Category Archives: 50 Recipes

November 18, 2013 · 3:04 pm

Pie for Breakfast

Last year for Thanksgiving I made six pies. Why so many pies for sixteen people, all of whom had consumed a huge Thanksgiving dinner? Well, I guess you were going to find out sooner or later. Truth is I like pie for breakfast. There, I said it. A slice of pie with a cup of tea or coffee and any day gets off to a good start as far as I’m concerned. The trick to being able to have pie for breakfast is to make extra pie the day before. Which means with a crowd that big (made up mostly of teenage boys) I had to bake a whole lot of pies.

The rustic apple tarts I baked were based on this recipe, while the other three pies were variations on my Blue Ribbon Pumpkin Pie. For many years my local Bread & Circus supermarket (now a Whole Foods) had a pumpkin pie contest the weekend before Thanksgiving that was judged by several department managers. The only rule was you had to make a pie from ingredients which could be purchased in the store. The first year I entered I didn’t win, not even third place, but I was able to figure out why I’d failed to even place. Being located in the Happy Valley (as we locals call this area) when the judging was finished all the contestants were able to taste all the other pies, including the winners. One bite was enough to know the secret to a blue ribbon pumpkin pie (in these judge’s opinion) was molasses. I tweaked my recipe and the following year came home with a blue.

Even though we’re having a much smaller Thanksgiving dinner this year my sister Heather and her gang of six are coming to visit the day after turkey day. I’m going to be making a whole lot of pies to ensure there are enough leftovers so everyone can have a slice of pie for breakfast.

Blue Ribbon Pumpkin Pie

This recipe was adapted from Nick Malgieri’s How To Bake. With the addition of some molasses it helped me win first place at the Hadley Bread & Circus Pumpkin Pie contest.

Crust

1 cup flour

3 Tablespoons sugar

1/8 teaspoon salt

1/2 – 1 teaspoon nutmeg

4 Tablespoons unsalted butter

1 egg

In a food processor add the flour, sugar, salt and nutmeg then pulse three times. Next add the butter and process until mixture resembles cornmeal, 7-12 times. Add egg and pulse just till incorporated. Pour dough onto a work surface and briefly kneed into a 6” circle. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate one or more hours.

Filling

1 1/2 cups canned pumpkin

2 eggs plus 2 yolks

3 Tablespoons molasses *

1/3 cup water

2/3 cup cane sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon ground ginger

1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1/4 teaspoon ground clove **

1 1/4 cups light cream

whipped cream for serving

Preheat oven to 350ºF. Roll out dough and line 9” pie plate. For some inspiration on how to make your crust look pretty check out this video. Pop your finished crust in the fridge while you make the filling. Gently whisk filling ingredients together in the order in which they are listed. Pour filling into crust. Bake 60 minutes or until center is nearly set.

The classic method for testing if a custard pie is done is to insert a knife tip into the center and see if it comes out clean. I am of two minds on this testing method since it can often leave a small crack in your finished pie which can lead to a fissure of extreme proportions. Your second option is to go for the jiggle test whereby you gently shake the pie plate while it is still in the oven and see how much of the center wiggles. You want some movement, but not too much. This second method requires some baking experience as to exactly how much jiggle/wiggle is enough. If you’re unsure go for the knife. You can cover your crack by using some of the leftover pie dough to make a leaf shape, which you bake (make several). Once the pie is cooked and cooled you can gently lay the leaf/leaves over the crack.

Cool and serve with whipped cream.

* My nephew Asher is not a fan of molasses. If you don’t like the taste either you can just leave it out and increase the water to 1/2 cup.

** The first time my Mom made a pumpkin pie the recipe did not specify ground cloves so she used whole instead. After the first bite everyone was very cautious to look for cloves before chewing. For this recipe Mom and I suggest you use ground clove, nutmeg, cinnamon and ginger.

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Tagged as blue ribbon pie, bread & circus, leftovers, Nick Malgieri, pumpkin pie, thanksgiving, Thanksgiving dinner

October 31, 2013 · 1:10 pm

A Squash of One’s Own

I am a big fan of squash. Any squash. Butternut, Delicata, Blue Hubbard, and Acorn. Bring ’em on (though for some of those bigger squash you may need a chain saw to cut into them)! To me these hard squashes say fall, New England, feasting. When the leaves are down and you finally decide you have to turn the heat on (we made it to October 27th before flipping the switch this year); about the time you dig into your bottom drawer for your sweaters; but before the first snowflakes hit, is the perfect time to celebrate the change of seasons with squash.

For me this recipe is akin to a cooking meditation. You chop and peel and stir as you sip a mug of hot apple cider or a glass of wine and hear about everyone’s day. The timing can be loose and the recipe (even though I’ve written it down for you) is flexible, more of a concept than something to follow to the letter. It’s the food version of one-size-fits-all, and you can tweak it and adapt it to your taste, as well as to what happens to be on your pantry shelves that day.

I’ve made it dozens of times over the years and while it’s wonderful every time, it hasn’t been the same twice. I’ve used sweet pork sausage, but also chicken apple sausage, garlic sausage, and one time a spicy chorizo. When vegetarians are coming to dinner I substitute tempeh for the sausage and vegetable stock or apple cider for the chicken broth. The last few incarnations have had dried cherries mixed with chunks of crisp fall apples, though previous iterations of this dish have contained silvered apricots, dried apples, dried and/or fresh cranberries, pears, and golden raisins.

Nan, the woman who told me about this recipe was a huge fan of the Neville Brothers so I often find myself playing one of their CDs as I putter around the kitchen. When I told her I’d never heard of the Neville Brothers she described them like this, “They have the voices of angels – angels who sing rhythm & blues and funk and come from New Orleans.”

Happy squash! Happy Fall!

Stuffed Acorn Squash

3 acorn squash, cut in half & seeds removed

3-5 Tablespoons olive oil or butter or combination

1-2 small onions, diced

2 carrots, peeled and diced

2-3 celery stalks, diced

2-3 parsnips, peeled and diced

3-4 sausages or equivalent amount of tempeh

2 apples, peeled, cored and diced

1/2 cup walnuts, roughly chopped

1/2 cup dried cherries or cranberries, roughly chopped

4 cups dried stuffing (look for something low sodium)

2 cups chicken or vegetable stock

thyme

salt

pepper

garlic powder

sage

Butter or olive oil (if desired)

Preheat oven to 350ºF. Arrange squash, cut side down in a jelly roll pan with 1/2″ water. Bake until soft 60-80 minutes, depending on size.

While the squash are baking make the stuffing. Sauté onions, carrots, celery together 5-8 minutes depending on the size of your chopped pieces. If your sausage is pre-cooked dice up and add to the vegetable mixture. For the vegetarian version chop up tempeh and sauté until lightly browned. If you’re using raw sausage cook with vegetables until all pink is gone from the meat. While all this sautéing is going on heat up the stock until simmering.

Add the walnuts, cherries and spices to the vegetable-sausage mix and season to taste with thyme, salt, pepper, garlic powder and sage. Pour 1/2 cups warm stock over dried stuffing and stir to moisten. Pour remaining stock over the vegetable-sausage mix to moisten, then combine the two. Re-taste to correct seasonings.

At this point the squash should be cooked. Flip over, add a pat of butter or margarine or small spoonful of olive oil (if desired) and a light sprinkle of salt and pepper to the squash. If your squash won’t sit level slice off a tiny piece from the bottom so they won’t rock. Mound in the stuffing so it is slightly domed. Repeat with all squash halves. You should have a fair amount of stuffing left over. Place the remaining stuffing in a shallow baking dish or pie plate.

Bake stuffed squash and extra stuffing for 15-20 minutes or until the top of the stuffing starts to lightly brown and crisp. If the stuffing in the baking dish is getting too dry cover with foil. The last bit of baking time gives you time to clean up so there won’t be a mountain of pots and pans to attack after dinner. I admit I derive some OCD satisfaction from the fact that this meal comes out of the oven already portioned out (let’s not go into what that says about me). Sometimes it’s important to have a squash of one’s own.

Serve squash with a side of stuffing.

Because there is no such thing as enough stuffing…

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Tagged as acorn squash, fall, fall dinner, Neville Brothers, new england, stuffing

October 9, 2013 · 10:32 am

Be Brave Brownies

There are times when I forget how much bravery and faith it takes to step into the kitchen some days.

No one is born knowing how to cook. Everyone knows how to eat from day one, but producing the meals which get consumed over a lifetime is a learned skill. Some people master those skills early on and for them cooking becomes like a second language. Others acquired their culinary skills as needed – when they get their first apartment or in my Mom’s case, when she married and had a family to feed. I’ve noticed that for some of those late kitchen bloomers the joys of cooking are abundant while others simply tolerate their time in the kitchen because there is a need both to eat and feed people. For me being around food and cooking is akin to breathing. I do it unconsciously. There is a comfort level I’ve attained both from my love of food as well as from the hours and hours I’ve stood in front of a stove.

I don’t want to sound cocky because it wasn’t always this intuitive. I enjoyed learning to cook, but I also had to work at it. There were such spectacular failures along the way its amazing I ever took up a spatula again. For some people completely losing their eyebrows in a gas oven lighting fiasco might have turned them away from food, or at least from cooking on gas appliances, but not me (and it turns out eyebrows do grow back and you really shouldn’t wait three minutes to strike the match once the gas is on). There was a memorable visit to my parent’s kitchen from the Manlius Fire Department after I had accidentally set the stove top on fire using my new wok. The disasters have given me pause, but not frightened me out of the kitchen. There have also been some foods I’m not entirely comfortable around. Ok, I’ll say it – there are a few foods which have scared me because they were strange (offals) or dangerous (spun sugar) or had a reputation for being complicated and temperamental (chocolate). Yup, I said chocolate.

Chocolate and I go way back. I adore chocolate so much I think it should have its own line on the food pyramid. I consume some nearly every day. When we were first dating my husband noticed this obsession and asked what would happen if chocolate were illegal. I replied that he would be visiting me in jail with a file baked into a vanilla cake. Really, did he think if chocolate were illegal I would abstain from it??? Silly man. Life without chocolate? Unthinkable. I love chocolate. The thing is chocolate in some forms can be temperamental. It can seize if you add liquid at the wrong moment or turn grainy if not heated properly. There are so many ways it can misbehave. More to the point I just hadn’t tried to make many chocolate desserts beyond the classic Nestlé Toll House Chocolate Chip cookie. Even my Mom who doesn’t love being in the kitchen is able to whip up a chocolate mousse which is so velvety smooth and deliciously chocolatey you ask for seconds and then thirds. I was a chocolate wuss.

This hesitancy towards chocolate was quickly noted by my two bosses at the Leaf ‘n Bean Café after they hired me as their baker. Alan and John explained they expected me to have at least one chocolate item on the dessert menu every single day. “Sure, no problem,” I told them as I inwardly said to myself, “Shit, shit, shit what am I going to make?” One of the waitresses took pity on me and gave me the recipe for the best chocolate cake ever. A regular customer at the café heard about my conundrum and slipped me the recipe for her no fail brownies. What I quickly learned was you didn’t need to be afraid of chocolate – you just need a good recipe and a little faith.

It turns out that most chocolate desserts aren’t hard or scary. I’ll grant you making fancy chocolate that needs to be tempered is tricky, but there are so many chocolate dessert recipes which are “Easy Peasy” as Jamie Oliver says. If you are craving gourmet chocolate bonbons there are plenty of fabulous chocolatiers out there who can make them for you. I am particularly fond of L.A. Burdick. Beyond the fancy stuff I suggest you take a deep breath, find a good recipe, and head into the kitchen.

For everyday chocolate consumption it doesn’t get much simpler than brownies. Practically fail proof*, quick to make, as well as delicious, home-made brownies are as easy to whip up as their boxed Betty Crocker cousins. Brownies are the all American chocolate equivalent of apple pie, and like apple pie you can notch them up by serving them à la mode.

Here’s a tip from Maida Heatter on how to line your brownie pan with foil. Spread a sheet of foil over the outside of the pan and press the foil to follow the shape of the pan. Then slide the foil off and flip the baking pan over. Gently nudge the pre-formed foil into the inside of the pan and secure the ends by wrapping them over the edge of the pan.

Brave Brownies

I wish I remembered the customer’s name who gave me this recipe all those years ago. I’d like to thank her all over again for the kindness she showed to me when I was learning to navigate my way into a daily routine of chocolate desserts. Perhaps these should be called Thank You Brownies.

1 stick of unsalted butter (1/2 cup)

2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, roughly chopped

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1/2 – 2/3 cup flour (moist to cakey)

1/4 cup cocoa (optional)¹

pinch of salt

a handful or two of extra bits like chocolate chips, chopped walnuts or dried cherries

Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Flip over a 8″ x 8″ baking pan and smooth a sheet of foil over the outside – I have gotten very fond of non-stick foil recently. Gently lift the foil which is now shaped like your pan place it into the inside of the baking pan. Since the foil has the overall shape of the pan it should be easy to snug it in. The foil will make removal of your finished brownies, and clean up, a snap.

In a small saucepan heat the butter and unsweetened chocolate until melted over a low heat. Give it a stir every so often as they’re melting, then set aside to cool when both the chocolate and butter are melted.

In medium bowl beat together the eggs, sugar and vanilla. Add the melted butter and chocolate. Finally stir in the flour, cocoa (if using) and salt. I beat it 50 times which is the number from the back of a box of brownie mix. Silly, but one of my quirks. You can simply beat until combined and then pour into the pan. If you want to add any “extra bits” you can either fold them in or sprinkle them on top.

Bake 22-27 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out with just a few crumbs on it. Cool for at least 20-30 minutes before trying to cut because warm brownies will cling to the knife.

Gluten Free Brownies

Many years ago I worked with a food stylist who was starting to transition from food styling to writing cookbooks. I remember three things about Carol Gelles – her generosity to her assistants; her telling me about the deal she had with God when it came to dirty dishes – she washed and he dried; and lastly her recipe for oatmeal brownies. Back then I didn’t think of them as gluten-free, but they are made with oat flour so this is a perfect alternative for any of your friends who have an intolerance or sensitivity to gluten. If someone has a severe allergy make sure you get oats that say they are gluten free. This version is pretty much the same brownie recipe if you look at them side by side.

1 stick of unsalted butter (1/2 cup)

2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, roughly chopped

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3/4 cup oat flour (made from 1 cup oatmeal)

1/4 cup cocoa (optional) ²

pinch of salt

a handful or two of extra bits like chocolate chips, chopped walnuts or dried cherries

Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Flip over a 8″ x 8″ baking pan and smooth a sheet of foil over it. Gently lift the foil off then gentle the foil into the inside of the pan to make getting them out of the pan easy.

In a small saucepan heat the butter and unsweetened chocolate until melted. Give it a stir every so often until both are melted, then set aside to cool while you put together the other ingredients.

In medium bowl beat together the eggs, sugar and vanilla for three minutes. To make the oat flour process the oatmeal in a food processor until you have flour 3-6 minutes depending on your machine. Add the oat flour and salt to the melted butter and chocolate. Stir that mixture into the beaten eggs and sugar. If you want to add any “extra bits” mix in a few handfuls into the batter or sprinkle them on top.

Bake 33-38 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out with just a few crumbs on it. Cool for at least 20-30 minutes before trying to cut because warm brownies will cling to the knife.

* I will give someone out there the benefit of the doubt that they could somehow screw these up, if only to be perverse or because they tried to mess up.

¹ Having made these brownies for every school event since writing this post I have decided I really like a small amount of cocoa added in. Since cocoa is similar in texture to flour you may want to consider reducing your total amount of flour used so the brownies don’t get too cake-y. Also my preferred brand is Ghiradelli, which while more expensive than regular cocoa is well worth the extra cost when it comes to taste.

² I have been adding a small amount of cocoa to the oatmeal variation too since it is gluten free and similar in texture to flour. As I mentioned in the previous recipe my preferred a high end brand such as Ghiradelli.

PS – These brownies have been so easy to make I’ve been making them (and tweaking them) twice a week for the last two months. One of my favorites was when I had some left over cocoa powder and chocolate truffle filling. I chilled the chocolate truffle filling then chopped it into little chunks and mixed that along with the Valrhona cocoa powder into the batter. Because I didn’t think to take some of the flour out to compensate for the cocoa I added these brownies were more on the cake-y side, but the chocolate flavor was amazing. Here is one of my variations –

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Tagged as Allison, best chocolate cake, brownies, chocolate

August 16, 2013 · 6:52 pm

Focaccia – A Love Story

I believe in Romance with a capital R. My Grammy Thompson was adored by her beloved Teed before and after they were secretly married. My parents met on a blind double date and walked down the aisle twelve months later. My husband Shawn and I were introduced by mutual friends (yep-another blind date). One week later a different set of mutual friends tried to get us together, only to realize we’d already been introduced. Then there is one of my favorite romantic stories involving my brother Jay, his (now) wife Leah, and a loaf of rosemary focaccia.

My brother, like a lot of guys, was pretty quiet about his romantic interests. After all I am his big sister and telling me about different girls he was interested in would have been weird in that sibling “ew cooties” kind of way. However what was a guy to do in the days before the internet and cooking channel if he needed food advice? His choices were at the time limited to A) buying a cookbook B) buying a cooking magazine or C) calling his big sister. Which is what lead to me giving my baby brother advice about dating food.

Truthfully I don’t remember the whole menu, but I do remember one food I strongly recommended he make because it was guaranteed to impress – focaccia. The tricky part was I had to teach him how to do it over the phone. He managed the proofing of the yeast and initial mixing of the flour just fine, but I could hear that he’d run into a problem when he started to knead the dough. Jay had me on speakerphone since his hands were sticky with dough (remember this was over twenty years ago when the closest thing to skype was the George Jetson’s phone). What I heard was a whole lot of nothing. Here’s how the conversation went –

“Why aren’t you grunting?”

“Why should I?”

“You’re supposed to be kneading the bread dough, not just rolling it around!”

“I am kneading it, you just can’t see me!”

“Well then I need to hear you huffing and puffing with the effort of kneading.”

“I am (huff) putting effort (puff) into kneading (grunt) this dough!!!”

“Better. Do that for ten minutes. It should feel like a baby’s bum soon.”

“How the heck (grunt) am I supposed to know (huff) about baby’s butts (puff)!?!”

A few phone calls later he had the focaccia in the oven and something simmering on the stove. When I asked my brother how his date had liked the dinner (and especially the focaccia) he told me, “Great.” Why is it that brothers are so reluctant to give post date details?

It wasn’t until a few years after Jay and Leah were married that I finally got to hear the inside scoop of how the focaccia was actually received. My sister-in-law said the date was indeed fabulous (after all she married my little brother!!) and after dinner Jay had given her the rest of the focaccia to take home. She was going to visit her parents the next day and wanted to show them this amazing bread which this fabulous guy had made for her. She took the remains of the focaccia, balanced carefully across the palms of her two hands, and walked into her parent’s kitchen. Since it was Sunday morning, and Leah was gazing so reverently at this piece of bread, her mother thought she was bringing them some sort of large, misshapen communion wafer. She looked up at her mom and said, “Mom, he made this for me!”

If you haven’t ever tried it focaccia is a flattish bread filled with herbs then drizzled liberally with olive oil before baking. Perfect for nibbling on before or with a meal. I often serve it with a shallow dish of extra virgin olive oil.

Rosemary Focaccia

1 1/2 cups warm water

1 package yeast (2 1/4 teaspoons)

1-2 teaspoons honey

3 1/2 – 4 cups flour (I do a 4:1 ratio of white to whole wheat but all white is fine)

2 teaspoons salt

1/4 cup olive oil plus 2-3 Tablespoons more

4 Tablespoons fresh rosemary leaves, divided

1/2 cup sautéed onion slices (optional)

1/2 cup pitted olives (optional)

Proof the yeast by mixing the warm water with the honey and sprinkling the yeast over the top. When yeasts bubbles to the top of the water and “foams” it is good to go. Start with 3 cups of flour/s, salt, 1/4 cup olive oil, and 2 Tablespoons ripped up rosemary leaves. Mix together into a shaggy ball and plop out onto a flour covered counter to knead.

Knead for ten minutes, adding enough flour to keep dough from sticking to your counter. Huffing and puffing show you’re putting some effort into this. The dough should be quite soft, though not sticky when you’re done. Place into a lightly oiled bowl, cover with a clean tea towel and let rise until double about 2-3 hours.

Once dough has doubled punch it down and knead a few times to remove any air bubbles. Roll or pat it our to about 1/2″ thick rectangle and place on parchment covered or lightly oiled jelly roll pan. Cover with tea towel and let rise another 30-40 minutes. About half way through the second rising preheat oven to 400ºF. When dough has doubled again make several random indentations with the tips of your fingers. Then drizzle 2-3 Tablespoons of olive oil over the top (it will pool in the indentations) and sprinkle the remaining 2 Tablespoons of rosemary leaves over top. If you want you can sprinkle with a touch of coarse salt.

If you want you can add sautéed onions and or olives. It starts to become a pizza without the cheese or sauce, but focaccia is flexible enough to handle a couple more ingredients.

Pop in the oven and bake 15-20 minutes or until the focaccia is nicely browned. Serve as is on a board so people can pull chunks off as they eat or with a small bowl of olive oil.

Disclaimer: Just because this bread is so awesome doesn’t necessarily mean that whomever you make it for will want to marry you. But it could happen…

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Tagged as focaccia, love story, rosemary

July 22, 2013 · 8:02 am

Turn Up the Heat

We’ve been thinking a lot about driving lately. Isabelle takes her driving test today. Russell is studying for his permit test. Which means everyone is learning about stuff they didn’t know. Like how to parallel park (trickier than you might think), how tinted the windows of your car can be (35% who knew?), and what to do if your car starts to skid out of control (don’t break and steer into the skid). The last one got me to thinking that if you should turn your car into a skid does that mean when the weather gets nasty-hot outside should you turn up the heat in your food?

Last week the weather was brutal. One friend wrote on her Facebook wall –

“Even in this putrid, humid heat, I’m reading all kinds of status updates of people running 5 miles, biking, etc…and I’m just sitting here thinking how proud I was when I went and got the mail without fainting.”

That pretty much sums it up, surviving this most recent heat wave feels like an accomplishment. The question is how do you cook dinner when walking into the kitchen causes you to break a sweat? Do you serve popsicles and plates of uncooked food? In part that has been my default strategy – when the temperatures are close to 100° I stop actually cooking (which is ironic since many restaurant kitchens I’ve worked in were 101° + in the summers). But if you apply the skid rule to food then when the temperatures soar you should turn up the heat in your food rather than trying to make it colder. In counties where it is really hot the cuisines often have a spicy component to them. Think of Indian curries and tandoori or the hot jabanaro peppers used in Mexican cuisine. It’s not that everything from these cuisines will burn your tongue off, but taking a bite of something that makes you sweat seems to counteract the heat outside.

So I’ve been adding more zip and spice to our food. Extra raw garlic in the pesto, and hotter peppers in our Samosas. Samosas are savory Indian pasties meant to be served as an appetizer or snack. My gang likes them so much we make a meal of them. Our favorites are the Aloo Samosas which are filled with potatoes, peas, onions, and plenty of spices. In the winter I use jalapeno peppers and bake the samosas in the oven. The more traditional method is to fry them, which I do in the summer. I also use cayenne or Thai peppers (easy to grow or find them at most farmer’s markets) to bring up the spice level in the warmer months. Despite the main ingredient being potatoes these little pockets of yummy are full of flavor – coriander, garam masala, fresh ginger, and of course hot peppers. This recipe is a tweaked version of Julie Sahni‘s from her book Classic Indian Cooking.

Potato Samosas

Dough

3 cups flour

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup solid vegetable shortening

1/2 – 3/4 cups cold water

Put the flour, salt and shortening in a medium bowl. You then want to rub the fat into the flour so you take some flour in your hand and a little shortening and smear them together. You keep doing this until all the fat has been smooshed between clumps of flour and all the flour has bits of shortening in it. Then add around 1/3 cup of cold water and mix. Keep adding more water until the dough comes together. The amount of water depends on the weather/humidity so start slow and work up. You don’t want the dough oozing, nor do you want it crumbling. When you think you’ve got it right knead the dough for about 10 minutes. If it feels a bit dry dribble in more water. It should be as soft as a baby’s bottom when you’re done kneading. Wrap it in plastic wrap and let rest for 30-60 minutes.

Filling

1 1/2 pounds potatoes, cut into chunks (7-8 medium)

1 medium to large onion, chopped into small pieces

2 teaspoons minced fresh ginger

2 teaspoons ground coriander (or you can use the seeds)

2 1/2 – 3 teaspoons garam masala

5 tablespoons vegetable oil

2-3 fresh chilies (jalapeño or Thai), seeded and finely chopped

1-2 Tablespoons fresh lemon juice

2 1/2 – 3 1/2 teaspoons salt

1 generous cup peas, or more if you like peas

Boil the potatoes until you can easily slide a fork or knife in them. Peeling (or not) is up to you. While the potatoes are cooking sauté the onion, ginger, coriander, and garam masala in vegetable oil. Your nose will go into hyperdrive at this point. When the onions are soft, add the chilies. Depending on which chilies you use your eyes may start to water. Once the potatoes are cooked, drain them and throw them into the sauté pan with the cooked onions, you may need to crumble them with your fingers to make them smaller – you don’t want mashed potatoes, nor do you want large chunks which can break through the dough. Add the salt and lemon juice to taste. When you’ve had two or three tastes stir in the peas and taste once more.

If you’re baking the samosas turn the oven on to 400°F and line a jelly roll pan with parchment paper. If you’re frying them get out a cast iron fry pan and fill it with 1″ vegetable oil. To make the samosas you’ll need some flour for rolling out the dough and a bit of water to seal the pastries. Cut off large walnut size lumps of dough and roll into a 5″ circle. Cut in half and scoop a generous Tablespoon of filling into the half circle. Dab a little water along the cut edge and pinch the seam together. Then with a little more water dabbed on the curved edge fold it over and seal. You’ll have a lumpy little triangle-esque form.

Depending on your cooking method either place samosas on the jelly roll pan or into the hot vegetable oil. If you’re baking them drizzle with olive or vegetable oil and bake 30-40 minutes, flipping once and adding more oil if necessary. The look and texture of the dough is different from baking (they’re not fried after all), however they are still very yummy. If you’re frying them have the oil at medium high and cook until all sides of the samosa are a golden brown. Drain on paper towels. We like to serve them with chutney.

This weather has been intense. Our Sumac Deforestation project is on hold because I’m worried we’d all suffer from heat stroke. I’ve been fantasizing about moving somewhere near the arctic circle. That sounds nice and cool. Also rereading this post and this one from last summer. What are you doing to stay cool?

Category Archives: 50 Recipes

Pie for Breakfast

A Squash of One’s Own

Be Brave Brownies

Focaccia – A Love Story

Turn Up the Heat

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