Category Archives: non-local luxuries

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

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

Roasted Brussels Sprouts with Preserved Lemon & Aleppo Pepper

2 March 2014 by local kitchen

Until a couple of years ago, I placed myself firmly and emphatically in the Brussels Haters Club. The sprout, not the city (although really, those Brussels Belgians give Parisians a run for their money in the pissy department). But then, on a whim, I tried the maple-glazed Brussels sprout salad from Kiss My Spatula, and my Brussels-hating days were promptly kaput. (Let’s all pause here for a brief moment of silence in honor of one of my favorite food blogs, […]

Categories: cabbage, citrus, fall, roasting, side dish, vegetarian, winter • Tags: cooking, food, local, quick & easy, recipes, sides, vegetarian

Lazy Citrus Salt

20 February 2014 by local kitchen

For the past few weeks, I’ve had a series of small bowls living at the end of my counter. They each contain a different citrus salt: grapefruit, blood orange, Meyer lemon, Kaffir lime. The levels of each go up and down as I juice a lemon, or eat a grapefruit, and add zest and salt to the pile, or pull out a pinch of the fragrant zest to add to a soup, curry or batch of scones. It may seem […]

Categories: citrus, preserving, winter • Tags: citrus, cooking, food, preserving, quick & easy

Meyer Lemon Rosemary Mac & Cheese

18 February 2014 by local kitchen

I wasn’t going to do it, y’all. I mean, there are already three mac n’ cheese recipes on here: do we really need a fourth? But this one: this one was so good that I couldn’t keep it to myself. And since the end of Meyer season is upon us, I rationalized considered it my civic duty to make this one again, so I could photograph it and share it with you, gentle reader. It’s simple enough: a basic bechamel-based macaroni and cheese, […]

Categories: cheese, citrus, main course, rosemary, vegetarian, winter • Tags: cooking, food, local, pasta, recipes, vegetarian

Grapefruit & Walnut Tart

16 February 2014 by local kitchen

I’m having a tiny love affair with Johnny Weir & Tara Lipinski right now; their figure skating commentary has been one of the bright spots of these Olympics in Sochi and their Instagram feeds (including the combined @taraandjohnny feed) are not to be missed. I love the Olympics, but I loathe the 5:1 ratio of commercials and talking-head noise to actual sporting moments that dominates prime-time. The daytime coverage has, in general, been much more about sport and much less […]

Categories: baking, breakfast, citrus, dessert, winter • Tags: baking, cooking, dessert, food, local, quick & easy, recipes

Kumquat Habanero Marmalade

11 February 2014 by local kitchen

It appears that it is Kumquat Preserve Week on ye olde interwebs: not only my own modest contribution, but a straight-up kumquat marmalade from David Lebovitz, slow-cooked and with less sugar, and this rhubarb(!) and kumquat jam from Yossy via Blue Chair Fruit (who are teaching marmalade classes this month as well, if you live in the Bay Area and want to learn). Well, I have one more to add to the pile of kumquat love: kumquat habanero marmalade, originally made & […]

Categories: canning, citrus, preserves, preserving, winter • Tags: canning, cooking, food, marmalade, preserving

Kumquat & Meyer Lemon Marmalade with Chile & Kaffir Lime

7 February 2014 by local kitchen

It’s been all marm, all the time around here for the last week or two, what with Meyer lemons, Rio Red grapefruit, and blood oranges, kumquats and Kaffir limes all rolling around my counter tops. And trust me, there are worse things than having 40 lbs of California and Texas citrus perfuming the kitchen in the midst of a snowy, snowy Polar Vortex New York winter. I’ve been enjoying a lot of citrus fresh: grapefruit for breakfast, blood orange as an afternoon […]

Categories: canning, citrus, preserves, preserving • Tags: canning, cooking, food, preserving, winter

Toasted Couscous Salad with Fennel & Kumquats

9 January 2014 by local kitchen

Can we talk about the tyranny of 5-ingredient recipes? I mean, what line of bullshit have we swallowed that makes us think that limiting a recipe to just five ingredients will make our lives better, simpler, or “down right irresistible?” Don’t get me wrong: we all know that the essence of good cooking is restraint. But to arbitrarily limit ourselves to only five ingredients (not counting salt, pepper, water, a splash of olive oil, a dash of lemon, a…..) out of […]

Categories: cabbage, celery, citrus, fennel, grains & legumes, quick & easy, salad, side dish, vegetarian, winter • Tags: cooking, food, local, quick & easy, salad, vegetarian, winter

White Bean, Leek & Preserved Lemon Soup

3 January 2014 by local kitchen

Winter storm Hercules was a bust, in my opinion. While my friends in Boston got hammered with a foot and a half of the powdery stuff, we’ve got a mere 7 inches here in New York: hardly Herculean amounts. All sorts of bluster and school closings and road closings and State of Emergency declarings for what was, once upon a time, simply…. winter. It is, however, very cold & blustery, with air temps in the single digits and wind chill standing […]

Categories: beans, citrus, grains & legumes, heirloom beans, leek, main course, soup, winter • Tags: beans, cooking, food, local, main course, soup, winter

Rosemary Roasted Cashews

23 November 2013 by local kitchen

Have you heard the news? Nuts will save your life. Literally. A study published in the New England Journal of Medicine has analyzed nut consumption in nearly 175,000 health professionals over a span of 30 years. They found a 20% reduction in death from any cause in people who ate nuts every day. Twenty. percent. Let that sink in for a moment. Twenty percent lower incidence of heart disease. Of diabetes. Of cancer. Respiratory disease. Neurodegenerative disease. Stroke. Even infection. (How […]

Categories: appetizer, gifts, holiday, nuts, quick & easy, rosemary, snack, year round • Tags: cooking, food, local, nibbles, nuts, quick & easy, recipes, vegetarian

Use It or Lose It! Jam & Almond Crumb Bars

5 November 2013 by local kitchen

A few weeks ago, in the midst of birthday and anniversary celebrations, rock climbing, hiking and mountain biking excursions, and all around amazing-Fall-weather craziness, Tai & I went to a house party hosted by one of his colleagues and fellow rock climbing guides up in the Gunks. It was sort of a potluck, with friends requested to bring either a dessert or a side dish; Tai brags about my cooking to these guys all the time, so of course I […]

Categories: baking, breakfast, dessert, jams, nuts, snack, Use it or Lose it!, whole wheat flour, year round • Tags: baking, cooking, food, jam, local, quick & easy, recipes

Chuzos de Pollo

20 October 2013 by local kitchen

Most of the meals I had in Panama fell into one simple category: meat on a stick. While I can’t claim to be a big fan of Panamanian cuisine; it’s very meat & starch-centric, with lots of fried food and nary a vegetable in sight; I can say that when it comes to carne en palito, Panama knows its stuff. Incredibly tender and moist chunks of chicken or beef, marinated and flavorful and perfectly grilled over an open flame: it’s enough […]

Categories: chicken, citrus, grill, main course, parsley, year round • Tags: cooking, food, grilling, latin america, local, meat, recipes

Nectarine Meyer Lemon Butter

29 September 2013 by local kitchen

As promised, the nectarine Meyer lemon butter recipe. It’s a simple one: a nice pile of nectarines from the farmer’s market, a bit (a very little bit) of sugar, and two precious Meyer lemons, hoarded from my visit to Karen in August. This has become my preferred method for fruit butters: coarsely chop unpeeled fruit and soften at a low simmer until you can push it through a food mill; strain the juice from the pulp and reduce the juice […]

Categories: canning, citrus, fall, peaches, preserving, sauces, summer • Tags: canning, cooking, food, local, preserving, recipes