Sometimes Santa just wants a nice, comforting goodie to go with his glass of milk: not too sweet, but sweet enough; not too spiced, but spiced enough, like biscotti, only Swedish, and more ethereal. This is it, from one of Cook & Tell’s Christmas elves. Cardamom is the clue that we’re speaking Swedish here.
image: abreadaday.com
Swedish Toast (Skorporr)
Karyl Bannister, Cook & Tell
1 cup (2 sticks) butter or margarine, softened
1¼ cups sugar
1 cup sour cream
2 large eggs
3½ cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cardamom
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
Preheat the oven to 350°. Grease a 9-by-13-inch baking pan.
Cream together butter and sugar in a large bowl. Add the sour cream and eggs and mix well. In a separate medium bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, salt, cardamom, and nutmeg. Add half of the flour mixture to the butter mixture and mix well. Add the remaining flour mixture and mix well. The dough will be sticky. Spread the dough in the prepared pan. Bake for 35 to 40 minutes, or until a tester comes out clean. Cool in the pan on a rack.
When the cake is completely cool, preheat the oven to 325°.
Cut the cake, in the pan, lengthwise into thirds and then crosswise into ¾-inch-wide slices. Lay the slices cut side down on two ungreased cookie sheets and bake until lightly toasted, 15 to 20 minutes. Cool on a rack. Store in a covered jar for 1 week or in the freezer for 1 month.
Makes 4 dozen toasts.
This Thanksgiving, try making Betsy Allport’s Hot Sausage Stuffing!
image: kitchenparade.com Continue reading “Hot Sausage Stuffing” »
“Ferdie Plante ran a seasonal art gallery over in the Harbor for years and would occasionally lure me in to talk cooking. One August, I left the “e” off his last name when I printed one of his recipes in the newsletter. By the end of the season, he’d gotten over it and began telling me about his favorite pie, but he agreed to hand over the recipe only if I would promise to spell his name correctly.”—Karyl Bannister
image: mygreatrecipes.com
Cranberry-Raisin Pie
Karyl Bannister, Cook & Tell
¾ cup sugar, plus more to sprinkle on the crust
1 Tablespoon cornstarch
¾ cup light corn syrup
2 Tablespoons grated fresh orange zest
3 cups fresh cranberries
½ cup golden raisins
½ cup finely chopped walnuts
2 Tablespoons (¼ stick) butter
Pastry for a double-crust
9-inch pie
Milk for brushing the crust
Combine the ¾ cup sugar and cornstarch in a large saucepan and mix well. Stir in the corn syrup, ½ cup water, and the orange zest and bring to a boil over medium heat. Stir in the cranberries, raisins, and walnuts. Reduce the heat to low, cover, and simmer until the cranberries pop, 3-5 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat and add the butter, but do not stir. Cool.
Preheat the oven to 425°.
Roll out one crust and line a pie plate. Trim, leaving a ½-inch over-hang. Fill with the cranberry mixture. Roll out the top crust, cut vents, and fit it on the pie. Seal and crimp the edges. Brush the top with milk and sprinkle with sugar. Bake for 40-50 minutes, or until the crust is golden brown and juice bubbles out of the pastry vents. Serve warm or at room temperature.
Serves 6-8.
You can combine almost anything with butternut squash and come up with a hit. A tangy apple and some smooth Stilton, the blue blood of cheeses, play a surprising harmony to the satiny melody of butternut squash. Any blue cheese will do, I suppose, but why settle?
image: elleninamerika.com Continue reading “Butternut Squash, Apple, and Stilton Soup” »
“I don’t think I’ve ever deviled an egg before the middle of June or after Labor Day, and isn’t that stupid? But then, maybe not. Maybe some things just taste better when you’re sitting outdoors on a blanket, or indoors when the windows can be wide open. I’ve hidden an optional secret in each egg and called in Major Grey to flavor the yolks. But he’s not the only chutney maker. Use whatever brand, or homemade version, you wish.”—Karyl Bannister
image: food2.com Continue reading “Black-Eyed Susan Deviled Eggs” »
Every proper picnic needs a bit of fancy fork work. We nominate this tasty-tangy beet salad. We love cold beets captured in a jellied ring, tossed with macaroni and mayonnaise, or, as here, spiffed up with unexpected accompaniments. For picnic preparation, pack the dressed beets and onions in a plastic container, the lettuce leaves and walnuts in separate plastic bags, and bring a small can of mandarin oranges and a can opener. You will look so clever when you put it all together.
image: celebrationsathomeblog.com Continue reading “Beet and Orange Picnic Salad” »
This is the perfect brew for weddings, lawn parties, and assorted special events and warm-weather occasions when a lot of people are going to be thirsty. For just a few, halve the quantities and you’re all set to enjoy a picnic and an afternoon tea party on the back porch, with a few glasses left over for cool breaks from gardening chores.
image: eteaket.co.uk Continue reading “Fancy Iced Tea” »
Must a cooked vegetable side dish always be served hot? Time’s up. Time to cook broccoli and serve it up not warm, not at room temperature either, but as cold as Greenland’s icy mountains.
This recipe certainly deserves Cook & Tell’s AAA rating!
image: coffeebeansandcurryleaves.blogspot.com Continue reading “Cold Broccoli Side Dish” »
Once we opened the picnic season with the launch of my husband’s canoe on Love’s Cove, across the road. I was not allowed to paddle, because I’m supposed to be a lady of leisure (but not until I’ve made the lunch and cleaned up the kitchen). We pushed off from shore and pulled up at one of the uninhabited islands nearby, sat on a log surrounded by ocean and blue sky, and shared peanut butter sandwiches on whole wheat bread and tin cups of cold borscht. I based my borscht on a recipe from a free Columbo yogurt booklet.
image: about.com
Cold Creamy Borscht
Karyl Bannister, Cook & Tell
2 15-ounce cans sliced beets, with their juice
1 small onion, chopped
2 teaspoons sugar
1 teaspoon chopped fresh dill or ½ teaspoon dried
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
½ cup fresh lemon juice (about 2 lemons)
1½ cups plain yogurt
2 Kirby cucumbers (the bumpy kind for pickling), peeled, seeded, and diced for garnish, if desired
Put the beets, onion, sugar, dill, salt, pepper, and lemon juice in a blender jar and blend until smooth. (You’ll probably have to do the blending in two batches.) Pour the puree into a large plastic container with a cover. Stir in the yogurt until well mixed. Chill thoroughly. Pack in your cooler with a separate container of the diced cucumbers to distribute evenly over each cup or bowlful as a garnish. Serve cold.
Serves 6.
The more you talk with the best Maine cooks, the more infinite seem the ways with the tasty scallop. Cook them unceremoniously in crumbs or cream, or dress them up in Sunday best, like this. Place smaller portions in more shells and serve them as hors d’oeuvres. Oven-safe scallop shells are available in gourmet shops and kitchen boutiques.
image: kunstdame.com
Continue reading “Savory Scallops Baked in Shells” »
In London, we ran into “jacket potatoes” in all the little sidewalk restaurants and sandwich shops. The British fluff up a whole baked potato and pour over it things like chicken and cheddar cheese or baked beans and sausages, resulting in a tasty square meal similar to our own stuffed baked potatoes. I devised this version in remembrance of the great Indian cuisine we enjoyed at the Regent Tandoori, near Picadilly Circus.
Concoct the curried cauliflower while the potatoes are baking.
theenglishkitchen.blogspot.com
Continue reading “Curried Cauliflower Jacket Potatoes” »
And you thought pineapple was the only fruit that did headstands! Chocolate and pears team up here in a moist, rich, torte-like cake, whose satiny topping echoes the delicate flavor of the fruit.
image: marcussamuelsson.com
Continue reading “Pear Upside-Down Chocolate Cake” »
When the sap is running in Maine, we like to pay homage by pointing cooking endeavors in a maple direction. But a jug of dark syrup is always on hand for waffles and salad dressing, and these mighty muffins, which began life in a recipe from the cookbook, Let’s Bake Bread. I gave it a tune-up and endowed it with a cozy crumble topping.
image: tasteofhome.com Continue reading “Maple-Oat Muffins with Crumble Topping” »
If you’re like me, you need a pretty good excuse to spend nine bucks a pound for a hunk of meat. Here it is: Phyllis Gimbel’s scrumptious and cinchy roast beef. Invite your best beau or lady and another couple for a double date, or hog the whole thing for just the two of you. Fluffy baked potatoes and Asparagus ASAP are suitably stylish, no-fuss accompaniments.
Continue reading “Roast Tenderloin of Beef with Horseradish Cream” »
I’m not sure we’re talking real fajitas here, but this salad is “yum-yum-yum,” to quote Patrice Robertie. Patrice sampled a dish like this at Pier 66 in Albuquerque, NM, and went home to replicate it. “The sauce starts off medium-hot on your tongue,” she says, “but it cools down fast.”
Continue reading “Fajita Salad” »
One day down at the lunch place on the coziest harbor in Maine, Marion Bates’s mother, Eleanor, shared a lobster reminiscence worth writing down. It turned out to be well worth making and sharing, too. Here’s how she remembered a favorite lunch dish from a long-gone favorite restaurant, with some tinkering by me. The quantity of lobster meat depends on how flush you’re feeling.
Continue reading “Little Lobster Casseroles” »
Between the pantry, the vegetable bin, and the fridge, you’re going to find everything you need to make Judi Wagner’s pasta supper for two. We like to use orzo, a rice-shaped pasta. If you want to break out the grated cheese rut, use a vegetable peeler to produce interesting cheese shavings for the topping.
Pantry Pasta
Karyl Bannister, Cook & Tell
1 carrot, peeled and thinly sliced or finely chopped
½ cup chopped broccoli
½ cup chopped cauliflower
1 cup uncooked orzo or your favorite pasta
Salt
2 Tablespoons olive oil
1 medium onion, chopped
1 garlic clove, minced
A few white mushrooms, sliced
1 14.5-ounce can stewed tomatoes, drained (reserve 2 Tablespoons of their jucie)
1 14-ounce can artichoke hearts, drained
¼ cup grated or shaved Parmesan or Romano cheese (about 1 ounce)
1/3 cup pitted black olives
Cook the carrot, broccoli, cauliflower, and pasta in a large pot of boiling water for 8 minutes, or until everything is tender. Drain.
Meanwhile, heat the oil in a large skillet over medium heat and sauté the onion and garlic until limp and translucent, about 5 minutes. Add the mushrooms and sauté until they soften and give up their juices, about 5 minutes. Add the tomatoes and artichokes and sauté for 1-2 minutes more, or until heated through. Add the 2 Tablespoons reserved tomato juice and the pasta mixture and toss to distribute everything evenly. Dole it out into bowls and top each serving with 2 Tablespoons cheese and a few olives.
Serves 2.
Note: You may use any combination of carrots, broccoli, and/or cauliflower or skip them altogether. For the sautéed portion, you may add sliced red or green bell pepper and skip the mushrooms.
I can’t believe how good this is, notwithstanding the Minute Rice, which I snatch off the supermarket shelf only when nobody’s looking. Double the quantities for extravaganzas, where this dish will shine. With “supremo” in its name, you just know it’s going to be good.
Continue reading “Rice Pilaf Supremo” »
Betty Govan began making this great Christmas pudding in 1941, when raisins were 29 cents a pound and dates 19 cents, as she noted when she sent the recipe to me. She found the recipe in a dairy’s leaflet. It’s a love of pudding, evoking scenes of snow swirling down narrow London streets and Bob Cratchit serving the Christmas goose. The hard sauce, softened with cream and egg white, is pure inspiration.
image: foodchannel.com
Continue reading “Classic Plum Pudding with Whipped Hard Sauce” »
Next time you’re invited to a friend’s house for dinner, bring a box of this perfectly jolly sweet for a thank-you gift. Or leave bowls of it around the house. When all else fails, just make it some lazy Sunday afternoon and keep the good nibbling to yourself. You don’t have to know how to cook to make this lovely, foolproof confection.
image: etsy.com
Continue reading “White Chocolate Pretzel Bark” »
