Cooking from Scratch
Did you ever have a recipe that you knew would be good, but didn’t have the ingredients to try it? We did. We saw this recipe, if you can call it that, several years ago in The Cowgirl Creamery Cooks, by Sue Conley and Peggy Smith, and knew immediately that we’d try it. But before we did, we’d have to get the ingredients.
Continue reading “Brie Layered with Wild Mushrooms”
We’re not really sure when we last had twice-baked potatoes. Definitely many years ago, and most likely at some restaurant, long since forgotten. But, then, just a few weeks ago, when we were at a farmers’ market, one of the sellers mentioned that she’d made twice-baked potatoes from those tiny fingerling potatoes, and that they were a great hit at Thanksgiving. Never wanting to let an idea like that go to waste, we figured, hey, we can make twice-baked potatoes, too. While we don’t have fingerling potatoes, we do have little Yukon Gold potatoes that’ll work.
Continue reading “Twice-Baked Potatoes”
After making the Eggplant Pie, we had enough crust left over for another pie. We thought about putting the crust in the freezer for later, but we waited a day to see if we could come up with an immediate use. We thought about a fruit pie, or perhaps a custard pie, but, as you can see from the title we settled on Potato Pie. So, what, exactly, is Potato Pie? We had no clue, except that it contained potatoes. In fact, we made up the idea of Potato Pie on the notion that it sounded like it might be good. Then all we had to do was come up with something resembling a recipe!
We’re in the process of putting together a dinner for about 25 people. Nothing super-fancy, but something nice, and, we hope, good. One thing that we really like to do when making food for others is to try it out in advance. That way, there won’t be any surprises (in this case, there was a small hitch, necessitating a change in schedule; more about that later).
Continue reading “Staff Lasagna”
We looked and we couldn’t believe it! We’ve never covered what’s probably the most common filling for pasta — ravioli, tortellini, stuffed shells, cannelloni, and what we hope to make tomorrow, caramelle — ricotta cheese filling. Never heard of caramelle? Well, just tune in tomorrow and you can see what they are, or, if our plans don’t go that well, perhaps you’ll see a real big mess.
Continue reading “Simple Cheese Filling for Pasta”
We went with a leek and cheese pie for our main for Christmas dinner, and, in many respects, we’re glad we did, because right during the middle of preparing dinner, our electricity went out. Having one of those all-electric houses, that could have spelled disaster. But, luckily for us, the pie had already been in the oven for about 30 minutes (of the 60 needed) and the residual heat baked it enough. Of course, our side dish was another story.
Continue reading “Leek and Cheese Pie”
Making cheese at home seems unrealistic, doesn’t it? We mean, it just seems as though some sort of alchemy takes place that’s beyond the realm of mortals like us. Well, it may seem that way, but think about the names of some cheeses: farmer’s cheese, cottage cheese, for instance; both refer to where they were made. So, it’s obvious that at least some cheeses were made on farms or in cottages and probably at home, too. Let’s try scratchin’ out an easy one.
Continue reading “Homemade Cream Cheese”