Category Archives: Easy

Lamb Steaks with Herbs and Caramelized Garlic

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Truth be told, we eat more red meat as as a flavoring in a pasta sauce or a stir-fry than we do as the straight-up center of attention. However, Lamb Steaks with Herbs and Caramelized Garlic make a great indulgence, especially with the Puglian wrinkle of using olive oil scented with rosemary, sage and thyme instead of a butter sauce.  The aroma of lemon, herbs and olive oil is a Proustian ticket to the sun-drenched Adriatic coast of your choice–and you’ll definitely want some bread to mop everything up.

What the world needs now is. . . Goat’s Milk Panna Cotta with Star Anise and Grape Compote.

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Another panna cotta recipe?  Really?

As well ask, Does the world need another saxophone riff?  Another short story?  Another poem?  Of course it does.  Look, if you’re filleting fugu or sautéing false morels (not advised), you want a recipe nazi with hairy calves and an I summitted K2 without O2 tattoo.   But panna cotta?  Ah, no.  Panna cotta is a melody that invites riffing, if only because sometimes no matter how wonderful the last iteration, the simple tune of cooked cream cries out for variation, a what if . . .  and because sometimes things just don’t work the way the recipe says they should, so you need to improvise.  That’s how we ended up with Goat’s Milk Panna Cotta with Star Anise and Grape Compote.

Slow-Roasted Plum Tomatoes with Herb Salt

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Give me one good reason why anyone would choose to cook tomatoes at the very apex of their season, especially for for four hours?  

Okay, here’s one: Slow-Roasted Plum Tomatoes with Herb Salt.

Plum tomatoes are the different tomatoes of the pomodoro world.  Not inferior, just different.  Consumed raw, their virtues remain hidden, but when roasted slowly they soften to the consistency of butter.  Spread them on good bread, give them a quick chop to help them morph into a quick sauce.  As a contribution to a picnic where everyone is assembling a plate of goodies, or as a high class sumpin’-sumpin’ with olives and shaved Pecorino Romano before dinner, they will provoke applause.

Unfortunately, they’re also addictive.

Grilled Figs with Crème Fraîche and Chestnut Honey

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Grilled Figs with Creme Fraiche and Chestnut Honey.  What??!!  Two desserts in a row, what are Ken and Jody coming to?   Nothing spectacular–the blog reflects what we eat, and during August we eat a lot from the grill, including dessert.  I tumbled on to grilling figs one hot summer night when we were already planning on cheese and fruit for dessert and I had both figs and grill at the ready.  Hmm, I wonder what these would taste like?  Depends on how you feel about intense little packets of sweetness crusted with bits of caramelized fig sugar.  You will find no dessert with as high a ratio of taste to ease as this week’s recipe.

Coconut Yogurt Cake with Roasted Peaches

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Jody and I both like simple, unfussy desserts with a couple of dominant flavors that compliment each other.  A couple of weeks ago I laid my hands on a quart of wild blueberries, so my original vision for this included a wild blueberry compote.  Jody, however, wanted to go with peaches.  Since I couldn’t get my hands on any wild blueberries for the day we were scheduled to blog, she won.  This is a simple Coconut Yogurt Cake with Roasted Peaches.  The crumb is moist, with a rich with coconut flavor.  And the peach accompaniment, oh man.

Grilled Corn with Pepper Pecorino Butter

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If you give a mouse an ear of grilled corn, he’s going to want some grilled peppers to go with it.  Or vice versa.  The peppers have been so beautiful of late that we can’t stop eating them, or trying to figure out what else to eat with them.  Now that corn is coming into view one of the treats of the season is Grilled Corn with Pepper Pecorino Butter.

Grilled Lamb Blade Chops with Hot Mint Chutney

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Nobody hates lamb blade chops.  People either love them, or they’ve never heard of them.  Viewed from a diner’s perspective, lamb blade chops are to loin chops as  pork ribs are to pork loin.  There’s fat, gristle, a bit of bone, and you need to work a bit more to get the good stuff.  The reward is heaps of flavor.  If you fall into the never-heard-of-’em group, then this week’s Grilled Lamb Blade Chops with Hot Mint Chutney is your opportunity to step-away from the fancy-dress dinner party of loin chops, leave your champagne flute of civilisation on the veranda, and stride across the lawn through the baffled croquet players as you peel off your tuxedo and enter the forest.

Torchio Pasta with Squash Blossoms

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Oh, the birds and the bees, you gotta love ’em, especially if you enjoy eating things like this week’s dish, Torchio Pasta with Squash Blossoms.  After Jody’s rant last week about the tyranny of seasonality, we’re presenting another dish that is, well, seasonal.  But move fast, the season for squash blossoms is here and gone in the blink of an eye and you’ll have to wait another year for the opportunity to enjoy their delicate flavor fried, stuffed or, as we do here, expressed in a light pasta sauce.

Roast Chicken with Muhammara

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What???!!!  There’s a Garum Factory post in my mailbox?  Boy, did this week fly by!  

I hate to break the news, but it’s still Wednesday.  We’re running a couple of days ahead of schedule because this weekend is the PanMass Challenge bicycle ride for the Dana Farber Cancer Institute–and Team Rialto-Trade is a big participant.   I wish I could thank each and every one of our contributors in persons–Thank you! Thank you! Thank you!  

And now, back to the food…

Muhummara, a spicy ground walnut and pepper paste, has been on my post list for some time.  We’ve got some more grilled items coming up and I didn’t want the month of August to be all-grill, all-the time, so while Jody’s notes may suggest that this is more appropriate for December of February, ask yourself, When is a roast chicken ever the wrong thing to make?”   The answer is never.  

Grilled Mussels with Coconut Curry Broth

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Grilled Mussels with Coconut Curry Broth–what more is there to say?  Last summer we did a piece about grilling clams.  Mussels–and oysters–work the same way.  You pop them on a hot grill and wait.  When they open, they’re done.  We’re talking about very lightly grilled seafood here.  As you can see from the pictures, Jody first made the coconut curry broth.  Then we grilled the mussels (no, really, we grilled the mussels).  If you’re deft with a pair of tongs you can get the mussels off the grill and into the coconut broth with minimal loss of mussel juice. Toss the mussels with the herbs and the coconut broth and Bob’s your uncle.