Come Through the Gate and into the Garden
All the wonderful things coming out of my kitchen
It is a simple thing to make lobster salad. Take the meat from the shells (a chef’s knife is all that is necessary) and chop, add homemade mayonnaise, celery, lemon and season to taste. It is a short jump to a lobster roll. Toast a buttered hotdog roll, add a bit of buttery, bib lettuce and pile with your lobster salad. This can be a contentious recipe, celery or no celery, etc. but as a Southerner, I have no dog in the fight. Enjoy!
Tempura is such a pretty, delicate dish. Replacing some of the water with vodka reduces the formation of gluten and ensures a crispy coating.
Love to bake these crispy, flavorful crackers. They are made of yeast dough from a recipe by Martha Stewart in her Baking Handbook. I find that I need to let the dough come to room temperature when it’s removed from the fridge or it will spring back too much to roll. They need to be rolled very thin to be crisp enough. Great with cheese.
Just picked and none the worse for the extreme heat we have had. I shall top it with grilled skirt steak, whip up a balsamic vinaigrette. Perfect dinner.
These are the classic macaroons made from the recipe on the bag of Baker’s Angel Flake coconut. Simple and delicious.
Make zoodles! Sauté them in olive oil with garlic in a really hot cast iron skillet and they’re delicious. Or coat them with egg, then dust them with a bit of flour and pan fry them. Crispy and decadent.
The first step is to cook the polenta. I use 4 cups of water to 1 cup of corn. My favorite is Rustic Integrale Polenta from http://ansonmills.com It is coarse with flecks of color and full of rich, corn flavor. I slowly add the corn while stirring to make certain it doesn’t clump
and then cook it for about an hour. I check the seasoning, adding salt if necessary, and a knob of grass-fed butter. Then I pour it into a buttered half-sheet pan, cover it with plastic and put it in the fridge to set. When I want to serve it, I tak
e it out, cut it into wedges and fry it in a little olive oil in a cast iron skillet until it’s crispy on the outside and creamy on the inside. It’s the perfect side with a roasted chicken and a fresh, green salad.
I have used the old Joy of Cooking “Rich Roll Cookies” recipe for years. It is so simple and so good. It’s basically flour, egg, sugar and butter and holds its shape beautifully when cut.
My husband wanted another round of the sandwiches and scones we had for Afternoon Tea yesterday and, being an obliging wife, that is what I made for him. We had butter and Little Scarlet strawberry conserve on our scones this time. So delicious.
We couldn’t pass up Afternoon Tea Week. It rained (at last!) all day yesterday and was the perfect day for baking. So, I baked cookies and scones. I also made tea sandwiches. There were ham ones, and cheese and tomato ones, and cucumber ones. So dainty. So delicious. We also had clotted cream and the strawberry jam I made this summer.