Jim Lahey's No-Work Bread My Way

This is the now-famous bread recipe of perfectly textured french bread baked in a heated Dutch oven. There are many variations (and opportunities for variation) of this recipe. This loaf was fairly close to the original. Be aware: this recipe takes about 24 hours from start to finish, so please plan ahead.

Broccoli Cheese Soup

This is a lovely recipe adapted from America's Test Kitchen. You'll notice the unusal addition of baking soda to this soup. The baking soda helps break down the broccoli—without it, the brocoli would have to cook for a good hour to be soft enough for our purposes. This hearty soup serves 6 to 8. I think this would also be really good over potatoes—baked or boiled or on grilled chicken.

Chicken Braised in Soy Sauce and Lemon

I've been making this affordable dish since college. Serve the chicken with a little of the sauce over brown rice or rice pilaf.

Every spring when the asparagus is cheap, this recipe seems to be a natural pairing. I make a little asparagus drizzle sauce by shaking together 2 tbsp olive oil, 1 tbsp lemon juice, salt, and lots of pepper.

Cornbread Muffins

The perfect accompaniment to Turkey Chili, this recipe is a Jessica Seinfeld creation. These usually become desserts to my meals. I warm the muffins, drizzle them with honey, and serve with green Tabasco sauce. Divine!

Glazed Carrot Soup

Another delicious recipe from Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything Vegetarian. Before this recipe, I'd started to give up on ever coming across a truly delicious creamy vegetable soup. This soup completely blew me away. It needs no accompaniment...it's just that delicious. Although, serving with some french bread is lovely.

Roasted Beet and Beef Borscht

I have fallen head-over-heels in love with Mark Bittman's cookbooks: How to Cook Everything Vegetarian and How to Cook Everything. This recipe comes from his vegetarian cookbook and I modified it to have lovely tender chunks of beef and potatoes. This is health food at its most elegant and tasty. Unfortunately, no photos are available this time due to technical difficulties, but trust me, this soup is a beautiful magenta colour.

Turkey Chili with Kidney Beans

This chili is absolutely fabulous either on it's own or over a baked potato with sour cream, shredded cheddar cheese, and chives. The flavor of the chili improves with age. Try to make it a day or two before serving. It can also be frozen for a month.

Tikka Masala

I know I haven't written in awhile and I apologize for that. However, I recently have found inspiration in a new cookbook called How to Cook Indian by Sanjeev Kapoor. The flavors are huge and comforting and the texture is absolutely luscious. I served this with some homemade garlic naan and spiced brown rice. You can easily make your own spiced brown rice by adding 5 whole cardamom pods, 5 whole cloves, and 2 cinnamon sticks to your pot of rice—the result smells like dessert! It would probably make a lovely rice pudding as well.

Blackberry Pie

One of the treasures of summer was going out into the country with my dad to collect the little clusters of black gold. We would take the berries home, wash them well, and freeze them for use all year round. My favorite application for blackberries is in pie. Blackberries tend to get runny, so to thicken the pie, add tapioca. Unfortunately, for this round of cooking, I forgot to get the tapioca at the store. Even if your pie turns out extra juicy, it's great over ice cream!

Stuffed Zucchini Casserole

At the Farmer's Markets and in the gardens, the zucchinis are getting HUGE. I bought this particular one and decided to tackle the Italian-American favorite, Stuffed Zucchini. I seem to have very little time these days to cook and it seems we eat out more than eating at home. So, I am attempting to write and find recipes that are simple and don't generate a ton of dishes. Casseroles accomplish this quite well, and they become wonderful lunches for the next day.