Our Favorite Recipes...

We tossed all commercial salad dressings out 20 years ago and never looked back. Well, almost never looked back. I am stilll partial to a small bottle Ranch salad dressing once a year. I eat some, stick it in the fridge and dispose of it when the expiry date goes out.

We make caesar salad dressing constantly. We use one of those hand-held immersion blenders and do it directly in the glass Mason jar where it will await its use.

In a 32-oz Mason jar, combine:
3 egg yolks
1 egg white
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp fresh ground black pepper (we love pepper)

Tip the jar slightly to get everything in one corner and blend until the yolks are lemon-yellow.

Add 1 tsp drained capers,
the juice of 1/2 lemon
6 nice plump garlic cloves, peeled (I sometimes put up to 9 if they're not so big)
1 tsp dried parsley (fresh doesn't work well here)
1/2 tsp anchovy paste (optional, not everyone likes anchovies).
1 1/2 to 2 tbsp Dijon mustard, depending on taste

Blend until smooth, making sure the garlic doesn't get stuck in the blender's structure around the blade.

In a slow, continuous motion, add 1 cup canola oil while keeping the blender going. Add it really slowly and noone gets hurt. Add it too fast and it won't emulsify. Your vinaigrette will separate.

At this point, you'll feel your blender getting tired or at least working harder. Keep the blender going and add 1 tbsp white vinegar and 1/4 cup milk, pr coffee cream, or heavy cream - depending on what you have in the fridge.

You're done. The consistency will be like homemade mayonnaise. It keeps up to 2 weeks in the fridge but we make some at least every week.

This recipe is shared in loving memory of my friend Léo who gave it to me before his death so many years ago.


Take care,
Sylvain.

I am so into simple good cooking these days, but it’s those fresh spices and herbs that really make the difference and make it special.

My Dear wonderful man must have read my mind this morning. He was golfing and I’m thinking, I have to hit the seafood store on the way home from work. I don’t go to work early on Fridays and he came home with the most incredible seafood!!! OMG…that’s better than anything! He made a lot of points today! hehehe

Tonight, I made Mussels and Clams with a spicy tomato sauce…It’s really good with fresh tomatoes, but I was too lazy to go to the veggie store, so I used canned…but it is still very good!

4 tablespoons good Olive Oil
I large 28oz can of diced tomatoes
1 medium can 14oz can of diced tomatoes
1 medium sized onion diced
1 stalk of celery chopped
3 Hot peppers – cut in half (seeds exposed)
4 cloves of garlic chopped
2 dozen middleneck clams
2 dozen mussels
A small handful of parsley chopped
A couple sprigs of rosemary chopped
A couple sprigs of oregano chopped (or dry substitute)
A few fresh basil leaves chopped (or dried)

Clean and scrub your clams and mussels and remove any hairy appendage from the mussels (beard). Heat your oil and add onions, celery and garlic and peppers and cook until transparent, stirring so it doesn’t burn. Drain the tomatoes but reserve the juice. Add the tomatoes and cook with the occasional stir and simmer for about 45 minutes and add in the reserved juice if it gets too thick. Add in the chopped parsley, rosemary and oregano, basil.

Turn the heat up and bring the tomatoes to a rapid simmer and about 10 minutes before you’re ready to eat, toss in the clams. Let them cook about 5 minutes and then add the mussels, By this time, all your shellfish should open, but if it doesn’t, don’t eat any that don’t.

You can serve this over pasta, but I prefer just eating it with a good crusty bread. Just dipping and soaking up the sauce.

Enjoy!

Kat



This message was edited May 16, 2009 3:19 AM

That sounds really good.

kat G, just found your Hungarian Bean Soup. Very similar to what my mother cooked on Saturday's.
Here is Tomorrows Sunday Dinner, Brother and Wife are coming..
Will make the Cabbage Noodles with it. If energetic will make "Schupfnudel". Viennese for Nocchi, instead.

Boneless Loin (not from a lion) of Pork.
Slice into the center of the pork and stuff with frozen Hungarian Sausage available here at "Geiers" in Sarasota (I do make my own suasage). Italien sweet can be used. Spike with slivers of garlic.
Roast at 325 degrees depending on size, 2-3 hours. Last hour of roasting add chuncks of peeled russet potatoes. Salad with vinaigrette. Steamed Asparagus.
Dessert Ice Cream with strawberries and "88's" cookies.

Here we have "88's"

What time is dinner?

Hi Hetty, How are you? We start serving 12:Noon. Zwiwabcici (spelling). (Serbian ground lamb on Vidalia Onions) As Apps. Helene

Very, very tempting..... :-)

curious, what is this for?. Any one, what do I do with it?. Came with a bag of Vidalia Onions Helene

Helene it is a onion keeper. You don't always use a whole onion so if you put it in there it will keep it fresh and you won't lose it in the frig. Paul

more suggestions or guesses
please

Paul is right: it's an onion keeper. My kitchen is small. Therefore, I do not keep anything that only serves one duty, like keeping the leftover part of a half-used onion. I place the leftover onion in a baggie, stick it in the fridge and move on.

Here's what I would do. I would fill the bottom part with an onion & chive dip, place the cover on it, wrap it in that fru-fru plastic wrap that is used for basket, adorn it with ribbons and bring it to my next party, explaining to the hostess this is the latest thing, no kitchen is complete without it and you`ll leave the onion keeper for her to enjoy. Please don't thank me, it's nothing, really.

This is how regifting got started. An attentive hostess will make a note to make sure she doesn't regift it back to you: What a faux pas that would be!

Oh, I am so bad this morning. Must be something in the coffee.
Sylvain.

Sylvain,Haven' t have coffee yet, but I do think your solution is great. I too use baggies....
Nothing like re-giving.
Paul, thanks.

Helene

Ohhhhhhhh Helene! You sure have some wonderful recipes...My mouth is watering just reading about your dinner today!

I wonder what the purpose of that little spiky thing is on the bottom part of your plastic onion?

Kat

I believe it is supposed to hold the onion in place. Does anyone remember a similar spikey thing at the bottom of Tupperware's lettuce keeper, which was supposed to keep your letture fresher longer? It looks like the same principle.

Sylvain.

OK, here is my contribution!

this is an appetizer/dip/salsa sort of thing and requires about 20 minutes to prepare.

Cowboy Caviar

1- 15 ounce can of Bush's Blackeyed peas, drained but not rinsed
3-4 green onion chopped, entire stalk.
1 - medium green bell pepper chopped
1 - medium red bell pepper, chopped
1- 15 oz bottle of Kraft Zesty Italian Dressing.

in a serving bowl, combine peas, peppers, and onions. pour on salad dressing enough to coat / drench mixture. refrigerate to chill and serve with tortilla chips.

and thats it. Chick peas can be substituted for black eyed peas, and any chopped veggie can be added as per your tastes. How easy is that?

people LOVE this stuff... i get asked to make it at every gathering, function and get-together.

Hello, dahhh, on my part, I should have realized there should be a recipe
the spike keeps the onion in place for 5 min nuking at high.
I actually found the recipe for the onion "microwave" gadget on the vidalia onion bag, where it was attached/ cooked one whole onion as directed with spices I had here,in the nuker Served it with these little lamb sausage like looking serbian apps. which should be served over raw/salted onion rings. Man was this good and different. Interesting and a keeper.
Also Pics of the finished dinner and dessert and tomato and pepper salad.

This message was edited May 17, 2009 5:48 PM

the pork lion all ready to be served

Tomato and cubanella pepper salad with italien dressing

Oh good dessert first
LOL.
That looks extremely yummy!!

Try to keep this thread alive.

After 45 years of not knowing my girlfriends last name, who lives in Baden, Germany, we made contact 2 years ago. She decided to come and visit here on Longboat key, Fl with her husband, their son, his wife, motherinlaw and 3 children. (Motherinlaw happens to have a cousing here on LBK) They arrived late at night and are staying in 2 condos which they rented for 2 weeks right smack across from our abode.

Here is their "Hello" welcome Dinner. Smithfield ham studded with pineapple,cherries and cloves, basted with a mustard ducksauce garlic vinegar blend. Baked for 1-1/2 hours Delicious. German Potato salad, and Tomatos. Mothers recipe for easter bread (not sweet), a plain bread as well. Hazelnut chocolate cake.

That looks gorgeous Helene and I bet it tasted even better!!
I can see you will be busy the next few weeks.

I am still on line, They had dinner here last Sunday Roasted stuffed chickens, etc. and actually they insist on sight seeing somewhere everyday, therefore, I don't understand why they have these very Xpensive condos here, (like Cape Canaveral, Tampa, and the everglades,) and then they insist on cooking for us on Sunday and i am getting a "Spaetzle making" lesson with a board and the spaetzle are being scraped into the water with a knife like tool. She brought me this tool. Baden is the area where Spaetzle is the main stay as you, Hetty, must know .helene

Great looking spaetzle - haven't had them in years!

There used to be a swiss restaurant (Le St-Moritz) near our home in Montreal that made spaetzle. Oh, the food in there! I sometimes find myself reminescing about the wonderful restaurants from just about every country in the world that we had in Montreal. Like you, Hetty, I haven't had spaetzle inhears. I may try making some. I know I have a recipe at home.

Take care, all.
Sylvain.

Oh Helene...there you go again making my mouth water! Looks absolutely fabulous as usual and I also haven't made spaetzle in years - I haven't seen this tool but there is also something you can use called a Spaetzle Press. I always just pinched off the dough in 1/2 pieces (keep a bowl of flour handy to dip fingers as dough can get sticky). Not as uniform and pretty, but works.

Kat

hello Kat, hungarian galuschka = spaetlze, Mother and I, we just shaved them with a knife from the bowl they were mixed in. Do have a spaetzle press and another gadget my kids use. This is the site
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjgmpzSemC0&feature=related that shows the board, I am getting tomorrow with the shaving/cutting tool, as a gift from Germany, "but not until I show you"... we were 15 year old girls when we last saw each other. Now we are in our 70's
She doesn't know that I can do spaetzle, always with goulash or chicken parikasch or perhaps sauer braten, sometimes with pork roast as well. Or just simple Spaetzle (then made in the press) boiled along with cubed Potato. Bread Crumbs browned slightly in butter poured over the starch and sprinkled generously with greated Parm. Cheese. This is my soul food. Lambs lettuce salad or arugala. Serve a hungarian potato soup before Helene

You guys are making me hungry.

I make spaetzle all the time! I have a sort of sieve and you move the dough over it, back and forth, into the boiling water

A propos gifting and re-gifting.....there was a story on NPR about a fruitcake that travelled around the world and ended up being regifted to the original owner...

We had this tonight. I make this every so often when I’m over-heated and just feel like something easy and refreshing. It’s really good if you have fresh grown tomatoes that you don’t know what to do with. It’s so simple. (serves about 4)

Easy Gazpacho

5 medium sized ripe tomatoes
½ large Onion chopped
1/3 English cucumber peeled and chopped
2 Cloves Garlic chopped
½ Green Pepper, seeded and chopped
3 tablespoons Olive Oil
2 Tablespoons White Vinegar
½ Bunch of fresh parsley (or Cilantro if you like it)
Lots of salt to taste to wake up the tomatoes
Pepper to taste
8 ozs of spicy V8 juice (or tomato juice) bloody Mary mix works too
3/4 teaspoon paprika
Half and half cream (optional)

Boil a saucepan full of water and drop the fresh tomatoes in for about 30 seconds. Remove from the water and peel them under cold running water. Chop them coarsely.

In a blender or food processor, combine the tomatoes, garlic, chopped onion, cucumber, green pepper, olive oil, vinegar, parsley and salt and pepper. Blend to your desired texture, I like mine finer, but some people like it chunkier. Just keep testing while blending. Stir in the V-8 juice and paprika. Put it in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours to blend flavors and chill.

Optional: When you put it in the bowls to serve, pour about a tablespoon of half and half on top…it just gives it a little richer texture and cuts the acidity. You can also add some Hot-sauce if you’re into real spicy!

I’m looking forward to the leftover bowl I’ll have for breakfast tomorrow, as it will really be flavored! Haha

Enjoy

Kat


This message was edited Jun 21, 2009 11:35 PM

I had a duckling in the freezer and finally got around to cooking it tonight! It was so good! My Hungarian Mom used to make this dish every so often and I love it till this day. This is such a good dish if you like Duck. The thing about cooking duck is that it’s usually pretty greasy, but doing it this way get’s rid of a lot of the fat. I’ve never seen duck done like this and it sounds like such a weird combo of flavors, but they really blend together so well! It’s just something different for a change!

Duck and Cabbage

1 6-7 lb Duckling
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 medium sized Onions – chopped
2 large stalks of celery – chopped
3 cloves of garlic – chopped
1 teaspoon of Paprika
1 teaspoon of Hot red dried chili peppers (or 1 fresh hot pepper)
1 cup chicken broth
2 cups water
1 15 oz can of diced tomatoes
½ large Cabbage – sliced into 1” pieces
¼ cup of fresh chopped parsley


Cut up your duck, just like you would a chicken – legs/thighs/wings less tips/ cut the breast into 4 pieces/cut the back into 2 pieces – cut out the real fatty pieces especially the flap around the neck and any other fatty folds. They’re not easy to cut up so be careful as knives can slip easily.

In a large dutch oven…heat your oil until hot and add the duck pieces and brown them – fat side down (about 10 minutes) turning if there is fat on both sides. Remove the browned pieces to a separate plate.

There should now be a lot of fat in the pan – Get rid of it and pour it off keeping just enough to slightly cover the bottom of the pan. Toss in your Onions/Garlic and Celery/ Add the Paprika and dried hot peppers (or fresh) and cook until the onions are transparent. Ohhhhhh the aroma!!!

Put your browned Duck pieces back into the pot. Add the chicken stock and water. Bring to a boil and add the diced tomatoes. Simmer for about 45 minutes on medium heat, stirring on occasion.

Toss in your sliced cabbage and stir it into the broth…cook for about another 20 minutes until cabbage is tender. Add your parsley and stir into the broth. If there is fat floating on top, just skim it off.

Spoon cabbage into bowls – with a couple pieces of duck meat and top off with broth. Great with some nice Crusty bread for dipping!

Kathy you have the best recipes!!

More desserts, please!!! These all sound so good, but life is too short not to have dessert FIRST!

Cherries in a Cloud

6 egg whites
¾ tsp cream of tartar
2-cup sugar
2-cup saltine crackers
1-cup pecans
2 tsp vanilla
Whip cream
Can fruit pie filling

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Beat egg whites and cream of tartar until peaks form. Fold in sugar, roughly crumbled saltines, pecans, and vanilla. Place mixture into a 9x13 pan and bake in oven 25 minutes. Let cool completely. Top with whipped cream and then spread the fruit filling on that and refrigerate until ready to eat.

Here is Gail's amazing carrot cake recipe. Comfort food for us. Makes a large cake that can be baked in a Bundt or angelfood cake pan.


GAIL’S CARROT CAKE
Start the day before.

INGREDIENTS :
1 ¼ cup vegetable oil
2 cups brown sugar, firmly packed
4 eggs
3 cups coarsely grated carrots, firmly packed
2 cups all purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 measured tsp salt
1 cup chopped walnuts, dusted with some flour to prevent them
from sinking to the bottom of the cake as it cooks

PREPARATION
• Preheat oven to 350°F.
• Using a hand mixer, mix well oil, sugar and eggs in a large bowl.
• Add the rest of the ingredients and mix well using the hand mixer.
Grease a tube pan
Bake for 1 hour.
Test for doneness.
Cool at least 15 minutes before removing from pan.


ICING
1 package (8 oz) cream cheese at room temperature
2 tbsp butter
2 cups confectionner’s sugar
1 to 1 ½ cup chopped walnuts
1 cup coconut
2 tsp pure vanilla extract.

PREPARATION
• In a saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat.
• Add the cream cheese and mix into the warm butter to melt.
• Remove from heat, add the rest of the ingredients.
• Allow mixture to return to room temperature.
• Ice the cake, trying not to eat it as you go along.
Spread on cake.

Enjoy.
Sylvain.

And only twelve calories per slice LOL

Carrot cake and Cabbage, 2 of our favorite foods! Being from a Czech background, we eat cabbage in every manor, shape, and form! But my husband's favorite birthday cake is carrot cake, so I'll be sure to give that one a try!

Oh, my - those sound SO good!

Oh Darla and Polar Bear! Those just sound so goooooooood!

I don't eat cake too much but LOVE Carrot Cake! I'm not a great Baker but I made one for Mothers day and it was excellent! Going to try Gails recipe though as this sounds great. Especially the addition of coconut in the icing!

Thanks

Kat

Tonight we grilled some steaks but I was looking for a Potato side dish that would be kind of different.

This is kind of like Scalloped Potatoes, but a lot drier and can be sliced. I haven’t had this for years and we had it up in Prince Edward Island and it brought back memories. Found a basic recipe and added to it. This was soooooo good! Not good on calories though…but great comfort food! Can be made in advance and then sliced and heated up.

Dauphinoise Potatoes:

¾ pint of whipping cream or half and half
3 cloves of garlic - minced
Salt and pepper
6 medium sized baking potatoes ( I used Florida white potatoes and it was good)
2 tablespoons of butter
½ cup of grated cheddar or parmesan cheese
2 tablespoons of butter
Nutmeg – about ¾ of a teaspoon

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees.

Bring the cream to a simmer and add your minced garlic. Add plenty of salt to taste – even more than you would normally use as the potatoes will absorb it. When you start getting little bubbles on the side of the saucepan, remove from the heat and set aside.

Peel your Potatoes and cut them into about 1/8th inch slices. I used my food processor and it made it go real fast. However, if your cutting by hand, put your slices into cold water to prevent the starch from turning them dark. In a bowl, toss the potatoes with some salt, pepper and the nutmeg.

Grease the pan (I used a Loafpan) with the butter. Layer the potato slices flat. Add the cream to the Loafpan and let it absorb into the potatoes – they should be barely covered and not swimming in cream.

You should have about an inch of headroom in your pan. Cover with aluminum foil and press it all down inside the pan to keep the potatoes from floating. (You can use another pan to weigh this down, but it’s not that necessary)

Bake for 40 minutes – remove the foil and bake for another 20. Turn on the broiler to 500 and add the grated cheese on top – Broil for an additional 10 minutes. Take it out of the oven and let it rest for another 15 minutes before cutting. If you make it in advance – just refrigerate it, cut it into serving pieces and place on a buttered baking pan in a 450 degree oven until browned and heated. Enjoy!

Kat