Back to the Kitchen

It's been a while. After many years of lots of entertaining and extensive meal planning, I needed a break; some time to consider interests and priorities. Please, don't think that since I'm posting again I've magically found the secrets to life. Nope. But I have begun to figure out that I should consider my action, and think about what I'm doing rather than operate on auto-pilot. And as much as I love cooking and entertaining, making one fewer side dish, or buying challah instead of making homemade in order to spend time with someone I love, is a better choice.

But this shabbat, this empty nester has the joy of cooking for a son home on school holiday and here's what we'll have

Friday Night

Homemade Challah

Chicken Soup with Noodles

Roast Chicken with Shallots

Roast Potatoes

Popcorn Cauliflower

Shabbat Lunch (with company)

Fettucine with Tomato Basil Crudo Salsa

Silver tip Teriyaki Roast

Honey Ginger chicken

Basmati Rice

Hot & spicy cabbage

Spinach Patties

Carrot Kugel

Mesclun Salad with Toasted Pecans

Surprise Cookies (mallomar-ish)

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Meringues

Lemon Squares

And if I don't have time to make the challahs, or pecans don't get toasted so that there's less stress - that's ok!

Shabbat Shalom

Ironic Menu Planning

You never know who or what will inspire you, and where the inspiration will take you...

A few weeks ago, when Rosh Hashana menus were far from my mind, a conversation at the Fairway kosher meat section with a man who regularly provides inspiration to so many people with his voice and spirit, gave me the inspiration to start planning for the holidays

We were talking recipes, and I told him about the grilled brisket that was this summer's "gotta have it"... He shared with me a recipe for a "meat" lasagna, using Morningstar crumbles - amused by the idea of making a "meat lasagna" for lunch one of the days of Rosh Hashana, I decided to continue the theme, and will be serving "crab" cakes for lunch the second day (my sister's recipe - I'll post it soon).

Never one to follow cooking recipes (versus baking recipes) very strictly, I combined the recipe Chazzan Yitzy sent me, with my regular spinach lasagna recipe, and took a little peek at the Ronzoni box recipe - to add a little authenticity -

Lasagna is a terrific holiday lunch meal - it reheats beautifully, and you can put it on the hotplate or in a low oven before you go to shul, have a tossed salad ready in the refrigerator, have the table set and when you get home from shul - IT'S ALL READY!!!! Considering how late lunch is after shul on Rosh Hashanah, after having received spiritual inspiration from Chazzan Yitzy (versus gustatory), this will be ready immediately and DELICIOUS!!!

Deb's "Meat" Lasagna

1 pound lasagna noodles, cooked according to package directions

12 ounce bag Morningstar farm crumbles

2 jars good quality marinara sauce ( sometimes I make my own, but with a 3 day chag coming it was too much)

2 pounds part skim ricotta

1 pound mozzarella cheese - shredded

10 ounces package frozen spinach, defrosted - squeezed dry

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground pepper

1/4 cup grated parmesan

Stir crumbles into sauce. Combine well ricotta, 1/2 of the mozzarella, spinach and pepper. Ladle a thin layer of sauce in the bottom of a 13 x 9 x 2 pan. Lay down 3 or 4 noodles, overlapping slightly. Carefully spread half of cheese mixture in even layer over noodles. Sprinkle with 1/3 of remaining mozzarella cheese. Ladle over a generous amount of sauce. Place 3 or 4 more lasagna noodles, overlapping slightly. Carefully spread remaining cheese mixture. Sprinkle with another 1/3 of the mozzarella. Place 3 or 4 more lasagna noodles, overlapping slightly. Pour over remaining sauce. Sprinkle with remaining mozzarella and parmesan cheese. Bake about 1 hour.

Shavuot Confession

Of the three major festivals, Shavuot is the least complicated to celebrate. No manic cleaning, no shlepping boxes, no building a hut and eating (or living) in the cold, and it only lasts two days. But from a cooking standpoint, Shavuot has never found it's way into my heart - I just don't do dairy!

An internet search for "passover recipes", will result in a trillion hits, but google Shavuot - and you'll get a trillion cheesecakes (and to tell the truth, cheesecake is cheesecake - it's all about the mix-ins)

But notwithstanding all my whining - I make terrific homemade blintzes, a killer oreo cheesecake and learned from a friend to make a phenomenal greek salad dressing.

This year, I'm hosting dinner the second night of shavuot and for once, rather than try to figure out a menu that's balanced, nutritious and delicious, I've decided to just have fun and make everyone's dairy favorites - and worry about calories and nutrition another time. So, my shavuot guests will be treated to the following:

Homemade Warm Cinnamon Challah - served with homemade strawberry whipped butter

Greek Salad

Spinach Lasagna

Cheese Blintzes

Macaroni & Cheese

Individual Mini Pizzas (with a topping bar - so I can make them for each person)

Oreo Cheesecake

Heath Bar Cookies

If they're not exhausted from all night learning the night before, they will be when they're done with this food!

Strawberry Spinach Salad - A Taste of Spring

First course on Friday night is nearly always soup (and we all know the story why!). Shabbat lunch first courses run the gamut from meatballs to puff pastry things, or pasta, but when the weather warms up, I like to start the meal with a salad - gives people a few minutes to relax into the meal, but isn't overly filling.

This past shabbat I tried a new recipe - the seeds in the dressing, along with the toasted almonds gave a lovely crunch and the strawberries in the dressing had a tart, sweet, tangy flavor that woke up palates! Don't even bother to use a "fancier" vinegar - it will get lost!

Strawberry Spinach Salad

Dressing:

2 tablespoons sesame seeds

2 tablespoons poppy seeds

1/4 cup sugar

1/3 cup white vinegar

1/2 cup olive oil

1/2 teaspoon sweet paprika

1 teaspoon kosher salt

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground pepper

2 tablepoons grated shallot (use a microplane grater)

1/2 cup blanched slivered almonds - toasted

10 ounces baby spinach

12 ounces fresh strawberries, sliced

One day ahead of serving, put all dressing ingredients in cruet and shake well. Set aside to blend.

Immediately before serving, mix spinach, strawberries and almonds - shake dressing well, coat and toss!

Shabbat Menus

Meals to make the the birthday celebration delicious! The lemon filled cake looks like it's going to be a real winner! Three layer lemon sponge filled with lemon curd and frosted with seven minute frosting - can't wait!!!!

Friday Night Dinner

Homemade Challah

Crispy Baked Wonton
Chicken Soup with Noodles

Roast Chicken
Teriyaki London Broil
Bok Choy Salad - Soy Sauce Green Beans
Roasted Potato Wedges - Corn Kugel


Lemon Filled Cake with Seafoam Frosting
Peanut Butter Brownies




Shabbat Lunch

Homemade Challah

Strawberry Spinach Salad
or Fruit Cup

Shnitzel - Adin Shnitzel Nuggets
Silver Tip Roast Beef
Oven Browned Potatoes
Israeli Salad - Bok Choy Salad
Peanut Butter Noodles
Carrot Kugel
GF Pasta - GF Corn Muffins


Frozen Chocolate Mousse Cake with GF "Oreo" Crust
GF Muddy Buddies - Oatmeal Cookies
Chocolate Chip Cookies - Peanut Butter Brownies

Deli Roll - Delicious!

Though a bit more effort that a standard deli roll, a mashed potato deli roll is just delicious! The day before I planned to make the deli roll, I made mashed potatoes, but a little stiffer than usual didn't add salt - the deli meats were going to add the saltiness!

On a sheet of plastic wrap, cold mashed potatoes were rolled/patted into a rectangle, about a half inch thick. Mustard was lightly spread over the mashed potatoes, then thinly sliced deli meats layered on top - I used pastrami and salami - next time I'd use turkey and one other - it was a little too salty....


Using the plastic wrap, the potatoes/meat were wrapped up jelly-roll style



Next, a sheet of puff pastry was lightly rolled out so it was slightly larger than the potato/meat roll and rolled around the outside of the roll



The roll was then brushed with egg wash, sprinkled with sesame seeds and bake at 400 degrees for about 40 minutes. I reheated it for shabbat lunch and it was delicious!

Cooking Class

“MAKE YOUR SHABBAT/HOLIDAY SPECIAL” SERIES – Session 2

(Just in time for Shavuot)

NOT ONLY CHEESECAKE …

Baking Class

(for Adults & Teens)

with Debra Kamerman

Sunday May 16, 4:00-5:30 pm

Hebrew Institute of White Plains

20 Greenridge Avenue

White Plains, New York

Think you’ve got no time to bake?

Debra will also teach organization and time management skills to get it all done!

RSVP by May 10

For more information contact Meira Orentlicher

meiraoren@optonline.net or 831-7111

Deli Roll Dilemma

Whether you make it with pizza dough, or puff pastry dough, deli roll is delicious. For the those of you who don't know, a deli roll is a rectangle of dough, spread with mustard, lined with different thinly sliced deli meats, rolled like a jelly roll and baked.

But...

More often than not, the dough that's rolled within the slices of meats doesn't really cook nicely - it stays soft, and I've had more than one occasion when it just seemed raw and sticky.

This week I'm going to try a different approach - I'll make stiff mashed potatoes - pat them into a rectangle shape, line with the sliced meat, roll, THEN cover with dough and bake...

I'll try to get pictures as I go along and let you know if it works!

Spinach Cheese Matzo Lasagna

Published again! Click to find the article which includes Deb's Spinach Cheese Matzo Lasagna Recipe. I will make this ahead of time, and pop in the oven to warm before I leave for shul on Wednesday - yummmmm

Hope everyone's pesach planning, shopping and cleaning is going well!

Getting Organized for Pesach

By planning the basics for all of your pesach meals ahead of time, you can get the shopping for all the staples in one trip.

This meal organizer will help you. It's what I used to create a framework for myself, making sure I wasn't duplicating too many dishes (other than matzah pizza), and from that framework, I can make shopping lists.

Spending a little time organizing before you go shopping will pay off!

Ban the Box!

Last night I drove out to Monsey, dealt with horrible traffic on Route 59, and got a majority of my pesach shopping done.

You'll have to decide if it's fortunate or unfortunate, but I found no new "faux" products this year, along the lines of last year's "soy" sauce. Personally, I'm thrilled. While products like "soy" sauce, "noodles" and "pizza" mix certainly follow the letter of the law, they seem to detract from the spirit of pesach, which should be different than the rest of the year. Pesach can be an opportunity to detox your family from packaged goods and ridiculously expensive convenience foods that don't really save time, and add too much preservatives and junk to your diet.

This year, I bought only basic ingredients - matzoh meal, cake meal, potato starch, sugar, cocoa and bars of chocolate. OK, I'm not perfect, I bought two bags of potato chips too. I'm not suggesting that sweets have to be avoided, but is it really necessary to have 4 ounces of candy for $10!!!!

But with those basic ingredients and fresh fruits and vegetables, and nuts, you can have nutritious, palate pleasing foods that will cost less and be better for you that mixes.

It's 8 days! Embrace the differences and let those differences remind you why we were commanded to do this.

Recipes by Request - Passover Mandelbrodt

Different in texture and flavor than my regular mandelbrodt, but absolutely delicious!

Deb's Passover Mandelbrodt

1/2 cup oil

1 cup sugar

4 eggs

1 1/2 cups cake meal

6 tablespoons potato starch

1 teaspoon kosher salt

2 teaspoons lemon juice

1 cup mix-ins: any combination of raisins, chopped nuts, diced dried fruit

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place all ingredients other than mix ins in large bowl of mixer. Beat until well combined. Mix in mix-ins. Spoon in long logs onto cookie sheets lined with parchment paper. Bake 45 minutes. While still hot, slice into 1/2 inch slices. Place cut side down on cookie sheet and sprinkle with sugar. Bake an additional ten minutes.

Forget Lady Gaga - I'm Looking for my Passover Face!

When pesach falls early (more about that later), I have a hard time gearing up for pesach, my favorite holiday. I need the seasonal visual cues to get excited about spring and passover approaching. We've had a tough snowy winter, and up until yesterday, I've found it impossible to find my "Pesach Face". Then - behold - the sun came out with a brightness that finally engaged my brain, and enough snow melted so that I could see the daffodil shoots sticking out of the ground - hallelujah!

After many years of making two seders, and more recently making only one seder, I've pretty much got the system down. The timing of the seders this year, and the fact that I'm hosting the second further simplifies things for me.

The first seder is Monday night. Most people will kasher their kitchens after shabbat, or on Sunday morning, but because I love to do a lot of baking for pesach, I always need a bit more time, so I will start kashering Wednesday night, finish Thursday night and by Friday after my half day of work, I will start cooking for pesach - I can do this because a wonderful friend (who won't kasher until Sunday) is having us for dinner Friday night, and we'll either go to the shul for the Shabbat HaGadol lunch, or have motzi on the porch, and eat a basic meal for shabbat lunch that is kosher l'pesach - after all, roast chicken and potatoes always work!

I will spend some time today finalizing my menus and starting lists -

As always - if you have any questions or need help, please comment or email.

Ladies & Gentlemen - start your engines!

Recipes By Request - Mandelbrodt

Whether you call them biscotti, mandelbrodt, rusks or something else, they are delicious and satisfying treats. The "mix-ins" can be varied based on your mood or the contents of your pantry - and since mandelbrodt are dried out to begin with, they have a very long shelf life (assuming you can keep them on your shelf). I've been making the same recipe for mandelbrodt for many years. The mandelbrodt are light and crisp - not too dense, nor too crumbly - and have a coterie of devoted fans.

Deb's Mandelbrodt

1 cup sugar

3 eggs

1/3 cup oil

1 teaspoon lemon juice

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3 cups flour

4 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 cup mix ins - any combination of nuts, chocolate chips, dried fruits, raisins, craisins....

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Beat sugar and eggs until very light. Beat in oil, lemon juice and vanilla. Blend flour, baking powder and salt. Stir into egg mixture until well combined. Mix in "mix-ins".

Line two cookie sheet with parchment paper. Using half of dough on each cookie sheet, spoon dough into long strips. Bake 45 minutes. Immediately slice strips into 1/2 inch cookies. Place cookies cut side up back onto baking sheets, and put back into oven for 10 minutes to crisp up.

Recipes by Request - Broccoli Shiitake Kugel

This is one of my favorite kugels... It's fresh tasting, good any temperature, light and can be made for pesach too!

Deb's Broccoli Shiitake Kugel

2 head broccoli

1 tablespoon oil

1 medium onion, diced fine

1 cup fresh shiitake mushrooms, cleaned, stemmed and thinly sliced

2 teaspoons salt

1/2 teaspoon freshly ground pepper

2 tablespoons fresh dill, minced

4 eggs

1/3 cup fine dry breadcrumbs (or matzoh meal)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cut florets from broccoli. Peel stems and cut into small chunks. Boil broccoli florets and stems in salted water about 8 minutes, until just tender. Do not overcook. Drain well, and coarsely chop.

Heat the oil and saute the onions over medium heat until soft, but not browned. Add the mushrooms and cook and additional three minutes. Add mushroom mixture to broccoli. Add dill.

Lightly beat eggs and stir into vegetable mixture. Add breadcrumbs, salt and pepper. Spray either two 8 inch or one 9 x 13 pans with cooking spray, or lightly coat with oil. Fill with mixture. Bake about 40 minutes, until the kugel is firm when pressed in the center.

Chocolate Fudge Tart

Deb's Chocolate Fudge Tart

1 1/4 cups flour

2 tablespoons sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup margarine, cut into small chunks

1 egg yolk

1 tablespoon ice water

6 ounces bittersweet chocolate

6 tablespoons margarine

1/2 cup sugar

2 tablespoons flour

3 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract (or substitute almond or orange)

Put flour and sugar in food processor and pulse once or twice to blend. Put margarine into food processor and pulse until the the mixture looks like course crumbs. Add egg yolk and ice water and pulse until dough forms moist clumps. Gather dough into ball, flatten into disk, cover with plastic wrap and chill at least one hour or overnight.

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Press dough into 9 inch tart pan with removable bottom. Freeze 15 minutes. Prick dough all over with fork and bake 25 minutes.

While crust is baking, melt chocolate and margarine over double boiler. When melted, remove from heat and whisk in sugar and flour, then whisk in eggs one at a time and vanilla.

When crust comes out of oven, reduce oven temperature to 325 degrees, pour filling into crust, and bake 20 minutes. Filling will still be soft in the center.

Barterers Unite!

After extensive negotiations via a posting on facebook, this shabbat I will be bartering a deli roll for a dessert. We all love deli roll, but I never seem to get around to making it. One of my son's friend's mothers makes a phenomenal deli roll - and she loves my desserts, so it seems a natural! So rather than deciding on the desserts I will make for shabbat as an afterthought, I started my menu at the bottom of the page, by deciding what dessert I will be swapping for that deli roll. I wanted to give her a beautiful, delicious dessert, that was sufficiently easy to transport, but was more exciting than a batch of cookies - and I thought of the wonderful, rich chocolate fudge tart I make - so hopefully, the two fudge tarts I make this week will be enjoyed in two homes!

This shabbat we will have:

Homemade Challah

Chicken Soup with Kreplach and Noodles

Honey Mustard Chicken

Potato/Sweet Potato Torte

Saffron Rice

Broccoli Shiitake Kugel

Some kind of salad (I'll play it by ear, see what veggies look nice at the market)

Meringues (one of the guests favorites)

Chocolate Fudge Tart

Shabbat Lunch

Deli Roll

Israel Salad

Leftovers (of course!)

Pesach Posting to start next week!

Shabbat Shalom

Reese's Frozen Mousse Pie

I wanted to make frozen chocolate mousse pie.

My son wanted frozen peanut butter mousse cake.

Solution: Frozen Reese's Pie!

A half recipe of Frozen Chocolate Mousse Cake

Either with that crust or a graham cracker crust (8 graham crackers, 1/4 cup sugar, 1/4 cup margarine - bake at 350 degrees for 10 minutes)

Then beat another 4 ounces of pareve whip and when stiff, beat in 1/2 cup peanut butter - use to top the chocolate mousse and decorate with chocolate curls or shaved chocolate.

Trying Something New - Follow Up

I made the Teriyaki Short Ribs last night - followed the recipe through the first cooking, except left out the lemongrass -

The little taste I took was amazing!!! I refrigerated the unstrained sauce and ribs separately, and the beef fat is now solid on top of the sauce, so I'll be able to easily lift it off, reduce, strain and enhance the sauce and have an incredible dish!

Worth it!!!!

Shabbat Shalom

Deb