
Rosé. Raspberries. Buttercream. You need these cupcakes in your life.
Recipes and life lessons from my favorite Italian
My great grandmother called me the other day to tell me that her older sister, Frances, was in a book. The book, called Farms, Factories and Families is a compilation of stories told by Italian women who emigrated to Connecticut.
The book reads like a card deck of short stories and life lessons that make you appreciate those family members who struggled every day to build a better life for their children and grandchildren. Having heard so many of my great grandmother’s stories about her childhood I was surprised to read a story I had not heard before. The story about my great grandma and her sister waking up before sunrise to bake bread for their family made me appreciate how lucky I am to have grown up in the United States and how fortunate I am to have been given such great opportunities to further my education.
Check it out, it’s worth a read.
I used to think that the only people who could make good pies were my Nané, competitive fair pie bakers, and, of course, chefs. Despite meticulous adherence to classic pie dough recipes, every time I made pie dough it would crack and crumble and more would end up on the floor than in the pie plate. After years of unsuccessful attempts (ok, I usually only tried once per year around apple picking season), I threw in the towel and swore off pie baking. Why spend a morning getting frustrated by dough that was too stiff, too soft, too crumbly, or too buttery (can anything be too buttery?) when I could opt for the quick, simple, and tasty cousin of the pie: fruit crisp. I love crisp so much I would make it with any type of leftover spring and fall fruit: apples, peaches, pears, plums, you name it I’ve tried it.
My pie boycott was full steam ahead until three weeks ago. I had a birthday party to attend and did not want to go empty handed. I contemplated baking a cake, but people can be fussy about cake. When one of my friends gave me her leftover fresh picked strawberries and rhubarb, I knew that my pie boycott was over… Sure I could make a crisp, but a pie would be prettier. And hopefully tastier. So I scoured the internet in search of a recipe for the perfect pie dough. And I am happy to say that I found it! Not only was this pie dough easy to make, but it rolled like a champion. Arrivederci dry, brittle pie dough, ciao smooth, buttery, creamy, melt-in-your-mouth pie dough that makes you want to bake a new type of pie every week. Seriously, it even stays together when you cut the pie, take it out of the pie plate, and place it on a dish – amazing!
For this recipe you will need some special baking equipment: a rolling pin, a food processor, a zester, and a silicone baking mat.
Perfect Pie Dough
Ingredients:
Step 1: Sift the flour into a medium size bowl. Add the salt and sugar to the food processor. Stir 10 times, gently combining the dry ingredients.
Step 2: Add the cream cheese and cold butter chunks to the dry ingredients. Toss gently, coating the cream cheese and butter chunks with flour.
Step 3: Pour the flo
ur/salt/sugar/butter/cream cheese mixture into the food processor. Pulse 5 to 7 times for 1 second intervals, until the butter and cream cheese are in small pieces. *Be careful not to over mix here!
Step 4: Add the vinegar and 2 teaspoons cold water to the food processor. Pulse 2 to 5 times. The dough should start to form into a ball. If the dough does not form a ball, add another teaspoon of cold water, and pulse 2 or 3 times.
Step 5: Once the dough forms a ball, remove (carefully) from the food processor. Divide the dough into two parts. Roll each piece of dough into a ball and flatten gently to resemble a disc. Wrap each piece in plastic wrap and place in the fridge for 20 minutes.
Step 6: When the dough has chilled, remove the dough from the fridge. Place one piece on silicone baking mat. Gently coatthe rolling pin with flour and roll the dough into a circle, 2 inches wider than the pie dish you are using (i.e. if you are using a 9 inch pie plate, roll the dough so it is 11 inches in diameter so that you have extra dough to join the crusts together and make and edge).
Step 7: Place first piece of dough in your pie plate. Poke the dough about 10 times with a fork. Add your filling. Repeat step 6 with the second piece of dough, and get creative! This dough is super easy to work with and works great if you want to make a decorative top like a lattice top.
Ingredients
Streusel Topping:
1 ¼ cups granulated sugar
¼ teaspoon salt (if you are using unsalted butter)
1 ½ cups flour
1 tbsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp ground nutmeg
6 tbsp melted butter
Filling:
8 oz blueberry jam (I like Stonewall kitchen Maine Blueberry jam – which you can find on sale for $3.99 when they have their holiday stock up sales)
Cake:
¾ cup butter (softened, not melted)
1 teaspoon salt
1 ½ cups granulated sugar
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 tbsp vanilla extract
1 tbsp baking powder
3 large eggs
Zest of 1 lemon
2 tsp cinnamon
¾ cup sour cream (or 6oz plain greek yogurt)
1 ¼ cups milk (anything from skim to whole)
3 ¾ cups flour
Directions
1) Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease a 9 x 13″ pan.
2) Make the topping by whisking together the sugar, salt, flour, and cinnamon. Add the melted butter, stirring until well combined. Set the topping aside.
3) To make the cake: In a large bowl, beat together the butter, salt, sugars, baking powder, vanilla, lemon zest, and cinnamon until well combined and smooth. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. In a separate bowl, whisk together the sour cream or yogurt and milk until well combined. Add the flour to the butter/sugar mixture alternately with the milk/sour cream mixture, beating gently to combine. Pour/spread half of the batter (a scant 3 cups) into the prepared pan, spreading all the way to the edges. Spread the blueberry jam evenly atop the batter. Pour/spread the remaining batter atop the filling.
4) Sprinkle the topping over the batter in the pan.
5) Bake the cake about 55-60 minutes until it’s a dark golden brown around the edges, medium-golden with no light patches showing on top, and a toothpick or cake tester inserted into the center comes out clean.
This recipe is my variation of King Arthur Flour’s “Cinnamon-Streusel Coffee Cake”
My great grandmother was not the first volunteer to try this Pinterest-inspired vegetarian dinner. Let’s just say quinoa is not in her 94 year old vocabulary.
I found these three recipes on Pinterest. Happily, they were all successes!
Quinoa Burgers
These vegetarian quinoa burgers are tasty, packed with protein, and best of all easy to make. They are great on top of salad or in a pita with baby spinach, tomato, and garlic mayo.
Ingredients: (makes approximately 10 burgers)
Directions:
Per burger: 132 Calories, 8g Protein, 5g Fat, 12g Carbs (2g Fiber); 0g Sugar; 200mg Sodium.
Crispy Parmesan Green Bean Fries
Ingredients:
Directions:
Garlic Mayo Dip (for Green Bean Fries)
This garlic mayo is great with Crispy Parmesan Green Bean Fries and home made sweet potato fries. It is also great on burgers and sandwiches.
Ingredients:
Directions:
Sweet and Sour Pickles
Ingredients:
Directions:
Made only twice a year (Christmas and Easter), these chocolate and almond cookies do not disappoint. The key ingredients are chocolate, roasted almonds, orange zest, and “vinacotta” (a syrupy liquid made from raisins).
Recipe will be posted soon! I need to track down the original from my great grandmother.
These almond and lemon filled cookies are a favorite of my great grandma’s around the holiday time. Think crispy fried dough with lemon almond sugary goodness.
Filling
Ingredients:
Directions:
Dough
Ingredients:
Directions:
Cookies
Ingredients:
Directions:
This dish is based on a recipe I found in Martha Stewart (March 2013). I have added a few additional ingredients (lemon and garlic) and eliminated others (I’m not a rosemary person). This dish is great served over spaghetti, or served over a simple salad of arugula and micro greens and paired with oven roasted yukon gold potatoes.
Ingredients:
1 1/2 lbs pork loin, cut cross wise into 6 thin slices
Sea salt and freshly ground pepper
1/2 cup all purpose flour
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, divided
2 tablespoons capers, rinsed and chopped
1 tablespoon chopped fresh sage leaves
1 lemon, sliced
3 cloves garlic, smashed
1/2 cup dry white wine
Recipe:
Pound pork slices until approximately 3/8 inches thick. Season with salt and pepper, and dredge in flour, shaking off excess. Transfer to baking rack and let stand about 10 minutes. **
Heat 2 tablespoons of oil in large non-stick saute pan over medium-high heat. Add 1 tablespoon of butter and melt, swirling to coat bottom of pan. Add 3 pork slices in a single layer and cook, flipping once, until both sides are golden brown and pork is cooked through (about 4-5 minutes total). Transfer cooked pork to serving plater and cover with foil. Repeat with 3 remaining pork slices.
Once all of the pork is cooked (and placed on the serving platter), add garlic, capers, and sage to the pan and cook over medium-high heat, stirring until fragrant (about 30 seconds). Add lemon slices and wine and cook until liquid is reduced by half. Stir in remaining tablespoon of butter and melt. Pour sauce over pork.
**If you opt to serve the pork over pasta — before starting to cook the pork, fill a pasta pot 1/2 full of water and turn on high heat. When water comes to a boil, salt, and add 1 pound of spaghetti. Reduce to medium-high heat. Cook spaghetti 7-8 minutes until cooked al dente.
This dish is something I came up with last weekend while I was playing “clean out the fridge.” It’s hearty, delicious, and may take the cake as the perfect rainy day comfort food. Note: for those of you who aren’t huge fans of eggplant, give this dish a try! The eggplant is subtle and the tomato and cheese are the real stars.
Ingredients:
Recipe: Cooking Time (about 40 minutes)
My Nane is a clever woman. She loves having company. At 94, she still cooks dinner every Sunday for the family. As us grandchildren and great-grandchildren have grown older and gone away for college, it’s hard for all of us to attend every Sunday dinner. But that doesn’t stop my Nane from trying. She has this subtle way of reminding you that you’ve been absent a few too many Sundays in a row. The phone rings. “Hi Nane!” “Hello, [grandchild X]. I’m making X desert for Sunday…” And before you know it, you are figuring out a way to get home for Sunday dinner. It’s at 6:00pm. Don’t be late!
It’s become quite the family joke. Nane knows everyone’s favorite desert. And she knows that making someone’s favorite desert sends the homing beacon.
For my grandfather, the homing beacon is lemon merengue pie. For her neighbor, the signal is apple cake. For my aunt and uncle in Florida, it’s blueberry cookies. For me, it’s home made pumpkin pie. And not just any pumpkin pie, the kind made from a real pumpkin! But for my mom, and most of the family, the homing beacon is apple pie.
There is just no comparison to Nane’s apple pie. No bakery or diner apple pie comes close. This apple pie is the queen of all apple pies.
Recipe to follow!