Tonight I am making Lasagna Rolls and for those I need tomato sauce. It’s a cool, rainy summer day and I have piles of fresh basil in the garden–a perfect day to let some sauce simmer! This is my recipe for a basic slow-cooked, chunky ground beef tomato sauce. There is nothing really fancy about…
Sara, why are you making pot pies in the middle of the summer? Well, I’d say that the surprise success of my first pot pie recipe (Spicy Mushroom Chicken Pot Pie) back in May–when it was still sensibly chilly–got me inordinately excited about savory pies. They are so easy! Especially with a forgiving pie dough like…
‘Tis the season for an overabundance of zucchini. Here is a recipe that I recently rediscovered at a cookout at my mom’s house. A friend of hers brought it as a dish to share and mom had the card in her old recipe box. I increased the parmesan and added fresh basil from our garden,…
If you see fresh peas in the pod at your local farmers market, buy them immediately and plan to eat them that evening. Fresh peas are best the same day they are harvested. Frankly, they are best eaten directly out of the pod as you are shucking them. If you can resist however, cook them up…
Adding a ton of vegetables to pasta makes it healthy, right? We made this for “meatless Monday” this week. So creamy, delicious, and easy. Every summer, I make a lot of Basil Pesto. Last summer, my plants over delivered and I’m still making my way through the frozen bounty. By the time this year’s plants…
Here is the “recipe” for my basil pesto. I make this every few weeks during peak basil production (mid-summer), generally two batches at a time. During the summer, there is usually a small jar of fresh pesto in the fridge. It primarily goes on sandwiches or into hot or cold pasta dishes–I’m always looking for…
Yummy, creamy cannellini beans make an easy and fast spread that is excellent on fresh or toasted bread. It can replace mayo or cheese on your chicken or turkey sandwich and is great on as a crudité dip. And, at about $1 per can of beans, it costs far less than store-bought dips or hummus. We had…
It has been rainy, cold couple of weeks in the Philadelphia area, which sent me on a quest to find a good spring soup that would chase away the chill but also feel healthy. I came across several variations of Sicilian chickpea soup (which I had never made before). Low in fat and high in protein,…
The goal when making pasta puttanesca is to have the sauce and pasta finish at the same time. It’s good practice for a fun game that I like to play called Get Everything on the Table at Once. The sauce should cook fast and hot, and the pasta will finish cooking in the sauce. This will…
Are you ready for Memorial Day Weekend parties? Are you supposed to bring a dish to pass? Well, check your spice cabinet and run to the store for potatoes, onions, celery, and mayo. And get ready to share this fast, easy, and delicious recipe, because your friends will ask you for it. I asked my dear…
On Friday night, our Cincinnati adventure took us to Abigail Street, a mediterranean small plates restaurant and wine bar, in the Over-the-Rhine district of Cincinnati near the Ensemble Theatre, where we would be watching my sister perform later that night in The Marvelous Wonderettes: Caps & Gowns. We are suckers for tapas and happily shared five plates…
Last night we made this delicious and satisfying White Vinegar-Braised Chicken Thighs with Leeks and Peas. The leeks and peas give this dish a distinctly Springtime feel, and the vinegar smells wonderful as it lightly infuses (and tenderizes) the chicken. The recipe was only very slightly adapted from Vinegar-Braised Chicken with Leeks and Peas Recipe – Grace…
Artichokes were one of those weird things that we ate growing up that a lot of other people did not. I have a very clear memory from my volatile teenage years, of sitting with my mother at the dining room table, slowing picking our way through an artichoke in the afternoon light. There is a…
This is a great way to cook chicken legs and thighs for a simple and inexpensive weeknight dinner. Braising the chicken results in meat that is fall-off-the-bone tender and a flavorful sauce with zero extra effort. The braising liquid–in this case, stock thickened with flour and tomato paste and aromatic with Emeril Lagasse‘s “Essence” (i.e. a mix…
This started off as an experiment with one of the “Mother Sauces” of French cuisine, the veloute sauce. A veloute sauce is made with equal parts butter and flour, a light chicken or fish stock, and salt and pepper. We amped up the veloute with thyme and cayenne pepper, added our leftover chicken, mushrooms, and…
This week, I also made this practically perfect yogurt banana bread. It stays moist and is great for a quick breakfast or afternoon snack. Banana Bread Makes 1 loaf. Adapted from: Classic Banana Bread Recipe | MyRecipes.com (Cooking Light, September 2003). Ingredients 2 cups all-purpose flour 1 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 cup sugar 8 tablespoons butter,…
Last night, we made a hot and sour Thai soup based on a recipe from The Culinary Institute’s The New Book of Soups. It was delicious, and even came out basically looking like the photograph in the book (and on the CIA website). The broth of this soup is light but complex, melding the flavors of lemongrass,…
As of this afternoon, my husband and I have visited eight–eight!–different grocery stores looking for–but not finding–pickled chilies for the Thai Hot and Sour Soup that we planned to make this week. The recipe, from The Culinary Institute’s The New Book of Soups, calls for 1/2 a pickled chili and we are not about to go…
The best thing about this recipe is that you can customize it in dozens of ways with different sausages, cheeses, and fresh herbs. We especially like it with mushrooms and spinach. Once you have this recipe in your arsenal, you can class it up or play it down, for an easy dinner win any night…
We’re regularly experimenting with the best way to cook brussels sprouts. These adorable green bulbs find their way into our shopping cart at least two to three times per month. We’ve been stuck in a rut of simply blanching then sautéing our sprouts with bacon. With this recipe, I was going for a softer sprout, but still…
In my first post, I wrote about making Basic Chicken Stock using a store-bought rotisserie chicken. For me, the goal is really the stock, but what to do with all that chicken once the bones go into the stockpot? Our strategy is generally to eat the best parts immediately for an easy–I mean a really,…
There is nothing like a fresh, homemade stock burbling away on the stove. It smells like comfort, and will pay off in the coming days and weeks as a basic ingredient for your soups, sauces, and other dishes. Here is the theory behind and recipe for my basic chicken stock. I don’t like to roast chickens…
Sara Makes Soup 