Apple Welsh Rarebit Recipe

A few years ago I received a shipment of SweeTango apples courtesy of the growers and used them to make an individual apple crisp . This year, I was contacted to be a SweetTango blog ambassador, and was also hired to create a couple of extra crunchy recipes using raw apples. One of the recipes I suggested wasn’t chosen, but I was eager to make it anyway and it turned out to be a real keeper.  The SweeTango was developed at the University of Minnesota and is cross between a sweet Honeycrisp and a tangier Zestar! apple. It’s grown in New York, Michigan, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Washington, and Nova Scotia, Canada. While it’s fine to bake SweeTango apples, they are particularly good raw. In addition to being juicy and sweet with a complex flavor that’s sweet, spicy and tangy, these apples are really known for their crunch. And there’s a reason for that. The apples have cells twice the size of most other apples. How crunchy is the SweeTango? It's acutally the Guinness Book of......

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Chestnut and Celery Root Soup Recipe

My CSA or community supported agriculture box of produce from Eatwell Farms challenges me with every delivery this season. Bok choy? Cabbage? Celery root? Sure I have a recipe or two for each of those, but week after week and I get bored and need to find something new. As much as I love celery root salad and mash I think I've discovered a recipe I like even better, Chestnut and Celery Root Soup. It would be perfect to serve on Christmas or on New Year's Eve.  This is the epitome of a shortcut recipe with few ingredients and a reliance on a couple of convenience items namely roasted, peeled and vacuum packed chestnuts I find at Trader Joe's and canned chicken broth. I've mentioned it before, but when I don't have homemade chicken broth, I find Swanson's to be the next best thing. The prep for this soup takes more time than the cooking and it's just a matter of peeling, slicing and dicing onions, celery root and an apple pear.  Chestnut and Cele......

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Individual Apple Crisp Recipe

Last week I got a shipment of SweeTango apples to try. New varieties of apples appear up now and again and the SweeTango is a relatively new one that's harvested the end of August and beginning of September. It's a very pretty apple with a bright mix of golden green and bright red. The SweeTango is a cross between a Honeycrisp and a Zestar apple. Honeycrisp is sweet and crisp and Zestar is juicy and zesty. The cross is a very good eating apple but you can use it for cooking too. It's a juicy apple so it doesn't need additional liquid and is best for recipes that are fairly quick cooking because it gets very soft when cooked.  The SweeTango is perfect for apple crisp, which is super easy to make, easier than pie or even a cobbler. It's the kind of thing that takes only minutes to prepare, then you can pop it in the oven after or even during dinner. The smell of apples, butter and cinnamon might be the best thing about autumn.  If you've ever ordered a......

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Brussels Sprout Slaw with Apples & Walnuts Recipe

This brussels sprout salad recipe is perfect for lovers and haters of the little cabbage-looking sprout. The flavor is so mild, that it barely has any cabbage flavor. Because the brussels sprouts are shredded, guests might not even know they are the basis for the dish. Sweet apples and toasted nuts add complexity and crunch. It's a nice balance of sweet, salty, crunchy, tangy with just a touch of richness from the walnuts and the oil. Brussels sprout slaw is yet another recipe that was created out of "whatever was in the house." I will admit, laziness that keeps me from going to the store in turn inspires new recipes on a regular basis. In this case I had one apple and a bag of brussels sprouts. Back from a weekend out of town, I had no desire to go shopping. My original plan was to roast or saute them, but raw was a refreshing change from the expected. You could probably slice the brussels sprouts very thinly with a knife, but it's much easier to do in a food pro......

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Charoset Recipe

My favorite part of the hilarious bestseller Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris is when he tries to explain Easter to his fellow French class students. The more he explains about Jesus, the bunny and a basket of eggs the more impossibly ridiculous it sounds. So it is with charoset. In the beginning there was a seder plate. Seder means "order" as the Passover meal has a distinct order to it and describing what is on the seder plate, a kind of centerpiece to the dinner table, is one of the rituals of the evening. On the seder plate were various symbolic items, bitter herb which is usually some horseradish, matzoh and a roasted lamb shank. The bitter herb represents the bitterness of slavery. The matzoh is the bread of affliction or what the Jews ate on their way out of town. The lamb shank is symbolic of the lamb offered as a sacrifice. Somewhere along the line, various other things were added making a much more crowded plate. I don't know exactly when rabbis add......

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