December 2009

Celery Root Mash

December 28, 2009

Celeriac, or celery root, is a rather ugly veggie.  In fact, it might win the prize for the ugliest produce in the grocery store.  It’s gnarly (that’s really the best word to describe it), with all sorts of bumps and almost hair-like roots sticking out, but don’t let that deter you!  For underneath that rough [...]

2 comments

Holiday Macarons Making

December 25, 2009

Third time is a charm….well almost…. you see, I just HAD to make macarons for Christmas.  Mainly because the recipe I was using for dessert, poached apples filled with frangipane pastry cream, called for crushed macarons.  While I could have “cheated” and bought some at the store, I have had a really hard time here [...]

4 comments

Chicken Cordon Bleu

December 23, 2009

This dish is never served in restaurants anymore.  It’s a total throwback to decades ago, and today it seems that it only appears at conference dinners at hotels.  Nothing against mass produced hotel dinners, some of them can really be quite good, but unless a place is particularly reputed for their food, not many people [...]

2 comments

Creamy Béchemel, Gluten Free

December 21, 2009

French cooking has 4 basic “mother sauces” – béchemel, allemande, velouté, and espagnole (though sometimes hollandaise is on the list too), and this one takes what I consider the richest of them and makes it richer.  I found this recipe in my mom’s 40+ year old Gourmet cookbook and oh is this good.  I don’t [...]

3 comments

Photoshop to the Rescue: Non-Ideal Lighting

December 19, 2009

Everyone knows that the best situation for photographing is during the day with a great amount of natural light flooding through the windows that can be shaded or diffused as needed but nevertheless shines a pure white color on your delicious freshly made food.  If food blogging isn’t your career (and even if it is), [...]

6 comments

Pear Tart and a Gluten Free Puff Pastry Attempt

December 18, 2009

Puff pastry seems like it should be easy to adapt to be gluten free.  After all, the gluten isn’t involved in the “puffing”, all that work is done by the layers of butter within the dough and the steam pockets that arise because of it while baking.    However, searching online yields very limited results [...]

13 comments

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