| Local cooking and eating in New York's Hudson Valley.

Holiday Party Menu 2014

22 December 2014 by local kitchen

The menu for this year’s Christmas party was pretty epic, if I do say so myself: bourbon-glazed pork belly, savory cheddar shortbreads, grilled skirt steak tacos, an amazing maple-mustard pulled pork, and more nibbles than you think you could possibly go through, but go through we did. I never get the chance to take photos; the light is Christmas-tree festive, but horrible for photography, and I’m always too busy running around and cooking to even think of it (hence I’ve […]

Categories: holiday, winter • Tags: cooking, food, holiday, local, recipes

Feta & Preserved Lemon Scones

11 December 2014 by local kitchen

My beloved New England Revolution played in the MLS Cup in Los Angeles last weekend. For the fifth time in a dozen years, the Revs battled it out in the championship game of Major League Soccer. For the fifth time, I jumped up and down in the stands; I clapped and sang, I rejoiced and cried. For the fifth time, I sat dejected in a stadium parking lot, nursing a beer with a few hundred die-hard New England fans, all of […]

Categories: baking, breakfast, cheese, citrus, parsley, snack, winter • Tags: baking, cooking, food, local, quick & easy, recipes, vegetarian, whole grain breads

What To Do with Preserved Lemon

1 December 2014 by local kitchen

Did you know that our good friend Sean of Punk Domestics fame is now the Food Preservation Expert over at About.com? It’s a really nice resource for All Things Preserve-y, and he’s been steadily adding new content. You should go check it out. And while you’re over there, you can take a look at the little guest post I put together discussing a bunch of different ways to use up preserved lemon, including links to various favorite recipes around the […]

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

Fennel, Grapefruit & Feta Salad

19 November 2014 by local kitchen

“Oh no,” I hear you groan. “Now that she’s trying to lose weight, it’s going to be All Salad, All The Time around here.” Never fear, my pretties: I had gumbo for breakfast. It will be business as usual Chez LK, and though I will admit that my determination to halt middle-aged spread in its tracks may result in fewer bacon biscuits and more crunchy vegetables, bacon biscuits will always have a place in my heart. And my belly. But, […]

Categories: citrus, fennel, salad, vegetarian, winter • Tags: citrus, cooking, food, local, recipes, salad, vegetarian

Quinoa & Red Cabbage Salad

12 November 2014 by local kitchen

True confessions: I am on a mission to lose weight. It’s an odd goal for me, to tell the truth: I have often trained to get fit in order to improve my performance in some sport or another – soccer, kayaking, rock climbing, hiking – but rarely do I simply want to change the number on the scale. In fact, I haven’t even owned a scale for at least a decade. I had to buy one recently in order to […]

Categories: cabbage, quinoa, salad, year round • Tags: cooking, food, local, recipes, salad, vegetarian

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

Mirepoix, Sofrito, & Soup Base for the Freezer

16 October 2014 by local kitchen

Have you ever noticed how each season’s preserving takes on a life of its own? Sure, you have the standards that you put up every year: canned tomatoes, your husband’s favorite pickle, ears and ears of frozen grilled corn. But each season it seems a certain method of preservation wins the day. Either the canning pot is bubbling away non-stop, or you have six different crocks fermenting on the counter, or everything in sight gets spread out in the dehydrator. […]

Categories: 100% local, freezing, preserving, soup, spring, summer • Tags: cooking, food, local, preserving, recipes

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

Nectarine Plum Butter

16 September 2014 by local kitchen

I have a confession to make: this fruit butter sat on my stove, in the Staub, for three days before I managed to cook it fully down and get it into jars. My friend Tanya had pointed me to a recent article on the Kitchn about when a health inspector visited Faith’s kitchen, and I had to laugh: I had a sponge near the sink, half an apple that had been sitting on my cutting board for hours, and a […]

Categories: canning, fall, peaches, plums, preserving, spreads, summer • Tags: canning, cooking, food, local, preserving

Roasted Heirloom Tomato Sauce

10 September 2014 by local kitchen

And the tomato recipes go rolling, rolling, rolling on. Last week I picked up a bushel of organic paste tomatoes from Fishkill Farms; at the same time, I got 20 lbs of heirloom paste tomatoes, a gorgeous red-and-yellow-stripey varietal with a deep magenta flesh, few seeds, and fantastic flavor. (I also grabbed some orchard nectarines, heirloom baby orange sweet peppers, NY maple syrup, and Flying Pigs‘ hot Italian sausage. Fishkill has a great year-round farm market, full of all sorts […]

Categories: canning, preserving, sauces, summer, tomatoes • Tags: canning, cooking, food, local, preserving, summer, tomatoes

Curried Yellow Tomato Chutney

7 September 2014 by local kitchen

Rarely do I meet a chutney that I do not like. Which is strange, because chutney is basically a pickle and I hate pickles. Hmmm. The exception that proves the rule, perhaps? At any rate, this chutney – this chutney with its adorable, tiny, yellow peach tomatoes, its subtle hint of sweetness, its lightly curried Indian flavors and just enough heat on the finish – this chutney is no exception. It’s simply lovely. I have to give it up for […]

Categories: chutneys, summer, tomatoes • Tags: canning, cooking, food, local, preserving, recipes, tomatoes

Garden-Busting Roasted Tomato Sauce

24 August 2014 by local kitchen

Is the garden erupting with end-of-summer bounty? Are the piles of CSA vegetables taking over your fridge and kitchen counters? Are you feeling as lazy about canning as I am this summer? Well then, you’re in luck! This easy-peasy roasted vegetable tomato sauce solves all those problems and more, in addition to the perennial question, “What’s for dinner?” While I am slowly (oh-so-slowly) surfacing from my post-World Cup funk (two loonnnnggg years before qualifying for 2018 starts), I can’t quite […]

Categories: 100% local, preserving, sauces, summer, tomatoes • Tags: cooking, local, preserving, recipes, summer, tomatoes

Green Bean, Corn & Bacon Salad with a Chipotle-Lime Dressing

21 August 2014 by local kitchen

I’m sometimes at a loss when it comes to green beans. I mean, sure: when I’ve got a handful or two, the way I will buy them at the farmer’s market, I’ll toss them into a curry or noodle dish, no problem. But often it seems, when beans are ready, they are READY: the harvest comes fast & furious, and we end up with two bulging gallon Ziplocs in the fridge, courtesy of the CSA (and of me avoiding green […]

Categories: corn, green beans, quick & easy, salad, summer • Tags: cooking, food, local, quick & easy, recipes, salad