Crisp cookies

Silly me. I have been making some new snack cookies to go with drinks for my new book. To see how they hold up, I have been carefully wrapping them. A few escaped the wrapping process. Lo and behold, the crackers that seemed a little soggy got too hard to bite. Back to the drawing board to allow for nature's help in creating crisp. More later after more tests.

clam pleasure

Tonight, I had a lovely meal. Vico is a restaurant just around the corner from me. I have taken advantage of proximity and frequency to persuade them to carry Chopin vodka (potato not wheat} and gluten-free pasta. They made me a pasta with vongole (clams) in bianco and broiled fresh sardines with green. I over ate and no taboos. If you have habitual hang outs, try the same thing. Good night.

Farinaceous Fun

For my new book, I have been working on a seemingly endless chart of weights, measures, cooking times, yields and ratios of dry to liquid. What is amazing is that after all these years I still am making discoveries. It's not just playing with ingredients that are not usual for me such as quinoa and flax seed. It is discovering things that can be done with them that I had never thought of. I have taken to using uncooked quinoa instead of bread crumbs to coat moist foods--marinated sometimes--that are to be sauteed or fried. I discovered that cooking flax seed makes it gooey and able to hols other foods together much like an egg yolk--besides they taste good. I hope that new flavors and usages continue to emerge. I would love any suggestions. Credit will be given. As I get them under control, I will post some recipes....Many more of these foods are availablf these days than they used tobe. Not inyour neighborhood, try on-line.

Exotic Sources for Simple and Good

Syrian Spice Market

I have just returned from Egypt, Syria and Jordan. As expected it was breath taking. My only fear was not political, but being food fixated, I anticipated starvation. What to eat in a Yogurt and wheat culture.
I did get a bit tired of chickpeas and eggplant; but sadly it didn't cause me to loose weight--a minus.
In fact, I picked up a few new recipes and tips which was a plus.
A shop in a souk in Damascus gave me great pleasure and culinary disappointment. The very real as well as fabulous, frankincense and mhyr smell perfumed everything around me; but so far unless someone helps out they seem to be unusable in cooking. If I could eat custards, I suppose I could try shaving and sprinkling some on top. Come to think of it, I will try some sort of cereal custard.
I had a fabulous cold drink, a mint and lemon mixture. Look in recipe section and save for summer.

Syrian Pizza

Syrian Mint Cooler

Usable Flours

With wheat flour being a no no, I have been experimenting with a variety of alternative flours. Some have been so so. Some have been a real discovery. Almost all of them come from Bob's Red Mill. No, they do not pay me (Boo Hoo) but I really thought they deserved a plug.
Also, they are trying to create recipes for these unfamiliar grains. That they have almost, but not quite, got right. I'm working on it. In the meantime, if you go to their web site, you can find out where to buy these goodies.
I used the chestnut flour in my turkey dressing. The recipe is included in this web.
Keep enjoying the holidays.

Purple Cow

I never saw one; but this weekend I had a surprise. At the farmer's market in Cold Spring, I bought a gorgeous looking, bright purple cauliflower. I expected that when cooked it would turn green like almost all the purple vegetables I have cooked with, or brown like eggplant. Much to my surprise and partial failure, when I microwaved some of the cauliflower it stayed purple. My failure was in over cooking it as I thought that it would turn green. In the future I'll know better and enjoy my purple cowliflower for itself.

by the way

If you go on line, you will find many entries for Bourbon
Red turkeys. I haven't tried them so no endorsement.