Vegetarian

Caramelized Red Onion and Pear Tarts with Goat Cheese and Spicy Honey Drizzle

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Pear & Caramelized Red Onion Tarts with Goat Cheese and Spicy Honey Drizzle

These are what you want for a holiday party: buttery puff pastry pear tarts topped with balsamic-caramelized red onions and goat cheese crumbles. A drizzle of spicy chili-honey puts it over the top. 

Here’s how we fell in love with pear tarts. While we love throwing parties around the holidays, we inevitably get so busy that what we envisioned as a relaxed morning of prepping nibbles ends up being a scramble to get food on the table before our famished guests start experimentally sprinkling salt and pepper on the cats. That’s when a time-saver like puff pastry sheets becomes our best friend in the kitchen. In fact, the day before a party, we often defrost a box just on the off chance that we’ll need to make more vittles. It’s a matter of minutes to throw a few ingredients onto a pastry square and bake it.

We recently found a combination that requires a little more prep time, but is so worth it: roasted pears, caramelized red onions, goat cheese and chili-infused honey. It’s so satisfying that these tarts, maybe with a simple cheese board, are all you need to wow and satisfy your guests. The toppings can be made in advance and even assembled the day before, so all you need to do the day of the party is pop them in the oven. Easy peasy.

Also, don’t forget to check out our tips for buying and cooking pears below. The variety you buy matters!

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Mughlai Cauliflower (in a Creamy Almond Curry Sauce)

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Mughlai Cauliflower (in a Creamy Almond Curry Sauce)

This vegetarian side dish or main course features roasted cauliflower in a fragrant, creamy sauce, spiced with ginger, cinnamon, anise, and more, and studded with plump raisins and slivers of crisp almonds.

When your childhood introduction to most vegetables is through their boiled varieties, you might be forgiven for seeking any alternative — anything at all! — to another plate of pallid, soggy specimens. I’m not saying rural England in the 1970s was unimaginative when it came to mealtimes, but … well, yes, that is actually what I’m saying. I am saying exactly that. Nothing was immune to the standard preparation (boiled beyond all recognition). I couldn’t again face parsnips or rutabaga (what we called “swede” which was served up in tiny cubes from a can) until well into my 30s. And then, of course, there was the poor old cauliflower. It’s such a healthy food – packed with nutrients and vitamins, but if you’re just going to boil it to death, what’s the point?

This article is part of our collaboration with Serious Eats.

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Cheesy Zucchini and Corn Fritters with Herb Sour Cream

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Zucchini and Corn Fritters

If you grow your own summer squash, or belong to a CSA, the weekly glut of produce can be overwhelming. Our solution? Shred it, squeeze it, mix into a cheesy batter and fritter it away. Literally. 

If you grow your own summer squash, zucchini can sometimes feel like a plot device in a horror sci-fi movie. At the beginning of the season, you carefully harvest the first zucchini, cradle it like an infant and rest it with pride on the cutting board. The next day, you have two more, and with the proud thrill of the backyard farmer, you slice and grill your summer bounty. The next day you have two more, and two more the following day. By the end of the first week of peak zucchini, you’re nervously eyeing the stack of squash that has built up on the kitchen counter, wondering how many more friends you can gift your harvest to before even they stop answering the door.

And woe betide you if you skip checking for a few days – when you return to the garden and lift up the lowest squash leaf, you’ll inevitably find one monster marrow lurking like a squat green fiend.

Note: We originally blogged zucchini fritters back in 2013, when we were all a little more fresher of face and bouncier of step. We make these fritters all the time in the summer, and we’ve adapted the recipe by adding fresh corn and cheese, so we’ve been meaning to re-blog this recipe ever since. So finally, here is the updated article.

This recipe is part of our ongoing series with Serious Eats. 

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Crostini with Blistered Cherry Tomatoes, Burrata and Chive Oil

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Crostini with Blistered Cherry Tomatoes, Burrata and Chive OilThe building blocks of a classic Caprese salad are re-imagined in these summery toasts. First, cherry tomatoes are blistered in a skillet until bursting with juice. Then creamier burrata takes the place of the more standard mozzarella. And in place of basil leaves, a quick and easy chive oil adds an herbal accent. The result makes for a great snack or light meal.

When local tomato season begins, we could happily eat nothing else. I can’t recall a summer when we didn’t turn over our lunch almost entirely to slices of crusty peasant bread, thick slices of heirloom tomato, perfectly-ripe and bursting with flavor, a little torn mozzarella, a drizzle of good olive oil, perhaps a few snipped chives or basil leaves, and a sprinkle of flaky sea salt. Like a scent that brings you back to childhood, a good open-faced tomato and mozz evokes a carefree summer’s day. Of course, the key is that the tomatoes have to be at their peak, and most year-round varieties, grown for their ability to be shipped cross-country, just don’t have that essential tomato-ness.

Without losing the essentials of what makes that pairing work so well, we can use the same kind of flavors to add a little sophistication to a light lunch, dinner or party snack. Instead of slicing fresh tomatoes, we toss the cherry variety in a very hot cast iron pan and char them just until they burst with juicy tomato flavor. Turn off the heat and add a little sliced garlic which cooks just enough to take the edge off; instead of mozzarella, we turn to its creamier, more indulgent cousin, burrata; and instead of chopped chives, we make our own chive oil, which gets drizzled over the whole shebang.

Note: This recipe is part of our series with Serious Eats.

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Homemade Maple Mustard

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Homemade Maple Mustard

If you like mustard, you seriously have to try making your own. It’s so much better than the jarred kind and it couldn’t be easier. Our Homemade Maple Mustard is a little sweet, a little spicy and tastes incredibly fresh. 

Yeah, I get it. The idea of homemade mustard is just a little bit precious. Bordering on the dreaded ‘artisanal’ label that plagues lovers of real, unpretentious food … but hear me out because this stuff is awesome and I really, really want you to make it.

The truth is, I think most things taste better homemade. Sure, jarred mustard can be good and I use it most of the time but for something really special (like a crazy-beautiful charcuterie board or a holiday ham), why not serve it with a condiment as special as the main dish? We knew we wanted to make Red Onion Jam with Wine, Honey and Thyme but we also wanted something spicy that would be good with charcuterie. And besides, I think there’s something cool and homesteader-ey about making something so inherently useful. 

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Red Onion Jam with Wine, Honey and Thyme

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Red Onion Jam with Wine, Honey and Thyme

Sweet, savory and just plain delicious, Red Onion Jam with Wine, Honey and Thyme is a perfect addition to any cheese or charcuterie board. 

Caramelized red onions are tasty in their own right, but simmered in a sweet/spicy mix of red wine, honey and herbs, they turn into a the most delicious preserves ever. We made our jam (along with Homemade Maple Mustard!) to accompany our charcuterie board, but we have big plans for the leftovers. Click the link below for ideas (and the recipe!)

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