Apple Walnut Cake with Maple-Brown Butter Glaze

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Apple Walnut Cake with Brown Butter Maple Glaze_edited-2
If you recall, I spent last fall on the hunt for an apple cake recipe to call my own.  I tried a French apple cake and served it with caramel sauce; I made another that was packed with apples and loaded with an obscene amount of crumb topping.  And this September, as soon as the stone fruits and berries gave way to apples at the grocery store, I picked up right where I left off in my quest for apple cake perfection.  This year I was thinking walnuts and cinnamon, butter and maple.

My persistence is paying off–this cake’s a keeper.  It’s a lightly spiced tube cake, with a moist, tender crumb.  You hit an apple chunk in most bites, a walnut in every other.  All of that goodness is sealed in with a maple and brown butter glaze that is the literal and figurative icing on the cake.  It’s decadent but homey, easy yet impressive, and definitely a cake I’ll make over and over.

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Asparagus, Spinach & Chèvre Tart

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Asparagus, Spinach & Chevre Tart 3I’ve been really into brunch the past few weeks.  Life has felt a bit frantic lately and carving out time for a leisurely morning meal on the weekends is a good way to make the day at least feel like it’s stretched out in front of you, even if the minute your plate is empty you’ve got to run off and go about other business.

This tart is the latest addition to my brunch repertoire.  It’s basically a compact quiche that’s heavy on green vegetables and goat cheese.  Spinach is whisked into an eggy custard, topped with spears of asparagus and rounds of chèvre, and baked in a flaky crust.  It’s a great thing to linger over with a second cup of coffee on a spring morning or, should the weather cooperate, perfect for a patio lunch with a salad and a glass of wine.

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Mushroom, Leek & Artichoke Stuffed Shells

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Spring Vegetable Stuffed ShellsOne surefire way to determine the success of a recipe is to eat the dish every night for a week and if you find yourself craving more after it’s gone, you know you’ve got a winner.  For instance, you know a batch of baked shells is worth sharing with the world (and by “the world” I mean my mother and the three other kind souls that read my blog) when you single-handedly take down three-quarters of the pan and, when they’re finally gone, you find yourself wishing for just one more dinner’s worth.  Forgive me for a moment while I lament the fact that these little beauties will not be my dinner again tonight.

Alright, I’ve had a moment to compose myself and I’m ready to tell you all about these spring vegetable stuffed shells.  The shells have been stuffed with a filling of sautéed mushrooms, leeks, artichoke hearts, and tarragon.  They’re then blanketed in a lemony béchamel sauce and baked, with just enough cheese melted over the top.  All in all, it’s my perfect kind of comfort food–cheesy and a bit indulgent, but not to the point where you’ll be wracked with guilt after eating it, nor is it “food-coma” heavy.  It’s exactly the kind of thing I could eat it every night of the week–oh wait, I kinda did.  

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Parisian Gnocchi with Arugula Pistou & Crispy Prosciutto

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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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Chicken & Mushroom Pâté

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Chicken & Mushroom PateWhen I was 20, I spent a semester in Florence, Italy.  I arrived a fairly committed vegetarian but within a week or 2, there I was, debating the merits of Prosciutto di Parma versus Prosciutto di San Daniele at the market, working up the nerve to try a tripe sandwich, and being schooled on  how to chop chicken livers with a mezzaluna to make the ubiquitous crostini toscani.  Needless to say, it was an exciting time in my life.

I will admit, it took me a couple of tries to warm to the rustic chicken liver pâté smeared crostini toscani, but they are literally everywhere in Florence and throughout Tuscany.  You go to a restaurant, they’re on the menu.  Stopping in at a wine bar?  Yup, they’re going to be offered.  Dinner at a house in the countryside?  You can bet on starting with them.  They’re unavoidable and even if their rather dull looking appearance doesn’t win your heart at first glance, after a few polite nibbles they start to grow on you.  Polite nibbles will turn into voracious bites which will eventually turn into tucking a few in your purse for a midnight snack.  

And then you’ll return home and realize how much you miss the ugly brown crostini you’d just taken for granted.  But thankfully, the pâté is ridiculously easy to make.  You can make a batch, toast up a pile of crostini, pop a bottle of Chianti, and whisk yourself away to Italy whenever the mood strikes.  I find myself doing this quite often.  Usually it’s just a tiny batch made from just 1 liver, enough for a couple of toasts to munch on while a chicken roasts, but occasionally I’ll make a bigger batch.  

This particular version isn’t exactly the traditional way of making Tuscan chicken pâté, as mushrooms also play a large role.  I had over-bought mushrooms and wanted to use them up, so I made a pâté that was half mushrooms, half liver.  The mushrooms and chicken livers play nicely off each other to make a spread that is rich and earthy and traditional or not, just eyeing it up, I immediately return to my 20 year old self, off exploring a new place in the world and a new world of food.

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