Hosted by Barbara J Nosek
New Salon every Friday – c’mon in
CS friends, and help yourself to tasty resources!
♦ Here’s what you’ll find when you scroll below ♦
♦ TIDBITS – Thank-full help / cheese help / Cookbook Club help ♦ CS MARKETPLACE SPOTLIGHT – join Flay in the kitchen ♦ FEATURED RECIPE – timeless tasty classic ♦ TIP – tv “guide” ♦ THE WEEK – frozen, really ??? / Parm butter 2.0 / Yay Twain
♦ TIDBITS ♦
Newsy, schmoozy stuff for cooks
♦ The Create Channel by PBS is bringing “Thank-full” to your livingroom for Thanksgiving help in your kitchen. Kevin Breton, Sara Moulton, Vivian Howard and the crew from America’s Test Kitchen, plus style expert Christy Rust, come together to deliver tips on what goes on your table and for the table itself. In my directory, Sat Nov 23, 6am-noon & 6pm-midnight, repeats Nov 24 from noon-6pm, and again on TG day from 6am-noon.
♦ Plan on setting out a cheese platter this holiday season? Take a tip {or more} from Food & Wine Top Ten, by learning “6 Common Cheese-Serving Mistakes and How to Avoid Them.”
♦ So, have you and maybe some like-minded friends ever thought about starting a cookbook club? It’s much like a succession of potlucks but with each dish tested from a particular cookbook. The discussion then centers on not just the food but also the book. As well, the subject of the book becomes the theme of the dinner. In the article, “How to Have a Successful Cookbook Club,” MyRecipes shows you the ropes.
♦ CS MARKETPLACE SPOTLIGHT ♦
Bobby Flay in home kitchen mode
Kind of nice to see a celeb out of the chef whites and more into our realm, as captured in Flay’s new “Bobby at Home” cookbook. And it becomes extra endearing when you see that he dedicates the book to his mom, Dorothy Flay, saying each page “is filled with the spirit of her memory and a lust for life that only she could attain.”
Flay calls this a collection of favorite dishes that he serves to family and friends. And at home, he says, “it’s a pace that’s steady but focused and where the food is always abundant and served family style.” And as well not too different from us CS folks, those gathered eat, drink, play games, listen to music, even “solve the problems of the world.”
And here’s most of all what the chef says this book is all about. “Don’t just think of these dishes as a means to feed someone, but as a way to gather the people in your life you want to spend quality time with . . . I hope they bring as much joy to your table as they do to mine.”
Here are some of the dishes that I look forward to putting on my table: almond crusted baked manchego, red chile caesar salad, green chile cheeseburger, coconut red curry spot prawns, chocolate hazelnut crema catalana. The book also delivers Bobby’s essential pantry & equipment guide, clever cocktail preps, and basics that Flay calls the building blocks he uses to start and finish his dishes with flavor.
“Bobby At Home” cookbook, 4 1/2 stars, Prime eligible, big discount, at Amazon
Flay’s other books ♦ Flay’s DVDs
♦ FEATURED RECIPE ♦
Jump into the way-back machine
Where we re-discover one of the most notable winners in Pillsbury’s annual Bake-Off® Contest. Yep it’s the Tunnel of Fudge Cake from 1966, where magic happens right in the bundt pan.
Not familiar with the mysterious transformation that takes place as it bakes? An inner ring of fudge, a melty 
chocolatey surprise, is revealed when this famous treat is cut into slices. And then a cocoa-rich glaze takes it right to the wonderful brink of wretched excess.
As the recipes instructs, “don’t scrimp on the nuts, or it won’t work.” {No idea why} Also scroll down to see the note about testing for doneness.
And another nice thing when you scroll on the page. Yet other very fine recipes. Sweet bonus.
♦ TIP ♦
Write on!
This is quick and simple and if it’s something you’re not doing, I hope you will find it helpful. It’s always part of my routine now.
It’s just this. I make sure I always have a tablet and pen at hand when I’m watching a cooking show. Some of you may prefer to do this on your electronics.
Whichever it is, you’re always ready to make note of a cooking tip or technique, a recipe you may want to check on the show’s site, a cookbook featured during the broadcast. Easier {for some of us anyway!} than trying to remember it all.
♦ A PEEK AT MY WEEK ♦
Welcome to my kitchen and living room
♦ A tale of two veggies, one canned, one frozen. Oh yeah, fresh is best but can’t compete with the storage perks of those in the pantry of freezer. But, ummm, those guys need help. I recently tried whole canned green beans in the hopes they’d have a little more life than the frenched one. Nope. So, two steps. First, drain and pour into a jar of dill pickle juice. Second, chop and hide in salads. Now just came across “6 Ways to Make Frozen Cauliflower into Something Delicious.” The roasted version does sound promising.
♦ So, as much as I enjoyed the Parm corn butter mentioned in our 11.01.19 Salon, made as the recipe specified, I found a way I think like it even more. Pureed. Here, you see it melting on a toasted baguette, all snuggled up to some baked mostaccioli.
♦ Paging through my charter issue of Milk Street magazine, subtitled “The New Home Cooking,” I came across a favorite but long since forgotten quote from Mark Twain: “Part of the secret of success in life is to eat what you like and let the food fight it out inside” {in some citations, “a success”}. Thinking the antacid industry could adopt this as its motto.
So far next week: bacon pimento cheese dip, jar salad {& other easy lunches}, best yet for Parm corn butter, primo baking book, pie tips & recipes
Last week, just below: Irish Whiskey pumpkin pie, save on NOWFE tix, what to do if you’ve eaten recalled food, kicky kitchen timers, savory sweet potato casserole, marshmallow equivalents, clever waffle appetizers, cinnamon apple pull aparts, saving the casserole
Direct access to Amazon homepage through my personal link
Looking for something in CS? – scroll & check previews OR use the search box OR email me at bjnosek@gmail.com, also valid for questions & comments – see the Let’s Chat tab for details, also for my partnerships and more
Note, transactions are solely between the buyer and linked supplier
Photo credits – cake/Pillsbury site, paper & keyboard/Pete O’Shea, book/Amazon, other/mine
Link sources – all Flay items/Amazon, recipe/Pillsbury site, cauliflower/MyRecipes. Milk Street/magazine site
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