By Nathan
– Sunday, February 28, 2010
Growing up, one of the great things about meals was the bread. I don’t just mean sliced bread, I mean the gluten-based delicacies that look like dessert to anyone else, but which pass for “dinner rolls” in my family. One of my favorites were — are — yeast rolls with caramel nut (pecan) topping.
My mom made these for some friends in San Francisco once, and was a little distressed when nearly everyone passed them up. She picked up the tray, circling my friends, prepared to serve them herself. “Doesn’t anyone want bread?” she asked, a little anxiously.
“Oh, I’m waiting to get dessert until I finish everything else,” they said.
Mom tilted her head to the side a little, indicating that the excuse sounded flimsy. “Oh, well we have apple pie and lemon pan dessert when you’re done; this is just some bread!” Everyone’s eyes lit up as they pulled the cinnamon pecan rolls apart, and no one described them as “just bread”.
I’ve made the recipe a few times since then, and while I wouldn’t exactly call it “easy”, it’s well worth the effort. I made this batch when Alex visited us earlier this month; I think he liked them.
Continued…
Posted in Recipe Card, tagged with bread, Desserts.
By Nathan
– Monday, February 15, 2010
The plan was to make an apple pie: for some reason the idea of making an apple pie from scratch — crust and all — seemed like a good way to really put the new kitchen (and my cooking skills) through its paces. I had the recipe out and was arranging the ingredients on the counter when I realized I don’t own a pie pan. That must be remedied, but I’d already promised Richard something sweet that evening. I flipped through the Desserts section, looking for a substitute that I had the ingredients for, and could put together fairly easily (for some reason my willingness to really work on dessert had evaporated with the mythical pie pan). I came across Apple Crisp: a special treat from my childhood, when it was served warm from the oven, in a bowl, half covered in milk.
Apple Crisp with Milk, CC BY-NC-SA, Richard Kim
Continued…
Posted in Desserts, Volume 1, tagged with apple, fruit.
By Nathan
– Monday, February 15, 2010
It’s appropriate that I start things off with a breakfast recipe: breakfast is traditionally at the beginning of the day (although the less pedantic among us realize that it’s a great end of the day meal, too) and breakfast foods are some of my favorites.
Pancakes are one of my favorite breakfast foods. Actually, saying that they’re “one” of my favorites isn’t quite accurate — I can think of at least three different kinds of pancakes we had with some regularity growing up, and since then I’ve had many variations. This recipe combines a couple of my favorites pancake features: buttermilk and cornmeal. The result is a fluffy pancake with texture reminiscent of cornbread.
Continued…
Posted in Breads & Rolls, Volume 1, tagged with breakfast, pancakes.
By Nathan
– Tuesday, February 9, 2010
My name is Nathan, and I like to eat. And I really like to eat the way I grew up eating: where bacon, lard, and butter were all staples. Where vegetables weren’t served until covered in cheese sauce, bacon, or (preferably) both. Where it was perfectly acceptable to serve a dish consisting entirely of pot-pie dough, cooked in chicken stock and fat. Where casseroles, baked goods, and red meat roamed free.
Sure, we had salads, and dressing usually involved a cup of sugar and bacon fat. And of course we ate fruit: what else do you put in your jello and pie? And I must say, we always ate well. At my grandparents’ house, vegetarians will be disappointed. Vegans will be hungry.
This blog is about cooking the way I did growing up, about talking to my family about food, and about eating. And loving it. Welcome.
Posted in Site Announcements, tagged with Site Announcements.
