Sour cherries are revered for their tart taste, aroma, and flavor. They're a special fruit with lots of versatility in both sweet and savory recipes. In Hungary, sour cherries are king in early summer. They're too tart to enjoy fresh, though some people do eat them that way. Sour cherries are much better in recipes: tarts, pies, cakes, compotes, brandied cherries—these are some popular recipes. Here in the States sour cherries are pretty rare and hard to find, and their season is short, but they are in season now. If you look hard enough you'll find these red jewels in farmers' markets, especially on the East coast.
I love sour cherries in every which way, especially in sweet recipes, like pie and even soup. When I was a kid my mom would make sour cherry cakes and tarts, but she almost always used canned or jarred cherries, because it was difficult to find fresh ones. Luckily for me, I picked up two quarts of sour cherries at Cheerful Cherry Farm at the Union Square Greenmarket this past week. Immediately all the possibilities of what to make swirled in my mind. But I knew that making a sour cherry cake like my mom's would be the perfect choice.
Retro Recipes and Traditional Fare
Retro Recipes and Traditional Fare
The Monte Cristo Sandwich
A Monte Cristo consists of ham, turkey or chicken, and Swiss cheese sandwiched between two slices of white or challah bread that is dipped in an egg batter, then grilled or fried in butter until golden brown. It is often dusted with confectioners’ sugar and served with a side of red currant jelly.
The Monte Cristo is an American version of the Croque-Monsieur, the famed French grilled cheese and ham sandwich that is fried in clarified butter. The sandwich first appeared on the menu at Gordon’s, a restaurant on Wilshire Boulevard in Los Angeles, but it didn't get its big break until Disneyworld got involved. When the Blue Bayou Restaurant in the Pirates of the Caribbean put the Monte Cristo on its menu, its popularity soared.
I hadn't eaten a Monte Cristo since I was a kid, and I didn't remember particularly loving it. My, how things have changed. This sandwich has it all: it's sweet, salty, and chewy. It's addictive.
Cauliflower Mock Mashed Potatoes
Holidays can be treacherous times for anyone trying to shed weight…unless you’ve learned how to fill yourself up and fake yourself out with The Skinny versions of the foods you crave!
And if you’re craving mashed potatoes with your turkey dinner, or just want them as part of a simple supper, this is a recipe that delivers in taste and texture…but has only a fraction of the calories and none of the fat.
Mashed potatoes made with milk and butter can have as much as 200 calories a cup. But a cup of “mock mashed” made with nutrient rich cauliflower has less than 30!
I didn’t invent the brilliant substitution of cauliflower for spuds–that’s a trick I learned from The South Beach Diet years ago…
But by changing the cooking technique–microwaving the cauliflower rather than steaming it (which made it too wet!)–and using just a wee bit ofSmart Balance Light Butter Spread and fat-free half and half, the dish is now quicker, easier, requires much less clean-up AND has much better flavor and texture..which means I can serve it to the pickiest of eaters!
Rugelach
I’ve made lots and lots of rugelach in my
day, but this one takes the cake. I have made my grandma’s, I have
made Ina’s, Martha’s and Rose’s. This one, from Cooks Illustrated is by
far the best I have ever had. Better than Weby’s bakery (most Sunday
mornings, when I was little, you could find me and my dad, waiting in
line to buy the fresh baked egg-onion bread). My kids don’t really like
raisins or dried fruit in their sweets. I altered the filling. I
substituted mini chocolate chips for the raisins.
The dough was super easy to work with. Even though the recipe didn’t ask me to refrigerate the dough after rolling, I did anyways. Only for about 15 minutes. I feel it made all the difference in the world. I baked off a few to taste and then cut and flash froze the rest. Even though they look more like a pinwheel cookies, they taste like rugelach.
Vichyssoise
As the weather warms toward summer days, I look forward to enjoying cool and refreshing soups. One of my favorite cold soups is Vichyssoise with its combination of potatoes and leeks that is simply delicious. The great thing about this soup is that you can enjoy it either hot or cold or even just warm.
The soup's French name makes it sound much more fussy than it really is. But the soup is not really French in origin. It was invented in the 1920s by a Frenchman at the Ritz in New York City.
The preparation is as simple as sautéing leeks and boiling potatoes. Once it's cooked, simply purée. I love to serve a soup like this in small cups as an appetizer. It's the perfect start to a summertime dinner party.
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