Kale, Sausage, and White Bean Soup

A weekend of overindulging combined with the first chilly fall day inspired this soup. We had some sausage on hand and I wanted to eat some kale. This is super tasty and warming - great with some crust bread and butter. Feel free to scale down, this makes A LOT. (Lots of future lunches...)

Roasted Purple Cauliflower

Cauliflower is just more fun when it's bright purple, right? This is such an each and delicious way to prepare it, and the color looks awesome on your plate. I couldn't stop eating it.

Ingredients:

1 head purple cauliflower (white works too, just not as pretty)

a few glugs of olive oil

pinch herbs de Provence

plenty of salt and pepper

pecorino

Homemade Soft Pretzels

Each fall, Jamie and I throw a Sausage Fest down in Brooklyn Bridge Park. We invite all of our friends and grill up tons of sausages. Starting last year, I've also made fresh soft pretzels. They are so. good. Not as hard as you'd think to make, and people love them - big hit. They're glossy and brown on the outside and warm and soft on the inside. I made half of them just plain with salt, and the other half I played around with some flavors. Feel free to do your own thing, but the actual consensus was that the original salt were the favorites. 

Makes 16 pretzels (feel free to halve)

Ingredients:

3 cups warm water

2 packets active dry yeast

2 tbsp sugar

4 tsp kosher salt

9 cups white flour

1 stick butter, melted

1 1/3 cup baking soda

egg yolk

salt (big salt like Maldon or rock)

Apple Pie Crust

Jamie's favorite pie is apple, and it's definitely apple pie season. Usually apple pies have a top crust that's either solid or sometimes latticed, but there have been all of these beautiful top crust options floating around the internet lately and I wanted to try something more fun. I rolled out the top crust dough as big as I could and cut out a whole bunch of hearts. 

Roasted Butternut Squash Puree

This is so good! I couldn't stop "tasting" it to make sure it was seasoned correctly. Yum! Often butternut squash gets a sweet treatment with brown sugar or maple syrup, or the classic pairing with sage and brown butter. This pairing with roasted garlic, thyme, and a hint of spice is just awesome. Roasting everything gives a great, deep flavor. Can't wait to make it again!

Ingredients:

1 small butternut squash, peeled and cut into 1" cubes

2 garlic cloves (skin on)

a few springs of thyme

pinch of smoked paprika

pinch of cayenne pepper

salt and pepper

olive oil

1 tbsp butter

1/4-1/2 cup whole milk, warm

Directions:

Fresh Falafel

Homemade falafel is awesome! I've always wanted to try it, but I never got around to soaking chickpeas overnight. (Canned chickpeas don't work - too soft.) As long as you have the forsite to start this a day in advance, and prep at least an hour before you want to eat them, it's not very difficult. They are crispy on the outside and fluffy and flavorful on the inside and they're great in a pita or on top of a salad. They also freeze really well, so next time I'm doubling the recipe and freezing half. I used Ottolenghi's recipe as a starting point.

Feel free to boost the onion, garlic, herbs and spices if you want a stronger flavor.

Collard Wraps

Has anyone tried collard wraps? Seems to be the new thing! I had my first one from Bare Burger when I was deep into gestational diabetes and had a moratorium on carbs. It's kind of genius. You can use a big, sturdy collard leaf to wrap up anything that you would normally use a tortilla to wrap. You can do burritos, wraps, sandwiches, etc. I tried it for a desk lunch and it was quick and delicious, and of course, healthier than a couple big slices of bread or a big tortilla. Will definitely be doing this more! I stuffed the wrap with some sriracha chicken salad.

You just wash and dry a big collard leaf, put it vein-side-up and shave the vein down to be the same level with the leaf (to make it more pliable), then use the leaf as you would use a tortilla or wrap. 

Vegetable Garden Week 28 - September 17

Even though I've been MIA on the garden, it has done well! We have gotten SO many peppers! I think it's because it was such a hot summer. We had habaneros (the orange peppers), Scotch Bonnets (the red), Thai Birds Eye (the little red and green), and jalapenos (the green). The habaneros and Scotch Bonnets are super hot so I've been making hot sauce. This Jean-Georges Scotch Bonnet hot sauce is amazing! It's no spicier than tobasco so don't be scared. I highly recommend it - it's a beautiful orange color and the flavor is addicting. 

The garden is dwindling, but we're still getting peppers and tomatoes so that's great. I'm definitely getting the end of summer blues, but hoping this lovely warm, September weather continues! 

Tomatoes

It's peak tomato season! Go out to the farmers market or farm stand and buy them and eat them before tomato season ends! With a little mozzarella, basil, balsamic, and olive oil you can have the most amazing salad. I <3 p="" tomatoes="">

And these are from our garden, which did really well this year! We had tomoatoes, snap peas, cucumbers, zucchini, green beans, strawberries, eggplant, and more hot peppers than ever. Keep an eye out for a Scotch Bonnet Hot Sauce - coming to the blog soon and it's incredible. 

Thai Style Grilled Corn

First off, I apologize for my very long absence! I had an amazing summer home with baby, and while I was still cooking, I was not good about taking pictures and documenting. Promise to get better! We have the world's most adorable and sweet baby and now that she is a wonderful little sleeper, I have plenty of time to make dinner once she's down. 

Jamie got me a the amazing cook book of one of my favorite restaurants, Pokpok, and I've loved everything I've made so far. Some of the recipes involve a whole slew of impossible to find ingredients (although anything can be found on the internet!), but some are very simple, like this corn recipe. We love, love, love summer corn and usually just eat it on the cob with butter because it's so good that way. If you're looking for a change of pace with your later-summer corn consumption, this is the way to go. The coconut milk with sugar and salt is so simple but amazingly tasty (I want to put it on everything) and the squeeze of lime give it a little zip. We had it one night with spicy Thai cucumber salad and Thai-style skirt steak, and another night with grilled veggies. Yum!

Saltine Toffee Chocolate Peanut Ice Cream Sandwich

This is such a treat - a fancy, grown up ice cream sandwich. They're incredible messy (especially if you don't let them firm up enough) but oh my goodness, they are so good! I saw this recipe on Smitten Kitchen and had to try it. Yum! The saltine/toffee/chocolate/peanut combo is amazing and so crunchy. If you want want to go through the trouble of making the sandwiches, you could also just crack it up and sprinkle it liberally over vanilla ice cream. It's addicting. I recommend making these the day before you want to eat them so they have a lot of time to firm up in the freezer - makes them a lot easier to eat. 

Ingredients:

36 saltines

1/2 cup butter cut into chunks

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/4 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/3 cup dark chocolate chips

sea salt (or kosher salt if you don't have sea salt)

2 cups vanilla ice cream, slightly softened

Big handful roasted peanuts (or any other nut of your choice)

Grilled Mozzarella and Prosciutto Balls

These are inspired by a recipe by South African chef Reuben Riffel (his "Buffalo Bomb" from his cookbook Braai). Yum! They're very easy to make and are a nice, salty, and creamy side. Feel free to use store bought pesto. I just made a teeny portion of pesto by chopping up some basil, garlic, almonds, and pecorino and mixing in some olive oil. You could also get smaller mozzarella balls and make these hors d'oeuvres size, too. 

Strawberry Blueberry Crumble

Yum! This is a delicious and easy summer dessert. We used strawberries and blueberries, but it would be great with any mix of fruit. The crumble topping is delicious and it's so easy because you don't have to make crust - the whole thing takes about an hour start to finish. The baking soda in the crumble is from Smitten Kitchen. It really makes it puff up and get nice and crunchy. Will definitely make this again, maybe in individual ramekins. 

Juice Press-Style Raw Oatmeal

Baby is here! Little Billie arrived on May 21 and we're so thrilled. She is the sweetest little thing and Jamie and I are over the moon. 

My cousin Dorrit brought us all of these great Juice Press goodies when we were in the hospital and it was so nice to have some healthy food and juice. The raw oatmeal was amazing. I tried to recreate it this week and I think I got pretty close. The steel cut oats are quite chewy so feel free to use rolled oats if you want a smoother texture. It's rich and hearty and it's cold which is good for this hot weather. 

Makes about 3 cups

Ingredients:

1 cup steel cut oats

1 cup coconut milk

1/2 cup water

5 pitted dates

A handful of raw cashews

2 tbsp vanilla

Pinch of kosher salt

Directions:

Purée everything except the oatmeal in the blender for a few minutes until very smooth. Pour it into a bowl or some Tupperware with the oatmeal, stir well, and let it sit, covered, overnight. 

Tricolore Salad with Eggplant, Peppers, Tomatoes, and Mozzarella

This is another delicious recipe from Plenty. It's a really great, light side dish. The mix of textures is really nice - the soft eggplant and mozzarella and the crispy peppers. It seems like a lot of capers, but they get mixed in and it's just right. The cilantro adds a nice, fresh flavor on top. Can't wait to eat the leftovers for lunch!

Ingredients:

4 small eggplants, sliced into 1/2" circles

olive oil

salt and pepper

1 yellow pepper, in about a 1/2" dice

15 grape tomatoes, quartered

1 tbsp red wine vinegar

3 1/2 tbsp capers, plus 1 tbsp of the brine

5oz fresh mozzarella

1 cup roughly chopped cilantro

Grilled Feta

I wanted to make grilled halloumi but couldn't find any, so I bought some feta and found that you can grill it as long as it's in a little tinfoil packet. This is a great appetizer or accompaniment to a light dinner of Greek salad and chicken souvlaki. You can really add in whatever you want for seasoning. I kept it pretty simple with grape tomatoes, herbs de provence, lemon, and garlic, but you could add cooked tomatoes, capers, chilies, olives... The cheese gets hot and melty and it's super tasty, and couldn't be easier.

Vegetable Garden Week 9 - May 7

We've got radishes! They're just itty bitty radishes, but I needed to cull them a bit so it was great to have a little something to nibble on. The first harvest is always fun. This is why radishes are great - you get them so early compared to everything else! The French Breakfast radishes (the long and skinny ones) were much milder than the regular round red radishes which had a lot of spiciness. I made a batch of radish butter which is a really great hors d'oeuvres on some crackers. 

Garden Plan

Even though this weather is horrendous, I'm excited to go out and garden this weekend. This is the plan for the two big garden beds (the two little beds are already planted with snap peas, lettuce, radishes, strawberries, and zucchini). I'm hoping we'll have a few minutes where the rain lets up so I can run out and plant tomatoes, eggplants, and hot peppers. I bought a few at the farmers market on Wednesday and am planning to get a few more today. I'm searching for Black Cherry Tomatoes - I think they're my favorite. So sweet and tart and delicious. This will also be our last weekend out in Long Island pre-baby so I need to get as much done as possible!

Not much more room in there!!

Chia Seed Meatballs and Meatball Gratin

These were delicious! With the gestational diabetes, I can't have carbs so I gave chia seed meatballs a try (using chia seeds instead of breadcrumbs). It worked really well. They were super flavorful and you don't really notice the chia seeds, but they bind the meatballs together, and are apparently super good for you. The fennel seeds give them a bit of a sausage flavor and the sundried tomatoes give them some umami and richness. I topped them with marinara sauce, fontina, and pecorino and threw it under the broiler - so tasty! For Jamie, I made a meatball sub. 

Vegetable Garden Week 7 - April 24

The garden is looking good! I was worried that after the cold snap after planting these seeds that they might suffer, but so far they're looking very healthy! The snap peas are already almost six inches high, the radishes are growing like crazy and there are little red bulbs just under the dirt, and the lettuce looks very thick and healthy so far. 

Vegetable Garden Week 4 - April 3

The seeds are sprouting! Even though last weekend was cold and windy and awful, the warm weather in the past few weeks has been good for the garden. We have little sprouts for the snappeas, lettuce, and radishes. 

When we're out next weekend I'll probably have to do a little culling to make sure there aren't too many too close together. Yay spring!

Zucchini Noodles with Ham and Peas

My mom got me a spiralizer for Christmas and I've been having fun trying out new recipes with it. We had some leftover ham so I made a ham and pea pasta with zucchini noodles - really tasty, and a lot lighter than a big bowl of pasta. (Get ready for more recipes like this - I just found out I have gestational diabetes so goodbye carbs for the next two months.)

Serves 2

Ingredients:

2 zucchinis, ends trimmed

1/4 cup chopped up ham (feel free to use bacon if you don't have ham)

1 cup of frozen peas

1/2 cup chicken broth

1 clove garlic, peeled and minced

1 pinch red pepper flakes

salt and pepper

Pecorino or parmesan cheese for grating

optional: basil leaves for garnish

Mini Berry Tarts

This is a great, quick little dessert. If you can't find speculoos (delicious French/Belgian cookies that taste like a mix between a graham cracker and a ginger snap) you can use graham crackers, or ginger snaps. The crust with the speculoos and browned butter is delicious, and perfect with the tart berries and slightly sweet whipped cream. 

Serves 2

Ingredients:

Berries

About 1 cup mixed berries

3/4 tsp sugar

1/4 tsp vanilla

squeeze of lemon

Tart

6 speculoos cookies

1 tbsp butter

1/4 tsp sugar

Whipped Cream

1/2 cup heavy cream

1 tbsp powdered sugar

1/4 tsp vanilla

Roasted Butternut Squash with Cardamom and Lime

This is another great recipe from Ottolenghi. I love butternut squash, and in this recipe it takes on a really different flavor than the usual roasted squash. 

Serves 4-6

Ingredients:

2 limes

1 medium butternut squash (about 2 lb)

2 tbsp cardamom pods

1 tsp ground allspice

1/2 cup greek yogurt

2 1/2 tsp tahini

1 tbsp lime juice

1 green chile, thinly sliced

2/3 cup picked cilantro leaves

Butterscotch Bourbon Ice Cream

This homemade ice cream is so creamy and perfect. I stupidly forgot to take a picture of it scooped out, so you'll just have to take this one of it churning. A few summers ago, the New York Times came out with a fantastic ice cream article and recipe with a basic base and a whole bunch of ways to customize it with different flavors, aptly titled, "The Only Ice Cream Recipe You'll Ever Need." They had a butterscotch bourbon flavor that I tried last weekend - yum! It's really, really good and I will definitely make it again. It's rich and creamy and has just a hint of bourbon - it's not overwhelming at all. (I don't like my desserts to taste like booze).

Maya's Coconut Tart

There's a great restaurant in St. Barth called Maya's that my family goes to every year. One of my favorite parts of a night at Maya's is finishing off with a slice of coconut tart. It's so delicious and crunchy and caramelized. We were having friends over for dinner last weekend and I was trying to think of something new to make for dessert. I googled around wondering if Maya's recipe had made it online, and it had! Jean-Georges published it for Food & Wine! (You can see it here.) It was so good and tasted just like how Maya makes it. Coconut fans will love it. Definitely get fresh coconut and shred it yourself - do not get the pre-shredded coconut. It will be too fine.

Vegetable Garden Week 1 - March 13

What a beautiful weekend! It was so warm and springy - the perfect time to start the garden. My sweet husband did all the heavy lifting since I can't really be lugging topsoil bags or turning soil at this point. 

Sautéed Bay Scallops on Cauliflower Purée

Bay scallops are the best. The season is November through March so Jamie and I always load up on them anytime we go to Southampton. They're sweeter and smaller than sea scallops. The flavor is so good so you don't need to add much. Simple butter and lemon is really all you need. Yum!

Serves 2

Ingredients:

1/2 lb bay scallops

1 tbsp butter

Zest and juice of half a lemon

1/4 cup flour

Salt and pepper

Cauliflower purée 

Pear Crostini

There was a recipe in Plenty for pear crostini and this is inspired by that but a little different. I love pears and cheese, so this is a great mix. It's sweet and a little tart and creamy, it's delicious. Great appetizer. 

Ingredients:

1 pear

1/2 tsp sugar

Black pepper

1/2 tsp lemon zest

Juice of 1/2 lemon

1 tbsp pecorino

2 slices good bread

Olive oil

1 clove garlic

Soft goat cheese

Barley and Pomegranate Salad

This is another great recipe from Plenty. It's super light and flavorful and perfect after a weekend of eating too much. The pomegranate seeds add such a nice, sweet pop. Looking forward to eating leftovers for lunch this week.

Serves 4

Ingredients:

1 cup barley

6 stalks celery, leaves removed and saved, in a small dice

1/4 cup olive oil

3 tbsp white wine vinegar

2 small garlic cloves, peeled and crushed

2/3 tsp ground allspice

salt and pepper

3 tbsp chopped dill

3 tbsp chopped parsley

seeds from 2 large pomegranates

Roasted Chicken Thighs with Broccoli and Carrots

After a mini vacation in California eating everything in sight, I wanted a nice, homey meal. I love this recipe for roasted chicken and wanted to change it up with broccoli and carrots. Yum! It's easy, pretty healthy, and a great weeknight meal. Your house will smell amazing when you cook it. 

Easy Roasted Shrimp with Garlic and Chorizo

This recipe is so simple! It's a great snack hors d'oeuvre from Blue Ribbon cookbook. They have you just toss it all together and bake it at once, but I think it would do better with a little time to marinate. We had it in the winter, but I think this would be a great summer dish to eat outside with some rose. 

Serves 2

Ingredients:

8-10 medium size shrimp (or fewer if you can find jumbo shrimp), peeled and deveined - leave the tail on for looks

1 small dried Spanish chorizo, cut into 1/4" half moons

2 cloves garlic, peeled and thinly sliced

olive oil

salt and pepper

fresh parsley, roughly chopped

Roasted Eggplant with Buttermilk Yogurt Sauce and Pomegranate

My friend Alice got me Ottolenghi's Plenty cookbook for my birthday (thank you, Al!!). I couldn't wait to test it out. I made the roasted eggplant last weekend and it's delicious. The soft roasted eggplant is tangy and almost meaty tasting from the bits of char, and the buttermilk yogurt sauce, za'atar, and pomegranate are such a great mix of flavors. The sweetness of the pomegranate is really nice. We had this as a main because we had a huge lunch, but I think it would also be great as a side dish to some grilled meat. Also, very pretty presentation! 

The picture is also the cover of the book. So pretty.

Homemade Marshmallows

We were homebound last weekend, along with most of the northeast. It was perfect hot chocolate weather. We have some great, 100% chocolate from Peru that we use to make hot chocolate, and I wanted to up our game a little and try making fresh marshmallows. It's pretty easy! You need to make them a few hours before you want to eat them, though, so it's not a spur of the moment thing. They're so light and fluffy and definitely worth the effort (it's not that much effort - just cleaning is sticky). They melt so nicely into hot chocolate. Can't wait to try them for s'mores! They would also be a great hostess gift along with supplies for either hot chocolate or s'mores. If it's another cold weekend when you'll be holed up at home, I recommend trying these out! (Got the recipe from Martha and halved it.)