BROCCOLI SOUP WITH LEMON-CHIVE CREAM

I am in full-on spring eating mode, which means I want to eat nothing but green, lemony things all day long. So although ordinarily I wouldn’t say a broccoli soup sounds exactly irresistible, this soup, full of not just broccoli but also leeks, green onion, chive, Parmesan, and lemon, called out to me with a siren song the instant I first saw it at Orangette. Obviously the superstar here is the lemon-chive cream, which would make a delicious dip on its own (and indeed, is reminiscent of some perfected form of sour-cream-and-onion potato chips), but the soup is nothing to sneeze at later. A far cry from heavy, army-green, cabbage-smelling cream of broccoli soups you may have met before, this is a simple, light (but with those rich spikes of cream), fresh concoction that’s the perfect way to celebrate the coming of spring. Even A, who confessed he was suspicious of this soup while I was making it, gives it the thumbs up.

I’m not a huge sour cream fan, so I used crème fraiche instead. (It only came in half-cup containers, so I ended up making a half-recipe of the lemon-chive cream, and that was plenty sufficient for the four servings of soup we got.) It was mad delicious (I may have licked the container clean when no one was looking), but it did lack a little zip, being not as sour as actual sour cream, so I ended up doubling the lemon juice. Next time I may try Greek or European-style plain yogurt instead.

For the soup:
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
1 tablespoon olive oil
2 medium leeks, white and tender green parts only, sliced
1 small yellow onion, coarsely chopped
3 cloves garlic, coarsely chopped
1½ pounds broccoli, both crowns and stems, trimmed and coarsely chopped
5 cups chicken or vegetable stock
1 rind (about 2 inches square) from a piece of Parmesan cheese
¾ teaspoon kosher salt, or less if your broth is well salted

For the sour cream:
1 cup sour cream, crème fraiche, or plain yogurt (preferably Greek yogurt)
2 scallions, white and pale green parts only, very thinly sliced
¼ cup minced chives
1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
½ cup finely grated Parmesan cheese
½ teaspoon kosher salt
¼ teaspoon pressed or minced garlic

1. In a stockpot or Dutch oven, warm the butter and oil over medium heat. Add the leeks and onion and cook, stirring occasionally, until they have softened and the onion is translucent, about 10 minutes. Add the garlic and cook for one minute. Add the broccoli, stock, Parmesan rind, and salt and stir to mix. Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer, and cook, partially covered, until the broccoli is tender, about 20 minutes.

2. While the soup cooks, prepare the cream. In a medium bowl, stir together the sour cream, scallions, chives, lemon zest, lemon juice, grated Parmesan, salt, and garlic, mixing until fully combined. Taste, and adjust as necessary. (If you are using crème fraiche, you may want to add more lemon juice; if you are using yogurt, you may want to use less lemon juice and/or add some olive oil and a pinch of sugar.)

3. To finish the soup, remove the Parmesan rind. Using a blender and working in small batches, purée until very smooth, then return the soup to the pot (or purée it in the pot with an immersion blender). Add a few dollops of the cream mixture (about ⅓ cup) and stir to incorporate. Taste for seasoning, and adjust as necessary. If needed, rewarm the soup gently over low heat. Serve the soup with a spoonful or two of the remaining cream on top.

Serves: 4–6
Time: 40 minutes
Leftover potential: Good. The freshness of this soup is one of its main selling points, so I wouldn’t keep it for days on end, but I did eat the leftovers for lunch the next day, and as usual with soup, the flavor had only improved overnight.

CHRISTMAS LIMA BEANS WITH CARAMELIZED ONIONS AND BACON

This is as sexy as lima beans will ever get.

Of the many varieties of Rancho Gordo heirloom beans I received for Christmas, the ones I was most unsure what to do with were, ironically, the big, reddish-brown-and-white-dappled, supposedly chestnut-flavored Christmas lima beans. So I was excited to find this recipe from the Rancho Gordo cookbook (which my library annoyingly doesn't have) at the Kitchn. Although it was written for Florida butter beans, it mentioned that Christmas lima beans could be used instead. Score!

I hardly need to bother saying that it was delicious. As if anything could taste bad when covered in caramelized onions and bacon! But the beans themselves had a wonderfully savory flavor (I can’t vouch for whether it was reminiscent of chestnuts or not, having never to my knowledge eaten a chestnut to begin with) that made this dish more than the sum of its parts. The only flaw was that, although I cooked them even longer than the recipe called for, they didn’t turn out quite soft enough for my taste. The one I tested before declaring them done and turning off the stove was perfectly tender, but when we began to eat I discovered that most of the others were firmer and a few were downright crunchy in the middle. I’m not sure I can blame the recipe—I was a little impatient, what with being distracted by watching the Oscars while I cooked, and these are big honkin’ beans, possibly bigger than the Florida butter beans, so maybe I needed to adjust the cooking time accordingly. Anyway, it’s an easy fix: allow plenty of time to cook them and make sure they’re fully soft, and with very little effort you’ll have one heck of an elegant-yet-comforting (and very pretty, if I do say) dish that’ll please bean-lovers and lima-phobes alike. I’m so happy that I have a stash of enough Christmas lima beans to make this three more times in the future.

½ pound Christmas lima beans
4 slices high-quality bacon, diced
2½ medium yellow onions
2 celery stalks, diced
2 garlic cloves, finely chopped
Salt to taste
¾ teaspoon fresh thyme leaves
Freshly ground black pepper to taste

1. Place beans in a stockpot and cover with three inches of cold water. Soak for 4–6 hours.

2. Add more cold water if needed to cover the beans by 1 inch. Place stockpot on the stove and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer, partially covered, until beans are beginning to soften, about 1 hour.

3. In a medium, heavy skillet over medium heat, sauté the bacon until fat is rendered and bacon is beginning to brown, 8–10 minutes. Remove bacon with a slotted spoon and drain on paper towels.

4. Pour off all but 2 tablespoons of bacon fat from the pan and reserve. Chop half of an onion and add to the pan over medium heat. Add celery and garlic and sauté until soft and fragrant, about 10 minutes. Add vegetables to the beans, reduce the heat to low, cover, and simmer until beans are tender, 1 to 1½ hours. When beans are nearly soft, season them with salt.

5. After adding vegetables to beans, cut the remaining 2 onions in half, then slice them thinly. Add the remaining 2 tablespoons of bacon fat to the skillet and set over medium-low heat. Add the sliced onions and a few pinches of salt. Cook, stirring, until onions wilt. Reduce heat to low and cook, stirring occasionally, until the onions are medium brown, soft, and caramelized, 45 minutes to 1 hour. Add 2 tablespoons water and stir to loosen any browned bits on the bottom of the pan. Add the thyme and season to taste with salt and pepper. Add the bacon to the onions and heat gently.

6. When beans are fully tender, place them in serving bowls (drain off any excess liquid first) and top each serving with some of the onion-bacon mixture.

Serves: 4
Time: 2–3 hours, plus soaking time
Leftover potential: Good.

ZUCCHINI AND BRIE SOUP

This is one of my older recipes (so old, I don’t remember where I got it and can’t find it online), and apparently I don’t make it too often because I’ve never posted it here before. So when I made it last week, it was with a critical eye—obviously it’s not one of my cherished faves, so should it be eliminated from the repertoire?

Luckily, this simple-but-unique soup passed the test with flying colors. It’s exceptionally quick and easy to prepare, requiring only a few basic ingredients. It’s a lovely, cheerful pale-green color, with the delicate flavors of zucchini and Brie. And even though it’s cheesy and creamy, the overall effect is light and refreshing, the kind of soup you could enjoy year-round. Keeper!

2 cups sliced zucchini
1½ cups diced peeled potatoes
1 medium yellow onion, chopped
4 cups vegetable or chicken broth
1 cup diced Brie cheese, rind removed
salt and pepper to taste

1. In a soup pot, combine the zucchini, potatoes, onion, and broth. Bring to a boil, reduce to a simmer, and cook, stirring occasionally, about 15 minutes or until the potatoes are tender. Remove from heat, add the cheese, and stir until just melted.

2. Puree soup in batches in a blender or food processor until smooth. Return to the pot, heat through, and season with salt and pepper to taste.

Serves: 4–6
Time: 30 minutes
Leftover potential: High

ROASTED CHICKEN v.2.0

This photo doesn't begin to do justice to the majestic roasted chicken that emerged from my oven that night. But that's only because while carving the bird, I happened to lick my fingers and they tasted so delicious that all of a sudden I was hunched over the carcass stripping leftover scraps of meat off it with my hands and popping them into my mouth like some kind of animal. So this photo is inadequate because it was taken under the influence of a frenzied need to EAT THAT CHICKEN LEG ALREADY. But at least you can get a sense of the beautiful golden-brown skin on the chicken. (The potatoes look really dark, but that's because some of them were purple and red potatoes, not Yukon Golds.)

Forget my other roasted chicken recipes.

OK, maybe don’t completely forget them, but try this one first.

Usually, I don’t like to be bothered too much with methodology when I’m cooking. I just want to know the ingredients I need and how to assemble them. I like to follow directions, but I don’t like to fuss. I find America’s Test Kitchen interesting on an academic level, but I never want to make their recipes.

Some foodies loooove to bicker about the best way to do things, comparing chocolate-chip cookie recipes or potato-mashing techniques. I tend to just find a recipe I like and stick with it. I rarely spare a glance for new potato-leek soup recipes, for instance, because I already have a potato-leek soup recipe I really like. It’s just more restful for my easily-overwhelmed brain that way. And let’s face it, I like consistency and routine. Occasionally, yes, it turns out that what I like can be improved upon—I liked this mac and cheese just fine, right up until I found my super-awesome no-white-sauce 2:1-ratio-of-cheese-to-macaroni version and promptly left the old one in the dust. But I thought I was perfectly happy with my reliable, made-dozens-of-times roasted chicken with vegetables recipe. I was wrong.

The trouble all started with the post on the Zuni Café roasted chicken and bread salad at Smitten Kitchen. I’d heard plenty of praise for the Zuni chicken before—it’s downright developed a cult—but never seen photos that made it look so droolingly good, that made me hungry for it right then and there. Reading the recipe, it became clear that it would be best achieved using a cast-iron skillet or a roasting pan, which I don’t have. (I want a cast-iron skillet at some point, but I didn’t want to have to buy one before I could have roasted chicken. Typical hunger logic.) I did a quick online search for a workaround, and while I didn’t find much information about what else I could roast the Zuni chicken in, I quickly gleaned two pieces of information: (1) To hear some people tell it, the Zuni chicken-roasting method is transcendent, possibly life-changing; (2) It is likely that the high-heat cooking will make a mess of your oven, fill the kitchen with smoke, and possibly set off your fire alarm. Then there were the people who thought Zuni was overrated and professed their allegiance to some other chicken-roasting religion, like Cook’s Illustrated or the Barefoot Contessa. I was starting to feel overwhelmed. But still hungry.

Apparently just a glutton for punishment, I straight-up Googled “best roasted chicken recipe.” Just as my head was starting to spin, I happened on this post at My Husband Hates Veggies. First of all, the chicken looked delicious (and oh wow, those perfectly browned potatoes!). Second, it seemed to be a thoughtful synthesis of several popular methods (I recognized the day-long brining and careful drying from the Zuni method, and the lemon and thyme in the cavity from the Barefoot Contessa recipe). Third, it had some intriguing-looking features that included boiling the potatoes with the lemon and garlic before roasting. Feeling adventurous, I decided to give it a try on a Sunday night.

The process wasn’t hard, and since I could boil the potatoes while preheating the oven, it didn’t take any longer than my old recipe (in fact, the bird cooked for less time because the heat was higher). And the results were completely miraculous. Unless it’s sort of emergency, I will never roast a whole chicken without rubbing salt on it 24 hours beforehand, and I will never forget to dry it thoroughly. As promised by the Zuni devotees, those two easy measures ensured the crispest skin and most flavorful meat I’ve ever eaten. Meanwhile, the hot lemon and garlic infused the whole chicken with additional flavor and kept the meat, even the breast, unbelievably moist. The higher-temperature cooking made for a perfectly cooked bird (with my old recipe, even with the help of a meat thermometer, I sometimes ended up undercooking). And the trick of boiling the potatoes before roasting them was brilliant—while with my old recipe they’d sometimes get blackened on the outside before they were soft on the inside, here we had perfectly tender interiors surrounded by an addictively crisp-fried shell (like French fries! But unlike fries, they even stayed crunchy when eaten as leftovers the next day, after being reheated in the microwave). And, to mimic my favorite part of my old recipe, other vegetables could be added to the mix—I threw in some carrots and parsnips (unboiled) that I needed to use up, and while I should have cut them into bigger pieces to prevent charring, they still turned out tasty.

This really is the perfect roasted chicken. It’s my go-to recipe for now on, and even if in the future I decide to return to my other recipes for the different flavors (smoked paprika, honey) they can offer, I will always follow some of the basic steps of this one (SALTING and DRYING, people). I may have finally learned the value of methodology.

1 whole 3-pound chicken (the best quality you can find, preferably organic and free-range)
1 large lemon
10 garlic cloves, unpeeled
2 sprigs of fresh thyme
Plenty of coarse kosher salt and fresh-ground pepper
Olive oil
1½ pounds small Yukon Gold potatoes

1. Prep your chicken about 24 hours ahead of time by patting it down with paper towels and covering it liberally with kosher salt. Really massage it into the skin, and inside the cavity as well. (Be sure to remove giblets or any neck pieces from the cavity first!) Place in a baking dish (not the one you’re going to use to roast the bird) in the refrigerator and cover with tin foil or plastic wrap.

2. When ready to roast, preheat the oven to 425 degrees. Slice the potatoes in half, or in quarters if they are larger. Add them to a large pot and cover with cold water. Add the lemon and the garlic cloves, and cook over high heat until water boils. When it does boil, add salt to the water.

3. Remove chicken from refrigerator and wipe it off with paper towels until it is as dry as possible. Place in a roasting pan (I use a roasting rack on a heavy baking sheet).

4. Once the potatoes are tender, drain everything. Add the potatoes back to the hot pot you cooked them in to dry off. Take the lemon (use tongs and be careful; it’s hot!) and pierce it 8–10 times with the tip of a sharp knife. Stuff the lemon inside the chicken cavity, along with the hot garlic cloves and the thyme. Drizzle the bird with olive oil and rub it all over, then rub kosher salt and freshly ground pepper all over it. Place the bird breast side up to cook, and tuck the wings underneath.

5. Place the roasting pan in the oven and cook for 30 minutes.

6. Remove the pan and lower the oven temperature to 375 degrees. Give the cooled potatoes a quick stir in their pot, then add them to the roasting pan. Stir them around in the hot fat and juices that have accumulated, so none are dry. Position the potatoes cut side down. Return the tray to the oven and cook for another 45 minutes.

7. Chicken is done when juices run clear and a meat thermometer inserted into the thickest part of the thigh reads 180 degrees. Remove pan from oven and let stand 10 minutes. Remove the potatoes to a serving dish and sprinkle with coarse salt. Remove everything from the chicken cavity (carefully, again!)—you can discard the lemon and thyme, but it’s great to serve the garlic with the potatoes. Carve the chicken and serve.

Serves: 4–5
Time: 2 hours, plus 24 hours of brining
Leftover potential: Insanely high. Aside from being eaten plain the next day (with the magically still-crisp leftover potatoes), leftover chicken can be used for sandwiches, salads, soups, pizza, or anything else you like (you can freeze it for months). And once you’ve stripped off all the meat, don’t forget to use the carcass to make chicken stock. Delicious and thrifty!

CRISPY SALTED OATMEAL WHITE CHOCOLATE COOKIES

Two Saturdays ago, A and I were feeling under the weather and had canceled our afternoon plans in favor of lying limply around the house. But first, I managed to drag myself to the kitchen and bake these easy cookies, and they made us supremely happy. I don’t care for white chocolate, and I usually prefer my oatmeal cookies on the soft side, but there’s something irresistible about these. The recipe is from the Smitten Kitchen, where Deb sums it up perfectly: “They’re crispy, but not because they’re hard or because they’re thin but because they practically hollow out when they bake, leaving you with this… shell of an oatmeal cookie with rich bits of white chocolate scattered about and the tiniest flaking of sea salt on top.” And oh, that salt is so so good, providing an excellent counterbalance to the sweetness of the white chocolate, as well as an excellent opportunity for me to use the fleur de sel I got for Christmas (thank you!). I won’t be throwing dark chocolate over for white chocolate anytime soon, but these cookies are well worth trying and are a unique addition to my repertoire.

I’m sure hand-chopped chunks of great-quality white chocolate would rock these cookies even harder, but I’ll admit I took the shortcut and used Trader Joe’s white chocolate chips. They contain cocoa butter, so they’re “real” white chocolate, and they taste good to me.

1 cup all-purpose flour
¾ teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
¼ teaspoon table salt
14 tablespoons (1¾ sticks) unsalted butter, slightly softened
1 cup sugar
¼ cup packed light brown sugar
1 large egg
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2½ cups old-fashioned rolled oats
6 ounces good-quality white chocolate bar, chopped (or non-artificial white chocolate chips)
½ teaspoon flaky sea salt (like Maldon or fleur de sel) for sprinkling on top

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Line your baking sheets with parchment paper or Silpat. Whisk the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and table salt in a medium bowl.

2. Beat the butter and sugars until light and fluffy. Scrape down the bowl with a rubber spatula, then add the egg and vanilla and beat until incorporated. Scrape down the bowl again. Add the flour mixture gradually and mix until just incorporated and smooth. Gradually add the oats and white chocolate and mix until well incorporated.

3. Divide the dough into 24 equal portions, each about 2 tablespoons. Roll between your palms into balls, then place on lined baking sheets about 2½ inches apart. Using fingertips, gently press down each ball to about a ¾-inch thickness.

4. Sprinkle a few flakes of sea salt on each cookie.

5. Bake until cookies are deep golden brown, about 13 to 16 minutes, rotating baking sheet halfway through. Transfer to wire rack to cool.

Yield: 2 dozen
Time: 45 minutes

FISH & CHIPS DINNER

I am inordinately pleased with myself for trying this set of recipes, and even more pleased (one might say downright smug) that I pulled them off. Sure, fish sticks and oven fries seems like a safe bet—in fact, this readymade menu is basically designed for picky kids. But keep in mind that I didn’t grow up eating fish sticks or fish sandwiches; I hated fish as a child (I blame my few limited experiences with the dreaded orange roughy). The first time I ventured to even try fish and chips in a restaurant was less than 10 years ago, I’ve only been cooking fish at home for 5 years or so, and I’ve never cooked anything other than salmon. I don’t like coleslaw and tartar sauce makes me shudder (I prefer my fish with malt vinegar and lemon). So there were a lot of hurdles to overcome here. But when I saw the photo of this meal in the “Family Style” column in November’s Bon Appetit, it just looked so tasty and fun, and it was well-reviewed online, and A was encouraging, so after hemming and hawing about a million times, I went ahead with it. Even while I was cooking I wasn’t sure everything was going to work out, but then suddenly it did. Pretty brilliantly, if I do say so myself. And I do.

In short: The fish sticks are straight-up awesome. The breading is crispy and flavorful without being deep-fried, with a welcome bit of kick from the cayenne. But it wasn’t all about the breading—the halibut really shone through, and I loved the texture and non-fishy flavor. My only complaint was that it was hellishly expensive—“fresh” (meaning frozen and then thawed) wild Alaskan halibut was an astounding $24.99 per pound at the Whole Foods fish counter. Relieved that I’d decided to only make a half-recipe, I headed over to the freezer case and found a bag of frozen wild Alaskan halibut steaks at $13.99: still steep, but not quite as insane. When I got them home and thawed and cut into sticks, however, I realized I’d paid that price for just 12 ounces of halibut, meaning that (although it was still cheaper than the “fresh” stuff) there was just enough for two and a half fish sticks per person. We didn’t starve or anything—they were hefty sticks and there were plenty of oven fries on our plates—but once I tasted just how good the fish was, I was sad to have so little of it. My mission will now be to find a more affordable source of quality halibut so I don’t have to break the bank to make this meal again.

The fish recipe is the real gem here, but I highly recommend making the whole menu. The oven fries were unsurprisingly delicious—again, a healthier, non-fried take on the restaurant standard. And I may not like coleslaw, but this was its most tolerable incarnation. I don’t like mayo, and the dressing on this was a non-creamy vinegar-based one (no oil, either—again, a healthier update); I don’t like cabbage, and I found a coleslaw mix at Trader Joe’s that was predominately made up of shredded broccoli stems supplemented by smaller amounts of shredded carrot and shredded red cabbage (I used half the bag for my coleslaw and have been enjoying the rest sprinkled over my green salads). In my heart of hearts, I’d probably still have preferred a green salad for my vegetable, but I’d have the slaw again—it was important in terms of replicating the classic restaurant meal. And I even tried the tartar sauce and have to admit it wasn’t bad. The fish was so good it didn’t really need it, but A was a fan of it (as he is of all dips and sauces) and again, it was key for restaurant-style verisimilitude.

Best of all, even though I had to think carefully about the order of operations and dirtied a few too many bowls in the process, this seemingly complicated meal of four separate recipes came together in just a little over an hour, no longer than it usually takes me to make a weeknight dinner. We both really enjoyed it, it was refreshingly different from our usual fare, and it was even pretty healthy.

Oven fries:
1 pound large unpeeled Yukon Gold potatoes, each cut into 8 wedges
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 teaspoon fleur de sel or coarse kosher salt

Quick tartar sauce:
½ cup mayonnaise
3 tablespoons sweet pickle relish or finely chopped bread-and-butter pickles
1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

Five-minute slaw:
2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
1 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon coarse kosher salt
⅛ teaspoon celery seeds
2 green onions, thinly sliced
1 8-ounce package coleslaw mix

Pan-fried fish:
1 pound 1½-inch-thick halibut filets
¾ cup panko
1½ teaspoons finely chopped fresh Italian parsley
1 teaspoon coarse kosher salt
1 teaspoon finely grated lemon peel
¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper
2 large egg whites
2 tablespoons dark ale
2 tablespoons olive oil
Lemon wedges for garnish

1. To make the oven fries, preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Toss all the ingredients in a medium bowl to coat the potatoes well with olive oil and salt. Place the potatoes, points facing up, on a rimmed baking sheet and roast 15 minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 400 degrees and continue to roast until potatoes are tender and golden, about 20–30 minutes longer.

2. While oven fries cook, make tartar sauce by mixing all ingredients in a small bowl. Cover and chill until ready to use.

3. To make slaw, whisk first four ingredients in a large bowl, then add green onions. Add coleslaw mix and toss well.

4. To make fish, cut halibut into sticks and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Heat oil in a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. While oil is heating, combine panko, parsley, salt, lemon peel, and cayenne in a shallow bowl; in a separate shallow bowl, whisk egg whites and ale. When oil is hot, dip fish sticks in ale mixture, turn to coat, and shake off excess; then place fish in panko mixture and turn to coat all sides. Add fish sticks to skillet and cook about 2 minutes on each side, until all sides are golden and fish is opaque in center. Transfer fish to paper towels, sprinkle with salt and pepper, and serve immediately.

Serves: 2
Time: 1 hour, 15 minutes
Leftover potential: I’d say low, because fried foods (even oven-fried and pan-fried ones) don’t reheat that well. I deliberately halved the recipes in order to have no leftovers. But Bon Appetit did have a pretty decent-sounding suggestion for making a fish sandwich out of the leftover fish sticks, tartar sauce, and slaw on hamburger buns, so give it a try if it floats your boat.

BLACK BEAN SOUP WITH CILANTRO-LIME SOUR CREAM

I chose this highly-rated recipe from Epicurious as an appropriately noble use for my Rancho Gordo midnight black beans and my new Dutch oven. I wanted a recipe specifically designed for using dry beans, involving a long simmer with flavorful ingredients. This one struck the right balance between delicious (bacon! sour cream!) and wholesome (everything else—lots of veggies and no extra fat besides the bacon). Don’t be scared off by the long soaking and cooking times—you only have to pay undivided attention to this recipe for about 30 minutes. Sure, you won’t be whipping it up on a weeknight, but make it on the weekend and it will certainly feed you happily for the rest of the week. It fit perfectly into my Sunday schedule: I started soaking the beans right away when I got up in the morning, read the paper, went to a museum, came home and chopped the soup ingredients and got them cooking in the later afternoon, cleaned the apartment while they simmered cozily, and for once did not have to miss the beginning of the season premiere of 24 because I was hustling to get dinner on the table. The result of this day of cooking was a substantial, flavorful soup, slightly smoky from the bacon, with a delightful burst of contrasting freshness from the cilantro-lime sour cream.

I’ll admit I was prepared for this soup to rock my world and make me turn away from canned black beans once and for all, but those expectations might have been a bit high. It’s certainly worthwhile to cook with good-quality dried beans now and again (they’re more affordable and healthier, and the process is enjoyable), and if I get my hands on any more Rancho Gordo black beans, this is a treatment worthy of them. I thought this soup might blow my quickie canned-bean version right out of the water, but although the flavor was more complex and the texture was satisfyingly meatier, it wasn’t so dramatically different as to inspire me to toss away my old recipe. The moral: Both versions can coexist. Sometimes you want a quick weeknight meal with convenient ingredients, and sometimes you want a slow-cooked, old-world weekend meal. Besides, simmering something on the stovetop for hours is great on a cool winter day, but torturous on a hot one--and I live in Southern California, so canned beans will continue to have their place in my pantry. That said, I will certainly make this soup again. In the meantime, I still have leftovers to enjoy!

A few notes: I used nonfat plain yogurt instead of the sour cream, because I’m not much of a sour cream fan to begin with and knew I wouldn’t miss the extra calories. And yogurt is tasty! Instead of my usual Trader Joe’s French Village, I tried what seemed to be a new TJ’s offering, Organic European-Style Yogurt, which turned out to be a great choice for this recipe—it was smoother and creamier than ordinary yogurt but also much thinner, aptly like Mexican crema, with a nice tart flavor. I highly recommend it if you can find it. Also, the original recipe had you add the tomato and vinegar with the rest of the ingredients, but Rancho Gordo’s bean-cooking guidelines say that adding acids too early in the process can make the beans tough, so I added them about 30 minutes before the end of the cooking time and have changed the recipe below accordingly.

16 ounces (about 2½ cups) dried black beans
6 bacon slices, chopped
¾ cup finely chopped celery
¾ cup finely chopped onion
¾ cup finely chopped carrots
¾ cup finely chopped leeks
6 to 8 cups low-sodium chicken broth (preferably homemade)
1 cup (packed) chopped fresh cilantro, divided
⅓ cup (packed) chopped fresh Italian parsley
1½ tablespoons minced garlic
1 jalapeño pepper, minced
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon ground coriander
1 large tomato, chopped
1 tablespoon red wine vinegar
¾ cup sour cream or plain yogurt
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
2 teaspoons fresh lime juice
Salt and pepper to taste

1. Place beans in a large bowl. Add enough water to cover by 3 inches and let stand about 6 hours or overnight. Drain well.

2. Cook bacon in a large, heavy pot over medium heat until brown but still soft, about 4 minutes. Add celery, onion, carrots, and leeks, and sauté until vegetables begin to soften, about 10 minutes. Add beans, chicken broth, ½ cup cilantro, parsley, garlic, jalapeño, cumin, and coriander. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover, and simmer soup until beans are very tender, stirring occasionally, about 2 hours. When the beans are just starting to become tender (after about 1½ hours), add the tomato and vinegar.

3. Working in batches, transfer soup to a blender a process until a slightly chunky puree forms, then return soup to pot (better yet, use an immersion blender until the soup is about half-blended). Season to taste with salt and pepper.

4. Mix sour cream/yogurt, lemon juice, lime juice, and remaining ½ cup cilantro in a small bowl. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Ladle soup into bowls and place a dollop of sour cream mixture atop soup (if you are making leftover portions, store the sour cream mixture in a separate bowl; do not add it until soup is reheated and ready to eat).

Serves: 8
Time: About 8½ hours, but only about 30 minutes of that is active cooking
Leftover potential: High (all soups improve with age), but remember not to add the sour cream until ready to eat.

CHICKEN BREASTS WITH BACON, ROSEMARY, AND LEMON

I made this before Christmas but didn't have time to post it, what with all the frantic baking. From Cook's Country via RecipeZaar via Ezra Pound Cake, it's a great treatment for boneless, skinless chicken breasts, which are not one of my favorite foods but still seem to find their way into my kitchen on a regular basis due to their sheer usefulness. This recipe uses the big, bold flavors of bacon, rosemary, lemon, and red pepper flakes to combat the dryness and blandness of the chicken, transforming it into an exciting, sophisticated, yet still super-easy weeknight meal. If you're anything like me, you won't be able to restrain yourself from licking the sauce right off the plate afterwards.

My only complaint was with the 1 and 7/8 teaspoons of red pepper flakes called for by the RecipeZaar version of the recipe. While I totally wouldn't put it past the America's Test Kitchen people to require such a randomly precise measurement, that's a lot of red pepper flakes--even my red-pepper-flakiest recipe, Spicy Roast Chicken and Tomatoes, tops out at 1 teaspoon. We (especially A) are spice fans, and lord knows you'll have to pry my red pepper flakes from my cold dead hands, but we agreed that even the 1 1/2 teaspoons I cautiously used seemed way too overpowering for this recipe. Later I did a more thorough Google search and found that (although the official Cook's Country version isn't available for free) several other online versions of this recipe called for just 1/8 teaspoon of red pepper flakes, suggesting that's the correct original measurement. Nice typo, RecipeZaar poster! And nice detective work, me! That's a biiiiiig difference in measurement. But 1/8 teaspoon is way too wussy, so I'm going to go ahead and recommend that you use 1/2 to 1 teaspoon of red pepper flakes.

4–5 slices bacon, chopped
¼ cup all-purpose flour
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
1 tablespoon unsalted butter
4 garlic cloves, sliced thinly
1 tablespoon fresh rosemary, chopped
1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1 cup low-sodium chicken broth
2 tablespoons lemon juice

1. Fry bacon in a large skillet over medium-high heat until crisp, about 5 minutes. Use a slotted spoon to transfer bacon to a plate lined with paper towels. Spoon off all but 2 tablespoons bacon fat.

2. Place flour in a shallow dish. Season chicken breasts with salt and pepper, dredge in flour, and shake to remove excess. Add butter to reserved bacon fat in skillet and heat over high heat, swirling to melt butter. When foam subsides, reduce heat to medium-high and cook chicken until browned on both sides, 3 to 4 minutes per side. Transfer chicken to a plate (leaving fat in skillet) and cover loosely with foil.

3. Reduce heat to medium and add garlic, rosemary, and red pepper flakes. Cook until garlic is browned and crisp, about 2 minutes. Add broth and lemon juice, scraping up browned bits from bottom of skillet with a wooden spoon, and simmer until slightly thickened, about 4 minutes.

4. Return chicken and bacon to pan and simmer, turning chicken once or twice, until sauce is thick and glossy and chicken is cooked through, 2 to 3 minutes.

Serves: 4
Time: 30 minutes
Leftover potential: Medium. I can take or leave leftover chicken, but I have to admit that Ezra Pound Cake's recipe for turning these into sandwiches sounds pretty freakin' amazing.

BEST RECIPES OF 2008 AND OTHER NEW YEAR'S BUSINESS

Happy belated new year! After three weeks of feverish baking and canning before Christmas, two weeks in Minnesota being blissfully fed by others, and then two weeks of slow readjustment to everyday life, I’m finally back in the kitchen and back to the blog, and it seems a big fat update is in order.

Sharing recipes for the holiday treats I made seems to detract from their mystique, particularly when I’m giving them as gifts, so you probably won't be seeing separate entries on them anytime soon, but here’s a rundown.

The standards:

• My mother’s spritz recipe—absolutely the best I’ve ever tasted, puts all others to shame—using the cookie press handed down to me from A’s mom
• Chocolate peanut-butter balls on pretzels—my personal favorite of all the treats I made
• Carole Walter’s coconut-apricot cookies—simply awesome, and my favorite of the non-chocolate treats
• Apple butter—the only canning I did this year; I nearly forgot how fun it is!

The experiments:

• Rosemary roasted cashews—Wanting something more savory to give to the non-sweet-toothed among us, I originally intended to make a ton of different spiced nuts, but ran out of time and settled on just this recipe. It was so easy and delicious that I ended up cranking out four batches and will definitely make them again next Christmas. Or, you know, next week.
  
• Peppermint bark—I pretty much just made this to go into cookies (see below), but was impressed by how pretty, tasty, and crazy easy it was. Sadly, there was no peppermint extract at the store and I had to go with just regular mint extract instead, which gave the bark a slight wintergreen-gum flavor that kept it from being perfect. I’ll make it again next year with the right flavoring, maybe kicking it up a notch by using dark chocolate as well as white.
• Peppermint bark chocolate cookies—such a great concept, but so-so execution. I’m obsessed with Trader Joe’s Peppermint Jo-Jos and wanted to capture that classic chocolate-peppermint combo in a homemade treat, so I was happy to find this recipe. The result was tasty enough to try again, but not the ideal cookie of my dreams; I’d like a darker chocolate cookie with a moister texture (though that might have been my fault; I overbaked them) and more peppermint-bark pieces. I’m wondering if it would be possible to just add peppermint-bark pieces to Carole Walter’s delicious chocolate sugar snaps.
• Cream cheese sugar cookies—I love a good frosted sugar cookie, and when I tasted some at an office cookie exchange last Christmas I immediately snagged the recipe, but I shouldn’t have chosen to make them as a gift, considering it was my first time baking cutout cookies. A and I had a lot of fun making and decorating them together, but they ended up looking as though they were created by demented four-year-olds instead of college-educated thirtysomethings. The cookies seemed thinner and crisper than I remembered, and the icing recipe I selected was an epic fail, turning out so runny that it was really more of a glaze. The homely cookies still tasted delicious (I’ve been working my way though the leftovers in my freezer with increasing enjoyment), but the process was too frustrating and the cookies not interesting or attractive enough to become regular members of my Christmas-cookie rotation.

OK, enough about giving. Let’s talk about all the awesome food-related gifts I received! Thanks to my parents, I now finally have a good, heavy, tight-lidded, oven-safe Lodge Dutch oven, a cast-iron behemoth covered in adorable red enamel, and it cooks like a dream. I plan to spend the rest of the winter making soups, stews, braises, and no-knead bread to my heart’s content. In particular, I will be using it to cook beans, because thanks to my parents and A’s mom, I received a stash of nine pounds of delicious heirloom varieties from foodie fave Rancho Gordo! As a recent convert to bean-eating and a relative newbie to using dry beans, I’m taking things slow, but I’ve already been pleased with the results of using yellow eye beans for my fave stovetop baked bean recipe, and on Sunday I tried a great new black bean soup recipe (recipe to come) using the midnight black beans. Next I’m thinking maybe refried Vaquero beans, and eventually we’ll get brave and tackle the Christmas limas. It’s fun to be able to experiment with new ingredients, but the main point is that these are some of the best beans I’ve ever had—you really can taste the difference, and I’m already plotting my next Rancho Gordo order. (To A’s slight dismay, I think; he’s been gamely trying the new beans and claiming to enjoy them so far, but secretly he’s still a beanphobe.) Other great gifts included a little digital kitchen scale (sooooo handy), a pizza cutter that doesn't make my hand feel like it's falling off, reusable produce bags to use instead of plastic at the farmers’ market, another year of Cooking Light, a supply of Tea Source tea, fleur de sal, and Wisconsin honey with the comb still in it.

On to the year-in-review stuff: Last year I chose five best recipes, but this year I’ve made so much good food that I need to expand the list to ten. But I’ve created two separate categories of five each, so technically it’s not cheating!

Bookcook’s Five Best Recipes of 2008: New Standbys (these are the ones I’ve come to rely on and have already made over and over again, occasionally on a near-weekly basis…I’m looking at you, frittata)

1. Asian Dumpling Soup
2. Roasted Root Vegetables With Sausage
3. Monster Cookies
4. Zucchini-Potato Frittata
5. Stovetop Baked Beans

Bookcook’s Five Best Recipes of 2008: OMG I Made That! (these are the revelations, the showstoppers, the ones that’ll make you feel like a DIY diva or domestic goddess, but the dirty little secret is that they’re all simple and easy enough for everyday cooking)

1. TIE: Creamy Lemon Chicken and Roast Chicken With Pears, Shallots, and Leeks
   
2. Pan-Fried Lemon-Ricotta Gnocchi
3. DIY Taco Seasoning
4. Ranch Dressing
   
5. Dill Pickles

Can you believe there's not even a pizza recipe on either list? And I love pizza! That's how good these best recipes are. You really should try at least one of them immediately.

Last year, I listed my favorite food books, but I must have burned out on food reading because this year, none spring to mind. Last year, I also listed a bunch of resolutions, but most of them are still ongoing, so I don’t really feel the need to make more (a few I did actually cross off my list: acquire Dutch oven and kitchen scale, make gnocchi and pickles). In 2009 I’d definitely like to rejoin the CSA (P, the friend I split produce haul with before, got too busy with grad-school classes to cook regularly, but she’s recently expressed an interest in getting back into it) and finish adding photos to all the recipes on this site (except the sad, rejected ones in the Not Favorites category). I do have a huge wishlist of recipes to make and cooking experiments I’d like to try, including homemade yogurt, mayonnaise, ricotta, dumplings, tortillas, pita bread, and popsicles. And I won’t say that a pasta maker or ice-cream maker wouldn’t be nice. But mostly I’m happy with the way things are going here, so I’m just going to keep on keepin’ on. I hope you’ll keep on joining me...and I hope you're hungry!

SPINACH-GARLIC PIZZA

It would never have occurred to me to put Boursin on a pizza, but I’m so glad I found this recipe from Eggs on Sunday. Spinach and garlic are a natural combination, and the garlic-herb cheese amps it up times ten, not to mention having a really appealing creamy-browned texture when cooked. Originally titled “Green Garlic Monster,” this is certainly not for the garlic-averse, but it isn’t so intent on being super-garlicky that all other flavors are obliterated. The parsley (another great pairing with earthy spinach) and the red onion brighten things up nicely. My only quibble is that the recipe only called for “two large handfuls” of spinach; I used a 6-ounce bag, which was more than that, and this particular spinach-lover still wanted more. Maybe I made a bigger pizza than the recipe intended, but there was a lot of crust showing through. I’m going to try 10 ounces next time and see what happens. Regardless, this is an excellent addition to my burgeoning pizza recipe collection.

Pizza dough for 1 pizza (1 lb)
½ cup finely chopped flat-leaf parsley
2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
2 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
6–10 ounces baby spinach
2 large garlic cloves, minced
½ small red onion, very thinly sliced
Half a round (2½ ounces) Boursin garlic-herb cheese (or other soft garlic-herb cheese)

1. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees.

2. Roll out your pizza dough and place on an oiled or cornmeal-dusted baking sheet.

3. Heat 1 tablespoon olive oil over medium heat. Add the spinach and garlic and sauté until spinach is just wilted and bright green, about 2 minutes. Season with salt and pepper to taste and set aside.

4. In a small bowl, mix the parsley with the Parmesan and the remaining 1 tablespoon olive oil.

5. Spread the parsley mixture over the pizza crust. Lay the red onion slices on top, then add the sautéed spinach. Crumble the Boursin over the top of the pizza.

6. Bake for about 8 minutes, until cheese is melted and crust is nicely browned.

Serves: 4
Time: 30 minutes
Leftover potential: Good

SAUTEED SHREDDED ZUCCHINI WITH SHALLOTS AND LEMON

Look, yet another way to combine vegetables with shallots and lemon! I will never tire of those flavors. This is a nice, simple-but-interesting side dish that reminds me, with its crisp greenness, of deconstructed zucchini fritters. It reminds A, for some strange reason, of Rice-a-Roni. But don’t let that put you off; he clarifies, “I always liked Rice-a-Roni!” I’ve never tasted Rice-a-Roni myself, but surely it doesn’t have a shallot-and-lemon flavoring? Still, I suppose the shape and texture of the shredded zucchini is vaguely rice-like, and maybe the nutty brownness it achieves when briefly sautéed over high heat is somehow reminiscent of rice too? Or we could all just ignore A on this one.

Anyway, aside from the minor travail of shredded and squeezing the zucchini, this is an easy and fast-cooking recipe to throw together, and it will pair well with most flavors. We ate it with the splendid roast chicken with pears, shallots, and leeks, and the fact that I even remember we had a side dish at all in the face of such blinding magnificence should tell you that this one is surely worthwhile. The original recipe says it serves four, but the two of us ate it all in one sitting.

5 medium zucchini, ends trimmed
1½ teaspoons salt
2 shallots, minced
1 tablespoon olive oil, divided
1–2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
Freshly ground black pepper to taste

1. Shred zucchini (on large holes of a box grater or with shredding disk of a food processor). Place zucchini in a colander in the sink and toss zucchini with 1½ teaspoon salt. Let drain for at least 10 minutes. Wrap zucchini in a kitchen towel (in batches if necessary) and wring out extra moisture.

2. Place zucchini in a medium bowl and break up any large clumps. Add shallots and 2 teaspoons oil and toss to combine thoroughly.

3. Heat remaining 1 teaspoon oil in a large nonstick skillet over high heat. Add zucchini mixture and spread evenly. Cook without stirring until bottom layer browns, about 2 minutes. Stir well, breaking up any clumps, then cook until new bottom layer browns, about 2 minutes more.

4. Remove from heat and stir in lemon juice and salt and pepper to taste.

Serves: 2-4
Time: 20 minutes
Leftover potential: Unknown

ROAST CHICKEN WITH PEARS, SHALLOTS, AND LEEKS

This. Is. Amazing. If you only make one chicken recipe from this blog, make this one. Now! Hurry! You can thank me later.

I was a little suspicious about the pears. I’m not a proponent of putting fruit in savory dishes. (Big chunks of fruit, anyway; lemon and lime juice and zest obviously get a pass.) Sure, I’ve made exceptions—Brie and apple soup and butternut squash with sausage and apples—but in general if I see any hint of cranberries, figs, plums, raisins (god forbid) or any other such malarkey in a non-dessert recipe, I turn the page. I’m just close-minded that way. But the photo at Sassy Radish was so succulent-looking, I would have made any recipe that followed it, even if it were titled “Raisiny Chicken in Raisin Sauce.” Luckily, the title name-checked shallots and leeks instead, which I love. But then there was that pear, plus all that orange juice…would this chicken just be a mass of fruity sweetness?

Not at all. The chicken doesn’t even taste overwhelmingly orangey, but the juice gives the skin an impressive caramelized, burnished finish. Those sweet pear and orange flavors are facing off against savory shallots, leeks, garlic, olive oil, salt, and chicken fat, and they all melt together into a luxurious, addictively delicious compote blanketing tender, juicy, falling-off-the-bone chicken. (Do not even consider substituting chicken breasts or anything boneless and skinless here—the dark meat is integral to the moist, complex richness.) This is guaranteed to knock the socks off anyone you serve it to. They’ll be convinced that after years of expensive culinary-school training, you spent hours laboring in the kitchen over a hot stove crafting this gourmet masterpiece for their enjoyment. The kicker is that not only is this dish unique and mad tasty, it’s one of the easiest main dishes I’ve ever made. Throw everything in the pan and bake it—not even for that long, because you’re using small pieces of chicken instead of those dense, honkin’ breasts—and magically it transforms into molten awesomeness. Oh, and? And! If you’re still hesitant about using dark meat, let me just inform you that a package of 6 drumsticks at Trader Joe’s cost me under $3. TOTAL.

Delicious, creative, sophisticated, easy, pretty quick, and cheap? Folks, we may just have found the holy grail.

6 chicken drumsticks and/or thighs (bone-in, skin-on)
1 pear, thinly sliced
2 shallots, finely chopped
1–2 leeks, thinly sliced (white part only)
2 cloves garlic, minced
½ cup freshly squeezed orange juice (about 2 oranges)
¼ cup olive oil
1 teaspoon coarse salt
Freshly ground black pepper to taste

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

2. Wash and pat dry the chicken parts and place in a 9-by-11-inch glass baking dish. Surround the chicken with the pear, shallots, leeks, and garlic. Pour orange juice and olive oil over everything and season with salt and pepper.

3. Bake for 20 minutes, then turn the drumsticks over and return to the oven for another 20–25 minutes. Remove from oven and let stand for 10 minutes before serving.

Serves: 3
Time: 50 minutes
Leftover potential: This yields a modest amount of food—for a while there, I didn’t even think we were going to have any leftovers because midway through our first drumsticks we were in such rapture that we’d already decided we needed to have a third one apiece, but this is actually pretty rich stuff, and after our second drumsticks we were definitely sated. A ate the two leftover drumsticks a couple of days later and reported that they were just as excellent as the first time around.

PEPPERY BROWN SUGAR SALMON

Yum yum yum. This recipe, from Recipezaar via Ezra Pound Cake, is a simple treatment for salmon that packs a big whallop. The brown sugar creates an irresistible crispy, caramelized crust, while the onion powder, lemon pepper, and pepper balance it out with a savory edge. The seasonings don’t overwhelm the flavor of the salmon, but they do permeate the fish a lot more than some other salmon recipes I’ve tried. That plus the bold flavors and candy-like appeal make this is a great way to tempt fish-phobes (or the fish-reluctant, like me) into eating salmon for dinner.

The only reason I wasn’t completely head over heels is that I feel like I overcooked my fish a little, and the result was a tad dry. I blame myself; I halved the recipe and thus probably should have shortened the cooking time more than I did, plus things got a little confused because I was roasting squash in the oven at the same time. I’ll certainly be trying this again. I love lemon and pepper nearly as much as I love brown sugar, and am grateful to this recipe for finally giving me a reason to buy the bottle of lemon pepper with built-in grinder that has always tempted me on the shelves at Trader Joe’s. I actually ended up using a bit more lemon pepper and black pepper than the recipe called for, and I was not sorry.

This was my first time trying frozen wild Alaskan salmon from Whole Foods. It was so much fresher than the non-frozen farmed salmon we’ve been getting from Trader Joe’s, and the 12-ounce package was exactly the size I needed for a half-recipe. My only trouble was in defrosting the fish. I followed the directions on the package to let it sit in the fridge for 6 to 8 hours, but when I removed the fish to cook it, there was still a thin shell of ice on it. The middle of the fish was soft, but I had to crack away the icy coating with my fingers, and the fish was still so cold that it solidified the melted butter when I brushed it on. Next time, more defrosting!

One other note: Melted, burnt sugar makes a big mess, so use an old baking sheet and be sure to coat it with foil. Even after a thorough greasing, my salmon stuck to the foil—which actually ended up working in our favor, because when I pulled the fish away, it conveniently left its skin behind!

1½ pounds boneless salmon fillets
3 tablespoons brown sugar, packed
½ teaspoon onion powder
½ teaspoon lemon pepper seasoning
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1 tablespoon butter, melted

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

2. Combine the brown sugar, onion powder, lemon pepper, and pepper in a small bowl and mix well.

3. Line a baking sheet with foil and lightly grease it.

4. Pat the salmon fillets dry, place them on the baking sheet, and brush them with melted butter. Sprinkle the seasonings over the salmon and press down gently so they adhere.

5. Bake for 20–25 minutes.

Serves: 4
Time: 35 minutes
Leftover potential: Unknown, since I made a half-recipe. Generally, though, I don't like leftover fish, and I don't think the crustiness of the sugar coating--one of the main selling points of this recipe--would hold up particularly well on reheating.

ROASTED ACORN SQUASH WITH GARLIC

This barely qualifies as a recipe, but it was still something of a revelation to me. Roasted squash is certainly nothing new, and acorn is a prime candidate, with its single-serving size, easy-to-cut-and-seed texture, and edible skin. Traditionally, roasted squash is prepared with sweet flavors, like butter and brown sugar, or spices, like cinnamon or curry, or some combination of the two. I grew up eating it with butter and brown sugar, although shamefully I was not much of a squash fan (it was a textural issue I’ve happily outgrown) and would only eat the small surface area that had come into direct contact with the sugar. Anyway, when I saw this idea at The Kitchn, I was immediately struck by its genius: throw a few peeled cloves of garlic into the shelter of the squash cavity as it bakes! Then you get two for the price of one—both roasted squash and the nutty, caramelized awesomeness of roasted garlic! When it comes out of the oven, just smoosh the garlic into the soft flesh of the squash and devour. I loved how the garlic, salt, pepper, and olive oil all help to balance out the squash’s sweetness. As much as I love brown sugar and butter, this more savory treatment wins hands down in my book.

One note: I used a mix of small and large garlic cloves (I was in the process of finishing the teeny inner pieces of one head and starting with the huge outer pieces of another), and some of the bigger ones didn’t quite get as soft and squishy as I’d have liked, so I think it’s best to err on the side of small-to-medium cloves to make sure they cook through. (Or if you have only big cloves, maybe cut them in half?)

2 acorn squash
8–12 medium cloves garlic
Olive oil
Coarse salt
Freshly ground black pepper

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

2. Cut the squash in half and scoop out the strings and seeds. Place squash halves, skin side down, in a baking dish or on a baking sheet. Brush the tops of the squash (the flesh and especially the cavity) thoroughly with olive oil. Place two to three garlic cloves in each cavity and drizzle them with a little more oil (toss to make sure they are thoroughly coated). Sprinkle squash with salt and pepper to taste.

3. Bake for 50 to 60 minutes, or until squash flesh comes up easily when scraped gently with a fork, and garlic is soft and lightly browned. Let cool for a few minutes, then mash the garlic into the squash flesh with a fork or spoon before eating.

Serves: 2
Time: 60 to 70 minutes
Leftover potential: OK.

ROASTED BROCCOLI WITH PARMESAN AND LEMON

Here’s an easy side dish (from Tyler Florence via the fantastically useful blog Cheap Healthy Good) that may win over some members of the anti-broccoli contingent. Roasting is an awesome treatment for almost every vegetable, and it’s an especially good way to transform questionable ones like kale, beets, and Brussels sprouts (or so I’ve been told—I’m sold on kale, but not the other two…yet). I’d tried roasted broccoli before and liked it, but this recipe takes things to a new level by adding a small amount of Parmesan. The cheese not only tastes great with the broccoli (or distracts from it, if you’re trying to convert a skeptic) but also creates an appealingly browned, crispy crust. This is how I sold the recipe to A, who is wary of broccoli; I, of course, love cheese but was mainly in it for the lemon. Neither of us were disappointed; this one’s a keeper.

1 head broccoli (½ to ¾ pound)
½ tablespoon olive oil
Coarse salt and freshly ground black pepper
¼ cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
¼ lemon, juiced

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

2. Trim about 1 inch off the ends of the broccoli stalks and cut the broccoli lengthwise into spears. Arrange the broccoli on a nonstick baking sheet lined with aluminum foil, drizzle with olive oil, and season with salt and a generous amount of freshly ground black pepper. Toss to coat evenly. Put in the oven and roast for 10 minutes.

3. Remove broccoli from the oven, sprinkle the cheese evenly over the top, and bake until the cheese melts and forms a crisp shell over the broccoli, about 10 minutes. Drizzle with lemon juice.

Serves: 2
Time: 30 minutes
Leftover potential: Unknown, since we made just enough to eat that night and if A hadn't been around, I might have eaten it all on my own. I expect it would taste fine the next day, although you'd lose some of the crispness of the cheese.

GREEN BEANS WITH SHALLOTS AND LEMON

Here’s a quick and easy side dish that pairs one of my favorite vegetables with one of my favorite flavor combos for vegetables: shallots and lemon. After making this recipe from the Smitten Kitchen (but leaving off the tomatoes, which I don’t particularly like paired with green beans) a couple of times, I barely even want to bother with any of my other green-bean side-dish recipes anymore. This one is light enough for spring and summer but can just as easily brighten up a fall or winter meal as well.

½ pound green beans, trimmed
2 teaspoons butter
1 small shallot, sliced
Salt and pepper to taste
Juice of ½ lemon

1. Bring a pot of well-salted water to a boil. Add green beans and cook for 3½ minutes. Drain and plunge beans into cold water.

2. In the empty pot, melt butter over medium heat. Add shallot and sauté until tender, 1–2 minutes. Add drained and cooled green beans and reheat them in the butter and shallots. Season with salt and pepper and squeeze lemon juice over.

Serves: 2
Time: 15 minutes
Leftover potential: Low, because they’re so addictive you’ll eat them all right away. If you do somehow manage to have some hanging around the next day, the lemon juice will have discolored the green beans, although they’ll taste just fine.

ROASTED FALL VEGETABLE AND RICOTTA PIZZA

Wow. I’m down with putting potatoes (and more potatoes) and squash on pizza, and everyone knows roasted onions and garlic are splendid on anything, but I was skeptical about the carrots. Not to fear; this recipe from Everyday Food, which I mainly selected because I had leftover ricotta to use up, is one of those fabulous “I wish I’d thought of it sooner” combos. Paired with creamy cheese, these sweet, tender, caramelized vegetables make a great topping for a crisp crust. The result is a sophisticated and surprisingly rich pizza—after two pieces, my taste buds still wanted a third piece, but my belly was quite sated (a green salad makes a nice accompaniment to lighten things up).


This one is definitely being added to the pizza repertoire. Even though it takes some time to cut and roast the vegetables, barely any work is required of you after that, so this is still a pretty easy recipe that’s manageable on a weeknight. I think sweet potatoes would be a nice addition to the vegetable mix, maybe instead of the butternut squash if it’s not in season or you don’t want to futz with peeling and seeding it. I loaded my pizza pretty heavily with vegetables and still had about a cup of them left over, but I just stuck them in the fridge and ate them later in the week as a side dish with something else. Oh, and the original recipe calls for 2 cups of mozzarella—I cut it down to 1½ cups and might consider reducing it still further in the future. The cheese is nice and adds some needed moisture to the starchy vegetables and crust, but 2 cups is a lot, especially when you’re also using a cup of ricotta. The original recipe also calls for a final drizzle of olive oil before putting the pizza in the oven, but I also skipped that as unnecessary and didn’t miss it—it felt a bit like gilding the lily to be pouring oil on top of cheese.

For the roasted vegetables:
1 pound (about ½ medium) butternut squash, peeled, seeded, and cut into 1-inch cubes
1 pound small red potatoes (6 to 7), well scrubbed and quartered
½ pound red onions (1 to 2), peeled and quartered
½ pound carrots (3 to 4 medium), halved lengthwise, if thick, and cut into 1½-inch lengths
2 to 3 cloves garlic, peeled and smashed
1½ tablespoons olive oil
Coarse salt and ground pepper to taste

For the pizza:
Olive oil
1 pound pizza dough
6 ounces part-skim mozzarella cheese, grated (1½ cups)
1 cup part-skim ricotta cheese
1 tablespoon fresh rosemary leaves

1. Preheat oven to 450 degrees.

2. Spread vegetables and garlic on a rimmed baking sheet and toss with oil, 1 teaspoon coarse salt, and pepper to taste. Roast until vegetables are tender and beginning to brown, about 30 minutes, tossing them halfway through.

3. Brush a pizza pan (I use 9x12) with oil, roll out dough, and transfer to pan.

4. Sprinkle dough with half the mozzarella. Scatter vegetables on top (you may have extra vegetables left over), then dollop with ricotta. Sprinkle with remaining mozzarella and rosemary. Bake until bubbling and golden, 20 to 25 minutes.

Serves: 4
Time: 1½ hours
Leftover potential: OK. The crust won’t be as crisp on the second day, but the toppings are still just as tasty.

BUTTERNUT SQUASH AND SAUSAGE BAKE

This recipe, originally from Serious Eats, wasn't the quickest thing I've ever cooked (in addition to the long baking time, there are lots of prep steps), but it was triumphantly worth the labor--A declared it to be "awesome" and "the best use of butternut squash yet." Caramelized onions, smoked cheese, and chicken stock (infused with squash flavor via a clever method of boiling it with the squash innards) all help to pack a powerful flavor punch for a dish that actually has relatively little meat and fat. I halved the recipe and then feared there wouldn't be enough food for four servings, but the squash tasted so rich that a petite portion, served with a fresh green side salad, was plenty satisfying.

I made a few changes to the original recipe, mostly because when I halved it some of the quantities seemed so tiny that they might disappear altogether--only an eighth of a pound of sausage (less than one link)? A quarter-cup of cheese? And 3/8 cup of stock was hardly enough to simmer the squash seeds in. Since the volume of a 9-inch square baking dish is more than half of a 9-by-12 dish, I felt OK about using slightly more of certain ingredients, and though I mostly eyeballed it, I've tried to replicate the measurements below. I also substituted smoked Gouda for smoked mozzarella (which Trader Joe's didn't carry) and used panko instead of the breadcrumbs because it was easier. Whatever I did, it was great and I'll certainly be making this oozy, deeply flavored little casserole again during the dark days of winter.

2 links Italian sausage (about ¼–⅓ pound) (I used chicken sausage)
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 small-to-medium onions, quartered and sliced
3 thyme sprigs
1 teaspoon dried sage
Salt and pepper to taste
1½ pounds butternut squash, peeled and chopped into ½-inch cubes (3–4 cups), seeds and scrapings reserved
2 tablespoons flour
⅓ cup shredded smoked mozzarella or Gouda
⅓–½ cup chicken stock
1½ slices white sandwich bread, cubed, or about ⅓ cup panko
1 tablespoon melted butter, plus butter to prepare baking dish

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Butter a 9-inch square baking dish.

2. Remove sausage from its casing and cook in a large skillet over medium heat until just browing, breaking up sausage with a spoon as it cooks. Remove cooked sausage with a slotted spoon and drain on paper towels.

3. Add 1 tablespoon olive oil to the rendered fat in the skillet, then add the onions, thyme, and sage. Season liberally with salt and pepper. Cook over medium heat for about 20 minutes, stirring occasionally. When onions are thoroughly soft, remove from skillet and place in bottom of baking dish. Dot with the sausage bits.

4. While the onions cook, simmer the squash seeds and scrapings in the chicken stock in a small saucepan for 10 minutes; strain, discard seeds and scrapings, and keep the stock warm over low heat.

5. Add the remaining tablespoon of oil to the empty skillet. Toss the squash cubes with the flour and arrange in a single layer in the skillet. Let the squash brown, undisturbed, for 4 minutes, then stir the squash as it cooks for the next 4 minutes. Season liberally with salt and pepper and add squash to baking dish atop onions and sausage.

6. Sprinkle the shredded cheese over the squash, and then pour the stock into the baking dish. Press the top of the casserole with a spatula to evenly distribute the liquid. Cover tightly with aluminum foil and bake for 30 minutes.

7. While the casserole bakes, if you are not using panko, pulse the bread cubes with the melted butter in a food processor until you have coarse bread crumbs.

8. After 30 minutes of baking, remove the baking dish from the oven, remove the foil, and top casserole evenly with breadcrumbs, or top evenly with panko and drizzle with the melted butter. Bake uncovered an additional 20 minutes, until the liquid is absorbed and the top is nicely browned.

Serves: 4
Time: 2 hours
Leftover potential: Pretty good; doesn’t make a ton, but the flavor deepens over time and there are no unappetizing textural changes.

COCONUT BANANA MUFFINS

Lately, at my office, we are awash in overripe bananas. The company provides fresh fruit for us throughout the week, but I think someone has been buying too many bananas, because every Friday, there are dozens of speckled brown ones left over, and everyone starts trying to persuade everyone else to take some home, make banana bread over the weekend, and bring it in on Monday morning (there aren’t too many cooks in my department, but a lot of enthusiastic eaters). I’ve never been a huge fan of bananas or banana bread, but I also can’t resist the siren song of free, perfectly good fruit in danger of going to waste. If my freezer wasn’t already insanely full, I’d take every last one of those poor orphaned bananas and save them for a rainy day. As it is, when last Friday rolled around and no one seemed to be stepping up to the banana-bread-making plate, I figured I’d better take a shot at it.

I got it into my head that what I really wanted was coconut banana bread, and I found this recipe at Baking Bites that seemed to fit the bill. Actually, I wanted coconut banana muffins, because I like muffins so much better than loaves of bread—they’re cute, they’re perfectly portioned and portable, and they stay fresh longer. Usually I try to follow a recipe exactly on the first try, particularly when I’m planning to feed it to other people, but I knew that quick-bread recipes usually translate pretty well to making muffins, as long as you decrease the baking time. I took an even bigger risk by deciding I didn’t want to fool with buying a can of coconut milk and then only using a little bit of it. The original blog post mentioned you could use plain milk, but the flavor would be less coconutty. Then I had a brainwave—I have coconut extract in the cupboard, so why not add a little of that to amp the flavor back up?

I’m relieved to say that my experimentation worked perfectly and the muffins were awesome. I made some plain ones, too, from the Baking Bites basic banana bread recipe, because I know there are weirdos who don’t like coconut, and they were certainly good, but the coconut ones were the clear favorite—the container I’d brought was cleaned out by the end of the day. (Luckily, I’d hoarded a few at home in the freezer for A and me.) The flavors were perfect together, and the coconut ensured an extra- tender texture. I will admit the muffins were on the verge of being too sweet for me—if I were to make these regularly (and I’ll hazard a guess that they will indeed replace the tasty-enough-but-slightly-fussy banana-nut muffins as my go-to banana-bread recipe), I would experiment with either reducing the sugar slightly or using unsweetened coconut (although the unsweetened coconut I’ve seen is always dry—would that detract from the moistness of the muffins?). Still, that’s a mild complaint; in all other respects, these are a slam dunk.

2½ cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 cup mashed banana (2 medium-large bananas)
½ cup coconut milk (or ½ cup milk and ¼ teaspoon coconut extract)
¼ cup butter, melted
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup shredded coconut

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and lightly grease two muffin tins or line them with cupcake wrappers.

2. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, and cinnamon.

3. In a large bowl, whisk together sugar and eggs until well combined, then whisk in the mashed banana, coconut milk (or plain milk and coconut extract), butter, and vanilla.

4. Pour dry ingredients into wet ingredients and stir until just combined, making sure no streaks of flour remain. Stir in shredded coconut.

5. Pour batter into muffin cups, filling them about two-thirds full. Bake for about 30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean (or with only a few moist crumbs attached). Remove muffins from tins and cool on wire racks.

Yield: About 16
Time: 45 minutes
Leftover potential: High. Stored in the freezer, these will keep for weeks.

CRASH HOT POTATOES

Courtesy of The Pioneer Woman Cooks, this simple but clever technique combines the tenderness of baked potatoes and the brownness of roasted potatoes with the crispness of fried potatoes. Perhaps because I didn’t have PW’s awesome potato masher (I used a meat tenderizing mallet), perhaps because I didn’t boil my potatoes quite long enough, perhaps because they were too big, or most likely because I wasn’t gentle enough (Hulk smash!), I botched the crashing part of the recipe, shattering my potatoes into a crumbled mess instead of PW’s neat-looking patties, but they still tasted great. I served them with meatloaf and slow-cooked carrots (which always go together on my menus), and it was a perfect new-wave meat-and-potatoes meal. I sense this will become my go-to side-dish potato recipe...once I hone my potato-squishing skillz, anyway.

8-12 smallish red potatoes
Olive oil
Coarse salt
Black pepper
Fresh rosemary (or other fresh herb, such as chives, parsley, thyme, or oregano), chopped

1. Preheat the oven to 450 degrees.

2. Bring a pot of salted water to a boil and cook the potatoes until fork-tender.

3. Generously drizzle olive oil on a baking sheet. Place the cooked potatoes on the baking sheet, leaving plenty of space between them. Using a potato masher, gently press down on each potato until it slightly mashes, then rotate the potato masher 90 degrees and mash again. Brush the top of each crushed potato generously with olive oil. Sprinkle potatoes with salt, pepper, and chopped herbs.

4. Bake for 20-25 minutes, until golden brown.

Serves: 4
Time: 1 hour
Leftover potential: Neutral. I wouldn't make these with the specific intention of having leftovers, but I certainly wouldn't throw the remnants away, either. I had some the next day and while they weren’t icky, the delightful crispiness was gone, leaving them basically tasting like baked potatoes. Which is fine, but far less exciting than CRASH HOT!