This post is sponsored by La Crema Wines. All opinions here are my own. You can find the companion recipes over on the La Crema blog. 

Way back in 2013 (seems like ages ago now, doesn’t it?) I spent a lot of time in Russia. I’ve written about those trips a little bit, here and here, but never in great depth. I studied Russian throughout high school and college, so getting the chance to travel there for work was a dream. My primary destination was St. Petersburg, a glamorous, coastal city of old-world charm. I was there frequently between July – when the beauty and midnight sunsets of the white nights kept the whole city feeling celebratory – and December. And in December, it is very dark.

The dark is more shocking than the cold. In fact, at least in coastal St. Petersburg, it’s not much colder than New England. This week, for example, lows there are a balmy 29°F, while here in Boston we’re bracing ourselves for a week of -3°F nights. The dark, however, is a real challenge. For most of December, the sun rises at 10am and sets around 3:30. It never quite feels like daytime. The sun arcs low across the sky, resulting in sort of a 5 hour-long sunrise/sunset. In the context of all this darkness, it’s not hard to understand how New Year’s Eve became the bright spot of a Russian winter. It celebrates light and warmth, and requires feasting with friends long into the dark night.

For my final La Crema post of the year, I put together a celebratory menu of Russian-inspired New Year’s treats. A typical Russian New Year’s Eve spread consists of lots of small plates, salads, pickles, breads, and plenty to drink. A few years back I did a Russian-inspired end-of-year post, with recipes for rye blini, hot-smoked salmon dip, beet dip, and a pink vodka cocktail. This menu builds on those recipes. Taken all together, you could put together a pretty serious New Year’s Eve spread.

The first dish – Potato Bites with Caviar – is one of the easiest holiday appetizers I’ve ever made. All they require is boiling a pot of small potatoes, slicing them in half, scooping out a bit of the center, and dolloping each potato half with sour cream, a few pearls of caviar, and a tiny sprig of dill. That’s it – that’s the whole recipe in one sentence. And they are delicious! I was surprised by how addictive each little bite was.

The next dish is a bit strange to the American palate, but it’s super traditional. Herring Under A Fur Coat is a classic layered salad consisting of pickled herring, potatoes, carrots, onion, mayonnaise, beets, and hard-boiled eggs. I attempted to modernize it a bit, with the goal of making each layer taste good on its own. The changes I made were to cut out the mayo, add grated apple to the carrot and onion layer, and use smoked salmon in one half and pickled herring in the other. I also served them individually, for easier party-consumption. They were pretty good, although arguably still an acquired taste. Check out the recipe over on the La Crema blog if you’re feeling adventurous!

Last in the menu is a party friendly version of my favorite Russian recipe – Mushroom Pirozhki. These are a bite-sized, vegetarian version of the Rabbit and Mushroom Pie I posted a few years back. These little guys are addictive, and the perfect party food (warm, carby, easy to carry, and great with wine!). The filling for these Mushroom Pirozhki is a tasty mixture of wild mushrooms, sour cream, wine, and dill.

With all these recipes, you probably don’t need much dessert. If you must have something sweet, put out some Russian chocolates (like Alenka if you can find them!) and fresh fruit. And of course, we can’t forget the drinks. While vodka is the traditional drink at a Russian New Year’s party, there’s plenty of room for other libations. I’m definitely more of a wine girl than a vodka girl, and I opened a bottle of La Crema’s Monterey Chardonnay and one of the Monterey Pinot Noir for this menu. The potatoes and herring salad are both best with the Chardonnay. Mushrooms are deeply earthy, so the pirozhki pair well with the Pinot Noir – but if you’re only opening one bottle, the dill and sour cream in the filling also make them a good match with the Chardonnay.

Enjoy, and don’t forget to head over to the La Crema blog via the links below for all the recipes:

• Potato Bites with Caviar
• “Herring Under a Fur Coat” Salad
• Mushroom Pirozhki

The post Russian New Year’s Recipes and Celebration Menu with La Crema appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

It has taken me so long to write about the time we spent in Hong Kong last winter. I’m not entirely sure why. Perhaps because we were there for long enough to feel like it wasn’t a trip, so there’s no clear narrative, but not long enough to make it feel routine. I’m not sure how best to structure our stories and experiences to share with you, but at the end, it’s probably best to just start writing.

We had a wonderful time in Hong Kong, and I’d go back in a heartbeat. Hong Kong is this vibrant, slightly chaotic, proud, country full of contrasts. It is at times loud and bustling and wonderfully modern and at times ancient and mystical and steeped in tradition. Pristine luxury shopping malls smelling of expensive perfume bump up against Buddhist temples filled with incense smoke. Michelin stars are awarded to French tasting menus and hole-in-the-wall dim sum joints. You can spend $30 on a cocktail or $2 for a bowl of noodles, and both will be delicious. The iconic skyscrapers packed together in Central fade suddenly and without warning into green mountains, blanketed with hiking trails.

A friend who visited several months after we’d left told me afterwards “I wasn’t expecting it to be so Chinese.” And he’s right. The international image of Hong Kong is of a massive, modern, high-tech city, full of expats and expensive clothes and big business. And it is that, in parts, but it’s also old, and pungent, and a little run-down, and very traditional. The international glitz is fun, but for us, the real draw was outside of the glamorous neighborhoods: the hole-in-the-wall dumpling restaurants and the sleepy seaside island towns. In five weeks we barely scratched the surface – for a small country there’s a lot to explore.

Hong Kong is a food-lover’s dream travel destination. Everything is good, and you can find pretty much anything, for a price. There’s an amazing hipster coffee scene (if you’re willing to spend $7 on a latte), 61 Michelin-starred restaurants (more than London and Chicago and Madrid), wet markets where you can buy any meat or seafood you can think of, and incredible local Cantonese cuisine. I tried things I never thought I would – abalone and shark fin and literal birds’ nests – and had some of the most memorable meals of my life.

When we got back from Asia I wrote down all the recipes I wanted to eventually share here – noodles and dumplings and soups. The other night I was reading through that list and when I got to “Shanghai Noodles with Pork, Mushrooms, and Cabbage” I had the most visceral food memory. Those noodles – fat as a pencil and utterly slurpable and chewy and coated in an addictive, salty-sweet brown sauce – were unbelievable. I struggled to recreate them at home – that sauce! Those fat noodles! – but after several rounds of trial-and-error I finally have a reasonable approximation.

The first recipe I tried wasn’t saucy enough and the second was far too salty. I ended up ditching the pork because it wasn’t adding anything, and experimenting with my own sauce. Ideally I would use thick fresh egg noodles but I couldn’t find any, so I made do with fresh udon. Now that I know how to make them, these are actually very easy. Once you have the sauce ingredients, you could whip them up on a weeknight with no problem.

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Shanghai Noodles with Mushrooms and Cabbage

Thick, eggy Shanghai Noodles covered in a slurpable, sweet-salty sauce and stir-fried with mushrooms and cabbage. Inspired by an extended trip to Hong Kong.

Adapted loosely from The Daring Gourmet, with sauce inspiration from BBC Good Food. 

• Author: Katie at the Kitchen Door
• Yield: 4-6

Ingredients

• 4 TBS dark soy sauce (don’t substitute regular soy sauce!)
• 2 TBS peanut butter
• 2 TBS honey
• 1 TBS sugar
• 2 TBS rice wine vinegar
• 1 tsp hot sauce
• 2 TBS plus 2 tsp sesame oil, divided
• 1 TBS fish sauce
• 1/2 cup chicken stock
• 2 tsp cornstarch
• 1 TBS canola oil
• 2 portobello mushroom cups, cleaned and cut into 1/4 inch thick slices
• 1/2 lb shiitake mushrooms, stems removed, caps cut into thin slices
• sea salt
• 5 cups shredded napa cabbage
• 4 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
• 3/4 lb. thick fresh egg noodles or fresh udon noodles
• 2 fresh scallions, chopped, for garnish

Instructions

1. In a medium bowl, combine dark soy sauce, peanut butter, honey, sugar, rice wine vinegar, hot sauce, 2 teaspoons of the sesame oil and the fish sauce. Whisk until very smooth.
2. In a separate small bowl, whisk together the chicken stock and the cornstarch until smooth. Set aside.
3. Heat half of the remaining sesame oil and half of the canola oil in a wok over medium-high heat. Add the sliced mushrooms and sprinkle with sea salt. Cook until golden brown on both sides and tender, about 5-6 minutes, stirring often. Transfer the cooked mushrooms to a plate. Add the remaining sesame oil and canola oil to the walk along with the shredded cabbage and the minced garlic. Cook quickly, just until wilted, stirring frequently.
4. Add the sauce and the noodles to the pan with the cabbage. Use tongs to coat the noodles in the sauce, then add the chicken stock with the cornstarch. Continuously toss the noodles in the sauce until the sauce is glossy and thickly coats the noodles. Add the mushrooms back to the pan and toss a few more times, then remove from the heat. Serve immediately, topped with chopped scallions.

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I’ve been trying to perfect some of my pasta recipes. In my kitchen, pasta is both a luxury and a staple, giving it a unique place in my repertoire. It’s easy to make, and it’s what I crave when I’m exhausted and can’t think of anything else to make. But it’s also a treat – I usually go heavy on the cream and the cheese. So when I make it, I want it to be really good. And too often, it’s just OK. Why indulge in a giant bowl of pasta that’s just OK? I want my pasta to be great.

The first recipe I tackled was a fresh heirloom tomato sauce. It took a few tries, but now it’s pretty much the only thing I want to eat when I’ve got an excess of fresh tomatoes (and you can find the recipe here). Next up, mushroom cream sauce. I’ve been making a variation of this for ages, but it’s never quite what I want, which is: golden brown and crispy mushrooms; a thick, luxurious sauce that covers each and every bite of pasta; the right balance of mushrooms and pasta; and plenty of cheesy flavor in every forkful.

So here’s what I’ve learned over the past few weeks in my efforts to make the perfect bowl of creamy mushroom pasta. First, there’s never enough sauce. What looks like a huge amount of sauce becomes dwarfed by half a pound of pasta in no time. As a corollary, you need more mushrooms than you think you do – I weighed my mushrooms this time, thinking there would be way too many and wanting to give you accurate measurements. But a pound of mushrooms quickly cooks down into just enough for half a pound of pasta. You already know this one, but don’t crowd your mushrooms – give them lots of space in the pan so they turn crisp and brown. And last, my secret pasta weapon: mascarpone. A spoonful stirred into hot pasta makes all your pasta dreams come true, thickening the sauce just enough to luxuriously coat each noodle.

I know that many of us are trying to watch the indulgences this month – saving room for all the cookies and wine and Christmas treats. But it’s all about balance, right? And sometimes you just need a bowl of pasta. When you do, make it a good one.

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More perfect pasta recipes:

Heirloom Tomato and Sweet Onion Pasta

Rigatoni Bolognese

Butternut Squash Carbonara with Fried Sage

Creamy Mushroom Pasta

A Katie at the Kitchen Door original recipe. Serves 2-3.

• 3 TBS butter
• 2 shallots, peeled and sliced into thin rings
• 1 lb of mixed wild mushrooms, thinly sliced (I used an equal mixture of criminis, shiitakes, and chanterelles)
• 1/2 cup heavy cream
• 1/2 lb. spaghetti
• 2 oz. freshly grated parmesan cheese (about 3/4 cup packed)
• 1 cup of pasta cooking water
• 1/4 cup mascarpone
• black pepper
• sea salt
• 2 TBS minced fresh parsley leaves

1. Bring a large pot of salted water to a rolling boil. Let boil while you prepare the sauce (don’t add the pasta until the sauce is almost ready).
2. Melt the butter in a wide frying pan over medium heat. Add the sliced shallots and saute until soft and translucent, about 3-4 minutes. Add one variety of the sliced mushrooms in a single layer, being careful not to crowd the mushrooms to ensure good browning. Let the mushrooms cook undisturbed until they are golden brown on one side, about 2-5 minutes depending on the mushroom variety, then flip and cook on the other side. Transfer the cooked mushrooms to a plate, then repeat with the remaining varieties of mushrooms. Once all the mushrooms are cooked, add them all back to the pan and lower the heat to medium-low.
3. Add the spaghetti to the boiling water and cook until barely al dente, 1 or 2 minutes less than the package directs.
4. Add the heavy cream to the pan with the mushrooms and stir until the mushrooms have absorbed most of the cream, about 1-2 minutes. When the pasta is just al dente, use tongs to transfer the noodles directly into the pan with the mushrooms and cream. Add a ladleful of the hot pasta water to the pan as well (about 3/4 to 1 cup), along with the grated parmesan cheese. Use the tongs to toss the pasta with the mushrooms until the cheese is melted and a smooth, luxurious sauce has formed. Cook one to two minutes longer if needed for the sauce to thicken. Remove from the heat. Stir in the mascarpone and parsley until they coat the noodles. Season generously with black pepper, and to taste with sea salt, and serve immediately.

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I’ve been working with La Crema for a while now, and we recently seem to have found a groove in a series of internationally-themed dinners to pair with their Chardonnays, Pinot Gris, and Pinot Noirs. In July we did an al fresco Italian seafood feast, for Labor Day we had a Greek-American cook-out, and now, as the weather turns colder, we’re looking to the other side of the world to find the inspiration for this Korean-inspired dinner. I say Korean-inspired because, well, I’m not Korean, and I’ve never even been to Korea, and I don’t want to call these recipes something they are not. Because they are definitely not traditional, authentically-prepared Korean recipes, the kind of recipe that gets passed down from generation to generation and takes a lifetime to learn. What they are are a collection of delicious recipes that attempt to incorporate some of the influences and flavors of Korean cooking into the way I cook and eat at home.

With that disclaimer out of the way, let’s get to the food! The appetizer here is Vegetarian Lentil and Mushroom Mandu, Korea’s stuffed dumpling. Trevor walked in the door just as I was frying these up. “You’re just in time,” I told him, and he grabbed one (one of the ugly ones that I would let him eat before photos) straight from the frying pan. He bit into one and sort of grunted appreciatively before I said “they’re vegetarian.” At which point he looked at me with a mixture of anger and confusion, so upset because he didn’t even notice they were vegetarian. (Also when we eat vegetarian food without me telling him in advance he feels like I’m tricking him.) Because lentils and mushrooms and cabbage can taste as good as ground pork when wrapped up in a dumpling and fried. Not that I have anything against pork, I just love being able to create vegetarian food that’s as satisfying as meat. You can find the Mandu recipe here on the La Crema blog.

For the main event, we have two dishes – a simple Cabbage and Kimchi Salad with Sesame-Miso Dressing, and an Autumn Bibimbap. The salad is all about the super flavorful and creamy dressing – a mixture of tahini, miso, honey, ginger, and rice vinegar. It’s the kind of dressing that makes eating raw cabbage slightly addictive instead of slightly awful. The addition of kimchi – a funky, tangy, spicy fermented cabbage dish that’s ubiquitous at any Korean meal – brings an unexpected heat and excitement to an otherwise sweet and mild salad. The bibimbap, which is inspired by the book Bowl: Vegetarian Recipes for Ramen, Pho, Bibimbap, Dumplings, and other One-Dish Meals, includes a few seasonal variations on a classic bibimbap: gochujang-roasted brussels sprouts and tamari-roasted portobello mushrooms. Mixed with the more traditional toppings of bulgogi-marinated beef, pickled cucumbers, and a fried egg, it makes a comforting, delicious fall dinner, especially served with a glass of La Crema Monterey Pinot Gris. The bright minerality of the wine is a good counterpoint to the spicy gochujang and rich egg in the bibimbap and the funky heat of the kimchi in the salad. (Find the bibimbap recipe here and the cabbage and kimchi salad recipe here!)

And for dessert, we have Red Bean Paste Filled Sesame Cookies, which are arguably more inspired by our time in Hong Kong and Japan than Korea but the flavors seemed to be loosely aligned with Korean desserts. I knew what I wanted these cookies to taste and look like, but I wasn’t quite sure how to get there. Incessant googling of variations on “crispy sesame cookies stuffed with red bean paste” didn’t reveal anything, so I had to experiment on my own. I started with the vague idea that these cookies should have the texture of shortbread, crumbly and buttery, with a distinct sesame flavor from a generous amount of tahini. And I knew I wanted them to be sizable, big enough that you could fill them amply with sweet red bean paste. I’m pretty happy with the way they turned out – and they were super easy to make. They’re not perfect perfect, but I’ll come back with an updated recipe if I end up tinkering with them any more.

Stay tuned, because I’m really excited about what La Crema and I have cooked up for Thanksgiving! Think chipotle, passionfruit, mole sauce… it’s going to be all kinds of delicious.

Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by La Crema. All opinions are honest and my own.

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Red Bean Paste Filled Sesame Cookies

A Katie at the Kitchen Door original recipe. Makes 8 large cookies.

• 1 stick salted butter, room temperature
• 1/4 c. tahini paste
• 1/2 c. powdered sugar
• 1 c. cake flour
• 1/2 c. sweetened red bean paste, store bought or homemade, chilled
• 2 tsp sesame seeds

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and set aside.
2. In a medium bowl, beat room temperature butter until light and fluffy. Beat in the tahini paste until it is evenly combined with the butter. Sift the powdered sugar into the butter-tahini mixture and beat until evenly combined. Stir in the cake flour and beat until a smooth dough is formed. Dough should stick together in a ball when you make one with your hands. If the dough is too difficult to work with, chill for about 30 minutes before continuing.
3. To form the cookies, take ~1 TBS of dough and use a cupped hand to form a half sphere with a hollow center. Fill the center of the cookie with 1 tsp of the chilled red bean paste, then carefully close the tops of the cookie dough over the top of the red bean paste. Roll into a ball and then flatten slightly to make a thick, disc-shaped cookie. Use a fork to gently press hash-marks into the top of the cookie and sprinkle with sesame seeds. Repeat until you have used all of the dough. Bake cookies until golden brown and just beginning to crack, about 20-25 minutes. Let cool slightly and serve warm.

The post Korean-Inspired Dinner: Red Bean Paste Filled Sesame Cookies appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

People ask me all the time what my favorite thing to make is. I think that’s sort of a difficult question – it depends on my mood, on what I feel like eating, on what produce is abundant in my garden. But when someone asks you a question like that, to show interest in your hobby, to learn a little more about you, they don’t want to hear “it depends.” So I tell them, soup. And it’s true. I love to make soup. I love the rhythm of chopping vegetables, I love the way onions browning in butter smell, I love the sound of gentle simmering, the way steam curls over a pot and fills the entire house with the scent of comfort. I love sitting with a warm bowl of soup between my hands, how nourished and relaxed I feel after eating it. Campbell’s got it right all those years ago – soup is good food.

In our house, it’s an all-year food, too – I eat soup almost as much in the summer as I do in the winter. But it’s particularly gratifying to make and eat in the fall, on a rainy and blustery day, when the leaves are wet and slippery under your feet and houses, windows lit up against the blue-gray sky, begin to look incredibly inviting. I’m getting a little bit ahead of myself here – it’s currently 75° and partly sunny here, and while we did get some much needed rain this week, it was more of a tropical, humid rain than a cold, fall-ish rain. But I still found myself thinking about simmering pots of fragrant broth and chunky vegetable stews. So I thought it was finally time to share this lentil, mushroom, and pancetta soup that I made on a rainy day back in May. It’s a fairly straightforward French-style soup – shallots, carrots, celery, potatoes, and lentils – that gets three little upgrades. First, a bit of pancetta or bacon cooked with the mirepoix; second, crisp and earthy sauteed mushrooms on top; and third, a dollop of thyme-laced whipped cream that melts into the top of each bowl. It’s a soup that makes the simple and earthy just a little bit elegant, but still while being easy enough to whip up on a weeknight with ingredients you probably have in your fridge already.

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Lentil and Mushroom Soup with Thyme Cream

Adapted from Revolutionary French Cooking. Serves 4.

• 1 TBS olive oil
• 3 oz. pancetta or bacon, cut into 1/4 inch pieces
• 2 shallots, peeled and finely sliced
• 1 carrot, peeled and diced
• 1 stalk of celery, diced
• 3 cloves garlic, peeled and minced
• 4 sprigs thyme, divided
• 1 c. Puy lentils, rinsed
• 5 c. chicken or vegetable stock
• 2 medium potatoes, peeled and cut into 1/2 inch cubes
• 2/3 c. heavy cream, divided
• 2 TBS butter
• 1 1/2 cups thickly sliced shiitake mushrooms
• sea salt and pepper to taste

1. Heat the olive oil in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the pancetta and cook, stirring occasionally, until golden brown all over. Add the sliced shallot, carrot and celery and saute, stirring frequently, until vegetables are slightly soft and beginning to brown, about 6-8 minutes. Add the minced garlic and saute until fragrant, about 1-2 minutes longer. Add the 2 of the thyme sprigs, the lentils, and the stock. Bring to a simmer then add the cubed potatoes. Simmer the soup until the potatoes and lentils are tender, about 15-20 minutes.
2. When the potatoes are tender, use a slotted spoon to fish out the thyme sprigs and discard the stems. Add 1/2 cup of the cream to the soup. Transfer two thirds of the soup to a blender and blend until smooth and creamy, then return to the saucepan and mix with the remaining lentil and vegetable pieces. Season the soup to taste with salt and pepper. Keep the soup warm over very low heat.
3. Melt the butter in a large frying pan over medium heat. Add the sliced mushrooms to the pan in a single layer, and season with sea salt and pepper. Let the mushrooms cook for two minutes without disturbing them, then flip them over using a spatula and cook two minutes on the other side. Mushrooms should be golden brown. If not, continue sauteing, stirring occasionally, until golden brown. Remove from the heat and set aside.
4. Pour the remaining heavy cream into a medium bowl. Whip until soft peaks form. Remove the leaves from the remaining two sprigs of thyme and whip into the cream. Season the cream lightly with black pepper.
5. To serve, ladle the soup into bowls, then top each bowl with sauteed mushrooms and a generous spoonful of the thyme cream. Serve immediately.

The post Lentil and Mushroom Soup with Thyme Cream appeared first on Katie at the Kitchen Door.

This week I found myself unexpectedly gifted with two weeks at home stretched out ahead of me. Two weeks with relatively little on the calendar, because I was supposed to be in Colombia, and now I’m not. I’m enjoying it immensely – just being able to settle into a little bit of a routine, grocery shopping, catching up on chores I’ve had on my list for months, eating dinner outside on these lovely June nights when the dusk lingers past 9pm. It’s a nice breather in the middle of what feels like an increasingly chaotic schedule.

Although I skipped setting a fitness goal in May, April’s goal went well – I managed to squeeze in some form of exercise on 26 out of 30 days (which definitely included some awkward, 11pm hotel room workouts while I was traveling). I still feel like I’m struggling to make progress overall – It seems like every time I take a couple of strong steps in the right direction, something comes up that takes it all back (bachelorette party! graduation weekend! another unexpected work trip to Colombia!). So it feels especially important to take advantage of a few quiet weeks and focus them on taking care of myself.

In the spirit of routines and good habits, I’m committing to two things this month (at least for the next few weeks that I’m home). First, meal planning. Meal planning is one of those things that requires dedicating 30-60 minutes to it at the beginning of the week, but makes it so much easier to stay on track with healthy eating when you go into each day with a plan. Build in treats, build in events you know you’ll be attending, and make sure the other days are balanced around that. The second thing? Drinking is reserved for weekends, and only for weekends. This one is harder. I already slipped and had a glass of rosé at a work happy hour before even writing this post, but I stopped at one and followed it up with two big glasses of water at home.

Back to the meal planning… on Sunday, I sat down with a pile of cookbooks and logged in to Huckle & Goose, a meal planning service with gorgeous recipes. Their recipes are fresh, seasonal, simple – exactly the type of food I should be trying to cook on weeknights. I saved a few recipes from their site, dogeared a few cookbook and magazine recipes, and added one or two recipes I’ve been meaning to make for the blog. And I had a plan! So far it resulted in this delicious and super simple Herb-Crusted Cod with Peas from The Broken Bread (see mine on instagram!), and the Polenta Pizza you see here – topped with ramp pesto (because ramps are still available in Boston!) and perfect oyster and chestnut mushrooms from the farmer’s market because I couldn’t resist. This pizza has several steps, but none of them are hard – if you can boil stock, stir polenta, and saute mushrooms, you’re all set. If you’re looking to save time, store-bought pesto is the way to go. You’ll lose the excitement of ramp pesto, but it will still be delicious, seasonal, and healthy (and totally doable on a weeknight). Stay tuned for more weeknight-friendly recipes over the next few weeks!

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Note: I do have a complimentary subscription to Huckle & Goose as one of their blogger partners, but this is in no way a sponsored (or even pre-planned!) post. I think it’s a great service and wholeheartedly recommend it.

Polenta Pizza with Wild Mushrooms and Ramp Pesto

Polenta crust recipe adapted from Whole Living Lauren. Serves 2-3.

• 2 1/2 c. chicken or vegetable broth
• 1 TBS finely chopped fresh rosemary leaves
• 1 c. polenta
• salt to taste
• 8 large ramps, well cleaned
• 1/3 c. walnuts, roughly chopped
• 2 oz. parmesan cheese, cut into cubes
• 2 oz. pecorino cheese, cut into cubes
• 1/2 c. olive oil
• 30 leaves fresh basil
• juice from 1/2 lemon
• 1/3-1/2 lb. mixed wild mushrooms, such as king oyster, shiitake, and chestnut
• 1 TBS butter
• 1 TBS olive oil
• 2 oz. soft brie or goat cheese, cut into small pieces
• 1/4 c. grated parmesan cheese to top pizza

1. To prepare the polenta crust, bring the chicken broth to a boil over medium heat. Add the rosemary leaves and the polenta all at once, lower the heat to low, and stir the polenta vigorously until it is very thick and bubbling, about 5 minutes. You want the consistency of the polenta to be thicker than you would prepare for eating in a bowl to help the crust hold it’s shape – err on the side of cooking too long rather than too short. Season the polenta to taste with salt and remove from the heat.
2. Trace a large circle into parchment paper (use a large round pan or cake stand to trace if you can), then cut the circle out. Place on a large baking sheet or inside a large round baking dish. Spread the cooked polenta out on top of the parchment paper circle in a layer about 1/2 inch thick, then transfer to the fridge to chill for 20 minutes.
3. While the polenta is chilling, prepare the ramp pesto. Bring a medium pot of salted water to a boil. Cut the green leaves apart from the white bulbs of the ramps, setting the bulbs aside. Add the greens to the boiling water and blanch for 30 seconds, then immediately drain and rinse several times in very cold water. Squeeze the excess water from the ramp greens and set aside. Roughly chop the ramp bulbs, then add them to a food processor along with the walnuts, pecorino cheese, parmesan cheese, and approximately 1/4 c. of the olive oil. Pulse in the food processor until finely chopped. Add the ramp greens, the basil, and the remaining 1/4 cup of olive oil to the food processor and process until smooth and creamy, adding more olive oil if necessary. Stir in the lemon juice and season to taste with salt.
4. Preheat the oven to 450°F. Bake the polenta crust for 15 minutes, then remove from the oven. While the crust is cooking, prepare the mushrooms – slice the different varieties of mushrooms into pieces about 1/4 inch thick. Melt the butter and the 1 TBS olive oil together in a large saute pan over medium heat. Spread the mushroom slices out in a single layer and cook until golden brown on each side. Cooking time may vary for the different mushrooms, and you may need to cook the mushrooms in several batches to avoid crowding them (which causes them to steam instead of brown). Season to taste with salt.
5. Assemble the pizza by spreading a layer of ramp pesto on top of the partially baked polenta crust. (Store extra pesto in the fridge – you won’t use all of it). Top with several pieces of the brie or goat cheese and the sauteed mushrooms. Sprinkle with the grated parmesan cheese. Return to the oven and bake for an additional 10 minutes, then remove from the oven and serve immediately.

Past Fitness Challenges

January ’14: 10 Visits to the YMCA; Recipe: Gluten-Free Olive-and-Feta Corn Muffins
February ’14: One vegan meal every day; Recipe: Pakistani Chickpea Pulao with Sweet-Hot Date-Onion Chutney
March ’14: Run 40  miles in 20 days; Recipe: Chocolate-Dipped Almond Butter Cookie Bites
April ’14: Walk 8,000 steps a day; Recipe: Herb-Flecked Spring Couscous
May ’14: 180 minutes of Nike Training Club; Recipe: Warm Arugula Salad with Maple Mustard Dressing
June ’14: Fresh fruit/veggies at every meal; Recipe: Chickpea Crepes with Grilled Curried Chicken and Mango Salsa
July ’14: 8 different types of exercise; Recipe: Homemade Spinach Wraps with Chopped Greek Salad Filling
August ’14: Relax; Recipe: Green Tea and Zucchini Noodles with Honey Ginger Sauce
September ’14: Average mile pace below 8’10″; Recipe: Potato, Poblano, and Chard Enchiladas with Salsa Verde
November ’14: Go to 6+ dance classes; Recipe: Crispy Brussels Sprout, Lemon Chicken, and Pomegranate Rice Bowl
December ’14: Hit my goal weight; Recipe: White Bean and Parsnip Soup with Guanciale
December ’15: Regular yoga practice; Recipe: Vegetarian Chili
January ’16: Walk 10,000 steps a day; Recipe: Bananas Foster Oatmeal
April ’16: Daily exercise; Recipe: Vanilla-Cashew Granola

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I can’t believe how quickly this month is slipping by. I had been hoping to get a few more blog posts published in the past few weeks, but find myself too preoccupied / overwhelmed by the combination of preparing for our short-term move to Hong Kong in January, trying to get the basics of a wedding planned before we leave, continuing to slowly renovate the house (although the burden of this one has primarily fallen on Trevor), and the general busy-ness that comes with the holidays every year. All of the things going on in our lives right now are good – they’re so good! – but they’re also big things, things that might be stressful at times on their own, and are definitely a little stressful taken all at once. Still, despite the stress, I’m enjoying having this season at home, and I’ve been making a point of taking the little extra time I do have to savor the loveliness of fall – whether it’s a quick afternoon walk on those last few warm, golden days of the year; a cup of hot chocolate as a break from work; or a savory pot pie like this one on a chilly Friday night.

Last month, Greek Gods Yogurt reached out to me about working with them to develop a pie recipe featuring one of their thick, tangy Greek yogurts. I can safely say that pie is one of my favorite food groups, so I was quick to agree to the collaboration. I love savory pies, especially after all the incredible ones I had in Russian (this rabbit and mushroom pie is one of my all-time favorites), so I decided to go a savory route with this recipe. This pot pie is filled with thick-cut chunks of beef, saucy mushrooms, pancetta, and tender potatoes. The sauce is a mixture of beef stock, dark ale, and a few heaping spoonfuls of Greek yogurt. The yogurt adds an incredible richness and tanginess to the savory filling, elevating the hearty flavors just a touch and giving each bite a smooth and creamy mouthfeel. I was really pleased with the way this recipe turned out – it’s another one that I left in the fridge to keep Trevor fed while I was in Hong Kong, but I was seriously disappointed that I only had a chance to have one serving. I guess that just means I’ll have to make it again sooner rather than later.

I used Greek Gods’ plain variety for the pie recipe, but I also had the opportunity to try a number of their other flavors. My favorite was definitely the Honey Salted Caramel, which was great on its own or with granola for breakfast, but was particularly delicious served on top of the Salted Caramel Apple Cake I made last month to celebrate our engagement. Greek Gods Yogurt is sharing a number of other delicious-looking pie recipes, sweet and savory, over on their Facebook page – head on over if you’re looking for pie inspiration for next week.

Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by Greek Gods Yogurt. All opinions are honest and my own.

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Beef, Mushroom, and Ale Pot Pie

Serves 6.

• 2 TBS olive oil, divided
• 4 oz. pancetta, cut into 1/4 inch cubes
• 1 medium onion, peeled and diced
• 10 crimini mushrooms, quartered
• sea salt and pepper to taste
• 1 tsp fresh thyme leaves
• 2 lbs chuck roast, cut into bite-sized cubes
• 1 TBS flour
• 1 c. dark ale
• 1 c. beef stock
• 1 TBS worcestershire sauce
• 1 TBS soy sauce
• 1 TBS mustard
• 2 medium Yukon Gold potatoes, cut into 1/2 inch cubes
• 1/2 c. Greek Gods Yogurt plain Greek yogurt
• 1 recipe kulebyaka dough, using yogurt in place of sour cream (another pie dough or puff pastry will work equally well for the crust)

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Heat 1 TBS of the olive oil in a large dutch oven or cast-iron casserole over medium heat. Add the pancetta and saute, stirring frequently, until crisped all over, about 3-5 minutes. Add the onion, mushrooms, and thyme and saute until golden brown and reduced in volume by half. Season to taste with salt, then transfer to a bowl.
2. Add the remaining 1 TBS of olive oil to the dutch oven and add the beef cubes to the pan. Brown the beef on all sides, which should take about 5 minutes. Add the flour to the beef and stir to coat. Add the mushrooms and pancetta back to the beef, along with the ale, beef stock, worcestershire, soy, and mustard. Stir to combine everything, then place the lid on the dutch oven and transfer to the oven. Roast, covered, for 1 hour. After an hour, remove the lid, add the chopped potatoes, and continue roasting, uncovered, until beef and potatoes are tender and sauce is reduced, about another 45 minutes.
3. At this stage, remove the dutch oven from the oven and stir the Greek yogurt into the filling. Roll out your prepared pie crust or puff pastry and place on top of the pot pie, carefully covering the edges of the dutch oven (don’t touch the hot pan!). Return to the oven and bake until the crust is golden brown, about 20-30 minutes longer. Let cool slightly before cutting and serving.

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I spent this past week in Hong Kong, on my first work trip in two months. This trip felt a lot easier than some of the others I’ve taken this year, for a number of reasons. For one, it was a lot easier to say goodbye after so much uninterrupted time at home, a much-needed break after the insanity of the first 8 months of this year. And Hong Kong is such an exciting city, with great food and a ton to see, it made the week fly by.

When I’m gone for more than a day or two, I have a tendency to cook up a bunch of different meals and then leave them in the fridge. I’m not consciously doing it to make sure Trevor stays fed while I’m gone, as he’s a very good cook (despite his tendency to eat primarily chips, salsa and hot dogs while I’m gone… I think that habit is more of a celebration of his brief freedom from bounty bowls and green vegetables). But maybe I’m subconsciously doing it out of guilt for leaving so often. Regardless of the reason, I haven’t heard any complaints. This time, I left him with not one but two big batch meals, a steak and ale pie (recipe coming soon!) and a tray of this lasagna.

Over the past few months I’ve been experimenting with lasagna recipes, which I’ll admit, is kind of a fattening thing to experiment with. The first one I tried was a classic lasagna Bolognese, adapted from the over-the-top Serious Eats version. It was delicious, but it took like 6 hours to make from start to finish and was also a little too soupy (probably because I lacked patience in cooking the ragu down to the right consistency and then letting it cool). Next I tried this Wild Mushroom Lasagnette, which was much faster and had great flavors, but was a little dry. So I came up with my own version, using tons of wild mushrooms, fresh fall herbs like sage and rosemary, a rich béchamel sauce, ricotta, and grated taleggio cheese. I won’t say that I’ve reached lasagna perfection, but I will say that when I got home from my trip last night the entire tray of lasagna was gone… so I know it was good.

Wild Mushroom Lasagna

Serves 6-8. Inspired by Bon Appetit and Serious Eats.

• 2 TBS butter
• 2 TBS olive oil
• 1 tsp fresh thyme leaves
• 2 TBS chopped fresh sage
• 1  TBS chopped fresh rosemary leaves
• 1/2 lb. oyster mushrooms, sliced lengthwise
• 1/2 lb. shiitake mushrooms, stems removed, thinly sliced
• 1/2 lb. crimini mushrooms, thinly sliced
• sea salt to taste
• 1/2 c. white wine
• 1 bunch Tuscan kale, leaves removed from stems and roughly chopped
• 1/2 c. heavy cream
• 3 TBS butter
• 3 cloves garlic, minced
• 3 TBS flour
• 2 c. whole milk
• 1/2 lb. taleggio cheese, grated
• 1/4 tsp nutmeg
• 1 box no-boil lasagna noodles
• 1 lb. whole milk ricotta cheese

1. Finely chop the fresh herbs and mix together in a small bowl. Melt 1/3 of the butter and 1/3 of the olive oil in a large saute pan over medium heat. Add the oyster mushrooms to the pan in a single layer, and sprinkle with 1/3 of the chopped herbs and a pinch of sea salt. Let cook undisturbed for 3-4 minutes, then flip with a spatula and brown on the other side. Mushrooms should be golden brown all over and slightly crisp when finished. Transfer oyster mushrooms to a bowl and repeat the process with the shiitakes and criminis, cooking each type separately in a new batch of butter, olive oil, herbs, and sea salt.
2. Once all the mushrooms are cooked, return them all to the pan and add the wine and kale to the pan. Simmer the mixture until the kale is tender and the wine has mostly evaporated. Add the heavy cream and simmer for 2-3 minutes longer. Season the mixture to taste with salt and pepper, then remove from the heat and set aside.
3. Add the 3 TBS of butter to a small saucepan and melt over low heat. Add the minced garlic and saute until fragrant, about 1-2 minutes. Add the flour all at once and stir into the butter to form a paste. Cook for 1 minute, until flour is lightly browned and nutty smelling. Slowly drizzle in the milk, whisking as you do to incorporate the milk smoothly into the roux. Once you have added all the milk, cook over medium-low heat, stirring constantly, until the sauce has thickened enough to coat the back of a spoon. Remove the sauce from the heat. Reserve a small portion of the grated taleggio cheese to the side for topping the lasagna, then stir the rest of the cheese in a handful at a time, until it is fully melted. Stir in the nutmeg. Set the béchamel sauce to the side.
4. Preheat the oven to 350°F. To assemble the lasagna, place a thin layer of ricotta cheese on the bottom of a large casserole dish. Cover the ricotta with a layer of noodles. Top the noodles with a layer of mushroom filling, a thin layer of ricotta, and a layer of béchamel sauce, spreading each layer out thinly to cover the entire area. Repeat this layering – noodles, mushrooms, ricotta, béchamel – until you have used all of the filling and almost all of the noodles and béchamel. Your last layer should consist of noodles, topped with béchamel, and then sprinkled with the reserved taleggio cheese. I usually get between 3-5 layers out of this amount of filling. Place the lasagna on a baking sheet to catch any drips, and place in the oven. Bake until noodles are tender and cheese on top is browned, about 40 minutes.

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It’s a bit impossible for me to believe that it’s already May. I was having this debate with my manager yesterday – whether time moves more slowly or more quickly when you’re incredibly busy. I say quickly. With all the planes and coming and going, I feel as if I’m in a constant state of transit, never quite settled. It’s not my favorite feeling, but I’ll admit that being a frequent traveler has a certain glamour to it. Anyway, between airports and planes and a never-ending Boston winter and buying a house, the last 5 months seems to have slipped right by, and now it’s the first of May. It was unreasonably chilly outside today, but I still woke up this morning excited about spring and summer and hopefully carving out some time to really enjoy this season. May is really a lovely, happy month. It has Trevor’s birthday, cinco de mayo, the season’s first BBQs, Memorial Day Weekend… and Mother’s Day.

My first picnic of the year was in honor of my mom, although she wasn’t actually there, which I’m sure she will mention to me as soon as she sees this post. (Don’t worry, mom, I will give you your own picnic when it is actually Mother’s Day — this picnic was just in preparation so that the real one can be as good as possible. And so that other people could read this and plan picnics for their moms. Also, I will bring you a trifle on Sunday.) Mothers are wonderful, special people who pour a whole lot of energy and love and heart into ensuring that we, their children, are safe and well-fed and happy and that ultimately we turn out alright. They are worth celebrating, probably a lot more frequently than once a year, but let’s start there. Brunch is perhaps the most typical way to celebrate Mother’s Day, but I think that a picnic is an equally lovely way to treat mom to something special. If the weather cooperates, it’s a great way to linger over a meal, enjoying the outdoors, each other’s company, and some light and spring-like dishes.

The savory part of this picnic is Mushroom and Goat Cheese Savory Squares, which is just a fancy name for “puff pastry tarts.” These are super simple to prepare: the mushrooms are sliced and sautéed with butter, garlic, Chardonnay, and thyme, then baked along with goat cheese on store-bought puff pastry. Despite being easy to make, they look and taste super elegant, thanks to the wonderful amount of butter in puff pastry. For dessert, there are Mini Lemon Curd Trifles. Trifle, because it reminds me of my mother; mini, because packing things in mason jars is trendy and perfect for picnics; and lemon curd, because I love it and it screams springtime. The trifle layers are lemon shortbread, lemon curd, whipped cream, and fresh raspberries. I could have eaten about 6 of these little trifle mason jars on my own, they were so good. And of course, the wine! A bottle of Cambria’s Bench Break 2012 Chardonnay is the perfect thing to bring along, because it’s a lovely match for the mushrooms, goat cheese, lemons, and buttery pastry and shortbread.

Find the recipes for the Mushroom and Goat Cheese Savory Squares and the Mini Lemon Curd Trifles over on the Cambria Wines blog!

Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by Cambria Wines. All opinions are honest and my own.

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The Book: Although I somehow missed Sprouted Kitchen’s eponymous first book (so many cookbooks, so little time!), after the rave reviews I saw for it all over my favorite blogs, I wasn’t about to make the same mistake with their newest book, Sprouted Kitchen Bowl + Spoon. If you’re not familiar with Sara and Hugh’s lovely blog, please take a few minutes to go check it out – it’s full of warmth, love, and healthy, wholesome meals. In their newest book, which is a seamless continuation of their blog, they take the somewhat trendy idea of “bounty bowls” (see also “earth bowl,” “broth bowl,” etc… even Panera now sells “broth bowls” of quinoa, lentils, and kale, although to be honest, I’m not sure how a broth bowl is different from soup) and explore it to the fullest. They’ve managed to turn everything from breakfast (cabbage, fennel, and apple slaw with smoked salmon) to dessert (key lime eton mess) into a “bowl” meal. Perhaps the best description of what qualifies as a “bowl” is that it should be a hearty but healthy mixture of grains, beans, vegetables, fruits, eggs, lean meats, and flavorful sauces, served together in a big bowl but with each element maintaining it’s own flavors and integrity. The recipes that Sara and Hugh have included are not particularly innovative or particularly classic – what they are is well-loved, tried and true meals that a family that loves to cook and eat has come to rely on. I love that the recipes are healthy without being restrictive – they won’t deny you eggs, a little cheese, or a few spoonfuls of maple syrup. They are also simple – nothing in this book should overwhelm you, even if you’re a tentative cook. Everything is simple to prepare, simple to serve, and simple to eat, the sort of food you’d happily whip up and pack for a picnic, but with smart, bright flavors throughout.

The Food: In my last post, I lamented my recent (poor) eating habits, driven largely by my nutty travel schedule (I have another week-long trip starting tomorrow, and I’m planning to be a lot more diligent about what goes into my body this time!). Coming home to a copy of Bowl + Spoon waiting for me in the mail was exactly what I needed – it’s full of inspiration for healthy, nourishing, and simple meals to fuel you through a busy day. The first recipe I turned to was the Tahini Kale Slaw and Roasted Tamari Portobello Bowl, because it was exactly to my tastes without even a small tweak (although I did skip the carrots as Trevor is allergic). The base of the bowl is a hearty scoop of brown rice, which is then topped with a raw kale slaw dressed in a sweet and savory tahini and citrus sauce. The crowning elements are sesame and soy roasted portobello mushrooms, and perfectly ripe avocado. The beauty of this recipe, besides that it’s filling, healthy, and super simple to prepare, is that each element has a distinct flavor – they don’t run together and end up tasting like a stirfry. I made this two nights in a row, and my body and tastebuds were both grateful.

Recipe Shortlist: Burrata with Figs and Crostini; Golden Quinoa and Butternut Breakfast Bowl; Caribbean Bowl with Jerk-Seasoned White Fish and Tropical Fruit Salsa; Lentil and Rice Bowls with Summer Vegetable Kebabs; Curried Sweet Potato Soup with Crispy Lentils; Lentil and Mushroom Stuffed Peppers over Goat Cheese Butternut Mash; Coconut Sorbet with Strawberry-Rhubarb Sauce; Key Lime Eton Mess

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Disclaimer: I received a review copy of Sprouted Kitchen Bowl + Spoon from Ten Speed Press, but I was not otherwise compensated and all thought and opinions are my own.

Tahini Kale Slaw and Roasted Tamari Portobello Bowl

Recipe from Sprouted Kitchen Bowl + Spoon. Serves 2.

For the Tahini Citrus Miso Dressing:

• 1/2 c. tahini
• 2 TBS white or yellow miso
• 2 TBS honey
• 1 TBS toasted sesame oil
• 2 tsp Sriracha or hot sauce
• 1 TBS rice wine vinegar
• 1/3 c. orange juice, preferably freshly squeezed
• Sea salt and freshly ground black pepper
• Lemon juice, to taste

1. In a mixing bowl or mason jar, whisk together the tahini, miso, honey, sesame oil, Sriracha, vinegar, and orange juice until smooth and evenly combined. Thin with water or lemon juice, 1 TBS at a time, if needed. Season to taste with salt, pepper, and lemon juice. The dressing will keep, covered, in the fridge for two weeks.

For the Tahini Kale Slaw and Roasted Tamari Portobello Bowl:

• 2 large portobello mushrooms, stems removed
• 2 TBS toasted sesame oil
• Sea salt and black pepper to taste
• 1 TBS tamari or soy sauce
• 1 bunch lacinato (tuscan) kale, central stems removed
• 1 carrot, peeled and grated
• 3 scallions, white and green parts, chopped
• 1/2 c. sunflower sprouts or microgreens
• 1 c. cooked brown rice
• 1 large avocado, peeled, pitted and cubed
• 1/3 c. roasted and salted sunflower seeds

1. Preheat the oven to 375°F. Line a small roasting pan with tinfoil and place the portobello mushrooms in it. Rub both sides with the sesame oil and with sea salt and black pepper. Place them gill side up on the roasting pan and drizzle with the soy sauce. Roast until soft and collapsing, about 15-18 minutes. Remove from the pan and thinly slice.
2. While the mushrooms are roasting, prepare the kale slaw. Finely chop the kale into slivers, then toss with the carrot and scallions. Dress with the tahini citrus dressing to taste, rubbing the dressing into the kale to help tenderize it. Add the sprouts to the salad just before serving.
3. To assemble the bowls, divide the brown rice between two bowls. Top with a generous portion of the kale slow, 1 of the sliced portobellos, and half the cubed avocado. Sprinkle with sunflower seeds and serve.

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My department has recently moved to work-from-home Fridays. I’m still figuring out how to be as productive from my apartment, which isn’t really set up as a workspace (no desk, no chairs with backs, no computer monitor), as I am at work, but in general it’s a nice perk. My lunch break  in particular is a whole new experience – I can get out for a quick run, shower, and make myself a homemade lunch all in the space of an hour or so. It completely re-energizes my day. Although it can be tempting to dig into leftover rigatoni bolognese or penne alla vodka at my lunch break, I’ve been trying to come up with creative salads instead. I’ve been experimenting with this Brussels Sprout Caesar Salad over the past few Friday lunch breaks, and I think I’ve finally figured out how I like it best.

The first trick to this salad is that the brussels sprouts should be cooked over high heat so that they’re charred in places but still retain some color and crunch, and not be cooked down to a point of total limpness. A little bit of preserved lemon chopped up and stirred into the sprouts as they cook does wonders to brighten up the overall flavor. For heartiness, I’ve tried both chicken and sauteed shiitake mushrooms, and the mushrooms are the much better choice – especially thickly sliced and sauteed until golden brown in butter. Roasted chickpeas coated in smoked paprika add crunch and a bit of depth, a protein-rich alternative to croutons. Then of course you have the dressing, which should be homemade and extra tangy – unless of course you’re forgoing dressing in favor of an olive-oil fried egg, yolk broken and stirred into the warm salad. The final touch is a few shards of pecorino cheese. These days it’s my perfect salad, and I imagine I’ll continue enjoying it until spring is really upon us and I can move onto lighter, brighter foods. Until then, it makes eating my vegetables a pleasure.

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Brussels Sprout Caesar Salad

Serves 2.

• 1 1/2 c. cooked chickpeas
• 4 TBS olive oil, divided
• 1/4 tsp smoked paprika
• sea salt
• pepper
• 20 – 30 brussels sprouts
• 1 wedge of preserved meyer lemon, finely chopped
• 1/2 TBS butter
• 10-15 large shiitake mushrooms, stems removed, thickly sliced
• pecorino cheese
• homemade Caesar dressing

1. Preheat oven to 375°F. Toss the chickpeas with 2 TBS of the olive oil, the smoked paprika, and sea salt and pepper. Spread on a baking sheet and roast, stirring once or twice, until crispy, about 20 minutes. Set aside
2. Trim the ends and the outer leaves from the brussels sprouts and discard. Thinly slice the brussels sprouts. Heat the remaining 2 TBS of olive oil over medium-high heat in a large frying pan, then add the brussels sprouts and stir to coat with the oil. Add the preserved lemon to the pan, and season the sprouts with salt and pepper. Saute the brussels sprouts, stirring frequently, until bright green and charred in places, but still slightly crunchy, about 6-8 minutes. Remove from the pan into a large bowl.
3. Melt the butter in the same frying pan you used to cook the brussels sprouts, over medium heat. Add the sliced shiitake mushrooms and saute, stirring occasionally, until golden brown on both sides, about 8-10 minutes. Add to the bowl with the brussels sprouts and toss to mix.
4. Serve the salad warm, tossed with shaved pecorino cheese, the roasted chickpeas, and homemade Caesar dressing.

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I had really wanted to get a few more holiday-ish posts in before Christmas. There are so many great Christmas cookies and cakes and drinks to share! But when I found myself running around in the rain the morning of the 24th, scrambling to finish my shopping and get everything wrapped and packed for the weekend, I decided to cut myself some slack. I know that I’ve been needing a break – a real break, one where I leave my computer at home and don’t try to squeeze in a photo shoot here or there – and if you can’t take a true, unplugged break for 36 hours over Christmas, then you never will.

I think it worked – I woke up yesterday morning feeling more relaxed than I have in ages. I spent Christmas Eve sitting around the fire with Trevor and my parents and my brothers, noshing on smoked salmon, Swedish meatballs, roasted veggies, and sliders, sipping prosecco and eggnog in equally large quantities. It felt indulgent: four hours spent just sitting and eating and talking, with a little bit of book reading thrown in here and there. Christmas morning I woke up in my childhood bedroom to the sound of rain on the roof and Trevor sleeping next to me, with a pile of goodies in the stocking at the end of my bed. Brownies eaten in bed and a card detailing a surprise getaway to New York to see Les Mis preceded more presents under the tree, mimosas, and the most luxurious creme-fraiche scrambled eggs and slices of stollen slathered with butter. Then in the afternoon, my family and Trevor’s sat down together to share roast beef, yorkshire pudding, buttered cabbage, and meyer lemon tart before a sunset walk to a nearby farm and a little street football. It was wonderful.

I hope you all had lovely, relaxing Christmases, too, and are enjoying an equally relaxing long weekend. Do whatever you need to do to take care of yourself, and try not to let the joy and calm of the big day fade too quickly! And, although we’re just at the beginning of the holiday break, if you’re thinking ahead to New Year’s already, or are just looking forward to a few indulgent and lingering brunches over the next few weeks, I have two New Year’s Day brunch recipes for you. I partnered with La Crema Wines to develop these recipes for pairing with La Crema Monterey Chardonnay. The main event is a vegetarian wild mushroom strata: with a goat cheese and rosemary sauce, sauteed wild mushrooms, mashed roasted garlic, and tuscan kale simmered in chardonnay, the strata makes egg-soaked bread feel upscale and seasonal while still being absolutely craveable and satisfying. For dessert, a clementine and rosemary upside-down cake makes the most of juicy winter citrus in an easy and wonderfully pretty dessert. Since it’s un-frosted and not too sweet, serving this for brunch feels enough like serving coffee cake that you can get away with it. A hint of nutmeg in the cake batter punches up the wintery feeling, and enhances the sweet citrus and piney rosemary. Since the flavors of both dishes all work well together – orange, rosemary, mushrooms and goat cheese – and also all pair well with chardonnay, it’s a natural serving choice. You can find both recipes over on the La Crema blog. Here’s to long lazy mornings, dining in good company, and starting the new year off right!

Disclaimer: This post is sponsored by La Crema. All opinions are honest and my own.

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Last weekend, Trevor and I went on a little adventure. We drove up the coast into Maine, trekked out into the woods, and began our search for forest gold: chanterelles.

The first time I had chanterelles in any quantity was last summer in St. Petersburg. There’s a much stronger foraging and preserving culture in Russia than here in the states, and when chanterelles come into season, the whole city explodes with лисички сезон (lisichki sezon) menus, featuring chanterelles in every form imaginable. Although prized and celebrated for their texture and flavor, they aren’t the commodity that wild mushrooms are here, and while you may pay a few dollars more to have your mushroom soup made from chanterelles, it won’t break the bank.

Around Boston, however, it’s rare to find specialty wild mushrooms like chanterelles in grocery stores, even the upscale ones. When you do, they’re usually exorbitantly priced – I’ve seen morels go for as much as $70 a pound. Morels are delicious, but there are a lot of other delicacies I could buy for 1/3 of the price – like filet mignon and wild-caught salmon. So when Trevor’s uncle called to let us know that chanterelles were abundant in Maine, and offered to take us on a foraging trip, we jumped at the chance. Trevor’s uncle is a foodie in the truest sense of the word, without any of the negative connotations that word sometimes carries. An author and editor who has lived in both France and Russia, he has a deep understanding of food and its history from multiple cultural perspectives. Many of his books revolve around food: From Here You Can’t See Paris chronicles a year in the life of a restaurant in a rural town in France, while his cookbook, Fresh From Maine, shares recipes and stories from Maine’s up-and-coming chefs. In short, a good person to go foraging with, and an even better person to get ideas from for what to do with your bounty of mushrooms.

I had no idea that chanterelles grew in such prolific quantities in New England. Michael led us to hillsides covered with the small golden mushrooms, poking up from the pine needle-blanketed forest floor. Once we had found a good spot, we set to work gathering: down on our hands and knees, slicing the mushrooms from their stems, brushing the dirt and pine needles from the caps, then adding the clean mushrooms to our quickly filling bags. It’s a lovely thing to do, foraging for mushrooms – it’s quiet and focused, with the exhilaration of discovery and the wonderment of nature’s creations. Find someone who knows the forest and knows mushrooms and is willing to teach you – it’s worth it.

After only an hour of picking Trevor and I had gathered 5 pounds – as much as we could dream of using – and Michael probably picked twice as much as the two of us combined during the same time period, so we packed up our mushrooms and hiked out of the woods. We enjoyed a quick but perfect lunch of mozzarella, tomato, and basil on fresh baguette, then Trevor and I were on our way back home, where the task of further cleaning and processing our mushrooms awaited us. Although the cleaning and processing is not a small amount of work, we now have enough bags of butter-sauteed chanterelles tucked away in our freezer to get us at least through the fall. We froze about 2/3 of our haul, but we kept enough fresh mushrooms in the fridge for a week of good eating. We started off with a Chanterelle Carbonara, then these Chanterelle and Corn Tacos, and finished up with Chanterelle Burgers. All three recipes were delicious, and perhaps I’ll share the other two with you later, but for now, let’s focus on these tacos. I had been toying with the idea of a summery, mushroom and corn vegetarian taco for a while, so it was the perfect thing to try when we found ourselves with a surplus of mushrooms. The mushroom filling is as savory and satisfying as any meat-based taco, and the creamy and slightly spicy chile sauce is a little bit addictive. The tacos don’t need much more than that, but I added some sliced avocado and a bit of crumbled cotija cheese to finish them off. A worthy use of our chanterelles, for sure.

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Chanterelle and Corn Tacos with Chile Crema

Serves 2 as a main, 4 as an appetizer.

• 1/4 c. sour cream
• 2 TBS heavy cream
• juice from 1/2 lime
• 1/4 tsp coarse sea salt
• 1/2 tsp chili powder
• 1/8 tsp smoked paprika
• 2 TBS butter
• 3 c. chanterelles torn into large pieces
• 1 ear raw corn, corn kernels cut from the cob
• 1/2 small jalapeno, seeded and minced
• 1 TBS minced fresh thyme leaves
• salt and pepper, to taste
• 1 avocado, halved, pitted and sliced
• 4 small tortillas
• 2 oz. crumbled cotija

1. In a small bowl, stir together the sour cream, heavy cream, lime juice, sea salt, chili powder, and smoked paprika until smooth. Taste, and adjust flavorings to your taste. Set aside.
2. In a large frying pan, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the chanterelles and cook until soft and deeply colored, about 8 minutes. Add the corn, jalapeno and thyme to the pan, and cook, stirring occasionally, until the corn and jalapeno have softened slightly, about 5 minutes. Remove from heat and season to taste with salt and pepper.
3. To serve, line each tortilla with a few slices of avocado. Top with 1/4 of the mushroom and corn mixture, then drizzle some chile crema over the top. Sprinkle with the crumbled cotija, and serve immediately.

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This is my favorite salad, and I have a difficult time imagining the salad that will ever replace it as such. It’s something I order every time I go to Via Matta, an upscale Italian restaurant near my office in Boston, and I’ve gotten many of my coworkers addicted to it as well. I can’t believe it’s taken me this long to share it with you – I’m sorry to have been depriving you all this time. The only excuse that I can offer up is that I only recently acquired my first bottle of truffle oil – the key ingredient. During my quick business trip to Rome a few weeks ago, I loaded up on Italian food products that are really pricey in the states and only sort of pricey in Italy: Myrtle liquor, candied kumquats, truffle sauce, dried squid ink pasta, and a treasured bottle of truffle oil.

Something about the mix of the ultra-rich burrata, zippy arugula, super thinly shaved mushrooms (that are almost creamy in texture), salty capers, and pungent truffle oil in this salad is absolutely intoxicating. Trevor thinks it’s just the fact that anything made with truffle oil and/or burrata (a super luxurious cream-filled fresh mozzarella, for those of you who aren’t familiar with it) is delicious, but I maintain that this is a special combination. The raw mushrooms soak up the truffle oil so that it’s almost like you’re eating a truffle itself when you bite into them, too. I really can’t get enough. I should note that a little bit of truffle oil goes a long way – you only have to use one or two teaspoons of oil per salad – so although it is certainly rich for a salad, it’s not over-the-top indulgent.

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Arugula Salad with Burrata, Shaved Mushrooms, and Truffle Oil

Inspired by Via Matta. Serves 1.

• 2 or 3 large handfuls of fresh arugula
• 3 mushrooms, shaved or sliced as thinly as possible
• 1 TBS very finely chopped red onion
• 2 tsp capers
• 2 oz. fresh burrata
• 2 tsp truffle oil
• 1/2 tsp coarse sea salt

1. Toss the arugula, shaved mushrooms, red onion, and capers together in a large bowl. Place the piece of burrata on top of the salad, drizzle with truffle oil, and sprinkle with sea salt. Serve immediately.

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At some point I do plan to share some general travel tips for St. Petersburg – I’ve eaten at dozens of restaurants, stayed in four hotels, and made it to a good number of the biggest attractions, and I feel like I can’t let all that experience go to waste! I still have to get my act together and assemble that info, but I do have a really delicious Russian recipe for you right now. So far, my favorite place to eat in Russia is a popular chain called Shtolle (штолле), that serves sweet and savory pies. Russian pie dough is much more like a dinner roll than an American pie crust – it is a yeasted dough with sour cream and butter worked in, making it rich and airy at the same time. To get the good pies at Shtolle you have to go earlier in the day, as they’re often out of the best ones by dinnertime. I’ve tried the cabbage pie, meat pie, green onion and egg pie, and apricot pie, but my favorite by far is the mushroom and rabbit pie. I talked it up so much to Trevor that I knew we’d have to recreate it – so recreate it we did, and pretty successfully as well.

I fully expected to struggle to find a good dough recipe, but I quickly found this recipe and it sounded like just what I was looking for. In fact, the hardest part of this whole process was finding reasonably priced rabbit in Boston. It’s around $13 a pound at Savenor’s, which feels like a lot, and we found one semi-local farm that sells whole rabbits for $6 a pound, but they weren’t going to have any available for the next few weeks. We had almost caved and bought the pricey Savenor’s rabbit, when we found it by chance for $7 a pound at Market Basket in Andover. We stocked up of course, so now we have plenty of rabbit for experimentation. As for the rest of the filling, I made it up based on memory – I knew it should have shredded braised rabbit, finely chopped mushrooms and onion, lots of dill, and a mild, light white sauce, which most likely was made from sour cream. Memory served me well, and the pie came out just like I remembered. I’m happy that I was able to leave Trevor a little taste of Russia while I’m away.

Russian Mushroom and Rabbit Pie

Inspired by Shtolle. Serves 6-8. This recipe makes extra filling, which can be frozen for later use.

• One 2.5 pound rabbit, broken into pieces
• salt and pepper to taste
• 2 TBS canola oil
• 1 1/2 c. chicken stock, divided (1 c. rabbit, 1/2 c. for filling)
• 2 TBS butter
• 1 large white onion, finely chopped
• 12 oz. wild mushrooms, finely chopped
• 1/2 c. fresh dill fronds, finely chopped
• 1/2 c. white wine
• 1/2 c. sour cream
• 1 recipe kulebyaka dough (below)
• 1 egg yolk mixed with 2 TBS water

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Break the rabbit down into pieces (see tutorial here), removing the organs (to be discarded or cooked otherwise – we dredged the livers in flour and fried them up and they were surprisingly tasty). Season the rabbit pieces with salt and pepper.
2. Heat the canola oil in a large frying pan over medium heat. Add the rabbit pieces and brown on all sides. Place the browned rabbit pieces in a 9×13 casserole dish. Add 1 cup of the chicken stock to the bottom of the dish. Bake for 90 minutes, basting with the roasting liquid every 30 minutes.
3. Remove the rabbit from the oven and let cool until it is comfortable to handle. Shred the rabbit meat into pieces using your fingers or two forks. Set aside in a large bowl.
4. Melt the butter in a large frying pan over medium heat. Add the chopped onion and saute until soft and translucent, about 5-8 minutes. Add the chopped mushroom and saute until soft, another 5-8 minutes. Add the rabbit pieces and the dill, and cook to warm the rabbit through, about 3 minutes. Add the white wine and let simmer for 5 minutes, until reduced by half. Remove from heat and stir in the sour cream. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
5. Roll out the kulebyaka dough into two large rectangles, about 8 by 12 inches. Place one rectangle on a parchment-paper lined baking sheet. Pile the rabbit filling into the center of the dough, leaving about one inch of space around all four edges. Pile the filling about 2 inches thick, using about half the rabbit filling – freeze the rest for a later use. Drape the second piece of dough on top of the filling and pinch the edges closed with your fingers. Trim any excess dough with a knife and use to make designs on the top of your pie. Increase the oven temperature to 375°F and let the pie sit at room temperature for 15 minutes. Before putting in the oven, brush the top and sides of the pie with the egg yolk wash and slice a few slits in the top crust to allow steam to vent. Bake the pie for 25 minutes, until dough is golden brown. Let pie cool for 10 minutes before slicing and serving.

Kulebyaka Dough

Recipe from It’s Sooo Good. Makes 1 large pie

• 1 tsp active dry yeast
• 1 tsp sugar
• 2 TBS warm water
• 2 c. AP flour
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 3 TBS butter, cut into 1 cm cubes
• 3/4 c. sour cream
• 1 whole egg

1. In a small bowl, stir together the yeast, sugar, and warm water. Let sit for 10 minutes for yeast to proof – it should get frothy on top.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour and the salt. Add the butter cubes, and use your fingers to crumble them into the flour until there are no large chunks of butter remaining. Stir in the yeast mixture, the sour cream, and the egg until you have an even, soft dough. Form the dough into a disk, wrap in plastic wrap, and refrigerate for at least 2 and up to 12 hours.
3. Bring the dough out and let come to room temperature. On a floured work surface, knead the dough until it is smooth and elastic, taking care not to add too much additional flour. This may take from 5-20 minutes, depending on your dough. Once the dough is smooth, place in a greased bowl, cover with a clean dishtowel, and let rise in a warm place for 1 1/2 hours, or until doubled in size. At this point, proceed with the recipe above to roll out and fill the dough.

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