Plum-Almond Cake

I have to admit that I've never really cared for plums.  Unless you get a perfect one, they're often tart and mealy.  Although the plums we get in our CSA share are better than most, some of them are less than perfect and my threshold for less-than-perfection in plums is pretty low.

Which is why I put them into a cake.

Butternut Blondies

I’ve never been a fan of blondies. They’re usually just overly sweet little blobs packed with white chocolate chunks (which I do not at all care for) and maybe some nuts. There’s no real flavor there, at least not in any of the blondies I’ve ever eaten to date, and, as a result, I’ve never been compelled to make my own.

That is, up until last week, when I somehow stumbled upon a recipe for butternut squash blondies. The recipe looked weird, though – strange proportions and the inclusion of those dreaded white chocolate chips – so I took the basic idea and set about crafting my own recipe.

Mango-Pistachio Crunch Cake (Mom's Birthday Cake)

Today is my mom's birthday, and what sweeter way to celebrate than with a cake made just to suit her palate. 

My mom loves mango, pistachios, saffron, and cardamom, and I've made her birthday cake using these ingredients in previous years.  But this year, I wanted to shake up this cake, and this is what I came up with.

Chioggia Beet and Yellow Plum Salad

Well look who it is.  I'm back from my accidental hiatus, and I've got a ton of recipes to post courtesy of the cupcakes I made for Matt's brother's wedding and some excellent meals I've made courtesy of my CSA share.  I have no real reason for disappearing other than neglect and preoccupation with other things, but I've refocused and am hoping to get back into my regular blogging groove once again.

First up: this simple yet stunning salad.  It came together on a whim while I was searching my fridge for items to make into a pretty plated salad.

Blood Orange, Olive, and Arugula Salad

I've recently developed a minor obsession with citrus.  This may be (largely) due to the fact that, for more than a month now,  it's been freezing and snowy and slushy and gray.  When did I move to a strange hybrid of Seattle and Minneapolis?  But my daily 3 pm Cara Cara orange always seems to make me oblivious to the nasty conditions outside.

Despite of the lack of local fruit this time of year (I know there are lots of apples in cold storage, but I really cannot eat another apple for a long time - we were getting 8 pounds a week from our CSA for nearly two months and we ate every single one of them and I am surprised we did not turn into apples), February is the perfect time of year for out of the ordinary citrus: Meyer lemons and Cara Cara and Moro (aka blood) oranges.  All of them are head and shoulders above their run-of-the-mill counterparts, so I try to indulge in them as much as possible for the few weeks I can find them.

Frosty's Flipped Fruitcake and The Brooklyn Holiday Experiment

Poor fruitcake. It's always the butt of jokes this time of year, and, unfortunately, for good reason: it's usually dense, booze-soaked but somehow dry in texture, and filled with frightening artificially colored candied fruits. But fruitcake doesn't have to be such a disaster. It can be good - even delicious - if it's approached with a fresh perspective.

Photo from Metromix NY

Last week, I reinvented fruitcake for The Brooklyn Holiday Experiment and with great results - the judges awarded it third place.  Redemption for fruitcake! 

Mizuna and Pear Salad with Goat Cheese Croquettes

Ever since I joined my CSA, I’ve been forced to cook around the ingredients I get each week instead of coming up with ideas and then shopping for them. I’m usually fine with this, as I always cook vegetarian and therefore use tons of vegetables, but some weeks have proven challenging – like the ones where all I get are leafy greens.

Last week was another greens-filled week. Among the bounty was mizuna, escarole, and bok choy, and I had gotten Swiss chard and romaine lettuce the prior week (half of which is still in my fridge…thankfully CSA/greenmarket produce is so fresh that it lasts longer in the fridge than supermarket produce, which is already many days, if not more than a week old by the time you get it). I transformed the escarole and bok choy into a stir fry (along with some green beans – another CSA share item – and tofu) but the mizuna stayed in the fridge. It’s still there, as Matt and I were away last weekend so there went a good four meals through which I could’ve used up a lot of last week’s haul. And let’s not talk about the huge bag of apples and pears that is going to turn into mush any second now.

Hand-Cut Pesto

Two summers ago, I discovered the magic of hand-cut pesto. I had just moved back to Brooklyn from Baltimore and I was visiting Matt in Baltimore for the weekend.  We had made a trip to the Waverly Farmers Market on a Saturday morning - one of our favorite things to do in Baltimore - and returned home with a ton of produce, among which was a huge bunch of basil and purple string beans (like green beans, but purple!)

One of my favorite pasta dishes is Trofie Genovese, which I discovered at Supper restaurant in the East Village (it used to be my favorite Italian place in NYC but for a variety of reasons, I won't go there anymore.  Feel free to ask me why).  It's a blend of trofie, a thin corkscrew pasta, pesto, green beans, and cubes of potatoes - a very simple dish, but when done well, it's delicious.  I hadn't had this in ages so I decided to create it myself using the purple string beans and basil from the market along with some amazing pasta and cheese from Mastellone's.  There was just one problem - Matt didn't have a food processor or chopper with which to make the pesto.

Pasta with Fava Beans, Sugar Snap Peas, and Pistachio Pesto

It was 103 degrees in NYC yesterday so there was no way in the world I was going to stand in the kitchen any longer than absolutely necessary.  We live on the 4th floor of a small walkup building and it gets – and stays – really hot in our apartment.  Combine that with the fact our air conditioners are small units that are not really capable of cooling down a 100 degree room and you have a recipe for a very hands-off dinner.

Eating out and a big salad were not options (the former because we have so much produce from our CSA share and the latter because we had already had one for lunch), nor were turning on the oven or anything that needed more than 20 minutes on the stove so as to not overheat the apartment or the person standing over the stove in the kitchen (which would be me).

Blood Orange Olive Oil Cake with Candied Pistachios

Early March is generally pretty dreary here in NYC - as evidenced by the past few days of horribly grey and wet weather - but there is something that comes around every year at this time to (temporarily) lift the doldrums: citrus. Sure, you can get navel oranges and pink grapefruits year-round, but it's only for this brief period in the late winter that we New Yorkers can readily get our hands on Meyer lemons, blood oranges, Cara Cara oranges, and Key limes.

There's something about these ephemeral citrus species that just works wonders in lifting my mood. Maybe it's their exotic flavors or their fleeting nature, but it always is such a treat to be able to indulge in the sweet, bright, and not-too-tart flavor of the aforementioned fruit. Of them, I'm particularly fond of blood oranges - aside from their wonderful flavor, their ruby red flesh is so dramatic and there's something amazing about a fruit that can stain your hands and your cutting boards.

Pear, Pomegranate, and Pistachio Salad

It seems that January is the month of eating well and detox, at least according to my friends and a bunch of food publications.  I guess after all the sweets and booze of December’s holiday parties, we feel the need to negate the damage with healthy foods, and salad is usually the first thing that comes to mind.

Baked Figs with Honeyed Goat Cheese and Walnuts

Here’s another one from Thanksgiving – I know I’m totally behind, no need to remind me.

Since I’m feeling lazy (which is not really news, I’m generally fairly lazy, I don’t quite understand how I can be both lazy and hyperactive, but I am), there’s no story on this. It just sounded like a good idea at the time, and it worked out really well (phew).

Cranberry, Pear, and Almond Frangipane Tart

So it’s January and I’m still posting my Thanksgiving recipes…..

Anyhow, this one was actually a last minute addition to the Thanksgiving menu. There was a total of 15 of us and I realized that one apple pie and one pumpkin cheesecake would be just enough for everyone, and, of course, just you don’t want just barely enough of anything you’re serving – you want to make sure there’s plenty to go around. I wasn’t quite sure what to make that would be Thanksgiving-y, and it occurred to me that I should use cranberries seeing as how they weren’t on the main menu.

Pistachio Cardamom Shortbread Cookies

Happy new year! I know I’ve been totally slacking on posting regularly, but I’ve come up with a few ideas to maximize my use of time, so hopefully I won’t be as negligent on here anymore (at least not for the next few months…I also have to kick the wedding planning into high gear – I’m getting married in eight months!)

Anyway, a few weekends ago, I went on a baking bender and made tons of cookies for a friend's family's holiday party as well as to take down to my fiance's family's house for Christmas (I still can’t reconcile palm trees + Christmas lights). Among the many cookies I made were these little shortbread cookies.

Brown Sugar-Hazelnut Cupcakes with Blackberry Buttercream Frosting

Update: these cupcakes were selected as one of the 20 best potluck recipes by the New York Times Magazine!  Make sure to check out all 20 recipes and read the related article by Amanda Hesser.


I don’t want to play favorites, but I’m going to have to: this here is my favorite cupcake to date. It’s actually my favorite cake (I’ve made it a few times before), but because I wasn’t in the mood to make a full-out layer cake (nor did I think it would be a good idea to have my favorite cake sitting in my apartment), I decided to just turn the cake into cupcakes.

Lady Baltimore and Lord Baltimore Cupcakes

Tomorrow is a big day in Baltimore – the running of the 133rd Preakness takes place tomorrow evening (and I’m going!). Although this race might not be as glamorous as its counterpart in Kentucky, it’s certainly not devoid of class, refinement, or traditions – you better believe I’ll be wearing a pretty dress, heels, and a big hat decorated with ribbon and flowers, as will countless other women at the event.

And while the Kentucky Derby may have the mint julep, Preakness also has an official drink, and it’s named for Maryland’s state flower: the Black-Eyed Susan. A mixture of vodka, light rum, Cointreau, orange juice, and pineapple juice, the Black-Eyed Susan sounds tasty as an afternoon cocktail (I’ll find out how it tastes tomorrow), but not so much as a cupcake to serve at the pre-Preakness party I’m hosting at my place tomorrow afternoon before my friends and I head up to Pimlico in our sharp attire.

Earl Grey Cake with Kumquat Marmalade and Almond Meringue Buttercream

My brother celebrated his birthday last weekend, and, of course, I offered to make him a cake. He loves Earl Grey tea, so he requested that the cake somehow incorporate this flavor. After some brainstorming, I came up with the idea to flavor the cake itself with the tea. I like to make my cakes such that they have some sort of fruit filling and, if it works, some sort of nut on top of a flavored frosting. For this cake, I picked kumquats because their tart citrus flavor would complement the bergamot in the tea, and almonds for their mild nuttiness.

This cake isn’t very hard to make, but, as I learned while making it, you should definitely make the kumquat marmalade in advance – between the slicing and seeding, simmering, reducing of the syrup, and cooling, it takes a good 2 hours. The marmalade can be made up to a week in advance, and you should definitely make it before you start making the cake. (Learn from my mistakes!) 

Goodnight Rose Cupcakes (Pistachio Cardamom Cupcakes with Rosewater Meringue Buttercream Frosting)

I was kind of bored the other night and decided that I was going to make interesting cupcakes despite the fact that my beloved KitchenAid mixer has been dead for the past month and its replacement is nowhere in sight. I’ve been on a bit of a rose water kick lately, so I decided to use a combination of flavors that are very common in Indian and Middle Eastern sweets: rose water, pistachio, and cardamom. Because the flavors are so delicate, I decided on a chiffon cupcake, but coming up with the recipe took me a while because I couldn’t find anything decent on which to base mine. After much scientific analysis (ha ha, not really) and studying of other recipes, I came up with these. (The cakes are best within 2 days of baking them – their texture is very delicate and light but they start to lose that quality after a few days.)

These might be my favorite cupcakes that I have made to date - the silkiness of the floral meringue buttercream beautifully complements these delicately fragrant and nutty cupcakes, and the finished product is really just so pretty and perfect for a special occasion (or just a boring Wednesday night).And if you’re wondering about the name, it’s because I’ve been listening to way too much Ryan Adams lately, and I found the name to be perfectly fitting.

Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Hazelnuts and Pomegranate

And another recipe for brussels sprouts. They have gotten a bad rap for so many years because they haven’t been cooked the right way. These little green guys deserve better treatment than being dunked in or suspended over boiling water.

A little coating of oil and a hot oven is what they need, and they will shine if you do so. Once you’ve done that, the possibilities are endless. They’re great on their own, but they can take on a whole new persona with the addition of a few extra ingredients. I love a traditional treatment of walnuts and parmesan, but I’ve recently experimented (and with success, I think) with some different dressings.

Honey-Glazed Bartlett Pear, Gorgonzola, and Walnut Salad

This is the first course I served for my Thanksgiving dinner. It’s a salad I’ve been making for years, but this year, I made it a little better by using gorgonzola dolce, which is aged for less time than regular gorgonzola cheese, making it milder and softer; it goes especially well with pears.