Cooking Show: Day-After Thanksgiving Recipes!

With Thanksgiving right around the corner, it wasn't difficult to come up with a theme for our recent cooking show.

Instead of preparing traditional recipes, however, I decided to focus on leftovers.

I need to confess that I actually roast a pre-Thanksgiving turkey, and perhaps make an extra batch of mashed potatoes and cranberry sauce as well, ensuring that there will be post-Thanksgiving leftovers...can you relate?  

I find it helpful to have a fridge full of leftovers because it makes meal-planning a cinch when I'm in the midst of my decorating frenzy during the days after Thanksgiving...

I was assisted by my friend, Maureen.  We made batches of No-Stress Cranberry Sauce and Make-Ahead Gravy.  This is a cooking show after all.  We felt the need to actually cook something before we started assembling our leftovers!

If you've never made homemade cranberry sauce, please give it a try!  I would usually strongly suggest making gravy using pan drippings, but a recipe like this one that you can make ahead before you even put the bird into the oven can certainly come in handy!

(Click on the highlighted titles to be taken to the recipes.)

Cranberry/Brie Phyllo Tartlets with Pistachios

One more phyllo tart recipe to add to the repertoire. FOUR ingredients!!! 

Great way to use your leftover cranberry sauce! And so easy to whip up a batch to fortify yourself during your post-Thanksgiving decorating frenzy (hint-hint).

Loaded Leftover Mashed Potatoes

If you're wondering what to do with leftover mashed potatoes, look no further!  Soooo good.  

Simply reheat your mashed potatoes and add your favorite toppings!

Day-After-Thanksgiving Turkey Wraps

Fill them up, give them a quick sear, dip them into gravy.  A one-stop-shopping recipe for Thanksgiving leftovers!

Thank you for following along.  I hope that you have a very Happy Thanksgiving...

...and a very happy day after Thanksgiving as well!

Cooking Show: Slow Cooker Ribs & Chili, Wedge Salad and Roasted Potatoes

We're still waiting here in New England for this seemingly endless winter to end.

Snow in April? Check.

Comfort food still on the menu? Check.

I've been looking forward to spring for months (since the first week of January), but until warmer temperatures actually arrive I'm still cooking comfort food and our latest cooking show menu featured a few favorites!

Slow Cooker Baby Back Ribs

Fall-off-the-bone perfection.  When they're done, throw them onto your grill or stick them under the broiler for a minute or two to crisp them up!

Click here for the printable recipe.

Slow Cooker White Chili.   Perfect chili for a chilly day!

Roasted Parmesan Potatoes.  

My friend, Amy, cooked with me and she has informed me that these are "Everyone's new favorite potato!"

They are so quick and easy to prepare.  No special skills required!

And finally....

Wedge Salad with Blue Cheese Dressing

I admit that this was my favorite recipe of the night.  Try this and you will agree that salad can be a comfort food!  Crunchy lettuce, creamy dressing and sweet tomatoes topped with crunchy pancetta.  What's not to love?

Cooking Show: Fall Recipes!

Last week, we filmed a cooking show featuring fall-inspired recipes.

If you've been searching for a recipe or two that will take the chill out of these crisp, autumn days then you need not look any further!

We started off with Pumpkin Martinis.  If ever there was a martini that qualifies as comfort food, this is it.

Dan the Awesome Camera Man proclaimed, "When you get to the bottom, the marshmallows are delightful!"

Here is the printable recipe.

 We then prepared Chicken Orzo Soup with Fennel & Kale.  Bonafide comfort food!  Click here for the printable.

Then we moved on to Oven-Roasted Spiced Sweet Potatoes.  This picture simply does not do them justice.

How's this picture?  

I had made a batch before we started taping the show, I also made a double batch on camera and guess what?

They all disappeared by the end of the night.  Yes, they are that good!! Just peel and dice a sweet potato, mix it with olive oil and spices, pop it into your oven and that's it.

Here's the printable recipe.

And finally, our tasty finale, Pumpkin Gingerbread!

Click here for the printable recipe.

Oven-Roasted Spiced Sweet Potatoes

If you're looking for an easy recipe for a spectacular side dish, look no further!!

I'll sum up this recipe for you in one sentence: wash, peel and dice a sweet potato, stir with olive oil, cumin and paprika and bake for 25 minutes at 425 degrees.

How do they taste, you ask?

Out of this world. To-die-for. 

Yes, they are that good.

Don't just take my word for it.  Make some today!!

Today's Playlist

• "The Girl Got Hot"...Weezer
• "Ball and Biscuit"...The White Stripes
• "Last Night"...The Strokes
• "Joker and the Thief"...Wolfmother
• "Where Is My Mind"...Pixies

Oven-Roasted Spiced Sweet Potatoes (4 servings)

Printable Recipe

• 1 large or 2 small sweet potatoes, cut into 3/4" cubes
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 teaspoon cumin
• 1 teaspoon paprika
• 1 teaspoon salt

Gather your ingredients.  Preheat your oven to 425 degrees Fahrenheit.  Line a large (10" x 15") baking sheet with parchment.

Wash and peel your sweet potato.  Cut it into 3/4-inch cubes.  You should have about 3 cups of cubes.

Place the cubed sweet potatoes into a medium bowl and drizzle with the olive oil.  Stir to coat the potatoes with the oil.

Combine the cumin, paprika and salt in a small bowl.  Sprinkle over the sweet potatoes.  Stir to coat the potatoes with the spices.

Spread the potatoes into a single layer on your parchment-lined baking sheet.  Roast the potatoes for 25 minutes, until tender and easily pierced with a toothpick.

 Enjoy.

Cooking Show: Our Favorite Ina Garten Recipes

The theme for our most recent cooking show was suggested by a friend of mine who absolutely loves, loves, LOVES Ina Garten.

"Have you ever thought of doing a show featuring Ina Garten recipes?" was all she had to say to convince me that it would be the next theme for the show.  So we picked out a few recipes (I admit we had trouble narrowing it down to a few!  We'll have to do another show in the future).

 

We started with Pomegranate Cosmos.  Whew, they sure do pack a punch.  After a few sips, we all agreed that they were extremely refreshing and would be a great summer cocktail!

Next up: Cape Cod Chopped Salad.  Was it my love for arugula that made me choose this recipe?  My affinity for Cape Cod? My fondness for adding fruit to my salads?  Because...bacon?  Who knows?  The only thing you need to know is that this salad is out-of-this-world delicious! 

I asked my friend, Trish (an expert on all things Ina), if she had a favorite Ina Garten recipe.  Her reply:  "Shrimp Scampi!"  I googled it and the first recipe that popped up was for Ina's Baked Shrimp Scampi, which was not the scampi recipe that Trish was referring to; however, we both agreed that it looked so good that we had to give it a try!

This scampi was outstanding.  It didn't take long to disappear!  One of the participants in our dining room audience may have asked me for the recipe before she even swallowed her first bite, it was that good.

The last recipe we prepared was my recipe for Croque Monsieur, which I've altered over the years but the first time I made it I followed Ina's version.

 Do you notice anything else in this picture, something I haven't mentioned yet?

Truffle Tots!!

Not an Ina Garten recipe, but I did promise in a previous blogpost that I would post about my truffle tots soon-- click here to be taken to that recipe!

Valentine's Day Cooking Show!

We filmed an episode of the cooking show last week.

Valentine's Day is on a Sunday this year!  Wouldn't it be fun to stay home and cook something special together?  Spend time bonding in the kitchen with your husband, wife, boyfriend or girlfriend instead of going out?

My friends Amy & Kerry cooked with me, and we came up with a few things that are perfect for Valentine's Day!

We started off with a cocktail.  Whenever a certain one of my circles of friends gathers, we refer to this cocktail as "Karen's Drink," because Karen was the first one who served it.  There are 8 of us who regularly get together, and one of us will say, "I'll bring Karen's Drink!"

Valentine's Day Cocktail

I googled the ingredients (Cran-Raspberry juice, Sprite and Stoli Razberi) to see if there is such a drink which already exists.  There were two that are close: Razberi Kicker, which uses similar ingredients in different proportions (regular cranberry juice instead of cran-raspberry and only a splash of sprite); and From Russia With Love, which I thought was a GREAT name for a Valentine's day cocktail!  However, the From Russia With Love cocktail uses opposite proportions (mostly 7-Up and only a splash of cranberry juice).

So Karen's Drink is going to become our Valentine's Day Cocktail.  Click on the title above to be taken to the printable recipe.

Herbed Scalloped Potatoes

These were totally devoured.  When Dan the Awesome Camera Man arrived, he handed me a container and said, "I mentioned scalloped potatoes to my wife and she handed me THIS."

I'm so glad that I filled up Dan's container before we all sat down to eat!  There would have been nothing left for him to take home to his wife.

Lemon & Garlic Shrimp with Wilted Spinach

This requires minimal prep and about 5 minutes cooking time.  I think it took me longer to take this picture of the shrimp than it took to cook it.

And then it completely disappeared when we finished filming.   No leftovers.  It was thoroughly devoured.  

Next time, I'm making a double batch.

And finally, Raspberry Brambles, little fruity pockets of yumminess.

Herbed Scalloped Potatoes

In my mind, I call this recipe Christmas Potatoes.

I only make them once a year (care to guess when?), for many reasons, prep time and caloric content being at the top of that list.

When I made them last month (did you guess that I made them on Christmas?  Good guess, you're right!), I thought to myself that I needed to make this recipe on a day when I had time to take pictures and blog about it.

There's a good amount of hands-on prep time involved (about 25 minutes) and then there's at least an hour of cook time (more if you prep and refrigerate in advance).  I promise you, however, that if you serve these potatoes as a side dish for a special occasion, you won't regret putting the time in!

They are really good.

Roasted Boiled Potatoes

I opted to save myself the trouble of planting a vegetable garden this year.  The past few years have yielded very few vegetables that weren't sampled first by the backyard critters.  After all this time of thinking that the neighborhood population of bunnies and squirrels was increasing, I was really surprised by the scarcity of the furry creatures this year.  No garden to lure them into my yard meant fewer nuisances  adorable bunnies and pests  beautiful squirrels hanging around.

I'm just grateful that the li'l varmints don't bother with the flowers that I've planted.  I can easily pick up locally grown produce at the farmers market every week, but there is no bouquet of beautiful flowers anywhere that could ever give me the amount of happiness that I feel every time I look at a vase of flowers that I cut from my own yard.

And speaking of furry creatures--

Clyde is a year old!!

I can't believe how quickly his first year went by.

Here he is when we brought him home last November.

And here is a picture I took yesterday, on his birthday.

And there have been lots of playful moments in between.

It's getting harder and harder to remember a time when he was smaller than Gus!

Maybe someday we'll convince him that he's not a lap dog.