Like the tart? Check out this article about making fruit tarts. Mine isn’t from the recipe given with the article, but it’s close. I used a cream cheese filling, which went very well with the strawberries. I must say that the lime marmalade glaze mentioned in the article sounds like it would be divine with the raspberries in their tart.

Today, apparently, is World Blog Day. I love how there is a day for everything now.
For example, today is National Trail Mix day. Tomorrow is National Cherry Popover Day. I know that I have never seen a cherry popover, let alone eaten one. I want my own day! Wait. I guess that my birthday counts as my own day.
In honor of World Blog Day 2005, I am going to share with you 5 links to sites I like. I am also going to get around to updating the links section on my blog today, so you may get a few more than 5. These sites are probably not new to many of you, but I really enjoy them all.

The Food Whore makes food for money. Unfortunately for her, you can’t always pick your clients. And if you have ever worked in any job that required you to interact with the public, you’ll know that if you could pick your clients, there wouldn’t be too many of them. Love her.

Waiter Rant is another food service blog. I think the Bistro is lucky to have him, though probably not so lucky to have some of their customers. He has great stories and great tips. I’d point you to a favorite post, but I like them all.

Who doesn’t like candy? Cybelle of The Candy Blog does, and so do I. She tests and reviews a new type of candy every day: foreign, domestic, high quality or a mystery item on sale at the local discount store. Tasty.

Susan is living out her dreams of opening an artisan bakery at her farm in Missouri. At Farmgirl Fare, she posts a picture of ferm life every day. If we’re lucky, she’ll throw in the occasional recipe or useful tidbit about baking.

My last link of the day is not to a blog, but to the Red Cross, to support their efforts in helping the victims of Hurricaine Katrina and the City of New Orleans, which, at the time of writing this, is 80% underwater with water still coming in.

How do you know when you’ve hit on a good chocolate chip cookie? When everyone who tastes one reaches for another.

Chocolate chip cookies are funny things because, though just about everyone (except for a few crazies) likes them, everyone has a slightly different opinion about what makes a good one. Jeffrey Steingarten said it much better than I could hope to in It Must’ve Been Something I Ate. He likes thinner, crispier, butterier chocolate chip cookies. I like not-too-thin, crisp-on-the-edges and chewy-in-the-center chocolate chips. I add enough oatmeal to ensure a bit of a chew, but not enough to qualify as a oatmeal cookie. There is a nice amount of chocolate chips, but if you must have nuts in your cookie, add 1/2 cup of walnuts. If you don’t have quick cooking oats, you can substitute instant. If you only have regular rolled oats, whizz them in the food processor or blender to break them up.

They really are addictive.

(more…)

I like a good scone. Unfortunately, a good scone outside of the kitchen seems to be rather difficult to come by these days. I know this is not true for many people for two reasons: you might have a particular bakery you frequent that makes nice ones or you have different scone standards than I do. Let me say that having one bakery that does scones well is a great thing, but it does not really increase the availibility of scones to the rest of us.

As to scone standards, I think that they are heavily influnenced by chains that do a heavy business in them. There isn’t anything wrong with that. To be fair, some of their scones can have a good flavor (often from the glaze one the scone), but to my mind they are too dry and bready to be really good. My favorite scones are made by The Cheese Board in Berkeley, CA. If you live anywhere in the bay area and have never been, shame on you. Make sure to have their pizza, as well!
For now, I guess I’ll stick to homemade.

Using buttermilk instead of cream in this recipe give the scones a richness without some of the fat. They are buttery and the cherries go well with the tang of buttermilk. You may need a bit less liquid if it is very humid where you live.

(more…)

Frying is the theme of this 18th edition of Is My Blog Burning, hosted by Linda of At our table. Now, I am not a big fryer. Don’t get me wrong, fried food tastes good. Great even. But I want and like to eat healthy when I’m eating at home.

Last year, I had a great dinner at B. Smith’s restaurant in New York. I ordered Fried Green Tomatoes as an appetiser. It isn’t something that commonly pops up on menus out here in California. Fried green tomatoes are a classic Southern dish made from unripe tomatoes. Green tomatoes are pleasantly firm and more crunchy than their riper counterparts. They have a hint of tomato flavor, but taste rather lemony. Green tomatoes are best when nearing ripeness. They should be juicy around the seeds, but be far less juicy than any ripe tomato. This firmness makes them great candidates for both breading and frying.

I decided to oven-fry my green tomatoes. I did take B. Smith’s advice and was sure to use celery salt in my recipe. I added breadcrumbs for an extra crunch, but the texture of the cornmeal is imperative for a classic touch. The coating crisps up nicely in the oven and the tomato retains its shape but becomes soft in the center.

(more…)

It seems like it’s been a while since I made a loaf of bread. The last few I’ve made for personal consumption - not just to post about here - have been sourdough. I like sourdough and I feel like my loaves come out consistently well enough to be impressive. Not that I’m constantly fishing for compliments or anything, but it is decidedly fun to have people over for a bbq or something and serve a loaf that you baked yourself. At least 80% of people have no idea what makes sourdough sourdough.

Of course, you don’t always want the same kind of bread. This was an easy one - great taste and easy to work with dough. Slightly sweet and a bit nutty, this bread tastes like nothing more than good bread. It is light, with a soft and even crumb. It goes great with soup, sandwiches or nothing more than a little butter. Addictive.

(more…)

I don’t know about you, but when I make rice I often season it or cook it in chicken or vegetable stock instead of simply cooking it plain, in water alone. I also don’t usually have too much rice left over at the end of a meal. This is a problem because I like rice pudding and it seems that most recipes call for starting with leftover rice.

There are two types of people in the world: those who like rice pudding and those who don’t. Let me state for the record that if you don’t like rice pudding at all, you have probably never had a decent rice pudding. Blandness is the most common complaint and that is easily resolved by actually flavoring your rice pudding.

Rice pudding is, in its simplest form, a dish of cooked rice, thickened with milk or cream and sweetened with sugar. In more complex forms, it is enriched with egg yolks and studded with fruits and nuts. I think of classic comfort food, something that you might eat when curled up by the fire on a wintery night or have as an indulgent breakfast treat, cold from the refrigerator, at your grandmother’s house. In fact, I can’t remember ever making rice pudding, just eating it. And my grandmother picked it up at the store.

The recipe I used was from Retro Desserts, by Wayne Harley Brachman. I had a few problems with his method. Essentially, you cook the rice in caramel, add milk and bake until thickened. Mr. Brachman says to cook the rice, in the caramel, with the saucepan lid on. Mine bubbled over. Twice. Needless to say, I left the lid off after that. I also decided that baking the pudding was not strictly necessary, not to mention that there would be less cleanup if I added the milk straight to the pan.

All in all, the pudding was delicious. The light brown color came from the brown sugar. If you soak the raisins in run, you’ll get a nice, adult flavor, but it’s not necessary and I think I actually prefer it without. Any type of milk will work in this recipe, but light cream will give you the creamiest, most decadent results.

(more…)