On Friday, Nov. 17, a state Department of Safety security officer was fatally shot at New Hampshire Hospital, a state-run psychiatric facility in Concord, the AP reported. Bradley Haas, who was previously the chief of police in Franklin, was working at the front lobby entrance when a man identified by law enforcement as John Madore entered the hospital and fired a handgun; Madore was then shot and killed by a state trooper assigned to the hospital, the Union Leader reported. Investigators found a U-Haul truck in the hospital’s parking lot containing an AR-style rifle, a tactical vest and several ammunition magazines, which they are investigating for possible connections to Madore, the AP reported. The shooting was confined to the hospital’s front lobby, and no other injuries were reported, according to the article. The hospital continued operations but was closed to visitors immediately after the incident, according to the report. There were 152 patient beds occupied on Nov. 17, according to a press release from the New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services.
Early childhood ed
The Community College System of New Hampshire (CCSNH) is now providing comprehensive tuition assistance for individuals pursuing careers in early childhood education, potentially allowing students to earn credentials with little to no personal expense. According to a press release, this initiative is due to collaborations with the State of New Hampshire, the University of New Hampshire’s College of Professional Studies and the NH Department of Health and Human Services’ Division of Children Youth and Families. Scholarships available include Early Childhood Tuition Assistance and Granite Steps for Quality Tuition Assistance, along with the newly introduced CCSNH ECE Scholarships. These are designed to fill gaps left by other aid programs and make early childhood education programs more accessible to residents.
Better internet
New Hampshire is seeking public input on improving internet connectivity, especially in areas currently lacking service, NHPR reported. The state has received nearly $200 million in federal grants aimed at providing high-speed internet connections to about 25,000 residents who are part of the 8 percent of the state’s population without internet or a device to access it. The Department of Business and Economic Affairs is calling for suggestions from residents and community leaders on the best uses for these funds to enhance broadband access. Public comments are open until Dec. 13 and must be submitted in writing via email to broadband@livefree.nh.gov. For additional details, the public can visit the website at nheconomy.com.
Bank layoffs
The Bank of New Hampshire has announced the layoff of 19 staff members and has ceased accepting new mortgage applications, NHPR reported on Nov. 15. This decision, as stated by the bank’s president and CEO Christopher Logan, is a result of unstable markets and diminished returns on loans, the article said. According to the article, existing customers will not experience changes to their loans or services, and the bank will continue to service existing loans and those currently in process.
Fewer students
New Hampshire has experienced a consistent decline in student enrollment over the past two decades, with the New Hampshire Department of Education reporting a 1.4 percent decrease in public and public charter school students for the 2023-2024 academic year. According to a press release, this year’s enrollment stands at 165,095, down from 167,357 the previous year and significantly lower than the 207,684 students in 2002, reflecting a 20.5 percent decline over 21 years. Specific districts such as New Castle and Stewartstown have seen the most considerable declines, while others like Marlow and Landaff have experienced increases. Even the state’s largest districts, including Manchester, Nashua, Bedford, Londonderry and Concord, have not been immune to this trend, with all reporting fewer students compared to last year. This decline is mirrored in the state’s higher education institutions, with a 13 percent drop in enrollment at the University System of New Hampshire since 2019.
Behavioral health
The New Hampshire Insurance Department (NHID) has released a bulletin, Docket Number INS 23-038-AB, to improve access to Behavioral Health Integration (BHI) services and address the reimbursement challenges faced by behavioral health practitioners. According to a press release, the bulletin provides guidelines for health insurers on the use of billing codes for BHI services, aiming to clarify billing protocols and the roles of Behavioral Health Care Managers, as well as the eligibility of clinical practitioners. The NHID recommends that insurers follow guidance from the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services and the American Medical Association to align with industry standards.
The Bedford Facilities Information and Communications Committee has announced the advancement of the South River Road Police and Fire Complex, with the town planning a new station and substation due to increased service demands since 1994. According to a press release, the project, located at 300 S. River Road, is estimated to cost $34 million, with an extra $2.5 million for existing facility renovations, funded by a proposed 20-year bond. This bond, expected to impact taxes by $0.531 per $1,000 property valuation, will be discussed in a public hearing on Jan. 24, 2024, followed by a March 12, 2024, vote. Public sessions and tours are planned to inform residents about the project.
Gov. Chris Sununu joined New Balance leadership on Monday, Nov. 20, for the groundbreaking of the company’s new manufacturing facility at 12 Innovation Way in Londonderry, which had been previously delayed. According to a press release, the event marked the start of a $70 million investment by New Balance into the 102,000-square-foot facility, with an expected addition of more than 150 jobs. The facility is scheduled to begin production in 2025.
C&J Bus Lines has announced the resumption of its bus services from Dover Bus Terminal to Boston’s Logan Airport and New York City, starting Feb. 4, 2024. According to a press release, the service will provide 26 daily roundtrip schedules between Dover and Logan Airport, along with a daily service to New York City. The Dover terminal, which operates 24 hours a day, offers free parking facilities. C&J has also introduced a reservation system for these routes. Visit ridecj.com.
The best thing about playing in a Cars tribute act is it never gets boring. The Boston band broke out in the late 1970s with a string of hits that ran the gamut from edgy jangle pop to swirling, ethereal rock, and no song exactly resembled another.
“The Cars had such a diverse palette of musical tastes, you listen to some of their music and sometimes wonder if it’s the same band,” Ken Marchione said recently. Panorama, the band he co-founded, will bring its pristine Cars reproduction to Tupelo Music Hall on Nov. 18, a co-bill with B-52s sound-alike Bikini Whale. “Their music will live on, and even after all these years they still sound fresh.”
That said, anyone looking to tackle The Cars’ catalog, from their eponymous debut to 1984’s Heartbeat City (the last-gasp Door to Door three years later doesn’t really count), should be more than a fan. The variety and complexity of songs like “My Best Friend’s Girl” and “Hello Again” can challenge the most talented musician.
The five members of Panorama are up to the task. In fact, their stage act often improves on, or at least cleans up, the original group, as it employs prerecorded multitracking and layered vocals to emulate The Cars’ album sound.
“We want to make it note for note as perfect as we can,” Marchione said. “Because in a lot of ways they really were a studio band.”
Marchione and keyboard player Darren Muise, who are also in the J. Geils Band tribute act Whammer Jammer, came up with the idea for Panorama in 2019. The two were already Cars fans. Muise went to Berklee College of Music, where he latched onto Cars keys man Greg Hawkes, particularly liking his synthesizer work. Marchione picked up the guitar at age 6 and was smitten since “Just What I Needed” hit on WBCN and WRKO.
He marvels at guitarist Elliot Easton. “His solos … are songs within songs that can be hummed; the average listener gravitates to that,” he said. “That’s why I think he’s been so successful as a soloist and a writer because he makes these intricate arrangements for the guitar that everybody can latch on to.”
The first piece in putting the band together was singer-guitarist Darin Ames, who answered Marchione and Muise’s Craigslist ad. Drummer Gary Agresti came next, bringing additional skills as a sound man — he runs the mix at BankNH Pavilion in Gilford during the shed season. Bass player Jeff Ares came in last, replacing one who’d only played one gig.
Ares was a find. “It was fate — he knew about 25 songs when he walked through the door,” Marchione recalled, adding they did a full rehearsal with him the same day. “He just stepped in, he knows every song, he’s a great bass player, he looks the part and he loves The Cars. It was just an absolute perfect fit, and that completed the band.”
The doppelganger band opens its show with a brief Cars history video and uses career-spanning visual imagery throughout the set. They perform a couple of times a month and recently completed a well-received jaunt to Wisconsin. They’ve even received acknowledgement from the objects of their tribute. At a recent benefit concert, Ares and Ames sat in with Eliot Easton for a pair of songs.
At the show, Marchione had a chance to speak with his musical hero Easton.
“I got to ask him a bunch of questions about a lot of the solos that I’ve been playing for years now,” Marchione recalled. “He was fantastic, and a super nice guy. He knew that we had a tribute to The Cars, and he wasn’t in any way upset; he was flattered. That was a bucket list item for me.”
Panorama (The Cars tribute) w/ Bikini Whale (B-52s tribute) When: Saturday, Nov. 18, 8 p.m. Where: Tupelo Music Hall, 10 A St., Derry Tickets: $30 at tupelohall.com
Captain Marvel, Ms. Marvel and Monica Rambeau team up, much to Ms. Marvel’s teenage-fangirl glee, in The Marvels, a mostly fun adventure movie in spite of some Marvel Cinematic Universe “did you do your homework?”-ing.
I came to this movie slightly more prepared than usual with these Marvel movies that have TV series tie-ins, having seen — and absolutely loved — the Ms. Marvel series all about high schooler Kamala Khan (Iman Vellani), a comics-making, Avengers-loving Pakistani-American girl from Jersey City. I did not see the Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson)-centric Secret Invasion or WandaVision, where I gather we meet the grown-up Monica Rambeau (Teyonah Parris). But it’s fine; the movie recaps enough about who everybody is and their relationships to each other — like, for example, that Monica still thinks of Captain Marvel (Brie Larson) as Aunt Carol Danvers, best friend of her mother, the late Maria Rambeau (Lashana Lynch), who died during the five years Monica was Blipped away.
Monica has superpowers now and works for Nick Fury at the S.H.I.E.L.D.-in-space-like S.A.B.E.R. Carol/Captain Marvel is still traveling the universe looking to help people, basically alone except for her cat, Goose, who is a tentacle-mouthed Flerken. Kamala is still in Jersey, still in high school, still making comics when she should be doing homework — as her loving and rightfully suspicious mother Muneeba (Zenobia Shroff) reminds her.
Muneeba, Kamala’s dad Yusuf (Mohan Kapur) and Kamala’s older brother Aamir (Saagar Shaikh) are deeply confused when, after a crashing noise upstairs, Captain Marvel comes down from Kamala’s room. At the same time Kamala finds herself floating in space, where Fury, watching from a space station, had expected to see Monica, who is suddenly on the strange planet where we had just seen Carol. It seems that some kind of space-time-portal-thingies have entangled Carol, Kamala and Monica and whenever they use their powers, they change places. This phenomenon has something to do with the bangle (one identical to the one Kamala wears) that Dar-Benn (Zawe Ashton), our antagonist, has dug up and put on. Dar-Benn, a Kree warrior/leader person, is trying to use the power she gains from the bangle to transport, via wormhole, resources from other planets to her people’s dying homeworld, Hala. From a Skrull planet, she steals the atmosphere. From another planet, she attempts to steal the water. From Earth’s solar system, she intends to steal the sun.
(OK, so — Skrull, Kree, Flerken, Blip? Translation: The first two are warring aliens who appeared in Captain Marvel and other MCU properties, a Flerken is a cat that’s really an alien and the Blip was the whole Thanos thing. And, Thanos? Look, I don’t feel like this is anybody’s MCU entry point but if it is maybe just take notes for post-film Wikipedia-ing. It took catching a bit of Captain Marvel for me to remember “oh, yeah, Hala is a thing we know.” Meanwhile, we are introduced to a brand new planet, Aladna, and an alien people who communicate largely through song and I feel like, if we want to pile on the lore, why not go with new, delightfully weird lore like that?)
Monica and Carol haven’t reconnected since Monica was a child and of course everybody seems a little uneasy about bringing teenage Kamala to intergalactic battles. But the three women eventually realize that their tangled powers mean they need to work together.
The movie has some fun with the powers-tangling concept. The scene that sort of introduces the three superheroines to each other features a prolonged fight with the three swapping places throughout, occasionally pulling bad guys with them, which is how the Khan family ends up fighting Kree and how Goose ends up at the family home, at one point eating some Khan family knick-knacks. It’s choreographed for maximum fun, with the three characters figuring out the rules and what their powers are and who they’re fighting. Later we get a training montage of the three learning how to use the position swaps so they can mount a fight against Dar-Benn.
I also appreciate that the movie pulls the Khans into the adventure, as Kamala’s family was so central to her story. Plus Shroff’s Muneeba is great and I found myself wishing that the movie had given her some superhero-ing of her own. Muneeba’s “you’re not allowed to go on a space adventure” protectiveness also helps to root Kamala’s character in her teenagerness.
The chemistry between the three women is nice too. We don’t get some antagonism-for-the-sake-of-antagonism shoved into the relationships. Instead, we get Carol and Monica reckoning with their past and all three of them learning to work together and value each other’s contributions. It’s a small thing but it keeps the movie relatively light and fun.
The Marvels mostly keeps its head above the Kree/Skrull-ness MCU soup but it does feel like a struggle. The whole business of Dar-Benn’s planet and Captain Marvel’s past feels like it gets in the way of really setting this movie free to be the buddy-adventure it wants to be. B
Rated PG-13 for action/violence and brief language, according to the MPA on filmratings.com. Directed by Nia DaCosta with a screenplay by Nia DaCosta and Megan McDonnell and Elissa Karasik, The Marvels is an hour and 45 minutes long and distributed by Walt Disney Studios in theaters.
815 Cocktails and Provisions in Manchester has reopened
815 Cocktails and Provisions in Manchester reopened its doors this September after closing to undergo renovations, now having officially retired its speakeasy style for a modern approach with a more functional open space and the same classic cocktails.
After a combined 30-plus years of bartending experience, Sarah Maillet and Ryan McCabe originally opened 815 back in 2015.
“We wanted it to be more of a relaxing place where people could come, enjoy and have classic cocktails,” Maillet said. “It has always been in our mind an ode to where bartending began and where it is today.”
The duo spent months researching the market and classic cocktails while trying all kinds of spirits they had never heard of, to create their own cocktail menu that now consists of drinks like Starr Gazer, with Bacardi rum, raspberry liqueur, lychee, lime, demerara and grapefruit bitters, and 815 Old Fashioned with Nebco bourbon, demerara, bitters, orange peel and luxardo cherry. Provisions include flatbreads, such as tomato burrata and pimento pork, salads, tacos, like mushroom carnitas and Brooklyn bodega, a charcuterie and cheese board and more.
“We decided to go back to the old speakeasy theme,” Maillet said. “The entrance was a little bit secretive, there was a phone booth in the hall and there were sliding fake brick walls so it didn’t look like there was an actual restaurant or bar behind it.” Patrons would enter the phone booth, press the button and be asked for that week’s password, which would be posted on 815’s social media pages. After about four years, the password system proved to be a hassle.
“There were always techy kinds of issues,” Maillet said. “I started to feel like, as far as locals go, it wasn’t appealing for them to wander into their local restaurant or bar if they had to jump through hoops to look up a password every week.”
They decided to do away with the password on weekdays, saving it exclusively for weekends. This worked for a while, the speakeasy aspect making 815 a weekend destination theme, but with the arrival of Covid things were complicated further.
“I told Ryan, if there’s ever a time when we can change something and not have to explain it to anybody, now’s the time,” Maillet said. “So at that point we decided to get rid of the password speakeasy aspect of 815, and not just [for] the fact that we were changing and evolving, but it would have been an absolute nightmare … if we had to go into the phone booth … and clean and sanitize it.”
When they first established 815, the pair made do with the layout of the bar and worked with what they had. After occupying the space for several years, they had a better idea of what would ideally work best for them. With the bar needing new subfloors, they decided to take this as an opportunity to renovate, revamp and rebrand 815 entirely, building a bigger kitchen and more comfortable bar, adorning the walls with pictures and murals, removing bulky furniture and doing away altogether with the speakeasy aspect.
Despite the changes, 815 is still the same at its core, continuing to serve cocktails that are both classic and creative.
“I’ve never really let go of that creativity,” Maillet said. “I have an idea of what I like the cocktail menu to look like and keeping it balanced … and I like to think that I have a decent amount of experience under my belt to make a balanced menu and things that people enjoy, that are fun, unique, … approachable, … adventurous, whatever the case may be.”
815 Cocktails and Provisions Where: 815 Elm St., Manchester When: Tuesday through Thursday, 5 to 11 p.m., Friday and Saturday, 5 p.m. to midnight.
Featured photo: Photos courtesy of 815 Cocktails & Provisions.
New League of NH Craftsmen members bring ornate paper ornaments to Nashua gallery
The League of New Hampshire Craftsmen has been fostering the art of craft making for nearly a century, bringing crafts to the community through its seven galleries and craft fairs. The Nashua Fine Craft Gallery has added the work of several new crafters, including glassblower Emery Wenger, fiber artist Elaine Farmer, and Ann Desmarais and Martha Whitney, a duo who specialize in paper ornaments.
“We’ve worked with a lot of materials in the past, but right now the work we’re doing for the league are paper ornaments that are either folded or woven and bent into position … using beautiful papers that we’re sourcing from around the world,” Whitney said.
The two met in art class in high school and have been friends since, exploring various art forms over the years. With a shared familiarity with paper — Desmarais a retired graphic designer — it eventually became their preferred medium.
“The real appeal for us is we get to work with beautiful papers and create beautiful things,” Whitney said. “We get to visit each other a couple of days a week.”
The three classic ornament shapes that they create are triskele, an orb shape made from three strips of intertwined paper; pleated ornaments configured into a diamond-like shape; and the traditional German bell. Without many unique options available domestically, they often use paper imported from other countries.
“Some of the Florentine papers that we use on the pleated ornaments are very ornate, they’re often five, six, seven colors,” Desmarais said. “They often have metallics in them and the patterns have been around since the Renaissance period.”
“Of all the beautiful handmade papers that we can find around the world … some are too soft to hold a crease or [they] absorb the glue too quickly or they have other characteristics that make them unusable for the type of work we’re doing,” Whitney adds. “[With] these Italian papers, there’s quite a bit of variety available and we’re able to find the papers we need for each of the three ornaments. They require different papers because of the structure of them.”
While Whitney was living out of state, Whitney and Desmarais got together during holiday breaks and school vacations. She eventually moved back to Amherst and the two were able to work on their ornaments more regularly, eventually getting involved with craft fairs, where their ornaments were well-received. Once the pair felt they had perfected their craft, they went ahead with the jurying process and became members of the league this past summer.
“Eventually you just have so many beautiful ornaments, you need an outlet for them,” Whitney said.
League of NH Craftsmen Nashua Where: 98 Main St., Nashua November hours: Sunday, 11 a.m. to 4 p.m.; Tuesday and Wednesday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Thursday, 10 a.m. to 6 p.m.; Friday and Saturday, 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Closed Mondays.
Ooh, that recipe looks good; I wonder what’s in it.
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OK, this looks like the right recipe.
Uh, huh. Yes, I’m sure your Uncle Oswald was very fond of this recipe. I might like to make it myself.
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Yes, that’s a very nice photo of the finished dish—
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and of your Uncle Oswald.
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No, I don’t want to buy all the ingredients for the recipe. You haven’t even told me what they are yet.
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Yes, I’m glad your family likes it, too. Especially your picky 8-year-old.
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Yes, I’m sure he’s very precious to you, and I’m glad he’s gotten over his night terrors.
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OH, COME ON!!!
This has happened to all of us. We want a recipe and end up having to wade through a lot of non-recipe exposition to get to it. It’s very frustrating.
Because it’s a couple of weeks before the holidays (possibly the most recipe-intensive time of year) here are 54 recipes — for breads, desserts, main dishes, feed-a-crowd food, tastiness for when you in this season just need tastiness — with virtually no (additional) exposition.
1) Sesame Crunch Ice Cream
1½ cups (190 grams) tahini paste. I like Krinos brand.
1 scant cup (180 grams) white sugar
3 cups (660 grams) half-and-half, or non-dairy cream
large pinch coarse sea salt
1 Tablespoon dark sesame oil
Blend all ingredients in your blender.
Chill the mixture for several hours or overnight.
Churn according to your ice cream machine’s manufacturer’s instructions.
This is excellent and very sesame-y, but even better when you mix in:
2) Sesame Brittle
¾ cup (160 grams) white sugar
¼ cup (85 grams) rose jam
pinch of coarse sea salt
½ teaspoon ground sumac
1 Tablespoon water
1 ¾ cups (125 grams) sesame seeds
1 Tablespoon coconut oil
¼ teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon rose water
Cook the sugar, jam, salt, sumac, water and sesame seeds over medium heat, stirring often. Everything should melt together. Cook until it reaches 305ºF.
Quickly stir in the remaining ingredients — the oil, baking soda and rose water.
Pour onto an oiled silicone baking mat or parchment paper. Smooth out so it’s very thin.
Let cool, then break into small pieces.
This is a delicious, nutty and floral hard candy that will last about one week in an airtight container. If you have one of those little “Do Not Eat” dehydration envelopes, put it in the container with the sesame brittle. It will help keep it from getting too sticky. Even better, break it into smaller pieces and mix it in with your sesame ice cream before hardening it in your freezer.
3) Totally Delicious, Yes-I’m-Serious, Cilantro Ice Cream for the Brave of Heart
½ loaf (99 grams) marzipan, cubed. (Marzipan is a sweetened almond paste. You can find it in the baking section of your supermarket, or online.)
Blend all the ingredients except the marzipan.
Chill for several hours or overnight.
Churn according to your ice cream machine’s manufacturer’s instructions.
During the final minute of churning, add the cubes of marzipan.
If you are not yet a fan of marzipan, you will be after trying this. It is especially good with a slice of banana bread.
7) Apple Bundt Cake
3 Granny Smith apples, peeled and diced (about 440 grams)
3 cups (360 grams) all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg. If you’ve never grated your own nutmeg, try it. You’ll never go back to pre-ground again.
½ teaspoon salt
1½ cups (360 grams) sour cream
1½ cups (275 grams) white sugar
½ cup (64 grams) brown sugar
3 eggs
Heat your oven to 325ºF.
Butter and flour your Bundt pan.
Whisk together the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt.
In another bowl, mix the sugars and sour cream. Mix in eggs, one at a time.
Mix in the diced apples by hand.
Pour mixture into your pre-gunked Bundt pan. Lift the pan and bonk it on your counter 10 times.
Bake for 70 minutes or until it reaches an internal temperature of 200º F.
Remove from the oven. Let it cool for 20 minutes, then remove from the pan.
This is an outstanding Bundt cake. The apples are tart and still a tiny bit crunchy. The cake itself is rich but not too sweet. The nutmeg and cinnamon shine through. This is especially good with Custard Sauce.
8) Custard Sauce
1½ cups (340 grams) half-and-half
1/3 cup (56 grams) white sugar
7 egg yolks
2 teaspoons vanilla
Combine the cream and sugar, then heat over medium heat until just before boiling (175ºF/80ºC), then temper in the egg yolks.
Or — Heat the cream, sugar and egg yolks to 175ºF, whisking constantly.
Strain, to make sure there aren’t any bits of cooked egg, then add the vanilla and chill.
This is delicious on anything British, or on Apple Bundt Cake.
9) Orange Crinkle Cookies (18 vegan cookies)
Orange Crinkle Cookies. Photo by John Fladd.
These are excellent, and especially good if you are baking for a classroom, Girl Scout troop, etc., and don’t know who is dairy-intolerant or allergic to eggs.
1 Tablespoon flax meal or egg replacer, mixed with 3 Tablespoons water
1 box orange cake mix
½ teaspoon orange extract
½ cup orange soda
½ cup (70 grams) chopped, candied orange slices. Trader Joe’s has excellent ones.
powdered sugar
Preheat the oven to 350ºF.
Prepare the egg substitute.
Mix all ingredients together.
Chill in the freezer for 30 minutes.
Roll 1-Tablespoon balls of dough in powdered sugar, and place six to a baking sheet with a silicone mat or parchment paper.
Bake for 18 to 20 minutes.
Cool briefly, then transfer to a cooling rack.
Delicious. Orangey. Crinkly.
10) Cheese Crumb Pudding from an Obscure Antique Cookbook
2 cups (110 grams) bread crumbs (I feel like you could blitz Triscuits in the food processor in lieu of fresh bread crumbs)
2 cups (250 grams) shredded, smoked cheddar – I went with an Australian brand called Old Croc, and I was not disappointed
½ teaspoon dry mustard
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
3 Tablespoon jarred salsa (this is playing pinch hitter for pimientos)
2 eggs
1 cup (225 grams) whole milk
¼ teaspoon paprika
Heat oven to 375º.
Generously butter a 9×9” baking dish.
Mix the mustard, pepper and paprika together in a small dish.
Spread 1/3 of your crumbs over the bottom of the baking dish. Look at them critically. Do they look cold and lonely?
Cover them with a blanket of cheddar — half the cheddar. Sprinkle half the seasoning on top of the blanket. You know, like a blessing.
Repeat with another layer of crumbs, the rest of the cheddar and the rest of the seasoning. Top with a final layer of crumbs.
Mix the milk, eggs and salsa; gently pour over the top of the guys you already have in the baking dish.
Bake for 30 minutes.
Allow to cool for 10 minutes before serving.
Imagine very good macaroni and cheese, intensified, and with the macaroni mysteriously absent. This is extremely decadent, one of the few dishes that will satisfy everyone, including picky children and fathers-in-law.
11) Crumpets – Sort of Like a Cross Between English Muffins and Buttered Toast
1 cup + 1 Tablespoon (235 grams) warm water
1½ teaspoons (6 grams) white sugar
1 Tablespoon (4 grams) yeast
1½ cups (180 grams) all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon (4 grams) coarse sea salt
1 teaspoon (4 grams) baking powder
lots of butter
Combine the water, sugar and yeast. Let sit for 5 to 10 minutes to give the yeast a head start.
Combine flour, salt and baking powder in a medium-sized bowl, preferably a metal one.
Add the wet ingredients to the dry ones and whisk thoroughly to combine.
Leave the batter to rise in a warm-water bath for 45 minutes.
Heat a frying pan or skillet to about 375º — about as hot as you would for pancakes.
Butter the inside of a pastry ring or a small can with the top and bottom removed. Place it on the hot skillet.
Add a dollop of butter, then three large spoonfuls of batter into the ring/can.
Using pancake-making skills, fry the proto-crumpet in the browning butter, until it is ready to flip over. I usually wait until there are a few non-popping bubbles on the surface.
Remove the ring/can — if you buttered it liberally enough, it should slide right off.
Flip your crumpet and cook in more butter, until it is golden brown on the other side.
Remove to a plate and cover with a tea towel, then rebutter your ring/can and make another. Once you have gotten good at this, you might cook two or more crumpets at a time, but because this recipe only makes six, you might want to focus on them individually.
These are buttery and salty and chewy. They make excellent Sunday morning treats, or housewarming gifts. Everyone you give them to will insist on putting butter and or jam on them, and they are delicious that way, but also a treat as is.
12) Sourdough Starter – Yes, for Sourdough Bread, But We’ll Worry About That Another Time
Equal amounts, by weight or volume, of flour and yeast
In a large container — I use a 1-quart plastic takeout container — thoroughly mix the flour and water.
Cover it and set it aside for 24 hours.
As you do this, tiny yeast cells from the air in your kitchen and clinging to tiny flour particles will start to wake up and do what they do best: give off gas and multiply.
The mixture won’t look much different than it did the day before.
Pour out half the mixture, then add the same amount of flour and water as the previous day.
Stir thoroughly, then set aside for another day.
Repeat this every day for a week or so. You will start to notice a yeastiness to the mixture. At that point you can use it in sourdough-y recipes, like sourdough biscuits. The longer you keep your starter — feeding it regularly — the more sour and delicious it will get. Once it is thoroughly established, you can reduce the feedings to three per week. If you are going away on vacation, you can store it without feeding for several weeks in the refrigerator.
13) Sourdough Biscuits
1 teaspoon white sugar
¾ cup (130 grams) all-purpose flour
1½ teaspoons (7 grams) baking powder
½ teaspoon coarse sea salt
½ cup (1 stick) butter
1 cup (264 grams) sourdough starter
Freeze the butter in your freezer for at least 1 hour.
Preheat your oven to 425º.
Combine the sugar, flour, salt and baking powder.
Using a box grater, grate the butter into the flour mixture. If it starts getting melty on your hands, roll it around in the flour.
With your hands, toss the butter in the flour mixture until it is thoroughly combined. (This is the technique I’ve been using for my pie crusts lately, and it works very nicely.)
Add the sourdough starter, and mix to combine. You will end up with a very shaggy dough. Turn it out onto a floured countertop.
Pat the dough into a 5×7” rectangle, about the same size as a postcard. Flip it over so that both sides are floury and not too sticky.
Fold the dough in half, then pat it out to postcard-size. Flip it around in the flour as necessary.
Fold, pat and flip the dough a total of eight times. As you do this, you are building up layers in the dough. Each time you do this, it will become a little smoother and biscuit-doughy.
Pat the dough out into a 7×9” rectangle. Using a large knife or a bench scraper, cut the edges off. As you’ve been patting the dough out, you’ve been pinching the edges a little. Cutting the edges off will allow the biscuits to rise, with lots of layers.
Cut the dough to make six biscuits. Use the off-cuts to make spiral-shaped, wonky biscuits. These will not rise as well or look as pretty, but they will also be delicious.
Bake for 15 to 20 minutes. This will vary, depending on how accurate your oven is. Watch very carefully the first time you do this to get your specific time. In my kitchen, it is 17 minutes.
Nobody from the South will believe you, but these might be the best biscuits you ever have.
14) Strawberry Ice Cream
2⅔ cups (450 grams) frozen strawberries, thawed (The freezing makes the berries give up more juice. Plus, the frozen ones are less expensive than fresh.)
½ cup (175 grams) strawberry preserves
1 generous cup (240 grams) heavy cream
1 Tablespoon (18 grams) lemon juice
More strawberry preserves for layering in
Blend all the ingredients in your blender.
Strain — otherwise the ice cream might be a little too seedy.
Churn according to your ice cream machine’s manufacturer’s instructions.
Layer the soft ice cream with more strawberry preserves before freezing.
This is extra strawberry-y and not too sweet. It’s totally worth making once per week, especially in the winter, when you are feeling sun-deprived.
15) Potatoes au Gratin
12-ounce can evaporated milk
2 cloves garlic
2 Tablespoons butter
1½ pounds (700 grams) potatoes – waxy red potatoes would work well for this, but there really are no wrong potatoes for this dish – peeled and sliced thin
2 cups (200 grams) grated cheese – I like the pre-grated, bagged cheese from the supermarket, but again, there really is no wrong cheese for this
salt and pepper
Preheat your oven to 425º.
Warm the evaporated milk and one crushed clove of garlic, and leave it to steep for 30 minutes.
Rub the inside of a casserole dish with the other clove of garlic, then butter it thoroughly with 2 Tablespoons of the butter.
Put down the potatoes and cheese in three layers, salting and peppering each one.
Strain the warm milk mixture over the potatoes. Dot the top with the remaining Tablespoon butter.
Bake for 35 to 40 minutes. The top should be golden brown.
You’ve got your french fries, your Tater Tots, even your mashed potatoes, but this may be the prince of potato dishes.
16) Coffee Ice Cream
2 cups (454 grams) heavy cream
1½ cups (375 grams) half-and-half
½ cup (100 grams) white sugar
pinch of coarse sea salt
¾ cup (50 grams) ground coffee
1 Tablespoon vanilla
Set aside 1¼ cups of heavy cream, and the vanilla.
Combine the rest of the ingredients in a small saucepan, and heat to hot-but-not-boiling (about 150º).
Remove from heat and let it steep, covered, for about an hour.
Strain the coffee mixture into the rest of the cream. Add the vanilla.
Chill for several hours or overnight.
Churn according to your ice cream machine’s manufacturer’s instructions.
This is outstanding coffee ice cream, but be warned that two scoops of it before bed kept me awake until 4 a.m.
17) Corn Chowder
1 stick (8 ounces) butter
1 small or ½ large white or yellow onion, chopped
4 ears sweet corn, cut from the cob; alternatively, one small bag of frozen corn
1 hatch/poblano chili, chopped
½ gallon milk
1 large baking potato, peeled and diced
salt, pepper and smoked paprika to taste
Melt the butter in a large soup pan. (If you are a bacon-eater, half a package of bacon, chopped, fried and rendered, will work well too.)
Add the onion and corn. Sauté until they have some color.
Add the pepper, potatoes and smoked paprika. If you are using bacon, you can skip the paprika at your discretion. You really want a rich, smoky flavor in the background, though. Cook for another five minutes or so.
Add the milk. If you are using fresh sweet corn, chop the cobs in half and use them, too. They will make the chowder extra-corny.
Bring to a simmer, then cook on low heat for 60 minutes.
Season to taste and serve with bread and butter.
This is probably the easiest soup you will ever make from scratch. If you wanted, you could make this entirely from frozen vegetables and still impress picky chowder purists.
18) Scallion Pancakes
½ cup (170 grams) sourdough starter
2 Tablespoons (28 grams) water
¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
2 or 3 scallions, finely chopped
a large handful of fresh herbs, chopped – I like chives and basil; cilantro is always good
1 teaspoon sesame oil
oil for frying
Heat the oil in a frying pan until shimmering.
Combine all the ingredients, reserving half the scallions.
Fry the batter in 3 to 5 batches, sprinkling the reserved scallions on top.
Fry on both sides, drain and serve.
The more quickly you eat these, the crisper they will be.
19) Paneer – Fresh Indian Cheese
1 gallon whole milk
⅓ cup vinegar
Heat the milk in a large soup pot, stirring occasionally to keep it from bonding too firmly to the bottom.
Bring to a boil. Remove from heat immediately.
Stir in the vinegar. Stir for another minute or so, until the milk solids separate from the watery liquid. (This is whey, as in “Little Miss Muffet sat on a tuffet.”)
Line a large colander with a tea towel. Strain the clumpy milk mixture into the towel.
After a minute or so, squeeze some of the moisture out of the towel. Set the towel aside to drain for another hour or so.
You just made cheese. Cut it into cubes, and store it in your refrigerator to make curries with, like a Paneer-Pistachio Curry.
20) Paneer-Pistachio Curry
½ cup (75 grams) cashews
1 bag frozen onions and peppers
8 to 10 cardamom pods, crushed and placed in a tea strainer
2 or 3 serrano chilies, stemmed, seeded and chopped
1½ teaspoons coarse sea salt
1 teaspoon ground cayenne pepper
½ cup (75 grams) salted, roasted, shelled pistachios
8 ounces paneer cubes
1 bunch of cilantro leaves and stems, rinsed and chopped
Boil the cashews, peppers/onions, serranos and cardamom in 2 cups of water for 10 minutes.
Remove the tea strainer, then puree the mixture with an immersion blender or in your regular blender. Return to the pot.
Stir in the pistachios, paneer, salt and cayenne. Warm for five minutes.
Stir in the cilantro and serve with naan.
This is spicy, nutty, hearty curry. If you think you don’t like curries because you don’t like curry powder, this may change your mind. This is a gateway drug to Indian cooking.
21) Granola
2½ cups (225 grams) rolled oats
¼ to ½ cup (75 grams) coarsely chopped nuts
¼ to ½ cup (70 grams) poppy seeds, sesame seeds, or a mixture of both
3 Tablespoons brown sugar
½ teaspoon coarse sea salt
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
¼ teaspoon black pepper
¼ teaspoon cayenne
¼ cup (50 grams) vegetable oil
⅓ cup (112 grams) honey
2 Tablespoons vanilla
Preheat your oven to 305º.
Mix the dry ingredients together in a large bowl.
Add the wet ingredients and mix thoroughly. You might be able to do this with a spatula; you will probably end up using your hands.
Drop the mixture onto a silicone sheet or parchment paper on a large baking sheet.
Bake for 15 minutes.
Remove from oven and stir with a wooden spoon or spatula. Press the mixture down, especially in the corners of the pan.
Return to oven and bake for another 15 minutes.
Remove from oven and let cool before breaking into clumps.
This is a salty, spicy, lightly sweet granola that will make itself remembered.
22) Peppermint Stick Ice Cream
Peppermint Stick Ice Cream. Photo by John Fladd.
3 cups (680 grams) half-and-half
pinch of salt
⅓ cup (65 grams) white sugar
4 crushed candy canes (about 70 grams)
1 Tablespoons cornstarch
Another 4 (70 grams) crushed candy canes
Combine cream, salt, sugar, the first batch of candy canes, and cornstarch in a medium saucepan. Heat until the candy canes have completely melted and the mixture has thickened. It should look like pink hot chocolate.
Chill for several hours or overnight.
Churn according to your ice cream machine’s manufacturer’s instructions.
About five minutes before the mixture is done churning, add the second batch of peppermint candy.
This is an outstandingly pepperminty ice cream and an excellent way to use up late-season leftover candy canes.
23) Peanut Butter and Jelly Bundt Cake
Butter for generously greasing your Bundt pan
⅓ cup (75 grams) finely chopped dry-roasted peanuts
½ cup (114 grams) sour cream
1¼ cup (213 grams) brown sugar
½ cup (135 grams) peanut butter
1¾ cup (210 grams) all-purpose flour
¾ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon fine sea salt
¼ teaspoon baking soda
3 eggs
⅓ cup (76 grams) half-and-half
1 Tablespoon vanilla
¾ cup (255 grams) strawberry jam
11 (60 grams) maraschino cherries, stems removed
Preheat your oven to 350°.
Prepare a Bundt pan — lavishly butter the inside surface with butter, then dust it with crushed peanuts.
Measure or weigh out the sour cream, brown sugar and peanut butter in the bowl of your stand mixer, or the bowl that you’re going to finish the cake batter in. Now leave it alone until you are ready for it.
Combine all your dry ingredients in a separate bowl. If you worry about such things, go ahead and sift them together; otherwise just stir them together with a spoon.
Beat the sour cream, sugar and peanut butter together into a fine goop.
When your goop is as light and fluffy as it is going to get, continue beating, adding the eggs one at a time, followed by a glug of vanilla.
At this point your mixture is pretty soupy. You’ll be happy to know that it’s time to add the dry ingredients, alternating with the half-and-half.
Scrape the sides of your bowl down to make sure that everything has gotten mixed together, then pour a little more than half of your batter into your Bundt pan.
Bonk the Bundt pan firmly on the top of the counter twice. This is to make sure that there are no air pockets. If you want to, you could wait until you’ve added all the ingredients. In this particular recipe it might also drive your jam and cherries downward, to what will be the top of the cake, and make visible jam inclusions. In any other cake this would be a bug. In this cake it would be a feature.
Gently spoon the jam in a ring around the Bundt pan, on top of the batter you just poured in. Place the cherries in a ring on top of the jam.
Pour the rest of the batter into your pan, making sure to cover the jam and cherries. Don’t worry about being particularly neat; the batter will level itself out.
Bake at 350° for about half an hour. If you are worried about whether it is completely baked, stab it with a probe thermometer. If it reads over 200° F, you’re fine. Don’t worry about it being overbaked; that’s what the sour cream is there for. It has your back.
Let the cake cool in the pan for 10 to 20 minutes, then invert it onto a plate. I find that I rise up onto my toes as I make the flip, then come down hard on my heels. I don’t know if that does anything productive, but I like to think that it lets the finished cake know that I mean business.
This is a moist, not too sweet snack cake, ideal for sharing with a special friend over coffee.
24) Roasted Banana Sorbet
3 tired bananas, the type you might find in the sale rack at a supermarket or by the cash register at a convenience store, the type that has seen too much of life – these are the sweet, flavorful ones
⅓ cup (70 grams) brown sugar
1 Tablespoon coconut oil
1⅔ cups (375 grams) non-dairy half-and-half
2 Tablespoons white sugar
1 Tablespoon créme de banana
1½ teaspoons lemon juice
¼ teaspoon coarse sea salt
Preheat your oven to 400º.
Slice your bananas, and mix with brown sugar and coconut oil.
Transfer to an oven-proof pan or dish, and roast for 40 minutes, stirring halfway through.
Remove from the oven and allow to cool.
Combine all ingredients, including the banana mixture, in your blender and blend thoroughly.
Chill for several hours or overnight.
Churn according to your ice cream machine’s manufacturer’s instructions.
Your kitchen will smell amazing while you roast the bananas. If you have a child who complains about not liking bananas, sympathize with them and eat it all yourself.
25) Blackberry Syrup
1 bag frozen blackberries
An equal amount (by weight) of white sugar
1 Tablespoon lemon juice
Combine the sugar and frozen berries in a medium saucepan over medium heat. At this point you will be extremely skeptical: This mixture looks far too dry to ever turn into syrup. Have patience.
Keep stirring the mixture occasionally. As the berries thaw, they are going to give up a surprising amount of liquid. When they froze, ice crystals pierced all the cell walls, and now you get all that juice, with very little work.
Keep stirring, crushing berries wherever possible. Bring to a boil.
Let the syrup boil for five or six seconds to make sure that the sugar has all been dissolved, then remove from the heat.
Pour the hot syrup through a fine-mesh strainer to remove all the seeds. There will be a lot of them.
Stir in the lemon juice.
Let the syrup cool, bottle it and store it in your refrigerator for a month or so.
This is an excellent topping for ice cream or pancakes, but also a surprisingly wonderful ingredient for cocktails.
26) Rich and Decadent Peanut Butter Soufflé
2 large eggs, separated
½ cup + 1 Tablespoon (120 grams) brown sugar
¼ cup minus 1 teaspoon (55 grams) peanut butter
Small glug of vanilla, about 1 teaspoon
pinch of salt
Preheat your oven to 350°.
Separate your eggs. Do this over the bowl of your stand mixer, or the bowl you will be beating the egg whites in. Everyone has their own method for separating eggs. My preference is to break the shell on a flat surface, like a countertop. (This pretty much eliminates small pieces of shell in the bowl that I have to fish out.) I crack the egg open and pour it into my open hand. I keep my fingers just far apart enough that the egg white will eventually release its hold on the yolk and slip through them into the bowl. Remember to wash your hands before and after doing this.
Place the egg yolks in a separate large bowl. Add the brown sugar and peanut butter. Mix well with a spoon. The mixture will be really stiff, so it will be more a matter of mashing than mixing.
Add the salt and vanilla to the egg whites, then whisk them to medium peaks. Have you ever seen a cooking show or competition where a baker beats their egg whites, then holds the bowl over their (or a competitor’s) head to show that they are stiff enough? This is what bakers call stiff peaks. That’s a little stiffer than we want for this recipe. We want them to be the consistency where the TV baker starts giggling and it is just enough to make the egg whites slowly glop onto somebody’s head.
With a silicone spatula, scoop out about a third of your egg whites and mix them into the peanut butter mixture. This is what professionals call loosening up a stiff base. Go ahead and mix everything together. As the mixture becomes more liquidy and stir-able, the doubt you’ve been feeling about your ability to pull this whole soufflé off will ease up by about 15 percent.
This next step is the closest thing to tricky. Use the spatula to scoop out about half the remaining egg whites and put them in the peanut butter bowl. Run the edge of the spatula through the middle of the mess, then sweep it around the edge of the bowl. A tiny bit of the whites will mix together with the base. This is called folding in the egg whites. Even though you can’t see it easily with the naked eye, beaten egg whites are made up of a gazillion tiny bubbles, held together by the sticky proteins in the egg white itself. Remember when your hands felt sticky and gross after separating the eggs? That stickiness is what’s holding those tiny bubbles together. Those bubbles are what’s going to lighten your soufflé and give it lift. By folding the egg whites into the mixture, instead of just stirring it, you are preserving as many of the bubbles as possible. Keep folding until the whites are mostly incorporated with the base.
At this point, your peanut butter mixture should be looking a lot lighter. Your soufflé stress will also lighten up, probably another 15 percent. Fold the rest of the egg whites into the mixture.
Gently spoon the mixture into two large ramekins and put them into your preheated oven.
Bake for approximately 30 minutes. Your oven and mine are probably different by a few degrees, so you might have to make this recipe a couple of times before you perfect the timing. The good news is that even sub-optimal soufflés are awfully good.
Pull the puffed-up soufflés from the oven and serve immediately. The now-baked bubble matrix is proud and puffy, but it will collapse within the next 10 minutes. Serve with something fruity, like Rhubarb Compote.
27) Rhubarb Compote and Rhubarb Syrup
This recipe is very much like the one for Blackberry Syrup, but at the end of the process you get syrup and compote.
rhubarb – cleaned and chopped
the same amount of white sugar, by weight
juice of half a lemon
Freeze the chopped rhubarb for several hours or overnight. This will allow ice crystals to pierce all the cell walls.
Heat the frozen rhubarb and sugar in a saucepan. As it thaws, the rhubarb will give off quite a bit of liquid. If you want to help the process along, you can crush the rhubarb with a potato masher.
Bring the mixture to a boil to ensure that the sugar has dissolved completely.
Remove from heat. Stir in the lemon juice.
Strain the mixture with a fine-meshed strainer.
The liquid is your rhubarb syrup, which makes a delightful Rhubarb Margarita, and the solids are a very nice compote that is delicious on toast or with a Peanut Butter Soufflé. Both will last for two or three weeks in your refrigerator.
28) Rhubarb Margarita
2 ounces blanco tequila – I like Hornitos
1 ounce rhubarb syrup
¾ ounce fresh squeezed lime juice
Combine all three ingredients with ice in a cocktail shaker.
Shake until the shaker becomes painful to hold.
Strain into a cocktail glass, and drink while listening to flamenco music.
29) Carrot Pie
purée of two large carrots – about 1½ cups, or 300 grams
½ teaspoon ground ginger
¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon kosher salt
½ cup (99 grams) sugar
2 whole eggs
½ cups (1 can) evaporated milk
zest of 1 large orange
1 pie crust
Preheat the oven to 450º F.
Whisk all ingredients together in a medium-sized bowl.
Pour into the pie crust. Much as with a pumpkin pie, the crust does not need to be blind-baked.
Bake at 450º for 15 minutes, then lower the temperature to 325º and bake for a further 50 to 55 minutes or until the blade of a knife comes out more or less clean.
30) Sweet Lemon Buns
1 cup (227 grams) whole milk
1½ Tablespoons butter
¼ cup (50 grams) white sugar
1 Tablespoon yeast
zest of 2 lemons (about 7 grams)
juice of ½ lemon (40 grams)
½ cup (85 grams) golden raisins
1 egg
3 cups (360 grams) all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
In a small saucepan, heat the milk, butter and sugar, until the sugar is completely dissolved. Remove from heat.
Stir in the yeast, then leave the mixture to proof for 10 to 15 minutes.
In a large bowl, combine the yeast mixture, lemon rind, lemon juice, raisins and egg. This will make a gloppy mess.
Add the flour and salt. Knead with the bread hook on your stand mixer, or by hand for five to 10 minutes.
Pull the still-sticky dough into a tight ball, then place in an oiled bowl to rise.
Let the dough rise for one to two hours, until it has doubled in size.
Preheat your oven to 350º.
With a large knife or bench scraper, divide the dough into 12 portions.
Form the portions into proto-buns and leave to rise a second time on parchment paper or a silicone baking sheet, about 20 minutes.
Bake for 20 minutes.
Eat, warm from the oven, with too much butter, or with Egg Foo Yung Salad.
31) Egg Foo Yung Salad
I am passionately fond of eggs, but not hard-boiled ones, or, as I like to call them, “sulfur-flavored Jell-O.” This is an excellent work-around egg salad.
1 order takeout egg foo yung, minus the sauce
mayonnaise
pickled red onion
pickled jalapeños
canned water chestnuts
roasted, salted pecans
a tiny amount of sesame oil
salt and pepper
Chop the egg, onion, jalapeños and water chestnuts. Place in a medium-sized bowl.
Add the mayo, sesame oil and pecans to taste.
Season to taste.
There are no specific amounts of any ingredient in this recipe, because egg salad, like tuna or potato salad, is entirely dependent on individual preferences. About once per month I stop for takeout egg foo yung just to make this.
32) Boston Brown Bread
Boston Brown Bread. Photo by John Fladd.
generous ½ cup (60 grams) whole wheat flour
generous ½ cup (67 grams) rye flour
generous ½ cup (75 grams) fine corn flour or masa harina
½ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon ground allspice
½ cup (85 grams) golden raisins or dried blueberries
1 cup (227 grams) buttermilk
1 teaspoon vanilla
½ cup (170 grams) molasses
Heat your oven to 325º.
Generously butter a loaf pan or large coffee can.
Combine all dry ingredients in one bowl, and the wet ingredients in another.
Combine the contents of the two bowls.
Pour the batter into the loaf pan or coffee can. Cover the top with foil and tie it with twine.
Put the pan or can in a large roasting pan or Dutch oven, and fill 1/3 of the way up with boiling water.
Cover the roasting pan or Dutch oven, and bake for two hours and 15 minutes. Check in on the water level from time to time, and refill as necessary. The bread will be ready when a toothpick comes out clean.
Cool for 10 minutes before serving with a truly inordinate amount of butter.
Use any leftovers the next day for Brown Bread French Toast.
33) Boston Brown Bread French Toast
Make French toast from your leftover Boston Brown Bread.
34) Flame-Grilled Vegetables
Flame-Grilled Vegetables. Photo by John Fladd.
2 red potatoes, peeled and diced
1 large onion, diced
1 yellow or red bell pepper, diced
1 can artichoke bottoms, diced – artichoke hearts are fine, but if you can find the bottoms, they will be a revelation; they taste the same, but with a meaty texture
1 can jumbo black olives, strained
1 package haloumi cheese, diced
½ bottle balsamic vinaigrette salad dressing
salt and pepper
Several hours before you want to eat, boil the potatoes until they are just al dente — maybe five minutes from being perfectly cooked.
Add the potatoes and all the other ingredients to a gallon-sized zip-lock bag. Squeeze as much air out as possible. Leave the bag on the kitchen counter to let the vegetables marinate for two to three hours.
Half an hour before dinner, start the charcoal in your grill.
When you have a good set of coals, march outside with a determined expression, a grill pan, a pair of tongs and a cold beer.
Place the grill pan — it looks like a metal basket with a lot of holes in it — over the coals, then pour the contents of the bag into it.
There will be a huge hiss, but don’t worry, the coals have not gone out.
Grill the vegetables until the onions and haloumi have some good color. Move them around with the tongs from time to time. You will probably have to change position from time to time to escape the worst of the smoke. This is the price you pay for delicious grilled vegetables.
Sneak a piece of potato or pepper occasionally. You will know when everything has cooked.
Finish your beer, then make way too big a production of bringing the hot grill pan back into the kitchen for service.
35) Homemade Hummus
2 15.5-ounce cans of chickpeas, sometimes labeled as garbanzo beans
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 clove fresh garlic
½ cup (117 grams) tahini paste, sort of like a peanut butter made from sesame seeds
1 lemon, squeezed
olive oil and paprika to garnish (optional)
Using a colander, drain and rinse the chickpeas to wash away any metallic taste from the cans.
In a blender or food processor, combine the chickpeas, salt, garlic and a generous cup of water. Blend or process on low speed for two minutes or so. The mixture will be a tan color and look a little grainy.
Add the tahini and lemon juice, then blend or process again for three to four minutes.
Pour into a serving dish. Garnish with a splash of olive oil and a sprinkling of paprika, then surround the bowl with olives, pickled turnips and torn or sliced pieces of flatbread.
36) Homemade Chocolates
You’ve probably watched a cooking competition and been scared off from ever trying to mold your own chocolates because the judges kept going on about properly “tempering” your chocolate and made it seem like glass-blowing or something.
Buy some silicone chocolate molds, or soap molds, or even ice cube trays from a craft store, or online.
Ingredients:
chocolate
That’s it. You can, of course add pretzel pieces or crushed peppermint, or white chocolate chips, but all you really need is chocolate. Dark chocolate chips do very nicely.
Fill a small, microwave-safe bowl with chunks of chocolate. Microwave for 20 to 30 seconds.
Stir. At this point the chunks are probably just a little melted around the edges.
Microwave for 15 more seconds. Stir. More melty…
Let’s go 10 more seconds, then really stir. The warm chocolate will melt the rest of the pieces.
When you have a bowlful of melted chocolate, pour it into the molds. Make sure that you jab at it with your spoon or craft stick a little to get into any crevices.
Cool for an hour or so in your refrigerator, then de-mold.
Bask in the admiration of friends and co-workers.
And as long as you’re melting chocolate, you might as well make some Chocolate-Covered Cherries.
37) Chocolate-Covered Cherries
melted chocolate (see above)
maraschino cherries, stems removed.
One at a time, drop cherries into the melted chocolate, and roll them around with a fork until they are completely covered.
Transfer to wax paper or parchment paper to set.
Eat them, or use them to woo an attractive, dark-eyed stranger.
38) World’s Greatest Breakfast Sandwich
1 slice of ordinary sandwich bread (seriously, don’t try to get fancy with this), toasted
peanut butter
pickled jalapeños
1 egg, scrambled (I cook mine in the microwave oven for 67 seconds)
salt and pepper to taste
OK, go ahead. Be skeptical, but once you’ve tried this you will make it again: Toast, peanut butter, jalapeños, scrambled egg, salt and pepper.
39) Taco Variations – Which Absolutely Should Be the Title of a Piece of Classical Music
So, the key to an extended family get-together, like on Christmas Eve, or Eid al Fitr, is feeding everyone generously, and keeping grumbling to a minimum. One of the best ways to do that is with tacos. Everyone likes some sort of tacos, so set up a taco bar in the kitchen with crispy shells, traditional grilled tortillas, and a variety of different ingredients. Here are a few ingredients that you probably haven’t thought of:
Pan-Fried Hominy – Drain a couple cans of hominy (alkali-treated corn that you can find in the canned vegetable section of the supermarket, near the beans), and fry them in butter until they are golden brown. They have a chewy texture and carb-y flavor that adds a whole new dimension to a taco.
Pulled Chicken – Buy a rotisserie chicken at the supermarket and pull it apart into taco-sized chunks. Half the work, all the flavor. You can set some golden-brown skin aside for a relative you actually like.
Plant-Based Hamburger Substitute – It is highly likely that you have at least one member of your extended family who is vegetarian or vegan and generally sulky about being left out at family gatherings. It is just as easy to make hamburger taco filling from Impossible or Beyond Burger. You wouldn’t even need to tell any of the huffier members of the family; just whisper in the ear of your relative-arian, and let them know that you have their back.
40) Another Cocktail – A Cranberry Cobra, Made with Cranberry Syrup
The Cranberry Cobra
½ ounce lemon juice
¾ ounce golden rum
½ serrano chile
1½ ounces blisteringly cold vodka
1 ounce cranberry syrup (see below)
½ ounce unsweetened cranberry juice
1 bottle Fever Tree Aromatic Tonic
Muddle the serrano in the bottom of a cocktail shaker.
Add the rum and vodka, and dry-shake (without ice). Capsaicin, the fiery chemical in chiles, is alcohol-soluble, so dry-shaking it will allow the rum and vodka to strip out more heat and flavor from the serrano.
Add the lemon juice, cranberry syrup, cranberry juice and ice, then shake again, as vigorously as you see fit.
Strain into a tall Collins glass, over fresh ice.
Top with tonic and stir gently.
41) Cranberry Syrup
1 part sugar
1 part 100% cranberry juice – NOT cranberry juice cocktail
Bring both ingredients to a boil in a small saucepan and cook until the sugar dissolves completely, about two minutes.
Actually that’s it. You will probably want to let it cool before actually using it in a cocktail.
So, right now, if you are a thoughtful reader, you are asking why you can’t just use cranberry juice and simple syrup in the Cranberry Cobra and skip the syrup-making altogether. Seven words for you: Apple. Pie. Ala. Mode. With. Cranberry. Syrup.
42) Thumbprint Cookies
1½ cups (3 sticks) butter, softened
1 cup (198 grams) white sugar
2 whole eggs
1 Tablespoon vanilla
½ teaspoon salt
3½ cups (163 grams) all-purpose flour
1 cup fruit preserves, any flavor – the key here is to find some sort of really unusual jam that people won’t be expecting: ginger preserves, hot pepper jelly, rose jam, lime marmalade — these are all excellent choices
Preheat your oven to 350º
In a medium bowl, cream together the butter, white sugar, then the eggs.
Mix in flour a little bit at a time until a soft dough forms.
Roll dough into 1-inch balls. Place balls 2 inches apart on parchment paper or a silicone baking sheet.
Use your finger or an instrument of similar size to make a well in the center of each cookie. Fill the hole with 1/2 teaspoon of jam.
Bake for 14 minutes in the preheated oven, until golden brown on the bottom. Remove from cookie sheets to cool on wire racks.
43) Failure Cookies, aka Blank Canvas Cookies
This recipe was adapted from another 100-year-old newspaper clipping, and something was definitely lost in the translation. The filling burned and the dough turned out to be impossible to roll out. And yet — think of this as a Blank Canvas cookie. It has a mild, shortcake-like flavor that lends itself to modification. Add some peppermint oil? It would work beautifully. Lemon zest and lemon oil? Please. Bourbon? Why not?
1 cup (227 grams) whole milk
1 cup (198 grams) sugar
½ cup (1 stick) butter
3½ cups (420 grams) all-purpose flour
1 egg
pinch salt
1 Tablespoon baking powder
Preheat your oven to 375º
In a medium bowl, whisk the flour, salt and baking powder together. Set aside.
Cream the butter and sugar in your stand mixer until light and fluffy.
Add the milk and the egg.
Gradually add the flour mixture and mix until it has been incorporated.
Drop 1-Tablespoon dollops of the batter onto parchment paper or a silicone baking sheet, six at a time.
Bake for 10 minutes. Cool briefly before eating, or making a Trifle.
44) Failure Cookie Trifle
Failure Cookie Trifle. Photo by John Fladd.
The amount of each ingredient will be determined by the size of your trifle dish.
Failure Cookies
heavy cream
maple syrup
frozen cherries
amaretto
Thaw and drain frozen cherries. Soak overnight in amaretto.
Whip the cream until stiff with maple syrup as a sweetener.
In a large, or whatever size you have, glass dish, layer Failure Cookies, maple whipped cream, and marinated cherries.
Repeat as many times as you have ingredients and room in the bowl.
Dust the top with nutmeg or chocolate shavings.
45) Chocolate-Orange Cookies, Also From a 1923 Newspaper Clipping
2 egg whites
1 cup (114 grams) powdered sugar
6 Tablespoons unsweetened cocoa
4 teaspoons melted butter
¾ teaspoon cinnamon
1 cup (about 1½ slices, 68 grams) fresh soft bread crumbs – a food processor or blender will crumb bread very nicely
½ cup (85 grams) chopped candied orange slices – Trader Joe’s has very good ones
2 teaspoons vanilla
Mix the cocoa and butter into a stiff paste. Set aside.
Beat the egg whites to medium peaks.
Slowly mix in the powdered sugar…
Then the salt and cocoa paste…
Mix in the cinnamon, bread crumbs, chopped orange pieces and vanilla, until combined.
Chill the dough for 30 minutes.
Heat your oven to 350º.
Bake 1-Tablespoon balls for 10 minutes.
Cool and eat.
46) Browned Butter Cookie Bars
1 cup (2 sticks) butter
1 cup (213 grams) packed brown sugar
½ cup (99 grams) white sugar
½ teaspoon salt
⅓ cup (76 grams) whole milk
2 teaspoons vanilla
2½ cups (300 grams) all-purpose flour
1 cup (170 grams) chocolate chips
4 ounces (about 1 large bar) dark chocolate, chopped
2 Tablespoons heavy cream
2 teaspoons light corn syrup
sea salt flakes
Grease and line a 13×9” baking pan with parchment paper.
In a small saucepan, melt the butter, and cook until it turns light brown and smells nutty. Pour into a bowl to cool.
Add both sugars and the salt to the browned butter until completely combined.
Beat in the milk and vanilla, then the flour and chocolate chips.
When this has turned into cookie dough, transfer it to the baking dish and smash it down flat with a spatula, making sure to fill the corners. Put this in the refrigerator to chill while you play with melted chocolate.
In a small saucepan, maybe the one you used to brown the butter, heat the dark chocolate, cream and corn syrup. When it has turned to a melted saucy consistency, take the cookie dough from the refrigerator and pour the chocolate onto it. Tilt the pan to completely cover the dough. Sprinkle the top with sea salt.
Chill overnight, then cut into bars.
47) Gooey Butter Rum Bars
¾ cup (1½ sticks) butter
½ cup (99 grams) white sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
3 eggs
2 Tablespoons dark rum
1¼ cups (150 grams) all-purpose flour
1 8-ounce package cream cheese, softened
2½ cups (284 grams) powdered sugar
Heat your oven to 350º.
Grease and line a 9×13” baking pan with parchment paper.
Beat ½ cup (1 stick) of the butter with your mixer. Add the white sugar, baking powder, and half the salt. Beat until light and fluffy.
Add one egg and 1 Tablespoon of the rum. Keep mixing.
Beat in the flour until everything is combined.
Smush this dough into the bottom of the baking pan. Make an even layer, including the corners.
Clean out the mixing bowl, then beat the remaining butter and the cream cheese until light and fluffy.
Add the rest of the ingredients, being careful to add the eggs one at a time.
Pour the batter on top of the crust in the baking pan.
Bake 30 to 35 minutes.
Cool, cut and eat gleefully.
48) 1970s-era Nuts & Bolts (Chex Mix)
½ cup salted butter (1 stick)
2 Tablespoons full-sodium soy sauce
1¼ teaspoons seasoned salt
¼ teaspoon garlic salt (if there was any way to cram more salt into this, we didn’t know about it in the ’70s)
2¾ cups Corn Chex
2¾ cups Rice Chex
2¾ cups Wheat Chex
1½ cups cocktail peanuts (oh, wait – apparently there is a way)
1½ cups sesame sticks
Preheat oven to 275 degrees F.
Melt butter in a shallow pan. Stir in soy sauce, seasoned salt and garlic salt.
Add cereal, peanuts and sesame sticks. Mix until all pieces are coated.
Place on a shallow baking pan with sides.
Bake for 40 minutes, stirring every 10 minutes.
49) Switches and Coal, a Krampus-Themed Holiday Drink
Switches and Coal. Photo by John Fladd.
This is a take on a classic drink called a Black Satin, but boilermaker-y:
3 ounces very dark beer – stout or porter
3 ounces Brut Champagne
2 ounces of the darkest rum you can get your hands on – I like Cruzan Black Strap
Gently pour the very dark beer into a tall glass.
Float the Champagne on top of it. Pour it over the back of a spoon. It will not make visibly separate layers, but it makes a difference.
Pour a shot of very dark rum, then drop it into the mixture.
Drink, while complaining to your husband about your day.
50) Greyhound – A Retro Cocktail that Will Make You Feel Better About Things in General
2 2-inch slices of grapefruit rind (just the thin outer layer – the grapefruit will bring enough bitterness without using any of the white pith under the surface)
1½ ounces good gin – I like Death’s Door
1 ounce St. Germain, an elderflower liqueur
2 ounces unsweetened ruby grapefruit juice
Muddle the grapefruit peel thoroughly in the bottom of a cocktail shaker. This will release citrus oil and add an extra layer of grapefruitiness to the finished drink. Feel free to really smash the peel.
Add the other ingredients and four or five ice cubes to the shaker, and shake thoroughly.
Strain over ice in a rocks glass.
Sip while thinking about that one time when you met that guy with that crazy idea. What would have happened if you’d thrown caution into the wind?
51) Lady In Blue – A Classic Cocktail With a Touch of Sophistication
1½ ounces very cold gin
¼ ounce créme de violette
¾ ounce fresh squeezed lemon juice
½ ounce simple syrup
3 drops orange blossom water
A “slip” of blue curaçao
Combine all ingredients except the blue curaçao with ice in a cocktail shaker.
Shake until frost forms on the shaker and your hands become uncomfortably cold.
Strain into a martini glass. This is one occasion where you should not frost the glass first; you will want to show this cocktail off. The frosted glass would mess with that.
Pour a small slip of blue curaçao down one side of the glass. It is denser than the rest of the drink and will pool in the bottom of the glass.
52) Existential Luau – A Tiki Drink That Brings Up Difficult Questions
1 ounce lime syrup (see below)
1 ounce Campari
2 ounces gin (I like Death’s Door)
4 ounces pineapple juice
cracked ice or tiny ice cubes
Fill a tall glass — a pint glass or a Collins glass — with ice.
Add lime syrup, Campari and gin.
Top off with pineapple juice.
Stir with a bar spoon.
Drink while thinking what you would name your boat, and then the bar you would run when you got to a tropical island, sold the boat and opened a bar.
53) Lime Syrup
juice of 3 or 4 limes
An equal amount (by weight) of white sugar
zest of 2 limes
In a small saucepan, bring the lime juice and sugar to a boil. Stir until the sugar is completely dissolved, about 10 to 15 seconds, once it’s boiling.
Remove from heat and add lime zest. Let it steep for 30 minutes.
Strain the zest from the syrup, so it doesn’t get bitter.
Label your jar so you won’t have an awkward moment a week from now, when your wife wants to know what’s in that jar in the door of the fridge.
54) Navy Grog
1 ounce black rum, the darker the better – I like Cruzan’s Black Strap for this
1 ounce golden rum – I’ve got a bottle of Kirk and Sweeney that I save for special occasions like this
1 ounce white rum – Bacardi is fine for this; the white rum in this recipe is like the friend who is seriously underdressed to get into a club but is able to brazen her way through because of her fancy friends
1 ounce honey syrup
¾ ounce grapefruit juice
¾ ounce fresh-squeezed lime juice, plus half a lime for garnish
1 ounce aggressively bubbly seltzer – I like Topo Chico
1 sprig fresh mint for garnish
Fill the large half of a cocktail shaker to the top with ice.
Pour the ice into a clean tea towel. Wrap the ice in the towel, then beat it brutally with something heavy (I use the billy-club-sized pestle from my largest mortar and pestle for this). Beat the towel until you have a variety of ice shards, from half cubes to pebbles to legitimate snow. Pour this ice back into your cocktail shaker. It will take up significantly less room than before.
Add the rums, honey syrup and citrus juices to the shaker, and shake thoroughly.
Add the carbonated water, then stir gently with a bar spoon.
Pour the entire contents into a glass. Does it have to be a Tiki mug? It could be; again, who’s going to judge you? But frankly, any large-ish glass, mug or mason jar will do.
Squeeze the remaining half lime into the glass, then drop the carcass in to class the joint up a little. Finish it off with the fresh mint.
