobbler.

Before baking

So here’s my report on the version with the herb topping which came together super fast once I dragged out the food processor: It was AMAZING! The fruit got juicy and rich and unami (yes, seriously.) The cornmeal baked up toasty to give the biscuit topping a buttery crunch. The tomato juices got wonderfully thick, thanks to just the right amount of cornstarch. And the herbs in the topping added just the right amount of sparkle – without the little kicks of herbal flavor from chives, basil and mint that I used, the dish may have been a little flat.

Golden baked

The dish would be perfect along a nice piece of lemon baked fish. (I just learned from The Splendid Table that lemon is a flavor that complements tomato nicely.) Tomato Cobbler would also be lovely topped with a rich scoop of crème fraiche and served with lemon vinaigrette-dressed salad and corn on the cob. (Corn and tomatoes are also a favorite combo.) But here’s our reality: We had it for dessert topped with plain yogurt. See, my girls had been playing hard all afternoon and were starved. So I whipped the recipe together but knew they couldn’t wait the 50 minutes (on the dot) for it to bake. So I served them deer sausage sandwiches and told them we had cobbler for dessert. Now granted, they were not quite as excited about Tomato Cobbler with herbs for dessert (sans ice cream that usually accompanies cobbler in our house) as they would’ve been by Blueberry Cobbler (with ice cream!) But they did eat every bite of my new favorite cobbler.

Brilliant

2010-07-31T20:36:00.000-07:00

Before kids, my husband and I traveled to South Africa; on one of our safaris, a tardy British couple had to run after our large ATV in order to keep from being left behind. Once onboard, we all chatted quietly, while keeping our eyes peeled for wildebeests, wild dogs and elephants. Since the couple had only just arrived in South Africa and we’d been in the country for longer, the very proper British elderly lady questioned us on various issues in her high pitched tone of voice. Finally she asked about the mosquito situation. (Prior to traveling abroad, we’d had to get painful preventative malaria shots and were repeatedly warned to bring potent DEET insect repellant.) So in response to the woman’s question, my husband responded, “We’ve been in Africa for two whole weeks and haven’t seen a single mosquito!” The woman responded with relieved laughter and then screeched, “Brilliant, simply BRILLIANT!”

Eight years after our trip, my husband and I can still make each other smile by uttering the phrase, “Brilliant, simply BRILLIANT!” (Yes, you had to be there, but just imagine those words being uttered at soprano pitch in the middle of an African jungle.)

Last night I did a few things that were “Brilliant, simply BRILLIANT!”

We’ve been eating a lot of farmers market corn on the cob lately. And while doing so, 2-year-olds and 5-year-olds make gigantic messes of corn all over the kitchen floor. So last night, we ate outside on the deck! The whole mess went on the floor of our deck…and then I just swept it between the cracks! Why didn’t I think of that earlier? Brilliant!

Secondly, I needed something super quick to go with the corn. Checking the pantry, I found some Trader Joes canned trout fillets in olive oil. I lifted the fillets out of the oil and flaked it, added some of our fresh chives and then scraped in a few kernels of the sweet corn; after a twist of ground pepper, it was served on slices of French bread. The sweet corn and herbal chives made the trout tasted even sweeter.

Beautiful, irregular rind

And the oil from the fish provided just enough moisture to keep the salad from tumbling off bread. The girls ate it up along with their corn on the cob and the sweetest, musky canteloupe from the farmers' market. Simple, tasty and “Brilliant!”

Lastly, I just learned this trick from my frugal neighbor: Once you finish the last pickle in the jar, stuff the jar with fresh cucumber or zucchini slices and refrigerate for a couple hours. Voila, the easiest pickles ever. And they were delicious with our Sweet Corn and Trout Crostini! “Brilliant!

Mom, did you blow up my dinner?

2010-07-22T21:15:00.000-07:00

The word is ‘on’ instead of ‘up.’ But when you’re two years old, all that matters is that there are pancakes on your plate and you’re worried about scalding your mouth.

Tonight we made Zucchini Pancakes from one of our favorite old Molly Katzen recipes. A couple highlights to share:
• When we grated 3 large zucchinis in about 1 minute flat using the food processor, the same two-year-old shouted excitedly, “Mommy, it’s zucchini spaghetti!” as she watched the shreds shoot out of the whizzing grater.
• My girls ate four pancakes each before I even got the sour cream or applesauce on the table. (I was still back at the stove flipping hot cakes.)

• Since we were out of feta cheese, we found that cottage cheese works great – maybe even better than the recipe-called for feta. The cakes are lighter and really moist; and if they’re really hot when you cut into them, you sometimes get a string of melty cheese all the way to your mouth.

• A flavor profile: The pancakes have crispy edges and insides that are light and fluffy; the salty cottage cheese brings out the sweet mint flavor which is all mellowed by the earthy onions. Yum!

Here’s my adaption to the Zucchini Pancakes recipe:

4 large eggs

Dash of salt

Lots of ground black pepper

4 cups (packed) grated zucchini

1/2 cup finely minced scallions (I used fresh white baby onions from the garden)
1 tablespoon fresh mint, chopped (I used more since it grows like a weed)
1 cup cottage cheese; drained for a couple minutes through a colander (or 1 cup feta cheese)
1/3 cup unbleached all-purpose flour

Oil for cast iron skillet

My favorite Toppings:

Sour cream

Applesauce

1. Separate eggs and whip up the whites until stiff.

2. Combine egg yolks, salt, pepper, zucchini, scallions, mint, cottage cheese and flour in a medium-sized bowl.

3. Fold in egg whites.

4. Place a cast iron skillet over medium-high heat. After 1 ½ minutes, swirl in oil to coat the bottom. When hot, use a 2 tablespoon scooper to scoop batter onto the hot pan, and fry for 4 to 6 minutes on each side, or until golden and crisp.

5. Serve hot – plain is best – but you could slather on sour cream and applesauce for those folks wary of anything zucchini.

Menthe a l'eau and hello

2010-07-11T14:43:00.000-07:00

Menthe a l'eau is French for 'mint water.' And menthe a l'eau rhymes with ‘hello’ (pronounced ment-a- low'). I'm feeling the need to say 'hello' again. Yes, I know it's been a WHILE since I’ve written.

Our little boy was born in April and he started sleeping through the night last week. Now I feel a like a real person. We were on vacation in Michigan and Montana the entire month of June. Anyway, I'm back...and I know I'm really back to a routine because this week I popped the THREE kids in the mini-van and drove to three farmers’ markets. (Actually we walked to one.) Farmers’ markets and blogging were routine last summer… expect great things. I'm optimistic! (Photo left: Menthe a l'eau and farmers' market squash)

So last night our French supper was inspired by a story I told the girls about when I was 16 and visiting a friend in France. She, her girlfriends and I would sit at French cafes and drink frosty glasses of bright green menthe a l’eau. Maybe my memory of how refreshing they were is so vivid because it was so hot in Châlons-sur-Marne that summer!

My daughter made the mint simple syrup herself (photo left). She cut the mint from our container garden and measured equal parts sugar, water and lightly packed mint leaves into a pan. We brought it to a boil then simmered for 2 minutes and then cooled. After straining out the mint leaves, we just added green food coloring and water (you could use sparkling water, but the French just use tap).

After all these years, the drinks were just as refreshing and just as bright green (photo below.) And in French style we wrote our menu on a chalkboard: Menthe a l'eau, Summer Succotash, Deviled Eggs, cheese plate, chocolate (photo above.)

Three Cakes, Including Pancakes

2010-03-10T13:22:00.000-08:00

Not many little girls get the opportunity to make their world ballet premiere and turn five years old in the same weekend. But that happened to my daughter Saturday and Sunday.

Saturday began with ballet-slipper-shaped pancakes (not hard, most of mine usually turn out more oblong than round anyway.)

Then it was off to the local junior high for her debut dancing the song Deep in the Jungle. (She's the tallest one – and once she got going she was a regular ballerina ham! She knew ALL her dance steps and appropriate expressions.)

After the ballet recital, we tried out a new gelato place downtown. My littlest ballerina (the one always imitating her big sister’s dance moves) approved highly of the wild berry gelato.

Saturday afternoon my daughter completed the task of decorating ladybug cupcakes for her Sunday School class. It was most arduous, as you may imagine, having to stop to lick hot pink butter cream frosting off ones fingers every few seconds. Her sister helped by thoroughly cleaning frosting off the electric mixer beaters. To transform the hot pink cupcakes into ladybugs, we used black frosting and piped it onto each cake in a stripe and two dots. A piece of black licorice was the ladybug head. Upon sampling, the tiny cake was divine. We used the Vanilla Cupcake recipe in Whimsical Bakehouse’s Little Cakes cookbook which uses cake flour; this made the cupcakes as light as air and used half the sugar of a cake recipe using all-purpose flour. The lower sugar content made this dietitian a feel a bit better about subjecting preschoolers to cupcakes mid-morning.

And then there was the birthday cake; with the last of the Meyer lemons we brought back from Florida, we made a yellow cake shaped into one 9-inch round, one 8-inch round and a 5-inch round baked in an oven-safe mixing bowl. To top the finished cake, we mixed up some Meyer lemon butter cream. I must pause to comment on the flavor of Meyer lemons – and this frosting. In one word, it was heavenly – but with more descriptors, Meyer lemons taste less bracingly acidic than regular lemons, they are floraly, but still pleasantly tart. The flavor made the frosting seem ultimately richer.

There’s nothing better than watching the pleasure and excitement in a child’s eyes as she watches you frost her birthday cake and ‘magically’ turn it into a bee hive! And it was magic! We stacked up the cakes, filling the layers with The Kings Cupboard Orange Chocolate Sauce. It was topped with the Meyer lemon butter cream and the little marzipan bees we colored and created a few days ago. My daughter was left alone with the black piping frosting and instructions to make stripes on the bees. She emerged with a very black tongue and a good effort at stripes. Her dexterity will improve when she turns six. But for now, the bees on their hive were completely obvious. And what could be better than a cake- and gelato-filled weekend?

Happy Yellow Chicken Day

2010-02-28T19:43:00.000-08:00

It’s only a day away from the month of March and the snow is piled high and it's still really cold outside. When you've been inside the house for the past five month, your ability to come up with ‘something to do’ wanes. So yesterday was Yellow Day. I told my 4 ½ year old that Yellow Day was the day we said, “Happy Yellow Day” to Daddy first thing in the morning and said the same to anyone who phoned. On Yellow Day we wear yellow clothes. (She was pleased that the only yellow attire she could find in her closet was a yellow and orange polka-dot sundress.) And we play with yellow toys and games and of course we eat yellow food.

Breakfast was Cheerios® from a yellow box, lemon yogurt and banana. Morning snack was a graham cracker with peanut butter, banana and honey; and to drink a smoothie of yogurt, orange juice and yellow food coloring. (No, I didn’t drag out the blender; I often make “smoothies” for my girls in a cocktail shaker with a couple spoonfuls of yogurt, juice and an ice cube or two. The cocktail shaker makes a super foamy smoothie in which they love all the bubbles.)

After snacks, we all went out to shovel the driveway for the 50th time this winter. So when Daddy came home for lunch, I sent the girls in with him while I finished the job. Daddy forgot it was Yellow Day and made them very un-yellow PB&J for lunch. But some bright yellow corn with butter and canned pineapple for an afternoon snack put us back on track! And a dinner finale was yellow spaghetti squash, roast chicken and for dessert, thawed-from-frozen guava was a perfectly-yellow tropical treat from a local Hispanic grocer.

Now, about the just-mentioned roasted chicken; I’ve been craving a beautifully golden roast chicken lately. After buying the whole chicken, I consulted my trusty Cook’s Illustrated cookbook, Here in America’s Test Kitchen. The authors denounced roasting the whole bird and said it would result in uneven cooking. Instead they instructed, cut up the whole bird, pan-sear the pieces and then roast to perfection in a hot 450° oven. So we set out to make Pan-Roasted Chicken with Sherry-Rosemary Sauce.

Now, I haven’t cut up a chicken since my daughter has been alive. I’m way out of practice. But of course she helped and it was a fantastic lesson in anatomy for her. As I hacked away with a pair of kitchen shears, she learned all about bone, muscle, cartilage (like in her nose!), and the yellow chicken fat. In the end, we had eight pieces of chicken that were marginally discernable. But best of all, my daughter wasn’t afraid to get her hands all gooey with chicken meat/fat/skin.

And the chicken was divine! First we brined it for only 30 minutes, patted dry, and pan-seared in a tiny amount of oil. It was then roasted for only 10 minutes in the same pan and removed to a plate. For the sauce, we sautéed a shallot, deglazed the pan with sherry and broth, let it simmer with rosemary, whisked in a few knobs of cold butter and then added the chicken back to the pan to warm through.

Cook’s Illustrated was right. Every piece was tender and so, so flavorful. The few bits of chicken skin that I didn’t hack off in the beginning were crispy and golden. And when my husband asked for another thigh, I knew he could at least partially tell which piece was which. Happy Yellow Day!...Happy Yummy Chicken Day...Happy Yellow Chicken Day!!

Paczki Day

2010-02-17T20:54:00.000-08:00

It took us all Fat Tuesday, but we did it. Yup for dinner (yes, dinner) last night we had jelly donuts….or paczkis as they’re called around here. And being that my husband is from Michigan, where in Detroit they call Fat Tuesday, Paczki Day, my husband thought eating paczkis at any time of day was just fine. (They were actually quite delicious with my homemade Curried Pumpkin Tomato Soup.)

We had several bumps in the road along the way to puczkis (pronounced POONCH-ki) making: My 4 1/2 year-old spilled some of the yeast on the floor (so it had to be swept up and the amount in the dust pan carefully measured!); then there was the exploding resealable plastic bag used to jelly-fill the 'donuts.' But in the end they were warm, yeasty, sweet and delicious!

In full-dietitian-disclosure, they were a brilliantly lightened version of the deep fried donut. Good Housekeeping developed this version which is actually a sweet yeast dough filled with jelly. Hint: My girls couldn’t tell it was lightened. They still loved having my homemade strawberry rhubarb jam squirt all over their faces. And my husband just loved having ‘donuts’ for dinner.

(Yes, my 4 ½ year old did do her own hair yesterday – with 2 different colored ribbons – but at least one of them matched the color of the jelly!)

Happy Birthday Teaspoon

2010-02-12T11:45:00.000-08:00

It's the one-year anniversary of Teaspoon Communications! This small business that I own with my two sensational partners, Deanna and Bonnie, has made it one year and we're looking forward to another happy year of being moms and running our little business on the side.

To celebrate, we sent a little 'Happy Birthday Teaspoon' note attached a box of matches printed with our name and a pack of candles to a few folks who mentored or helped us along the way.

I'm quite pleased with my own box of Teaspoon matches; they will come in very handy for the next birthday at my house. In December, we used up the very last restaurant book of matches. And we had quite a stash. Since smoking bans went into effect, have you noticed restaurants don't give out match books anymore?

To accompany my Teaspoon matches and candles in the mail, my baking genius of a partner, Bonnie, included the most delicious cupcake I've eaten in my life in a nifty little cupcake-holder. It was Kirsch liqueur cake with champagne buttercream frosting and topped with a delicate sparkle-sheen of glitter. Unfortunately I cannot share the recipe. But maybe she will share it with us here! In the meantime, this is the alcohol-infused cupcake recipe I intend to make for my Valentines: Chocolate Red Wine Cupcakes.

Fishy

2010-01-21T18:55:00.000-08:00

We're at the end of our Florida vacation and we've seen a lot of dead fish. Luckily two of them have been delicious! The week before we arrived, it was so cold here that the beech is littered with fishies which got way too chilly. (We even saw them floating next to the alligators in the Everglades - so you KNOW it was cold here.)

But what I really want to tell you about is the delicious fish that were healthily swimming in the morning and ended up on our plate that night. We know they were healthy because our favorite fish market, Paradise Shrimp Company in Marco Island, goes to the docks every morning for the freshest catch.

Scott, the chef/fishmonger at Paradise Shrimp recommended the Florida Pompano. We were excited to give the girls an extra lesson in where their food comes from by purchasing the entire fish to cook. Although those eyeballs staring up at us were a bit daunting, the cooking couldn't have been easier. Scott instructed us to fill the fish cavity with lemons, then salt and pepper the outside after sprinkling the smooth silvery skin with a slick of olive oil.

We cooked the Pompano at 450 degrees for five minutes per inch. And Scott's instructions were right on. The fish was tender, super moist but not at all oily and the flavor was incredibly delicate and almost sweet. The girls ate it up, almost right off the thick, jagged bones.

Last night, we cooked an entire yellow-tailed snapper. Same instructions. Same results: Delicious! However, this time, the flavor was different in a good way. The snapper had a stronger fish flavor and was not as moist, but not dry or 'fishy'. It only needed a little black pepper and Meyer lemon (from our tree out back!) We did need to watch for pin bones for the girls. And my mother-in-law liked it so much, she ate the snapper's eyeball!! (She'd heard it was a 'delicacy' somewhere in the world.) In case you're curious, she said it tasted fishy and squishy.

A Birthday Buche de Noel

2009-12-26T11:15:00.000-08:00

As I lick the last crumbs of orange-almond cake with chocolate buttercream frosting from my fork today at tea time, I realize it is this delicious Buche de Noel cake that should bring me back from my sabbatical. I’ve taken a few months off to deal with morning sickness – that hormone-induced nausea that saps all energy and makes you feel rotten no matter the time of day. I’m five months pregnant and again able to indulge in sweet delights, like the traditional French Christmas cake shaped like a Yule log.

I decided to make this sweet indulgence for my little girl’s second birthday. We wanted it to be a special day for her – even though the date is so close to Christmas.

Despite the fact that the Buche de Noel was for her, my precious toddler was more of a hindrance than a help baking the cake. I used Julia Child’s recipe (I found it in Food & Wine’s Holiday Favorites not in Mastering the Art of French Cooking) and now I know why Julia did not have toddlers helping her in the kitchen. The second that I turned my back to reach for a spatula to scrape the last of the ground almonds and sugar out of the food processor, my daughter was upsetting the bowl of egg whites I’d just separated. And so it went with me measuring and re-measuring, mixing and folding very, very slowly through the creating of an almond, orange chiffon jellyroll cake using orange zest and juice, almond extract and a scant amount of cake flour. My daughter watched the entire process from the second rung of the step-stool. Luckily I started two days before her party.

What fun it was to show my four-year-old daughter that after taking the jellyroll cake from the oven, it was to be rolled up in a dishtowel! She’s baked many a cake with me, but never a jellyroll. She was flabbergasted!

The next day, both girls helped me knead the food coloring into almond paste (inside a plastic bag to avoid red/green stained little fingers) to create marzipan insects. Julia didn’t suggest them; and I suppose there aren’t many bugs crawling around the snow-covered logs in French forests...but it was a kid’s birthday cake. And while we didn’t resort to gummy worms, we thought a few bright green caterpillars with red spots and red ladybugs with yellow spots were in order.

That night, after the girls were in bed, I made the meringue mushrooms. I felt like a French pastry chef! Well, almost; they easily turned out looking like real mushrooms. Without a Julia-prescribed pastry bag, I used a plastic sandwich bag and piped them onto parchment paper; just little 2-inch wide domes and then a separate stem that stood straight up on the paper. They baked to a golden-cream mushroom color.

And on the day of the birthday party, I whipped up the chocolate buttercream with yummy ingredients like brandy (because our liquor cabinet is fresh out of rum), rum flavoring (just in case the rum was an essential flavor), coffee, rich chocolate and leftover meringue.
Decorating the cake was tricky at first, but easier once I discovered that Julia’s chocolate buttercream could cover a multitude of torn jellyroll cake sins. (Yes, when I unrolled the cake, it cracked quite a bit; more powdered sugar on the cake and dishtowel next time.) Seeing the evergreen boughs on our advent wreath made me think that dying coconut green would make it look like pine boughs. It didn’t. Instead, sprinkled around the cake, it looked like bright green grass. However, it was perfect into which bright green and red marzipan bugs could nestle. Thus I held off on the traditional dusting of snow on the log, since that would confuse obvious summer seasonal look of our log.

The buttercream was lovely glue for attaching the mushroom stems to the tops. Dusted with cocoa, they were fine looking mushrooms; melt-in-your-mouth tasty ones too! And they were the finishing touches to the Yule log.

All the kids, adults and my little girls devoured what became a whimsical (and not very traditional) but most scrumptious Buche de Noel birthday cake.

Organic Brown Eggs $2

2009-08-08T05:25:00.000-07:00

We just returned from what I’m calling our ‘farmcation,’ (similar to the popular and economical staycation, but instead of staying home for our summer vacation, we stayed on Grandma’s farm.)

The hand-made brown wooden sign down the road from Grandma’s was painted in white, hung from a tree, and advertised “Organic Brown Eggs $2.” The new neighbor had around 50 beautiful Isa Brown laying hens; he also had new baby chicks only a few days old. My little girls adored seeing the chicks under a heat lamp in a cardboard box in his garage. The neighbor told us they were even hatched by the hens. (We didn’t have chickens on our farm when I was young, but all our neighbors ordered their chicks from a catalog and they arrived in a box by mail.) The lone rooster, it was reported, crowed every morning at 4:17!

My baby was so excited to see all the fluffy brown hens running around – and also, no doubt, to know where the eggs she was about to eat came from – she screeched with joy! We bought two dozen of the beautiful brown eggs for $4.00. (We would have paid $10.00 at our local farmers market.)

At home, I curiously conducted a taste test against conventional store-bought eggs. At 20 months and 4 years, the members of my tasting panel did not have most discerning palates; they liked all the eggs hard-boiled and scrambled. My husband and I also participated. Here are our results:
· Egg shells: Conventional – pale brown; organic brown – darker, but still relatively pale brown with (pretty) brown speckles
· Egg yolks both when raw and cooked: Conventional – yellow; organic brown – brighter orange-yellow
· Taste: Conventional – the egg-y taste I’m accustomed to and adore; organic brown – richer, deeper egg flavor

Sweet Donuts

2009-08-06T05:59:00.000-07:00

We turned off Interstate 94 in hopes of locating the ice cream shop I’d read was in Kalamazoo. (I later remembered it was Tommie’s Goodie Shop and is known for its creative homemade flavors.) We never found the ice cream shop.

What we did discover was Sweetwater’s Donut Mill. It was just a few minutes off the expressway on the main drag, Stadium Drive. Always on a quest for a good plain unglazed cake donut (the standardized test for a donut shop), I am not one to pass up a promising-looking independent donut shop. There are a few good ones in my area of western suburban Chicago: Kay’s Bakery in Forest Park, Honey Bee Bakery in Downer’s Grove and Bridgeport Bakery on the South Side of Chicago. They all have what I consider their specialties – but none of them do all things donuts well. For example, Bridgeport Bakery’s Boston Cream donut is tremendous (with homemade vanilla cream), but their chocolate glaze is too sweet on the chocolate cake and the plain unglazed is passable.

The perfect donut shop must also have a lunch counter with stools for patrons to sit upon and drink black coffee from white enamel diner cups. The donut shop I discovered in tiny Peru, Illinois, on the way back from a camping trip has such a lunch counter, which is frequented by older gentlemen catching up on town gossip. The fact that donuts in Peru are also only 50 cents a-piece adds a great deal to the shop’s charm.

Donuts at Sweetwater’s are 84 cents a-piece and I have no problem paying this price for any donut worth its sugary, fried weight. I am happy to support a good old-fashioned donut shop. And Sweetwater’s Donut Mill was that type of shop; with a lunch counter to boot!

As we walked in the door, the Sweetwater’s counter attendant was just bringing out a fresh wire tray of hot cinnamon and sugar dusted cake donuts – at 4 o’clock in the afternoon. And I can nearly guarantee the same experience for you, whenever you should arrive. Sweetwater’s makes fresh, hot donuts all day long because they are open 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Sweetwater’s plain cake was rich and cakey, but not too heavy. Tiny dark specks in the donut confirmed the ever-so-subtle flavor of sweet nutmeg. But there wasn’t even a hint of old-grease flavor. It was a sweet and simply delicious product; and it passed the quality test with very high marks.

The Peanut Butter Cup donut was an entirely different breed of donut. Smothered with home-made peanut frosting and generously filled with chocolate buttercream, it wasn’t very simple – but it was delicious. The cherry cake was heavy with tiny pieces of maraschino cherries and was truly pretty in pink. Even the French Crueller, which the counter attendant threw in for free, “Because I think they’re only good when they’re still hot,” was light, fluffy, egg-y and sweet fried goodness. The chocolate cake was deep dark cocoa. There were over twenty varieties; many were original like Snickers, Banana Cream Pie and Reeses.

The shop doesn’t have a web site, but they do have three locations in Michigan: 3333 Stadium Drive and 2138 Sprinkle Road both in Kalamazoo, and I-94 at Capital in Battle Creek.

Back to Say Hi....And Some Cherry Pie

2009-07-05T15:37:00.000-07:00

I’m back. Life has been nutty lately; mostly in a good way, but there’s been a few trials sprinkled in too. Most importantly, we are thankful we all healthy now and it’s my intent to post to this site regularly.

It’s perfect timing that I’m resuming this post immediately after sour cherry pitting time. For the past three summers, we’ve pitted cherries together with my grandmother’s antique cherry pitter. At two, my daughter was interesting in standing on a very tall stool and turning the crank a few times; at three she was excited about the whole process until the crank got stuck on a stubborn pit and she got frustrated. This year, I gave her the small crate of cherries and a few instructions and she did everything from washing to dumping the pits at the end.

First we made muffins with the freshly pitted cherries. To our old-standby muffin recie, we added a ½ cup of whole wheat flour for nuttiness and a bit of healthfulness. We also added a whole teaspoon of vanilla to the recipe for 12 muffins. Mmmm, the aroma of cherry vanilla muffins was sublime.

Next, we made a 4th of July rhubarb cherry pie. The rhubarb was from our garden and I had to pick it in the rain. (Yes, it rained on our parade yesterday.) The deep red, sweet-sour pie was the perfect end to our meal of burgers from the grill – eaten inside – as we waited for the rain to stop and fireworks to begin.

Eggs twice her age

2009-04-20T19:47:00.000-07:00

My daughter turned four a couple days ago. We made her lime chiffon birthday cake together. In a chiffon cake recipe, egg whites are beat until stiff, and then folded into the batter before it’s poured into cake pans. The fluffy egg whites produce a cake with a wonderfully light texture.

The recipe called for eight egg whites. So I set my daughter up with an egg separator – a small plastic utensil that is placed over a cup/ramekin. When an egg is cracked into the egg separator, the white drips through the holes in the bottom and the yolk stays in the utensil.

Now, for a little girl who is a few days away from being four, it is quite an exercise in concentration to keep all the steps of separating the yolks and whites of EIGHT eggs. First, there is the whole egg cracking process. I remember the first time, a couple months ago that I let my three-year-old crack an egg. I was prepared for egg carnage all over the kitchen. In actuality, she was so careful, she didn’t crack it hard enough for the first several tries.

When cracking eggs into an egg separator, my daughter had to remember to place the egg separator on top of the ramekin BEFORE cracking the egg into the cup – otherwise the yolk must be fished out of the ramekin with a spoon – defeating the entire purpose of the egg separator. If the egg separation has been successful, she then had to remember to dump the egg yolk into the bowl with egg yolks and the white into the bowl with other whites, and NOT visa versa and BEFORE she cracked another egg into the separator. Like I said, it took a great deal of concentration.

We had a few mishaps along the way; a few fishing excursions for egg yolks. But in the end, I was impressed. My daughter completed the egg separation process eight times. And then we measured, dumped and mixed our way through the rest of the recipe.

The resulting birthday cake was light and fluffy with a light lime flavor to complement the texture. To top it off, we didn’t use artificial whipped topping as specified in the recipe. We used real whipped cream and flavored it with lime zest and powdered sugar. However, after all that, I think my daughter liked blowing out the candles even more than eating the cake; such is the magic of having a birthday when you’re four.

Superdawg Lounges Inside

2009-03-22T14:12:00.000-07:00

It was sunny spring day on Lake Michigan today.

The photo speaks for itself: There were lots of people out buying the Chicago favorite; the hot dog. (Yes those are giant hot dogs on top of the building.)

Some of the purchased dogs were Superdawgs, "comfortably lounging in Superfries." And all of them had NO KETCHUP.

Hot dogs - or red hots - are not served with ketchup in Chicago. Instead the traditional dog is served on a warm poppy seed bun, with sweet pickle relish, chopped tomatoes, pickeled green tomoato, chopped onions, a dill pickle spear, "sport peppers" (they're hot!) and mustard.

We were lucky enough to visit the friendly car hops at Superdawg. The dogs and the hand-cut fries (that still included some 'tato skin) were delicious. All those flavors of sweet, sour, spicey and meaty umami were delicious. And of course, the sunshine made them taste even better.

Homemade Bread with Honey

2009-03-05T18:56:00.000-08:00

A few days ago, on a snowy afternoon, I decided we should bake some bread to help warm up the house (yes, in March!) My 3 1/2 year old daughter and I had also been reading a book about baking bread and she asked how bread rises. So the two of us set out to make homemade whole wheat bread.

Since we do quite a bit of baking, I knew my daughter would be able to do many of the steps required to make the dough: leveling the cups of measured flour, dumping in the package of yeast, stirring the sludgy mixture of yeast and warm water. But when it came time to do the kneading, I was amazed. It only took a few (like three) demonstrative turns of the dough before I gave in to her pleading to give kneading a try.

I told her to lay her thumb on top of the dough, fold the top over her thumb and turn. She couldn't quite get her thumb to lay at the right angle at first. But it didn't take long and my little girl (who still needs a large stool to stand at the cupboard) was kneading bread!

She loved the step in which she got to punch down the dough.

And then the light in the oven went on and off many, many times while it was baking.

The conclusion was the best: a thick slice of crusty warm bread, with a smooth and soft interior all slathered with butter and honey. The aroma and taste took me back to my own mother's kitchen where she made homemade bread every week! I won't be making bread every week, but I do pledge to bake even more with my daughter. It is so rewarding for everyone - (ok, I'm going to be really cheesy now) it warmed my heart and my kitchen.

Recipe testing with a kid

2009-02-15T13:33:00.000-08:00

When it comes to the tasting of chocolate and/or peanut butter, it’s hard for a kid to be completely objective. Case in point: Subjecting my 3 ½ year old to a taste-test of one chocolate peanut butter dip compared to a second chocolate peanut butter dip will probably yield results like, “I like them both, they’re both my favorite!” Not surprising.

In my most recent recipe development endeavor, the final result needed to be kid-friendly. And although I can’t share the final recipe since it’s for a client, I can tell you it contains super secret ingredients like low-fat plain yogurt, chocolate and peanut butter. But get creative; really, you can’t go wrong. Most kids I know will eat any vegetable dipped into any of the just-mentioned dippables – even if they are not combined into a super secret dip recipe.

Now I am a very strong advocate of cooking with your kids. And although it always takes longer to make a recipe with kids than without, it’s almost always worth the effort. There’s a million reasons this is so, but a few include: The kid will eat the final product – even if it’s just a taste and even if the food is healthy, it teaches math and reading skills, and cooking with kids teaches a life-long skill that could make them live more healthfully. However, don’t do any sort of recipe testing with your kids. On the 4th batch of chocolate peanut butter dip, it gets frustrating to hear, “Can I have a taste of (fill in ingredient currently being weighed and measured for the forth time.)” And yes, she’d already tasted peanut butter, chocolate and yogurt three other times earlier in the day, not to mention the fact that she eats peanut butter on her sandwich practically every day for lunch. But it’s my fault. Every time I pull out a recipe book or turn on the stove to make dinner, my daughter pulls her step stool out of the closet and climbs up to look over my shoulder and ‘help’ measure. She can already identify each measuring cup size. Maybe that’s because her tongue has licked over the top of the “1 cup”, “½ cup”, “1/3 cup” and “¼ cup” on the bottom of the cups so many times.

The Perfect Muffin

2009-01-24T12:47:00.000-08:00

It was an unlikely spot to find the perfect muffin. But it was: The perfect muffin. And we found it in a tiny store-front bakery on the relaxed, touristy Sanibel Island, Florida. This little vacation to stay in the sunny home of some dear friends is the reason I haven’t posted for so long. And then there’s been the recent illness in our family. But we’re back on track. And in order to help cure my sick husband, I went about recreating the perfect muffin that we’d tasted in the Florida sun.

So what made it perfect? In many ways, it was what it was not that made it perfect. It was not a mega-muffin – like those large rounds of sickeningly sweet blueberry or chocolate chip cake that are sold in oversized muffin papers at wholesale stores. (Why don’t they just label them more appropriately as “Unfrosted-prepared-cake-mix” and merchandize mega-tubs of frosting near them?)

The perfect muffin from the Island Bakery was dense but not heavy and had a very tender crumb. Since it was fresh from the oven, the edges were still a bit crispy. Buttery rich aroma wafted up as I took a bite. The muffin was of the Apple Cinnamon variety but it was not too sweet. In fact, it wasn’t very sweet at all; if it were, it would be a cupcake. Only the top was sugary it was smothered in perfectly cooked apples that roasted in the oven to a golden, caramel color. Speaking of caramel, that’s what the sugar that was sprinkled liberally on top did. And the namesake cinnamon? It wasn’t speckled throughout, instead it appeared in little surprise swirls that were ribboned through each bite.

I’m pleased to recount, we got a fairly close reproduction from my own kitchen. I began the muffin making by searching through some old-fashioned basic muffin recipes. Several called for only a few tablespoons of sugar but used oil as the fat. In my recipe, I kept the small amount of sugar but used butter to add richness and wonderful aroma. I also decreased the salt. Making the apple topping wasn’t difficult; making it turn golden instead of into chunky applesauce was. So when in doubt, add more butter. And making those cinnamon ribbons was also a bit of a trick. But my three-year old and I managed with the help of her sister’s baby spoon.

Sugared Apple Cinnamon Muffins
These MUST be eaten warm. If there are leftovers, warm gently before eating.

3 apples, peeled, cored and chopped
1 tablespoon cold butter
2 cups sifted flour
¼ teaspoon salt
3 teaspoons baking powder
2 tablespoons sugar
1 egg
1 cup milk
¼ cup melted butter
½ teaspoon cinnamon
1-2 tablespoons sugar

To make the topping, combine apples and sugar in a saucepan and cook until the apples are tender. Using a wooden spoon, push the apples to the side of the pan and drop in the butter. Melt the butter until it begins to brown. Quickly toss the apples (which will have become slightly golden and crusty as the butter browned) with the butter. Remove from heat.

Sift together the dry ingredients and make a well in the flour mixture. In a separate bowl, whisk together the egg and milk; continue whisking while adding the melted butter in slow steady stream. Stir wet ingredients into dry ingredients just until moistened. Divide the batter among 12 muffin cups using a scooper. Sprinkle the muffins liberally with cinnamon and then using a small spoon, make an ‘X’ in each cup to produce ribbons of cinnamon. Top the cinnamon with about a tablespoon of the apple mixture. Sprinkle muffins liberally with sugar. Bake at 400° for 20-25 minutes.

Creating a Gingerbread House: Day Five

2008-12-15T07:59:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was fun: More decorating, eating lots of candy, schmearing frosting over everything and taking photos!

We covered the base with aluminum foil. Our marshmallow snowmen didn’t stand up straight, even when we resorted to the glue gun instead of Royal icing. (Of course, part of the reason one of the snowmen didn’t stand up was because S. took a bite out of the bottom of him.) But we kept propping them back up again, and eventually it was the Royal icing that held. S. wanted to make an alligator pond in honor of our upcoming trip to Florida. Yes, we have an alligator cookie cutter. So now, there are several alligators at home in a snowy, candy-covered alligator pond.

We’re also quite proud of our reindeer pulling a sleigh. S. decorated the reindeer with green frosting and covered it in candy (so it has sort-of lost its resemblance to a reindeer.) The sleigh is made out of a paper muffin cup and has candy canes for runners. It’s full of toys; note the tiny cereal dolls among the candy toys.

Lastly, check out our licorice fence.

And we saw that it was good; morning and evening of the fifth day of gingerbread house creating. And then we rested….or we wanted to. But we had a very sticky kitchen to clear up.

Creating a Gingerbread House: Day Four

2008-12-14T12:50:00.000-08:00

I never did find the stash of my daughter’s Halloween candy! I hid it so well from my husband and daughter, that I couldn’t find it myself. I’ve been know for similar trickery in the past, so it was more than pure dumb luck that I decided to stop at the store on the way home from the gym this morning. I picked up candy canes, gum drops, lots of licorice and the old fashioned Gloria Mix by Brachs, just in case I didn’t find the hidden candy.

After the baby was sleeping, S. again dragged her stool out of the closet and climbed up next to me at the kitchen counter – for the forth day in a row – on our quest to make a gingerbread house (that was still, up until that point, only large pieces of cookie on a cooling rack.) I, in turn, dragged my huge Kitchen Aid mixer out of the closet. (My limited counter space does not allow me to look like a true cook year round.) To make Royal Icing, we poured pasteurized Egg Beater egg whites into the mixing bowl and then mixed, measured and poured 14 half cups of powdered sugar into the whites, dutifully adding them one-by-one, beating after each addition.

A good friend told us the trick to gingerbread house assembly with less frustration: Use a hot glue gun. But when we plugged in the brand new one we’d purchased days ago for this specific purpose, it didn’t work. Another delay.

While we waited for my husband to get home from work, so he could go to the store for a new glue gun, we used the icing to decorate the sides of the house, cover every inch of the roof cut-outs with Fruit Loops and make marshmallow snowmen. (The snowmen turned out great with a gumdrop stocking hat, red licorice rope scarf, broken toothpicks for arms and a sliver of toothpick colored orange for the carrot nose!)

Then with glue gun in hand and help from my husband and lots of supervision from S., we finally had a gingerbread house! The glue gun left lots of tiny streams of glue or “spider webs” inside the house, but otherwise, it worked very well and dried in no time.

And we all saw that it was good; morning and evening on the fourth day of gingerbread house creating.

Creating a Gingerbread House: Days Two and Three

2008-12-13T05:16:00.000-08:00

Thursday was day number two in the gingerbread house making process. Early in the day, before my baby’s nap, we squeezed in a trip to the supermarket to pick up ginger and parchment paper. I’ve never used parchment paper before. Mom never did. And it just seems that if my Mom was able to create the most delicious baked treats without parchment paper, I shouldn’t have need for it either.

At home, while the baby was sleeping, S. and I counted out almost SEVEN cups of flour using the spoon and sweep method. I scooped and S. leveled with the straight-edged handle of a frosting spreader. Leveling seven cups of flour with three-and-a-half-year-old style takes a very long time.

As I mentioned Wednesday, I had two choices of recipes, the very complicated one theat printed out onto six pages and the shorter Good Housekeeping one. Having decided on the shorter one, I reached into the fridge to pull out three sticks unsalted butter. Only one stick left. Well, bundling up both kids and myself in hats and mittens and big marshmallow puff jackets that make buckling carseats impossible, just to go to the store, was simply not an option. So I took another look at the long recipe.

Luckily, the long recipe had the same amount of flour S. and I had already tediously measured. So we continued to measure ingredients and mix using the Bon Appetit recipe. S. did a fantastic job using my mortar and pestle to crush cardamom seeds. Anything a three-and-a-half-year-old can smash is a good thing. The spice smelled heady and rich.

We got the dough mixed up and while it chilled, we measured and cut the house patterns out of paper. There were A LOT of measurements in the recipe so I did a quick sketch of each pattern and then measured, drew and cut. S. decided the house needed a garage, a garage door and a deck. So she drew and then cut some random shapes with her kids’ scissors.

Well, the parchment paper worked like a dream! Per the directions in the recipe, I rolled the dough out between two pieces of the paper and then laid the pattern on the top layer of parchment. Using a paring knife, I cut through the top layer of parchment paper around the pattern. After removing the top layer of parchment paper and the dough scraps, I simply slid the bottom layer of paper with the dough cut-out onto a baking sheet. I got two sides of the house baked Thursday.

Yesterday, we finished the other two sides of the house and the roof, in between calls to the doctor, a trip to the doctor (where we waited for an hour to see the pediatrician for five minutes and receive a diagnosis of ear infection for S.) But gingerbread baking and planning was a fantastic way to distract a hurting little girl.

And today is decorating day! Now, if I can only find S.’s Halloween candy. I stashed it somewhere in anticipation of this day of decorating the gingerbread house.

Creating a Gingerbread House: Day One

2008-12-10T20:49:00.000-08:00

We received around four inches of snow last night. So today was a perfect day to stay indoors and bake.

Every Christmas since my eldest daughter has been born, I've wanted to make a gingerbread house from scratch with her. Since she's now three and a half years, I've decided she's old enough that it will be worth the trouble. My Mom made a gingerbread house with my sisters and me when we were growing up. But only once, hmmmm....

I searched around epicurious.com and a few other recipe sites for the perfect recipe. I found a very long and complicated one from Gourmet magazine (six pages when printed!) And then I found one for Golden Gingerbread on goodhousekeeping.com that claimed to be "easy."

I started pulling ingredients out of the cupboard. Now, I do quite a bit of baking, so I figured I'd have all the items needed for gingerbread; since many of them are pretty basic. I knew I even had a brand new jar of molasses somewhere. However, my jar of ginger looked quite a bit shy of the three tablespoons needed. Can't have gingerbread without ginger; so it looks like I'll be bundling the girls up to go to the store tomorrow...after the driveway has been shoveled.

Beet Salad

2008-11-24T19:43:00.000-08:00

My husband probably would have been pleased had the middle schoolers mentioned in yesterday’s post would have consumed every last raw beet. They did not. So once again, I found myself flipping through cookbooks to find a way to help my husband enjoy beets. He thinks, "They taste like dirt.” He has a point. But I might call the same flavor “earthy.”

I’ve been re-reading Amanda Hesser’s Cooking for Mr. Latte. And it was therein that yesterday I found the beet recipe. I’d already been to the store once in the day. I was not going to go again. So I improvised the beet recipe; a lot. The resulting salad contained bright lemon juice and ginger flavors that made one sit up and take notice. Sweet apple mellowed the earthiness. I added a handful of bitter celery leaves to add contrast. My husband took a whole heaping spoonful.

I served the beet salad to compliment our favorite Sunday night supper of cheese, whole grain bread and a lovely libation. I’m not sure if this supper tastes so delicious because it’s so simple or because it’s slightly indulgent because it offers an opportunity to savor several American artisanal cheeses on one plate. There are hundreds of hand- or artisanally-made American cheeses now. Our fridge always contains a few of these fine cheeses. And in fact, I overstocked a bit at the last farmer’s market of the season.

Last night’s supper was rich in aromas and flavors. On our plates were Sartori’s Bellavitan Reserve (rich, earthy, with a crumbly texture of Cheddar aged for a couple months), award-winning Marieke Gouda (very nutty and rich, sweet but not caramely) and because I must have third contrasting cheese BelGioioso’s Gorgonzola (very dry and crumbly, also earthy). The apple wine – HalloWine from Illinois River Winery – was yummy and perfect for the earthy beet salad and the earthy cheeses and because it was a sweet and quite spicy, delightful with the blue.

Beets, Apples and Ginger Salad
(Adapted from Amanda Hesser)
Makes 2-3 servings

I love the contrasts of flavor in this salad: earthy beets, bitter celery fronds, sour lemon juice, sugar, crunchy salt and smooth olive oil.

10 baby beets, washed (remove and reserve any micro-beet greens that may have sprouted out of the tops should your beets have been kept in the garage during the recent warm days)
2 large apples (I used Gala), cored and sliced thinly
1 teaspoon of finely diced ginger (next time I’ll use a little more)
Celery leaf fronds
1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
1-2 teaspoons raw turbinado sugar
Juice of half a lemon
1-2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
Sea salt to taste
Fresh ground pepper to taste
1-2 tablespoons olive oil

1. Preheat the oven to 350 °. Wrap each slightly damp (from being washed) beet in a square of aluminum foil (about 6” X 6”). Roast beets for about 35-45 minutes or until tender. (While the beets are roasting, make the dressing so flavors can meld and sugar can mostly dissolve.) Remove beets from oven and unwrap – being careful not to get burned by the steam. Using a paper towel, rub each beet to remove the skin. Cut into 1/2 –inch dice.
2. Combine the beets, apples, ginger and celery fronds in a serving bowl.
3. To make the dressing, whisk together the vinegar, sugar, lemon juice, mustard, sea salt and pepper. Vigorously whisk the dressing while slowly pouring in the olive oil. Pour dressing over the beet mixture, cover and let set for as long as possible until dinner time, up to 2 hours.

Weird Veggies

2008-11-23T11:47:00.000-08:00

The 25 middle school kids were intently examining a small dark grayish-purple specimen being passed around the room.
“Can anyone tell me what this is?” I asked.
“Potato.” “No.”
“Radish.” “No.”
“Brussels sprouts.” “Um, no.”
I had been asked to teach a nutrition class to these kids who were very unaccustomed to vegetables that still had a little dirt on them.
“Zucchini.” “Not even close.”
“Is it a beet?” “Yup.”
Several of the boys raised their hands. I called on one.
“Can we taste it?” I was amazed.
“You mean raw? Well, I guess so.”

Middle school is a great time to introduce kids to new foods; especially if they’re a little weird. (I’m referring to the foods.) Case in point: By the time my 45 minutes of instruction on the vegetable group of MyPyramid was concluded, I had kids begging to eat raw beets, twisting raw Brussels sprouts off the stalk on which the sprouts grew in order to gnaw on them, cracking roasted chestnuts with their teeth and asking me where I bought the whole pomegranate they’d just devoured! And they were hungry for more. For all the produce – except the pomegranate – they were too late. I’d stocked up on the nuts, the tubers and the cruciferous veggies still on their stalk at the very last farmers market. Lucky for them, though, pomegranates are now in season and I just bought one on sale for $1.99 at Super Target. (And of course, frozen Brussels sprouts are just as good as those straight off the stalk.)

I ended the nutrition class with a challenge to help the veggie excitement hit home: Make dinner for your family at least once in the next 2 weeks. Their teacher chimed in that she would give an extra 25 points for photo proof that they’d made a family dinner. I dismissed them with a couple pizza recipes.

I saw one of the kids yesterday and asked him if he’d been cooking in his family’s kitchen lately. He said he had and that the Taco Pizza was “totally awesome!” I was just as excited as he was. But then, he told me that his mom said he wouldn’t be allowed to make dinner again until he was older because the kitchen was such a mess. I guess I should’ve sent a note home to the parents: “If you want your kids to learn to eat nutritious foods, you’re going to have to accept a little ‘weirdness’ from time to time.”

Staymen Winesap and Winter Banana

2008-11-01T13:23:00.000-07:00

“What are these Mommy?” “Dorion” “Oh!”

“What are these Mommy?” “Winter Banana” “Oh my!”

“What are these Mommy?” “Ida Reds, Tangy and tart. Good for baking.”

“What are these Mommy?” “Connie, sweet for eating.”

And so it went on down the line of crates of brightly colored apples. My daughter’s questions were the same. My answers were filled with exotic proper names that were somehow familiar and descriptors that filled us with sweet anticipation for a bite of each variety: “Winesap, the deep color of a rich burgundy wine.” “Gala, sweet, zesty with distinct coloring.” “Double Red Winesap, tart, spicy, firm with bright red color.” “Mutsu, mildly sweet with great crunch; juicy for eating.” “Staymen Winesap, crunchy, mild taste; good for cooking and eating; golden color with streaks of rose.” “Newtown Pippin, tart, hard; a good keeper.” “Braeburn, mildly sweet, tart, crisp, juicy, firm.” “Red Rome, juicy, firm, aromatic, mildly tart; good for baking.” “Fuji, exceptionally sweet, firm, crunchy, juicy.” “Swiss Gourmet, hard and sweet; next best to Honeycrisp for eating.”

Somehow, I managed to copy down the name of the varietal and the descriptors of each of the above apples on a little piece of sticky note and throw it into a different bag with the corresponding apple….while trying to keep my three-year-old away from the hornets circling the apple cider dispenser from which she continued to try to fill her paper sample cup. And then there was the baby to keep from crying. Needless to say, I was very frazzled by the end of the project. But, now as I reread the little sticky notes for each apple type and inhale the unique aromas of each varietal, it was all worth it. And a half bushel (a large bucket) was ONLY $20.00!!

The above descriptions were from Skibbe’s Farm, from whom I buy the Michigan apples at our local farmers market. The apple site has more colorful wording and some background on each variety. But not all the apple varieties I purchased were listed on the site. So I feel I’ve discovered some hidden gems. I’ll have to do a little more research on Staymen Winesap and Dorion and Connie. Aren’t those imaginative names? I wonder, where oh where did they originate?

Many of the recipes on the Michigan apple site are creative and sound delicious. We might try out the Apple Salsa tonight. Nachos for dinner would make and ordinary chilly Saturday something special. Plus, we have apples coming out of our ears.

Miss Donut's doughnuts

2008-10-15T20:06:00.000-07:00

The internet is great. But sometimes, the good old fashioned phone book is invaluable. That is especially true if your quest is to find mom-and-pop doughnut shops in a new area. You know, the kind of shops with a lunch counter that still serve coffee in white enamel cups for 50 cents and the senior citizen gentlemen that read the paper and catch up on the local gossip; these sorts of shops don't usually have web sites. What they do have is old fashioned, homemade doughnuts. And they are always worth the find.

We flew to Virginia on Saturday. Yesterday morning, I cracked the big 3-inch thick northern Virginia area phone book, and let my fingers do the walking right to ‘B’ for Bakeries. That's where I found Milan Bakery and Miss Donut in Falls Church, VA.

By the time we got two toddlers and a baby out of the house, it was lunchtime. So my friend and I, another dietitan, packed turkey sandwiches for the kids and set the GPS for Falls Church. We arrived at a storefront bakery with a blue awning. And when we opened the door to Milan Bakery and Miss Donut, we knew the doughnuts would be worth the trip. What blissful aroma of sweetly fried dough. Another sign of the goodness to come: There were only two or three left of many of the varieties. I chose three cake doughnuts, chocolate glazed, honey wheat glazed, plain sour cream; and a maple frosted raised doughnut and a French crueler.

We got the kids set with their turkey sandwiches and then, yes, we sat with our heads tucked behind our brown paper bags of doughnuts, out of view of the kids and the two of us RD’s tasted and swooned over freshly fried, sugared dough. Of course I tried the plain cake doughnut first. A doughnut shop’s plain cake doughnut is a signature of its quality. The plain cake has no sweet glaze or flavors or sprinkles to hide the flavors of old grease that may have been used in which to fry the doughnuts. The dough should be sweet, but not too sweet. A hint of spice – nutmeg or cinnamon – is nice too; just a hint to give the donut a bit of depth. Well Miss Donut’s doughnuts delivered on all accounts. The outside was still a bit crunchy, indicating freshness. The cakey part was faintly sweet – no spice – just dense and rich. Moving on to the maple raised doughnut, I found it divine too. It was chewy and fresh, and was smothered in just the right amount of subtly flavored maple frosting. The chocolate cake doughnut was perfect: pure cocoa flavor, but not too sweet either. No, I did not eat three doughnuts for lunch, only about a total of two and a half – because I had to try a bite, or three of each flavor. I also had coffee with lots of milk to balance out my lunch.

And yes, we did let the kids sample the doughnuts – after they finished their healthy lunches. What sweet smiles lit up their faces.

My fairy godmother

2008-10-10T11:58:00.000-07:00

Ever wish you had a fairy godmother who would do a little housework for you when you weren’t looking? Well, you may have one living right under your nose: Get your kid interested in spending time in the kitchen and a little magic may follow. That’s what happened to me.

It all started when I was upstairs taking a shower. Now my three-year old daughter knows that when I take a shower, she has free-reign and I’m unable to supervise her escapades. I always give her a lecture about being good – and on days she seems particularly adventurous, I’ve even forgone the shower. This is not ideal, but much easier than picking up gigantic messes resulting from pure curiosity. Out of eye- and ear-shot, a three-year-old can get into a lot in just ten minutes. She knows enough to be safe. And I keep my knives, etc. out of reach. But in just 10 minutes, she’s flooded the kitchen with her “baby’s bath” water, covered an entire wall with lots of “beautiful PIT-chors,” and found my secret stash of marshmallows. And S. loves marshmallows.

But yesterday, she did the dishes for me. There were a few cups and bowls in the sink from breakfast. And despite the very loud clanging of glass against enamel, not a single juice glass or cereal bowl or coffee cup was broken. And the proud look on her face when I came into the kitchen was priceless. Thanks fairy godmother.

She helped me with dinner last night too. She helped cut up pears for the pear butternut squash soup and she dumped in the 2 teaspoons of curry. With the soup I was able to use up the pears that were starting to get a little too mushy to eat out of hand. The soup was delicious. It was simple too. First I roasted an entire butternut squash in the oven. Then I sautéed an onion and the pears, added chicken broth, the roasted squash and curry. After it simmered a couple minutes, I blended it up with the emersion blender. Simple and only a roasting pan and the soup pot to wash. My fairy godmother was disappointed.

Mushroom Festival

2008-10-07T20:13:00.000-07:00

Our coats are still drying after attending the 40th annual Houby Festival in Berwyn on Sunday. Houby is Czech for mushroom. On our way to the Festival, we envisioned a parade of floats with children in cute little round-topped mushroom costumes, tasting a variety of mushroom dishes, and chatting with some local mushroom foragers while we purchase their local finds. It didn’t quite turn out that way.

Now I understand that this is an election year and have been lots of politicians in any parade in America in 2008. But the 40th annual Houby Festival parade was pretty much only politicians. I will do a shout-out to the Morton High School marching band in their classic, classic maroon and gold uniforms – they sounded great. And the guys who built and rode the six-seater bicycle were impressive. But I only saw one mushroom in the entire parade. It was a small red and white speckled cartoon mushroom on the sign for Past Houby Queens.

The food tents had fairly limited choices, none of which were indicative of their location at a mushroom festival: Hot dogs; steak sandwiches; barbeque; and fried dough with various toppings including strawberries and whipped cream, ketchup and cheese, and mushrooms. And that was about it; except for the booth from our favorite local Mexican restaurant, the Tamale Hut Cafe. They were serving corn on a stick, chicken nachos and mushroom tamales. We purchased our mushroom tamales and corn on the cob "Elote"and headed for shelter from the chilly rain in the tent with the lively Czech band. The tamales were yummy. Traditional Mexican tamales are not huge – and these weren’t either – but they were brimming with spicy (but not burning) sauce, a slice of roasted jalapeno, cheese and mushroom slices. I probably ate one full mushroom in my tamale. But the tamale and the corn slathered with butter, lime, chili powder, mayonnaise and cheese warmed us right up.

And about those mycologists, there were none. I did not see a single fresh mushroom at the Festival – although there was a table full of mushroom knick knacks. There was also a table with fresh vegetables from a local farm. But there were no mushrooms.

Without their namesake, I do wonder if the Houby Festival will live to see year number 41.

More zucchini and tip #2

2008-09-30T19:30:00.000-07:00

There is no more luscious aroma than that that wafts from a basket of Concord grapes I have sitting on my kitchen counter. It’s Tuesday, so we went to the farmers’ market. We saw our farmer friends Melissa and Mrs. Skibbe. We bought those grapes; teeny, tiny red Caviar tomatoes (the size of small peas!), a firm full creamy white head of cauliflower; apple cider donuts (of course); and zucchini. Yes, I know it’s not logical to pay for zucchini at this stage of the summer. But I panicked when I thought of the stack of zucchini recipes I still had in my “to-make” pile. How can I possibly wait until next summer to create a modified version of Taste of Home's curry(!) zucchini soup – besides it’s chillier now – perfect soup weather. And there’s a third zucchini pancake recipe I just have to try. Plus, S. again uttered, “Zucchini, that’s my favorite.” She told this to Farmer Melissa….and that’s a hint to a second tip on getting get your kids to eat healthy.

Tip #2: Get your kids involved in the process of bringing food from the farm (or the farmers’ market, or the supermarket) to the table. I grew up on a ranch in Montana, so it was pretty straight-forward for my parents to teach my sisters and I where our food came from; we grew it and then we ate it. I helped my mom milk the cow, can pears from our orchard and freeze green beans from our garden.

My daughters are growing up in suburban Chicago. So it’s not as simple to make the connection from farm to table. But we’ve tried. And it’s been fun! We know the farmers from our farmers’ market by name. As a result of our weekly visits, Sophia has not only learned where strawberries and asparagus come from, but also that they were just available at the beginning of the summer – and now they’re gone. But then it was peach, green bean, zucchini and tomato season. Now, it’s apple, squash, pumpkin and still zucchini season.

And yes, S. eats all those veggies – although her green beans must be accompanied by a side of ketchup for dipping. According to this dietitian, ketchup was made for dipping a lot more veggies than just fried potatoes. Fried zucchini and ketchup is good too.

Green and red sandwiches and tip #1

2008-09-29T19:46:00.000-07:00

We ate strange sounding sandwiches tonight. They were grated zucchini and imitation crab salad on toast. (And no the zucchini wasn’t stealthily hidden; in fact the green zucchini and specks of fresh mint were quite attractive against the red and white imitation crab chunks.) My three-year-old ate hers right up. And there, sandwiched between two pieces of wheat toast lies a good tip.

Tip #1. Involve kids in the kitchen. Tonight Sophi helped me pick the fresh mint from our rather overgrown flower bed, cut crab chunks with her kids' knife and mix in the mayo.

Start the kids in the kitchen early. Sophi was helping me mix with a spoon and bowl at age two. And now, she asks to help every night; which can really prolong the dinner-making process. But it’s worth it when she tells her pediatrician that broccoli is her favorite food to eat – and cut up with her kids’ knife.

Our kitchen adventures in the last week or so have included a luscious Lemon Cheese, pear-applesauce, pear muffins and applesauce cookies. (Can you tell it’s pear and apple season?) We also made sushi. Sophi was especially excited about that thanks to the fun rhymes in a favorite book, My First Sushi Book by Amy Wilson Sanger.

Yet like many moms, I still feel harried…most of time, and so carving out the time to spend with Sophi creating something delicious sometimes requires precision scheduling and sometimes it requires us to just drop everything and go cook. How about tonight?

Hi there

2008-09-28T19:29:00.000-07:00

So, you happened to stumble across my blog. I know. There are already a zillion food blogs (lots of really good ones) and about a half zillion mom blogs. (Good for you moms – won’t you look back and smile at the days you’ve captured in print?) Well, my contribution to the blogosphere is rather selfish. I love to write about food and being a mom is the best thing ever. I’m also a registered dietitian. So if you’d care to read on, I’m planning a unique recipe for miripoix. Instead of the classic miripoix (and fancy French term) for sauteed carrots, onion and celery, mine will be a mix of food writing, chronicles of kitchen adventures with my kids and a sprinkling of tips for helping kids eat healthy.

I certainly hope the tips may help your kids utter something similar to the comment of my three-year-old Sophi last night, “Oh, zucchini, my favorite!”

I also have a nine-month old infant daughter. So if my sentences are sometimes a bit run-on or there’s a typo here and there, please forgive me. I’m just having fun.

For now, welcome to my blog, and please, visit any time. And when you do, don’t be too surprised by the occasional tip on where to find good home-made donuts. Yes, dietitians eat donuts…at least this one does.