In recent years, I have gotten lazy (or have not planned ahead) and have generally microwaved my “baked” potato. It was ready in 7 minutes, vs. the 1 hour+ that it takes for the oven, and that seemed like a good deal. I recently read an article in www.thekitchn.com extolling the virtues of actually baking Read More …
For a family dinner, I was recently looking around for a good way to serve carrots, and I spotted a Pierre Franey recipe on the NY Times recipe website. It was both simple and very tasty. 1-1/2 lbs. of carrots, peeled and thinly sliced ½ tsp. sugar ¼ cup water 1 Tbs. lemon juice 2 Read More …
Fugazza con queso is an Argentine variation of pizza. This version is adapted from Ross Dobson’s and Rachel Tolosa Pas’s cookbook The Food of Argentina. Ingredients have been sized for a half recipe of the dough from Pepperoni Pizza from The Pizza Bible , which will serve 2-3 people. The contrast between caramelized onions (and Read More …
Gazpacho, a chilled liquid salad, is a Spanish classic for high summer when tomatoes are at their best. This straight-forward version is adapted from one of my oldest and most well-worn cookbooks, The Time-Life International Cookbook. It will serve 6 to 8 and needs to be made a few hours before serving to meld and Read More …
One of the first cookbooks I bought many years ago was Better Than Store Bought, which was about making at home foods which Americans normally purchase. This was a very useful idea when I lived in Thailand and many American products were unavailable or very expensive. One of the recipes in the book was about Read More …
I have made sauteed mushrooms a number of different ways. This simple version was quite a hit with the family at the beach last week. A double recipe quickly disappeared. 2 lbs. quartered mushrooms 4 cloves garlic, minced 1/2 onion chopped 1/4 cup olive oil 1 Tbs. brandy 1/4 cup chopped parsley 2-3 Tbs. fresh Read More …
One of the best dishes we had at a recent dinner to a Georgian restaurant in DC was a carrot, cucumber, and Feta salad. After a few tries, this is close to what we enjoyed at the restaurant. The key step is to boil the carrots just until crisp-tender. How long this will take depends Read More …
A frequent problem in cooking is what to do with a partially consumed avocado. Cut avocados are quickly oxidized by contact with the air into an unappealing brown color. I recently saw an article suggesting storing cut avocados in water, and it does work. Because avocados are high in fat, they do not mix much Read More …
This easy and tasty cold soup is adapted from South African Cooking in the USA. I chose to make it vs. some similar recipes since it did not call for any herbs which I did not have. (On the other hand, some dill would have been good in it.) I used a hothouse cucumber, but Read More …
Successfully grilling potatoes is really about technique vs. recipe. Here is how I did this batch of grilled potatoes for two persons last night, following some ideas in realsimple.com. 12 small Yukon Gold potatoes, washed and cut in half 2 cloves garlic, crushed 2 Tbs. olive oil ½ tsp. dried oregano Salt Bring the potatoes Read More …