Posted in cakes, fruit desserts, tagged citrus bundt cake, citrus butter cake, citrus cake, double glazed key lime bundt cake, key lime cake, lime bundt cake, lime butter cake, lime cake on March 31, 2017| Leave a Comment »
After a month of chocolate recipes followed by a bunch of beer recipes and a few Italian dishes for good measure, I was in the mood for something light, bright and tangy. Something citrus, puckery citrus. Something that screamed “Spring!!” at the top of its lungs. A tender, buttery bundt cake sounded pretty good too. Let’s combine the two, shall we?
Posted in breakfast items, cakes, fruit desserts, tagged blueberry breakfast cake, blueberry cake, blueberry ricotta cake, blueberry snack cake, brown butter, brown butter blueberry ricotta cake, brown butter cake, ricotta brunch cake, ricotta cake, ricotta dessert on March 3, 2017| 2 Comments »
I spend an inordinate amount of my time dealing with leftovers, which is funny because I don’t particularly care for them. Once I eat a meal, I’m done with very few exceptions. If I have people over for dinner, out comes my stash of takeout and deli containers, everything is neatly packed and labeled and goes out the door with my guests. I don’t want to see it again. But the bulk of my leftover issues lately are ingredients; an endless parade of bags, tubs and boxes of stuff. I develop recipes and every project typically involves a few shopping trips and a whole new set of ingredients. Once the project is complete, usually after several weeks, I have a dining room table full of stuff. Stuff I have to deal with quickly because the next project is usually on the horizon. I often joke that I’m going to have a “Kathy’s Pop Up Store of Half Used Bags of Stuff” in my dining room once a month. Come one, come all!
Posted in fruit desserts, holidays, pastry, pies, seasonal, tagged cranberry crumble tart, cranberry desserts, cranberry tart, holiday desserts, polenta tart crust, thanksgiving desserts on November 22, 2016| Leave a Comment »
When it comes to cranberry sauce on my Thanksgiving table, I’m a traditionalist. I make this triple cranberry sauce every year. Made with fresh cranberries, dried cranberries and cranberry juice it is bright, full of flavor and I love it. I might make a second one, spiced with ginger or zapped with horseradish or whatnot to mix it up, but the triple-cranberry version is non-negotiable. I might even make an allowance for a canned jelly, which is as much a tradition in some families as the turkey, but a whole berry, chunky sauce is a must have. Regardless of which direction you go, canned or homemade, we can all agree that cranberry sauce in some manner is required, especially on a leftover turkey sandwich. But what about cranberries in other parts of the meal? Like dessert? This year I decided to try something different and came up with a cranberry tart to cap the meal. I have to say, I’m quite happy with the results.
Posted in breakfast items, cakes, fruit desserts, pastry, pies, tagged german apple cheesecake torte, german apple pie, german apple torte, german pastry recipes, german quark torte, quark apple cheesecake, quark recipes, teahouse recipes on September 30, 2016| 2 Comments »
I’ve been doing quite a bit of recipe development work lately which is great but there is always the same end result: piles of random, leftover ingredients. The bags and boxes are open so I can’t donate them to the food pantry and it’s often too much for me to work through, knowing the next assignment is coming down the pike with even more stuff. In fact today, the FedEx guy delivered a 15 pound box of even more stuff from a client. Of the 9 things in the box, I really only need 2 of them and I’m not really sure why their light brown sugar is better or different than the brown sugar I have. But it is not for me to decide these things; I’ll use it at some point. The 5 pounds of lecithin, I’m not so sure. I’ve joked with my friends that when this round is over I’m going to have a pop-up grocery store in my dining room. Half filled bags of stuff for cheap! Kathy’s Store of Cheap Random Crap. C’mon down!
Posted in breads, cakes, fruit desserts, tagged fresh mango coconut teacake, fresh mango dessert recipes, fresh mango recipes, mango coconut cake, tropical mango bread on August 12, 2016| 1 Comment »
I’m feeling rather tropical as of late. Must be the heat or maybe its the 24-hour cycle of Olympic events from Rio that is emanating from every electronic device I own. All this broadcasting from Copacabana Beach is making me crave tropical drinks with long straws and plastic monkey decorations like nobody’s business. A recent stop at the local produce market persuaded me to grab case of ripe mangoes bought on the cheap. I can never resist a deal. I immediately ate one warm out of the case, sticky orange juice running down my arm. The next day, I did the same thing with a cold one. I like them better cold. Two down, six to go. I made some coconut sticky rice and sliced the third one on top. Five left.
Posted in fruit desserts, tagged cool summer desserts, cool tropical summer desserts, fresh pineapple desserts, kaffir lime leaf simple syrup, lemongrass kaffir lime leaf sauce, lemongrass simple syrup, pineapple with lemongrass lime leaf syrup on August 2, 2016| 2 Comments »
During these long hot days of summer my cooking mojo takes a nose dive. I don’t feel like doing much of anything and the thought of turning on the oven makes me cringe. Case in point: this weekend I baked two slab pies for a party that were delicious if incredibly frustrating. Hot kitchen and cold dough are not compatible in any way. It was a struggle that required a nap directly in front of a fan to cool down. While the pies were enthusiastically greeted at the party, I ditched them on the buffet table and immediately went to the bar to calm my overheated nerves. Not wanting to repeat that situation, today I wanted something sweet but something easy and nothing that would work up a sweat. I dug around in my unusually well stocked refrigerator, the result of enthusiastic shopping trips and the lack of energy to do much with my purchases. There was a pineapple with unfulfilled ambitions and a bunch of lemongrass that was supposed to go in something I never made. I looked at my little windowsill lime leaf tree and a decision was made.
Posted in fruit desserts, tagged banana leaf packets, charred rice, coconut rice & banana, Grilled Coconut Sticky Rice and Banana Packets, grilled sticky rice, thai desserts, thai grilled desserts, thai rice desserts on July 26, 2016| 1 Comment »
A few years ago I was in Bangkok, suffering from some tremendously awful jetlag. After a full, hard day of work in a foreign and unfamiliar kitchen, I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep so around 1am I gave up and decided to explore. I caught a cab and told the driver to take me to the Flower Market (Pak Khlong Talat) which I read doesn’t really get hopping until 2am or later. If I couldn’t sleep, at least I’d see part of the city as my sight seeing had been pretty limited up to that point.
