It was surprisingly easy to make and it looked really sophisticated when it came out.

Make the Crust first:

For The Filling

• 2 tart apples, such as Granny Smith or Gala, plus 2 McIntosh apples, peeled, cored, and sliced into 1/2-inch wedges
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 cup apricot preserves, warmed

1. 1. Make the crust: Roll out dough to a 13-inch round, about 1/8 inch thick, on a lightly floured surface. Transfer to a parchment-lined baking sheet. Refrigerate for 20 minutes.
   2. Make the filling: Toss together apples, granulated sugar, flour, lemon juice, and cinnamon.
   3. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Spread filling over dough, leaving a 1 1/2-inch border. Fold edges in to form a crust; brush with egg wash, and sprinkle with sanding sugar. (A-M Note: I just used regular sugar.) Refrigerate until edges are firm, about 30 minutes.

1. Bake crostata until apples are tender and crust is golden, about 1 hour 20 minutes. Let cool slightly. Brush apples with apricot preserves. (A-M Note: I let my crostata cool too much and the Apricot Preserves did not melt into the apples and instead stuck on top. I then microwaved it all hoping it would get gooey and melt down into the pie. Yeah, eh, not so much. But, it was still total deliciousness!)

Try this amazing recipe next time you need to make a dessert. It’s easy. It’s fast and it’s a crowd pleaser. The Cheddar Cheese + sweetness of the Apples is an unexpectedly perfect pairing.

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Ingredients:

6 oz. Bacon, diced
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 Tbs. baking powder
2 tsp. sugar
3/4 tsp. freshly ground pepper
1 stick cold unsalted butter, cut or smooshed into small pieces
2 Tbs. melted butter for later
1/4 cup grated Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese
3/4 cup shredded Extra-Sharp Cheddar Cheese
7 oz. Buttermilk

Preheat the oven to 425. If you’re using real bacon, fry the bacon until it is crisp, crisp, crisp. Drain on a paper towel. Reserve some of the fat to prep the pan bottom. If you’re not using real bacon, you can prep the pan with melted butter.

I used Morningstar Veggie Bacon Strips, pictured above. Finely chop the bacon or use my Father’s, soon to be patented, method: death by many scissor cuts.

In a large bowl, add the flour, baking powder, sugar and pepper. Notice my Father’s perfect pepper grinding stance? I was thankful to have his help on this recipe.

Cut in cold butter that you’ve smooshed and generally made into smaller, workable pieces.

This means to literally take two knives and cut, cut, cut the butter back and forth until it’s in pea sized chunks.

Then use fingers to pinch the crumbs into disks. Don’t overwork the dough. Stir in the cheeses and the bacon.

Stir in buttermilk until the dough just comes together.

On a floured work surface (I used my clean kitchen countertop), roll out the dough into a 9 x 11 rectangle.

In theory, you’d be using a pie roller thingy but I didn’t have one. A liter of sparkling water did the trick. Then, fold this into thirds, rotate 90 degrees and roll out another 9 x 11 rectangle. Do this again but roll into a 7 x 9 rectangle this time. You’re looking to make layers (for an extra light and fluffy biscuit).

Using a floured biscuit cutter (we didn’t have one so we used a wine glass), cut out the biscuits.

You want them to be right about 2 1/2″ in diameter. Re-roll the scraps to cut out more biscuits. Brush the tops of all the biscuits with melted butter. Bake for 20 minutes. Check them. Do they need more time?

You can easily bake up to 25 minutes depending on your oven. This recipe makes around 12 – 15 biscuits. The biscuits are delicious! Ours came out a bit salty so I’ve taken out the salt in the recipe; the bacon and cheese have a lot of salt in them. But, if you find them not salty enough, the original recipe from Williams Sonoma called for 1/2 tsp of salt. I hope you enjoy these yummy little butter bombs. They are delicious and very worth the effort.

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If you follow me on Twitter, you may have seen my photo of my CSA share haul. But if you don’t, you can see it here. In Washington state (and other states around the nation), small organic farms group together and offer ‘fresh from the farm’ produce groupings as a subscription program. We pick up a full box of veggies every week and have more vegetables than we can eat weekly.

Since eating fruits and vegetables is a proven anti-cancer strategy AND (darn), vegetables have less calories than cheese (double darn), while there are fresh veggies, I am taking advantage of them.

I have never eaten a Fava Bean before. I’ve seen them (in that movie ‘Silence of the Lambs’ but that counts, right?). And, you’ll have to forgive me, I started taking photos with my iPhone after I tasted how delicious the dish was (whoops).

So Fava Beans – they’re these large large large bean-like things. You have to get the beans peeled before you make this. I found the easiest way to do this was to slice the tip off the beans (horizontally) and then peel the beans out.

Recipe:

2 tablespoons Olive Oil
1 – 2 teaspoons minced garlic
1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh oregano
1 1/2 cups chicken stock (canned is fine)
salt & pepper
2 cups peeled fava beans
3/4 pound dried fettuccine
2 oz. piece of pecorino cheese or Parmesan cheese

1. Heat the olive oil in a medium saucepan until hot. Add the garlic and saute briefly until just before the garlic turns brown. Stir in oregano and then add 1 cup of stock. Bring to boil, season with salt and pepper and add 1 1/2 cup of fava beans. Simmer to blend the flavors for 5 minutes.

2. Dump this into a heat safe blender container and puree with an additional (remaining) 1/2 cup chicken stock until smooth. Return to the sauce pan and add the remaining 1/2 cup favas. Simmer gently and add salt and pepper to taste.

3. At some point in this process, bring another pot of water to boil and add salt and a teaspoon of olive oil to the water. Add the pasta and cook until al dente. Drain and mix with the sauce. Toss well. Serve immediately and grate cheese over the top.

Quick! It’s Fava Beans are in season now. Get thee to your Farmer’s Market and find some fresh Fava Beans.

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Place all ingredients in the bowl of a food processor and pulse until it starts to come together into a ball. Sprinkle in a little extra water if it seems too dry.

Gather the dough on a floured surface and knead it a little to incorporate any of the stray bits. Form it into a nice ball and place in the fridge for at least an hour. You could even leave it in the fridge over night and conquer the rest of the pasta the next day (I’ve definitely done that before).
Here’s my set-up for rolling the pasta. There’s my blue mixer with the pasta attachment hanging off the front, a floured tray for laying the pasta on as I work with it, and a pasta drying rack.

Divide the dough into 4 pieces. Place the pasta machine on the widest setting and pass the pasta through. Fold it over and pass it through a few more times until it’s smooth and pliable. Then start to turn down the thickness and pass the pasta sheets through until it’s as thin as you like. If your pasta feels a little sticky at this point, just brush some flour on it before passing it through the rollers.Once your have all of your pasta rolled to the thickness you like, it’s time to cut!

I have a spaghetti cutting attachment that I used on this batch. Once your pasta is cut you can immediately cook it and eat it – just make sure you don’t over cook it. Fresh pasta doesn’t take long! If you want to store it place it in a plastic container with a seal top using LOTS of flour between the layers. You want it swimming in flour to make sure it doesn’t stick together. Although it will keep for a week or two, I recommended eating it within a few days. Because otherwise, what’s the point of making fresh pasta if it isn’t fresh when you eat it?

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Ingredients
1/4 Cup Butter or Margarine
1 Clove of Garlic
1 Onion
2 Stalks of Celery
2 Tablespoons of an SDA-style Vegetarian Stock
1 Tablespoon of Soy Sauce
3 Beaten Eggs
1/4 Cup of Milk
1 Cup of Cottage Cheese
3-5 Cups of a “Flakes” Cereal
1/4 Cup Pecan Meal, Ground Fine (Optional)

1.Preheat oven to 350 F.

8. Place in a generously greased baking pan. It should be 1″-3″ deep. Do not pack. In fact, use a fork to make it fluffy.

I served protein-packed Cottage Cheese loaf, Mac ‘n’ Cheese, Butternut Squash Lasagna, Cabbage Au Gratin and Peppermint Cheesecake to my (vegetarian) family tonight for one of our Christmas gatherings. They were all a hit – especially the Butternut Squash Lasagna.

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1. On a lightly floured work surface, roll out the puff pastry to a 16-by-11 ½ -inch rectangle. Trim to form a 10 ½-by-15-inch rectangle. Transfer the pastry to a large rimmed baking sheet and cut into 1 ¾-inch squares; you should have about 48. Freeze the squares until firm, about 30 minutes.

2. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Line a large rimmed baking sheet with parchment paper. Arrange 12 squares on the sheet and cover with more parchment paper. Top the squares with another baking sheet, bottom side down. If you have another pair of baking sheets, repeat with 12 more squares. Bake the squares for about 35 minutes, until the pastry is golden. Transfer the squares to a rack to cool. Repeat to bake the remaining squares. Note: in my oven, 20 minutes was sufficient to get the pastry squares a nice consistency. But, I have a convection oven and supposedly, they heat differently than ‘regular’ ovens (shrugging shoulders).

3. Return as many cooled squares as will fit to a baking sheet. Top each square with ½ teaspoon of the fig preserves. Sprinkle with the Stilton. The Stilton sort of melts, sort of doesn’t. It’s a nice consistency when it’s warm. You can serve these fantastic appys warm or at room temperature but take it from me, they are best when fresh out of the oven. Makes 4 dozen squares.

Make Ahead The unbaked frozen pastry squares can be in an airtight container for up to 1 month.

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After starting our day with an awesome boot camp fitness class, my sister in law (Cheriss) and I cooked all day on Saturday. We made many yummy dishes and documented much of the day in photos. I am excited to share all the recipes with you over the next few months, starting with the undisputed favorite of the evening: Butternut Squash Turnovers.

1 large egg, beaten

Step 2:Line a baking sheet with parchment paper and lightly oil the parchment. Peel the squash (we cut the squash into manageable pieces and cut the skin off. Using a vegetable peeler didn’t even make a dent). Toss the squash with 2 tablespoons of olive oil, season with salt and pepper. Spread the squash on the baking sheet and bake for 25 minutes until the squash softens and begins to brown. Add this browned squash to the leeks and mushrooms and toss.

Step 3: Roll out pastry puff flat (we bought ours in sheets so got to skip this step). Cut the pastry into 4″ squares. Spoon as much of the mixture as you can safely fit into the pastry squares, leaving room for a generous dollop of goat cheese. The recipe suggested 2 tablespoons of vegetables and 2 tablespoons of goat cheese but there’s no way we could have fit that much into the little pastry puffs. Lightly brush the edge of the squares with beaten egg (the egg acts like a glue). Fold the squares over to form triangles and crimp the edges with a fork for a snazzy finished look.

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But, that whole lifelong vegetarian thing really puts a crimp on actually cooking fish. I do not know how to do it. I have no idea where to start. So, the fish habit is getting expensive. I have to eat out for each of those fish meals.

Determined to end my ignorance of all things fish and ocean, I attended a Fish Cooking Class at Ciao Thyme. I’ve taken a knife skills class with the talented and funny Mataio Gillis before so I knew it would be an entertaining evening. Thankfully, I had a good friend along to help. This is Heather and she did a much better crimp job on her “en papillote” than I did. More on that later.

The key things to take away from the class according to our instructor are:

1. Fish should be fresh and cold.
2. Fish should smell like the sea – not the sea shore.

My take-aways were:

1. Who knew fish could taste good with nothing but salt and olive oil?
2. Really? You can take the skin off a fish with a big, huge knife and one strategically placed pull?
3. I can do this! I really can do this!
4. The perfect grill marks *do* add to flavor.
5. En Papillote is easy to do and is your friend.
6. Sauteeing a fish is not only possible, but I can and will do it.

Mataio started by demonstrating the proper way to debone a fish. I am very proud of the large fish bone I’m holding in this photo; unreasonably proud given the relative ease of the task.

Then he proceeded to hand-on wow us with different techniques. We grilled salmon. We smoked salmon (Oh my goodness! The board caught on fire. There was smoke involved. It was quite exciting.). We brined salmon (this is key to adding flavor and slow the release of fat during cooking – genius!). We learned how to salt crust rock fish with a salt/water solution and a salt/meringue solution. Though Mataio predicted a “crimping failure” (I’m not adept at following many simple instructions; mostly because I started before I was supposed to), this is my perfect (eyes downcast modestly) en papillote fish. I will be doing this method again at home.

And then, we ate all of our creations. It was a little odd to have fish and fish alone for dinner but on the plus side, I feel much smarter today.

If you’re in the Bellingham area, you should mark your calender to attend a class. With classes like Cinco de Mayo, No Bake Desserts and Sushi 101 coming up, you can’t go wrong.

P.S. Making salmon skin chips (which look suspiciously like a leather belt) is simple. You coat the salmon skin with olive oil, put a little salt on the skin and then put the entire thing on a cookie sheet and bake until crisp. It tastes … okay. Sort of like dried seaweed.

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If you make the recipe, let us know how it goes!

Ingredients:

5 Tablespoons butter
1/4 cup flour
3 cups milk, heated
4 cloves garlic (1 smashed, 3 finely chopped)
salt
1/2 pound lasagna noodles
2 large onions, chopped
Three 6-ounce packages portabello mushroom slices
1 bunch basil, stems discarded
1 cup heavy cream
1 1/4 cups grated parmesan cheese
Pepper

1. Melt 3 tablespoons butter over low heat. Stir in flour and cook for 2 minutes. Whisk in hot milk, smashed garlic clove and 3/4 teaspoon salt. Bring to boil, while whisking, until thickened. Set aside.

2. Cook lasagna in salted water for 8 minutes. Drain and transfer to a bowl of cold water.

3. Preheat oven at 375 degrees. In a large skillet, melt the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter over low heat. Add the onions and chopped garlic and cook until softened. Stir in mushrooms and cook until softened (about 7 minutes).

4. Puree the basil leaves with the cream. Set aside 1/2 cup basil cream. Stir the remaining basil cream and 1/2 cup parmesan into the mushroom mixture; season with salt and pepper.

5. Grease a 9 x 13 inch baking dish and spread 1 cup reserved garlic sauce on the bottom. Drain the lasagna noodles and lay 3 in the baking dish. Top with half of the mushroom mixture, a layer of noodles, then the remaining mushroom mixture and noodles. Combine the remaining garlic sauce and basil cream; spoon over top. Sprinkle with the remaining 3/4 cup parmesan.

6. Bake until golden, 40 to 45 minutes. Let stand for 15 minutes. And, hopefully you’ll get this:

P.S. No, it’s not low fat…

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Pouring the mixture over the noodles.

Right now, my Dad is baking fresh rolls for dinner at 5.

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