New Goal: Try as many places on this list as I can by the end of 2014

99 Things to Eat in L.A. Before You Die
Fugu to foie gras, pizza to panuchos
By Jonathan Gold
published: February 26, 2010
(http://www.laweekly.com/content/printVersion/867257/)

Monkey and Son's Krakatoa coffee: strong enough to put hair on a bald ape's chest

View more photos in Anne Fishbein's "99 Things to Eat in L.A. Before You Die" slideshow.
The theme of this issue is somewhat morbid. We’ll admit to that. We were going to call it "99 Things to Eat in L.A. Before You Move to San Diego," but it didn’t have the same ring of finality. You could probably drive up from San Diego if you were really, really in the mood for a maple-bacon biscuit but from beyond the grave? I’m afraid our metaphysics isn’t quite up to that one.

And as long as we’re on the subject of metaphysics, we will also confess to being a bit judgmental, because judgmental is what we do around here. If we’re suggesting that some things — 99 things — are on this particular list, we’re also suggesting that others are not. A Tito’s taco: Eat before you die. A Pink’s hot dog? You’re on your own.

See — you’ve barely started reading and we’ve already absolved you of the responsibility of standing in line behind Leonardo DiCaprio. You’ve already recouped the entire cost of the issue, and then some.

To eat, perchance to dream, in no particular order.


Urasawa's Fugu
Eat before you die? If you get it from the wrong guy, blowfish can be what you taste rather immediately before you expire — tetrodotoxin, the nerve agent concentrated in the innards, is enough to paralyze a charging bull elephant, and is rumored to be the agent used to turn men into zombies. Usually, we satisfy our fugu cravings at Dae Bok, the Koreatown specialist that cooks the blowfish into a spicy, garlicky stew, but everybody should experience, at least once, the translucent petals of fugu sashimi prepared by Hiro Urasawa in its early spring season. But be warned: If the toxins won't get you, the size of the check just may. Urasawa, 218 N. Rodeo Drive, Beverly Hills. (310) 247-8939.

Bulgarini's Goat's Milk Gelato
Los Angeles is a world capital of so many things, including, it turns out, goat's milk ice cream. Delicieuse, in Redondo Beach, is the most obvious source, sporting reams of literature about the health benefits of goat's milk and eight flavors of ice cream made with the stuff, all of them delicious but none of them particularly goaty. And then there's Leo Bulgarini, the Zen gelato master of Altadena, who amps up the strong, animal taste of his goat's milk gelato by tossing goat cheese into the mix along with a handful of toasted, unsweetened cacao nibs for maximum pungency — it's petting-zoo gelato, gelato you can almost imagine nibbling on your sleeves. Leo recommends that you pair it with a glass of rose prosecco from Valdobbiadene. Bulgarini Gelato, 749 E. Altadena Drive, Altadena. (626) 791-6174.

Romanesco
If you've been to a local farmers market midwinter, you've probably seen these things — lumpy, glowing, pale-green vegetables, the size of footballs bisected on their horizontal axes, plunked down near the counter at any Weiser Family Farms stand. If you're at the Pasadena farmers market, there may be a Caltech student or two nearby, admiring the peculiar geometry of the vegetable; fractal pyramids flowing in tight logarithmic spirals, cruciferous Fibonacci series, galaxies expressed in the medium of cauliflower. Nudge the postdocs out of the way and take one home. Made into a salad with pureed anchovies, roasted whole with a dribble of olive oil or sliced and sautéed with garlic and capers, the nutty, deep-flavored Romanesco is the queen of winter vegetables. weiserfamilyfarms.com.

San Nak Ji
I have read more about cephalopod nervous systems in the last couple of years than most of the people of my acquaintance, and I'm still not sure about the morality of eating this dish — which is to say, the tentacles of a humanely dispatched octopus, served chopped and still wiggling on a platter. The predominant school of thought states that the tentacles move purely by reflex, like beheaded chickens or the twitching frog legs many of us encountered in high school biology. Another theory, which begins to make sense when your next bite starts to crawl up your chopsticks, claims that the octopus brain is rather decentralized, and that the suckers adhering to the roof of your mouth are still very much alive. Imagine a dish so delicious that it occasionally outweighs pretty serious ethical concerns. That's san nak ji. Masan, 2851 W. Olympic Blvd., Koreatown. (213) 388-3314.

Sherry Yard's Kaiserschmarrn
Everybody who hasn't been to Spago since the 1980s knows exactly what to get there — pizza, chopped Chino Ranch vegetables, and pasta with goat cheese and broccoli. They're the dishes that made California cuisine famous, that fed Hollywood and made Wolfgang Puck America's first celebrity chef. Except that Spago hasn't really served those dishes in a while: Puck's and Lee Hefter's palates lean more toward the Austrian palette than toward the pizza party, and the one dish that has remained on the menu for the last dozen years has been the beet layer cake with goat cheese and pumpkinseed oil. Which leaves longtime Spago pastry chef Sherry Yard's Kaiserschmarrn, an ethereal, fluffy pancake served with strawberries. What does Tony Curtis have in common with Emperor Franz Josef I? Do you even have to ask? Spago, 176 N. Cañon Drive, Beverly Hills. (310) 385-0880.

Tito's Old-School Tacos
One Tito's taco is perhaps an underwhelming artifact: meat, lettuce and shredded cheese if you pay for it, forlorn in its prefab shell. A box of 22, on the other hand, is a Westside childhood writ large, unimaginable abundance, shredded animal flavored mostly of itself, rich and weighty and comforting. Purists who have just learned the difference between buche and tripas often disdain Tito's Tacos, imagining it as somehow "inauthentic." And I suppose it is inauthentic if you're comparing it to what may be available in outer Quintana Roo, although certain styles of taco-making in Durango are interestingly similar. What Tito's Tacos provides, 500 calories at a time, is the plain, nourishing taste of third-generation Mexican L.A. Tito's Tacos, 11222 Washington Place, Culver City. (310) 391-5780.

Luna Oysters
Even palates trained on Zeeland flats, French belons and Totten Inlet Virginicas can agree: The shellfish from Carlsbad Aquafarm is superb, scallops, mussels and abalone raised in one of those pristine lagoons south of Camp Pendleton, which appear — from the interstate at least — so deserted. Best of all are the Luna oysters: a hint of cucumber, a rush of sweet brine, a bit of crispness. You can find them at the better local oyster bars, places like Anisette Brasserie and BP Oysterette, but if you should find yourself near the Carlsbad stand at the Santa Monica or Hollywood farmers markets, pick up an icy half-dozen to eat on the spot. The cold muscadet is up to you. Santa Monica Farmers Market, Wednesdays and Saturdays at Arizona Ave. & 2nd St.; Hollywood Farmers Market, Sundays at Ivar Ave. & Selma Ave.

Chantilly's Sesame Cream Puffs
Airy, eggy, stuffed to order with blackish, sesame-flavored whipped cream, the puffs at Pâtisserie Chantilly are drizzled with mesquite honey and sprinkled with sweet, caramelized soy powder. Cream puffs like these may be fairly common in the tonier quarters of Tokyo, where South Bay local Keiko Nojima studied her art, but there is nothing in Los Angeles remotely like the exquisite creations she serves at this Japanese-French bakery tucked into a Lomita strip mall. Even if you're not a fan of the genre — far too many Japanese baked goods are squishy, gummy things that look a lot better than they taste — Nojima's cream puffs, even the ones that don't happen to be flavored with sesame, take full command. Pâtisserie Chantilly, 2383 Lomita Blvd., No. 104, Lomita. (310) 257-9454.

Golden Deli's Vietnamese Spring Rolls
Of all the well-documented marvels of the San Gabriel Valley, perhaps none has inspired as much devotion as the Vietnamese noodle shop Golden Deli, a sticky-table joint with an unmistakable scent: sweet, sharply garlicky, with faint overtones of fish sauce, roasted coffee and burnt spice. Why is everybody waiting outside in the mini-mall when there are identical restaurants within a few minutes' drive? Because Golden Deli has the best cha gio — fried Vietnamese spring rolls — in the observable universe, and its fans will do anything for a crack at the burnished, bubbly deep-fried cylinders. Golden Deli, 815 W. Las Tunas Drive, San Gabriel. (626) 308-0803.

Langer's Hot Pastrami
The idea may have been heretical when Mimi Sheraton first posited it half a lifetime ago, but it is a truth universally acknowledged: Langer's is the Lourdes of Jewish-deli meats, and its smoky, dense pastrami, steamed to exquisite tenderness, cut thickly by hand, sandwiched between slices of crunchy-edged, seeded rye bread, is, as The Michelin Guide is fond of saying, worth a voyage. If your East Coast friends are doubtful, the deli is happy to sell you pastrami in hermetically sealed packaging — now even New Yorkers can discover what pastrami is supposed to taste like. Langer's Delicatessen-Restaurant, 704 S. Alvarado St., L.A. (213) 483-8050.

Cut's Bone-Marrow Flan
Few dishes in the world are more delicious than Fergus Henderson's marrowbones at St. John in London, but the version of the dish served as an appetizer at Cut comes close — marrow extracted from roasted veal bones, whirred with cream and egg yolk, spooned back into the bones and baked until the custard is set. Cut's version, like Henderson's, is served with coarse salt, slices of toasted brioche and a little salad of parsley chopped just enough to tame its weedy overtones. But Cut's marrowbones may be even better, with all the richness, all the flavor, all the slightly transgressive sensation of feasting on a part of the animal that nature has so fiercely guarded but without the charred ends and the charnel-house smell. The preparation tastes like something plucked from the pages of Escoffier but comes straight from Lee Hefter's brain. Cut, 9500 Wilshire Blvd., Beverly Hills. (310) 276-8500.

Little Flower's Sea-Salt Caramels
If you tend to esteem human happiness more than the state of your teeth, you may have a bag of Little Flower caramels stashed in your desk right now: supple lozenges made with French sea salt from the Guérande, which dissolve into pure, buttery clouds of flavor. Christine Moore's caramels are probably the best candy made in Los Angeles at the moment. Little Flower Candy Co., 1424 W. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena. (626) 304-4800.

Newport Seafood's Spicy Lobster
There are other things on the menu at Newport Seafood, and some of them are even good, but the Vietnamese-Chinese restaurant, which occupies a remodeled Marie Callender's, might as well have no menu at all: The throngs, most of which have waited a couple of hours for a table on a Saturday night, are there for the house-special lobster, a mammoth beast fried with chiles, black pepper and scallions, a dish as essential to Newport Seafood as chili dogs are to Pink's. It is the only Chinese place I know of where the waiters demand that you use a fork — chopsticks are insufficient for the task. Because it is work to dismantle these creatures, digging for bits of flesh from meat deep within the superstructure, fishing out coral and extracting slips of flesh from the legs. The lobsters, generally five to six pounds apiece at about $15 per pound, are not cheap, but they feed many. Newport Seafood, 518 W. Las Tunas Drive, San Gabriel. (626) 289-5998.

Matsuhisa's New-Style Sashimi
When Nobu Matsuhisa's "new-style" sashimi first made its appearance, the preparation seemed almost barbaric — thinly sliced fish dribbled with a warmed, ponzu-laced blend of sesame and extra virgin olive oils. Nobody had ever heard of Italian crudo at that point — the tide of oil seemed antithetical to the soul of sashimi and the blast of garlic and ginger was overwhelming. Sashimi: ice-cold, end of story. But as is true with so many things, Matsuhisa proved his critics wrong. The Nobu brand name seems more resilient than that of Toyota or Sony these days. Matsuhisa, 129 N. La Cienega Blvd., Beverly Hills. ( 310) 659-9639.

Angeli's Gnocchi
You know the gnocchi on the Thursday menu of every trattoria in Rome? These are not those. There is a taste to centuries of inevitability — maybe it's in the spoons. But ricotta gnocchi follow salad at Angeli like green grass follows the rain, and although they only show up as an occasional special — if gnocchi were on the regular menu, nobody would ever order anything else — your chances of running across them are pretty good. You can get the gnocchi with tomato sauce, but there isn't a foodstuff in the world that doesn't taste better with brown butter and sage. Angeli Caffe, 7274 Melrose Ave., L.A. (323) 936-9086.

Eva's Lechon
Nothing furnishes a room like books, they say. And nothing furnishes a party like a big, shiny roasted pig from the Filipino roasting house Eva's, plopped whole in the middle of the table. Men will fear you. Women will admire you. Your vegetarian friends will feel entirely justified in their contempt. Everybody wins. But the apple in its mouth is strictly up to you. Eva's Lechon, 4252 W. Third St., L.A. (213) 383-3179.

Rivera's Tortillas
If you wanted to track the progress of Mexican cooking here in the last few years, you could do worse than look at the state of the tortilla — the phrase hecho a mano is now more of a starting point than an end in itself. But even within the world of handmade tortillas, the gradations of quality verge on the infinite, and as much as we appreciate the toasty examples from Los 5 Puntos, the chile-flavored ones from La Casita Mexicana and the brawny ones from Lenchita's in Pacoima, the delicate, fragrant, almost mousse-light discs from John Sedlar's restaurant Rivera, herbs and flowers pressed into them like wildflowers preserved in the pages of a diary, are tortillas raised to the level of haute cuisine. It is not accidental that Sedlar's tortillas are served as a separate course of their own, needing no more embellishment than perhaps a few grams of guacamole. Rivera, 1050 S. Flower St., dwntwn. (213) 749-1460.

Wa Sushi's Apple Pie and Eel
Apple pie without the eel is like a kiss without the squeal — isn't that what they say in New England? Maybe not. Still, the combination, a regular on the post-Matsuhisian specials board at Wa Sushi, makes a certain sense when you think about it: a pairing of savory and sweet, melting richness and acidic fruit that is the basis of most of the foie gras or duck preparations you are likely to run across, and the warm, soft slabs of sea creature really do taste good laid across the pie. That said, if Wa is ever tempted to reimagine the dish with writhing masses of the baby eels Spaniards are so fond of, I am so out of there. Wa Sushi, 1106 N. La Cienega Blvd., No. 201, W. Hlywd. (310) 854-7285.

Casa Bianca's Sausage-and-Eggplant Pizza
First off, this is a California interpretation of thin-crust Southside Chicago bar pizza, so if you didn't grow up rooting for the White Sox, back off: It doesn't resemble the pizza from Taconelli's or any place named Ray's because it's not supposed to, and it's cut into diamonds instead of slices because that's the way it's done. Secondly, you don't like canned mushrooms? Don't order it with mushrooms. You're offended by the idea of pineapple? Don't order the Hawaiian. The pasta isn't al dente? Go to one of those fancy places where the valet charge alone is more than the cost of feeding a family here. But if you're in the mood for dense, crunchy, chewy, half-burnt, family-cooked pizza with fried eggplant and homemade sausage, nothing even comes close. Casa Bianca, 1650 Colorado Blvd., Eagle Rock. (323) 256-9617.

Huarache de Cabeza
A huarache, the definitive unit of Mexico City street food, is a flattish, concave trough of masa shaped like a size-12 sandal, pan-fried or deep-fried, then smeared with beans, sprinkled with meat and layered with lettuce, grated cheese and cream. Part of the fun is eating the thing — a huarache is too brawny to attack with a flimsy plastic fork, and you will either burn your fingers or wait for your lunch to cool into corn-flavored cement. Emily Post provides no guidelines for eating a huarache. You can have a huarache topped with almost anything, from the black corn fungus called huitlacoche to standard-issue steak, but I like it best with cabeza — rich, gelatinous meat pulled from a cow's head and cooked down into an ultraconcentrated essence of beef. El Huarache Azteca #1, 5225 York Blvd., Highland Park. (323) 478-9572.

Kogi's Kalbi Taco
Forget the paradigm shift, the social-media buzz, the legions of imitators, the rock star–chef thing and the lines that stretch halfway to Rosemead. We know that Kogi is a new kind of restaurant, an art-directed take on Korean street food previously unimaginable in both California and Seoul, truck food that makes you feel plugged into Los Angeles. What's relevant here is that a Kogi kalbi taco is really freaking good, Korean-style short ribs tucked into a decent-quality tortilla with shredded cabbage, a bit of chile and a proto-Korean relish of scallions, soy, sesame seeds and citrus, difference neatly split between a Mexican taco and a Korean ssäm. Kogi, twitter.com/kogibbq.

Canary's Lamb-Tongue Sandwich
Overshadowed by the magnificent Iranian stews, elegant rice dishes and complex soups, Iranian sandwiches are perhaps undervalued, though not by the expats who crowd into Tehrangeles cafés around noon. But there it is, even better than at its rival Attari, juicy, gently flavored grilled lamb's tongue tucked into a hollowed-out length of toasted French bread, and dressed in a way that may seem familiar to hot-dog cognoscenti, like something you might hope to find in a cross-cultural dive restaurant somewhere in Tehran itself. If you insist, they will make the sandwich for you with an actual Hebrew National frank instead of the tongue. Canary, 1942 Westwood Blvd., Wstwd. (310) 470-1312.

Fab L.A.'s Street Dog
Actually, you should be eating this after midnight somewhere out on Whittier Boulevard, cooked on a cheap device crudely welded to a stolen shopping cart by a guy who knows that sheriff's deputies are required to demolish the rig on sight. Street dogs always taste better that way: wrapped in bacon, squirted with mayonnaise and ketchup, and piled with grilled onions, peppers and grilled chiles. Similar to what is known as a Sonora dog elsewhere in the country, the street dog is bad to the bone, chips of which you can probably find in the meat. But sometimes you want all of the flavor and none of the salmonella. At such times, there is always Reseda. Fab Dogs, 6747 Tampa Ave., Reseda. (818) 344-4336.

Hollenbeck Burrito
Italian-Americans in South Philly have spaghetti and meatballs, a dish that never existed in the motherland, served in portions that make Fellini movies seem like documentaries. Mexican-Americans in Los Angeles have the Hollenbeck, a.k.a. Manuel's Special, which is more or less an old-line Mexican restaurant's entire menu wrapped into a bedsheet of a tortilla the size of a pillowcase. The streets are paved with gold, the burrito seems to imply. The rivers flow with Coca-Cola, and the burritos are too heavy to lift. The burrito is crude, you say? Why do you hate America? El Tepeyac Café, 812 N. Evergreen Ave., City Terrace. (323) 268-1960.

Whatever Lou Tells You to Drink
Aged in buried clay amphorae? Vinified to taste like Hefeweizen? Smelling a bit, quite intentionally, of old socks? Lou Amdur's ideas about wine are more evolved than yours or mine, grounded firmly in the land of meta, so that sound winemaking is dull; intellectual fraudulence can be a sign of integrity; and the fact that you like a wine means that there's probably something wrong with it. That dude from Sideways? He wouldn't last a minute here, at least when the conversation turned from overextracted Santa Ynez pinot noir to superior wines made with braucol, mtsvane or timorasso. Lou, 724 Vine St., Hlywd. (323) 962-6369.

Anisette's Pain au Chocolat
I have tasted way more than my share of these, both in Los Angeles and in systematic paths through the bakeries of Paris, but it was not until I tasted Alain Giraud's compact beauties that I finally realized the crisply intense breakfast pastry's ultimate purpose: not as a mere accompaniment to a café au lait and not just to showcase the chocolate, but as the ultimate expression of the gamy, slightly tart roundness of cultured butter. At such times is one's soul exposed to God. Anisette Brasserie, 225 Santa Monica Blvd., Santa Monica. (310) 395-3200.

Paleron With Kumquats and Cream of Wheat
Josef Centeno is often grouped with the postmodernist chefs, partly because his cuisine leans toward cross-cultural idioms, and partly because his career path, which has pinged from grand restaurants to bars and diners, is unconventional. But at bottom, I think, he cooks like a slightly hip French grandmother, classic cuisine bourgeois inflected with Los Angeles flavors, and the best food at all of his restaurants tends to be his long-braised meats. Don't miss his spoonably soft paleron, the thick cut of beef shoulder that is known as flatiron when it's cut into steaks instead of braised in red wine, nestled with bittersweet slices of kumquat into a gently salted bed of Cream of Wheat. The dish sounds kind of avant-garde, but is closer to a perfected version of Aunt Fanny's Sunday pot roast. Lazy Ox Canteen, 241 S. San Pedro St., dwntwn. (213) 626-5299.

Musso & Frank's Welsh Rarebit
Los Angeles, we are often told, is a city that refuses to recognize its past — as if, as in Sunset Boulevard, it weren't the most obsessively memorialized city in the world. And there is no restaurant anywhere, not Keens Steakhouse, Simpsons-in-the-Strand or Bofinger, as immersed in its past as Musso & Frank Grill, which is almost a museum of the American lunchroom menu of 1918: avocado cocktail, finnan haddie, chicken potpie, lamb kidneys Turbigo and diplomat pudding. Not least among these nursery-food classics is the Welsh rarebit, a concoction of cheese melted with ale, dusted with paprika and poured over toast. Think of it as ballast for your second martini. Musso & Frank Grill, 6667 Hollywood Blvd., Hlywd. (323) 467-7788.

Ciro's Flautas
A flauta is a corn tortilla wrapped tightly around a meat filling and fried. The flautas at Ciro's, an iron-barred, low-ceilinged room alive with the funk of frying meat, are tiny things, piccolo flautas, that come six to an order, tightly rolled and very crisp, sauced with thick, chunky, fresh guacamole and a splash of Mexican cream. The shredded meat inside is usually frizzled to a chewy consistency almost like carne seca, and tends to be a little salty, with a smack of pure beef flavor that cuts through the strong tastes of corn and hot oil. Restaurant taquitos tend to be pretty prefab. To go to Ciro's is like visiting a friend's grandmother who just happens to have homemade flautas on hand. Ciro's, 705 N. Evergreen St., E.L.A. (323) 269-5104.

The Gorbals' Dill Fries
Scottish-Jewish cuisine may be a construct that exists solely within the perfervid imagination of The Gorbals chef Ilan Hall, but an order of his French fries, cooked with whole garlic cloves and great, aromatic handfuls of fresh dill, is, as they say, a fact on the ground. Do you eat them before, after or along with the bacon-wrapped matzo balls? That part is up to you. The Gorbals, in the Alexandria Hotel, 501 S. Spring St., dwntwn. (213) 488-3408.

Jitlada's Fish Kidneys
This southern Thai curried fish, at least as interpreted at Jitlada, is one of the more intense things you will ever put in your mouth, a stunningly complex brew of organ stink, aromatics and chile heat that can be compared to biting down on a 9-volt battery, and I mean that in the nicest possible way. In southern Thailand, curries this intense are served over fluffy, hard-fried Thai omelets instead of mere rice, and the rich blandness of the eggs does indeed increase the dish's user-friendliness at least tenfold. Jazz Singnasong swears that some people from the Bay Area stop by her restaurant every few weeks and leave with 30 portions of fish kidneys to go. She thinks they may resell them in their own Thai restaurant, but I think they might just be in need of something to eat on the way up the 5. Jitlada, 5233 Sunset Blvd., Hlywd. (323) 667-9809.

Chicharrones de Queso
Northern Italian frico, a cheese crisp traditionally made with grated Montasio, was a Valentino signature for years, and good enough that Joe Bastianich built a New York restaurant around it before he decided to throw his lot in with Mario Batali. But the Mexican version, as served at Lotería Grill, may be even better: grated cheese sizzled on a flattop until it becomes a glossy, crisp mass as broad and as thin as a proper Indian dosa. You know the bits stuck to the pan after you've made a grilled-cheese sandwich? It's like that, a guilty, over-the-sink pleasure turned into public ritual, folded into a hot, freshly made tortilla, completed with a spoonful of guacamole and a shot or two of tequila. Chicharron de queso is thirsty work. Lotería Grill, 6627 Hollywood Blvd., Hlywd. (323) 465-2500.

Ivy's Corn Chowder
The Ivy's patio is where the much-photographed dine when they wish to be photographed at their best; laughing, splashed with sunlight on a Los Angeles afternoon, in a location where paparazzi are part of the décor. When at the Ivy, they often find it necessary to eat. And when they eat, they are likely to have the corn chowder, wholesome Americana as reinvented long ago by a chef from tropical Mexico with his nose pressed up against the window. The soup, not too caloric, sizzles with gentle chile heat, brightened with a sunny hint of fennel and a sweet bit of pepper. Here, the most Midwestern of ingredients masquerades as a Mediterranean prince. Ivy, 113 N. Robertson Blvd., L.A. (310) 274-8303.

Philippe's French Dip
Long before anybody thought to shave pig ears onto $33 entrées, Los Angeles was famous for its French dip sandwiches, sliced roast meat laid onto French rolls sopped in meat juice. The family that owns Philippe's claims the sandwich was discovered when an employee accidentally dropped a roll into some beef drippings; most of a century later, politicians, circus clowns and families in town for the Dodgers game still shuffle through the sawdust on the floor of the old dining room for the damp taste of history, seasoned with the restaurant's nostril-searing hot mustard. I always get the lamb dip with blue cheese. Philippe's, 1001 N. Alameda St., L.A. (213) 628-3781.

Cole's French Dip
Cole's, which until it was almost invisibly redone by downtown tavern auteur Cedd Moses had been the oldest L.A. restaurant in continuous operation, always claimed that one of its cooks came up with the French dip as an accommodation to a customer with sore gums. It too has a proprietary hot mustard. It also has good things to drink, although they tend toward the champagne cocktail rather than Philippe's Napa cabernet. Cole's French dip, reimagined by Grace's Neal Fraser, is a carefully constructed sandwich, roasted beef or pork on a crusty, custom-baked roll, small-producer cheese if you want it, jus on the side. The ingredient crowd likes Cole's. The gestalt crowd likes Philippe's. I, on the other hand, would like another rye old-fashioned. Cole's, 118 E. Sixth St., L.A. (213) 622-4090.

El Parian's Birria
Mexican cuisine is rich in hangover cures, first among them, of course, being menudo. But for transplants from central Mexico, birria is nearly a sacrament, a meditation in the key of chile, meat and cloves, young goat roasted and stewed and simmered until the tough-minded billy collapses into a soft, gelatinous sigh. It is nearly as easy now to find birria in Los Angeles as it is in the dish's hometown of Guadalajara, where it is seen as a bit old-fashioned but woozy Sunday mornings tend to find me at El Parian downtown, where the tortillas are thick and fresh; the chile-smeared rib meat is crisp on its bones; and the consommé sings with garlic, spice and a strong, goaty essence. It's almost shocking in a restaurant just a few blocks from the Convention Center. El Parian, 1528 W. Pico Blvd., L.A. (213) 386-7361.

La Brea Bakery's Country White Bread
If you grew up in Los Angeles, you may remember the year damp baguettes at Westside dinner parties began to be replaced by flour-dusted rounds of sourdough that befuddled hostesses foolish enough to attack them with a nonserrated knife. These loaves of natural-starter bread, the crucial product from Nancy Silverton's La Brea Bakery, had profoundly crackly crusts, deep brown, speckled with fermentation bubbles, with dense, chewy, moist interiors with the vaguely tart quality of fresh cheese. Twenty years later, La Brea's rounds of country white, which you can buy at almost any supermarket, can seem almost banal, at least to the local/sustainable crowd. But the fact remains: It is still among the best breads in America, the bread that changed the game. La Brea Bakery, 624 S. La Brea Ave., L.A. (323) 939-6813.

Hot Dog on a Stick
It's a hot dog. It's on a stick. It's fried in cornmeal batter and served by pretty college girls who wear tall, multicolored caps. If you are an Angeleno of a certain age, a mere whiff of a Hot Dog on a Stick is enough to transport you back to Santa Monica of the 1960s, when you probably ate your skewered weenie on your way to ride the Sea Serpent at the old P.O.P. (That's Pacific Ocean Park to you grommits.) As a regional hot dog style, Hot Dog on a Stick may be outranked by Nathan's Famous in Coney Island, but even New York City has nothing to compare with the sight of a short-skirted Hot Dog on a Stick employee pumping up a tankful of lemonade. Hot Dog on a Stick, various locations including Muscle Beach, Glendale Galleria and Westside Pavilion.

Chinois' Sizzling Catfish
Encounters with this magnificent fish once seemed so important in the early days of California cuisine — it was the size of the shark from Jaws, it was fried crisp, and it was the emblematic dish of Wolfgang Puck's Chinois, which in turn was the emblematic restaurant of Asian-fusion crossover cooking. It came — it comes — with a citrusy ponzu sauce, which at the time we didn't think weird in a Chinese-style preparation. Several generations of cooks have become incredibly weary of cooking the thing, which seems to dominate any menu it touches, but at the time, it seemed so modern! So daring! So ... 1983! In retrospect, of course, it was just a fried fish but a really good one. It remains the perfect centerpiece to a Chinois meal. Chinois, 2709 Main St., Santa Monica. (310) 392-9025.

Apple Pan's Hickoryburger
McDonald's, I am occasionally ashamed to admit, was born not too far from here; the double-decker Big Boy grew up in Burbank. But Los Angeles was also the birthplace of the great, lettuce-intensive lunch-counter hamburger: a drippy, paper-jacketed sandwich where the thin stratum of beef serves almost as a condiment. The lunch-counter burger is the burger that inflames desires in Karachi teenagers and young Masai tribesmen. Will you find a better example than the Hickoryburger at the Apple Pan, a funky, onion-scented 1940s Los Angeles lunchroom that happens still to be serving in 2010? Not likely. Apple Pan, 10801 W. Pico Blvd., L.A. (310) 475-3585.

Brooklyn's Hearth-Baked Bagel
There are some unbelievably bad bagels in Los Angeles. And to be honest, if it's your first visit to Historic Filipinotown Brooklyn Bagel Bakery, you are going to expect to eat one of them. The shabbiness and bare lighting are okay — that, you expect — and it's kind of cool that the person who takes your order probably wandered over from another part of the plant. But the glass cases are stuffed with pizza bagels, strawberry bagels and banana-nut bagels, among other atrocities, and the regular bagels are as puffed up as what you see in supermarkets. Still, there in the corner, illuminated as if from within, are the hearth-baked bagels, which is to say, dense, chewy, taut-skinned bagels, tinged with crispness but not crisp, properly boiled before baking — real bagels. It is interesting to contemplate the idea that "properly done'' is just one of a dozen flavors here, like cinnamon-raisin or jalapeño-cheese, but it is better than having it not be an option at all. Brooklyn Bagel Bakery, 2217 Beverly Blvd., L.A. (213) 413-4114.

Palate's Vegetables en Papillote
If the calendar function should stop working on your iPhone, and you happen to be occupying a table at Palate Food + Wine, you could probably get a pretty good fix on the week of the year by looking at the contents of these vegetables roasted with herbs and olive oil in a bag. The cooking method brings out the sweet freshness of baby carrots, asparagus, onions, peppers, whatever's in season, in a straightforward, spectacular way. Palate, 933 S. Brand Blvd., Glendale. (818) 662-9463.

Akasha's Quinoa With Edamame
When I was in a Lima slum a few years ago, sitting in on a class where Quechua-speaking migrants were taught to make dinner from indigenous Andean grains, what impressed me the most were the looks of absolute misery on the faces of the students. "I walked across three mountain ranges for this?" they seemed to be thinking. "I didn't come to the city to cook fucking quinoa, I came to the city to escape fucking quinoa. Wake me up when you get to the part about french fries." But quinoa, especially the sprouted red kind, can have a certain nutty charm, at least if you don't have to cook it yourself. And that bowl of steamed quinoa with edamame at Akasha, a fleeting reminder of the chef's vegan roots? Ascetic but not bad. Don't forget to get an order of onion rings on the side. Akasha, 9543 Culver Blvd., Culver City. (310) 845-1700.

Donut Man's Strawberry Doughnut
Have you ever seen a strawberry doughnut from Donut Man? It is an iceberg of a doughnut, a heavy, flattened demisphere big enough to use as a Pilates aid, split in two and filled to order with what must be an entire basket of fresh strawberries, and only in season. The fruit is moistened with a translucent gel that lubricates even the occasional white-shouldered berry with a mantle of slippery sweetness — oozing from the sides — forming frozen whorls, turning the bottom of the pasteboard box into a sugary miasma in the unlikely event that the doughnuts actually make it home. The tawny pastry itself is only lightly sweetened, dense and slightly crunchy at the outside, like most good doughnuts, with a vaguely oily nuttiness and an almost substantial chew. It is the only doughnut I have ever seen that is routinely served with a plastic knife and fork. The stand is on the way to nowhere, but the doughnuts are worth all the irreplaceable fossil fuel it takes to get there. Donut Man, 915 E. Route 66, Glendora. (626) 335-9111.

Chili John's Chili
What Chili John's serves isn't Cincinnati chili or Texas chili or Detroit Coney chili but a spicy, all-but-extinct Wisconsin style (and I for one am thankful for that), dense and comforting, lean and hearty, with a cumin wallop and a subtle, smoky heat that creeps up on you like the first day of a Santa Ana wind. Do you go to Chili John's for Three-Tequila Rattlesnake chili, for Mango-Habañero chili or for Gee, Your Hat Smells Terrific? No, you do not. This is the kind of chili you get here: chili. But you can get it with beans if you want, with spaghetti, or with spaghetti and beans if you're feeling a little racy. The day Chili John's comes back from its annual July vacation is one of the happiest days of the year. Chili John's, 2018 W. Burbank Blvd., Burbank. (818) 846-3611.

101 Noodle Express' Beef Roll
If you keep up with Chinese cooking in the San Gabriel Valley, you may have heard of the beef roll, a steroidal composition of fried Chinese pancakes, cilantro and great fistfuls of thinly sliced meat wetted with sweet bean sauce and formed into something like a Chinese burrito the size of your arm. A specialty of Shandong, half a day's drive south of Beijing, a proper beef roll may be big enough to feed a family of four but is also oddly delicate; it may taste of crisped pastry and clean oil but also projects the muscularity of the braised meat. 101 Noodle Express, 1025 S. Baldwin Ave., Arcadia. (626) 446-8855. Also at 1408 Valley Blvd., Alhambra. (626) 300-8654.

Eva Solo-Brewed Coffee
Somewhere in the back of a hall closet is what's left of three dozen INAO tasting glasses, crystal designed to expose a wine's virtues and flaws in total, excruciating detail. It wasn't long before I realized that I didn't necessarily want to taste wine quite that carefully. But I have fallen hard for the coffee equivalent, a willowy brewing carafe encased in tight, zippered neoprene, like a fitted wet suit on a supermodel, which brings out all there is to know about a roasted bean. Of course, the beans have to be pretty good, and at La Mill, L.A.'s best homegrown coffee company, they are. When you order that single-estate Kenyan, there is clear, limpid coffee in your cup, light-roasted, tart, smelling rather more of fruits and flowers than like whatever it is you're getting at Peet's. La Mill, 1636 Silver Lake Blvd., Silver Lake. (323) 663-4441.

Oki Dog
The signature object — a couple wieners, some chili, a scrap of pastrami and fried cabbage wrapped up in a tortilla — may be Mexican-Jewish-Chinese food prepared by Okinawans for a largely African-American clientele, but nobody who lived through the early years of the Hollywood punk-rock scene will ever think of it as anything but a continuation of the West Hollywood stand everybody used to haunt after Germs shows. Okinawans are famous in scientific circles for their longevity — could Oki Dogs be the key? Oki Dog, 5056 W. Pico Blvd., L.A. (323) 938-4369.

Comme Ca's Cheeseburger
The last conversation I had with chef David Myers lingered on a kaiseki restaurant he'd visited in Kyoto, its silence, and the great specialty it had been perfecting since 1292: a plain, perfect soft-cooked egg. So perhaps he understands why, with the evanescent wonders that pour out of his kitchens at Sona, and the finely realized brasserie cooking at Comme Ça around the corner, I find myself drawn most often to the Zen perfection of his cheeseburger. But Comme Ça's lunchtime-only cheeseburger is sui generis: a thick, dripping, loosely packed puck of bloody-rare beef, glazed with a good Cheddar, barely but adequately contained in a soft, shiny-crusted bun. This cheeseburger is from an old tradition in which ingredients are allowed to speak for themselves, an unfussy burger that tastes like good, aged meat. "It's basically my mother's hamburger,'' confesses the chef. Comme Ça, 8479 Melrose Ave., W. Hlywd. (323) 782-1178.

Saffron Silk Ice Cream
It can be difficult to choose a restaurant in Little India, but it's easy to choose dessert. Because as enamored as one may be with the reborn Standard Sweets or the halvah at Pioneer Boulevard's many chaat shops, the Saffron Spot wins every time. If I were made of sterner stuff, I would be drawn to the house's caramel-y, austerely delicious matka kulfi, a traditional ice cream made from milk slowly boiled until it becomes almost thick enough to resist the fierce Indian sun. But glittery objects tend to undo one. And it is hard to imagine ice cream more blissfully gaudy than the Saffron Silk, saffron-tinted to the brightness of a sari, flavored with a bit of rosewater and studded with pistachios. Saffron Spot, 18744 Pioneer Blvd., Artesia. (562) 809-4554.

Yellow Fish Fried With Hair Seaweed
What could be better than french fries? Possibly this Shanghai-style preparation of battered fillets that resembles nothing so much as freshly fried fish doughnuts, a seafood dish so tender, it makes Mrs. Paul's fish sticks seem as tough as raw eel liver: crisp, greaseless and unexpectedly fragile. Giang Nan, 306 N. Garfield Ave., No. A-12, Monterey Park. (626) 573-3421.

Mozza Pizza
A couple of times a month, I have it on good authority, a certain kind of comment card shows up in the stack at Pizzeria Mozza, written out in old-fashioned, auntly Italian script, suggesting that what the restaurant serves is the furthest thing from pizza. And perhaps that is true. But in the wood oven at Pizzeria Mozza, Nancy Silverton has more or less reinvented the very idea of pizza: airy and burnt and risen around the rim, thin and crisp in the center, neither bready in the traditional Neapolitan manner nor wispy the way you find them in Rome. The crust is so good, in fact, that it may be at its best dressed with nothing more than a drizzle of good olive oil and a few grains of sea salt — and it's not sad to eat topped with burrata and vivid squash blossoms, taleggio and house-made sausage, lardo and rosemary or pureed anchovies and fried egg. (The mandatory caveat applies here: Silverton is a family friend.) This isn't your mama's pizza, and it's not the pizza you used to eat back in Jersey, and that, perhaps, is the point. Pizzeria Mozza, 641 N. Highland Ave., L.A. (323) 297-0101.

Shanghai Xiao Chi's Pork Pump
The name of the dish came into existence, I was once told, as a typo on the menu at Mon Kee, the first serious seafood restaurant in Chinatown, and it has passed from menu to menu ever since. (I will, for the moment, ignore the inconvenient fact that Mon Kee was Cantonese, while pork pump is ur-Shanghainese, and that it was never clear what exactly was misspelled — the specific cut involved comes from nowhere near the rump.) In all the world, nobody braises with quite the intensity of the Shanghainese, who slow-cook the pump in a rich master sauce of soy and stock and rock sugar and rice wine until it becomes sweet and trembling and barely solid enough to hold its shape in a spoon before it collapses into a fragrant, slightly viscous puddle. For a long time, the local standard-bearer was Lake Spring in Monterey Park; at the moment, I might lean toward the place alternately called Wok n' Noodle and Shanghai Xiao Chi, although you will find neither name outside the restaurant, which from the front resembles nothing more than a shuttered print shop. Shanghai Xiao Chi, 828 W. Valley Blvd., Alhambra. (626) 588-2284.

Shanxi Knife-Cut Noodles
JTYH, a descendant of the late, great Heavy Noodling, specializes in the sorts of noodles a Cantonese chef would disavow at the point of a sword: thick, irregular things, frilled where they taper to an edge, shaved from a log of dough directly into boiling water. They're self-consciously rustic things that taste of themselves whether fried with moo shoo pork and lots of garlic or immersed with tendon in a deep, anise-scented beef broth. The noodles, which are in the style of Shanxi, a northern Chinese province sandwiched somewhere between Beijing and Inner Mongolia, have the good, dense bite of the best Italian pasta, and the heft to be used as bondage implements if that's the way you roll. JTYH Restaurant, 9425 Valley Blvd., Rosemead. (626) 442-8999.

Beverly Soon Tofu
A bowl of soon tofu looks less like food than a special effect, a heaving, bright-red mass in a superheated cauldron that spits like a lake of volcanic lava, and broadcasts a fine, red mist of chile and broth that tints anything within six inches of the bowl a pale, lustrous pink. If you saw soon tofu in a dark alley, you'd run. A soft, freshly made bean curd served in a bowl with broth, soon tofu is one of the wonders of the Korean culinary world. Get it with clams. Beverly Soon Tofu Restaurant, 2717 W. Olympic Blvd., L.A. (213) 380-1113.

Pho Minh's Pho Bac
Don't get me wrong — there's something cool, almost punk-rock about the snappy, MSG-juiced phos in town, Vietnamese beef-noodle soups that slap you across the face and command you to guzzle ice water. The pho bac at Pho Minh is different: a limpid, full-flavored, long-cooked broth, sprinkled with slivered fresh ginger and fortified with a delicious hunk of meat that looks something like a filet mignon that has just lost a bad razor fight. The broth is deeply scented with Vietnamese cinnamon, which is the best in the world, or at least that's what the guy at Penzeys says when he's charging me an extra buck for it. The pho dac biet is great, too, although it seems almost vulgar in comparison. Pho Minh, 9646 E. Garvey Ave., No. 108, South El Monte. (626) 448-8807.

Bigmista's Pig Candy
If pigs had their way, pig candy would be made out of chocolate — better yet, out of chocolate positioned in a trough right in front of them. But for better or worse, pig candy is the vernacular name for a snack made out of smoky, thick-cut bacon baked with lots and lots of brown sugar until it transforms itself into demonically fragrant slabs that bear more than a passing resemblance to pork-belly terrine. You want some of this stuff. Really you do. And if you should happen to be in Atwater on a Sunday morning, you should probably swing by the barbecue concession 'round the back, because Bigmista and Mrs. Mista will set you up with the best. Bigmista, Sun. at Atwater farmers market; Tues. & Sat. at Torrance farmers market; Thurs. at El Segundo farmers market. Menus, hours and preordering info at bigmista.com.

Euro Pane's Egg Salad Sandwich
You will find as many schools of egg salad–sandwich craft as you will brands of wax paper in which to wrap them. But the only one that matters is the agrestic, back-to-nature school, which is to say gooey-centered soft-boiled eggs chopped as coarsely as possible, bound with a minimal amount of freshly mounted olive-oil mayonnaise, loosely piled onto sourdough and sprinkled with the number of snipped herbs that one thinks prudent. In these things, as in so many others, we look to Europane. Euro Pane, 950 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena. (818) 577-1828.

Mandarin House's cha chiang mein
If you've ever been to a Chinese elementary school carnival or supermarket opening, you've seen hand-pulled noodles, the kind made by some old guy who slams a length of dough a couple of times on a counter, performs a few calisthenic movements and ends up with an armload of spaghetti. Hand-pulled noodles are immeasurably better than the machine-made kind: stretchy yet supple, irregularly shaped, veritable magnets for sauce. For some reason, the vast majority of L.A. chefs skilled in noodle-pulling seem to own Chinese restaurants aimed at a Korean clientele, and perhaps the best of these is Mandarin House, right in the heart of Koreatown. The kung pao shrimp at Mandarin House may be pedestrian, but the cha chiang mein, hand-pulled noodles in a dense, black sauce of fermented beans and pork, is out of this world. Mandarin House, 3074 W. Eighth St., Koreatown. (213) 386-8976.

Little Dom's Oyster Po' Boy
New Orleans has given so much to the world. And right up there with Dixieland jazz, Professor Longhair and the early novels of Walker Percy may stand the oyster loaf, which is basically fried oysters slipped into a buttered length of French bread. Though Casamento's in uptown New Orleans remains my personal benchmark for the sandwich, I admit a grudging admiration for Brandon Boudet's less-restrained version, at the Italian-Creole Little Dom's: fried, freshly shucked mollusks piled onto crunchy toasted focaccia with tomatoes, a crumpled sheet of the smoked Italian bacon called speck and a peppery remoulade. Little Dom's, 2128 Hillhurst Ave., Los Feliz. (323) 661-0055.

Street-Vendor Cheese Enchiladas
Why is Los Angeles the best place to eat on the planet? Because on a random East L.A. street corner, a woman behind a rickety card table can be cooking the best cheese enchiladas you've ever tasted in your life: prefab tortillas fried way too hard with way too much oil, dunked in too much chile and given another industrial sear. They're chewy and crunchy, spicy and smoky, smeared with a bit too much cream, and are absolutely amazing. Then you'll never see her again. Except when you do. No address, but she seems to operate about one block from the vendors who tweet as @BreedStScene. Maybe you'll get lucky.

A-Won's Al Bap
Korean sushi has its fascinations — its live-fish fixations, the emphasis on strong-tasting invertebrates like sea squirt and fresh sea cucumber, and the delightful custom of including sliced hot chiles, raw garlic and kkaennip alongside the customary wasabi and soy. But peasant that I am, I can never tear myself away from the ever-fascinating al bap, a big bowl of sushi rice frosted with a half-dozen different kinds of fish eggs, laid out in contrasting streaks radiating from a plop of creamy sea-urchin roe at the center of the bowl like rays from the sun. You can mix them together, gild them with the raw chicken–egg yolk that shares its bowl, or savor them egg by egg by egg until you are done. A-Won, 913½ S. Vermont Ave., Koreatown. (213) 389-6764.

Brandt Beef
Southern California is blessed with superlative homegrown fruits and vegetables, but local meat is much harder to buy. It's not economically viable to raise cattle on expensive land. Brandt isn't precisely local — the ranch is down south of the Salton Sea — but it's closer than pretty much anything else, and the quality of the organic, sustainably raised beef is exceptional, especially the braising cuts. Oddly, Brandt beef is much easier to find in New York City than it is here, but you'll find a small, nicely curated selection in the meat case of HOWS supermarkets. brandtbeef.com.

Krakatoa-Blend Coffee
Because sometimes you want coffee from that three-hectare, 1,730-meter, southwest-facing, tree-shaded, granitic-soiled, Cup of Distinction finca, and sometimes you just want something that's going to jolt you back to life in the morning. Monkey and Son's colossal Krakatoa coffee, a muscular blend of African and Sumatran beans strong enough to put hair on a bald ape's chest, is organic, Fair Trade–certified and locally roasted, all of that save-the-planet stuff, but the flavor roars out of your cup like an early Stooges record. Beans sold at Surfas, and through monkeyandson.com.

El Atacor #11's Potato Tacos
You will encounter many schools of thought when it comes to these tacos, some of which call for coarsely mashed spuds, others for herbs, and still others for a wallop of chorizo. But all pale before El Atacor #11's tacos de papa: thin corn tortillas folded around gooey spoonfuls of puree and fried to an indelicate, shattering crunch. The barely seasoned potatoes ooze out of the tacos with the deliberate grace of molten lava. The glorious stink of hot grease and toasted corn subsumes any subtle, earthy hint of potato, and guacamole-drenched tacos de papas evaporate so quickly from the table that you understand why they come 10 to an order. El Atacor #11, 2622 N. Figueroa St., L.A. (323) 441-8477.

Rajdhani's Thali
What the owners of Rajdhani like to call Gujarati dim sum might more properly be called a bottomless vegetarian thali, the cooking of the central Indian province overwhelming you with labyrinths of flavor and a profusion of perfumes, a 10-course combination platter constantly refilled in all of its components. After 45 minutes, your plate will look like a slightly messier version of the plate you started with. But even as your buttons start to pop, you will find yourself unable to stop begging for khandvi, tart, fermented-batter crepes smeared with lentils and coiled into tubes. The concept of too much khandvi does not exist in any language. Rajdhani, 18525 Pioneer Blvd., Artesia. (562) 402-9102.

Ludo's Fried Chicken
When you glance at a 1940s edition of Duncan Hines' Adventures in Good Eating, the important national restaurant guide of the time, Los Angeles looks to be the most chicken-obsessed metropolis in the universe — almost one-third of the listed restaurants are devoted to the specialty. But the fried chicken that the city is dreaming about at the minute comes from a Parisian haute-cuisine dude who probably couldn't tell you the difference between the chickens fried in Iowa and the chickens fried in Mississippi, but sets a crust like a Jesus-loving Alabama housewife with a bit of the devil in her soul. Brined, impossibly juicy, laced with strong herbs, Ludovic Lefebvre's fried chicken is pretty close to the godhead, whether fried Basque-style in duck fat, served with Oaxacan mole or served to 2,000 people waiting in line at a food festival on a winter afternoon. Find the latest incarnation of Lefebvre's pop-up restaurant, LudoBites, at ludolefebvre.com.

Lawry's Prime Rib
There are those who would complain that Lawry's uses indifferent meat, that the experience is corporatized, and that the dining room is thronged with visitors from the beef-deprived regions of Europe and Asia. I maintain that they are missing the point. Because with careful lighting, appropriate pomp and the silver cart, that slice of beef becomes the single-most glamorous dish in the world, the beef of kings and queens with creamed spinach on the side. If Los Angeles has taught us anything, it is this: Sometimes we don't want to see the man behind the curtain. Lawry's, 100 N. La Cienega Blvd., Beverly Hills. (310) 652-2827.

Campanile’s Grilled Prime Rib
Prime rib, it must be said, is mostly a come-on, a loss-leader at butcher counters, a bland expanse of underflavored flesh anchoring hotel buffets. It can also be a fairly precise description of one of the fattiest, tenderest, most delicious parts of a USDA Prime steer, and that's what you find at Campanile: rubbed with salt, passed over the fire by one of the most skillful grill guys in the galaxy, and served with perfect cannelini beans and a mess of sautéed bitter greens. Forget your bourbon-soaked steak houses: If you want to earn your infarction, this is the place to start. Campanile, 624 S. La Brea Ave., L.A. (323) 938-1447.

Mo-Chica’s Seviche
The dish of seafood marinated in lime juice and vinegar is ubiquitous in Los Angeles, a star of trucks and mariscos stands, fusion sushi bars and sticky seafood restaurants. And then there's the Peruvian seviche at Mo-Chica: cubes of sushi-quality tuna in a thick vinegar emulsion sharp with chile, soft and tart and brutally spicy all at once, served with slivered red onion, a half-ear of giant-kerneled corn and a soft chunk of sweet potato. Since Nobu Matsuhisa blew into town 20-odd years ago, high-quality Peruvian seafood has not been hard to find in Los Angeles, but this is earthier, more sensual, more Peruvian, speaking as much of the mountains as of the sea. Mo-Chica, in Mercado La Paloma, 3655 S. Grand Ave., L.A. (213) 747-2141.

Banh Mi from Mr. Baguette
The famous sandwich is probably the only good thing to have come out of a century of colonialism in Vietnam: a warm, freshly baked baguette stuffed with pickled vegetables, soft liver pâté, and a deli counter's worth of sliced Vietnamese charcuterie. The sandwich adapts well to standardization. The old-line stores have premade sandwiches stacked like firewood behind the counter in anticipation of the lunch break. The new banh mi superstores have bakeries on-premises, drive-through windows, and advanced video-ordering systems — some of them sell 10,000 sandwiches every day. The Mr. Baguette stores may have all the technology of their competitors, but their sandwiches taste as if they were made by humans. Mr. Baguette makes its own high-quality ham and headcheese and steamed pork loaves, its soft, luscious pâté has a mildly gamy tang — and for a quarter extra, the sandwich comes frosted with toasted sesame seeds. Mr. Baguette, several locations, including 400 S. Atlantic Blvd., Monterey Park (626-282-9966) and 8702 E. Valley Blvd., Rosemead (626-288-9166).

Animal's Foie Gras & Biscuits and Gravy
The conceit of serving foie gras with a mere fruit compote has become a little dusty as of late: all the hot chefs are serving it with eels or in jars, glazed with Coca-Cola or encased in cotton candy. The sweet taste of cruelty may be no longer enough. Animal — which already serves the liver as part of its crazed version of the Big Island drive-in classic Hawaiian concoction, loco moco — a beef patty with white rice, gravy and eggs — steps up the battle by putting its seared foie gras on top of truckstop–standard biscuits with maple-sweetened sausage gravy, and the aesthetic of fat-on-fat-on-fat is successful in ways I can't begin to understand. Animal, 435 N. Fairfax Ave., L.A. (323) 782-9225.

Chichen Itza's Panuchos
Like Los Angeles, Mérida is a sprawling multicultural city, temperate in climate, geographically cut off from the rest of Mexico, whose trade ties to foreign capitals are in some ways stronger than the ones to its own. Its cooking has always resonated here — not least the panuchos: split, bean-stuffed tortillas, panfried crisp, which juxtapose the round meatiness of well-done roast pork against the slight creaminess of pureed black beans, are drizzled with citrus, and are garnished with tart, pickled onions dyed scarlet with beets. Like many cross-cultural phenomena, panuchos are best sluiced with the hottest habanero salsa you can bear. Chichen Itza, in Mercado La Paloma, 3655 S. Grand Ave., L.A. (213) 741-1075.

Krua Thai's Pad Thai
In the dusty sands of time, I remember pad Thai as tasty, even thrilling: stiff bundles of rice pasta slicked with orange oil, oversweetened with palm sugar, sprinkled with peanut dust and plopped on top of a mass of bean sprouts. Mmmm — peanut dust. Not so much later, I recall, a woman broke up with me because I insisted on ordering pad Thai every time we went to the old Chao Praya, citing it as proof of my severe lack of imagination. (In my defense, Chao Praya's pad Thai was an awfully good plate of noodles.) But the ultra-spicy, tamarind-soured, fish-sauce-laced house-special version at Krua Thai is about as good as pad Thai gets, a powerful dish that retains some of the exoticism bred out of it by a thousand inferior versions, sweet and squiggly and delicious, stocked with both tofu and big shrimp — the dish made vivid again after decades as a cliché. Krua Thai, 13130 Sherman Way, N. Hlywd. (818) 759-7998.

Ancient Ginger Soup at Noodle Island
"Ancient ginger" is what happens when that node you forgot to use from last week's stir-fry languishes, forgotten, beneath the garlic and onions. Ancient ginger soup is a double-strength soup zapped with this withered, magically pungent ginger, soothing and powerful — if deli chicken soup is Jewish penicillin, this stuff is Chinese Cipro. Toss in a handful of soft rice noodles and a portion of simmered chicken, cooked just to the point beyond pinkness, and you've got the only ancient Chinese secret you need. Noodle Island, 800 W. Las Tunas Drive, San Gabriel. (626) 293-8839.

MCGrath's Rainbow Chard
Chard pictures don't light up Facebook feeds, and chard discussions do not clutter the airwaves. When they come across chard in your weekly CSA box, your children are unlikely to yelp with delight — in fact, what they do say probably sounds a lot like the French word for the vegetable, which happens to be blette. Still: chard, how delicious! The organic rainbow chard from the McGrath stand at the farmers market does not have the glamour of the farm's strawberries or tomatoes, but manages to pack all the sweet earthiness of the fabled Oxnard Plain into a few square inches of leaf. McGrath Family Farms, at the Wednesday and Saturday Santa Monica Farmers Market and the Sunday Hollywood Farmers Market. mcgrathfamilyfarm.com.

Border Grill's Green Corn Tamales
Popping with freshness, soft and light as air, green corn tamales are as sure a sign of spring in Los Angeles as the traffic at Dodger Stadium. The famous green corn tamales have always been at El Cholo, but Border Grill's sleekly rustic corn-husk bundles may be even more expressive of the milky flavor of sweet corn. Border Grill, 1445 4th St., Santa Monica. (310) 451-1655.

Lupe's #2 Burrito
At the best of the old-line Los Angeles burrito stands, you will find burritos as they should be eaten: slender instead of overstuffed; ballasted with a smooth, well-oiled paste of refried beans; wrapped into a griddle-toasted tortilla; and featuring a bit of cheese or a spoonful of sauce for flavor, perhaps, or stewed chiles, or sometimes a little meat. A burrito is supposed to taste if it were made by somebody's mom. Lupe's #2 has everything you need in a burrito and nothing you do not. Lupe's #2, 4642 E. Third St., L.A. 323-266-6881.

Good Girl Dinette's Chicken PotPie
I have occasionally posited the existence of universal comfort food, dishes that would convey warmth and love and abundance as well to an Inuit as it would to a Jain, in Canada as well as in Kyrgyzstan. Then I start daydreaming about fermented mare's milk, and the afternoon goes downhill from there. But if you were going to compile such a roster, you could do worse than to include Good Girl Dinette's chicken potpie, a classically transcultural dish of yellow Vietnamese curry, peas and carrots and everything, baked under a dense, buttery biscuit crust. Good Girl Dinette, 110 N. Avenue 56, Highland Park. (323) 257-8980.

Harry's Seascape Strawberries
Harry's Berries, to the annoyance of its devotees, charges almost double what every other strawberry grower in the farmers market charges, and there are weeks when the pull of those others' hand-scrawled "Oxnard strawberries Super Sweet" signs eventually proves too strong. Oxnard is at the sweet spot for strawberries in California, and even the white-shouldered commercial stuff that makes it to stores from here to Maine is acceptable. Are the berries at Harry's this week awe-inspiring, or merely stunning? It's hard to tell — the stand enforces a no-tastes policy. But during the weeks of spring when the Seascape strawberries make it on the truck, juicy blots of red whose vividly dimensional taste makes other strawberries seem like Styrofoam packing peanuts in comparison — you're going to buy those berries. And stand in line for the privilege. And get to the market early because they may be all gone by 10. Sometimes that's just the way it is. At farmers markets.

Michael Cimarusti's Squid With Piquillo Peppers and Pig's Ear
One of the problems with compiling lists like these is the existence of chefs, definitely including Providence's Michael Cimarusti, who are so attuned to the rhythms of the seasons and the market that their menus are never in the same place twice. Unless you're talking about Cimarusti's chowda, which is first-rate, among the best in the world possibly, but we're talking about things you have to taste before you die — before you die! It's like saying, as a Dodgers fan, that you would die unfulfilled if you never saw Vicente Padilla start another game. But the sautéed squid with piquillo peppers and stewed pig's ear — that one I'd really like to taste again. I'd like to see Manny Ramirez hit a couple out this year, too. Providence, 5955 Melrose Ave., L.A. (323) 460-4170.

THE Grill on the Alley's Corned Beef Hash

The meat-and-potatoes concoction is punch line to a thousand Army jokes, and is most commonly served direct from a can of Dinty Moore. Corned beef hash is the wrong call at almost every diner you walk into. At Grill on the Alley, the Beverly Hills Industry restaurant better known as home to the egg-white omelet and the eight-figure negative pickup deal, the hash is a dream: edged with deep brown; speckled with crunchy, carbonized bits; crisp, ruddy and delightful to behold. As long as somebody else is picking up the tab, an order of hash and a pot of coffee is the grandest Depression meal in town. The Grill on the Alley, 9560 Dayton Way, Beverly Hills. (310) 276-0615.

Kiriko's Salmon Sashimi

Salmon is not the most obvious candidate for sushi-bar glory. It is difficult to find the best fish, and you wouldn't want to eat even the finest wild king salmon raw. Salmon flesh is very expressive of its environment, which is often something you might feel is better left unexpressed. The salmon sushi is often the last one left on the nigiri platter. But Kiriko's Ken Namba is a master of salmon. And when he smokes fresh Copper River salmon over smoldering cherrywood, and wraps thick, rich slices of it around spears of dripping-ripe mango, the sashimi is soft and luscious, salty and sweet, penetratingly smoky yet delicate — one of the most magnificent mouthfuls of food imaginable. Kiriko, 11301 W. Olympic Blvd., No. 102, W.L.A. (310) 478-7769.

Maple Bacon Donut
"Home of the Maple Bacon Donut" is a slogan inscribed both on the home page of the Nickel's Web site and in the arteries of its best customers. And it is a lovely thing, warm and round and doughnutty, paved with crushed bacon, glistening with what the unimaginative might interpret as pure evil. If you look at it in a certain light, or at least the hazy rays filtering in off Main Street on a cloudy morning in June, the doughnut even seems to glow — a soft, pulsing glow like the ones you see from jellyfish under black light, or from the undersides of flying saucers in science-fiction movies. And then the person sitting across from you bites into one, and you have seen this look of bliss before: wood smoke melting into tree essence; pig fat into cooking oil; yeast into sugar, time into the smoky void. Nickel Diner, 524 S. Main St., dwntwn. (213) 623-8301.

Bay Cities' Godmother
Italian sandwiches have progressed a lot in Los Angeles in the last several decades, from the grinders at Connal's in Pasadena, to the meatball sandwiches at the wheezing Eastside Deli, to the fennel-saturated porchetta sandwiches at Mozza-2-Go, which are up to the best Florentine standard. But it occasionally feels as if the Westside would stop functioning without the doorstop known as the Godmother, which includes a slice of every Italian cold cut you've ever heard of, and a couple that might be new to you: salame, mortadella, capicola, ham, prosciutto, provolone cheese, on a chewy, foot-long, hoagie roll. Fully dressed, the Godmother includes lettuce, tomato, mayonnaise, mustard, and a few squirts from unmarked squeeze bottles that probably add up to a garlicky vinaigrette. The sandwich feeds a couple of people at least, and you should probably seek intervention if you're planning to eat a large Godmother by yourself. Bay Cities Italian Deli & Bakery, 1517 Lincoln Blvd., Santa Monica. (310) 395-8279.

Din Tai Fung's Soup Dumplings
The lure of the Shanghai-style soup dumpling is impossible to resist: thin-walled spheroids filled with pork, seasonings and teaspoonfuls of broth; mouthfuls of impossible juiciness; flavor-hits of a staggering intensity. Served 10 to an order in bullet-shaped aluminum steamers, the elastic soup dumplings at Din Tai Fung are engineered as carefully as iPhones. You can inspect three or four orders of soup dumplings at Din Tai Fung — and over the course of a meal, you probably will — before you find a dumpling that has breached so much as a drop of soup. Pick them up carefully, garnish simply with a shred or two of fresh ginger and a few sparing drops of black vinegar, and inhale. Din Tai Fung, 1108 S. Baldwin Ave., Arcadia. (626) 574-7068.

Bob's Plain Doughnut
The Platonic ideal of a doughnut is a plain one, fried in clean oil, subtly sweetened, tinged with vanilla, and holding its pleasant, mild crunchiness even when you dunk it into milk. It's the doughnut of swing-era diners, Homer Price's doughnut, the doughnut that won World War II. The Farmer's Market doughnut stand Bob's may sell fancy coffees now, and even fruit-flavored herb teas, but when you've got a Bob's doughnut and a cup of regular joe on your table, it might as well be 1943. Bob's Coffee & Doughnuts, Farmers Market, Third & Fairfax, L.A. (323) 933-8929.

Let’s Be Frank's Hot Dog
Could it be more disloyal to Los Angeles than to suggest that its best hot dog may be one first sold outside the home field of the hated San Francisco Giants? A hot dog sold from a truck? Yet the dogs — organic, grass-fed, sustainable, whatever — are taut, natural-skin beauties that snap like smartly hit line drives when you bite into them, tucked into griddled buns and served, if you want them that way, with grilled onions, organic sauerkraut and an occasional mystery condiment that they hide under the truck's counter like the secret stash at a comic book store. Let's Be Frank, Helms Ave., between Venice and Washington boulevards, Culver City.

Meals by Genet's Doro Wot

A dense chicken stew, complex as a Oaxacan mole, rich as butter, whose flavor seems to cut right to the Ethiopian soul, doro wot is not a quick dish: onions slowly reducing into marmalade, spices mellowing, two dozen strong-flavored ingredients subsuming their sharp notes into a harmonious if peppery whole. You can find the dish at almost every restaurant in Fairfax Avenue's Little Ethiopia. Doro wot at Meals by Genet is a serious dish, vibrating with ginger and black pepper and bishop's weed and clove but tasting of none of them, as sticky and dense as any French chef's demi-glace, so formidably solid that the chicken, which is well-cooked, becomes just another ingredient in the sauce. The chef is modest, allowing only that the stew takes her two days to prepare, but if you made doro wot like that you could afford to be modest about it, too. Meals by Genet, 1053 S. Fairfax Ave., L.A. (323) 938-9304.

Sapp Coffee Shop's Boat Noodles

The lunchtime dish is the standard stuff of any roadside stall in Thailand, but Sapp's version is brilliant, a murky, organ-rich beef soup amplified with shrieking chile heat, thickened with blood, the tartness of lime juice locked in muscular poise with the brawny muskiness of the broth, to which the slippery, flash-boiled rice noodles seem to bring at least as much texture as substance. If you enjoy wrestling with great, reeking mounds of offal, you're in exactly the right spot; if not, you can order the boat noodles with ordinary beef. Sapp Coffee Shop, 5183 Hollywood Blvd., Hlywd. (323) 665-1035.

Bludso's Brisket
If the fires are burning high and you turn up at the right time of day, the barbecued beef brisket at Bludso's can be as good as barbecue gets — less meat than a damp vapor of meat; meat you inhale so fast and so unconsciously that you barely remember you were eating meat at all. At Bludso's there is only bloodlust, smoke and salt, the need to pry the dripping brisket out of the heat-warped foam container, to feel the meat and the juice and the ribbons of fat slide down your throat like liquid, each slice generating the desire for the next, until the container is empty. At Bludso's, the only proper amount of meat is way, way too much. Bludso's B-B-Q, 811 S. Long Beach Blvd., Compton. (310) 637-1342.

L.A. Galbi
Whenever Los Angeles starts to feel like the wrong sort of place — where everybody really is carrying around Eckhart Tolle paperbacks, the Bodhi Tree was the last remaining proof of civilization, and existence is circumscribed by the universe contained within Brent Bolthouse's Blackberry — it is good to remember this: In at least one part of the world, L.A. is considered to be a midsized Korean city whose culinary specialty involves a special crosswise way of cutting shortribs. Now we can all relate to the way people in Parma feel about the cheese. L.A. galbi is available pretty much anywhere, but as with so many things having to do with Korean barbecue, you may as well go to Park's. Park's BBQ, 955 S. Vermont Ave., Koreatown. (213) 380-1717.

Capital's Hot Almond Milk in Pastry
Are we traditionalists? Perhaps we're traditionalists. Because as many advantages as there are to ordering dim sum from the little tick-off menus that have become standard at a lot of the newer Hong Kong-style seafood houses, we really prefer to get dim sum from rolling carts. I know the food tends to be slightly less long out of the kitchen, that it's the only way a non-Chinese is going to get to the chicken blood, and that you don't end up stuffing yourself with meatballs and bao while waiting for the roast duck to show up when you order from menus, but on a Saturday morning, immediacy is paramount. At Capital, you can even get steaming hot sweet almond milk off of carts, dosed with gingko nuts and topped with proud domes of golden puff pastry. Capital Seafood Restaurant, 755 W. Garvey Ave., Monterey Park. (626) 282-3318.

Kiyokawa's Sashimi
Fresh Japanese wasabi grated on sharkskin. Microscopically serrated cucumber. Chef-pickled ginger. Fan-cooled rice. Great sushi is in the details as much as it is in the fish. In Kiyokawa, as in so many great sushi restaurants, the creativity is at its most focused in the sashimi course, arranged carefully as a rock garden in a crystal bowl of ice: thinly sliced halibut folded into the shape of a fragile white rose; tiny lozenges of Spanish mackerel from Japan; fresh California abalone; an exquisitely fresh sardine. If you are not squeamish, there may be a Santa Barbara prawn, recently separated from its all-too-living head, whose sweet flesh pops in your mouth like segments of ripe grapefruit. Kiyokawa, 265 S. Robertson Blvd., Beverly Hills. (310) 358-1900.

Chung King's Chongqing Fried Chicken
This fried chicken dish is the red of silk pajamas, the red of firecrackers, the red of the Chinese flag, a knoll of crunchy dark-meat cubes dusted with Sichuan pepper and awesome quantities of salt, subsumed under a blizzard of fried chiles. If you wanted to represent pure dynamite in the form of a plate of food, it probably would look a lot like Chung King's chicken. Even children who have never experienced anything spicier than a bowl of Apple Jacks, instinctively know to stay away from this dish. My daughter took one look at the chicken and burst into tears. I rather like Chung King. She calls it the Worst Restaurant in the World. Chung King, 1000 S. San Gabriel Blvd., San Gabriel. (626) 286-0298.

Peruvian Roast Chicken
The first thing you notice about Pollo a la Brasa is the wood-smoke, great billowing draughts that perfume downwind noodle shops and coffee bars, and then the towers of split logs that make the wood-smoke possible. This cannot be the favorite restaurant of the Air Quality Management District. And the chicken, flavored with garlic and black oregano and roasted on a vast, flame-licked apparatus, is remarkable, well-garlicked, slightly spicy, marked with pungent smoke, caramelized and crisp, clearly the marriage of a chicken and a bunch of logs. Pollo a la Brasa, 764 S. Western Ave., Koreatown. (213) 382-4090.

Natraliart's Sprats
What do Jamaicans eat when they think nobody's looking? Sprats, which is to say whole little herring, bristling with bones, that have been marinated briefly in vinegar, fried to the brittle-chewy consistency of beef jerky, and garnished with a few slivers of onion and crimson shreds of fresh scotch bonnet, a pepper whose pungent, fruity heat punches through the limits of human tolerance. The fried sprats are tasty if you are not averse to the idea of strong-tasting fish, and the tiny bones go down easily enough. It is easy to see how sprats may not have the universal appeal of jerk chicken. It is also easy to see how some people (me, for example) like to toss the things down like potato chips. Natraliart, 3426 W. Washington Blvd., L.A. (323) 732-8865.

Hungry Cat's Lobster Roll
If you prize your sanity, try not to bring up the subject of lobster rolls with a New England native. Before you manage to edge away, you will be apprised as to how long the lobster must be boiled, how coarsely it must be chopped, and the exact brand of mayonnaise essential to the end result. You will also probably hear a dissertation on the top-loading hot-dog bun that will turn your knees to water. But when you taste the lobster roll at Hungry Cat, a first-class seafood restaurant near the corner of Sunset and Vine, a buttery, abstracted rendition of the New England beach-shack standard transformed into a split, crisp, rectangular object about the size of a Twinkie, you may be persuaded that the lobster roll is worth the fuss. In Maine, the $20-plus it costs would buy you a lobster the size of a small pony. But we are in Hollywood, where the next acceptable lobster roll may be 2,800 miles away. Hungry Cat, 1535 N. Vine St., Hlywd. (323) 462-2155.

Huckleberry's Maple-Bacon Biscuits
They have maple. And bacon. They're reasonably flaky, with a deftness one doesn't often see in things of this sort. Zoe Nathan is stepping up as the pastry chef of her generation in Los Angeles, coming out of a time and place where every apple tart was rustic, every croissant unglazed, every fruit from the farmers market, every pastry dashed with an appropriate lick of salt. And did I mention the bacon? Huckleberry, 1014 Wilshire Blvd., Santa Monica. (310) 451-2311.

duggar family recipe...as seen on tv

http://www.duggarfamily.com/recipes.html



NEW! ~ Grandpa Duggar's Favorite Banana Cake

1 box yellow cake mix
2 boxes vanilla pudding mix
5 bananas

Prepare cake mix & pudding as directed on boxes. After baking cake, spread pudding evenly on top. Slice bananas and layer over pudding. Enjoy!

Duggar Size It!

1 Industrial Size Cake Pan (or two 9x13 pans)
2 Boxes Yellow Cake Mix (and whatever ingredients is needed to make the cake from the box recipe: i.e. eggs, oil...)
4 Boxes Vanilla Pudding (plus the milk needed to make it : )
8 Bananas

Prepare yellow cake as directed & bake. After cake is finished baking use a butter knife to make 1 inch holes all over cake (removing the cake from the holes made).
In a bowl mix pudding as directed on box. Pour pudding over cake, making sure it fills in holes made earlier with knife. Slice bananas & lay on top of cake. Refrigerate until cold. Serve & enjoy!



Cherry Vanilla Punch (Served @ Mackynzie's Baby Shower)

1 quart Breyers Cherry Vanilla Ice Cream
1 (3 quart, 64 fl. oz.) Welch's White Grape Cherry 100% Juice No Sugar Added
1 (2 liter) Twist Up or 7-Up

Chill juice & 7-Up. Soften ice cream. Mix together for a delicious punch!


Homemade Liquid Laundry Soap- Front or top load machine- best value

4 Cups - hot tap water
1 Fels-Naptha soap bar
1 Cup - Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda*
½ Cup Borax

- Grate bar of soap and add to saucepan with water. Stir continually over medium-low heat until soap dissolves and is melted.

-Fill a 5 gallon bucket half full of hot tap water. Add melted soap, washing soda and Borax. Stir well until all powder is dissolved. Fill bucket to top with more hot water. Stir, cover and let sit overnight to thicken.

-Stir and fill a used, clean, laundry soap dispenser half full with soap and then fill rest of way with water. Shake before each use. (will gel)

-Optional: You can add 10-15 drops of essential oil per 2 gallons. Add once soap has cooled. Ideas: lavender, rosemary, tea tree oil.

-Yield: Liquid soap recipe makes 10 gallons.

-Top Load Machine- 5/8 Cup per load (Approx. 180 loads)

-Front Load Machines- ¼ Cup per load (Approx. 640 loads)

*Arm & Hammer "Super Washing Soda" - in some stores or may be purchased online here (at Meijer.com). Baking Soda will not work, nor will Arm & Hammer Detergent - It must be sodium carbonate!!



Powdered Laundry Detergent - Top load machine

1 Fels-Naptha soap bar
1 Cup - Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda*
½ Cup Borax

-Grate soap or break into pieces and process in a food processor until powdered. Mix all ingredients. For light load, use 1 Tablespoon. For heavy or heavily soiled load, use 2 Tablespoons. Yields: 3 Cups detergent. (Approx. 40 loads)

*Arm & Hammer "Super Washing Soda" - in some stores or may be purchased online here (at Meijer.com). Baking Soda will not work, nor will Arm & Hammer Detergent - It must be sodium carbonate!!



TIPS FOR LAUNDRY SOAP: We use Fels-Naptha bar soap in the homemade soap recipes, but you can use Ivory, Sunlight, Kirk's Hardwater Castile or Zote bars. Don't use heavily perfumed soaps. We buy Fels-Naptha by the case from our local grocer or online. Washing Soda and Borax can often be found on the laundry or cleaning aisle. Recipe cost approx. $2 per batch.



Inexpensive Fabric Softener Recipes

Recipe #1
1 Cup White Vinegar
Add vinegar to rinse cycle. Works great. Removes residue and odors. Also helps to keep washing machine and hoses fresh and clean too.

Recipe #2

1 Container of Name Brand Fabric Softener
4 Inexpensive sponges, cut in half

Pour entire container of softener into a 5 gallon bucket. Fill empty softener container with water twice. (2 parts water to 1 part softener) Add sponges to softener/water mixture. When ready to use wring out extra mixture from one sponge and add to the dryer as you would a dryer sheet.



DUGGAR's TATER TOT CASSEROLE
2 lb ground turkey cooked, seasoned, drained
3 2lb bags tater tots
2 cans cream of mushroom
2 cans evaporated milk
2 cans cream of chicken
Brown meat & place in large cass. dish.
Cover with tater tots. Mix soup & milk together.
Pour over top. Bake at 350 for 1 Hour.
(One of Daddy’s Favorites!) Makes 2- 9”X13” pans


BROCCOLI CASSEROLE
3/4 lb. Velveeta™ cheese, cubed
2 small boxes frozen chopped broccoli
1 cup cooked minute or brown rice
1 onion, chopped
1 stick butter
1 can cream of chicken soup
1/2 cup milk
Saute onions in butter. Cook broccoli as package directs,
drain. Cook rice, combine all ingredients; pour into 9x13 in.
dish. Bake at 350 for 45 minutes or until brown. Yum! Yum!

JEANNE’S SLOPPY JOE’S
1 lb. ground beef/turkey
1/2 c. ketchup
1/2 c. BBQ sauce
1/2 envelope dry onion soup mix
2 tsp. liquid smoke
Brown & season meat, drain. Add all other ingredients, heat
Through. Serve on buns; enjoy!


DUGGAR’S TACO SOUP
3 lbs ground turkey
1 med. onion, chopped
3 (4oz.) cans green chilies, chopped
3 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tsp. pepper
3 pkg. taco seasoning
3 pkg. ranch or 1 c. liquid ranch dressing
3 cans hominy, undrained
9 (14 1/2 oz.) cans diced tomatoes, undrained
3 (15oz.) cans kidney beans, undrained
6 (15oz.) cans pinto beans, undrained
5 c. water
Brown ground turkey w/ onion. stir in remaining ingr. Bring to boil. Simmer 30 min. Serve w/ Tortilla chips, grated ched. cheese & sour cream. Yum! Yum! Triple batch


BROCCOLI CHEESE SOUP
7 lbs. frozen broccoli
2 lbs. Velveeta™
1 quart sweet whipping cream
enough water to cook broccoli
1 c. cornstarch w/ cold water to thicken after hot
Cook broccoli first. Add Velveeta™ & whipping cream.
Add corn starch to thicken. Enjoy!


SLOW COOKER LASAGNA
4 pounds ground chuck
4 (28oz.) jar spaghetti sauce
32 lasagna noodles
3 (15oz.) cottage cheese
4 t. dried Italian seasoning
11/3 cups water
4 (4oz.) cans of mushrooms
6 cups shredded part-skim mozzarella cheese
Cook beef and Italian seasoning in a large skillet over medium-high heat, stirring until beef crumbles; drain. Combine spaghetti sauce, mushrooms, seasoned meat and water in bowl. Layer thinly in bottom of lightly greased 5-quart electric slow cooker: 4 uncooked lasagna noodles, sauce mixture, cottage cheese & mozzarella cheese. Repeat for each layer (approx 8 total layers). Cover & cook on high setting for 1 hour; reduce heat & cook on low setting for 5 hours. Can do ahead and store in fridge!! Yields 16 Servings (one FULL 5 quart Crock Pot!!!)



CREAMY CHICKEN & TORTILLAS
4 c. cooked chicken, diced
1 dozen corn tortillas, each cut into 6-8 triangles
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1 8 oz. jar salsa
1 c. sour cream
1/2-1 c. cheddar cheese
Combine the soups, salsa, and sour cream in a bowl and blend well. Grease the crockpot and make 2-3 layers of chicken, tortillas, and sauce. Cook on low heat for 4-5 hours. Add the cheese 15 min. before eating. Serve with salad and warm tortillas. Enjoy!
Serves 8

SPECTACULAR SAUTEED GREEN BEANS
Sauté on high till bubbly:
1/2 c. Bragg’s™ Liquid Amino
1 whole bulb garlic, pressed
Add:
1 5lb. bag frozen whole Green Beans
Stir well, Cover & Cook on high, stirring occasionally until
desired tenderness.(Bragg’s™ is much better than soy sauce, & makes a big difference in flavor.) Everyone’s favorite including company!
More of the Voeller’s healthy recipes can be found at www.thetwosisters.com

THREE BEAN CHILI
2/3 c. pinto beans
2/3 c. great northern beans
2/3 c. small red beans or kidney
1 clove garlic
3 t. chili powder
1 t. oregano
salt to taste
1 can of tomatoes
Anaheim pepper, whole to season, do not eat
1 T. apple cider vinegar
1 T. Bragg’s™ Liquid Amino
4 c. water
Combine all ingr. in crock-pot & cook 6-8 hours on High. (Add 1lb. cooked ground beef.) Optional. (Bragg’s™ is much better than soy sauce, & makes a big difference in flavor.)
We like to start the chili right before bed, cook it through the night & serve it for lunch the next day as Frito Chili Pie, with Fritos, cheddar cheese & sour cream! (Joshua’s favorite meal!)
Double batch fills Lg. crock-pot

OATMEAL PANCAKES
2 c. quick oats
1/2 t. baking soda
2 1/2 c. buttermilk
1 c. flour
2 t. baking powder
1 t. salt
1 T. sugar
1/3 c. salad oil
2 eggs, beaten
Combine oats, soda. buttermilk. Let stand 5 min. In another bowl combine flour, baking powder, salt, & sugar. Combine oat mixture, oil, & eggs. Add dry ingredients & stir till blended. Cook on lightly greased griddle or skillet. Yield 14-16 Pancakes.


HASHBROWN CASSEROLE
1 (32 oz.) pkg. frozen hash browns (2 lbs.)
2 cans cream of chicken soup
1/2 c. milk
2 t. onion powder
1/2 t. pepper
2 c. grated cheddar cheese
1/4 c. melted butter
3 c. cornflakes, crush cornflakes in Ziploc™ bag, pour
melted butter in & shake.
Spray casserole dish with oil. Layer 1/2 hash brown first. Then pour 1/2 of soup mixture = cream of chicken, milk, onion powder, salt, & pepper. Then half of the grated cheese. Repeat… Hash browns, soup mixture, grated cheese. Top with crushed, buttered corn flakes. Bake at 350 for 45 min. (Jana’s favorite meal!)


DUGGAR HOMEMADE ROLLS
1/2 c. shortening
1/2 c. sugar
1 t. salt
2 pkg. yeast
2 c. flour
Combine first 5 ingr. in large bowl & cut with pastry cutter.
2 eggs beat in 2 c. measuring cup, fill cup to 2 cup mark
with hot water. Pour over dry mixture.
Slowly add:
3 c. flour
Cover. Let Rise 20 min. in warm oven. Pour onto floured surface.
Knead. Flatten with hands into large pizza shape. Cut with pizza cutter into16 slices. Roll up from wide end to point. Place in greased pans leaving space for rolls to double in size. (can shape like crescent or lay on side where swirl shows.) Cover. Let rise in warm oven at least 20 min. Remove from oven. Preheat oven. Preheat oven to 375. Bake 20-30 min. depending on how dark you prefer. Immediately brush with 1 stick (1/2 c.) melted butter. (Everyone’s favorite Roll’s!)
Yields 16 Rolls in 2-9”x13” pans


CHICKEN & NOODLES
8 cans cream of chicken soup
10 T. Mex. chicken boullion
17 c. water
1 onion chopped (or 1 T. onion powder)
4-5 bags egg noodles
chunks cooked chicken (optional)
pepper to taste
Boil Soup, Boullion, Water, & Onion. Boil 5 min.
Add Noodles & chicken. Pepper either in pot or at table. Yummy!


LAYERED SALAD
1st- 1/2 head lettuce
6 boiled eggs, chopped
1/ 2 lb. turkey bacon, crumbled
2nd- 1/2 head lettuce
1 can peas, drained
1 small onion , chopped
3rd- 2 cups REAL* Mayonnaise
1 small container sour cream
Shred cheddar cheese over top. Chill.
*Be sure and use REAL mayonnaise, it makes a big difference! (One of Mommy’s favorites!)


GARLIC DILL PICKLES
3/4 c. salt (this is to salty for some;
may be reduced to 1/2 c.)
4-5 cups white vinegar
8 c. water
cucumbers (enough to fill 6- 1quart jars.)
18 cloves garlic, peeled
6 T. dill seed (not weed.)
Wash cucumbers, cut into spears, and pack in jars. Add 3 cloves garlic & 1 T. dill seed per jar. Place jars on baking sheet (or pan.) in oven at 250. (this keeps jars hot so they’ll seal when you add vinegar.) Boil vinegar, salt, and water, pour boiling mixture into hot jars, and immediately put hot bans & lids onto jars. (keep lids & bands hot by boiling them first.) Let cool on counter. (they should seal while cooling.) Let sit 10-12 days before using (this is the hard part! If you can’t stand it, only wait a week!)(Our favorite dill pickles!) makes 6 qts.


LEMONAPPLEADE
10-12 golden delicious apples- cored & cut into large pieces
2 small lemons-unpeeled & quartered
Put lemons through the juicer first, then apples. The more yellow the apple, the prettier the lemonade. Best if served over ice. Putting the lemons through the juicer first helps the lemonade not to brown as quickly. Enjoy!
Serves 6
More of the Voeller’s healthy recipes can be found at www.thetwosisters.com


ITALIAN DRESSING
1/2 c. olive oil
1/4 c. apple cider vinegar
1/4 c. Bragg’s™ Liquid Amino, Tamari, or soy sauce
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 T. Dijon mustard
Juice of 1 lemon
1 1/2 t. thyme
1/2 t. salt
1/2 t. salt
1/2 t. pepper
Whisk all ingredients together.
Mix the dressing by shaking all ingredients in a jar. (Bragg’s™ is much better than soy sauce, & makes a big difference in flavor.)
Makes 1 1/2 cups.
More of the Voeller’s healthy recipes can be found at www.thetwosisters.com

THE VOELLER DRESSING
1 c. olive oil
3 T. Dijon mustard
2 T. Bragg’s™ Liquid Amino, tamari, or soy sauce
2 T. honey
2 T. lemon juice
1 T. thyme
1/2 t. pepper
This dressing stores very well in the refrigerator. The Voeller Dressing can also be served over pasta, potatoes,& vegetables
& can be used as vegetable dip. (Bragg’s™ is much better than soy sauce, & makes a big difference in flavor.)
makes about 1 1/2 c.
More of the Voeller’s healthy recipes can be found at www.thetwosisters.com


CHOC. MOCHA HEATH CLOUD BROWNIES
Prepare one box of Brownies made using ‘cake’ brownie recipe on box usually with extra egg.
4 t. instant coffee (dissolve in T. hot water)
1 1/3 c. milk
1 sm. pkg. instant vanilla pudding
1 sm. pkg. instant chocolate pudding
2 c. cool whip™
mix together & then crumble up:
2 heath bars on top.
Makes one 9”x13" Pan!
(One of Mommy’s favorite desserts!)


ALLIE’S NO BAKE CHEESECAKE
2 pkg. cream cheese (12 oz.)
1 c. powdered sugar
8 oz. Cool Whip™
Beat cream cheese & powdered sugar together & fold in cool whip™. It will fill 24 cupcakes with a vanilla wafer in the bottom, or 1 heaping gram cracker crust, or 2 thin gram cracker crusts. (This is one of Jill’s favorite desserts!)



LAYERED ICE CREAM CAKE
Makes a 9”x 13” Pan
24 Ice cream sandwiches
8 oz. Cool Whip™
1 Hershey’s™ chocolate syrup bottle
1 Smuckers™ caramel syrup bottle
2 king size Butterfinger™ candy bars chopped up
1st layer -12 ice cream sandwiches
2nd – half of whipped cream
3rd - half of Butterfinger™ bars, Squeeze 1/2 of caramel &
chocolate over that.
4th - rest of ice cream sandwiches
5th – Cool Whip™
6th - rest of Butterfinger™, caramel & chocolate
You can freeze this and eat as desired! Yummy! Yummy!


BUCKEYES
(Michelle is originally from Ohio)
Combine & mix:
1 lb. peanut butter
1 lb. powdered sugar
2 sticks melted butter (1c.)
Shape into balls & cool in freezer.
Combine in double boiler on low:
1/2 slab paraffin
12 oz. choc, chips
Dip balls in with toothpick. Cool on waxed paper. Store in layers on waxed paper.

DADDY’S FAVORITE OATMEAL COOKIES
(& Jessa’s favorite cookie dough!)
1 c. butter
1 c. brown sugar
1 c. white sugar
2 eggs
Cream first four ingredients Together,
Now add:
1 t. baking soda
1 t. baking powder
1/2 t. salt
2 c. flour
3 c. oatmeal (or just a little less)
1 1/2 c. chocolate chips (optional)
Mix. Shape into balls on pan, then flatten with hand.
Bake at 350 for 10-15 min.

BUTTERSCOTCH BROWNIES
1 c. brown sugar, or sucanat*
1/4 c. oil (3T. olive oil)
1 egg
1 t. vanilla
3/4 c. flour
1 t. baking powder
1/2 t. salt
1/2 c. nuts, chopped (optional)
Mix together first four ingredients. Then add remaining ingredients & mix well. Spread into greased 8”x8” baking dish. Bake at 350 for approx. 20 min. Do not over bake. *if using sucanat, add 2 t. water. Enjoy!


ST. JOHN’S BANANA BREAD
1/2 c. butter
1 c. sugar
2 eggs
2 c. sifted flour
1 t. salt
1 t. baking soda
3 large bananas
1 c. chopped nuts
1 t. melted butter
cinnamon-sugar mixture
Cream butter &sugar. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Mix in sifted dry ingredients. Beat in mashed bananas. Add nuts. Pour into a greased & floured 9”x5”x3”-pan. Bake at 350 for 50-60 min. While bread is still warm brush with melted butter & sprinkle with cinnamon-sugar. Deliciously Tasteful!
makes 1 Loaf

FLAKEY PIE CRUST
2 2/3 c. sifted regular flour
1 t. salt
1 c. shortening
6 T. ice-cold water
Combine first 3 ingr. in large mixing bowl. Cut well with pastry cutter. Add ice-cold water. Cut with pastry cutter, thoroughly. *Always cut never stir. Dampen counter w/ wet cloth & lay saran wrap down. Sprinkle wrap with flour. Divide in 1/2. Shape into balls. Roll out on floured saran wrap, adding flour (sifted) as needed to keep from sticking. Carefully slide hand under Saran™ wrap. Invert pie plate over top of pie crust, center it, & flip, position it & peel saran wrap carefully off. Trim edges & shape as desired. (This is Daddy’s favorite pie crust w/ his favorite pie, pumpkin!)
Yields 2 crusts

DADDY’S FAVORITE PUMPKIN PIE RECIPE
4 eggs, slightly beaten
1 can (29oz.) Libby’s™ Solid Pack Pumpkin™
1 1/2 c. sugar
1 t. salt
2 t. ground cinnamon
1 t. ground ginger
1/2 t. ground cloves
2 (13oz.) cans evaporated milk or 3 1/4 c. half n’ half
2 9” unbaked homemade pie shells
with high fluted edge*
Preheat oven to 425. Combine filling ingr. in order given;
Divide evenly into pie shells. Bake 15min. Reduce temp. to 350 & bake an additional 45 min. or until knife inserted near center of
each pie comes out clean. Cool; garnish, if desired, with whipped topping.
For 2 Pies
*If regular 9” Frozen pie shells are substituted, recipe fills 4 (bake in two batches). Slightly thaw pie shells while combining other ingredients. Preheat cookie sheet while preheating oven to 375. Bake 2 pies on cookie sheet 45 min. or until pies test done as directed above. Repeat with remaining 2 pies.
*If deep dish 9” frozen pie shells are substituted, recipe fills 2. Let shell thaw 20 min. then re-crimp edge to stand 1/2” above rim. Preheat cookie sheet while preheating oven to 375. Bake 70 min. or until pies test done as noted above.
For One pie, follow above recipe but divide all ingredients in Half (half of one 29 oz. can measures 1 1/2 c.) Mix & bake as suggested. Enjoy!



NOTE: ™ = Trademark. All trademarks are property of their respective owners. Results may vary. All recipes are valid for non-commercial use otherwise written permission must be obtained from the The Jim Bob & Michelle Duggar Family. © Copyright 2009

Dream of irish scones and other irish recipes

http://www.littleshamrocks.com/Irish-Bread-Scone-Recipes.html

Perfect Scones
From the Kitchen of Mary Lydon Dunsany, Co. Meath, Ireland
3 cups self-rising flour
3 teaspoons baking powder
pinch of sea salt
1 stick plus 1 tablespoon butter, softened
3 tablespoons castor (superfine) sugar,
plus 2 teaspoons to dust
3/4 cup sultanas or raisins
3 large eggs
1 cup ice-cold milk, extra to glaze

Preheat the oven to 350. Line a baking sheet with baking parchment. Sift the flour, baking powder and salt together into a large bowl. Add the butter in little pieces and rub it in using the tips of your fingers and lifting the flour up high to aerate it.

When the butter is incorporated the mixture should look like fine bread crumbs. Sir in the sugar, then sultanas. In another bowl, beat the egg with the milk. Pour 3/4 into the flour mixture and quickly mix together with a large table knife, adding extra mixture as necessary to give a soft but not sticky dough. Do not over-mix; the quicker and lighter the mixing, the higher your scones will rise. Turn the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and very gently roll with a rolling pin or pat out with your fingers to 3/4 - 1 inch thickness. Using a 2-1/2 or 3 inch biscuit cutter, press out as many rounds as you can, gently reshaping the trimmings to cut out a couple more if you can. Place the scones on the lined baking sheet, brush the tops with milk and lightly sprinkle with extra sugar. Bake at 350 for 20 - 25 minutes until risen and golden brown.
To check if the scones are ready, light squeeze the sides of one; the dough should be springy. Place on wire rack and eat while warm, split and buttered, with or without clotted cream or jam. Yield: 12 to 15 scones

http://ivysfeast.blogspot.com/2009/12/in-eyes-of-irish-man.html

Irish Scones
Makes 6 to 8 scones

1/4 cup currants
2 tablespoons Irish whisky or brandy
10 ounces all purpose flour (about 2 cups plus 1 tablespoon)

2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
1/4 cup toasted hazelnuts, peeled and roughly chopped
1 large egg
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 tablespoon milk
3 tablespoons coarse (demerara) sugar

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F. Combine the currants and booze in a small bowl and allow the fruit to plump for 30 minutes. Discard (or drink) the booze, pat the currants dry with a paper towel, and set them aside.

Put the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, and sugar in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse to combine. Add the butter and pulse on and off to the refrain of "Jingle Bells" (jjjingle-bells-jjjingle-bells-jjjingle-all-the-waaaayyyyy), so that the butter is in small bits no larger than a brown lentil.

Transfer the flour-butter mixture to a large bowl and fold in the nuts and plumped currants. Whisk the egg into the buttermilk and add all but a few tablespoons of the wet mixture to the flour-butter mixture. Stir until the dough with a rubber spatula until it just comes together, adding more of the buttermilk mixture if the dough is too dry to come together. Turn the dough out onto a very lightly floured surface and knead until the dough is just smooth, a few turns should be enough.

Pat the dough into a 1-inch thick disc and brush it with the milk. Sprinkle the sugar over the top and cut the disc into 6 or 8-equal sized wedges with a chef's knife. Transfer the scones to a baking sheet and bake until the edges are golden brown, 15-20 minutes


Chocolate Whiskey Cake
Don't be tempted to use up that old yellow box of chalky supermarket baking chocolate on this cake. You're already making the investment in butter and whiskey; go all the way and buy a good-quality, name-brand chocolate. I used Ghirardelli, but local favorites Tcho and Guittard would work well, too. Same goes for the cocoa powder; skip the Hershey's and try the much more flavorful cocoas made by Ghirardelli, Scharffenberger, Valrhona, or Droste. And while Irish whiskey is the most appropriate for St. Patty's Day, all-American bourbon or rye is quite tasty, too.

Serves: 10 to 12

Ingredients:
1 cup Irish whiskey, plus more for sprinkling
1 cup golden raisins
5 ounces good-quality unsweetened chocolate
1 cup really strong coffee
2 1/2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup (2 sticks, 8 oz) unsalted butter, softened, more for greasing pan
1 3/4 cups granulated sugar
3 large eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 cups all-purpose flour, more for dusting pan

Confectioners’ sugar, for garnish

Preparation:
1. In a medium bowl, pour whiskey over raisins and set aside.

2. Grease and flour a 10-cup-capacity Bundt pan. Preheat oven to 325°F.

3. In a double boiler over simmering water, melt chocolate. Remove from heat and let cool.

4. In a measuring cup, dissolve cocoa powder and salt in hot coffee, then add to whiskey-raisin mixture. Let cool.

5. In a large bowl, cream 1 cup butter until fluffy. Add sugar and beat until well combined. Beat in the eggs one at a time, beating well between each addition. Beat in the vanilla extract, baking soda, and melted chocolate, scraping down sides of bowl with a rubber spatula.

6. Beat in a third of the whiskey mixture. When liquid is absorbed, fold in 1 cup flour. Repeat with a third of whiskey mixture, followed by remaining cup of flour. Add the last of the whiskey mixture, folding gently just until well mixed. Scrape batter into prepared pan. Bake until a cake tester inserted into center of cake comes out clean, about 1 hour 10 minutes.

7. Transfer cake to a rack. Unmold after 15 minutes. If you really want a potent whiskey flavor, sprinkle warm cake with about 2 tablespoons’ more whiskey. Let cool, then sift over confectioners’ sugar before serving.

Ahoy Foodies!

Today is a big day for Irish Americans, including me. Which is kind of funny since we're celebrating a man of Roman descent who came to Ireland as a slave. Our holiday celebrating one Magonus Saccauts Patricius, son of an official working for the Romans in Britain in the 5th century, has become about all things Irish--none of which are green beer, corned beef, or silly shamrock festooned hats. Funny that.

Ol' St. Pat was brought to Ireland as a slave (before he was a saint, of course) by a group of marauding pirate types in 416 AD . Contrary to popular belief, he didn't exactly bring Christianity to Ireland, but he did make it much more popular. As for driving the snakes out of Ireland? Well, that's probably myth. But, he did herd sheep, so he would probably appreciate this lamb stew recipe, which I'm reprinting from a previous post, cuz heh, the recipe is still great, and very timely, too.

So tonight, there's no need to go out to the overcrowded pubs with all the other "Irish for a day" types and drink watery green beer. Stay home, crack open a Murphy's or Guinness, and dig into this little bite of Irish soul food instead.


Manning's Irish Pub Guinness Irish Stew
Serves 6

3 pounds boneless lamb shoulder or leg, cut into 1-inch pieces
Salt and freshly ground pepper
1 cup flour
4 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 large onion, chopped
3 medium carrots, peeled
2 cups Guinness stout
1 bay leaf
2 tablespoons minced herbs (thyme, rosemary, marjoram)
1 tablespoon tomato paste
3 cups beef stock
2 medium Yukon gold potatoes, peeled and quartered
3 parsnips, peeled and cut into 2-inch lengths
Salt and freshly ground pepper
1 to 3 tablespoons brown sugar

Heat half of the oil in a large sauté pan over medium high heat. Working in batches, season a big handful of meat with salt and pepper and dredge it in the flour. Shake off the excess flour and brown meat in sauté pan until burnished on 2 sides. Transfer browned meat to a large Dutch oven or pressure cooker* with tongs and continue browning remaining meat, adding oil if necessary, and adjusting heat if flour begins to burn.

Chop 1 carrot finely, cut the others into 2-inch long sticks. Add more oil to pan, if necessary, and add the onions and chopped carrot. Saute until the onion begins to brown. Add 1/2 cup of the Guinness and bring to a boil, scraping up browned bits. Put mixture in pot with lamb. Add the remaining Guinness, bay leaf, herbs, tomato paste, and enough stock to the pot to cover the meat. Bring to a simmer over medium low and cover. Cook until the meat is nearly tender, 40 minutes.

Add the potatoes, remaining carrots, and parsnips and continue to simmer, covered, until the potatoes are tender, 30 minutes more. *If using a pressure cooker, make the stew up to the point where you add the stock, bring up to highest pressure (2nd ring on most models) and maintain pressure for 40 minutes. Release pressure, remove lid and skim any fat off top. Add the potatoes, remaining carrots and parsnips and simmer for an additional 30 minutes.

Season the stew with salt and pepper and brown sugar, if needed.

Ahoy Foodies!

St.Patrick's Day is creeping up fast (March 17th), and if you're even a little Irish you're likely beginning to hatch plans to make homemade corned beef and cabbage, or Irish stew for the big day. But what on earth are you going to serve your vegetarian and vegan friends? You can give them a slab of soda bread and an extra pint'o'stout, but that's not really fair, now is it?

May I suggest twice baked potatoes? It doesn't sound terribly Irish (well, except for the potatoes part), but add sauteed kale to the potatoes, mash them, and you've got colcannon, a rustic Irish dish that's been served for as long as any Irishwoman can remember. Add some caramelized onions deglazed with Murhpy's Irish Stout to the colcannon mixture, stuff it back into the potato jackets, cover it with Irish cheddar, bake it again, and you've got a very Irish vegetarian main course that will likely capture the interest of the stew and beef eaters, too.

Thanks to a collaboration with the folks at Cooking Up A Story, I am presenting my recipe for this dish in VIDEO FORM! I'm still finding my feet on camera, so be kind. Stay tuned, there will be more cooking videos with seasonal vegetables to come, thanks to Rebecca and the talented team at Cooking Up A Story!

Happy St. Pat's (early)!


Twice-Baked Irish Potatoes with Stout Onions and Kale
(from The Farm to Table Cookbook, by Ivy Manning)

4 servings

“What’s your favorite potato story?” Gene Theil, the spunky potato farmer nicknamed “ Gene the Potato Machine," asked me one crisp November morning as I chose from his table of russets. I drew a blank. “Everyone has a potato story,” he assured me. It finally dawned on me: colcannon. My grandmother used to make the satisfying mash of kale or cabbage and potatoes for me when I was a kid. She said its origins came from necessity when times were tough in Ireland. Women would add kale, cabbage, or even seaweed to their mashed potatoes to stretch the meager harvest;-- the greener the colcannon, the tougher the times. Gene was happy to hear that he was right again, we all have a potato story.

My love of simple but comforting colcannon inspired this satisfying variation of double- stuffed potatoes; it's a sort of Irish soul food, if you will.


4 large russet potatoes, scrubbed (8 to 10 ounces each)

1 tablespoon plus 1 teaspoon olive oil, divided

1 1/2 cups thinly sliced onions (about 1 large)

1 cup Irish-style stout

1 bunch lacinato kale or Russian kale(about 3 ounces)

1 cup buttermilk

2 tablespoons butter, at room temperature

1/2 teaspoon mustard powder

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

1 cup grated cheddar cheese

1. Preheat the oven to 400 F. Rub the potatoes with 1 teaspoon of the oil and place directly on the oven rack. Bake until they squish easily when gently squeezed, 45 minutes to 1 hour.

2. Heat the remaining 1 tablespoon of oil in a large sauté pan over medium heat. Add the onions and cook, stirring frequently until they begin to brown, about 15 minutes. Add a splash of the stout and scrape up any browned bits. Continue to cook, occasionally deglazing the pan with the stout until the onions are deep brown and nearly all of the stout is used, about 30 minutes total.

3. Tear the tough ribs and stems away from the kale and discard or use for stock. Roughly chop the leaves and add half the kale to the onions, tossing with tongs to wilt the leaves. Add the remaining kale, toss, cover, and cook until tender, about 5 minutes. Remove from the heat.

4. With a serrated knife slice off the top quarter of each potato. Use a soup spoon to scoop out the flesh, leaving a 1/4-inch-thick shell on the bottom and sides. Mash the flesh with the buttermilk, butter, and mustard powder. Gently fold in the onion-kale mixture and season with the salt and pepper. Mound the mixture into the potato shells, sprinkle the tops with the cheese, and place on a baking sheet. Bake until the cheese is melted, about 20 minutes, and serve warm as a side dish or a vegetarian main course.


Ahoy Foodies!

Mr. Tofu and I just spent a peaceful four days at the Oregon coast. We're back, rejuvenated (except for shin splints) and wind blown, and the home fires are burning again. As I type, a pot of Cream of Vegetable Keeper is on the stove and a batch of Irish soda bread is in the oven. It's good to be back in my own kitchen after four days in a rental unit equipped with cookware that predates the Eisenhower administration.

Upon returning from our little getaway, I read all of your entries for the Farm to Table Cookbook giveaway. Thank you all for sharing your stories and thoughtful reflections on your vegetable crushes! It takes a brave person to admit to one's edible romances, so I appreciate your candidness! I got a lot of great ideas for veggies from all of you! Though I admired all of your posts, I am handing the prize this time to Rainy Daisy. Don't dismay, I'll do more giveaways from time to time. A humble thank you to every foodie who entered!

I know St. Valentine's was just yesterday, but if you're anything like me, you've already plowed through your box of V-day truffles. Just like any good mind altering substance- a taste only has you wanting more, so I thought you might like this recipe for Raspberry Truffle Cake, from The Farm to Table Cookbook. Please note that this incredibly smooth, rich, sexy mousse cake is a lesson in reading instructions. Don't think you've heard this recipe before, it's special.

First, you must whip the batter for 10 minutes to make it fluffy, then bake it in a water bath for just 15-20 minutes. You'll think it's crazy, because it will still be lava like in the middle, but keep the faith. Refrigerate it for at least 8 hours and the cake magically sets up. The results? Melt in your mouth chocolate ecstasy.

Oh, before you run off to the kitchen, please take a minute to follow this link >>
to The Oregon Food Bank. There's a lot of hunger all around the world, but there are also many families in our own back yard that desperately need help feeding their families. The numbers in the last year on food insecurity have been grim, so please donate, it's easy and it feels good. When donating, please type in "Blog For Food" in the "in the honor of" column, it will help track food bloggers' progress. Thanks!

Raspberry Truffle Cake
6 to 8 servings

12 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped
10 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into small pieces
5 eggs, at room temperature
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/8 teaspoon almond extract (optional)
1/2 pint raspberries, divided
Hot water, for baking
Whipped cream, for garnish

Preheat the oven to 375F. Spray a 9-inch springform pan with nonstick cooking spray. Tightly wrap the outside of the pan with 2 layers of foil.
Place a large metal bowl over a pan of barely simmering water, add the chocolate and butter, and stir until the mixture is smooth. Remove the bowl from the pan and allow the mixture to cool to room temperature.
Meanwhile, whip the eggs, salt, vanilla extract, and almond extract in an electric mixer on high speed until pale yellow and tripled in volume, about 10 minutes. Fold half the mixture into the chocolate mixture until no egg streaks remain. Gently fold in the remaining egg mixture (do not overmix or the batter will deflate). Pour the batter into the prepared springform pan.
Set aside 1/2 cup of the raspberries for garnish and sprinkle the remaining raspberries evenly over the batter. Push them into the batter until they are almost submerged.
Place the pan in a large baking dish and transfer to the oven. Carefully pour enough hot water into the baking dish to come halfway up the cake pan. Bake until the top is no longer glossy and the cake pulls away from the side if the pan is tilted slightly, 15 to 20 minutes. (Do not overbake. The cake will still be very soft but will become firmer when refrigerated.) Remove the cake pan from the water and allow it to sit at room temperature until cool. Cover the pan with plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least 8 hours before serving. If you omit this step, the cake will fall apart.
To unmold, dip bottom of the pan in a bowl of very hot water for 15 seconds and run a thin knife around the edge of the cake to loosen. Release the springform and shake gently to release the cake. Serve with the whipped cream and remaining 1/2 cup of raspberries.


Ahoy Foodies!

I made a wicked good batch of Beef Bourguignonne recently, adapted from a recipe in Lisa Schroeder and Danielle Centoni's beautiful new book, Mother's Best (Taunton, 2009). My guests loved it, I liked it (in fact I had it for breakfast just moments ago), and my buddies on Facebook have been clamouring for the recipe. As did my brother in Wisconsin. Seems everyone in the country is in this deep chill and needs a beefy stew like thing to warm them. In fact, I recommend their book to anyone who likes homey comfort food from around the world.

My testing of the recipe wound up being a bit too thin in the sauce department, which likely has to do with the high-sided stock pot I had to use because I am not lucky enough to own a massive 10-quart Dutch oven the recipe calls for. (Take note loyal readers who want to get me a Christmas gift.)

To remedy the sauce, I simmered it uncovered on the stove for the last 30 minutes to thicken the sauce a bit. Otherwise, it was lovely. Be warned, though: this recipe is true classic French cooking: It takes LOTS of time puttering in the kitchen. If you need dinner on the table in like, 30 minutes, this ain't the recipe for you. If, however, you're snowed in, as my brother was, or feel like getting into the kitchen and channeling your inner Julia Child, the rewards for your time are great. It doesn't hurt to have a glass of red wine to keep you company.

I served the beef stew (because that is really what it is) with celery root mashed potatoes; I've included my recipe for them from my book, The Farm to Table Cookbook: The Art of Eating Locally, which incidentally, would be a nice Christmas gift for all your friends and family who ought to eat more vegetables. I also poured a bottle of the most excellent Resonance Pinot Noir , which you must go seek out immediately. It's like drinking silk. More than this, you know there's nothing, to quote Brian Ferry.

And what about Mr. Tofu, you ask? I made him some seared scallops, because he will eat those if forced to, and they went nicely with the mashers.


Boeuf Bourguignonne
Adapted from Mother's Best, by Lisa Schroeder with Danielle Centoni

5 pound beef chuck roast, cut into 1 1/2 inch chunks
1 1/2 teaspooons kosher salt (divided)
1 1/2 teaspoons freshly ground black pepper
8 ounces pepper bacon (I like Niman ranch), cut crosswise into 1/2 inch pieces
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 large leek, white and light green parts only, thinly sliced
2 cups finely chopped onions
2 1/2 cups finely chopped carrots
1 1/2 tablespoons minced garlic
1/4 cup brandy
1/3 cup all purpose flour
1 nice bottle of dry red wine, such as a French Burgundy from Drouhin
4 cups hot water mixed with 1 package More Than Gourmet Demi Glace, or low sodium canned beef stock
1 bouquet garni (1 bay leaf, 2 sprigs thyme, 3 parsley stems tied together)
3 tablespoons unsalted butter (divided)
4 carrots, peeled and cut into 1/2-inch thick sliced on the bias
1 pound cremini mushrooms, quartered
2 tablespoons chopped Italian parsley

1. Heat oven to 350 F. Season beef cubes with 1 teaspoon of salt and 1 teaspoon of pepper. Cook the bacon in a large Dutch oven (8-10 qt.) until crisp, remove from pan and place of a paper-towel lined plate. Leave bacon fat in pan.
2. Increase heat to high and brown the beef in batches (about 5 batches). Remove all beef from pot, reduce heat to medium-high and add olive oil, if needed. Cook the leeks, onions, and finely chopped carrots and saute until tender, 10 minutes. Add garlic and saute 2 minutes, stirring frequently.
3. Add the brandy and cook for 4 minutes. Reduce heat to medium and stir in the flour, cook 3 minutes. Stir in the wine in small additions, scraping up browned bits. Add the meat and enough stock to just cover the meat, about 3 to 3 3/4 cups. Bring to a boil, cover and transfer to oven.
4. Bake until a large piece of meat can be cut in half easily with a fork, about 2 hours. Remove from oven an simmer uncovered, if necessary, to thicken the sauce.
5. While the stew is simmering on the stove, make the glazed veggies. (The original recipe called for 10 ounces of pearl onions, but I hate them, so I replaced them with sliced carrots.) Place a medium saute pan over medium-high heat. Add a tablespoon of butter and the carrots. Season with salt and pepper and saute until they are lightly browned. Add 1/4 cup stock, cover, and cook until tender and glazed, 15 minutes. Transfer to a bowl.
6. Add remaining butter to the same saute pan, add mushrooms and a bit of salt and pepper, and cook until browned, 10 minutes. Pour into bowl with carrots. Microwave the bacon briefly to reheat it.
7. Season the stew with salt and pepper, if needed. Ladle over mashed potatoes, top with sauteed vegetables, bacon and parsley. Serves 10-12


Celery Root Mashed Potatoes
From The Farm to Table Cookbook, by Ivy Manning (Sasquatch Books, 2008)
6 to 8 servings

6 large Yukon gold potatoes (about 3 pounds), peeled and cut into 2-inch chunks
1 to 1 1/2 pounds celery root
3 medium garlic cloves, peeled
1 tablespoon kosher salt
1 1/2 cups whole milk, plus additional
1 bay leaf
4 black peppercorns
3 tablespoons butter, at room temperature
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2 pinches cayenne
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
1. Put the potatoes in a large pot with enough cold water to cover. Slice off the top stalks (if present) and bottom roots from the celery root and peel the skin and hairy roots away with a sharp vegetable peeler and/or paring knife. Cut the celery root into 1/2-inch slabs, then into 2-inch sticks; add to the pot. Add the garlic, salt, and enough cold water to cover the vegetables by 2 inches. Bring to a boil over high heat and cook until a paring knife slices easily through the largest piece of potato, about 40 minutes.
2. Meanwhile, heat 1 1/2 cups of the milk, bay leaf, and peppercorns in a small saucepan over low heat.
3. Drain the potatoes and celery root. Force them through a potato ricer or food mill to make a silky-smooth purée. Stir in the butter, nutmeg, and cayenne. Remove the peppercorns and bay leaf from milk with a slotted spoon. Add enough milk to potatoes to make a loose purée. Season with the salt and pepper and serve warm.

MMMMM----- Recipe via Meal-Master (tm) v7.01


Title: Potato Cakes (Bakestone Recipes)
Categories: Breads, Breakfast, Vegetables
Servings: 8


1 lb Cooked floury potatoes
1 t Salt
2 oz Butter, softened
4 T Self-raising flour
1 Butter for filling


Potato cakes are eaten with bacon and sausages. It's easier to make them
with hot, freshly cooked potatoes. If using cold potatoes, melt the
butter before adding it. Choose a floury type of potato, and boil in
well-salted water. -- Drain the cooked potatoes well, then return to low
heat in the same pan: put a dishcloth over the pan and allow the potatoes
to dry for 5-10 minutes. (This is called "drying in their steam" in
Ireland.) They should be dry and floury at the end of the process. Sieve
or rice into a mixing bowl with the salt. Beat in the butter. Work in
sufficient flour to make a soft dough which is easy to handle. Turn onto
a floured board and roll or pat out to 3/4 inch thick. Cut into rounds
with a 3-inch scone cutter. Place on the hot greased bakestone and cook
over a moderate heat until golden brown underneath. Turn and cook the
other side. Remove from the bakestone, split, butter generously, and
close again. Keep warm while cooking the next batch. Serve hot. (Re
"self-raising flour": in Ireland and the UK, this is flour which comes
with baking powder/baking soda already included. For this recipe, about
1/4-1/2 t of baking powder mixed with a plain all-purpose flour will
substitute nicely.)


MMMMM



This is a much-loved variant on the basic Irish scone recipe. It would be true to say that a lot of Irish people, especially back in the old days, had a sweet tooth, and this kind of "small baking" would have had a lot of appeal. Thrifty cooks would have liked it, too: it doesn't feature any fancy imported fruit, but that old Irish favorite, the apple... and the recipe works as well with fresh in-season apples as with ones that might have just come out of storage and been a little past their best.
In this recipe (adapted from one in Maura Laverty's classic Irish cookbook Full and Plenty) the scones aren't rolled out and cut separately. The dough mixture is baked in a pan and the scones are cut apart after they're done -- and after they've been well sprinkled with granulated sugar for a little extra sweet crunch.
Click on "read more" for the recipe and instructions.
Ingredients:
For the scones:
2 3/4 cups / 350g / 12 ounces flour
1 1/4 rounded teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
50g / 3 tablespoons butter or other shortening
150ml / 2/3 cup milk
60g / 2 ounces sugar (brown sugar if you like)
1 beaten egg
1 cup minced or grated apple
For the topping:
1 teaspoon melted butter, and sufficient granulated sugar to garnish
Butter a 9x9-inch square baking pan (or similar) and set aside. Preheat the oven to 220°C / 450F. (You may need to set this temperature a little lower if you have a fan oven, to prevent burning. Keep an eye on the baking during the last ten minutes or so.)
Sift together the flour, salt and baking powder. Cut in the shortening (or buzz it together with the dry ingredients in a food processor). Add the sugar or brown sugar and mix again
Add the beaten egg to the milk and mix well: add to the flour, along with the minced apple, and blend all together just until well combined. The result will be a very wet and sloppy dough.
Spread this dough in the prepared pan and place in the preheated oven. Bake for 25-30 minutes. When done, allow to cool briefly in the pan, then remove to a cutting board. Brush the top of the baked scone mixture with melted butter and sprinkle thickly with granulated sugar. Cut into sections, and serve hot, split and buttered.
Makes about 9 scones.
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CHOCOLATE GUINNESS CUPCAKES

TIME / SERVINGS
Total: 50 mins
Active: 25 mins
Makes: 24 cupcakes
By Dave Lieberman
I love cooking with beer, and that's no exception when it comes to desserts. Of all beers, Guinness is the perfect one for desserts because of its distinct chocolate and coffee notes. Pairing it with actual chocolate is the obvious choice. These cupcakes are light in texture, but heavy in the chocolate department. The white cream cheese icing reminds me of the creamy white head that Guinness is famous for.


INGREDIENTS
1 (12-ounce) bottle Guinness stout
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
3 large eggs
3/4 cup sour cream
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa, plus more for garnish
2 cups sugar
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
For the frosting::
1 (8-ounce) package cream cheese, softened
1/3 cup heavy cream
1 pound confectioners' sugar**
Cocoa powder, for dusting

INSTRUCTIONS
Preheat the oven to 350°F.
In a large mixing bowl, combine the Guinness, milk, vegetable oil, and vanilla. Beat in the eggs, one at a time. Mix in the sour cream.
In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the cocoa, sugar, flour, and baking soda. Gradually mix the dry ingredients into the wet Guinness mixture.
Butter 24 muffin tins and divide the batter among the muffin tins.
Bake 25 minutes, until risen and set in the middle but still soft and tender. Cool before turning out of the tins.
Make the frosting:
Beat the cream cheese in a bowl until light and fluffy. Gradually beat in the heavy cream. Slowly mix in the confectioners' sugar.
Top each cupcake with a heap of frosting and dust with cocoa.

http://www.recipegirl.com/2008/08/11/chocolate-guinness-stout-cake/
CHOCOLATE GUINNESS STOUT CAKE
www.RecipeGirl.com
CAKE:
¼ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/3 cup Guinness draught stout
1 cup flour
¾ tsp baking soda
¼ tsp baking powder
1/8 tsp salt
1/3 cup butter, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
½ tsp vanilla extract
1/3 cup low fat buttermilk
CHOCOLATE GUINNESS SAUCE:
¼ cup Guinness draught stout
4 Tbs brown sugar
2 Tbs unsweetened cocoa powder
½ tsp vanilla extract
CHOCOLATE GANACHE GLAZE:
10 ounces (1¼ cups) heavy whipping cream
10 ounces semi-sweet chocolate chips (or bar broken into small pieces)
1. Preheat oven to 350°F. and place rack in middle of oven. Grease and lightly flour 9-inch cake pan (or use 8-inch pan if you’d like a slightly taller cake.)
2. In a small saucepan, combine cocoa powder and stout. Heat over low-moderate heat until smooth. Set aside to cool.
3. In a medium bowl, sift together flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. In a large bowl with an electric mixer on low- medium speed, beat butter until creamy. Gradually add sugar and beat until pale yellow in color. Beat in eggs, one at a time, and vanilla.
4. Stir buttermilk into cooled cocoa and stout mixture.
5. With the mixer on low, slowly add 1/3 of the buttermilk mixture into creamed butter until incorporated. Add the flour mixture in three parts, alternating with the remaining two parts of the buttermilk and ending with the flour. Batter will look grainy or appear to be breaking up.
6. Pour batter into prepared cake pan and bake 25-35 minutes or until cake pulls away from the sides of the pan and a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out clean. Remove to wire rack with parchment or waxed paper beneath it. Allow cake to cool in pan for 10 minutes, then slide knife around the edge of pan and invert to release cake, bottom side up, onto wire rack. When cool, use a fork to poke holes generously into bottom side of cake.
7. To prepare sauce: Mix sauce ingredients in a small saucepan and heat over low heat until smooth. Allow to cool. Spoon ¾ of the sauce over bottom of cake, allowing sauce to seep into cake. Invert cake right side up onto serving platter. Poke holes in top of cake and spoon remainder of sauce on top of cake.
8. Prepare glaze: Bring cream to a simmer in a small saucepan. Turn off heat and stir in chocolate until sauce is smooth and creamy. Pour onto finished cake, smooth ganache atop and along sides of cake. Ganache will pool at bottom of cake and can be removed with a knife.
9. If desired, spoon extra ganache into ziploc baggie, snip corner and squeeze atop cake in zigzag lines or decorative pattern. If ganache is too runny, allow to thicken in bag until stiff. Or, reserve extra ganache in refrigerator to spoon over ice cream or form into truffles.
Yield: One 9-inch or 8-inch cake
Recipe Source: Kells Restaurant and Pub, Portland OR

IRISH CREAM BUNDT CAKE
www.RecipeGirl.com
CAKE:
1 cup chopped pecans
1 package yellow cake mix
3.4oz. package instant vanilla pudding mix
4 large eggs
¼ cup water
½ cup vegetable oil
¾ cup Irish Cream liqueur
GLAZE:
½ cup butter
¼ cup water
1 cup granulated sugar
¼ cup Irish Cream liqueur
1. Preheat oven to 325°F. Grease and flour 10-inch bundt pan. Sprinkle chopped nuts evenly over bottom of pan.
2. In a large bowl, combine cake and pudding mixes. Add eggs, water, oil and liqueur. Beat for 5 minutes at high speed. Pour batter over nuts in pan.
3. Bake 60 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in center of cake comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes in the pan.
4. Prepare glaze while cake is cooling in pan. Combine butter, water and sugar in small saucepan. Bring to a boil and continue boiling for 5 minutes, stirring constantly. Remove from heat and stir in Irish Cream.
5. Invert cake onto serving dish. Prick top and sides of cake. Spoon glaze over top and brush onto sides of cake. Allow to absorb glaze; repeat until all glaze is used.
Servings: 12

IRISH SODA BREAD WITH RAISINS AND CARAWAY
www.RecipeGirl.com
5 cups flour (regular- not self-rising)
1 cup granulated sugar
1 Tbs baking powder
1½ teaspoons salt
1 tsp baking soda
½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, cut into cubes, at room temperature
2½ cups yellow raisins
3 Tbs caraway seeds
2½ cups low fat buttermilk
1 large egg
1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Generously butter a 12-inch-diameter cast-iron (oven-proof) skillet with 2-inch-high sides.
2. Place first 5 ingredients (dry) into a large bowl; whisk to blend. Add butter, using pastry cutter (or fingers) to rub in until coarse crumbs form. Add raisins and caraway seeds and stir.
3. Whisk together buttermilk and egg in a medium bowl. Add to dry mixture using rubber spatula, and stir just until blended. The dough will be wet and sticky.
4. Pour dough into prepared skillet; smooth top and mound slightly in the center. Dip a knife in flour and make a 1-inch deep criss-cross in the center.
5. Bake approximately 75 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool bread in skillet for 15 minutes. Turn out on rack and cool completely.
Yield: 1 large loaf
Recipe Source: Modified from Bon Appetit
Cooking Tips
*This bread may be prepared one day ahead. Wrap tightly in foil or an extra large ziploc; store at room temperature.


COLCANNON
www.RecipeGirl.com
3¾ lbs Yukon Gold potatoes (about 6 large), peeled and cut into 1-inch pieces
4 oz chopped pancetta
1 bunch green onions, chopped
1 Tbs butter
¼ cup water
2 heads cabbage, sliced thinly (about 9 cups)
1½ cups milk, scalded
¾ stick unsalted butter, cut into bits and softened
1. Place cut potatoes in large pot of salted water. Bring to a boil; simmer, covered, for 15 minutes, or until tender.
2. While potatoes are on, saute pancetta and onions in a large saute pan with butter. Add cabbage and water and saute until cabbage is tender and a bit caramelized.
3. Drain potatoes. Place in large bowl and mash with a potato masher. Stir in the milk, butter and cabbage. Add salt and pepper to taste.
Servings: 6


IRISH BREAD PUDDING WITH CARAMEL- WHISKEY SAUCE
www.RecipeGirl.com
¼ cup light butter, melted
10 ounce French bread baguette, cut into 1-inch-thick slices
½ cup raisins
¼ cup Irish whiskey
1¾ cups 1% low fat milk
1 cup granulated sugar
1 Tbs vanilla extract
12 ounce can evaporated skim milk
2 large eggs, slightly beaten
TOPPING:
2 Tbs granulated sugar
1 tsp ground cinnamon
SAUCE:
1½ cups granulated sugar
2/3 cup water
¼ cup light butter
2 ounces low fat cream cheese, cut into cubes (about ¼ cup)
¼ cup Irish whiskey
¼ cup 1% low fat milk
1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Spray 13×9-inch baking dish with cooking spray and set aside.
2. Brush melted butter on one side of French bread slices, and place bread, buttered sides up, on a baking sheet. Bake bread at 350° for 10 minutes or until lightly toasted. (leave oven on) Cut bread into cubes and set aside.
3. Combine raisins and whiskey in a small bowl; cover and let stand 10 minutes or until soft; do not drain.
4. Whisk together 1% milk, sugar, vanilla, evap. milk, and eggs in a large bowl. Add bread and raisin mixture, pressing gently to moisten; let stand 15 minutes. Spoon mixture into prepared baking dish. Combine topping ingredients and sprinkle evenly on top. Bake 35 minutes, or until set.
5. Prepare topping: Combine sugar and water in a small saucepan over medium-high heat; cook until sugar dissolves, stirring constantly. Simmer on low and cook an additional 15 minutes or until golden – the mixture should be bubbling (do not stir). Remove from heat. Carefully add butter and cream cheese, stirring constantly with a whisk (the mixture will be hot and bubble vigorously). Cool slightly, and stir in whiskey and milk.
Cooking Tips
*If you prefer not to use whiskey, substitute apple juice for whiskey in the pudding. In the sauce, substitute 1 Tablespoon imitation rum extract and 3 Tablespoons water for the whiskey.



IRISH SODA BREAD MUFFINS
www.RecipeGirl.com
2 cups all-purpose flour
3 Tbsp granulated sugar
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup butter
1 cup buttermilk (lowfat is fine)
1 large egg, beaten
3/4 cup currants
1/2 tsp caraway seeds (optional)
1. Preheat oven to 375°F. Grease small muffin tins or large muffin tins.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. With pastry cutter or two knives used scissors fashion, cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. (You can also do this part in a food processor and let the blades mix the flour & butter together). In a small bowl, stir together buttermilk and egg until blended. Add buttermilk mixture to dry ingredients and stir to combine. Stir in currants and caraway seeds (if using).
3. Spoon batter into prepared muffin cups. Bake 20 to 25 minutes (longer for the larger muffins), or until cake tester inserted in center of one muffin comes out clean.
4. Remove muffin tin or tins to wire rack. Cool 5 minutes before removing muffins from cups; finish cooling on rack. Serve warm or cool completely and store muffins in an airtight container at room temperature.
Yield: 12 regular- sized muffins or 5 large
Cooking Tips
*These muffins freeze well.
*Reader tip: Try using 1 cup of white flour and 1 cup of wheat flour- yum!
*Reader tip: Try subbing raspberries and blueberries for the currants (with no caraway seeds). We loved it this way.
Recipe Source: Adapted from Mostly Muffins


CREAM SCONES
www.RecipeGirl.com
1 large egg
2/3 cup heavy whipping cream
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 Tbs granulated sugar
1 Tbs baking powder
¼ tsp salt
5 Tbs unsalted butter, cut into small pieces and chilled
¾ cup moist, plump currants
1. Center a rack in the oven and preheat the oven to 400°F. Line a baking sheet with parchment or a silicone mat.
2. Stir the egg and cream together.
3. Whisk the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt together in a large bowl. Drop in the butter and, using your fingers, toss to coat the pieces of butter with flour. Quickly, working with your fingertips or a pastry blender, cut and rub the butter into the dry ingredients until the mixture is pebbly.
4. Pour the egg, cream and currants over the dry ingredients and stir with a fork just until the dough, which will be wet and sticky, come together. Don’t overdo it. Still in the bowl, gently knead the dough by hand, or turn it with a rubber spatula 8 to 10 times.
5. Lightly dust a work surface with flour and turn out the dough. Divide it in half. Working with one piece at a time, pat the dough into a rough circle that’s about 5 inches in diameter, cut it into 6 wedges and place it on the baking sheet. (At this point, the scones can be frozen on the baking sheet, then wrapped airtight. Don’t defrost before baking- just add about 2 minutes to the baking time.)
6. Bake the scones for 20 to 22 minutes, or until their tops are golden and firmish. Transfer them to a rack and cool for 10 minutes before serving, or wait for them to cool to room temperature.
Yield: 12 small scones
Recipe Source: Adapted from Baking From My Home to Yours
Cooking Tips:
*If the currants you’ve purchased are rather dried out and hard, put them in a bowl with hot tap water for a few minutes and then drain thoroughly before adding to the scone dough.

THE BEST RED WINE SANGRIA
www.RecipeGirl.com
2 large juice oranges, washed; one orange sliced; remaining orange juiced
1 large lemon, washed and sliced
¼ cup granulated sugar (I like to use superfine sugar)
¼ cup Triple Sec
One 750 ml. bottle inexpensive, fruity, medium-bodied red wine, chilled
1. Add sliced orange and lemon and sugar to large pitcher; mash gently with wooden spoon until fruit releases some juice, but is not totally crushed, and sugar dissolves, about 1 minute. Stir in orange juice, Triple Sec, and wine; refrigerate for at least 2, and up to 8, hours.
2. Before serving, add 6 to 8 ice cubes and stir briskly to distribute settled fruit and pulp; serve immediately.
Servings: 4
Cooking Tips
*Cook’s Illustrated tested this recipe with more expensive red wines too and they found that the cheaper wine tasted just fine. It really is ok to buy an inexpensive bottle for this recipe. I used a Spanish wine… anything like a Rioja or the like is ok.
**The longer sangria sits before drinking, the more smooth and mellow it will taste. A full day is best, but if that isn’t possible, give it an absolute minimum of two hours to sit.
***You can easily double or triple the recipe- just switch to a punch bowl instead of a pitcher.


CRANBERRY MIMOSAS
www.RecipeGirl.com
4 cups cranberry juice cocktail, chilled
4 cups orange juice
Two 750ml. bottles chilled Champagne or sparkling wine
12 slices fresh orange, for garnish (optional)
Fill twelve 12-ounce glasses with ice; pour 1/3 cup cranberry juice into each glass. Top each serving with 1/3 cup orange juice and about ½ cup Champagne. Garnish with orange slices, if desired.
Servings: 12
Recipe Source: Cooking Light

OVERNIGHT EGGNOG COFFEE CAKE W/ NOG GLAZE
www.RecipeGirl.com
TOPPING:
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1 Tbs all-purpose flour
1 Tbs butter, softened
½ tsp ground nutmeg
CAKE:
1 cup granulated sugar
½ cup butter, softened
1 cup eggnog
8 ounces sour cream
1 tsp rum extract
2 large eggs
2½ cups all-purpose flour
1½ tsp baking powder
½ tsp baking soda
½ tsp salt
¼ tsp ground nutmeg
¼ tsp ground mace
GLAZE:
½ cup powdered sugar
2 Tbs eggnog
1/8 tsp nutmeg
1. Grease 12-cup round molded cake pan with shortening.
2. In a small ball, mix all topping ingredients with a fork until crumbly; sprinkle evenly into prepared pan.
3. In a large bowl, beat 1 cup granulated sugar and ½ cup butter with electric mixer on medium speed. Beat in 1 cup eggnog, the sour cream, rum extract and eggs until blended.
4. In a separate bowl, whisk together flour and remaining dry cake ingredients. Stir dry mixture into wet mixture. Spoon evenly into pan (on top of the topping). Cover and refrigerate at least 8 hours.
5. Preheat oven to 350°F. Uncover pan; bake 25 to 35 minutes or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes and then flip out onto a rack to cool completely.
6. In a small bowl, mix all glaze ingredients until smooth. Add more eggnog if not thin enough to drizzle. Spoon over coffee cake. Cut and serve.
Servings: 15
Cooking Tips
*Freshly grated nutmeg is best!
**I used full fat eggnog and full fat sour cream for this recipe, and the end result was a super moist and rich cake. You can certainly try to sub the lower fat versions but the baked product might turn out slightly different.
***Use real rum if you’d like (in place of the extract).
Recipe Source: Adapted from Betty Crocker

AMISH PUMPKIN CINNAMON ROLLS W/ CARAMEL ICING
www.RecipeGirl.com
ROLLS:
1/3 cup milk
2 Tbs butter
½ cup canned pumpkin or mashed cooked pumpkin
2 Tbs granulated sugar
½ tsp salt
1 large egg, beaten
1 package active dry yeast
1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
1 cup bread flour
FILLING:
1/3 cup brown sugar, packed
1 tsp ground cinnamon
2 Tbs melted butter
FROSTING:
¼ cup (4 Tbsp.) butter
½ cup brown sugar, packed
2 Tbs milk
¼ tsp vanilla extract
dash of salt
½ to ¾ cup sifted powdered sugar
1. Prepare rolls: In a small saucepan, heat milk and 2 Tbsp. butter just until warm (120 – 130°) and butter is almost melted, stirring constantly.
2. In large mixer bowl, combine pumpkin, sugar and salt. Add milk mixture and beat with an electric mixer until well mixed. Beat in egg and yeast. In a separate mixing bowl, combine flours. Add half of flour mixture to pumpkin mixture. Beat mixture on low speed for 5 minutes, scraping sides of bowl frequently. Add remaining flour and mix thoroughly (dough will be very soft). Turn into lightly greased bowl, then grease surface of dough lightly. Cover and let rise in warm place until doubled, about 1 hour.
3. Punch dough down. Turn onto floured surface. Knead a few turns to form a smooth dough, sprinkling with enough additional flour to make dough easy to handle. On lightly floured surface, roll dough into 12×10-inch rectangle.
4. In a small bowl, combine brown sugar and cinnamon. Brush surface of dough with melted butter. Sprinkle with brown sugar mixture. Beginning with long side of dough, roll up jelly-roll style. Pinch seam to seal. With a sharp serrated knife, gently cut roll into twelve 1-inch slices. Place rolls cut-side-up in greased 9-inch-square baking pan.
5. Cover and let rise until nearly doubled, 30 to 45 minutes.
6. Preheat oven to 350°F. Bake rolls about 20 minutes, or until golden. Remove from pan to waxed paper-lined wire rack. Cool 10 to 15 minutes.
7. While rolls are cooling, prepare icing: In small saucepan, heat butter until melted. Stir in brown sugar and milk. Stir in brown sugar and milk. Cool over medium-low heat for 1 minute. Transfer to a small mixing vowl and cool mixture slightly. Stir in vanilla, salt and powdered sugar. Beat with an electric mixer until well blended. If necessary, add more powdered sugar for desired consistency.
8. Drizzle icing over warm rolls.
Yield: 12 rolls
Cooking Tips
*If you’d like to begin preparing these the night before… Follow directions through step four, cover and refrigerate overnight. Take out in the morning and continue with step 5.
**If you’re lacking a warm place for rising, use your oven. Turn on the oven light. Then set your oven to 400 degrees for one minute. Turn it OFF and then place your pan inside the warmed oven. Make sure you have turned off your oven!