Thursday, October 19, 2006

A number of recipes I have tried but did not take pictures of, foolishly:

1. Pesto
I tried to grow basil this year. It did OK. I sprinkled basil seeds in with my tomato seedlings. The tomatoes never made it, since I didn't water them regularly enough, and they can't take that if they are in little clay pots. The basil did better, but still not great. Actually, pretty great considering I mistreated them (see above re: no watering). Only at the end of the summer did I read that basil plants grow more if you pinch bits off and use them, so on that day, I went out and harvested half the basil. You see, I thought the end of summer was near. That was in August or so, and yesterday was 90 degrees out. To be fair, today it was about 65 at the highest point of the day.

The pesto, however, was excellent:
2 T pine nuts
2 large garlic cloves
2 3/4 c basil
2 T grated parmesan
2 t lemon juice
3 T olive oil
I used these measurements as approximate guides. Process the pignoli and garlic, then add basil, parmesan and lemon and process again. Finally, add olive oil until a smooth (but still chunky) consistency. You know, like pesto.

2. Fruit cobbler
I love making fruit cobbler, and spent probably years "refining" my apple crisp recipe. Really, that just means trying different additions to the apples, and different types of apples, and occasionally trying different toppings. Or sometimes even different fruit. Peach crisp was nice too. Back in cherry season, I made a cobbler with cherries and nectarines. I will not include the recipe, however, because it was too biscuity on top, not sweet enough, too stout. I will note, however, that it was baked at 350 for about 35-45 minutes.

Then recently I tried again with the nectarines, this time what I think of as a crisp, though it might more properly be called a grunt or slump or crumble or something. I am not sure of the classifications on this type of dessert. Just that I like it.

Nectarine crisp
1-2 cups oats (like for cereal, the 5-minute kind, not the instant)
1.25 c brown sugar
0.67 c flour
0.67 c butter or margarine
sliced fruit (enough to fill the pan - medium-sized oval corningware pan, if you are me)

Mix oats, sugar and flour. Cut in butter. Top the fruit with this mixture, and bake 45 minutes (or until browning on top and fruit has obviously cooked to the point where it releases its juice).

3. Bread pudding
On returning from our last trip to Houston, we stopped in Corsicana at the Cooper Street Bakery outlet (or something like that; if you've driven from Houston to Dallas, you've probably seen the signs). They had lots of fruitcake and cookies, which I did Not buy, and some things that I did: egg bread rolls (delicious), a stale cupcake (blech), and English Muffin bread (blah). We did not really eat the muffin bread, because I made proper bread in addition. So midweek, there's this whole loaf of muffin bread staring at me with an accusatory tone. I decided to make bread pudding. It was pretty good.

2 c milk
3 eggs
4-5 c bread, cubed or torn to 1" pieces
0.75 t nutmeg (or since I hate nutmeg, cinnamon instead, and a little cardamom)
0.5 c raisins (I used dried cranberries)
0.75 c sugar
1 t vanilla extract
1 apple, cut into little pieces

mix the eggs, sugar, milk, cinnamon and vanilla. toss the bread, craisins and apple. Pour liquid over bread mixture, let sit for 30 minutes. Bake at 350-400 (it went too slowly and was in for 45 minutes, so I raised the temperature - I am impatient for results) until golden brown on top.
If reheating, add a bit of milk to each serving so the microwaving is more effective and less drying.
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So, that is all of the recipes with no pictures. They were good.

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