Peachy!

Peaches might be my favorite fruit. But I'm not talking about the crappy, hard, flavorless peaches you can get at Kroger any time of year. I'm talking about in-season, make-a-juicy-mess-all-over-your-shirt, daydream-about-them-over-the-winter peaches. I got a craving last night, so we went to ValuMarket and picked up our first peaches of the summer. I got home, selected the ripest one, and it exploded all over my face as soon as I bit into it. Perfect!

My very favorite thing to eat for breakfast during the summer is yogurt with granola and peaches. The tartness of the yogurt, the crunch of the granola, and the sweetness of the peaches is a perfect combination. So this morning, peaches in hand, I set about making some granola so I could enjoy my first bowl of breakfast bliss.

I have written about Ellie Krieger's granola recipe before. It's still my go-to granola recipe because it's so easy and because I usually have most of the ingredients on hand. Today it turned out that I was out of almonds, so I substituted sunflower seeds. Honestly, it's better with almonds, but the sunflower seeds were okay in a pinch. The great thing about this recipe is that you can throw in pretty much any combination of nuts, seeds and/or dried fruit that you happen to have. I think my next batch will be almond-coconut, and I'd like to try a cranberry-orange version, too.

After this photo was taken I totally cut up the other half of the peach and threw it in the bowl all willy-nilly!

It's Memorial Day Weekend and I have one or two interesting recipes on the agenda. Here's hoping they turn out blog-worthy!

The Imminent Return of Blog Tartare

So. Blog Tartare. It moved over to Tumblr for a bit, but even there it has been languishing. Graduate school was taking up entirely too much of the time that I used to use to cook things (and then blog about them), and since I've been only marginally employed for most of the last two years, we haven't had the money to do the kind of dining out we used to.

However!

Yesterday I graduated with my master's degree, and I start a new job next month. My hope is to start cooking interesting dinners again several times a week now that my evenings aren't dominated by academic reading and writing. (It helps that the Root Cellar will be on my way home from work!) I'm also looking forward to getting caught back up on the local restaurant scene. I feel incredibly out of the loop in that regard, because most of our dining out over the last couple years has consisted of old familiar (and cheap) favorites.

In honor of this new chapter in my life and the impending return of Blog Tartare, allow me to share a recipe that made an appearance at my graduation party last night. I found this on AllRecipes and was pretty impressed by how easy it was and how delicious these margaritas turned out!

Bucket of Margaritas
4 1/2 cups water
1 1/2 cups tequila
1 (12 fluid ounce) can frozen limeade
1/2 cup triple sec (orange-flavored liqueur)
1 whole lime, cut into 6 wedges

Mix the water, tequila, limeade, and orange liqueur in a freezer-proof container with a lid; stir. Cover and store in freezer until it reaches a slush-like consistency, about 24 hours. Serve in glasses garnished with lime wedges.

We made four gallons of this using freezer bags, and it was pretty awesome to be able to take a new bag out of the freezer and refill the margarita pitcher when it started getting low. Some of the comments on AllRecipes also mention making individual servings in sandwich bags and then taking them camping, to the beach, on picnics, etc, which I think is a great idea. The next time I do this I will probably try adding mango nectar, because I do love a mango margarita!

In other news, we're heading to New Mexico for a quick vacation later this week, and I am SO EXCITED about the food there. Hopefully my next entry will have lots of photos and descriptions of all the southwestern deliciousness I encounter there. I also want to write soon about my recipe for panang curry, which I adapted from another recipe several years ago and have finally perfected. This recipe has the distinction of being the first one that I know by heart and can prepare from memory.

'Til soon, Blog Tartare readers! <3

Delicious Summer Sandwiches

We're having quite a heatwave here in Louisville, and I feel like I've been kind of fast-forwarded into summer (which is fine with me!). The weather put me in the mood for these delicious grilled veggie sandwiches. We didn't feel like messing with the real grill, so we just slapped the veggies on the George Foreman. It's nothing fancy, but the lemon garlic mayonnaise with the feta is a great combination. I'm looking forward to making these throughout the summer, especially with veggies from the farmers market and/or my own garden!

Sweet Potato Gratin... and more!

This entry will cover a lot of territory, so here's a quick overview:
1. Sweet potato gratin.
2. Tomato soup.
3. Vegetable bouillon and vegetarian gravy.

Ready, go!

Earlier today I Tweeted/Facebooked about the awesome sweet potato gratin I made last night. A ton of people requested the recipe, and I'm more than happy to share it. Alas, I can't take credit for this one; it's another tremendously successful selection from Vegetarian Suppers From Deborah Madison's Kitchen.

I don't know about you all, but the changing weather has had me craving warm, hearty comfort food. I went cruising through Ms. Madison's cookbook yesterday and landed on the following recipe. We served it as an entree with a side of kale, but it would be fantastic as a side dish, especially if you're getting sick of the ubiquitous sweet potato casserole that always shows up at Thanksgiving.

Sweet Potato Gratin with Onions and Sage

2 teaspoons oil, plus a little for the dish
1 large onion, chopped into 1/2-inch dice
2 tablespoons chopped sage or 2 teaspoons dried
3 medium sweet potatoes (about 1 1/2 pounds), thinly sliced
sea salt and freshly ground pepper
a large handful of parsley leaves, chopped with 1 plump garlic clove
3/4 cup grated Gruyere or smoked mozzarella cheese (Kroger actually had smoked Gruyere, so I used that!)
freshly grated Parmesan cheese
1 cup cream or half-and-half, warmed (I never told you this was healthy!)

1. Preheat the oven to 350° F. Lightly oil a 2-quart gratin dish and put a moderately large pot of water on to boil.
2. Put 2 teaspoons oil in a skillet over medium heat and add the onion and sage. Cook, giving them an occasional stir, until soft and golden, about 12 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, peel the sweet potatoes, then slice them as thinly as you can manage. Salt the water, then drop them in. Allow the water to return to a boil, which may take a few minutes. Boil for a minute or until the potatoes are partly tender when pierced with a knife, then drain. Toss them with the onions, chopped parsley, and garlic.
4. Scoop a third of the potatoes into the prepared dish and even them out. Season with salt and pepper, add half the Gruyere, and grate over a little Parmesan. Repeat, making two more layers and covering the last with a dusting of the Parmesan. Pour the warm cream over all, cover with foil, and bake in the center of the oven for 25 minutes. Remove the foil and continue baking until the potatoes are utterly soft and the gratin has browned, another 25 minutes or so. Let the gratin stand a few minutes before serving.

A few things I will do differently next time:
1. Add walnuts. Neil and I agree they would be great in this.
2. Drain the potatoes better and/or let it cook a little longer. It was a little watery on the bottom.
3. Add more cheese (maybe). It's perfectly good as it is, but if you want to make it really obnoxiously fattening and delicious, more cheese would be the way to go.

So today, after a heaping bowl of leftover gratin for lunch, I got to thinking about what I wanted to make for dinner. I couldn't stop thinking about that delicious smoked Gruyere. I started thinking grilled cheese and tomato soup. I spent some time looking for a tomato soup recipe that did not require a food processor or immersion blender, neither of which I own (yet - hello, wedding registry!). I found this recipe for Hot and Healing Tomato Soup. I was a little concerned that it would be weird in a New Agey, earnestly healthy kind of way, what with its six cloves of garlic and handful of celery leaves. But it was actually really good, quite chunky and thick. Neil suggested that it would be good over pasta as well. To go with it, I sliced some of the Moroccan olive bread that Kroger makes (which is way better than it has any right to be), sprinkled shredded Gruyere on top, and stuck them in a hot oven until the cheese was melty and golden. I've taken to calling this deconstructed grilled cheese, because I occasionally enjoy being a pretentious asshole. (You're welcome to call it cheese bread.)

If you looked at the soup recipe, you may have noticed that it involves a roux, to which vegetable broth is added. Let me first say that today, instead of buying a package of vegetable broth, using half a cup, and putting the rest in the fridge to sit until it went bad, I wised up and bought some bouillon cubes. Specifically, Edward & Sons Garden Veggie. I mixed up half of one with some hot water to make broth for the soup and it smelled really good, better than vegetable broth usually does. Once I mixed it into the roux it smelled fantastic, so I gave it a taste. Sacrebleu! It was like a delicious gravy! I cannot wait to make some mashed potatoes to put this on!

Erin's Vegetarian Gravy
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons flour
1/2 cup to 1 cup vegetable broth, depending on how thick you like it

Melt butter in a saucepan over low heat. Slowly add flour, stirring constantly. Continue to stir until mixture turns golden. Slowly stir in vegetable broth until gravy reaches the desired consistency. (Note: I can't vouch for the tastiness of this if you don't use Edward & Sons bouillon. Like I said, it's better than any vegetable broth I've ever used. I found it at Kroger in the organic/natural section, with the soups.)

So, that's been my two days of culinary excitement. Now that I sit down and think about it, there are multiple things that I meant to write about on Blog Tartare, like my visits to Dragon King's Daughter, Zen Tea House, and a much-improved Zeppelin Cafe (whose website is so abjectly bad and lacking in content that I won't even bother to link to it). Expect restaurant reviews soon!

Eggplant Boursin Panini

We stopped frequenting Ramsi's some time ago, after a few too many experiences of mediocre food and bad service. But that doesn't mean I don't still love their Eggplant Boursin Panini:

Lightly breaded eggplant, tomato sauce, and a trio of cheeses, served on homemade Cuban bread.

When we brought home some eggplants from the farmers market last week, Neil suggested eggplant Parmesan, but that felt like too much work and too much time with the oven on. So I decided to try my hand at recreating my beloved panini instead. The results were pretty amazing, if I do say so myself. Anyone looking for ways to use up their eggplant harvest should give this one a try!

1 eggplant (depending on size, of course, but one average eggplant provided enough for four sandwiches and a few snack slices for us)
Italian breadcrumbs
2 eggs, beaten
1 package Boursin (it won't require nearly the whole package, but use however much you want)
1 ball mozzarella, sliced thickly (ours yielded four slices and a chunk for snacking)
Shredded Parmesan to taste
Some sort of chunky tomato sauce business (we used Kroger brand bruschetta topping and it was pretty good)
Whatever bread/bun/roll you fancy (no Cuban bread to be found at Kroger, so we went with their sub rolls, which worked surprisingly well)

Skin and slice eggplant, then dip slices into egg and dredge in breadcrumbs. Fry in oil (or bake, if you want to be healthier about it) until golden. Spread a layer of tomato sauce on the bottom of the roll, and follow with mozzarella slices, eggplant, and a sprinkling of Parmesan. Spread a layer of Boursin on the top of the roll (the inside of the top of the roll, that is). Stick the whole thing in your panini press press or George Foreman (what we used), or, if you don't have any such thing, just pop it in the oven until the cheese is melty and the bread is toasty.

I wish I had a photo of this for you, but unfortunately, the ones we took did not really do the deliciousness justice. Just trust me when I promise you that it is fantastic.

Notes:
1. Depending on what kind of bread you use, the quantities might vary a little bit. Since we used oblong sub rolls, each sandwich used four slices of eggplant stacked two high, and a slice of mozzarella on each eggplant stack. But that's just how it worked out for us. This is bound to turn out delicious no matter how you do it, so don't worry too much about the details.
2. I think I've more or less given up on sweating eggplant. The only difference I can tell is that when I do it, even though I rinse it off afterward, the eggplant ends up way too salty. It's also a pain in the ass. The hell with it, I say!
3. Boursin is freaking expensive, around $6 for 5.2 oz at Kroger. Although it's kind of central to the Eggplant Boursin Panini, feel free to skip it or mess around with other cheeses if you don't want to spend that much. (Or, if you happen to be going up to Jungle Jim's, get it there. It's always much cheaper even at regular price, and we once found it on sale there for $1.99.)

Enjoy!

Hot Fudge Pudding Cake

Several months ago my parents took a trip to Hershey, PA, and my mom brought me back a cute little tin full of Hershey recipes. My parents came over Sunday night for dinner (cheesesteaks from Danny Mac's), and I told Neil to select a recipe from the Hershey box and I would make it for dessert.

What Neil selected was Hot Fudge Pudding Cake.

Hershey's Hot Fudge Pudding Cake
1 1/4 cups granulated sugar, divided
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup Hershey's Cocoa, divided
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup milk
1/3 cup butter or margarine, melted
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/2 cup packed light brown sugar
1 1/4 cups hot water
Whipped topping (make it yourself, it's better!)

1. Heat oven to 350° F.
2. Stir together 3/4 cup granulated sugar, flour, 1/4 cup cocoa, baking powder and salt. Stir in milk, butter and vanilla; beat until smooth. Pour batter into ungreased 9-inch square baking pan. Stir together remaining 1/2 cup granulated sugar, brown sugar and remaining 1/4 cup cocoa; sprinkle mixture evenly over batter. Pour hot water over top. Do not stir.
3. Bake 35 to 40 minutes or until center is almost set. Let stand 15 minutes; spoon into dessert dishes, spooning sauce from bottom of pan over top. Garnish with whipped topping. Makes about 8 servings.

For the whipped topping I combined one cup heavy whipping cream, a tablespoon of sugar, and a half teaspoon of vanilla. I beat it on high until it was whipped cream. (There is no excuse for Cool Whip!)

Anyway, the cake. I don't know how, but we managed not to take any photos of it. But basically what happens is that the top turns into something cakey in texture, and the bottom turns into a thick gooey chocolate sauce. It's really neat! And also incredibly good. It's very rich without being overly sweet and disgusting.

What's really awesome (and kind of dangerous) about this is that it's made of stuff I always have in the house. And it's super quick and easy. I can make a gooey chocolate dessert (something I get a craving for not infrequently) whenever I want and with minimal effort! And now you can too!

Granola Love

To say that I have never been much of a breakfast person isn't entirely accurate. In fact, I love breakfast. The thing is, I only love it some of the time. I love it if it's a leisurely weekend morning and Neil and I are drinking bloody maries and listening to Getz/Gilberto while we cook, and I love it if I'm at a great breakfast spot like Wild Eggs, Lynn's Paradise Cafe, or my mama's kitchen. But when I'm dragging my ass out of bed on a weekday morning and trying to get myself ready to be at work at the unholy hour of 8:00, breakfast is not much of a priority.

I've been this way since high school, when breakfast consisted of a cup of coffee and a Bugs Bunny vitamin. Since then I've dabbled in toast, bagels, crumpets, muffins, and other quick, delicious carb-fests that left me feeling hungry sooner than I would have if I'd eaten nothing at all. If you ever asked me to skip lunch or dinner I'd laugh in your face, but it's not at all unusual for me to have nothing but coffee for breakfast.

Since everyone is always harping on the importance of breakfast, however, I recently decided that I should make an effort to eat it. Not the kind of effort that requires cooking or anything, though. But I decided that I could handle pouring some stuff in a bowl and spooning it into my mouth. I don't really care for cold cereal, though. (Except for the occasional guilty pleasure bowl of Lucky Charms.) So, what to do?

Enter Ellie Krieger and her granola recipe.

I picked up Krieger's cookbook, The Food You Crave, several weeks ago. I'd never seen her Food Network show or even heard of her, but I was in the market for a healthy cookbook that did not rely on a bunch of processed, fortified, low-fat, bullshit "food." This book definitely fits that bill, so I bought it. And found her wonderful, easy, delicious, good-for-me granola recipe inside.

Granola has had some image problems over the years. First it was considered healthy but goofy hippie food. Then people started looking at the nutritional info for granola and saying "Hey, this isn't really that good for me!" Ellie Krieger's granola recipe saves the day by managing to be natural, moderate on the calories, and super yummy. I know this will sound ridiculous, but I actually wake up each morning feeling excited that I get to eat this granola!

Nutty Granola
Cooking Spray
3 cups old-fashioned oats
1/2 cup chopped raw, unsalted walnuts
1/2 cup chopped unsalted almonds
1/2 cup chopped unsalted pecans
1/2 cup maple syrup
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 cup raisins, optional

Preheat the oven to 300 degrees F. Spray a large baking sheet with cooking spray.

In a medium bowl combine the oats, nuts, maple syrup, salt, cinnamon and the raisins, if using. Spread the mixture onto the baking sheet and bake until golden brown, stirring occasionally, about 30 minutes. Transfer the sheet to a cooling rack and let cool completely. Store in the refrigerator in an airtight container.

This makes 9 half-cup servings. Neil and I eat it mixed with a half-cup of low-fat organic plain yogurt. It's more delicious than it has any right to be!

Returning

Oh, Blog Tartare. How I've neglected you. I was hoping it wouldn't come to this, but there are, indeed, only so many hours in a day. I started this blog during a lull in my employment, but now that I'm working again (temping, and starting a new and exciting Real Job in the next few weeks), I haven't made as much time for blogging as I would have liked. I especially dropped the ball on the Valentine's Day events. Oops.

Also - and I'm hesitant to say this because it seems anathema to a food blog - I went back to Weight Watchers about a week and a half ago. It's going really well and hasn't put much of a damper on my food life. But as I've said before, this is not going to turn into a diet blog. I feel quite confident that I can continue to write about food without letting on that I'm watching my girlish figure.

I really want to update the events calendar, so stay tuned for some posts about local food goings-on (including one event that I'm crazy excited about). In the meantime, in the spirit of busy-ness, I will share this super quick and easy recipe for black bean soup (which I recommend you eat with a grilled pepperjack sandwich). This soup is pretty much everything you could want in a food: it's fast, it's easy, it's cheap, and yes, it's low-fat and otherwise good for you. Most importantly, it's super tasty!

Black Bean Soup in a Hurry
2 (15 ounce) cans black beans, drained and rinsed
1 1/2 cups vegetable broth
1 cup chunky salsa
1 teaspoon ground cumin
4 tablespoons sour cream (optional)
2 tablespoons thinly sliced green onion (optional)

1. Dump everything but the sour cream and green onion into the blender. Blend it.
2. Pour it into a sauce pan and heat it up.
3. Put it in some bowls. Garnish with sour cream and green onion if you feel like messing with it. Serves four.

Better Than Egg Salad

Some months ago I found this recipe for "egg" salad that uses tofu instead of eggs in a Light & Tasty magazine. I'm honestly not sure why there is a need for such a recipe, unless you are allergic to eggs (but then you'd also have the matter of the mayonnaise to deal with). It turns out, however, that we have another use for it; Neil is really bothered by the texture of hard-boiled eggs. But not, for some reason, by the texture of tofu. So we tried this recipe and it was actually really good. I just made it again today and thought I'd post it. It would also be excellent with eggs instead of tofu.

Better Than Egg Salad

1/4 cup chopped celery
2 green onions, chopped
1/4 cup reduced-fat mayo
2 tablespoons sweet pickle relish
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1/4 teaspoon ground turmeric
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper
1 package (12.3 oz) silken firm tofu, cubed
8 slices whole wheat bread
4 lettuce leaves

In a small bowl, combine the first eight ingredients. Gently stir in tofu. Spread over four slices of bread; top with lettuce and remaining bread. (I love how these instructions assume that you’ve never assembled a sandwich before.)

Just in time for New Year's...

101 Simple Appetizers in 20 Minutes or Less from the New York Times.

Have a wonderful New Year's, everyone!

Anniversary Food: Herbed Pork Chops with Wine

There are three meals/restaurants that are important to my relationship with Neil:

1. On our first date we had sushi at Sakura Blue.
2. On our second date (which was New Year's Eve) we got carry-out from Vietnam Kitchen. It was my first time eating there and it rocked my world.
3. The first time we cooked together we made herbed pork chops with wine.

Our third anniversary was yesterday, and of course we had to commemorate it with food. We didn't really feel like sushi, but we couldn't decide between fixing the pork chops together and getting food from Vietnam Kitchen. So we decided to fix the pork chops on Friday and go to Vietnam Kitchen on Saturday; a two-day anniversary food extravaganza.

Herbed Pork Chops with Wine
1 tsp dried leaf sage, crumbled
1 tsp dried rosemary
2 cloves garlic, finely minced
1/4 tsp salt
freshly ground black pepper
2 1-inch pork chops
2 tbsp butter
1 tbsp olive oil
3/4 cup dry white wine

Combine sage, rosemary, garlic, salt, and pepper. Press the mixture into the sides of the chops. Over medium heat in a large skillet, melt butter and oil. Brown cops on both sides, turning gently with tongs. Remove chops and pour off most of the drippings. And 1/2 cup wine and boil. Return chops to pan. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer until chops are tender when pressed with tip of knife, 25-30 minutes. Remove chops, add remaining wine to skillet, and quickly boil down to syrupy glaze. Pour over chops.

Every time I make this I amazed at how simple and delicious it is. The simplicity amazes me because the first time we cooked it together it seemed like a huge, complicated production. I can't imagine what it was that we had so much trouble with. It's not even really a good meal to cook together because there's not much for more than one person to do. It's really quite quick and easy.

We traditionally serve this with baked sweet potatoes and some manner of crusty bread dipped in herby olive oil. Friday we picked up a garlic and tomato focaccia at Liquor Barn that was great with this. We cooked and served this dish with a bottle of Lindemans chardonnay that was leftover from a party.

The wonderful thing about this meal, and about food in general, really, is its ability to transport you another place and time. Every time I fix these pork chops I'm reminded of my little yellow kitchen on St. James Court where Neil and I were just starting to figure out cooking and each other. These pork chops remind me of falling in love.

As it turned out, yesterday, which was our actual anniversary, I was not really in the mood for Vietnam Kitchen (probably because we ate there with friends just last week). So instead we walked around the corner to Jockamo's for a delicious pignolata pizza and a couple of beers. Not the fanciest of anniversary dinners by any means, but it was really exactly what I wanted; great pizza and beer with my boyfriend in the heart of our beloved Germantown. It was a very nice anniversary dinner indeed.

Today we're picking up my mom and going on a food field trip. If you know me and Neil, or if you're a foodie living in the Louisville area, I bet you can guess where we're going. I'll be sure to blog about our adventure when we get home.

Grandpa's Christmas Stollen

This is me and my grandpa, Herb. I'm not sure what year this photo was taken, only that it was a Christmas Eve in the early 80's and that we are sharing a cup of eggnog. I love this photo.

It's hard to explain how and why my grandpa was so awesome. For starters, he loved me. I was never a daddy's girl, but I was surely a grandpa's girl. He brought me jelly donuts (my favorite), called me sweethaht in his New York accent, and took the curvy, hilly "shortcut" home from the store with me even though it actually took longer to get home that way. We took his Dalmatian, Molly, to the park, and downtown he'd go through the revolving doors of office buildings with me, garnering odd looks from people in suits. The house he shared with my grandma was a gloomy, nicotine-stained wonderland of seashells, old National Geographics, bells, tea sets, books, slides, and other odds and ends that kept me occupied for hours at a time. For many years they lived right around the corner from me and my parents; our backyards were catty corner to one another, and I frequently fled to their back gate as a response to some real or imagined injustice perpetrated by my parents. To say that I loved my grandparents, and especially Grandpa, does not even begin to describe the relationship I had with them.

Grandpa died in 1995, when I was 14. With him died the long tradition of the Christmas stollen. Stollen is a German bread, similar to fruitcake but better, and Grandpa made it every year for Christmas Eve. He left the recipe behind, but it seemed that no one was up for the challenge of baking it. From 1995 forward, there was no Christmas stollen. This year, emboldened by my first bread-making experience a few months earlier, I decided to pick up the mantle.

A week or so before Christmas I called my mom to ask for the recipe. "Let me call you back with it," she said. On December 23 I called her again. "Let me call you back," she said again.

"That's what you said the last time I asked!"
"Okay, hold on."

She finally returned with the recipe and started reading. I scribbled furiously. I wrote. And wrote. And wrote. And started to wonder what on earth I was getting myself into.


I felt a little overwhelmed. But then I went to the store and got what I needed. There was no candied angelica to be found, nor candied citrus peel. Mom assured me that it didn't matter. "Just use extra candied fruit. It doesn't have to be exact." I returned home with the best approximation of the required ingredients I could find, and as directed, set all the candied fruit to soaking in rum. Christmas Eve morning, with Neil gone to work, I started baking.

Grandpa's Christmas Stollen
1 cup mixed candied fruit
1/4 cup candied angelica
1/2 cup dried (candied) citrus peel
1/2 cup seedless raisins
1/2 cup candied cherries
1/2 cup rum
2 packages live active yeast
1/4 cup warm water
pinch of sugar
2 tbsp flour
2 eggs, room temperature
1 cup milk
3/4 cup sugar
1 tbsp salt
1/2 tsp almond extract
1/2 tsp grated lemon peel
6 cups flour
3/4 cups butter, room temperature, cut into bits
1 cup blanched & slivered almonds
4 tbsp melted butter
1/4 cup powdered sugar

Combine fruit with rum, stir, and let soak at least one hour, preferably overnight.


Pour water into small bowl, sprinkle in yeast, add pinch of sugar and stir. Wait for yeast to bubble.

Strain fruit and reserve rum. Dry fruit with paper towels.


Put fruit in paper bag with 2 tbsp flour and shake to coat.

In medium saucepan, heat milk, 1/2 cup sugar, and salt until lukewarm, stirring constantly until sugar dissolves.

Off heat, stir in rum, almond extract, lemon zest, and yeast mixture.

In large bowl, combine 3 cups of flour and yeast mixture with wooden spoon. In a separate bowl, beat eggs until frothy. Stir into mixture. Add butter bits to mixture, beat 100 times. Add 2 cups of flour and mix until the dough forms a soft ball.


Turn out onto floured surface, sprinkle generously with flour, and knead, adding flour as necessary. Return dough to bowl and gently knead in fruit and nuts, taking care that fruit does not discolor dough. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and place in warm location until dough is doubled in size.


Turn dough out onto floured surface, punch, and knead again.

Divide dough and put half back into bowl. With a rolling pin, shape dough into rectangle 12" long by 8" wide and 1/2" thick. Melt 2 tbsp butter and mix with 2 tbsp sugar; brush surface of dough with mixture.

Fold long side of dough over to center, then repeat with other side, overlapping by 1". Press the outside edges of the dough gently. Taper the ends of the loaf slightly and push sides together to mound center. Loaf should be 13" long and 3-4" wide.


Repeat with other half of dough.

Place loaves on 11x17 baking sheet and brush with butter.


Cover with wax paper, propping the wax paper on two tumblers so that they do not touch the dough. Place in a warm location until doubled.


Preheat oven to 375°. Bake 50 minutes or until brown, turning halfway through.


Cool on wire rack. Sprinkle with powdered sugar just before serving.

I am pleased to report that the stollen turned out exactly as it was supposed to. We had the ceremonial cutting and first tasting of the stollen by the baker. We have many years' worth of photos of this event; now, after an 11-year hiatus, there will be more.

I cannot tell you how pleased I am to have revived this tradition. My mom was very proud of me. I know Grandpa would be too.

Nana's Sugar Cookies

Several years ago my mom gave me a great Christmas present: a recipe book with some of our most beloved family recipes. She included the recipe for my nana's sugar cookies. I have no idea where this recipe came from, if it was something passed down through the generations, if Nana made it up (doubtful - she's never struck me as much of a from-scratch baker), or if it came out of a 1950-something issue of Good Housekeeping. No matter. They are amazing sugar cookies. Somehow, though, I'd never gotten around to making them. There they were, the second card in my recipe book (after my mom's don't-call-it-Derby-Pie® recipe), but for some reason I never felt compelled to bake them.

Along came the holiday season, though, and sugar cookies sounded just right. So this evening I decided to get to baking. A mountain of delicious cookies was the result.

Nana's Sugar Cookies

1 cup softened butter
2 cups sugar
2 eggs
1 cup oil
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla
5 cups unsifted flour
2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp cream of tartar

Preheat oven to 350°. Cream sugar and butter together. Add the eggs, vanilla, oil, and salt. Mix until well blended. Sift the flour with the baking soda and cream of tartar. Add to butter mixture with wooden spoon. Mix well. Roll dough into balls the size of walnuts. Place on cookie sheet and gently press with bottom of glass dipped in sugar. Bake 10-12 minutes. Cook on wire rack. Makes 4-5 dozen.