Tag: easy

Weekend Finds 12:15:13

It’s time for weekend finds!

1. Chefs Feed

Chefs Feed // Serious Crust by Annie Fassler
The Chefs Feed homepage

My latest neat food-oriented website discovery is Chefs Feed, a website where you can look up chef recommended dishes, restaurants, and chefs in your town. Who better to trust than these experts themselves?

2. Winter Fruit Whiskey Mash

Winter Fruit Whiskey Mash from A Beautiful Mess // Serious Crust by Annie Fassler
Winter Fruit Whiskey Mash from A Beautiful Mess

This winter drink looks delicious. If I were in a rush, I would probably skip the persimmon simple syrup (though I think I need to give persimmons another try), and head straight for the muddled orange and pomegranate.

3. Reclaiming Provincial

Reclaiming Provincial // Serious Crust by Annie Fassler
Reclaiming Provincial

I found this blog through another blog (now I can’t remember which one), and I’m pretty happy about the discovery. With recipes like smoky cardamom ginger-molasses cookies and crispy sweet potato roast with herbed coconut creme fraiche, they seem unique, interesting, and the photos are beautiful.

4. Easy roasted chicken

Chicken Legs inspired by FoodSwoon // Serious Crust by Annie Fassler
Chicken Legs inspired by FoodSwoon

The other day Jonah and I bought some whole bone in, skin on chicken legs, and it was my job to figure out what to do with them. After some research, I based my creation on this recipe from FoodSwoon, except instead of doing either garlic or herbs or butter, I did all three. Preheat your oven to 450 degrees. Peel a few garlic cloves and cut each one into a few pieces, and pick a  few herb leaves (I used sage). Peel back the chicken skin and place the sage and garlic underneath (I did probably 3 cloves and 6 sage leaves per leg), then tightly and carefully re-wrap the skin. Rub each leg with half a teaspoon of butter, and season with salt and pepper. Roast for 45-55 minutes, until chicken is cooked through. (Also, FoodSwoon looks like it will quickly become a recipe resource for me.)

5. Mulled Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies

Mulled Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies from London Bakes // Serious Crust by Annie Fassler
Mulled Brown Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies from London Bakes

I went out for drinks and a white elephant gift exchange with some former co-workers the other night, and the place we went had some mulled wine, which I promptly ordered. When they asked what I got, and I said “mulled wine!” with all the enthusiasm that one ought to have when you say that phrase, all I received in return were blank stares. THEY HAD NEVER HEARD OF MULLED WINE. I was sad for them. We’ve made mulled wine and cider a couple times this year, and I can’t get over how much I love mulling spices in anything. So this recipe for chocolate chip cookies with mulled brown butter from London Bakes seems pretty decadent and incredibly perfect. I love the idea of using orange chocolate for the chips as well, just to tie everything together. (Also, the inspiration recipe from Top with Cinnamon also sounds wonderful.)

Honeyed Broiled Apricots

Honeyed Broiled Apricots // Serious Crust by Annie Fassler

Dear friends, I would like to share with you perhaps my favorite recipe of the summer season (thus far, anyways). I don’t know about you, but I am a big fan of apricots.

I love them in pies, tarts, crisps, and fresh as a perfect afternoon snack. I love how little and manageable they are, I love the color, and I love the tangy flavor. Most other summer fruits are incredibly juicy (peaches, nectarines, melons, berries), but I kind of like that, even at their ripest, apricots have a funny little dryness to them.

Anyway, I had this bag of apricots in the fridge a few weeks ago, and decided, after a little searching here and there for a quick apricot dessert, to make one of the world’s easiest and most delicious desserts. I kid you not.

You could eat them with a fork, but I recommend getting your fingers a little sticky and just picking them up. These are a few bites of heavenly goodness. The warm fruit with the cold creamy yogurt is a dream, sweetened by the broiled honey. Enjoy!

Honeyed Broiled Apricots

Ingredients

Apricots (think 1 per person)
Honey
Greek yogurt (sour cream, whipped cream, or regular plain yogurt will also work, but I like greek yogurt the best)
Pistachios (shelled and chopped)

Instructions

Heat your broiler. Cut each apricot in half along the seam, and remove the pit. Put the apricots, cut side up, in a baking dish (a brownie pan or a pie dish will work well), and fill each cavity with honey. You don’t want the honey to overflow, but you want the cavity to be full. Put the apricots under the broiler for about 5 minutes, rotating halfway through. You want the honey to be bubbling and the apricots to show some good color.

Allow the apricots to cool a bit (not all the way), then move them to little plates or saucers. Top with a dollop of yogurt and a sprinkle of pistachios.

Stale Bread Soup (Ribollita)

Stale Bread Soup // Serious Crust by Annie FasslerStale Bread Soup // Serious Crust by Annie Fassler

I realize that at this point you might be sick and tired of hearing us harp about how great Tamar Adler’s An Everlasting Meal is. But hear me out one more time. Everyone has stale bread. Or at least everyone who has bread at some point and does not eat it all eventually has stale bread lying around. And most of the time it gets thrown away, or responsibly composted. If you are culinarily educated, dear reader, you may already have known of stale bread soup; but as I read Tamar’s book, I was astounded to find out that not only does such a thing exist, but there is a long and ancient tradition of creating soup from leftover bread (Ribollita in Italian).

There are a few things that should be said about stale bread soup. First, it is not a soup in the same way that chicken noodle is a soup; stale bread soup is usually much thicker and feels more like a hearty chili. Second, stale bread soup is more of a general idea and a starting point than a recipe. It is meant to be made with whatever is around, provided you have some stale bread (otherwise, you will be making whatever-is-around soup – which could turn out to be vegetables-in-water “soup” if you don’t have any broth lying around).

The recipe below is adapted slightly from Tamar’s recipe for Ribollita in An Everlasting Meal. In usual Tamar fashion, you will use A LOT of olive oil in this recipe. We have made stale bread soup twice now, so I’ve noted the different things we used.

Stale Bread Soup (Ribollita)

Ingredients

Olive oil
1 onion, diced
2 cloves garlic
Celery, if you have it (I did not)
salt
1/2 cup chopped fresh herbs like parsley or rosemary or thyme (if you don’t have fresh, maybe do 1/4 cup dried?)
1/2 teaspoon chile flakes
Tomatoes in some form, if you want (3 peeled fresh tomatoes, or I used 1 can diced. Made it once without tomatoes as well)
1 bunch leafy greens (I used kale once and cauliflower greens once; other ideas are swiss chard, collard greens, radish greens, etc)
1/4 cup water
2 cups cooked beans (I used a can of black beans both times, Tamar suggests chickpeas or cannellini beans)
2 cups broth from beans or chicken/veggie stock or cans of tomatoes (I used a combo of all three, and you can make up any shortfall with water)
1 piece of Parmesan rind (Do this if you can, because it makes the soup soooo tasty and rich. Also, what else are you going to do with your Parmesan rind?)
2 cups stale bread, crusts removed, torn/cut into 1/2-inch pieces

Instructions

Heat 1/4 inch olive oil (this is just the beginning) in a big-ish soup pot. Cook the onion and garlic (and celery if you have it) until they soften. Add the herbs and chile flakes and a little bit of salt. Add the tomatoes and cook for a few minutes over medium heat.

Chop the greens (and remove from the stems) then add to the pot, and add the water. Cover and cook over low heat until the greens are wilted. Put in all your broths/waters/juices and the beans, plus the Parmesan rind.

(If you have a bunch of Parmesan left, make sure to cut the rind from the rest of the Parmesan. Otherwise, just save the Parmesan rind for when you will next make bread soup. Make sure your Parmesan is big enough that you can keep track of it, because you’re going to take it out later.)

Bring to a simmer, then add the bread and more olive oil (Tamar says to add 1/2 cup, but I was not brave enough and probably added about a 1/4 cup at this point). Cover and cook for 1/2 hour on low, stirring occasionally to make sure the bottom doesn’t burn. The bread will soak up the soup and then liquify into it.  Taste it, add more broth or salt or whatever you want, and then take it off the heat.

Add in another 1/2 cup olive oil (Tamar, are you crazy!?!? I probably added 3 tablespoons here) and take out the Parmesan rind. You can grate Parmesan on top and add some pepper to serve.

This soup is perfect for a windy, rainy, cold, or dark winter/fall night.

Simple Brownies with Almond

Simple Brownies

Simple Brownies

My co-worker Kelly, who I’ve written about before, has a commune dinner every Monday night. He lives near a bunch of his friends and all of them and their kids (and their pets) all convene for dinner every week. A few weeks ago, Jonah and started joining in. It’s really nice to have that sense of community, which I think can be hard to find when you’re in your 20s and you don’t live near your family.

Going over to Kelly’s on Mondays is so calming. Every member of this group is so kind and funny. They have been having these meals for I’m not sure how many years, but they weren’t even phased when Jonah and I started showing up every week, and have been so incredibly welcoming, pulling up chairs to the table and always making sure we have a drink in our hand. It immediately feels like we’re a part of this family, with the two little boys running around the house and the dogs barking outside. And they feed us delicious food, so I can’t complain.

The first night we went, instead of just grabbing a bottle of wine and heading over (which I was later scolded for not doing), I decided to whip up a batch of brownies. There’s a relatively quick recipe in An Everlasting Meal, so I pulled it out and made a couple of adjustments (mainly replacing half a teaspoon of the vanilla extract with almond extract), and they turned out to be a huge hit. The almond was a really nice and unique flavor with the chocolate.

Simple Almond Brownies

Ingredients

4 oz unsweetened chocolate
2 sticks butter
3 eggs
2 cups sugar
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp almond extract
1 cup flour
a handful (or 2) of chocolate chips, or walnuts

Instructions

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees and grease a 13×9 inch baking dish or pan. In a double boiler on the stove (or a heat proof bowl or a pot over a pot of simmering water), melt the chocolate and butter together, stirring so it’s all nice and smooth. Remove the bowl or pot from heat and let it cool. Once it is cool, add the eggs, beating after each addition. Add the sugar, vanilla, and almond, stir, and then add the flouring, stirring until combined. Pour the batter into the pan and sprinkle the chocolate chips (or walnuts, if you’re using them) on top. You can put on as many as you like or as few. Bake for about 30 minutes, but do the clean knife/toothpick check at 20. Mine took roughly 35 minutes. Enjoy!