Archive for June 2012

After dinner on Memorial Day, we raided the pantry my mom had geniusly stocked with s’more ingredients. There were old-fashioned grahams, bars of good dark chocolate, and the most enormous marshmallows I have ever seen. They were double, triple, maybe quadruple the size of regular-sized marshmallows. I was intimidated-they were massive-but they turned out to roast into the most perfectly golden s’more fillers, since they held their own a bit better beside the embers of the grill. They burst into full-blown marshmallow fires only rarely.

At the camp I went to (an all-girls camp with uniforms and no electricity in the bunks and the place where I spent some of the happiest summers of my life), every Sunday night we had a campfire. Some Sundays that meant hot dogs, other Sundays it was burgers by the beach, but it always culminated in 180 girls gathering around the campfire to roast marshmallows before singing every campfire song known to man in a not-quite-right harmony punctuated by my loud, off-key tones. And every Sunday, just before we lined up to crown our roasting branches with marshmallows, the head counselor delivered a lecture.

Until one weekend away with friends four years ago, I had no idea that dried Southwestern spices like cumin and coriander and chili powder had much use in raw things like salads and stuff. We always put cumin on chicken for tacos and chili powder in chili (obviously). But in salads, they were not my first choice of spice.

Was I wrong!

I remember a whole mismatched group in the kitchen that weekend, dangerously juggling knives and avocados and chips and meat for the barbecue. This guy, Mark, somehow got on guacamole duty. Being a backseat chef, I kept an eye on what Mark was doing, raising my eyebrows when he poured about a tablespoon of dried coriander into the guac. Treacherous, I thought, to use the dried version when fresh coriander-aka cilantro-made guacamole good.

A long time ago, my mother made grilled vegetable sandwiches and packed them for lunch when a group of friends and I went on a trip. They were rich vegetarian sandwiches, and time-consuming to make. There were eggplant and peppers and zucchini to roast, and pestos and tapenade to grind or buy. Fortunately, the sandwiches got better with time, so all the work was worth it, my friends and I thought as we unwrapped the sandwiches en route. Instead of growing soggy, the flavors melded and developed.

The original recipe came from Gourmet, I think, but that trip with friends was in 1997, and the print recipe is likely long gone. Still, I never got the taste of those vegetable sandwiches out of my mind.

Then these pressed sandwiches started showing up everywhere on Pinterest, and I thought about how well my mom’s vegetable sandwiches would adapt to that form-small, pressed sandwich squares made from focaccia. I knew they’d get better with time, so why not make them on a Sunday, cut them into portions, and have lunch all week?

Peanut butter cookies: do they epitomize home baking for you? Earlier this year, I admitted to not being quite so obsessed with the typical peanut butter cookie until I discovered this recipe, but now I feel like nothing is warm and fuzzier than a tray of warm peanut butter cookies.

Now, from the very same cookbook, Alice Medrich’s Chewy Gooey Crispy Crunchy, I can’t help but share a second recipe for peanut butter cookies but of a very different ilk. These are gluten free, dairy free, not too sweet, and not too heavy or caloric altogether. Their lightness borders on making them healthful- healthful cookies are sort of godsends for those of us with a sweet tooth.

How do they accomplish such transcendance?

This giveaway is now closed.

Caffeine cravings don’t stop just because it’s summer, and that’s why I’m gracing this busy weekend with a giveaway for an awesome - yet tiny and portable - espresso maker from Nespresso. It’s called the Nespresso Pixie, and you’ll get one in a lovely dark red if you win! The other half of the giveaway is an Aerrocino Plus, which will foam up your milk for cool iced lattes all summer long.

In honor of father’s day and this beautiful weekend, enter to win this wonderful espresso gadget below!

In spite of the hordes that line up at our city’s many fine brunch joints at 11:30am every weekend, I don’t think I am the only non-bruncher out there. I got the feeling that lots of people are starting to scoff at the meal-turned-phenomenon from this year’s Time Out New York guide to brunching, which seemed to consist of a series of ways to avoid the typical eggs benedict and thick French toast.

I can tell you the best way: have brunch at home.

I’m not against spending the mid-morning (or mid-afternoon, depending on what stage of your twenties you’re in) out at a restaurant with friends. I’m not even against over-paying, a little, for eggs and cheese and bread and bacon I know I could make at home for less. And I actually have a favorite brunch place, Hundred Acres on MacDougal Street.