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Roasted Asparagus with Parmesan Crown

Cooking, Melissa's, Produce, Recipes, Uncategorized By April 2, 2021

Roasting richly-coated-with-olive oil asparagus in a toasty hot oven, brings out the sweetness in the beautiful spring vegetable. Whether the stalks are pencil thin or have cigar-size waistlines, this Ina Garten recipe is delicious and goes together quickly. Tender from Tough: As for removing the woody ends, my mother broke off the tough ends one by one, holding each spear…

Avocado and PIXIE TANGERINE (or Orange) Salad – Updated Classic Combo

Cooking, Melissa's, Produce, Recipes, Uncategorized, Videos By January 13, 2021

Avocado’s rich, nutty taste and creamy texture pairs beautifully with the sweet-sour perkiness of oranges. The fruit duo is especially appealing in a simple salad along with tender lettuce, fresh lemon juice and crunchy almonds. Most often avocados are found firm-to-the-touch in the marketplace; they only ripen off the tree. If they are hard when you buy them, they will…

Gravlax, Fearless Homemade Cured Salmon

Cooking, Recipes, Uncategorized, Videos By December 17, 2020

Gravlax can be the centerpiece of simple-yet-elegant appetizers, first courses and salads. It’s delicious for breakfast or brunch, served with brown bread, cucumber slices, capers, red onions and mustard sauce (much more delicious than lox in my opinion). Toss it into warm potato salad or pasta. Mouthwatering. Making It Easy Gravlax, pronounced GRAHV-locks, is a Swedish-style cured salmon made by…

Ginger Cookies with Double Dose Zing

Uncategorized By October 28, 2020

Fresh ginger + crystallized ginger Two kinds of ginger make these cookies irresistibly delicious – – – fresh ginger and crystallized ginger come to this party. Some like to eat ginger for its health benefits, proclaiming that it cures everything from nausea to sore throats. But, I adore it for its alluring flavors – its pleasant peppery bite balanced with…

Layered Enchiladas Suizas, Oh Boy

Cooking, Melissa's, Recipes, Uncategorized By September 21, 2020

Many years ago, after taking cooking classes at the Santa Fe School of Cooking in New Mexico, I decided that layering enchiladas in a pan was a much faster and easier than the tradition individual stuff-and-roll approach. Right? A recent article in Martha Stewart Living magazine, offered a layered vegetarian enchiladas suizas recipe. I substituted small cubes of butternut squash…

Cake with Cider-Doughnut Personality

Cooking, Recipes, Uncategorized By September 7, 2020

In my book, an apple-cider donut is one of the best bets in the bakery box, both in flavor (apple and spices) and texture (crunch, crunch of sugar-salt-cinnamon-nutmeg coating). This loaf cake captures those lovely traits. The apple note comes from reducing apple cider to intensify the sweet-tart beauty; it’s used in the batter, atop the cake just out of…

Cheesecake with Blueberries, a Big Winner

Uncategorized By September 4, 2020

Snagged from Food & Wine magazine (August 2020), this delicious cheesecake teams a traditional graham cracker crust with a luscious cheesecake topped with a sweetened sour cream topping. The scrumptious crown on top is a mixture of fresh blueberries and sugar, cooked just long enough to dissolve the sugar and have the berries start to release a little purple-blue juice….

Crisp-Roasted Baby Dutch Yellow Potatoes w/Pickle Salad

Cooking, Melissa's, Produce, Recipes, Uncategorized By August 27, 2020

Thank you Chef Jamie Oliver. I’m a longtime fan of potato salads napped with vinaigrette. But Oliver’s concoction is over-the-moon delicious, teaming crisp spuds with a topping of crunchy vegetables adrift in an oil-less vinegar “pickle” concoction. ‘Such a creative and appealing combination of tastes and textures, as well as contrasting temperatures. It’s a whole new take on conventional potato…