Posted by Susie on Sunday, March 13, 2011
I have great news for all of you who were as disappointed as I was when Gourmet Magazine published its last issue: Gourmet Live is now a free app for your iPad!
It, of course, continues with articles, recipes and photography that are just as wonderful as they were in the magazine. If you look closely as you read “A Recipe for Heaven,” you just might spot a familiar face….that’s right, me slicing truffles.
Check it out here!
a recipe for heaven
Posted by Susie on Sunday, March 6, 2011
Honoring My Heritage
My mother was Irish. Well, she wasn’t 100%, she was part German too, but you would never have known that. Her mother died shortly after she was born and she was raised by her Irish grandmother and her two aunts… so she was raised Irish.
My mother and one of her aunts.The Sunday before St. Patrick’s Day was always important at our house, because that was when my mother would prepare (yes, you guessed it), corned beef and cabbage.Early in the day she would put the corned beef into her large Dutch oven on top of the stove and let it simmer for hours. Later, she would lovingly slice and dice her cabbage, carrots and potatoes add those and let it all simmer a bit longer and then she would serve up her Irish feast.
Over the years I have come up with my own updated recipe for this dish and I would like to share it with you. This is what we are having for our Sunday supper next week.
Easy, Oven-Roasted, Corned Beef and Cabbage
Yield: 6-8 servings
Ingredients:
For corned beef, cabbage and carrots:
1 – 3 ½ lb. corned beef – special note – I like to use uncured, first cut brisket that has been cured with all natural ingredients (no nitrate or nitrite added). This will produce a very tasty corned beef, but it will not have the red coloring associated with corned beef cured with nitrates/nitrites.
1 – Head of cabbage
1 – Bunch (8) carrots
3 – Tablespoons olive oil (or melted butter)
Salt and pepper to taste
For Sauce:
2 – Tablespoons stone ground mustard
2 – Tablespoons horseradish
2 – Tablespoons mayonnaise
2 – Tablespoons sour cream
Directions:
CORNED BEEF:
Instead of simmering the beef on the stove top, I like to slow roast it. I find that it is easier and more tender prepared in this manner.Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.
Rinse the corned beef and remove all excess fat. Place into a roasting pan, cover with water and put the lid on the pan.
Bake for 3 hours, remove from pan and let rest.
CABBAGE AND CARROTS:
Increase oven temperature to 425 degrees F.
While the corned beef is cooking, rinse cabbage and trim the stem. Slice the head of cabbage into 8 equal wedges.
Rinse the peel the carrots (I like to keep mine whole, but you could cut into slices, if you prefer).
Arrange cabbage and carrots on a baking tray and brush with olive oil (or butter) and sprinkle with salt.
Place in 425 degree F. oven and roast for 20 minutes.
SAUCE:
Combine the mustard, horseradish, mayonnaise, and sour cream in a bowl until ingredients are well mixed.I serve my corned beef, cabbage, and carrots with small, new, red potatoes that have been tossed in butter and topped with parsley and salt.
Enjoy!
Posted by Susie on Sunday, February 27, 2011
Cindy hails from Dunkirk, New York. Thank you Cindy, for adding humor to our Sunday supper with your story.
I have a funny story to contribute from my last “Mom’s Weekend” at Ohio University.A large group of moms, along with their sons and daughters, were planning a dinner together to celebrate Mom’s weekend…if I recall, there were about 12 of us. We were unsuccessful getting a reservation for a large group on such a busy weekend, so my son Wyatt and I, decided to cook dinner in his small apartment and take it down the street to the girl’s apartment… a much nicer, larger place.We wanted to make Wyatt’s favorite pork roast. So, off we went to the grocery store and picked out a pork loin roast, fresh green beans, red-skinned potatoes with dill, salad fixin’s and nice, crusty bread. He had always wanted to know how to make this roast, so he helped with the preparation.After the roast was finished cooking, we packed up all of the food we had prepared, and set out for the other apartment, leaving the hot roast in the pan. Wyatt carried the pork roast in the pan down the street, high over his shoulders. The sidewalks were full of moms and students, and as people caught a whiff of the cooked roast, most turned around asking what was in that pan. Some students started following us….it was so funny. I then started calling it the “Pied Piper Pork Loin”.
It is a simple recipe that I cook often, especially around the holidays. The aroma of the pork, garlic, rosemary, combination in your kitchen is heavenly… and you won’t have many leftovers.Bon Appetit!”Pied Piper Pork Loin”
Pied Piper Pork Loin
Yield: 6-8 servings
Ingredients:
1 – 3 lb. pork loin roast
1 – Tablespoon olive oil
4 – Cloves of garlic finely minced
Pepper to taste
1/3 – Cup of whole grain mustard
4 – Sprigs of fresh rosemary (removed from stem and chopped)
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
Pat the pork loin dry with a paper towel to remove excess moisture and remove all excess fat from the top of roast. Rub the roast with olive oil. Pepper to taste. Sprinkle the top of the roast with finely minced garlic. Spread the mustard evenly over the minced garlic and top with chopped rosemary.
Place uncovered in a shallow roasting pan and bake in 350 degree F. oven for 20 minutes per pound. Final internal temperature should read 150 degrees on a digital, instant-read meat thermometer.
Let the roast rest for 10 minutes. The temperature of the roast will continue to rise to 160 degrees F.
Carve and serve. Enjoy!
Posted by Susie on Monday, February 21, 2011
Kate from Madison, Wisconsin sent in this lovely Sunday supper story.
Sunday supper at my grandma and grandpa’s meant so many things to my family and I. My grandmother, who hailed from Lexington, KY, made a long drive from the city well worth it. When we’d finally arrive at her house, my three sisters and I would pile out of the back seat of my Dad’s Chevy, run to the back of the house, and swing open the screen door to an indescribable blast of smells–fried chicken, mashed potatoes, shelley beans and corn, yeast rolls, apple and cherry pies, and on and on!
My grandmother’s meals represented so much more than food to us. Much of what we ate had been nurtured in my grandfather’s garden–we ate fresh cucumber, beet, and cabbage salads all summer–with surplus “put up” for winter by my grandma. Only now do I understand how the patience and preparation that went into those home-grown, home-cooked meals, enriched my life and influenced my perception of food.
When my grandmother passed on, I kept her cookbooks, which still have bits of her beautiful handwriting on the worn pages. I am sure she based her yeast rolls on the recipe from those books, but the love she added to them made the real magic! This is my adaptation of her Old Fashioned Dinner Roll Recipe.
Old Fashioned Dinner Rolls
Yield: 7-8 large rolls, or 14-16 smaller rolls
Ingredients:
¼ cup warm water
1 package fresh, active dry yeast
¼ cup softened butter
2 tablespoons sugar
1 cup lukewarm milk
1 egg
2 ¾ cups of sifted all-purpose flour
Directions:
In a small bowl combine warm (110 degree F) water (please make sure that the water is no hotter) and yeast. Let mixture sit for 3 to 5 minutes.
In a large bowl add butter, salt, and sugar. Pour milk over the butter. Add the yeast mixture.
Beat in egg. Stir in flour and mix with a wooden spoon till it makes a soft dough.
Grease another large bowl and put the dough mixture into it. Cover with a damp cloth and let it rest till it is until it is doubled in size. (Depending on the weather 1 ½ to 2 hours). When it has doubled, punch it down. Then form the dough into balls that are about 1/3 the desired size. For this recipe we chose to do large rolls, but you could make up to 14 smaller rolls.
Place the rolls in greased pans. Let them rise until they have once again doubled in size.Bake in a preheated 425 degree F oven for 15 to 18 minutes until golden brown. Remove from pan and serve immediately.
Enjoy!
So that’s Kate’s Sunday supper story, now let’s hear yours!
Posted by Susie on Sunday, February 13, 2011
At our house we have one cookbook author that we turn to for creative, nutritious recipes over and over…Patricia Wells. The release of her new cookbook, Salad as a Meal, on April 5th. couldn’t be better timing. Our thoughts will (finally!) be turning away from snow and moving toward sunshine and outdoor eating! I know I could use a bit of Provence right now, and I bet you could too!
I had the privilege of tasting most of these recipes firsthand while this cookbook was being photographed in Provence by my husband, Jeff, and they are fabulous!
Enjoy!
Looking forward to hearing your Sunday suppers stories!
In our hectic world, most of us can't commit to having dinner with our family/friends every night, but maybe we can start to put aside Sunday to be together and share our lives and good food. Let's join together to inspire others to celebrate our old traditions and create new ones. 
