Adventures in Mika's Kitchen
I remember the first time I roasted a thanksgiving turkey. I followed the advice of some website I read, and roasted the turkey breast side down – supposedly to keep it “juicy”. What did I end up with? An ugly flesh colored bird, with rubbery skin, that was neither “juicy” nor appetizing. The meat was [...]
Butternut squash risotto is a wonderful warm fall dish – it’s comforting and is a rich and satisfying meal for a cold fall or winter evening! If you have a lot of pumpkin puree leftover from Halloween… you can even substitute the butternut squash for pumpkin with no problem! In the produce section of the [...]
Happy Halloween everyone!!!! When the night is over, don’t forget to reclaim your Jack O’lanterns to make pumpkin puree. You can then freeze the puree, and use it throughout the year to make pumpkin bread, pumpkin pie, pumpkin soup… whatever you feel like! Making pumpkin puree from field pumpkins is a little bit time consuming, [...]
With several holidays just around the corner… Halloween, Thanksgiving… and all the December holidays… many of us may need appetizer recipes that are easy to prep and serve. Mini quiches are the answer! You can make the tart shells for these mini quiches a few days ahead of time, then add whatever ingredients you have [...]
My husband LOVES flan. I’ve never understood why… every time I had flan in a restaurant it was lumpy and hard with a congealed cottage cheese texture – served in a bitter burnt-sugar tasting sauce. It reminded me of curdled milk… yuck! Since then, I’ve realized that is NOT how flan is supposed to be… [...]
Every Halloween, I go through the same thing. I stay up really really late the night before carving Jack o’lanterns (storing them in the empty garage refrigerator overnight)… then I put them out at dusk to greet all the neighborhood kids that come by trick or treating. After the crowds have gone, I reclaim the [...]
Rugelach are delicious cookie-sized crescent shaped pastries – traditionally made with a yeast leavened dough containing sour cream, wrapped around some sort of sweet filling (walnuts, cinnamon, raisins, poppy seed, marzipan, jam, etc.). Although they are quite simple to make, they look very impressive and are the perfect little treat to go with afternoon tea [...]
It’s Oktoberfest right now! Oktoberfest is a 16 day festival lasting from late September through the first weekend of October, and is considered the world’s largest fair – held annually in Munich (Bavaria), Germany. Specials beers and all kinds of wonderful German foods are served during this celebration… one of my favorite German treats [...]
Last week, I posted a recipe and method for making mini tart shells using my new Williams-Sonoma mini tart baking set. You can make a few batches of these shells and fill with a variety of flavors for some very beautiful and impressive looking desserts! I made: pineapple tarts, chocolate ganache with peanut butter cream, [...]
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