Category Archives: grains & legumes

Pumpkin Chocolate Marbled Bundt Cake + A Giveaway!

29 October 2014 by local kitchen

This post is in partnership with MightyNest, the online retailer with a positive mission: providing the natural, organic, and non-toxic products that families seek for their homes while also giving back to schools. MightyNest is sponsoring the giveaway and provided a set of the materials to me for review. Teflon in cookware is a bad idea: we don’t really need to debate this, right? When heated (which cookware occasionally is, cough), Teflon coatings on nonstick cookware can release a toxic […]

Categories: baking, cake, chocolate, dessert, fall, whole wheat flour, winter squash • Tags: baking, cake, cooking, dessert, food, giveaway, local, pumpkin, recipes

Preserved Lemon Hummus

23 October 2014 by local kitchen

Strange but true: I ate some of the best hummus in Brazil. Smack-dab in the middle of the Amazon jungle, to be exact, about 1000 miles from nowhere, otherwise known as Manaus. While I and my intrepid band of World Cup travelers endured a purgatorial stay at the Hotel Brasil (an establishment that made you wonder what heinous crime you committed in a previous life to get yourself stuck there) in advance of the second US match, we spent a […]

Categories: appetizer, chickpeas, grains & legumes, mint, quick & easy, snack, vegetarian, year round • Tags: cooking, food, quick & easy, recipes, vegetarian

Figgy Granola Bars

8 October 2014 by local kitchen

Gettin’ figgy wit it. I know. That was bad. I apologize. Ahem. Let’s move on, shall we? A simple little granola bar with a base of dried figs, oats, and almonds. Inspired by the 5 ingredient granola bars at Minimalist Baker, but of course, I tossed that 5 ingredient thing right out the window, adding coffee (because: morning), pepitas (because: Fall!) and flax seeds (because: health!), not to mention salt (because: who makes granola bars without salt??). The real beauty […]

Categories: breakfast, grains & legumes, nuts, oats, quick & easy, snack, year round • Tags: cooking, food, local, quick & easy, recipes

Bacon Cheddar Biscuits

23 September 2014 by local kitchen

A certain wonderful husband is celebrating a birthday today. Since there is only one morning person in this house, last night I made him a batch of bacon cheddar biscuits so he would have something delicious and celebratory for breakfast. Once I tasted one, I knew I had to share the recipe here: delicious and celebratory they are. Also smoky, salty, rich, flaky: fabulous. Happiest of birthdays to my sweet love. And happiest of biscuits to yours! Adapted from $72 […]

Categories: 100% local, baking, breads, breakfast, cheese, pork, whole wheat flour, year round • Tags: baking, cooking, food, local, quick & easy, whole grain breads

Whole Wheat Lavash

13 August 2014 by local kitchen

Well: it’s been a sad, sad week in the world so far. First, yet another unarmed young black man, Michael Brown, is shot to death by police: anger, frustration and protests erupt in Ferguson, Missouri. Then, Robin Williams, who brought joy to so many, lost the ultimate battle against his demons. Tributes and stories, hundreds of fabulous stories, poured in from every corner of the internet. Then Lauren Bacall died. And there’s the unrelentingly rainy weather. And Israel-Palestine. And the […]

Categories: baking, breads, whole wheat flour, year round • Tags: baking, cooking, food, local, recipes, whole grain breads

Ramp & White Bean Fritters with Sriracha-Marmalade Sauce

25 April 2014 by local kitchen

“Oh, ramps,” I hear you sigh, sniffing delicately. “That’s so last year.” To be sure, ramp mania seems to have dimmed somewhat, after a strong showing in the opening years of the decade, to be replaced by new must-have food items such as artisanal toast and eggs that are scrambled in the shell. Which is a good thing, really, as ramps have been dangerously over-harvested in recent years: perhaps everyone has finally gotten the message about sustainable ramp foraging? Or, perhaps, it […]

Categories: appetizer, beans, leek, snack, spring, vegetarian, wild foods • Tags: beans, cooking, food, local, recipes, spring, vegetarian

Citrus Saltines

18 April 2014 by local kitchen

I get a lot of questions from people asking how I use my citrus salt. I’ve got to admit, they sort of baffle me because, well, how do you use regular salt? That’s how you can use citrus salt. Use it in soups or stews, season meat, add it to bread, muffins or scones, garnish a salad or a baked potato or chocolate chip cookies. The uses for citrus salt are nearly as endless as for salt itself. There are […]

Categories: baking, snack, whole wheat flour, year round • Tags: cooking, food, local, quick & easy, recipes

Kami’s Birthday Cake 2014

10 April 2014 by local kitchen

I loved this cake. I loved its perfectly imperfect messy abandon. I loved its sweet-tart Meyer cloud cream, made with the very last of my Meyer lemon stash, and generously dolloped between layers of cake. I loved those layers of cake: orange-zest-spiked, tender and moist, perfectly flat. I loved the droopy, thick & luscious cream cheese icing, made a glorious pinky-purple with a reduced beet purée, and I loved the finishing touch, a light sprinkle of homemade orange sugar, for […]

Categories: baking, cake, citrus, dessert, holiday, spring, whole wheat flour, winter, year round • Tags: baking, cooking, food, recipes

Orange Chiffon Cake

4 April 2014 by local kitchen

April: it is the cruelest month. My feed is full of asparagus and cherry blossoms and daffodils and tulips and strawberries and and and…. we’ve got nothing. Nothing. Nary a bud on the forsythia nor a peeping green shoot in the soil. Spring is coming: the snow is gone, temps have been in the 50’s and 60’s, we’ve even taken the extra quilt off of the bed(!), but – it doesn’t seem to be coming as quickly here as it […]

Categories: baking, cake, citrus, dessert, whole wheat flour, year round • Tags: baking, cake, cooking, food, local, recipes

Homemade Instant Oatmeal

1 April 2014 by local kitchen

Twenty-four years ago or so, my parents moved back home to Boston after a brief stint in sunny Malibu. I had just come back home as well, after finishing up my senior year of college in not-so-sunny Syracuse, NY, and was living in my first official “adult” apartment, on not-nearly-so-trendy-at-the-time St. Botolph Street in Boston’s South End. While it was nice to be back home in New England, and to have the family all in the same state, not to […]

Categories: breakfast, oats, winter, year round • Tags: breakfast, cooking, DIY, food, local, quick & easy, recipes

Cannellini Bean Soup with Winter Veg

18 March 2014 by local kitchen

Just last week I was joking with Winnie that the last thing this blog needs is another bean + vegetable soup recipe. [At last count, I think I’ve got about 18. But I suppose, out of 600+ recipes, that’s a pretty low percentage. Maybe that’ll be my new tagline: only 3% bean + veg soup!] I had no intention of posting this recipe. I was just doing what I do almost every week in the winter: cooking up a pot […]

Categories: 100% local, beans, celeriac, main course, soup, turnip & rutabaga, vegetarian, winter • Tags: beans, cooking, food, local, recipes, soup, vegetarian

Caramelized Fennel & Bacon Pizza

4 February 2014 by local kitchen

I had the weirdest dream last night. (Wait; don’t run away! You’ll notice I did not start out with “Dear Penthouse Forum, I never thought this would happen to me…”). After a snowy afternoon of baking beet brownies and watching Kitchen Nightmares, I went to bed and had a dream about Gordon Ramsay. (Did I not just tell you that Penthouse Forum was in no way involved? Get your mind out of the gutter. Take mine with you.) In my dream, […]

Categories: 100% local, cheese, fennel, main course, pizza, whole wheat flour, winter • Tags: cooking, food, local, pizza, recipes, whole grain breads, winter

Leftover Love: Chips + Dip

29 January 2014 by local kitchen

Well here we are folks: Day 7 of our Week of Leftovers. I’ve managed to post every day for a week, which is a small miracle in itself; and I’ve managed to come up with some inventive ways to fashion a week’s worth of meals out of celeriac soup, slow-roasted beef and a pot of beans. I hope you’ve enjoyed this little peek into my leftover-obsessed fridge. A week out, the last of the beef has gone into chili, the […]

Categories: appetizer, beans, condiments, parsley, snack, vegetarian, year round • Tags: beans, cooking, food, leftovers, local, quick & easy

Leftover Love: Beef & Bean Chili Jacket Potato

28 January 2014 by local kitchen

On Sunday I decided that it was time to put the remaining chipotle beef into a stew, something I could freeze if it looked like we weren’t going to eat it all before it threatened to spoil. Since I had already cooked up a pot of Lina Sisco’s, and had sautéed all of the leftover chopped veg from our taco lunch, it was about the easiest chili ever: brown the beef in spices for a minute or two, deglaze with […]

Categories: 100% local, beans, beef, main course, winter • Tags: beans, cooking, food, local, recipes, winter

Leftover Love: Huevos Rancheros

27 January 2014 by local kitchen

A quick one today, as our Sunday was all about leftover lasagna, sneaking bites of spicy beef from the fridge, and popping popcorn for a Downton Abbey-Sherlock marathon. I did, however, manage to whip up some huevos rancheros for lunch. Leftover corn tortillas, the leftover taco vegetables that were already sautéed and in the fridge, beans that I had cooked on Taco Day, salsa verde, and even the leftover egg white from yesterday’s Swiss chard pasta. It all came together […]

Categories: beans, breakfast, eggs, vegetarian • Tags: cooking, food, local, quick & easy, recipes, vegetarian