It’s time again to wrap up some of the things I wrote about during 2011. Though I usually do it chronologically, this time around I have to start with the overwhelming reader response to my Oct. 6 column, “It’s alive!” I wrote about my 15-year-old sourdough starter having been inadvertently thrown away by a friend, […]
Food & Drink
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All about bubbly
“Remember gentlemen, it’s not just France we are fighting for, it’s Champagne!” – Winston S. Churchill Most New Year’s celebrations seem a bit awkward to me. The silly hats, noisemakers and excessive drinking just feel wrong, somehow. We had a party at my house every year when I was growing up. There was little alcohol […]
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Gougres
These cheese puffs hail from France’s Burgundy region. They’re a traditional accompaniment to red wine, but make an outstanding pairing with Champagne. tsp. kosher or sea salt 1 clove garlic 4 T. plus 1 tsp. chilled unsalted butter, cut into small pieces 1 c. water pinch of freshly grated nutmeg tsp. ground white pepper 1 […]
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Chocolate truffles
Champagne pairs deliciously with sweets, especially chocolate. 12 oz. good quality bittersweet or semisweet chocolate 1 c. unsalted butter 9 large egg yolks 6 T. superfine sugar (sometimes called bar sugar) or baker’s sugar 3 T. liqueur, such as Frangelico, Amaretto, dark rum, brandy, etc. Heat the butter, chocolate and sugar over very low heat […]
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Italian Christmas Eve seafood salad
This seafood salad is associated with Christmas, but it’s delicious any time of year. 1 lb. raw, peeled and deveined shrimp, 26-30 count 1 lb. calamari (squid) cleaned and cut into rings and tentacle sections 1 lb. large scallops, cut into fourths 1 bay leaf 1 tsp. salt a few black peppercorns 2 ribs celery, […]
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Panettone bread pudding with Amaretto sauce
This is bread pudding with an Italian twist. Panettone is a sweet yeast bread that usually contains candied citron and/or raisins. It’s widely available at Christmas in Italian specialty stores such as Angela’s and the Italian Food Mart as well as groceries and elsewhere – Pecori found some this year at TJ Maxx! It makes […]
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Italian-American Christmas, Springfield-style
For years, my husband Peter’s entire dental office eagerly anticipated the arrival of Velma Viele Mayes’ Italian Christmas cookies. The large foil-covered cardboard box overflowed with anise-flavored pizzelle, fried knots of wine-infused dough, cookies filled with dates, cookies covered with sprinkles, and too many others to name or even remember. I used to work there […]
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Italian spicy chocolate drops
1 c. butter, softened 1/2 c. granulated sugar 1/2 c. honey 2 eggs 1 c. ground toasted almonds 1/2 c. cocoa 1/2 c. cold coffee 1 tbsp. grated orange peel 2 tsp. baking powder 1 tsp. ground cinnamon 1/8 tsp. ground cloves 3 c. all purpose flour 1. Beat together all ingredients except flour. Stir […]
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Lanphier’s Iron Chefs
It’s astonishingly quiet in Lanphier’s kitchen lab. But not actually silent. Students in the four kitchen cubicles are talking to each other. They’re also responding to questions from the adults observing them. But none of the students – not one – is fooling around or engaging in the boisterous banter that can occur when adolescents […]
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Michael Ruhlman’s apple-cinnamon doughnuts
I’d call these fritters rather than doughnuts, but whatever they’re called, they’re absolutely scrumptious. There’s more apple than dough in them, the dough acting primarily as a binder. The resulting fritters/doughnuts are unusually light with a crispy sugared exterior and an almost custardy interior bursting with apple flavor. Ruhlman says of this recipe: “This is […]
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Books for cooks
Books always constitute a significant proportion of the gifts under our Christmas tree. And since most of my family members are enthusiastic cooks, it’s a safe bet that some of those books will be cookbooks. Here are two cookbooks on my Christmas shopping list this year. I’ve found both valuable – even invaluable – much […]
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Pickled mustard seeds
This recipe comes from Tom Colicchio, celebrity chef and host of the reality show “Top Chef.” But I first found it in a cookbook by another master chef, David Chang, whose New York Momofuko restaurants in New York are wildly popular, as I can attest. This condiment can always be found in my refrigerator. I […]
