homemade granola bars.

My idea of romance involves chocolate, pink peonies or dahlias, and grilled cheese or pizza or fondue for dinner (can you tell I like cheese?) - best enjoyed while wearing my most worn in sweat pants and an oversized cashmere sweater (and dinner will be followed by the exchanging of homemade cards because homemade involves effort and is far cuter).  I've never been one to obsess over the typical tokens of affection that seem to plague all stores around Valentines Day (except for the je t'aime necklace I spotted on the Barney's website.  That stole my heart).  Sure I want chocolate and flowers (but not Russell Stover chocolates or red roses) but I never want to be taken out for an evening of overly expensive price-fixe dinner.  Take me out any other night, on Valentine's Day I want to stay home and snuggle. I've also never felt the need to exchange overly expensive gifts (unless of course you want to buy me the je t'aime necklace or the arrow necklace and in that case call me and we'll talk), I much prefer small tokens of affection.  Things that remind the other person that you know them so well.  I like giving presents because I like showing people how much I love them.  This is how I found myself making my better half a box of homemade granola bars as a Valentine's Day token of affection.  He loves snacks and a homemade version of his favorite snack seemed to me the perfect gift.  These are simple but so much better then anything you can buy in the store. (Except for the granola bars at Bouchon Bakery in Rockefeller Center but that's a story for another time.) These can also be customized any number of ways making them the perfect gift for the ones you love.

Homemade Granola Bars

Recipe adapted (slightly) from Ina Garten

This is the kind of recipe that can be adapted to whatever flavors you prefer.  Want pecans instead of almonds?  Sounds good to me!  Prefer dried cherries to dried cranberries?  Swap them!  You can even use chocolate chips in place of some of the fruit.  As long as you keep the proportions the same, you can make any variation.  My next plan is to use half pistachios and half almonds and lots of dried cherries to try and mimic my favorite granola.

Makes 12-16 Bars

2 cups old fashioned oats

1 cup thinly sliced or chopped almonds

1 cup unsweetened shredded coconut, loosely packed

½ cup toasted wheat germ (I actually used pumpkin seeds which worked perfectly!)

3 tablespoons unsalted butter

2/3 cup honey

¼ cup light brown sugar, lightly packed

1 ½ teaspoons pure vanilla extract

½ teaspoon kosher salt

¾ cup chopped dried apricots

¾ cup dried cranberries

Preheat the over to 350 degrees.  Butter an 8 by 12 inch baking dish and line it with parchment paper.

Toss the oatmeal, almonds, and coconut together on a sheet pan and bake for 10 to 12 minutes, stirring occasionally, until lightly browned.  Transfer the mixture to a large mixing bowl and stir in the wheat germ or pumpkin seeds. 

Reduce the oven temperature to 300 degrees. 

Place the butter, honey, brown sugar, vanilla, and slat in a small saucepan and bring to a boil over medium heat.  Cook and stir for a minute, then pour over the toasted oatmeal mixture.  Add the apricots and cranberries and stir well. 

Pour the mixture into the prepared pan.  Wet your fingers (or use a piece of parchment) and lightly press the mixture into the pan.  Bake for 25 – 30 minutes, until light golden brown.  Cool for at least 2 to 3 hours before cutting into squares. Serve at room temperature.  Can be stored in an air tight container for up to a week. 

miami style.

I just came back from Miami - the land of sunshine and pretend.  Everything about the city feels unrealistic  It's hard to imagine people working typical 9-5 office jobs.  How can you when it's always warm and bright and a pool or beach is always within arms reach?  The whole thing felt utterly over the top and extravagant.  (The hotel we stayed at was the epitome of over the top chicness - it had 5 pools!)  All of this means that I spent the entire flight home thinking about how I could bring that level of elegance into my home.  A dinning room like the below would be a pretty good place to start.  Blue curtains whose color mirror that of the ocean.  A chandelier in the style of the art-deco period.  I want it all. 

Image via Pinterest.

grilled avocado and corn salad.

Have you noticed there is a blizzard going on outside ride now?  A blizzard named Nemo (I mean really who names these things?) and he is wreaking havoc on the city and flights (Miami I’ll be seeing you Sunday sorry for the delay).  I imagine you are sitting at home eating chocolate chip cookies and drinking hot chocolate (don’t tell me I’m the only one) and watching the fat flakes fall in an endless stream onto the city streets.  I haven’t experienced a winter wonderland like this in quite a while and I forgot how beautiful and quiet it can be when everyone is hibernating inside.  It’s rather magical, so magical in fact that I found self pressing my face to the glass in order to get a better look at the world outside.  Sometimes my inner child has a way of emerging. 

I decided this week, as a reward for making it to February, to finally dip into my stash of frozen summer vegetables.  I have the tendency to hoard summer’s bounty in my freezer so when the depths of winter doldrums have arrived I have a little of sun – a reminder of what will eventually arrive again.  I settled on the corn and knew a simple sautéed corn salad would help to cure my winter blues.  The cumin and crushed chipotle peppers give a great deal of warmth and complexion to the dish.  The grilled avocado provided the perfect creamy buttery touch to the salad.  I found myself slathering warmed avocado on homemade whole wheat bread and topping it with the corn salad.  It was an open faced sandwich that bridged the gap between seasons. 

Grilled Avocado and Corn Salad

Recipe adapted from Not Without Salt

I imagine when corn is in season again, this will then be on heavy rotation.  Cooking the salad on a cast iron skillet and grilling the avocados over an open flame will give the whole dish a smokiness that can never be achieved indoors.  If you don’t have a gas stove you can omit the grilling of the avocados. 

Also, this recipe is adapted from one I found on the most well-written and beautifully photographed food blog I have ever read called Not Without Salt (thanks Simone!).  She has beautifully well-written thoughts not only about food but also about love and what it means to be in a relationship.  I highly recommend it and I also recommend you have several hours available before you start reading because it’s addicting. 

Serves 2

1 tablespoon oil

3 cups frozen corn

1/4 teaspoon cumin

1/4 teaspoon crushed chipotle pepper or crushed red pepper flakes

1 tablespoon sour cream

1/3 cup diced queso fresco or feta

Salt and pepper to taste

1/4 cup chopped cilantro 

1 avocado, halved

Sea salt for sprinkling

In a large sauté pan heat the tablespoon of oil on medium-high heat.  When the oil is hot add the corn to the pan, stir to heat through.  Add the cumin and crushed pepper and continue to cook until the corn is heat through and just beginning to carmelize, about 3 minutes.  Add the sour cream and stir to combine.  Mix in the cheese and continue to cook for another minute.  Taste and adjust the seasonings.  Stir in the cilantro and remove the corn from the heat. 

Place the avocado cut side down on the burner over a medium heat.  Heat for a minute and the flip.  Divide the corn onto 2 plates and top each with an avocado half and then a sprinkle of sea salt.   

short rib chili nachos.

Back in my glory days (aka when I was in college), Tuesday evening was half-priced nacho night at the popular college bar on Main Street.  My friends and I would hightail it there at around 5:30 where we would command a large table and order a couple of large plates of nachos (and by large I mean humongous) and several pitchers of beers (and then several more pitchers of beers).  We would sit there for hours laughing far too loudly and getting far too drunk then one should normally get on a Tuesday evening.  But we were young and carefree and twenty-one and at that time there was nothing more fun then that.  Nachos and beer will always have a special nostalgic place in my heart which is why whenever party food is required I always revert back to them.  There is something comforting about the melted cheese and the plethora of toppings. Eating them always reminds me of my youth.  When I saw this recipe on the NYTimes a week ago, I knew immediately what I was whipping up for the Superbowl.  This is a refined and more "adult" nacho recipe.  The chips aren't weighed down with a ton of assorted toppings.  Instead it's almost delicate (or as delicate as meat and cheese and chip can be), with each chip getting the perfect amount of stuff.  The short ribs are rich and tender and the addition of some pureed avocado provides the perfect amount of freshness.  This is the kind of nacho that I imagine will become a new (adult) crowd-pleaser.  

Short Rib Chili Nachos 
Recipe via the NYTimes

Serves 8-12 

I halved the below recipe and then I also froze some of the meat because I am dying to make a wonderful quesadilla with it at a later date!  I can also envision it atop of grits or polenta.  Actually that sounds really delicious.  The below recipe also looks intimidating with it's list of ingredients but I promise you, it couldn't be easier.  

4 pounds bone-in beef short ribs, patted dry

5 teaspoons coarse kosher salt, more to taste

1 1/2 teaspoons black pepper

5 garlic cloves, smashed and peeled

2 jalapeño or serrano peppers, halved lengthwise, seeded if desired

1 onion, peeled and quartered lengthwise

1 (28-ounce) can chopped tomatoes

1/2 cup coarsely chopped cilantro stems, and 1/4 cup chopped leaves

2 teaspoons dried oregano

2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

1 to 2 tablespoons chile powder, to taste

2 teaspoons ground cumin

2 teaspoons ground coriander

1 tablespoon tomato paste

1 (12-ounce) bottle Mexican lager, like Negra Modelo

1 (13-ounce) package corn tortilla chips

8 ounces white Cheddar cheese, grated (2 cups)

4 avocados, peeled, pitted and diced

Juice of 1 lime

1 1/2 cups store-bought fresh salsa, preferably salsa verde

1 cup Mexican crema or sour cream

Hot sauce, optional

Heat oven to 325 degrees. Season short ribs with 3 teaspoons salt and the black pepper. Let rest while you prepare sauce.

Place a large, dry Dutch oven over high heat. Add garlic, peppers and onion to the dry pan. Cook, turning occasionally, until lightly charred all over, about 10 minutes.

Transfer garlic, peppers and onion to a blender. Add tomatoes with juice, cilantro stems, oregano and 1 teaspoon salt. Purée until smooth.

Return Dutch oven to medium-high heat. Add olive oil. Sear short ribs in batches, until well-browned all over, about 20 minutes. Transfer browned ribs to a bowl.

Stir chile powder, cumin and coriander into pot and cook until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Stir in tomato paste and cook until it begins to caramelize, 1 to 2 minutes. Stir in tomato-pepper purée and beer and bring to a simmer. Return short ribs to pot, cover and transfer to oven. Bake for 1 1/2 hours, then uncover pot, give meat a stir, and continue baking until ribs are fork tender and falling off bone, 30 to 45 minutes longer, for a total cooking time of 2 to 2 1/4 hours. (If you have time, let short ribs mixture cool, refrigerate overnight, then remove fat before proceeding.)

Once ribs are cool enough to handle, remove from pot, reserving sauce. Shred meat and discard bones and gristle. If sauce seems thin, simmer on stove until it thickens enough to coat a wooden spoon. Return meat to pot.

Heat broiler. Spread tortilla chips on a rimmed baking sheet. Top evenly with meat and sauce. Sprinkle cheese over the top. Broil until hot and cheese is melted, 1 to 2 minutes.

In a small bowl, mash together avocados, lime juice and 1 teaspoon salt, or to taste.

Dollop avocado, salsa and sour cream over hot nachos and drizzle with hot sauce if desired. Scatter the chopped cilantro leaves over top.

murray's cheese.

My better half is not a fan of presents.  Actually, I think if we eliminated giving and receiving gifts he would be a much happier person.  It would eliminate the stress he gets over what to buy me (even though I think I am a rather easy person to buy gift’s for – shinny and gold are always crowd pleasers).  It would also eliminate the stress I get over what to get him (because he doesn’t like presents and impractical items which is rather silly because impractical gifts are the world’s best gifts).  Unfortunately, for him, my love affair with wrapped objects is not going to abide anytime soon (nor will my eagerness to rip open all presents the second they enter into our home). He’s going to have to suck it up a little and I’m going to have to get creative, which is how we ended up at an Italian Wine and Cheese class at Murray’s Cheese last night.  Tyler had mentioned a few times about how he wished he knew a little more about wine and I figured a class that combined wine and cheese would give us a chance to learn a little bit more about them both. 

I realized last night, that that was the first time I’ve really made a conscious effort to taste cheese and not just eat cheese.  I never really noticed the slight nuances but, when you allow a piece of cheese to really melt on your tongue, you begin to discover all the different flavors.  When you then pair cheese with wine the flavors evolve even more and the two begin to play off each other.  The ways the acidity in certain wines play beautifully with certain rich cheeses is kind of magical – each component tastes better with the addition of the other one.  We tried six cheese and six wines last night, and while I loved all the cheeses, three of them really made us swoon (so much in fact that we bought a piece of each).  I’m now envisioning a simple meal of salad and another cheese tasting to see how we feel about them the second time around (hopefully it continues to be a love affair).  Below are the names and a little description of our favorites.  All of them can be found at Murrays (and I imagine other reputable cheese shops)! 

-At 12 o'clock - Quadrello di Bufula: A cheese made from the milk of the water buffalo!  Rich and creamy, similar in texture to a Taleggio but not quite as pungent.  

-At 2 o'clock - Gorganzola Cremifcato - If you thought you hated blue cheese this is the blue cheese for you (Tyler who despises blue cheese will eat this).  Super creamy (I think runny would be appropriate here), rich and sweet, it's perfect spread on bread or used in pasta sauces (which is how I am using it tonight!). 

- At 7 o'clock - Castelrosso - This is a cheese that smells like cheese (really it smells like cheese nips!), it's the firmest of the other two, with a texture similar to cheddar.  It has a subtle gradient where you find the center tastes different then the rind.  Buttery and mild it's kind of the perfect snacking cheese!

chicken pot pie.

There was a recipe in this months Bon Appetit for chicken pot pie and it got me thinking mostly, about the fact that I haven’t had a pot pie in years.  I couldn’t figure out why that was the case, I remembered eating them growing up, both a homemade version and a frozen version that was whipped out as dinner on evenings that my parents went out on the town and a babysitter (or us kids) were in charge.  I feel like I stopped eating pot pie because they went out of favor – they are too simple for the current influx of recipes that seem to prefer a laundry list of ingredients and an overwhelming amount of different flavors.  Don’t get me wrong, I will always be the first to try a recipe with an exhaustive list of ingredients and flavors but I realized that it’s sometimes nice to return to simpler, familiar and more All-American flavors.  This chicken pot pie recipe is about as simple as its gets.  It’s hearty – the pie is packed with potatoes, carrots, peas and chicken, the crust is tender and flaky, and it's really the kind of food that's perfect for cold winter evenings.  

Chicken Pot Pie

Recipe adapted from Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything

This is the perfect dish to make ahead.  I prepared the crust and filling (placing the filling in the baking dish I used) the night before we ate them.  When I came home from work the next night I simply rolled out the crust, topped the pie, and baked!  You can also cook this in a large 2-quart baking dish or do as I did and cook it in 4 ramekins.  The recipe for the crust is below, if you are feeling lazy and don't want to make a crust you can use puff pastry (the Dufour puff pastry is the best of the best.)  

For the Filling

About 1 pound bone in skin on chicken breast

2 bay leaves

2 teaspoons black peppercorns

2 tablespoons butter or oil

1 cup cubed potatoes

2 large or 4 small carrots, peeled and diced

2 tablespoons all purpose flour

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

1/2 cup cream

1 cup peas

For the crust

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

10 tablespoons frozen or cold unsalted butter, cut into chunks

1 egg yolk

3 tablespoons ice water

To make the crust: Combine the flour and salt in a food processor and pulse once or twice.  Add the butter all at once, process until the mixture is uniform, about 10 seconds.  Add the egg yolk and process for another few seconds.   Add the ice water to the food processor and process for a few more seconds (until the dough just comes together).  Form the dough into a ball and wrap in plastic.  Freeze for at least 10 minutes or refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.   

To make the filling: In a large pot heat up enough water to cover the chicken breast (about 4 - 6 cups).  Bring the pot to boil and add the chicken breast, the bay leaves, and the peppercorns.  Bring the water back up to a boil and then place the cover on the pot, cook for 10 minutes.  After 10 minutes, turn the heat off and let the chicken sit in the pot (covered) for 20 minutes.  After 20 minutes remove the chicken for the pot and set it aside to cool.  Bring the water back to a boil and continue cooking until it reduces to half, about 20 minutes.  When the chicken is cool, shred it and set it aside.  

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.  Put 2 tablespoons of butter or oil in a deep skillet over medium heat.  When the butter is melted or the oil is hot, add the potatoes and carrots and cook, stirring frequently until just beginning to soften, about 5 minutes.  Reduce the heat to medium-low and stir in the flour; continue cooking and stirring until it just turns tan.  Add 1 1/2 cups of the chicken cooking liquid and the cream to the vegetable flour mixture.  Cook, stirring constanly, until the mixture begins to bubble and thicken, but don't let it come to a rolling boil.  Taste, and add salt and pepper as necessary.  Turn off the heat and add the chicken  pieces and the peas.  Put the mixture into the baking dish.  (This is where you could refrigerate it).  

Roll out the tart crust large enough to cover the baking dish.  Lay the crust over the dish.  Using a sharp knife, cut 3 or 4 little vents into the top of the pie.  Bake for 40 - 45 minutes until the crust is deeply golden and the filling is bubbling.