Well, no, Martha wasn’t there. But one of her big fans was the hostess, who prepared a dinner using four of Martha’s highlighted recipes from the Martha Stewart’s Living July ’08 issue. Kathleen invited us to her home for dinner, and we had such a fun evening. We had wine (of course) and I helped just a little bit in the kitchen with the aioli sauce. Other than that, Kathleen had done all the work ahead.

Each magazine always includes a four-recipe perforated card in the issue; color pictures on one side, recipes on the back. The recipes are designed to go together to make a full meal. Here’s the delicious menu. Click on each title to link to Martha’s website for the recipes:

Grilled Lamb Shoulder Chops with Herb Aioli

The lamb shoulder chops were grilled briefly (perfectly) and served with the cold herb aioli on the side which took but a couple of minutes to whiz up in the food processor. It was delicious – the hot meat and the cold sauce were great together since it was a warm evening.

Couscous Salad with Cherry Tomatoes

Israeli couscous is different than ordinary (fine-grained) couscous. The Israeli version is more like the size of the large round tapioca grains. Traditional couscous is kind of irregularly shaped, but the Israeli are perfectly honed little globes. They make for a very pretty bowl. This is prepared just before serving (it can sit at room temp for awhile, so the recipe says). And this is an extremely low fat dish – only one tablespoon of oil for the entire salad for four people.

Minted Watermelon Salad

In Martha’s version, you use ricotta salata cheese. Kathleen couldn’t find it, so she used feta instead, which was wonderful. I’d never have thought to pair watermelon with feta. It was delicious, especially with the fresh mint too. I’d probably use more mint, but then I like the stuff in lots of things.

Raspberry and Lemon Sorbet Floats

Kathleen couldn’t find sorbet, so she used sherbet instead. These were just delicious with Vernors ginger ale poured over the sherbet. I mean it – so easy – and so refreshing on a hot summer’s night. She served them in brightly colored glasses, and we just sipped away. I looked up some info about Vernors – they claim to be the first American soft drink. The story is interesting – James Vernor went off to fight in the Civil War, leaving behind an oak cask in the pharmacy where he worked. It was filled with ginger, vanilla and spices. When he returned 4 years later, the cask was still there and ginger ale was born. And even more interesting to me, was that from 1866 to 1991 Vernors ginger ale was sweetened with stevia, but when stevia was banned by the FDA in 1991, they began using corn syrup. An even more obscure factlet, being the English nut that I am, is that in 1950 the company decided to drop the apostrophe from Vernor’s.

Thanks, Kathleen, for a very tasty Martha dinner and an altogether lovely evening.

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I’m a regular reader of the Brilynn from Jumbo Empanadas. And I’ve tried several of her recipes over the year I’ve been monitoring her blog. So when this recipe popped up the other day my taste buds went into zing mode.

Probably about 20 years ago my DH and I and our good friends Bud & Cherrie used to go to San Diego on an occasional Saturday and have a wonderful wine tasting lunch at the Wine Sellar and Brasserie.  You can go for just the wine tasting, but for a nominal fee, you can have their pre-set light lunch (very gourmet, I might add) to accompany it.

Anyway, at one of those tastings, the dessert was home made vanilla ice cream with strawberries, balsamic vinegar and cracked black pepper. Yes, you read that right. Since then I’ve seen it served at other places, but at the time my taste buds just went into overdrive. It was about the cracked pepper, but the combination of strawberries and balsamic vinegar is simply a match made in heaven.

You can see why, then, the Jumbo Empanadas’ recipe title put me into strawberry-balsamic nirvana. Just had to try it. And since strawberries are definitely on the wane here, I needed to do it right NOW if I was going to do it this season! My kitchen freezer is nearly chock-a-block full, but I just had to find room somehow. Even if I had to defrost something else to make room. I’m embarrassed to tell you how big this freezer is and it’s absolutely full to the brim.

The idea of roasting the strawberries with the balsamic seems like such a novel idea, and makes this luscious juicy mash of fruit and juice. And you can get yourself a little spoon to slick up the very last little droplets around the pan. It’s that good.

And don’t forget to reserve a bit of the fruit to drizzle on the top of the ice cream when it’s served. That’s a really nice touch. The taste: oh my goodness. Rich. Sweet. Delicious. Over the top. Fabulous. Wanna have it again SOON!
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My problem is: I love “afternoon tea.” It’s just so fun. And I love the food that is typical of such a tea. So it was that my friend, Cherrie, and I joined hostess forces and invited 10 of our friends to tea at my house last week. We started planning it a couple of months ago, and within about 5 minutes we’d decided on the menu and who would be invited. The date was set, invitations were mailed, and we both did an ample amount of cooking. Anyone who says doing an “afternoon tea” is easy is crazy. Even with both of us cooking and preparing the food, and with one of the guests helping an hour ahead and at hour after (thanks again, Joan), it was a tremendous amount of work. We made everything (except the fruit tarts) ourselves. I got to dig out all of my grandmother’s fancy frilly china plates and teacups and saucers. And used some beautiful pink hydrangeas from our garden as a centerpiece.

We had decided to do it at lunchtime, so we called it a “Luncheon Tea.” But the menu was typically English tea. We had:

Pink Champagne with Strawberry Puree Ice Cubes
(I didn’t take a photo of that – oh darn – but it was VERY pretty and everybody loved it – no recipe for this one)

Watermelon Blueberry Soup
(delicious – just delicious – most people liked it, although not all)

Chicken Salad Sandwiches
(different, with chopped smoked almonds on the outside edges)

Ham Mousse Sandwiches
(very different – with whipped cream in the filling)

Smoked Salmon Sandwiches with Dill
(just buttered bread, smoked salmon and fresh dill peeking out of the edges –
no recipe for this one as it’s so easy)

Mini Fruit Tarts
(the only thing we purchased)

Sarah’s Ginger Scones
(uses candied ginger pieces in the batter)

Golden Raisin Scones
(my tried and true favorite, posted long ago)

Chocolate Scones
(posted recently, also well liked)
(All of the scones were served with lemon curd, clotted cream and black currant jam)

Chocolate Ribbon Dessert
(like a chocolate pie but in a 9×13 pan, cut into small squares)

Earl Grey Tea
Lemon Rose Tea (herbal, from Peet’s)
Marco Polo Tea (a blend from Mariage Freres in Paris)
(from when I was there 2 years ago, and this was the hands-down favorite)

In the next week I’ll likely post most of these recipes. The only one I’m missing is the ham mousse (from a cooking class herrie has it and I’ll get it from her.

The ginger scones are Sarah’s recipe – from a cooking class in San Juan Capistrano. Sarah is from Scotland, and over the years we enjoyed several of her family favorites on the cooking school menu. These are easy to make, and I decided to do something totally different – I made the scones and froze them all raw the day before the tea. Gosh, why didn’t I do this years ago? All you have to do is take them out of the freezer about 20 minutes ahead of baking (when you turn on the oven) and increase the baking time by a few minutes (maybe 5 or so). I may never, ever, make them fresh again – just pop one or two out of the freezer when I want them for breakfast. Or a bunch when I need to serve something for my DH’s Bible Study Group. Of course, they won’t keep indefinitely in the freezer, but will likely be fine for a couple of months!
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My mother came from the era of 3×5 cards for her recipes. And when I was searching for just the right chocolate dessert to serve at the tea the other day (more about the tea later), this recipe floated out of the stack. It’s not an old-time recipe (probably it’s from the 1970’s), after the advent of Cool Whip and instant chocolate pudding anyway. I found some other versions on the internet, but none by this exact name. So I have no idea of the origin of this one. It’s basically a layered chocolate (and whipped cream) pie with walnuts.

The crust is a simple press-in bottom layer in a 9×13 pan (walnuts, flour, butter). Once that’s baked and cooled, you make a cream cheese layer (with powdered sugar, Cool Whip and the cream cheese), then a thick chocolate pudding layer. Then it’s topped with more Cool Whip and chocolate shavings and more nuts on top. This is a VERY simple and easy dessert. And it could feed a big crowd if you don’t cut very big pieces. It went well with the tea because I could cut it up into smaller pieces to look more like “tea” sized servings. We had ample leftover. It is best made the day ahead, and actually keeps for several days.
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The other day I walked into my pantry – I have nice, big walk-in type – and glanced around at the bulging shelves. What to fix? I was looking for something else, but my eyes landed on this box mix for panna cotta that I bought many months ago.

I don’t know about you, but I’m a sucker for any jars and bottles of things, like pickled onions, relishes, chutneys, toppings for cheese, or fruit. Even occasionally a sauce. But this was a box, and even those who don’t know me well, will perhaps recognize early on that I rarely use a box mix for anything.

Panna cotta happens to be one of my favorite desserts. It’s relatively easy to make, but when I read the ingredients in this little Canadian Dr. Oetker panna cotta box mix, there wasn’t really anything suspicious in it. And it looked like it took no time at all to make. Even less time than the real thing, and it didn’t have to bake or cook except for heating milk and water.

Sure enough, it was absolutely cinchy easy. It took less than 10 minutes to make the entire thing. You heat up a cup of milk to a simmer, remove from the heat, and stir in the contents of one of the little packages in the box. Once whisked in, you add a cup of heavy cream and whisk some more. Pour into serving bowls and cool, then chill. Meanwhile, the other package contains a nice raspberry sauce. This dry mix is combined with a half a cup of boiling water, and it’s done too.

I didn’t have time to chill the pannas for 2 hours, as suggested, so I put them in a pan surrounded by ice cubes and they were well enough chilled to serve (I did it in the little bowls instead of turning them out onto a serving plate) in about 45 minutes. I was amazed. They were delicious. I may need to have one of these boxes on hand for those occasions when I need a dessert – quick like. I bought it at Cost Plus World Market for $2.49. Probably last year. It’s Dr. Oetker brand. I’d recommend it, believe it or not!

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Strawberries are on the wane here in Southern California. They’re really at a peak of ripeness and sweetness, though. So I bought two big boxes of berries to use for a company dinner. First I made my much-loved Strawberry Gazpacho. Since I’ve written it up before, you can click on the recipe title above and get to the original posting for it. With super ripe berries, the gazpacho had a wonderful sweet taste.

The remaining I used in the dessert. No longer do I have the original recipe for this. My notes, though, tell me it was in a Sunset Magazine. Since I found it listed in one of my military officer’s wives’ cookbooks dating back to about 1968, I know it’s at least that old. I even remember when I first made it – I was living at Whidbey Island, Washington – learning to cook and enjoying the compact kitchen I had in the small but new home I was living in at the time. Strawberries make their entrance there in late May or early June (my recollection anyway) and once the main crops were picked, the fields near Oak Harbor opened up for people to pick their own “jam” berries. But even those were very tasty; they were just small. Perfectly ripe, however.

Making this over the years (but not for at least 15-20) I’d forgotten some of the procedures, and had to refresh my memory. My typed up recipe also contained an error; fortunately, however, I recognized something was missing and went to look it up on the internet. I found several sources for this recipe, and with the exception of two ingredients, they were all the same. The differences were in the original recipe too, as I recall. This can be made with frozen berries if you want – in which case you decrease the amount of sugar. A more recent version suggested using Cool Whip instead of heavy cream if you prefer, so I included that in my recipe, although I’ve never made it that way.

First you make a sweet crumb mixture. While it’s baking you can work on the filling (strawberries, lemon juice, egg whites and heavy cream or Cool Whip). Once the baked mixture is cooled and crumbled up well, 2/3 of it is sprinkled on the bottom of a 9×13 pan. I stuck that in the freezer while I finished up the filling. The recipes all said to combine the berries, the egg whites, sugar and lemon juice and whip it all up until soft peaks form. I thought that sounded so very odd – the sliced berries would be totally decimated. I wanted them to remain in a more solid form, so I only folded in the berries at the end. Then you combine the whipped cream or Cool Whip with it, carefully spoon it over the crumbs in the pan, sprinkled the remaining crumbs on top and freeze. When ready to serve, you can decorate the square with some additional strawberries, even drizzle some strawberry juice around the plate.

What I did forget was that once frozen, this dessert needs to defrost a little bit before you even attempt to cut it up. Ten minutes out didn’t seem to be enough time. It still cracked in odd directions, and is hard to eat. It still tasted good, but with mostly frozen chunks of berries in it, it really needs that defrosting time to make it easily edible. None of the recipes I found online indicate that, and it’s been too many years since I made this to remember. So, whatever method you use, fresh or frozen berries, cream or Cool Whip, this is a refreshing dessert, and really quite easy to make.
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Admittedly, I’m a fan of ice cream. I came to this anomaly honestly. My Dad was an out-and-out obsessive-compulsive about the stuff. I grew up eating dessert after nearly every dinner, and I can still remember (and hear it in my head) my Dad’s spoon against the side of the bowl, systematically scraping around to get the very last possible speck of it. After going around once, he’d change the angle of the spoon and scrape around one more time. Remember, my Dad was an engineer, so methodical was his middle name. His favorite dessert was vanilla ice cream with chocolate sauce, or rocky road, just plain.

We go for periods of time with no ice cream in the freezer. As summer months approach, though, and the last of our home grown Meyer lemons reach mid-to-past maturity, I need to use some of that lemon juice. So, a new recipe streaked past the recipe trove – from Bon Appetit, May, 2008. It sounded delicious. And indeed it was.

You simmer water, sugar and freshly grated ginger, strain out the ginger, then chill. Add the yogurt, buttermilk, fresh lemon juice and some grated zest and freeze in your ice cream maker. Freeze further for a couple of hours and serve.

The ginger flavor does not predominate at all. In fact, if you weren’t TOLD it was there, you might not be able to identify it. I adored the elusive flavor. A lot. Enough that the next time I make this I’m going to use a bit more ginger, but not much. The frozen yogurt/ice cream has more of the texture of sorbet – to me anyway – although it does have more dairy (buttermilk and yogurt) than water. It was very, very refreshing, and with a bit of crystallized ginger on top (and maybe mango as suggested in the recipe), it’s an easy dessert to make. Next time I may try using 2% yogurt, just to see if there’s any difference. In any case, it’s a very low-calorie dessert, but lovely enough for guests. I’ll be making this again.
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In my recent frenzy to dispose of some old magazines, I read and sorted about 20 old issues of my regular pile of food-oriented magazines. And normally I wouldn’t have stopped at a recipe for almond pound cake. But the word “limoncello” was a part of the title, so I read the story. It was included in the monthly Barbara Fairchild letter from the editor, of Bon Appetit. She explained that Inga Swenson (the actress from the tv series Benson), a friend of hers, gave her the recipe. Swedish, I would guess from her name. Then I glanced at the ingredients – almond paste, light olive oil and limoncello. Well, it got my attention because the ingredients were so unusual.

Limoncello didn’t hit my radar until a few years ago when we visited Sicily and other parts of Italy. Lemons are an integral part of the Italian – and particularly the Sicilian – food landscape. They eat them, juice them, paint them and sculpt them. And decorate everything in between (like tablecloths, napkins, plates, even silverware).

So, with a friend coming for dinner, I pulled out this recipe and my DH made a trip to the grocery store (I never keep almond paste around because it gets hard as a rock if you don’t use it very soon). The cake batter isn’t all that unusual, actually, except that you add in about 10 ounces of the almond paste (crumbled up in little pieces). I do not think – my humble opinion – that the cake portion meets the qualification of “pound” cake (used to be a pound of flour, a pound of eggs, a pound of butter). This is more like a cake-cake. It has a lighter crumb than pound cake, although the almond paste does give it a heavier texture than a cake.

After baking and cooling the cake, you slather it all over with limoncello, the lemon-flavored (vodka) liqueur that is ubiquitous in Italy. Then serve it in narrow slices. I’d serve it with whipped cream or table cream or vanilla ice cream, and maybe some berries for decoration. I didn’t have any berries or I’d have done so. Whatever the décor, this cake is scrumptious. The three of us scarfed down that cake in nothing flat. You do need to like almond as the flavor predominates through the cake. Wonderful. Worth making.
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There are probably 1001 recipes out there for molten chocolate cake, or lava cake. Meaning that some of the batter doesn’t quite get cooked through, so when you press your fork or spoon into it, some of the center, hot batter oozes out and becomes a sauce. I have made these before, but not often, since I rarely make a heavy-duty chocolate dessert for guests. I do serve chocolate, but not usually a really heavy dose of it because the caffeine in chocolate affects me, so I assume it affects others too. I’m sensitive to caffeine. A half a cup of regular coffee and I’m feeling jittery in a matter of 15 minutes and regular coffee would probably prevent me from sleeping all night.

When this was served at the cooking class last week I hesitated. Should I really eat this? I don’t want to be up half the night playing mindless games on the computer. But my will power was weak. Especially when each of these cakes was cut in half, so I was only getting a half portion. I dug in. Ah, yes, it was good. Very good.

It’s a relatively simple recipe. The batter can be made up ahead of time, poured into ramekins and refrigerated. Then you can pop the pan into the oven about 15 minutes before you want to eat them. You could bake them just as you’re getting up from the dinner table perhaps. The only thing I learned from this version was dusting the buttered ramekins with granulated sugar before pouring in the batter. You could also use powdered cocoa (that’s what I’ve done in the past) but the granulated sugar is probably a better option. Dusting the ramekins with one or the other helps when it comes time to unmold the cakes. And make the caramel sauce ahead of time – it will keep for several weeks in the refrigerator.

The good news is that I slept just fine, thank you!
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From my notes about this, it came from an ad I read in a magazine in 2002. Most likely an ad for Jell-o products since the pudding mix features in a major way in this dessert.

Searching through my recipes for something I could make at home and transport easily, I flagged about four recipes and this one won out because it just sounded good to me. My favorite go-to recipe for transporting is my German Chocolate Chip Cake I wrote up last year. Perfect for a picnic, camping, or any big gathering. But last weekend was our son’s birthday and his request was for German chocolate layer cake. He’s likely been eating leftovers of that all week. So I didn’t want to make that cake since it’s so similar. Therefore, this brownie pudding pie was the ticket.

It’s extremely easy to make. You do have to make a batter for the brownies, but it’s an easy one. Once baked and cooled, you make instant pudding to layer on top of that, and top with a thick layer of Cool-Whip (or real whipped cream if you’d prefer). If you want to be fancy, shave a bit of chocolate on the top for decoration. The cake doesn’t need anything else (like ice cream) because it’s already very moist with the pudding layer. Perfect for just slicing and serving on paper plates with plastic utensils. What’s interesting is: although you use an instant pudding mix, and Cool-Whip, for goodness’ sake, when you combine it all, you don’t realize you’re eating fake whipped cream and instant pudding. Somehow, the combination, or the zing of chocolate fools you to think you’re eating real whipped cream (would I kid you about this?) and you don’t exactly know there’s a pudding layer. It tastes kind of like mousse. Nobody has to know you didn’t slave on this – it looks like you did.

Because my DH is diabetic, I did substitute some Splenda for sugar in the brownie part, and I used sugar-free pudding so he could have some of this. But you can use whatever suits your fancy. It’s just the combo of the brownies, pudding and whipped cream that kind of just melt in your mouth. Not super gourmet by any means. Easy? Yes. Tasty too.
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