cook pot stories

Some time ago I posted about my problem with cookbooks. I have too many of them I don't use often enough. In that post I said I would try to use them more often and would blog about the results. Well, it's been awhile, but finally I have something to report - an exciting failure. I think we need to talk more about our failures because we learn as much from experimentation and failure (stretching our boundaries) as we do from our successes. I'm putting my money where my mouth is. And where my cake went. I needed to make a dessert for dinner with friends. Rather than go to any of my tried and true recipes or the store, I decided to try something from one of my old cookbooks. After some pleasant reading I settled on this one, The New Pennsylvania Dutch Cook Book by Ruth Hutchinson, (c) 1948 and 1958. Each chapter begins with some homely advice, the recipes themselves are straightforward and largely attributed to various wives - Mrs. Donald Hellferich, Mrs. Thomas B. Keck - w...

For dinner tonight I made a quick pesto for boneless chicken thighs on the grill. I used to be afraid of pesto, always measuring out all the ingredients, but have finally realized it's just a matter of throwing a green herb, garlic and olive oil into the processor.The photos are terrible, so you just get the recipe. I expect the pesto would be great on potatoes too. In a food processor or mortar and pestle smush together: a lot of garlic (I used an entire head of cloves) at least 10 good sized sage leaves, fresh from the garden enough olive oil to encourage emulsion salt and pepper to taste Smear it on your chicken, potatoes, whatever and grill. Don't breath on anyone afterwards, this is a lot of garlic. Enjoy! (c) 2010 Laura S. Packer

Some ingredients seem magical and unreachable. Their very names, even in translation, evoke distance, time, an immigrant's longing for home, the stories we tell to remind ourselves we are not lost to those we love. My list is undoubtedly different than yours (these may be everyday ingredients to you!) but here are a scant few: Szechuan peppercorn Black mustard seed Durian fruit Cashew fruit Zahtar Dried limes Now, I've used or eaten most of the things on this list at one time or another. I fell in love with cashew fruit in Brazil, I love the pop of black mustard seed when I make Indian food, szechuan peppercorn thrills and then numbs my taste buds (though I don't cook well with it) and I've gotten past the initial shock of durian fruit to taste its subtle sweetness. But dried limes have long eluded me. I could see them in Middle Eastern grocery stores and wonder how on earth would I use them? Then I'd be distracted by the halvah and olives, forgetting to get drie...