When it comes to cookies, it's hard to beat a warm, freshly baked batch featuring the dynamic duo of oats and raisins. Each sweet, lightly spiced bite of a chewy oatmeal cookie is like catching up with an old friend — a friend that you can eat.
Potato salad is an American classic we crave — especially during summertime. My nana is famous for hers; it's requested for every gathering from our Memorial Day barbecue to our late-summer family reunion. There's just something sublime and comforting about creamy, tangy mayonnaise dressing stirred into pillowy chunks of potatoes and sprinkled with table salt and black pepper.
Vibrant and tart, rhubarb is one of my favorite signs of spring. Rhubarb season is fleeting, though, so when you see the pink stalks, grab all you can! It's a great ingredient to incorporate into cake — especially a dense, rich cake chock-full of almond paste and eggs like the one here.
Avocado toast is as delicious as it is ubiquitous. Here I've riffed on the concept and elevated the idea for a ladies' tea to create these avocado tartlets. When blended with a little vanilla and maple syrup, avocado cream becomes a revelatory sweet pastry filling.
Who doesn't love a chicken tender, really? I think tenders are everyone's favorite — especially at a party. These tenders are easy to make; the ingredients and steps are simple enough for novice cooks to successfully follow and do. The tenders also have the flavor and texture we crave in chicken fingers — juicy and moist with a golden brown-crust — but they are baked rather than fried (although people swear otherwise).
Do you love pasta carbonara, but get a little intimidated by the step that calls for thickening — not scrambling! — the pasta with eggs? Love risotto, but don't want to spend all that time stirring at the stove?
Here's a much easier riff on both carbonara and risotto, made possible with the help of that teeny, tiny, rather magical orzo pasta. This is your 30-minute dinner tonight!
This Riesling rhubarb crisp cake has it all: tender white cake, rhubarb-strawberry compote and matching buttercream, a crispy oat crumble, and a fanciful, ruffled finish. It's the perfect cake to bake when you're feeling like showing off your cake-baking skills or looking for a weekend project to tackle when you want to spend the day in the kitchen.
