It has been a week of cherries. Only in the last few years have I been more cognizant about the seasons of foods. I’m not one of those obsessed with in season everything types, usually. If I want goulash in the summer, I turn up …
If you go looking for treasure long enough, deep enough, and carefully enough, you will find it. Such are the tiny beauties known as Manti in Turkish cuisine. They are small (quite small) purse shaped dumplings filled with a simple something–ours were beef, onion, parsley, …
I cannot remember the first time I had Irish brown bread. I’m guessing it was while living in Dublin and going to school that, one day, I bought a regular old package of sliced bread and the creamiest butter I’ve ever had. Toast and butter, …
I love coffee. I like to think I love the flavor, but, at this point, it is the feeling of drinking coffee that makes me happy, though the flavor rarely disappoints. Like my Croatian relatives, I can’t drink coffee from a tall paper cup while …
There is no real story here, other than summer is coming and it’s definitely time for some beautifully flavored cocktails. More than anything, you’ll find I love baking with alcohol: wine, rum, brandy (esp. Croatian Sljivovica), liqueurs like Amaretto, Grand Mariner, whiskey, Guinness. The list …
It is finally Memorial Day weekend. I wouldn’t know it, since Mondays, work days, sunny days, summer, spring, winter. It’s all one big blur. It’s hard out there in Manhattan. I don’t wish any loss or sickness on anyone, old, young, healthy or otherwise. But …
I’ve been dying to make a rustic savory tart using fruit for the longest time. And the time is now. I fell in love with all tarts sweet and savory awhile back, when I acquired my mom’s large fluted tart pan. I recently added a …
The man in my life and in our home is an American Turk. He grew up with a Turkish father in Astoria, Queens, which is where my mother calls home too. After years there, in Long Island, and California, he is still very Turkish, also …
Sometimes I resist the urge to extract family recipes, regional Croatian favorites, new and old Turkish discoveries, and French fare for a good, sweet American style layer cake. I grew up licking frosting off of my chubby fingers, after all. This is one of those …
Croatians love simplicity. Prosciutto, cheese, bread, tomatoes, olives, wine. Fruit can serve as dessert. Cheese can come with breakfast. Croatian desserts mainly come from the two main cultural influences: Roman/Venetian and Austro-Hungarian. The latter is filled with tortes and custard and streusel. The former comes …