This is a meal for the deep, deep winter. Lamb shanks need several hours of roasting to get to falling-off-the-bone-tenderness, but they’re so worth the wait! I’ve paired them with aligot, or as I think of it, extra cheesy mashed potatoes. Only the French could take something as good as mashed potatoes and melt mild cheese into them for the most over-the-top, heavenly, mind-blowing potatoes ever. If you’ve never tried them, you should, because they might be the best thing […]
I’ve been making these chicken potpies since my girls were little, and, over the years, I started getting special requests for the fillings in the pies. My husband wanted extra peas and pearl onions but no potatoes, one daughter is allergic to carrots, another liked the original version, and it became fun, and a special treat, to ‘customize’ the potpies. I marked the top of each with the initial of the person whose pie it was using a small cookie […]
One of my husband’s cousins who lived in South Carolina had a sign in her kitchen that said, “Shalom, Y’all,” which I always thought was a charming way to express both her faith and her geography. It’s the Hanukah season, and these three simple recipes combine both Jewish and southern traditions: rosemary roasted chicken, rustic cinnamon applesauce (my husband’s favorite condiment on a latke), and oven-roasted potato latkes baked in a cast iron cornbread skillet. It’s the kind of meal […]
Louisa Adams was the sixth first lady of the United States, the daughter-in-law of John and Abigail Adams, and the wife of John Quincy Adams. She was one of the most experienced and formidable hostesses the White House has ever seen, living in Prussia, St. Petersburg, and London while her husband was in diplomatic service, and then entertaining frequently when her husband became Secretary of State and later President. When I found her four-ingredient recipe for clam chowder, I was […]
When you’re in the mood for a cozy, romantic dinner at home, wouldn’t it be fun to snuggle yourself and your significant other up to a good steak, flavored with brandy and black peppercorns, and accompanied by a red onion and sour cream tart tatin? It feels like a special occasion meal, luxurious and special, but there’s less effort and expense than you would imagine: you grill a steak, pop some puff pastry dough from the freezer section of the […]
