Cooking

We were snowed-in this weekend, and I was lucky enough to already have on hand the ingredients for these carrots. Yay for planning! (Not usually my strong suit.)

The snow had stopped by Sunday, but the blowing! Just look at the hill outside my kitchen door:

That wind just kept right on blowing long after the snow stopped.

So. The carrots.

I don’t normally like cooked carrots. If they still have some firmness to them, they’re okay. But I am much more of a parsnip girl.

Now, onions, garlic, and ginger I like. A lot. And the buttery, ginger-infused cooking liquid reduces down to a beautiful and delicious glaze.

But, for me, the carrots are too soft by the time the liquid reduces enough to be a glaze. I did love that glaze, though!

Someone (I forget who) suggested that I try the recipe again, but this time remove the carrots from the pan when they reach the texture I like, and then toss them with the finished glaze.

What an excellent idea!

Next week: leek and potato soup.
Last week: my go-to beef daube.

Tagged as: cooking, French food

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What is your favorite nut? Mine is the pecan. Specifically, the raw pecan. I really do prefer the taste of just about all nuts in their raw form, cashews being one of the few exceptions.

That raw flavor reminds me of Christmas and the unshelled nuts we’d find in our stockings every Christmas morning. I loved to crack them open: my goal was to pull a perfect pecan or walnut half from the shell without it breaking.

Dorie’s cocktail nuts call for two cups of nuts. I used raw pecans; roasted, unsalted almonds; roasted, unsalted cashews; and roasted, lightly salted peanuts. (I bought all of my nuts from Trader Joe’s. Have you been down that aisle of nuts and dried fruits? The selection is phenomenal!)

The seasonings for these nuts are sugar, salt, chili powder, cayenne, and cinnamon.

And the recipe calls for only a pinch of cayenne, which gave me a good excuse to use one of my favorite kitchen gadgets: a set of very small measuring spoons that my mom gave to me. I know that I don’t really need them to add a smidgen, pinch, or dash of anything to a recipe. But they’re fun to use, just the same.

But then again, maybe I’m measurement challenged. You never know.

After coating the nuts with egg white …

… they’re tossed in the seasonings.

Then they’re spread on a baking sheet …

… and baked to sugary, spicy goodness.

These cocktail nuts are a little addictive.

I may or may not have eaten most of them myself over the course of three days.

Next week: my go-to beef daube.
Last week: potato gratin.

Tagged as: cooking, French food

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It’s amazing to me that we’ve just wrapped up our second month of French Fridays With Dorie. And this was a lovely way to end the month. This gratin is simple and absolutely delicious.

It probably would have been even more delicious if I had remembered to salt and pepper my potato layers.

C’est la vie.

I’m really looking forward to December. The Rice Pudding With Caramel Apples is falling in the December poll, so I don’t think it will make the cut for next month. I may have to go rogue and bake that very soon!

Next week: sweet and spicy cocktail nuts
Last week: pumpkin-Gorgonzola flans

Tagged as: cooking, French food

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