Butternut Squash Patties

This is Matt's recipe and they're the best things ever! He made them for lunch and since this is partly how I keep my recipes, I'm putting it up pretty quickly.

• Sage (chopped finely)
• Butternut squash cubes
• Salt/pepper
• Gram Masala
• Sesame seeds
• Panko bread crumbs
• Green onion (chopped finely)

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Place squash in oven-safe dish and coat with olive oil.
2. Roast squash 40 minutes.
3. Mash roasted squash.
4. Add salt, pepper, gram masala, sage, onions and sesame seeds. Mix well.
5. Add breadcrumbs, mix well and form into patty.
6. In a saute pan on medium heat, add patty and brown on both sides.

Sweet Herbed Pasta

I'm sure I've gone over how much I love sweet potatoes and Italy and pasta. Viola!

Servings: 2

2 small sweet potatoes
1 oz. chopped fresh sage leaves
1 teaspoon dried Italian spice blend
2 teaspoons fresh rosemary, divided
1 1/2 oz. spaghetti
1 clove garlic
olive oil

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Chop sweet potatoes and toss in olive oil and Italian spice blend.
2. Drain excess oil, sprinkle on half of the rosemary and put in to roast, about 20 minutes.
3. make pasta.
4. Meanwhile, saute fresh sage, rosemary and garlic.
5. Combine.

One of my favorite preparations of this pasta replaces sweet potatoes with butternut squash and adds butternut squash pasta sauce. I use Dave's, but you should try this recipe from food network.

Curried bean and corn salad

I am not really a savory chef, really more of a pastry one. So this is complicated at all.

1/2 cup Cannellini Beans
1/2 cup corn
1/2 red pepper diced
1 cup lettuce
2 tablespoons white wine vinegar
2 tablespoons curry powder, divided
2 teaspoons honey
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper

1. Curry beans and corn by heating them in a little water with 1 tablespoon mild curry powder
2. Add to lettuce and pepper.
3. Blend last 5 ingredients in blender, adding vinegar white blender is on to make a vinaigrette.
6. Toss salad and dressing.

Swiss-wich

Since Switzerland is historically divided into various French, German and Italian regions, it is no wonder that each country's cuisine has had its influence. Here I mix up ingredients from all counties and put it on typical Swiss bread.

2 slices Zopf Swiss braided bread

6 slices Mortadella lunch meat

2 tablespoons German whole grain mustard

2 lunch slices French raclette cheese

1. Preheat oven to 180 C/ 350 F.

2. Make two sandwiches: bread >spread> meat>cheese

3. Place on baking sheet on the top rack of the oven for 5 minutes.

White pizza

I really shouldn't admit this, but I really do hate rolling dough out. I'll make it, because i don't have to get all sticky, since I make it in the stand mixer. But, when it comes to flouring the dough and your hands and making sure there's enough flour or else everything else will get sticky, I'd rather pass. Especially when I flour way too much and the counter is about an inch high in flour and I have to spend 5 hours cleaning.

2 garlic cloves
1 shallot
5 slices of Provolone
1 handful of fresh basil
1 pizza crust
4 slices prosciutto
1 handful spinach
1/3 cup Ricotta
Italian seasoning blend

1. Preheat oven to 450 F and smear cornmeal on your pizza stone.
2. Chop your garlic and shallots and sprinkle on crust with Italian seasoning.
3. Lay fresh basil on top, then provolone, then smear Ricotta, than prosciutto.
4. Bake 7 mins.
5. Layer spinach.
6. Bake 3 mins.

Mojito twist

5 sprigs of thyme

1teaspoon sugar

2 teaspoons key lime juice

1 oz. spiced rum

Tonic water

1. Place thyme, sugar and lime juice in a glass and muddle. 

2. Top with rum and tonic water. 

Stuffed Cornish Hen

So, Matt's putting his apartment together and guess what we have. A. PROFESSIONAL. TABLETOP. YAY!!!!

Active time: 15 minutes

Total time: 1 hr 45 min

Servings: 2 half hens


1 Cornish hen
2 tangerines
1 big stick cinnamon
4 whole cloves
1/2 cup olive oil
2 pinches fleur de sel
2 pinches orange peel spice mix

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Cover hen all over with oil. Rub with pepper and fluer de sel.
3. Take 1 clementine, peel and remove all strings. Cut each slice in two width-wise.
4. Stuff hen with clementine pieces, cinnamon stick and cloves.
5. Place hen in roasting pan breast-side up, place slices of second clementine around bird and sprinkle with orange peel spice blend.
6. Roast for 1 and a half hours.

Cranberry-Pinenut Kasha

1 egg
1 cup Kasha
2 cups beef broth
Salt and pepper
Dried cranberries
Pine nuts

1. In a small bowl, beat egg and stir in kasha to coat.
2. Boil in beef broth for 7 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, toast pine nuts.
4. Stir cranberries into kasha during the last minute of boiling.
5. Top with pine nuts.

Chicken with mushroom cream sauce

1 pound sliced button or cremini mushrooms
1/4 cup chopped onions
2 large garlic cloves, chopped
1/2 cup cooking sherry
1 cup beef stock
1/2 cup heavy cream
1/4 cup vodka
Salt and pepper
1 1/2 pounds chicken

1.Sauté onions, garlic, and mushrooms in 2 Tbsp of olive oil in a large skillet on medium high heat until the mushrooms are browned - about 10-15 minutes. 
2. Add the sherry, increase the heat to high, and boil down until the liquid is reduced to almost a glaze, about 4 minutes.
3. Add the beef stock and bourbon, boil until reduced by two thirds. 
4. Add the cream and simmer several minutes until the sauce thickens.
5. Add chicken breast and stir.

6. Serve with Cranberry-pinenut kasha

Pretty Good Pasta

So we had a lack of food in the house, which sometimes is the best situation for a chef. Also, we had just ordered a boatload of bomba (Italian hot pepper sauce) and couldn't wait to open it.

I am ashamed to say that I just learned the correct way to make pasta, but I had just learned to correct way to make pasta.


Sauce:

10 cherry tomatoes
1 cup ketchup
1/4 Bomba hot sauce
1/4 cup Cento hogie spread
1/2 onion, chopped
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1/2 bell pepper, chopped
2 stems fresh rosemary
2 stems fresh thyme

NB (Nota bene): I know were all chefs here, but just in case you're not, don't throw in the stems of the herbs. Just gently roll between your fingers to get the leaves off.

Pasta:
 1 tablespoon olive oil
1 box whole grain spaghetti

1. Start boiling the water. Preferably in a pot with a colander in it so you can drain the pasta and save some starchy water.
2. Stew the tomatoes. Saute the veggies. Combine the sauces and spread.
3. When all sauce components are ready, combine and add the herbs.
4. When pasta is ready, pour out into a colander. DO NOT pour all the starchy water out of the pot or run cold water over the pasta.
5. Combine pasta, sauce and oil.
6. Buon appetito

Vodka

I will admit, we did have frozen pasta. BUT WAIT! It was sweet potato gnocchi from Trader Joe's! Since it was frozen, I thought I could at least make a fresh sauce.

Servings: 6

Active time: 15 minutes

Inactive time: 30 minutes


1/2 cup vodka

1/2 cup light cream

2 beef tomatoes 

1 tablespoon tomato paste

3 cloves garlic

1 shallot

1/2 teaspoon fresh sage

1/2 teaspoon fresh majoram

1 ounce fresh mozzarella 

1. Chop garlic and shallot in processor.

2. Sauté garlic and shallot then add cubed tomatoes. 

3. Once tomatoes have cooked, poor mixture in blender with other ingredients.  

Mandarin Mojito

This is seriously the best skill ever. I looked at a couple of recipes for tonight, but either didn't read the preparation all the way through, so I didn't have the equipment or just didn't have the ingredients. So I improvised.

Servings: 3

Active time: 30 minutes

Inactive time: 1 h 20 mins.

3 tilapia filets

2 cups Smirnoff's Mojito mix
1 tablespoon sugar
2 tablespoons rum
1/2 tablespoon orange zest
6 ounces mandarin oranges
1 1/2 tablespoons mint sauce
1 teaspoon ginger

1. Whisk all marinade ingredients in a bowl, poke holes in fish with fork and place all in a gallon size plastic bag.
2. Shake bag and marinade tilapia for at least an hour.
3. Preheat oven to 400 degrees and place each fillet on a separate piece of parchment paper with some sauce.
4. Fold parchment over horizontally on sides match and roll up sides to close.
5. Bake on cookie sheet for 20 minutes.

And they all come together

Recently, I've been reading The Map Thief and been falling in love with maps. My dad collects maps, so I've always been interested, but my interest might be growing. Of course, this set off a new idea for my third anthology: food and maps. Initially, this research idea didn't pan out, and it's still tricky. However, I have found one amazing example of a food map. And it's perfect.

What do you think if when you think of France? Any of you should go for "food and wine."

Carte Gastronomique de la France is a 1809 map showing regional foods and wines.

Shrimp Kebabs

Again: An Italian chef's main ingredients include pasta, white wine, rosemary, oregano, Parmesan and tomatoes. The pastry chef works with almond, cream, blood orange and lemon. Therefore, as the base for the marinade, I used white white, oregano, rosemary and orange juice. I gave it a nice kick with: ginger preserves.
This constituted the marinade for shrimp kebabs

pinch oregano
pinch rosemary
1 cup orange juice
1/4 cup white wine
1/2 teaspoon ginger preserves
12 raw shrimp

skewers

1 cup pilaf
2 cups chicken broth

1/2 green beans
balsamic

1. Mix marinade ingredients in a small bowl and set aside.
2. Poke two holes in each shrimp, place in dish and pour in marinade.
3. Marinade for 30 minutes.
4. While shrimp marinates, cook pilaf and beans.
5. Skewer 4 shrimp each on 3 skewers and grill until shrimp are pink.

Coconut Lamb

Story of my life: We  didn't have some ingredients. So, I added from there, subtracted from there, did a different preparation with that, and came up with something edible. The base recipe for this lamb comes from Matt's mom's Indian cookbook, Madhur Jaffery's Indian Cooking. The original recipe, calls for chicken, but we never liked that idea. So, Matt and I decided on lamb and as stated above, this is what happened a few incarnations later..


4 whole cloves
1 cinnamon stick (broken into pieces)
1 whole nutmeg
1 1/2 tablespoons whole coriander seeds
1 1/2 teaspoons whole cumin seeds
1/2 teaspoon whole black peppercorns

2 cups shredded coconut

6 cherry tomatoes
1 tablespoon onion relish
1 glove garlic
1-inch chunk fresh ginger
6 sprigs mint
red pepper flakes

2 pounds lamb
1/2 onion
1 can tomato paste
1 1/2 cups water
4 tablespoons vegetable oil

1. Dry-roast spices in a skillet over medium flame until fragrant and grind in coffee grinder until fine. Place aside.
2. Toast coconut in same skillet until edges are brown. The coconut should pick-up some of the flakes from the spices.
3. Process tomatoes, onion relish, garlic, ginger, mint, red pepper flakes and 4 tablespoons water into a paste.
4. In a 12-inch saute pan, on medium-high heat, saute onions.
5. Pour Paste into onions and stir once. Reduce into medium and cook together with lamb, water, tomato paste, coconut and spices.

Quiche

Among the ingredients I had to choose from today included about 5 pie crusts. I was thinking about lunch, and thought those pie crusts shouldn't just go toward fat pills. And I think I'm liking quiche more and more

1 1/2 cups half and half
1/2 onion, chopped
1/4 red pepper, chopped
1 teaspoon chives, chopped
6 eggs
1 pie crust
1 cup shredded cheese
1/2 cup ham-steak

1. Preheat oven to 350 F.
2. Saute onions and peppers.
3. Wisk half and half into eggs in large bowl.
4. Stir in all other ingredients and pour into pie crust.
5. Place quiche on cookie sheet and bake for 45 minutes.

Jumbalaya

DUDE!!!!!!! We sooooooooooo have stuff for dinner, just let me at that kitchen!!!!

2 tablespoons Cajun seasoning
2 tablespoons hot sauce
3 cups chicken broth
1 1/2 cups wild rice
1/2 pound shrimp
3 cups spinach
4 scallions
1/4 a red pepper
1/4 a green pepper
1/4 a white onion
1/4 red onion
2 andouille sausages
1 can black beans

1. Start rice first.  Combine broth, seasoning,  hot sauce and rice. Bring mixture to a boil and turn down to simmer immediately after for 50 minutes.
2. Chop pepper and onions and cook in saute pan until onions have browned.
3. Add spinach and cook until wilted.
4.  Boil shrimp for 5 minutes.
5. When rice is ready, combine and serve.

Switzerland

When we arrived in Switzerland (later than we were supposed to because of a 4 1/2 hour delay) we went immediately to Matt's godmother's house.  Her children greeted us warmly and we sat down to brunch. As typical of the region, we had assorted meats and cheeses with croissant and a milky bread.

For dinner we had sausages, salad, kabobs and pasta followed by plum tart with plums from the garden.

We spent the next day touring Genevea scouting out Matt's university, lake Geneva and the new Frankenstein statue. We stopped for a drink in town and decided to end our tour with gelato.

Syrups are very popular in Switzerland to flavor beverages-water, seltzer or even white wine. Matt loves to popular mint flavor and i usually get pomegranate. On that day, i tried violet and quince syrup with water. Both flavors don't seem to be at all popular in the United States so that admittedly I didn't recognize the quince fruit when it was presented to me. I have been exposed to violet before and liked the violet better, but would've preferred less syrup, or maybe more blended.

But the gelato was better! Paralleling my reading choice, I found two atypical spicy flavors which I urge everyone promote in their communities.  GINGER and CINNAMON!  God they were good!

On the third day, I SAW IT. On Matt's birthday I finally saw melted rachlette slide off the halved  cheese wheel. The cheese is traditionally served with potatoes, pearl onions and small pickles with either white wine or hot tea so it doesn't solidify in the stomach. There was Italian meat for an appetizer and the lactose intolerant, but Katie, her friend Nancy and I got a big plate to eat with the cheese.

..... 

After the third day, I stopped taking notes. However, this was not for lack of scrumy food.

We continued to eat great- Italian food. Yeah, I know,  its confusing, especially if you eat pizza in Zermatt. Why was the first restaurant we went to Italian?  Everyone knew I was looking forward to real Swiss food, geez. Just more evidence that everyone loves Italian. And Switzerland IS right next to it. We had pizza with goat cheese, panchetta and Gorgonzola.

On the Friday before we left,  we redeemed one of Matt's best birthday present.  We got the gourmet package at St. Christophe, which included a gourmet meal and a one night stay in the castle.  For the amuse-bouche, a triangle of toast with sun-dried tomato yogurt and a thick potato chip. Then we had salmon trout with fennel and grapefruit in a balsamic reduction, a entree of beef with broad beans and scallion crepes, and dessert of apricot parfait with chewy meringue and sugar work.  Saving the best for last, homemade pear liqueur.

In the morning,  we woke up to breakfast overlooking the medieval courtyard with a backdrop of mountains.
With all that good food, it might be a wonder why my favorite day surrounded a very rustic meal. On Sunday,  we went to Matt's hometown and had a day long meal with his aunt. We had the traditional Rachlette meal, this time all of it. The first course was rice, string beans and grilled meat. Then the cheese course followed by ice cream with black currant jam from the garden. We also had dried sage tea.

Passion fruit lassi

1 tablespoon monkfruit sugar
1 teaspoon ginger
1 cup passion fruit yogurt
1/2 cup milk

1. Blend and enjoy!

Dutch

This took me a bit...but just a hour or so. We were having burgers for dinner; but how should I dress it up? Which country should I choose? We had gouda and I wanted to use that.  So, dutch. The Netherlands is historically connected to Indonesia, so the burger now had to include Indonesian spices. I also suggest eating them with fries slathered in mayonnaise.

3 pounds ground beef

1 cup Heineken

1/2 onion

1 teaspoon ginger, cardamom, cumin, coriander, nutmeg, gloves, turmeric

1. Marinate separated meat in beer, onion, spice mixture for 1/2 hour.

2. Form patties and cook.