Food, Photography and Bon Mots

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Summer’s Kiss: Plum and Rose Pie Bars With Almonds
September 14, 2024

Summer’s Kiss: Plum and Rose Pie Bars With Almonds

As you know if you read this blog, I love plums. I asked ChatGPT to write a haiku about plums. Here it is.  Crimson orbs of joy,sweet tang dances on my tongue—summer’s kiss in fruit. Summer’s kiss. What a beautiful metaphor capturing the delight of…

Desserts, Plums, Vegetarian
Sweet and Sour Tofu With Corn
September 12, 2024

Sweet and Sour Tofu With Corn

  This Sweet and Sour Tofu With Corn is a wonderful Asian-inspired tofu recipe.  Preparation is pretty fast, too—perfect for a lazy end-of-summer meal. It’s beautiful, too.  Curious about tofu? Tofu was first produced in China more than 2000 years ago, probably as a happy…

Tofu, Vegetables, Vegetarian
Buttermilk Biscuits With Strawberries and Cream
August 28, 2024

Buttermilk Biscuits With Strawberries and Cream

Love biscuits?

This crisp-tender sweet biscuit is a perfect base for those oh-so-wonderful end-of-the-season (have I used enough hyphens here?) strawberries in our farmer’s markets right now.  

This recipe is from Stella Park’s extraordinary cookbook BraveTart. You can order this great cookbook through your local bookstore or on Amazon here.

Here is the recipe as I prepared it in my kitchen. 

Buttermilk Biscuits With Strawberries and Cream

August 28, 2024
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Ingredients
  • Biscuit Recipe Ingredients
  • 2 C. all-purpose flour
  • 1 T. baking powder
  • 2 t. sugar
  • 1 1/2 t. kosher salt
  • 1 stick unsalted butter (cold, cut into cubes)
  • 3/4 C. buttermilk (cold)
  • Garnishes
  • Fresh strawberries
  • Whipped Cream
  • Sparkling Sugar
Directions
  • Step 1 Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Spray 8-inch cast iron skillet with cooking spray.
  • Step 2 Sift flour into a bowl. Add baking powder, sugar and salt to the sifted flour. Whisk to combine all the ingredients. Add butter cubes and mix butter into the flour mixture with your fingers. You want the butter to be well-mixed into the flour with some small pea-sized pieces of butter visible.
  • Step 3 Stir the cold buttermilk into the flour and butter mixture. You want the ingredients to come together into a sticky ball. Roll the dough ball into some flour that you have sprinkled onto your counter. Shape the dough into a 6-inch square, fold in half. Repeat shaping and folding twice more. In the end you want a dough that you can shape into a 3/4-inch thick rectangle. Cut dough into squares or rectangles and arrange (touching) in your prepared cast iron pan.
  • Step 4 Bake in a 400 degree F. oven for about 35 minutes. You want the biscuits to be golden brown on the tops and sides. Remove biscuits from oven and allow them to cool on a rack.
  • Step 5 Meanwhile, slice strawberries and add sugar to your taste along with a little vanilla extract and a pinch of salt. Set aside for about half an hour to let the strawberries marinate and soften.
  • Step 6 Whip some cream with a bit of sugar and a pinch of salt.
  • Step 7 To serve, split biscuits. Spoon on some strawberries and their sweetened juices. Top with a bit of whipped cream.
  • Step 8 Cooks Note: I sprinkled some sparkling sugar on the top of the biscuits after moistening the tops of the biscuits with a bit of whipped cream. I bought the sparkling sugar from King Arthur Baking.

 

Breads, Desserts, Strawberries, Vegetarian
Oldies But Goodies: Buttermilk Molasses Quick Bread
August 23, 2024

Oldies But Goodies: Buttermilk Molasses Quick Bread

Every month Blue Cayenne features recipes from our archive of more than four hundred recipes. These recipes are our “Oldies But Goodies.” Today’s Oldie But Goodie recipe is for Buttermilk Molasses Quick Bread, a bread that would be just right as the base for some…

Breads, Oldies But Goodies, Vegetables, Vegetarian
Honey Cake: It’s a Honey of A Cake and Juliet is a Honey of a Pup
August 18, 2024

Honey Cake: It’s a Honey of A Cake and Juliet is a Honey of a Pup

If you read this blog, you’ve met our CQO-OT (Chief Quality Officer and Official Taster), Juliet, many times before. Juliet is a 7-pound rescue Yorkie who brightens everything about our world here at Blue Cayenne. Last week, King Arthur Baking’s Facebook page featured a post…

Cakes, Desserts, Juliet, Vegetarian
Blueberry Muffin Loaves
August 12, 2024

Blueberry Muffin Loaves

There are few things better than a warm blueberry muffin and a hot cup of tea in the early morning drowsiness of waking up. 

This is a very good muffin. Actually, it is a small loaf, baked in my small loaf pan shown below. 

My good (and much missed) friend, Gene, used to enjoy desserts that “weren’t too sweet.” This muffin is like that–delicious and not too sweet. Wish I could share one with him right now. 

This recipe is adapted from one that appeared in Bake From Scratch Magazine. You can subscribe to the magazine here.

Here is the recipe as I prepared it in my kitchen. 

Blueberry Muffin Loaf

August 12, 2024
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Ingredients
  • 3 C. all-purpose flour
  • 1 T. baking powder
  • 1 1/2 t. salt
  • 1 C. granulated sugar
  • 1 C. labneh or sour cream
  • 3 large eggs (room temperature)
  • 1/4 C. unsalted butter (melted)
  • 1/4 C. grapeseed oil
  • 1 T. lemon zest
  • 2 T. fresh lemon juice
  • 2 t. vanilla extract
  • 2 1/2 C. fresh blueberries (divided)
  • 2 T. turbinado sugar
Directions
  • Step 1 Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Prepare a small loaf pan or muffin cups by spraying with baking spray and dusting with flour.
  • Step 2 Melt butter. (Set aside.)
  • Step 3 Whisk 2 3/4 C. plus 2 T. flour with the baking powder and salt. Set aside.
  • Step 4 In another bowl, whisk granulated sugar, labneh (or sour cream or Greek yogurt), eggs, melted butter, oil, lemon zest, lemon juice and vanilla until combined.Fold the sugar mixture into the flour mixture until just mixed.
  • Step 5 In still another bowl (a small one!), mash 1/2 C. blueberries with a fork.
  • Step 6 In a medium bowl, stir 1 3/4 C. blueberries and remaining 2 T. flour together. Fold in mashed blueberries. Fold this mixture into your batter until just combined. Your batter will be lumpy. Refrigerate this mixture for about an hour before proceeding.
  • Step 7 Spoon batter into every other well in your muffin loaf tins or muffin tins. Fill every other well with water. Top muffins with remaining 1/4 C. blueberries, pressing the blueberries into the batter. Sprinkle with turbinado sugar.
  • Step 8 Bake for 5 minutes at 400 degrees F. After 5 minutes, lower heat to 375 degrees F. and bake for about 15 minutes. Your muffins/loaves will be done when a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Let muffins/loaves cool on a rack for at least 5 minutes before storing.
Blueberries, Breads, Breakfast Dishes, Desserts, Vegetarian
Tomato and Basil Fried Rice
August 6, 2024

Tomato and Basil Fried Rice

Love fried rice? I certainly do.  This fried rice recipe just might tickle your taste buds. The New York Times Food Section featured a recipe for Tomato and Basil Fried Rice by cookbook author Hetty McKinnon  this week. McKinnon is the author of a number…

Asian, Rice, Tomatoes, Vegetables, Vegetarian
A Very Fine Plum Cake
July 31, 2024

A Very Fine Plum Cake

This  Zoe Francois plum cake is absolutely wonderful. In the introduction to the recipe, she writes that this plum cake is her favorite cake in her cookbook, Zoe Bakes Cakes. (There are some outstanding cakes in that cookbook, by the way! So, that’s high praise…

Cakes, Desserts, Plums, Vegetarian
It’s Plum Season!!! Plum, Rum and Raisin Conserve
July 27, 2024

It’s Plum Season!!! Plum, Rum and Raisin Conserve

It’s plum season. How great is that? Plums are my favorite stone fruit. 

This season I was fortunate to get a large bag of home-grown plums from my friend Karen. (Karen is also the adored dog walker for Blue Cayenne’s Chief Taster and Chief Quality Officer, Sweet Juliet. Karen’s many kindnesses are legendary around here.)

Today’s featured recipe is for a wonderful Plum, Rum and Raisin Conserve.  This isn’t Blue Cayenne’s first rodeo with plums, though. Below you also will find some other wonderful plum recipes you may want to try this season while the plum supply is bountiful. (Or, you can, of course, just sit in your pajamas enjoying  slice after slice of perfect toast slathered with the Plum, Rum and Raisin Conserve. Your call.)

Here is today’s recipe for the Plum, Rum and Raisin Conserve. This recipe is from Olia Hercules’ wonderful Ukrainian cookbook Mamushka. You can buy the book on Amazon here. or through your local bookstore.  Hercules writes in her book that this conserve, beyond being delicious smeared on a piece of toast, makes a great Christmas gift or a mincemeat substitute for pies.  Can’t wait to try this wrapped in a flaky pie crust!

Here is the recipe as I prepared it in my kitchen. 

 

Plum, Rum and Raisin Conserve

July 27, 2024
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Ingredients
  • 1/2 C, golden raisins
  • 6 T. run
  • 7/8 C. soft dark brown sugar
  • 4 1/2 T. clear honey
  • Grated zest and juice of one lemon
  • Grated zest and juice of one orange
  • 6 T. water
  • 1 pound pitted and chopped plums
  • Vanilla paste to taste (I used 1 T.)
Directions
  • Step 1 Add rum to golden raisins and soak overnight.
  • Step 2 Combine sugar, honey, juice of lemon and orange (and zest) with 6 T. water in a pan. Bring liquids to a boil. Add plums and soaked raisins along with the rum and vanilla paste. Lower heat to a simmer and simmer for about 45-60 minutes.
  • Step 3 When the mixture is thick, remove from the heat to cool a bit. Store in refrigerator .

But don’t stop with the conserve recipe, here are a couple of other ideas for this plum season. 

First, it doesn’t get a lot more beautiful than this delicious Almond Butter Cake With Cardamon and Baked Plums. You’ll find the recipe from Blue Cayenne’s archives here.

Here is an exceptional  (and quite stunning!) plum tart recipe: Plum Tart.

 

 

Fruit, Fruits, Jams, Vegetarian
A Culinary Walk Down Memory Lane: Wedge Salad
July 15, 2024

A Culinary Walk Down Memory Lane: Wedge Salad

Remember the 1970s with its  leisure suits, lava lamps, and platform shoes? (I saw a 60-something lady today at the local Sprouts Market teetering along in jeans and sky-high platform shoes! Whoa.) Foodwise, I remember those  wonderful wedge salads served with generous dollops of roquefort…

salad, Salad Dressings, Vegetables, Vegetarian

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Juliet-Chief Taster and Blue Cayenne’s CQO (Chief Quality Officer)

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