Parisian Gnocchi with Arugula Pistou & Crispy Prosciutto

Parisian Gnocchi 2

When people discover you have a food blog, suddenly everyone has a great idea for what you should cook next.  I get a whole lot of (well-intentioned) requests for things like gluten-free baking ideas, cute holiday treats, and homemade girl scout cookies/bloomin’ onions/pumpkin spice lattes/etc.  In other words, I often find myself gently reminding folks that I’m capable of eating an entire baguette on my way home from the grocery store so gluten-free baking is really not something I have a huge interest in, that “cute” is something I do very poorly, and there’s this special place called Pinterest where I’m sure those “top-secret” recipes you want me to recreate already exist.

So when my boss approached me with, “d’you know what would be great for your blog?” I braced myself and started thinking of ways to let him down easy and hold on to my job.  But he followed it up with, “Parisian gnocchi.  I think you readers would really like it.  Do you want my recipe?” 

Umm…yes, absolutely!  Finally, a suggestion I didn’t have to politely turn away! 

(Okay, fine. If you don’t know me in real life and you’ve never wandered over to my about page, I suppose it bears mentioning that my “real” job is waiting tables, so it helps that my boss happens to be the chef of a French restaurant.)

So armed with Vincent’s recipe, I went home to make Parisian gnocchi.  Parisian gnocchi are unlike the Italian gnocchi you’re probably more familiar with.  Instead of relying on potatoes, Parisian gnocchi are made with cheese-enriched pâte à choux, which is the same type of pastry dough that’s used make gougères, profiteroles, and other such treats.  Yup, copious amounts of cheese, butter, and egg–leave it to the French.  The cheesy choux pastry is piped into simmering water and poached.  From there, you can go ahead and eat them or shock them in cold water, then sauté and sauce them later.  I’ll walk you through the how-to and show you how I served mine.

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Cherry Marsala Olive Oil Cake

Cherry Marsala Olive Oil Cake

The way I see it, there are 2 species of cake. There are the fancy, celebration cakes with swirls of frosting, bells, whistles, and the whole bit. And then there are the everyday cakes. I’m talking about the cakes that are made at a moment’s notice when you need an afternoon pick-me-up or when eating a salad for dinner only seems like a viable option if you get to round out the meal with a little slice cake.

Today’s cake, if you hadn’t already guessed, falls firmly into the second category. It’s nothing fancy, just a good, solid anytime cake to have in your repertoire. It’s the kind of cake that can be made on a whim, mixed up in less time than the oven takes to heat. Olive oil gives it round, fruity flavor and a splash of Marsala gives it a subtle but haunting Italian flavor. 

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Potato, Fennel & Leek Soup with Olive Tapenade

Potato, Fennel, Leek SoupTo tell you the truth, I thought twice about bothering to post this potato and fennel soup.  I made it, took pictures of it, singlehandedly ate almost the whole batch, and then talked myself out of sharing it with you all.  I decided it was too basic, too boring, not worthy of your time.  

But days after it was gone, I found myself wishing for another bowl and I realized I crave simple.  Simple is good.  Simple is worth sharing.

This is a good soup for chilly, rainy spring days.  The fennel and leek flavors are light and cheery, the potatoes provide the thick, creamy texture that’s bound to bring you comfort when your surroundings are gray, and a dollop of black olive paste adds a punch of flavor.

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Apricot & Salted Pistachio Brown Butter Blondies

Apricot & Pistachio Brown Butter BlondiesSometimes this whole food blogging business can be downright painful. See, I’m sitting here at my computer, remembering what these blondies smelled like as they were baking…like buttery, caramelly, brown sugary goodness, straight from the heavens. And now instead of writing, I’m just staring at the crackled tops of these bars, thinking about their perfectly chewy edges and just how addictively sweet/soft/salty/crunchy/chewy they were .

See, I’m remembering all of this. I made these over a week ago and now, as I’m finally getting around to writing about them, they are loooooong gone. I’m sitting here, tweaking photos, writing about these beauties, and they’re nothing but a memory. A beautiful, beautiful memory.  It’s painful, I’m telling you.  

But, as difficult as it may be (mostly because my keyboard is now covered in drool), I’m going talk about these blondies because they were simply too good not to share. They’re just your basic blondies with a few special touches–browned butter, dried apricots, and a handful of salted pistachios. Those little extras are enough to transform a simple bar into an “I want to eat the entire pan right now” treat that I can’t get out of my head and soon you won’t be able to get out of yours. Consider yourself warned.

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Slow Roasted Salmon with Escarole, Capers & Lemon

Slow Roasted Salmon with Escarole, Capers & Lemon

Some days.  You know the ones.  Nothing plays out as you intended.  Plans are broken, objectives lost.  Your to-do list doesn’t have any checks in the margin and the later it gets, the less likely it seems that you’re actually going to get around to making dinner.  But, dang-it, dinner was the thing on that list you wanted to make time for.  

These are the days you need a dish like this salmon in your arsenal.  You need to be able to just throw a bunch of ingredients together, toss them in the oven, and be treated to a great dinner half an hour later.  A 1-pan situation is critical–you certainly don’t want to end the night with a stack of dishes or start tomorrow with a hideous wreck of a kitchen–and it’s got to be healthy because even though you had the best intentions,  that jog you were planning on just did not get checked off the list.  

This salmon is just the dinner to cap these sorts of days.  It’s nothing but good-for-you fish, slow roasted on a big mound of escarole with briny capers and fresh bursts of lemon.  Thanks to the magic of roasting at a low temperature, the fish stays beautifully moist.  The greens wilt down with a few crispy bits here and there.  It’s the kind of dinner you can get in the oven with 2 minutes of prep, then have 30 minutes  to tear around the house, trying to make good on the to-do list…or enough time to decompress with a glass of wine.  Take your pick.

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