Polenta Stuffed Artichokes Recipe

My recipe for polenta stuffed artichokes came about thanks to winning some heirloom artichokes from  Ocean Mist . When I was working on my first cookbook I needed artichokes and it wasn’t quite artichoke season. Fortunately Ocean Mist came to my rescue and kindly shipped me a whole carton full and I’ve been a fan ever since. I've found each of the varieties of artichokes they grow to be particularly plump and meaty with great flavor and not overly bitter. I'm a subscriber to their newsletter ( join the free Artichoke Club ) which alerts me to when and where artichokes are on sale locally and sometimes also gives away artichokes. Most recipes use just the artichoke hearts or they call for stuffing the whole artichoke with bread crumb stuffing. I decided to try an entirely different kind of stuffing — lemon and goat cheese polenta. Artichokes tend to make other ingredients taste sweet, so the tangy and salty flavor profile of lemon and cheese complements it perfectly. It ......

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Helen Roberts & the Kikkoman Test Kitchen

Chef Helen Roberts is the manager of culinary development and public relations at Kikkoman . She works on consumer recipes using the whole range of Kikkoman products from soy sauce to panko bread crumbs to soy milk and beyond. She used to work in product development and was hired because of her amazing ability to taste subtle differences in 16 different soy sauces! At the time she was hired, she had never even tried Japanese food. I recently got to visit Helen and her test kitchen in downtown San Francisco. What a treat! Helen is friendly, enthusiastic and has a great sense of humor, and so it was no surprise to see that her recently renovated test kitchen in San Francisco is cheerful and lively as can be. The kitchen has a big island, two stoves and a large refrigerator. It also has a big flat screen television with cooking shows on all the time and the radio set to "old school." By the way, is there anything better than cooking with Prince playing in the background? ......

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Roasted Baby Artichokes Recipe

Eating an artichoke is like opening a present--getting to the heart is almost as much fun as "unwrapping" it. Like any good gift an artichoke takes some effort to get right. If it's a large artichoke it needs a fair amount of trimming, especially the spiky tips and outer leaves. Once cooked, you have to go through that unique teeth-and-leaf-scraping exercise to get at them. If you want to get to the real present, the prized heart, your chore continues as you have to trim away the fuzzy choke first. While large artichokes can be stuffed, steamed, boiled, fried or stewed, growing up I only ate them steamed and served with garlic mayonnaise or melted butter and lemon juice. But when I got to Italy it was another story altogether. Isn't it always? In Tuscany where I lived there were several kinds of artichokes available in the outdoor markets. But the little ones were really a treat. Now more commonly available in the US, they are not actually "babies" as y......

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Spring Macaroni & Cheese Recipe

The weather can't seem to decide what it wants to do, in turn making it hard to decide what to eat: something comforting and cheesy or something fresher and green? I decided the only solution was to combine the two. One of the great American dishes has got to be macaroni and cheese. Gooey, cheesy and rich with a slight crunch on the top it is pure goodness in a casserole dish. The one problem I have with macaroni and cheese is the guilt. It's soooo rich, it's not the healthiest dish in the world. One way to make a dish healthier is to cut back on the rich ingredients, like the milk, butter and cheese. Well, that's no fun! I'd rather add in some heathy but tasty stuff as a compromise that really doesn't feel like a compromise at all. My healthy additions are some peas and artichoke hearts, both tasty Spring arrivals. They both go particularly well with gruyere cheese. And gruyere is a perfect cheese for macaroni and cheese. The topping for this dish is a J......

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