Red, White and Blue Lemonade for the Summer

Every year, as we gear up for our annual friends' trip to Duck, each member of the group picks a summer song. It's a huge production, with lots of emailing and back and forth, and at the end, Alicia makes a mix that we listen to over and over for the rest of the summer.

This year, Cooper's song is "American Kids" by Kenny Chesney. It is bouncy and summery...plus it includes a line about a shotgun lever-action rifle. Cooper likes shotguns guns. (Side note: Cooper likes guns enough that he emailed me to clarify that the gun mentioned is not, in fact, a shotgun.)

A few weeks ago, just as Cooper was choosing his song, I got an email from the PR company that reps Blue Chair Bay - Kenny Chesney's rum brand (and the official sponsor of No Shoes Nation). Did I want them to send me some rum, so I could make up a cocktail, and write about it, in the days before KC's concert at Merriweather? Why yes, yes I did.

The concert - Kenny Chesney + Jake Owen - is on Wednesday, May 27th. And the drink? Inspired by "American Kids," it's called Red, White and Blue Lemonade...and it is pretty, pretty, pretty good. Here's how to make it:


Red, White and Blue Lemonade
Yields 1 drink

3 ounces Blue Chair Bay white rum (the white)
2 tablespoons blueberry syrup (see below) (the blue)
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
4 tablespoons mint simple syrup (use this recipe)
Sparkling water
Strawberries for garnish (the red)

To make the blueberry syrup:
Combine 1 pint of blueberries, 1 tablespoon of sugar and 1/3 cup of water in a saucepan over medium-high heat.

Bring the mixture to a boil, stirring and mashing the berries as they pop. Cook, continuing to stir, until the mixture is reduced about halfway (about 6-8 minutes).

Let the mixture cool a bit then place in a blender and puree. Refrigerate before using.

To make the drink:
Fill a pint glass with ice. Add the rum, blueberry syrup, lemon juice and mint syrup. Fill the rest of the glass with fizzy water, then pour from one glass to another, to mix.

Garnish with a strawberry and you are ready to drink!

Note: if you want a boozier drink, you could add a little more rum. Or, instead of finishing it off with sparkling water, use prosecco.

The recipe above makes one drink - but you could absolutely make pitchers of the rum-mint-blueberry-lemon juice concoction, then just add the fizzy water to the individual drinks just before serving. Though it does involve two syrups, both of them are very easy to make, I promise.

I mixed up a batch of these on Wednesday and fed them to the Bargers and Kyle. They made everyone happy:

Maggie, obviously, has the kiddie version of the cocktail - Dixon helped with those. We replaced the rum and the sparkling water with a healthy pour of Sprite.

So there it is - the American Kids/Kenny Chesney/Red, White and Blue Lemonade cocktail. If that doesn't make you want to make out on some living room couches, I don't know what will.

My Grandma's Cheesecake

I mentioned last week that it was the sort of week that's not exactly conducive to blogging. The main reason for that, unfortunately, is that on Saturday the 15th, my grandmother - my dad's mom - died. She was 94.

My grandparents lived in Epping Forest, in Annapolis, until I was going into high school. That's where my dad grew up and it's on the Severn River, just up river a bit from Ben Oaks, the neighborhood where I grew up. In 1989, they moved to northern Virginia to be closer to their youngest daughter.

Since we lived so close by, I saw my grandparents fairly frequently. And at their house, we did a lot of eating.

Many of my memories are focused on seafood, since they lived on the water and their kitchen was a constant stream of crabs (caught off the pier) and oysters (not caught off the pier) - I wrote a little about that here.

But even more than seafood, my grandparents' house was filled with sweet things. My grandmother was a masterful baker - she was constantly making cookies, cakes and - especially - pies. Last Friday, at her funeral, two of my uncles and one cousin spoke about Grandma. Baked goods came up more than a few times.

Though for most of my life, she looked like a sweet, older lady bearing cookies, she was quite tough and very sharp. Somehow, I think that helped her in the kitchen.

At any rate, I did not inherit her baking gene, so what she did with pastry seems nothing short of magical to me.

Fortunately for my branch of the Waskoms, my sister did end up with whatever skill helps you turn flour and sugar into something delicious. Recently, she's dipped her toe into the pool of Grandma's recipes, starting with her famous-in-the-family cheesecake, which is pictured above.

I can usually take or leave cheesecake - but I do love this one. It's dense but not heavy, with just the right balance of sugar and tanginess.

It's an appropriate mix, that combination of sweet and sharp. So much like Grandma.

Patsy Waskom's Cheesecake

Graham cracker crumbs to dust
Butter for greasing
1 pound small curd cottage cheese
2 8-ounce packages cream cheese
1 1/2 cups sugar
4 eggs, slightly beaten
1/3 cup cornstarch
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup butter, melted
1 pint sour cream

All ingredients should be room temperature.

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.

2. Grease springform an with butter and dust with graham cracker crumbs.

3. Run the cottage cheese through a sieve, discarding the solids.

4. In a large bowl, cream together the cream cheese and cottage cheese.

5. Add the sugar and beaten eggs and mix to combine.

6. Add the corn starch, lemon juice, vanilla, melted butter and sour cream and mix until smooth. (A note from Erin, my sister: Do not over-mix. It will add too much air and you will have a disaster.)

7. Cook for one hour plus ten to twenty minutes at 325 degrees. DON'T OPEN THE OVEN.

8. Turn off the oven, leaving the cake inside. Let it sit, with the oven door closed, for two hours.

9. Cool in the pan and freeze or chill the cake for at least 24 hours.

This Week: January 11 to January 17

This week must be our manliest on record. And, let's face it, things are often pretty manly around here.

Most of the action took place last weekend, when we hit the trifecta. First, our friend Adam took second place in the Swallow at the Hollow's annual chili cook-off. And how does this relate to us? OK, we weren't actually even there (a combination of DRP stomach flu and bad weather and work kept us housebound) but we did contribute a pound of ground venison to his mix. Which sounded awesome. I'm pretty sure the winning ingredient was a puree of spicy pepper and tomato that went into the broth. Also: three meats. You always win when you go mixed media on the meat.

Same day, I made these burgers - straight from Papa Hemingway's recipe. I can't resist anything Hemingway - he's one of my favorites. Between the Paris years, the Key West house (with its Picasso), his all-around bad-assery - and his killer, straightforward writing - I cannot get enough of the man (further appreciation documented here). As a bonus: his burgers are great. I didn't even use any condiments and they rocked.

Plus, when you make Hemingway's burgers, you talk about Hemingway at dinner. He is someone Cooper and I can agree on, though we've read completely different books and stories.

Finally, on Sunday, Cooper made a big batch of jerky, turning our kitchen into a, well, jerky-scented jerky room. The dehydrator I got him for his birthday last year has come in handy on more than one occasion - and thanks to his jerky-making prowess, we've been much been really good about using all of the venison we have packed away (he's had a good year, too, on the hunting front).

Turns out, we're also on trend with that whole jerky thing. I even got a Food and Wine email about jerky-making, just this morning! I probably should've realized when my brother told me he went to a jerky superstore while he was in LA on business. I mean, if it's happening in Los Angeles...it must be a thing.

Up this week: More manliness on the cooking front, with goose breast in the fridge, ready for smoking. Oh, and a long weekend for Dixon, who has Monday and Tuesday off. Me, I'm just ready for him to go to school for a full week, with no snow days or sick days or holidays. Gah.

Last Night's Snack: Goose Leg Sliders

Turns out, pulled goose leg looks kind of gross in pictures. But it tastes good.

Here at the Pollard manse, we are big fans of the Sunday afternoon snack. If we were in England, I guess we'd call it teatime: somewhere around 3:30 or 4, we gather ourselves up for a few appetizers and some family time.

This weekend was a special one. Saturday was the opening of goose season and Cooper came home with a couple birds.

After doing some research, he found this Field and Stream recipe for goose leg sliders...and got to work. In the past, we've focused mostly on goose breast meat, so he was happy to find a good way to use the leg meat - better to use more of the bird. Plus, it was fairly simple to prep and really very tasty.

The recipe calls it good "football food" and I see that, though its flavor was actually more sophisticated than your average queso dip out of a jar. After his first bite, Cooper compared it to coq au vin - makes sense, since it's a bird slow-cooked in red wine. I realize that coq au vin originated as peasant food and theoretically isn't "sophisticated" at all. But the fact is, we live in America, where even the most rustic French preparation has a glimmer of fancy. And this did.

Each of us accessorized our sliders differently. Dixon went bare bones - just a bit of pan sauce on his. He scarfed down two. Cooper added pepper jack cheese, which he said was a good fit, though I think the goose overpowered the cheese. I slathered on a spoonful of Stonewall Kitchen roasted garlic and onion jam (that I got as a surprise gift, along with some cookies and chocolate, from the people at Eddie's - it was on my doorstep Friday afternoon. Thanks, Eddie's!).

I think mine was best, of course - the touch of sweetness was a good match for the rich bird. But Cooper and Dixon stand by their preparations. In the end, everyone was happiest with their own.

Which is exactly how Sunday snack is supposed to be.

Yabba Dabba Do

I don't know what came over me yesterday but for some reason, 

I was in the mood for a fancy dinner.

Apparently, I was also in the mood for a laughably large hunk of meat, 

bone-in, in the style of Fred Flinstone:

Those giant meat sticks are veal chops from Ceriello.

With accoutrements of roasted grapes and blue cheese butter.

They were fantastic - all of it was - but then again, considering

that apparently veal chops cost a million dollars each, they should have been.

But still, if you're looking for a special occasion meal, you could do worse.

For the grapes:

Preheat the oven to 425. Throw a big bunch of red seedless grapes on

a cookie sheet. Toss with olive oil, salt and pepper.

Roast for about 30 minutes, shaking the pan every so often.

In the end, the grapes should be wrinkly but still juicy. 

They're a great condiment for meat, salad (try with goat cheese and greens)

or cheese.

For the butter:

Mix about 1/2 a stick of softened butter, unsalted,

with about 2 ounces of blue cheese (the exact quantity varies 

based on your taste and how strong the cheese is.

For the veal:

Preheat the oven to 325. Rub the chops with olive oil then season

with salt and pepper. Heat a tablespoon or so of olive oil in a large pan 

over medium-highish heat. Sear the chops until brown and a little crusty,

about three to four minutes per side. Place the whole pan in the oven

to finish - it should take 9 or 10 minutes. The meat will be slightly pink and soft.

I served the chops with roasted potatoes and a green salad with chevre toasts.

And there it was - a very Flinstonesy Hump Day dinner.

Irish Heritage Month Continued

Corned beef. 

It started out like this: 

And ended up like this:

Because I am a slacker, I bought pre-marinated corned beef from 

Trader Joe's. I did cook it myself, so that's something.

On Saturday, we had corned beef sandwiches with fontina and

 grilled or smoked onions (loosely based on this).

On Sunday, with our enormous pile of leftovers, I made

corned beef hash (using this recipe).

I don't even like corned beef, but the hash was great.

Even better: see that egg in the upper right-hand corner? 

The yolk looks extra bright, right? Well, that's because it was

a double yolk!

Luck of the Irish, baby.

Recipe: Awesomely Awesome Brussels Sprouts

Like most kids, I was not a childhood fan of Brussels sprouts.

I wasn't even a young adulthood fan. When I lived in Canton, my roommate/BFF Alison used to microwave frozen Brussels sprouts and eat them (alone) for dinner. Words can't describe how much it grossed me out. (To better set the scene: Those were the days when I ate pretzels and guacamole for dinner at least twice a week.)

But now...I love them. It just happened magically one night a few years ago. All of a sudden, I realized they're amazing and really quite versatile.

Usually, I sautee them in olive oil with some chopped bacon, then sprinkle them with a dash of balsamic before serving. But over the weekend, I mixed it up a little...with much success. So I thought I'd share the recipe here.

Brussels Sprouts with Dried Cranberries and Pecans

(Serves 10-12)

Ingredients:
3 bags of Trader Joe's Brussels sprouts
1 handful dried cranberries
1 handful chopped roasted pecans
1/4 cup plus 4-6 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
Salt and pepper

Preheat the oven to 450.

Cut sprouts in half or, for especially large ones, in quarters. Divide between two large cookie sheets.

Drizzle sprouts with olive oil - about 4-6 tablespoons - and season with salt and pepper. Using your hands, toss the sprouts in the oil and seasoning until they are evenly coated.

Roast the sprouts for 30 minutes, or until dark and tender, but not burnt. Rotate the pans two or three times during roasting.

When the sprouts are out of the oven, let them cool for just a minute, while you make the vinaigrette. Combine the 1/4 cup of olive oil and 1/4 cup of red wine vinegar. Season with salt and pepper and whisk to combine.

Put the sprouts in a bowl and cover with the vinaigrette, tossing to coat evenly. Add the pecans and cranberries and gently mix to distribute the nuts and berries throughout.

And that's it! The sprouts absorb the vinaigrette in a really lovely way, and the nuts and berries add just a little sweetness and crunch. It's so easy and I was so happy with the results

**Note: I owe my sister some credit for this recipe. She and I were talking about vegetables and she suggested Brussels sprouts - and suggested the nuts. So thank you, Erin!

Cherry Season Recipe: Cherry Clafoutis

I am not much of a baker, so when we found ourselves with about a million cherries, actual cherry pie was out of the question. (Cooper doesn't like it anyway.) But cherry clafoutis - a baked tart of cherries topped with a pancake-like batter - that was just perfect.

After some research, I developed a recipe that leaned heavily on Julia Child and the Barefoot Contessa. Here it is:

Cherry Clafoutis

Ingredients

• 2/3 cup sugar (divided)
• 3 eggs
• 1 1/4 cups milk
• 1 tablespoon vanilla
• pinch of salt
• 1/2 cup flour
• 3 cups cherries, pitted
• powdered sugar for sprinkling

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

2. Lightly butter a 7 or 8 cup baking dish (I used a pie dish).

3. Using a blender, blend the eggs with 1/3 cup of sugar until fully blended and a little fluffy.

4. Add the milk, vanilla, salt and flour and blend until all the ingredients are completely combined.

5. Pour a thin layer of batter (about 1/4 inch) over the bottom of the pan and bake until it's just set, about 5 minutes.

6. Remove from the oven and spread the cherries evenly over the batter.

7. Evenly sprinkle the cherries with the remaining 1/3 cup of sugar.

8. Pour the remainder of the batter over the cherries - the dish should be full.

9. Bake for about 40-50 minutes, until the batter is set. When the clafoutis is done, it will be brown on top and a knife in the center will come out clean. (Note: Don't try to test with a toothpick. I did and it came out clean, but the clafoutis wasn't actually done.)

10. Sprinkle the top with powdered sugar and serve warm.

It's so easy and delicious. Enjoy!

Recipe Reviews: Totally Approachable Ethnic Food

Sometimes I shy away from the more exotic recipes in Food and Wine, mostly because they involve a) a lot of marinating or b) a million ingredients that I don't already have on hand. If a recipe requires a trip to Whole Foods, I'm probably out, no matter how good it sounds.

Recently, though, thanks to Food and Wine, I've come across a handful of recipes that are a little more exotic than our usual meals, but that are also weeknight-friendly. It's been nice, mixing it up a little.

Recipe #1: Guy Fieri's Mofongo

  

Anything that starts with pork rinds must taste good.

  

Mofongo is a Puerto Rican comfort food of shrimp and plantains. Fieri's version is very simple and very tasty, though it's also kind of rich - maybe a little too rich. We thought it could use a little more acid - perhaps a squeeze of lime at the end. I also added warm flour tortillas to the dish - they added a touch of sweetness that balanced the super-savory flavor of the pork rinds:

 

Recipe #2: Baked Huevos Rancheros

I am a huge fan of eggs for dinner - just last week, Cooper was poking fun at me for making eggs benedict for dinner, pointing out - rightly - that it's my go-to whenever I can't really think of anything to cook. My response: that he should thank his lucky stars that my slacker dinner involves hollandaise. But I digress.

These huevos rancheros are from the February Food and Wine. The recipe was developed by Grace Parisi, who is one of my favorite recipe developers at the magazine. I find her recipes very user-friendly and consistently easy and good.

I made the eggs almost exactly as the recipe suggested - except thatI scaled back for our family, using only five eggs instead of eight. I also put all the eggs in one larger dish, instead of using individual dishes (you make dinner with the dishware you have, you know).

Prior to cheese-ing and cooking:

 

And out of the oven, all cheesy and crunchy and delicious:

I will definitely make that again, the exact same way.

Recipe #3: Luke Nguyen's Pork Banh Mi

Last night, we went Vietnamese, with a very easy, and also very inexpensive, banh mi that's featured in the same article that gave us the mofongo recipe. I forgot to take a picture before I bit into my sandwich, so halfway through dinner, I threw some ingredients on a piece of bread, took a picture and called it a day:

I'd also do this again, without any changes to the recipe (the only thing I did differently was skip the skewering of the pork, since I was grilling on a grill pan and didn't need to worry about losing any meat).

I'll tell you what I won't do next time, though: load the bread with too much sriracha. Ouch.

So there it is: dining a little differently, without spending a fortune on exotic spices.

Easy Autumn Recipe: Homemade Chicken Pot Pie

Once upon a time, this was a food blog. The kind that involved pictures and recipes - even recipes I developed on my own. At some point over the past six years, M&G turned into something else, but thanks to this recent cold snap, I'm back on a making-up-my-own-recipes kick. And you reap the rewards.

CHICKEN POT PIE
(serves 4, total time about 1 hour, active time about 30ish minutes)

Ingredients
3 carrots, chopped into small bite-sized pieces
4 small stalks of celery, chopped
4 medium red-skinned potatoes, diced into 1/2-inch pieces
1 onion, diced (not super fine)
7 tablespoons butter
2 cups chicken stock
6 tablespoons flour
3 cups rotisserie chicken, cubed into bite-sized pieces
3/4 cup heavy cream
1 tablespoon chopped fresh marjoram
3/4 cup frozen peas
1 sheet Pepperidge Farm puff pastry
1 egg
Salt and pepper

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

2. Start by gathering the ingredients and getting all that chopping out of the way. You can start with the veg, then move on to the chicken and marjoram while you've got the first batch of stuff cooking. Plus, the vegetables and potatoes look pretty:

Festive fall colors! Kind of tablescape-inspirationy, no?

3. Pull the puff pastry out of the freezer and set it aside to defrost.

4. Steps 4 and 5 happen pretty much at the same time, so get ready. In one large pot - a stock pot or dutch oven - melt the butter over medium heat. Add the onion, carrots and celery and cook until the onions are translucent and the carrots are tender - somewhere in the neighborhood of 10 minutes.

And the house smells like France!

5. At the same time, bring the chicken stock and potatoes to a boil over high heat. Turn down to a moderate boil - nothing frothy - and cook until the potatoes are tender, about 10 minutes.

6. While everything's cooking, chop the chicken and marjoram. Don't forget to stir your pots occasionally and check on tenderness.

7. Once all the vegetables are tender, stir the flour into the carrot/onion pot, slowly. It'll be sticky. Then (also slowly), add the chicken stock, followed by the potatoes, stirring all the way. The result will be very thick and very sticky.

8. Add the chicken, cream, frozen peas and season with salt and pepper, combining thoroughly. At this point, the consistency should be gooey, so if it's too dry, add a bit of water. I added about 2/3 of a cup and this is what it looked like:

Yes, it's kind of ugly.

9.  Scoop the mixture into a pan that's roughly 9x13 (mine is a little smaller and a tiny bit deeper than the traditional):

Starting to look better now, though, right?

10. Using a rolling pin on a floured surface, roll out the puff pastry just a bit, so it will overhang your pan on each side by about 1/2-inch. Carefully lay the pastry over the mixture and press around the edges to create a seal.

11. Cut a few slits in the top of the pastry to let steam escape, then brush with an egg wash so it'll turn golden brown in the oven.

12. Place in the oven and cook for 20-25 minutes, until the pastry is golden brown and crispy. Keep an eye on the pie - if the edges start turning brown, but the center still looks pale, cover the edges with foil and keep cooking.

13. Then, enjoy:

Gooey. Crispy.

Also, messy. But delicious.

I Am a Zucchini Flower Frying Machine

Just a couple of weeks ago, I'd never eaten a zucchini flower. I saw recipes for them all the time, but I'd never actually had one. Then I looked at our garden and spotted a whole bunch of these bad boys:

Today, there are about a thousand more where those came from.

Anyway, I realized I needed to figure out something to do with the flowers, pronto. Google lead me to this blogger, who said what I wanted to hear: less is more. Zucchini flowers are pretty great on when they're fried with very simple ingredients, so there's no need to go crazy.

I played around a little with the recipe and ended up with a simple process:

1. Place a frying pan over medium-high heat and cover the bottom with olive oil.
2. Put about 1/2 cup of flour in a shallow bowl.
3. Add club soda/selzer while whisking with a fork to combine. Stop when you've got a creamy consistency - you'll probably need just a little more liquid than you have flour.
4. Stir chopped fresh chives into the batter.
5. Holding a zucchini flower by its stem, dredge in the batter to lightly cover.
6. The oil should be hot enough that it sputters when you drop water in it. Place the flower in the hot oil and repeat for the rest of the flowers:

7. Cook until lightly browned on one side (about a minute). Carefully flip, then repeat on the other side.
8. Place on a paper towel to drain and sprinkle with sea salt.
9. Eat right away!

I've made them a couple times now and they're fantastic. They take next to no time to cook, require only simple ingredients, and the finished product is airy and really kind of special.

Happy summer!

Recently Learned Chez Pollard

1. Gougeres out of a box can be pretty good:

The mix came from Williams Sonoma and yes, it did cost $14, which is a lot for cheese puffs, but I'm not very good with pastry and these were easy and also delicious. So I would totally buy it again.

2. I need to remember that I bought myself some fennel pollen:

A few weeks ago, I went on an Amazon tear, and one of my purchases was a small tin of fennel pollen. Since it's arrival, I've used it exactly once - I sprinkled it on goat cheese for a salad - and it was good, but not earth-shattering. I get the impression it's a bigger deal when paired with meat...so I need to remember to pair it with meat. Also learned: I'm a sucker for trendy ingredients.

3. Ceriello makes a perfectly serviceable cold octopus salad:

While it's not as incredible as the grilled octopus appetizer at The Black Olive (my gold standard), it's got tons of flavor...and it's available 2 miles from my house.

4. Cooper makes a nice sun tea:

He's been adding basil and mint (WOW do we have a lot of mint) and it's delicious. Also learned: Mary really, really, really likes sun tea. She's had more of it than I have.

5. Cooper also makes some nice ribs:

Ribs are pretty ugly - they definitely don't photograph well. But they do taste good.

6. Jamie Oliver knows what he's talking about:

Over the weekend, I reread Jamie Oliver's The Naked Chef, which was the very first cookbook I bought when I decided to learn to cook, way back in the spring of 2002. I'm not sure I made much from the book back in those days, but upon a reread, I realized that I've internalized a lot of Oliver's approach (fresh, seasonal, etc. etc.). On Saturday, I made his salsa verde, which is a chimichurri-esque combination of mint, basil, parsley, anchovies, mustard, bread and butter pickles, capers, red wine vinegar and olive oil. He uses it for a variety of foods - I used it to make a warm potato salad to serve with corn and crab cakes. Perfect for this time of year and perfect with the crab.

Then, on Sunday, I took his advice again and topped boiled asparagus with a compound butter made with anchovies, lemon, and red and black pepper. It was surprisingly subtle and a nice alternative to lemon and olive oil or hollandaise.

7. I like Gwyneth Paltrow again:

Back in the late '90s, when Gwyneth was winning Oscars and loving Shakespeare, I was loving her. Sometime after that, though, the love faded. I don't know if it was the macrobiotic diet or the $300 yoga pants in GOOP or what, but something about her turned me off. I know I'm not alone in this.

So it was with some trepidation that I opened the June issue of Bon Appetit, which has Gwyneth's smiling face on the cover. The magazine got a lot of pushback on that cover - and I get it: it's a food magazine, not US Weekly. I also get, though, that a cover featuring a controversial movie star, who also happens to have some genuine food credentials, will a) generate a lot of buzz for a new editor and a magazine that's clearly trying to update its image and b) sell a hell of a lot of that magazine. It's controversial, but I think it was a good call.

Anyway, the magazine arrived while I was in NYC for the weekend with Alicia, visiting her friend Stacy (more on that one day). When I got home, Cooper had already read the whole thing. His response to it was simple: "I like Gwyneth again." I reserved judgment but you know what? After reading it for myself, I liked her again, too. Especially after I made her roasted tomato and anchovy oreganata pasta (above). I made one small adjustment - I pureed the sauce because Cooper doesn't really like whole tomatoes - but otherwise, I followed the very simple recipe exactly. And it was great. Easy, tasty, cheap.

Then I bought her book. And it is just as good as the few articles in the magazine (I've already made the cacio e pepe and it was also super simple).  Plus, as the book is called My Father's Daughter, it focuses on stories about the food memories Gwyneth shared with her late father, Bruce Paltrow, who died from cancer in 2002. There are tons of pictures scattered throughout the book and stories that are both heartwarming and sad. The end result is that Gwyneth comes across as a real person - and someone who is funny and genuinely likable. As in, I would want to be her friend. Even if she was wearing a $150 tank top.

So there it is, all the things I've learned recently, from gougeres to Gwyneth.

Last Week's Dinner: Vidalia Onion Soup

Since the weather still seems to be miserable (hot & humid today instead of cold & humid? I guess I'll take it), a soup-and-sandwich dinner doesn't seem too terribly out of season. Especially when the soup in question is Garden & Gun's very simple Vidalia onion soup:

I made this creamy, rich, sweet soup a few weeks ago and served it, as suggested: with brie grilled cheese, bacon and chopped chives. I also threw in a few Granny Smith apple slices just to add a touch of acid.

The soup was delicious and well worth the hours it took to slowly cook the onions (it was a Sunday and I had the time). Perfect for a rainy spring and a lazy Sunday.

Springtime Dinner: Citrus-Marinated Shrimp with Grilled Onion and Orange Salad

Spring is sometimes tough, cooking-wise. I'm totally over sausage and pasta and anything involving potatoes with cream, but the markets are still painfully barren. There's asparagus, sure, and lots of lettuce, but that's about it for good local produce.

So I'm always on the lookout for lighter recipes that include ingredients that are easy to find in the spring, or that don't suck out of season. This one, for a citrusy grilled shrimp, served with a grilled onion and orange salad, is perfect.

Look how pretty the salad is, even before it's all mixed up:

Puts me in a good mood just looking at it.

The onion in question is a sweet onion, which makes this an especially good late spring recipe. Vidalia onions are all over the store right now - and they're cheap, too. with just a little grilling, they make a great addition to citrusy shrimp. Plus, in this recipe, the addition of a few minced chipotles adds just the right amount of heat.

Served with rice (we just can't go carb-free around here), this made a super nice weeknight meal. Simple, flavorful, colorful. Perfect for springtime.

Recipe: Cooper's BBQ Sauce

Saucy!

One of the best things about pig-cooking days around here is that in addition to cooking all the pork, Cooper bellies up to the stove to make his worldfamous (regionally famous? famous in our family?) barbecue sauce. It's much tangier than most store-bought sauces and Cooper likes it very hot, so I can usually be found standing next to him, repeatedly saying, "Don't forget that not everybody likes it so spicy!"

It's not hard to make and it really is a nice addition to any sort of pig-centric meal. Last weekend, I finally remembered to write down the quantities (roughly, at least) so I could write about it here. And here it is:

COOPER'S BBQ SAUCE

Ingredients

(keep in mind that these quantities are all approximate)

- 1 clove of garlic, finely chopped

- 1/8 large white onion, finely chopped

- Olive oil

- 2 1/2 cups apple cider vinegar

- 2 cups ketchup

- 1 cup yellow mustard

- 1/4 cup brown sugar

- 1 tbl. cayenne pepper

- 1 tbl. smoked paprika

- 1 tbl chili powder

- 3 tbls. red pepper flakes

- 2 tbls. hot sauce (we've used Texas Pete and Frank's Red Hot)

- Salt to taste

Heat about two tablespoons olive oil in a large saucepan, over medium-low heat. Add the onion and garlic and sweat over low heat until onions are translucent. Add vinegar, ketchup, mustard, brown sugar, spices, hot sauce and red pepper flakes. Increase heat slightly, to medium, and stir to combine. Add salt to taste and adjust spices as you'd like - but keep in mind that as it sits, the heat of the sauce will intensify, so don't go overboard with the hot sauce or red pepper flakes right away.

Remove from heat and let cool...and you've got some sauce.

Last Night's Dinner: Spiced Chicken and Braised Endive

I've been tearing up the Food & Wine recipes recently. Early last week, just after receiving the February issue (which is jam-packed with genuinely appealing recipes), I tackled not one, but two of the issue's offerings.

First up, crispy coriander-spiced and oven roasted chicken, served on a bed of couscous with pomegranate seeds and pepitas mixed with a tangy green hummus vinaigrette:

This recipe came from the "Fast" section, which was F&W's own version of "Semi-Homemade Meals" this month (but without the forced tablescapes and partially drunk first lady of New York). The article focused on using store-bought foods as a starting point for more involved recipes. This one was impressively simple, despite the number of ingredients, but not because of the pre-prepped ingredient. That was hummus which is something you can make at home, but as a vinaigrette ingredient? I don't think so. That said, the vinaigrette was very good and I'll use the leftovers to dress a salad.

To accompany the chicken, I turned to another article - one that I found particularly charming. It's about the staff at a Madison, WI restaurant and their wintry activities (including broomball). The whole article focused on white foods, including a dish of endive braised in gin and orange juice. We like gin and I had some endive cooling its heels in the fridge, so it seemed like a date with destiny.

And in theory, right up until I tasted it, destiny seemed kind indeed:

Texturally, I loved the endive - it's soft without being mushy - and I really like the idea of serving lettuce as a cooked vegetable. Unfortunately, the flavor of the gin was just a little too bitter for me. I used Tanqueray - it's what we have - and maybe I didn't reduce it quite enough, or maybe I'm just sensitive to bitter flavors, but each bite was a little unpleasant.

Which is too bad, because I before I ate the endive, when I was just gazing lovingly at it in the dish, I had big plans to make this one regularly.

Later this week: a report on the weekend's rib-sticking beef and cheddar biscuit potpie (F&W November 2010).

The "Culinary Capers" of Boys' Latin Parents

The other night, Cooper's mom handed me a little book she'd found someplace in her house. It's a compilation of recipes called "Culinary Capers," published by the Boys' Latin Parents' Association. It's one of those garden club-style cookbooks with plastic binding, awkward typewriter text and member-contributed recipes. The kind that get crumpled up pretty easily, but are total go-tos when you're looking for hors d'oeuvres to serve your grandmother.

The book is older than we are - it doesn't have a publishing date, but one of the ads proudly boasts, "In business 50 years in 1972," which I hope means the whole book wasn't published when Cooper was at BL in the '90s. It's so much better for having those extra 20 or so years, too.

Patsy thinks someone gave it to her as a gift when Cooper was in school, and she passed it on to me because she knows I can't resist old cookbooks, especially ones that are full of recipes contributed by actual housewives of the day. And this book delivers: on the very first page, there's a recipe for something optimistically called "Frisky Puppies." I won't name the contributor, but the recipe goes just like this:

FRISKY PUPPIES

1 lb. cocktail hot dogs or 1 pkg. hot dogs, cut into 1/2 inch lengths
1 c. brown sugar
1/2 c. catsup
2 Tbsp. prepared mustard
about 1/2 c. brandy

Melt sugar with a little water.  Add catsup and mustard, and the brandy to taste. Fry hot dogs in butter until brown; add to brown sugar sauce and simmer. Serve on toothpicks. These are very popular at a cocktail party; also, good ham glaze. Mix with bread crumbs and cover ham before baking.

Hot dogs and brandy. So perfectly Mad Men, right? Easy, boozy, repulsive. I love it. This is the kind of stuff I'm going to cook when I really get down to business wearing those caftans.

Last Night's Dinner: Saag Paneer

Cooper and I have a couple of delivery places in heavy rotation - just a couple. So you can imagine our dismay when we discovered, a year or so ago, that one of our favorites, an Indian place named Yeti, had closed. We don't have another Indian place in delivery range, so we resigned ourselves to a world woefully lacking in that creamy, spinachy sauce known as saag.

Fast forward to last weekend, when the weekly food52 newsletter arrived in my inbox. I usually skim and delete, but for some reason, this one was jam-packed with stuff I'd actually make (especially unusual, considering that it was a meat-free edition). Most notably, a fairly simple recipe for saag paneer.

I was especially excited to note the recipe's one tough point, the thing that in the past, would've kept me from making it: you have to make your own Indian spice blend, out of a combination of a handful of whole spices. Not so long ago, this would've kept me from even reading the recipe to the end, but since Cooper gave me a coffee/spice grinder for Christmas, not only could I grind the spices, I wanted to.

So this was step on:

About 10 seconds later, all of those spices (including those incredibly expensive cardamom pods), looked just like this:

Smooth and fabulous, no? And so satisfying.

A bit of frying and sauteeing later, and I had a perfectly serviceable, very delicious spinachy, cheesy dish on my hands:

Cooper agreed that it was successful all the way around and that it would be a good addition to my usual weeknight repertoire.

Speaking of new additions to the repertoire, as well as that food52 newsletter, last week I also made this easy recipe for fried eggs with spaghetti. I multiplied the recipe (which is ostensibly for one) by three, which made way more than Cooper and Dixon and I could all eat together. I forgot to take a picture, but believe me when I say it was a) really good and b) really easy.

I did a little doctoring, adding a squeeze of anchovy paste and if I had it to do over again, I'd add even more capers than recommended (but we like capers) and a lot of the suggested pasta water. It was great, though, even without those tweaks - perfect cold winter night comfort food.

Trendy: Infused Whatever

Apparently infusing is so hot right now and this does not surprise me even a little bit, as I have been infusing the hell out of both liquor and simple syrup for the past few months (it happened last summer, too).

Right now, in my kitchen, this trend is looking a little something like this:
"That" is simple syrup infused with lemon, mint and rosemary. Since it's the end of summer, I'm in a rush to use all of our herbs before they shrivel up and die - and drinking herbs always seems like a good idea.

Here's how I make it:

Ingredients

• 1 cup sugar
• 2 cups water
• 2 sprigs rosemary
• zest of 2 lemons (cut into big chunks)
• mint leaves from 3 sprigs

Combine the sugar and water in a saucepan and cook over medium high heat, stirring occasionally, until all the sugar is dissolved (don't boil). Remove the pan from the heat and add the rosemary, lemon zest and mint leaves to the syrup. Let them steep until the syrup cools, then remove the mint leaves. (Mint is strong.) Place the rest in the refrigerator to chill for an hour or two (or a day or two).

Before using, strain the syrup to remove the zest and rosemary.

We use this to make a drink that is so refreshing, it's kind of dangerous. Fill a rocks glass with ice and add a shot of gin (or vodka, if you're into that sort of thing). Top with three tablespoons of syrup and one tablespoon of fresh lemon juice, then fill the glass the rest of the way with selzer. Stir and prepare to be refreshed.

Speaking of selzer, it's become the hot secret ingredient around our house lately. Like bacon, it seems to make everything better.

A Quick Note on Shrimp and Grits

When we were in New Orleans last fall for Tom and Cail's wedding, we ate a lot of shrimp and grits. Until last week, though, I'd never made them. I'd never even made grits. I found something about them intimidating. That something, actually, is that I know it's not that hard to screw them up.

Then again, as it turns out, it's not that hard to get them right.

This month's Food & Wine is all about southern flavors (unsurprising, since I'm not sure they could get hotter) - including shrimp and grits, which I made:

And they were good. I will caution against oversalting - when I tried the grits, they weren't salty enough, so I added some. Unfortunately, I didn't take the shrimp into account, so the overall effect was a little salty for me when they were combined. Not terrible, but a little intense.

Not only were they good, but they really were easy. Plus, Grace Parisi's recipe adds a little spinach. Antioxidants!