Archive for the 'family dinner' Category
Pan Roasted Chicken
March 2nd, 2010by Lisa
This is one of the easiest & fastest ways to prepare chicken in the winter, and it has the added virtue of being really adaptable. It’s not a recipe, but a technique, so you can use whatever cuts of chicken your family likes best, whatever fresh or dried herbs you prefer, and add a [...]
Pasta with Beets for Valentine’s Day
February 14th, 2010by Caroline
There was a time when Valentine’s Day had me making heart-shaped chocolate sandwich cookies, or even, just a few weeks before Ben was born, brownie ice cream sandwiches (I’ll never forget the lady who saw me standing in the ice cream aisle — I was looking for flavor inspiration — and commented, “It’s a [...]
Chard & Walnut Lasagna
February 1st, 2010by Caroline
It seems amazing to me that three and a half years ago, I began a blog post, “Ben’s not a picky eater…” What happened?! One day he was eating toasts spread with goat cheese and eggplant caviar and then, one by one, foods started to leave his diet. I wonder sometimes about the impact [...]
Fresh Fettucine, with Cream Sauce
January 18th, 2010By Lisa
I used to make fresh pasta a lot. As in once a week. Before kids, or when Ella was very little, it was easy to whip up a batch of fresh pasta for dinner, even for a first course. Fresh, it’s like nothing else in the world, and I even got good at making [...]
Winter Citrus Pasta
January 12th, 2010by Lisa
This recipe is an adaptation from my favorite cooking magazine: La Cucina Italiana. Sometimes the recipes are complicated and not friendly for weeknights or busy families, but the articles and pictures are terrific, and the recipes often astonishing.
Our orange tree is reaching its peak, and on a very rainy Saturday afternoon, this dish looked [...]
Tomato Confit
December 28th, 2009by Lisa
For two years now, I’ve served my Christmas filet with tomato confit. It’s totally delicious, sweet, herbaceous, jammy concoction that is pretty and complex enough for your holiday table.
But every year I have way too much left over. This year, I halved the recipe and still had too much, and so when we were [...]
Holiday Dining: Eating In
December 28th, 2009by Lisa
We are, when it comes to Christmas menus, a family of traditions. Though the side dishes and exact preparation may change from year to year, if my mother, my sister, or I are cooking, the meal is alway anchored by a beef filet. It’s a really expensive cut of meat, but our gatherings are [...]
Thanksgiving Favorites, Old and New: Kale Salad and Lemon-Parsley Stuffing
December 1st, 2009by Caroline
Like Lisa, I had a Thanksgiving without cooking, but my younger son and I were both too sick for me to be thankful for it. Instead, I was thankful for my sister’s oven repairman, and her own ability to produce several dozen of my mom’s wheat germ rolls, two pies, a pumpkin-ginger cheesecake, roasted [...]
Thanksgiving Without An Oven?
November 24th, 2009by Caroline
We alternate Thanksgivings either back east with my family, or in a beach rental here in California. For years, we shared the beach rental with my late mother-in-law, who would scout the rental kitchen ahead of time and pack boxes with good knives, mixing bowls, and her big white KitchenAid mixer, not to mention [...]
Something New for Dinner: Soba Noodles with Roasted Squash & Tofu
November 17th, 2009by Caroline
Like any family, we fall in to dinner ruts, when I feel like our meals fall into two categories: something with rice or something with pasta. This is exacerbated by the fact that I’m feeding two fairly picky eaters, and of course we are also limiting ourselves by choosing not to eat meat or [...]