Spicy Italian-Style Cauliflower

I have never cooked cauliflower before. I didn’t even know if I liked it when it wasn’t breaded and fried. Turns out I do.

When I got the Williams-Sonoma Bride and Groom Cookbook and flipped through the pages, I knew I had to try their recipe for cauliflower. It seemed really easy and I already had most of the ingredients in my kitchen. I picked up a head of cauliflower on my way home from work and in a half hour, this dish was ready. Continue reading

Mini Shells with Mushrooms

I used to think I didn’t like mushrooms, but here I am posting yet another mushroom recipe. I’ll admit it, I hate raw mushrooms. But when cooked, they have an amazing flavor that goes really well with pasta.

On my birthday I went for dinner and ordered a pasta with portobello mushroom sauce. It was delicious, but way too creamy and rich. I decided to recreate the intense mushroom flavor in my own pasta dish, without adding loads of cream. Here’s what I came up with.

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“Meat” and Dairy Lasagna

When it comes to lasagna, we Kosher Foodies always have to make a choice: dairy or meat. Well, I bought some Morningstar Farms Meal Starters to use as meat, and so I could have “meat” and cheese together! Layers of pasta, tomato, meat, cheese, and vegetables made for a very heavy and delicious dinner, the perfect comfort food for a winter night. Whatever you don’t eat can easily be frozen and reheated.

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Toasted Pumpkin Ravioli Appetizers

Remember when we made pumpkin ravioli and saved the ones with the store-bought wonton wrappers in the freezer for future use? Well, this time, instead of a classic brown butter and sage sauce, I decided to cook them up finger-food style as toasted pumpkin ravioli, not too unlike the toasted ravioli Rachael Ray inspired us to make a while back.

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Baked Ziti with Roasted Vegetables

This simple dish is a healthier version of mac and cheese. I adapted it from Giada’s version, but she uses way more cheese and adds sauce. I decided to omit the sauce and make it more like mac and cheese, less like baked ziti. Her recipe also calls for 4 mushrooms, which is nothing. I left them out, though they probably would have been a great addition to the meal. Next time I’ll definitely use them.

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Hameen, or Baked Chicken and Rice

While looking through a Syrian cookbook, I came across a dutch oven recipe for hameen, a dish that required a whole chicken, 5 hours, and long-grain white rice. It sounded delicious, but I definitely had to switch it up a little bit. This recipe is pretty simple and the ingredients are all really basic, and you should have most, if not all of them in your house already. Continue reading

Leftover Frittata

My favorite thing to do with the leftover vegetables and herbs in the fridge is make a frittata. It’s pretty easy to do, and works for any meal of the day. It’s also very easy to make it to feed a crowd, or for just one. And you can put virtually anything in it! This morning, I had about 1/3 of a box of frozen peas sitting in the freezer, some leftover red bell pepper, and a carrot. Then I found some thyme that was just begging to be used (my fresh herbs often end up in the garbage, it’s rather sad).

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Roasted Butternut Squash-Onion Pie

You can’t go wrong with caramelized onions and roasted butternut squash. Here’s a pretty easy (once you get the pie crust out of the way) special dinner recipe. Sure, it’s a bit fattening, but hey, once in a while you just have to splurge. If you’re having some company over and making dairy, this is definitely a great recipe to impress guests with. The list of ingredients looks rather long, but I found that I had a lot of the ingredients.

This recipe is from The Art and Soul of Baking, a book that I haven’t used in a while. I’m happy to have it opened up again, and keep finding more and more recipes to try… Continue reading

Cooking Yebra

We taught you how to roll and freeze the yebra, and I’m sure you were eager to know how to actually cook at eat it…well here’s one way to do it!

Yebra is definitely a Syrian favorite. We eat it with sweet sauce, sour sauce, meat filled, and with rice and chick peas inside (a pareve version). Different families prefer it different ways. This is not how our mom makes it, but it’s a really yummy version with apricots, one of my favorites.

These take a long time to cook, so if you’re making it for Friday night dinner, make it on Thursday night and reheat it before dinner Friday.

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Guest Post: Bulgur (or Cracked Wheat) with Chickpeas

Please give a warm welcome to our very first guest blogger, our lovely sister-in-law Adele!

I LOVE CHICKPEAS. There. I said it.

I’m a sucker for anything with chickpeas in them – salads, hummus, curry – whatever it is, I’ll eat it. Chickpeas, or Garbanzo Beans, are super delicious, super filling, super healthy, and super cute! (Seriously – have you ever looked at one? It looks like a baby butt!) If you ever need a protein in your meal – a handful of chickpeas is generally the way I go. They are versatile like you wouldn’t believe and couldn’t be easier to store. (In the past, I’ve bought dried chickpeas, soaked them overnight, boiled them, yadda yadda yadda. The canned is way easier. Just make sure to rinse them off thoroughly first. Here’s what Mark Bittman has to say on the subject.)

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