Category Archives: cooking

all day ham and bean soup

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People seem to have their soup memories from growing up. I have a friend whose soup memories are chicken soup. A lot of mine involve ham and bean soup.

My late father was the soup maker growing up. My mother will tell you it was her, but it really wasn’t. Every winter he would make a ham and bean soup. It would have cabbage, ham, beans, sometimes he would even dice up a hard, Italian salami, and vegetables.

When my vegetable box came this week, there was a beautiful cabbage in it. I realized from my recent pork share order that I had a big smoked ham hock in the freezer. I also had some leftover ham that I had frozen when we had not eaten all of a ham for just this purpose.

Yesterday I started with the dried beans. I boiled water and poured it over the beans and a big mixing bowl with some herbs and spices and salt. I left the beans to soak overnight and this morning I began the soup.

First I sautéed garlic, onion, celery, and the ham hock and ham. Then I added, cut up baby carrots because that’s what I had in the refrigerator. After that had all cooked together for a few minutes I poured in the liquid the dried beans were soaking in. I also added a 14 ounce can of crushed tomatoes. (Mutti, my favorite tomato brand.)

After that cooked together for a bit, I added a container of bone broth, the cabbage I had gotten in my vegetable box all diced up, and water. Note when you dice the cabbage small for a soup it’s sort of melts away and it’s not obtrusive.

To this, I added herbs. I still have sage and thyme growing in some of the pots in my garden, believe it or not. I also added some Herbes de Provence, and a couple dashes of New Mexico chili powder. I also added a salt free pepper blend that I use called Pennsylvania pepper.

And two cheese rinds. I can’t forget that! I save them in little baggies in the freezer for sauces and soups, and things like macaroni and cheese.

I brought the soup up to a boil, then I turned it down to just above a simmer, and just kept checking on it throughout the day and giving it a stir. I did not do it with the lid completely off because I wanted the beans to cook properly. I used one of my little pot lid risers and had the lid on but up a smidge.

The soup because it has cooked low and slow all day has thickened and reduced and melded together beautifully.

You know you don’t really necessarily need a specific recipe for a lot of these soups. It’s what you have on hand.

Happy souping!

dear recipe philly, sometimes the timing in life is just not right

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What some of the people that spend so much time criticizing me don’t realize is I love to cook. I also love to garden, which is of course why I have a separate gardening blog.

A while back a friend sent me a link to a website. It was for something called Recipe Philly.

So on a complete whim, I submitted the pasta sauce recipe taught to me by my great aunts and my paternal grandmother. It’s mostly their recipe, but I tweaked it and wrote it down.

I know that this sauce recipe is good enough to compete with. I’ve actually had people who are professional chefs, and in the restaurant industry tell me so over the years. I also just love the idea of the sauce I learned to make as well as gnocchi in a kitchen at 11th and Ritner when I was a little girl, could be shared with a broader audience.

I still have very distinct memories of the big ceramic top kitchen table that used to hold 8 or 10 of us at one time being cleared for first chopping up vegetables and what not going into the sauce, and then as a workstation to make the gnocchi.

The gnocchi is also another recipe that I finally wrote down because I was taught how to make it by feel. You could just feel when the dough was right.

When my father’s mother would sometimes babysit us when we were in high school and my parents were traveling for my father’s job at the time, I would have these memories of Saturday mornings, and even Sunday mornings, waking up to the mingled smell of fresh coffee and garlic and onion Starting to cook in the bottom of a Dutch oven for sauce.

It was these memories that I was all excited to bring to this competition. And I’m hardly a reality show person. But it was because this was really kind of a cooking thing I was interested. Finally, I’m at a place in my life where I have the time to do something like that.

But life throws you curveballs. I was interviewed on a zoom submitted my application and invited to compete tomorrow in Philadelphia but at the same time this was happening, I have a dog who developed cancer. And the reality of life and the responsibility to my pet means I can’t leave her for 8 or 10 hours right now.

So this morning, I had to decline. I had my recipe ready. I had my photos. I had my recipe card. They want it filled out done and a copy of my application. I sent the producers who gave up their valuable time for me an email apologizing. I didn’t want to just not show up that would be rude and disrespectful of their time and energy into this project which I think is a fun as well as cool idea.

If my recipe had been chosen, it would’ve been featured in this brand new restaurant opening in Philadelphia. If my recipe had been chosen, I think it would’ve amused the ghosts of my ancestors. This recipe was obviously taught to my great aunts and my grandmother by their mother, who immigrated to this country with her husband their father has a very young woman for a better life. This recipe is part of the DNA of my American story because we are a country of immigrants.

Those people, who would’ve been my late father’s maternal grandparents came here for a better life. If they hadn’t existed, the future generations of which I am part of the current present generation never would have existed.

So for the time being, I don’t get my home cook moment, but for the love of my dog, I just can’t do it. And I really wanted to. But sometimes the timing in life and being a grown-up and being a responsible pet owner have to come first.

If these people at Recipe Philly would ever want to talk to me after today about my recipe and competing when they actually film, I would welcome that opportunity. But sadly, I know that’s not how the process works, so it’s just not my time.

A girl can dream though…..

two dinners

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One roast chicken, two dinners.

Last night’s roast chicken with a curry paste in leftover form first became a bone broth.

Then, after broth was cooked and strained, the chicken I had leftover that had been separated from the carcass prior to bone broth was shredded and added back along with finely chopped vegetables (fresh spinach, red cabbage, red onion, celery) and simmered along to perfection.

Some of the mashed potatoes left over from the chicken became gnocchi- just enough to cook separately and fresh for bottom of the bowl and soup ladled over it.

Now last night’s chicken was a happy experiment. We love curries and I thought why not try a curry roasted chicken?

I made a curry paste and used it to roast the chicken with it.

It wasn’t too complicated to make the paste. It was a couple different kinds of curry powder that I have, red curry paste, olive oil, salt, pepper, garlic powder.

I thought that the leftovers would make a good bone broth and they did. And last night I decided some of the leftover potatoes would make great gnocchi.

And it all worked! In an era of expensive grocery prices, it was a thrifty solution to stretch groceries and make leftovers more fun!

Have a good night!

time for pesto

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I love growing basil. It’s one of my favorite herbs. And since I started growing it from seed and using my greenhouse to grow it , it’s a game changer. It is a stronger plant and it lasts longer when you grow from seed yourself. And it loves being in the greenhouse with the chili peppers I grow.

Today I made pesto out of some of the basil and served it on tortellini for dinner.

Now my late father made his pesto using a mortar and pestle. I use my blender. And below are the ingredients for my pesto and literally it just goes in the blender and I pulverize it. I refrigerate it until I’m going to use it and I just love pesto when homemade like this.

Pesto

3 – 4 cups fresh basil leaves

Bunch of fresh flat leaf Italian parsley or lovage 

1 cup olive oil

4-5 garlic cloves 

Zest and juice of 1 lemon

Juice but no zest of one lime

Salt to taste 

3/4 cup of toasted pine nuts / pignoli

1/2 grated Parmesan or Parmesan Romano cheese

Dash of hot sauce 

summer cacciatore

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Tonight I made a lighter version of a chicken cacciatore for summer. Boneless skinless chicken breasts, fresh vegetables, orange zest, a smidge of balsamic, mushroom ravioli found at Aldi.

Oh the tomatoes? Some fresh cherry tomatoes and a container of Mutti Passata.

summer sunday pasta

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Google for the creamy lemon zucchini pasta recipe. I used the All Recipes version of the recipe.  I signed up for I guess recipes from them and this one looked good.

https://www.allrecipes.com/creamy-lemon-zucchini-pasta-recipe-11740513

It’s a keeper.

I added a little more liquid than the recipe called for and I used half-and-half instead of heavy cream and also added a little more garlic and a little bit of onion minced up. I also used white vermouth because I didn’t have any white wine open.

I will note I never made this recipe before and when I went to Google to find everyone the link, I discovered that Bon Appétit and many other places have similar recipes.

It is not heavy. It’s surprisingly light and I really enjoyed it. 

https://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/creamy-lemon-zucchini-pasta

strawberry rhubarb crumble

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It’s such a simple thing, and it is a very uncomplicated dessert or breakfast treat with plain Greek yogurt. Strawberry rhubarb crumble.

I had rhubarb in my vegetable box from Lancaster County PA the other day and I had some strawberries in the refrigerator.

Here’s how you make it and it couldn’t be more simple:

2 1/2 cups diced rhubarb

1 1/2 cups diced fresh strawberries

1 1/4 cups white sugar

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

1 large egg

½ teaspoon ground cinnamon

1 ½ cups all-purpose flour

1 1/4 cup packed light brown sugar

1 cup quick-cooking oats

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

1 teaspoon ground ginger

1 cup butter

Preheat oven to 375°F.

Grease a 9 x 13 baking dish if you have one if not, I used a deeper vintage 8 x 8 Corningware baking dish.

Combine rhubarb, strawberries white sugar, 1/4 cup brown sugar, 2 tablespoons flour, egg, and 1 teaspoon cinnamon and 1 teaspoon ginger together in a large bowl until evenly coated.

Put fruit mixture in the bottom of the baking dish.

Mix 1 ½ cups flour, the rest of the brown sugar, oats, and 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon together in a separate bowl. Cut in butter using a pastry cutter or two forks until topping is crumbly. Sprinkle topping over rhubarb layer.

Bake in the preheated oven 40 to 45 minutes until it’s bubbling up around the edges of the topping. The topping will be brownish and color and smell delicious.

You can serve warm or cold and it is really good with plain Greek yogurt for breakfast.

vintage cookbook fun

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I bought a now vintage cookbook…that I remember seeing around when I was a kid. This was something the Junior League of Philadelphia put out during the Bicentennial.

The recipes since this was a cookbook that made its debut in 1976, are a combination of classic and dated. For example, there are more basic Jell-O mold recipes then I’ve seen in other places in a while.

However, there’s a bunch of fun stuff in this cookbook and I did make one recipe this week. I made the chicken tetrazzini. It actually turned out remarkably well. I do not however, use canned vegetables so I used fresh mushrooms, and I sautéed them with an onion and some garlic.

Anyway, here are all the various photos of my creation. I did also substitute Marsala for the sherry, because I didn’t have any.

I also used a combination of shredded Swiss and Gruyère with grated Manchego. I had a piece of leftover Manchego and decided that would add the sharpness the recipe calls for.

Other than these deviations, I pretty much stuck to a recipe for once and it was honestly surprisingly good. 

a must visit: settantatré in berwyn

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Settantatré is open! Now I know that they have been getting stuff ready this week because my friend has been raving about their coffees. So when I was at Surrey Consignment shop for their big April sale I decided to walk down the strip and check out Settantatré. (The address is 802 Lancaster Ave., Berwyn and it’s where Surrey and E MJ’s are.)

When I went in, they are still setting up, but they have their freezer and refrigerated cases full of goodies and homemade focaccia and I don’t know where the pastries come from. I don’t believe the chef makes them, but I could be wrong. I bought a couple of croissants for Sunday morning breakfast.

Now this business has been making a buzz ever since Matt Gentile and Genna Curcio opened in Milmont Park down in Delaware County. Matt Gentile was the chef at Panorama in Old City and other amazing places like LaCroix and Ela and Parc.

So Chef Matt was there when I went in today and couldn’t be nicer. And me in an Italian food store is probably irritating for some store owners because I have to look at everything. the store is not huge, but it has a great selection of pastas and sauces and soon they will be open for some kind of dinner things in the back. I didn’t get the details on those. That’s just what other people have told me and it says it on the website something about the 73 club.

https://www.settantatrepasta73.com/

I don’t need gluten-free pasta so I bought regular pasta which was a treat because I normally make my own. I don’t buy much pasta unless it’s dry. And even then, it’s if I can get certain brands like Garafalo. However, my sister and niece like gluten-free pasta so I’m very excited to have such an amazing place close by.

I will be having one of the raviolis I purchased for dinner with their spicy Rosé pasta sauce.

I also got this spicy tomato nest thing which is goat cheese with sun dried tomatoes and I guess pine nuts and stuff. That is from Shellbark Hollow, whose goat cheese is one of my favorites.

Anyway, I had a swell time visiting this little store. And I think Chef Matt was amused by me because I said look I’m just a regular kind of customer person, not an influencer looking for freebies, but I said I would put a little write up on my blog. My blog means nothing to him and I’m not a food writer. I’m just a home cook. But the real food writers like Craig Le Ban are fans of this Chef and business.

I look forward to my next visit and next time I will make time for coffee because it smelled espresso perfect.

I am including a little tiny video with the bottom for people that are stumped on how to pronounce the name of this business.

I was not compensated in any way shape or form for my visit. No overreaching wannabe influencers were involved either. Just plain old #shopsmall #shoplocal

Happy Saturday!

ny style cheesecake

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I wanted to make my husband a special anniversary dinner and one of his favorite things in the whole world is cheesecake. Good cheesecake, not loaded up with anything, so I went rummaging around and decided to make him a New York style cheesecake.

I will give you the basic recipe. Mine is slightly bigger than this recipe because my spring form pan is a little bigger. But if I try to explain how I increased it incrementally, it will get too confusing for people who are just trying to follow a recipe. For those who really want to know, I didn’t increase the filling. It was just that I also had more graham crackers and no place to use them so it was an additional half cup or so of graham cracker crumbs, so I added half a stick more of melted unsalted butter.

I originally found this recipe on the Aldi tab on Instacart. Instacart has these little recipes that they put in next to the different stores that they deliver, and this one looked fairly simple and it was. I did tweak it a little to suit me. I increased the vanilla extract, I increased the sugar slightly, and I added cinnamon and a dash of cardamom. I also substituted cinnamon graham crackers for regular graham crackers. I make my own crumbs in other words and it’s not very scientific. I put them in a plastic bag and I beat them with a kitchen mallet until they’re crumbs.

Full ingredient list

  • 2 cups cinnamon sugar graham cracker crumbs
  • 1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted
  • 4 (8 oz) packages cream cheese, softened
  • 1 1/3 cups granulated sugar (I say a generous 1/3 of a cup. )
  • 2 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
  • 4 large eggs
  • 1/3 cup sour cream
  • 1/3 cup heavy cream
  • Cinnamon
  • Dash cardomom

Preparation:
1 Preheat oven to 350°F.


2 In a bowl, mix graham cracker crumbs, about a teaspoon of cinnamon, a dash of cardamom, and melted butter until well combined. Press mixture onto the bottom of a 9-inch springform pan.


3 In a large bowl, beat cream cheese, sugar, and vanilla extract until smooth. Add about four dashes of cinnamon.


4. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.


5. Stir in sour cream and heavy cream.


6. Pour mixture over the crust and smooth the top with a spatula. Dust the top with a few dashes of cinnamon. 


7. Bake for 45-50 minutes or until the center is almost set. *Bake with a Bain Marie or pan of hot water* on shelf below shelf you place cheesecake to bake on in the oven* I will also note that I put my springform pan on a lined cookie sheet before putting it into the oven because I have had pans like this leak before in the oven. in the case of a cheesecake. I think it helps. Keep it level as well. The original Aldi recipe does not call for these additional steps and apparently you can bake this cake without a Bain Marie.


8. Turn off the oven and let the cheesecake cool inside for 30 minutes.


9. Remove from the oven and run a knife around the edges of the pan to loosen the cheesecake.


10. Let it cool completely at room temperature before refrigerating for at least 4 hours or overnight.


11.Serve chilled and enjoy!