
Lamb Tagine with Blackberries and Dates

If you bought into the media hype, you knew winter storm Elliot was going to kill us all. Comparisons to the blizzard of ’78 were flying everywhere, and I understand there was nowhere nearby to get eggs, milk, or bread. In reality, we only got about an inch and a half of snow. But the cold. The cold meant doing everything possible to stay inside! With wind chills approaching -40, traveling any further than the sheep barn was not in the cards for us.
But, Xenia had foraged some winter oyster mushrooms ahead of the storm, and I had some old, leftover Neapolitan style pizza dough. It was really too old to make good pizzas, and since the pizza oven is an outdoor only appliance, I wasn’t going to be making pizzas anyway. But, a savory onion, mushroom, and cheese roll for breakfast? That sounds perfect for a cold day next to the wood stove!
Continue readingI didn’t realize I hadn’t posted my Grand Marnier Dark Chocolate Chunk Cookies to the blog. What an oversight! They’re only the best cookie in existence!
Continue readingThis week, I decided to get a little meta with the pizza. French Onion Pizza: essentially deconstructed French Onion Soup on a Neapolitan style pizza crust. Different. Yummy. Would do again.
Continue readingGingerbread. It’s for more than making houses and teaching kids the dangers of hubris, overconfidence, and ignoring the advice of others. It also tastes good. At least when made like this. So, put away the royal icing, the gumdrops, the candy canes. Open up the spice rack instead, and wrap your taste buds in true holiday yum.
Continue readingLike most folks, we’re struggling a bit financially right now. But we also want to eat well, with some comforting winter food to tide us over the dark months. Stoups – thick, hearty one-dish meals that fall somewhere between a stew and soup – are among my favorite winter concoctions. They’re delicious, comforting, and fill the house with wonderful aromas while they cook. They also play well with improvisation. This time, I improvised a smokey, somewhat spicy, chipotle chicken and wild rice soup.
Continue readingThe spatchcock chicken recipe I posted Tuesday may have led you to think I abandoned the pie of the week project. Never fear: here’s this week’s: an onion marmalade, walnut, blue cheese pizza!
Continue readingI’ve had a lot of pizza since I started the Pie of the Week project. While it has been rewarding and I’m nowhere near done with the project, I wanted to do something more creative with the Roccbox pizza oven. I also needed to clear space in the freezer for lambs headed to the butcher this week. There was a whole chicken from Jim and Peggy Metz at the Culver Farmers’ Market in there, taking up space. So, I decided to see how a spatchcock chicken would turn out in the Roccbox.
Continue readingAfter making an untold number of farm to flame pizzas the last several weeks, and a bunch of them for thanksgiving, I nearly took a break from my weekly pizza experiments. Sorta. In the end, I did make one I’ve been contemplating for while: chili cheese pizza. I also had my first major pizza failure.
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