Cheese 'n Pickles » cooking

Apple Sauce

Mike — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 15:44:49 +0000

A snowy Sunday in Gardiner

Mike — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 02:02:24 +0000

Gallery

For your reading pleasure…

Mike — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 16:37:10 +0000

CheeseNPickles.com would like you to read this article from Time.

Pool Party!

Mike — Thu, 30 Apr 2009 01:49:24 +0000

Culinary Adventures: Very Brave Potatoes

Mike — Fri, 06 Mar 2009 10:50:48 +0000

Potatoes roasted with a healthy dose of harissa. The potatoes are brave but the diner is braver.

Culinary Adventures: Risotto

Mike — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 22:27:30 +0000

I made some risotto on Sunday night. It was simply flavored with peas and parmesan and the mirepoix based quick broth I seem to put in everything.

Making your own broth really, truly only takes an extra 5 minutes and it makes all the differences in the world. A risotto like this also benefits from a very healthy dose of freshly ground black pepper (I love the 4 pepper blend from Penzey’s).

I pared these with a warm sweet potato/swiss chard salad and the very dramatic brussel sprouts below.

Culinary Adventures: Banana Espresso Chocolate Chip Muffins

Mike — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 10:18:00 +0000

Good morning!

Heather threw together these banana espresso chocolate chip muffins from the Baked cookbook. Baked is a fantastic bakery near us in Red Hook.

Bailey’s Chocolate Truffles

Mike — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 16:46:08 +0000

I whipped up some Bailey’s chocolate truffles on Sunday night. Making truffles is much easier than they seem — just some cream and melted chocolate (a ganache, essentially), chilled, then rolled in cocoa powder. In this case I added Bailey’s Irish Cream to the mixture and rolled it in a combination of cocoa powder and vanilla sugar (also homemade, also super easy).

May I recommend serving these with a small glass of Bailey’s?

Saturday Night Dinner

Mike — Sun, 22 Feb 2009 02:38:25 +0000

Tonight, at Heather’s request, I made a little fresh pasta. First, the rolled out sheets…

…the cut pasta…

…and the final dish, finished with a tomato cream sauce.

Quinn helps with the Valentine’s Day meal

Mike — Sun, 15 Feb 2009 01:59:11 +0000

Quinn was nice enough to prep these potatoes for our Valentine’s Day fondue. Imagine my surprise when he handed me this baking dish and told me: “Listen, I know they boil the potatoes for Raclette in Switzerland, but boiling vegetables is for suckers, so go with me on this one. 450 degrees for about 3o minutes. Check them every 5-10 minutes or so and taste them for doneness near the end. Stir them if they begin to stick, but you shouldn’t have to mess with them more than 2 or 3 times. Oh, and hey, I just pooped, so if you could lend a hand, that would be great.”