Posts Tagged ‘family recipes’

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More Cold Weather Comfort

Wednesday, February 20th, 2013

Bitter cold, gray skies, gusting winds, snow, slush, sleet, ice: winter can be a lot to contend with.  One of the best antidotes is food that is warming and indulgent, something that makes us feel satisfied and cared for, soothed and nourished.  In two words, comfort food.  It’s almost a cliché, but one that continues to appeal to us, especially when the chilly world of winter makes a warm kitchen such a nice place to be.

Comfort food means different things to different people.  For some it’s simple scrambled eggs or a grilled cheese sandwich, for others it’s take-out Chinese or fried chicken or a stew that simmers away all afternoon on the stove.  Mac and cheese, chocolate pudding, meatloaf, dumplings, warm oatmeal cookies . . . the list could go on and on.  What everyone’s favorite comfort foods probably have in common is that they make us feel at home no matter where we eat them.

Here at MTG we have a good list of favorites, honed by years of weathering Ohio winters.  Soups could be at the head of our list: Classic Minestrone, Egg Drop Soup, Chicken Soup with Rice, and Cheddar and Beer Soup are just a few. For something heartier, there is always stew, from a simple Country Beef Stew or Chicken Stew with Mushrooms made in our slow cooker to labors of love like Pork Cassoulet or Beef Bourguignon.  And, of course, there’s nothing like a spicy pot of Texas Three Pepper and Beef Chili or Chicken and White Bean Chili or Vegetarian Black Bean Chili to warm us up on a freezing February night.

Also on our list of comfort food cravings are the close cousins of soups and stews, braises.  From Brisket of Beef to Sauerbraten to Braised Winter Vegetables with Butter and Herbs, there’s something inviting about the tender texture of braised foods sauced with savory braising liquid that makes a soul-satisfying dish.  The creamy mouthfeel and chewy texture of risottos sound especially good right now, too.  We like to make Wild Mushroom Risotto or Spinach Risotto with Chicken and Goat Cheese for a warming and indulgent supper.

Last but not least on our comfort food menu are the dishes we remember (or would like to remember) from childhood: pot pies, simple roast chicken, mashed potatoes, shepherd’s pies, and our version of a sloppy joe, the Sloppy Louie. They are quintessential kid food—simple, filling, stick-to-your-ribs stuff, good for warding off the chill of winter and chock full of nostalgic flavors.  Whatever your culinary yearnings this winter, we hope you find a nourishing dish to fill the bill.  You can find a great deal on our most popular stocks (good for making many of our winter favorites), plus more comfort food recipes at our Sauce Specials page.

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Posted in Cooking with the Seasons

Home for the Holidays

Friday, December 14th, 2012

Here we are, smack dab in the middle of the holiday season.  Thanksgiving turkey and autumn vegetables are behind us.  In front of many of us is the next holiday feast—whether it be Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year’s Eve, New Year’s Day, or the annual holiday dinner party—also known as The Big Meal.  What to serve?

It’s a festive occasion and we need a festive menu, filled with wonderful tasting food, but not overwhelming for the cook.  We need a substantial centerpiece for the meal, something with a little gravitas, plus side dishes that will do it justice and a starter that won’t leave everyone too full to appreciate it.  All these requirements and constraints can be enough to cause even the most experienced cook to pause a moment and rack his or her brain.

At MTG we love the holidays, so much so that we even have an entire section of our recipe collection devoted to festive recipes just right for culinary celebrations: “Home for the Holidays.”   When it comes to The Big Meal, we have a few ideas for you.

First, the problem of the starter.  In our experience, putting out a spread of great hors d’oeuvres before The Big Meal can sometimes lead to everyone enjoying the appetizers so much that they end up almost full before the meal begins.  There’s (almost) nothing worse than spending lots of time in the kitchen preparing a spectacular centerpiece for your dinner and then having everyone gather around the table and look sadly down at their plates, not able to eat more than a few bites of your labor of love.  Our answer: soup.

Elegantly served in small bowls or coffee cups, soup makes the perfect appetizer.  It’s flavorful, warming, and relatively simple to prepare, and it can be made a day or two ahead (or a couple of weeks ahead and frozen).  There is a nearly endless variety of soups to choose from.  Here are few of our favorite soups that would work well to start a holiday meal: Shrimp Bisque with Sherry, Roasted Red Pepper Soup, Creamy Tomato Soup with Orzo, Savory Pear Soup with Gorgonzola and Walnuts, Wild Mushroom Bisque, and Velvet Carrot and Ginger Soup.

For the main course, we sometimes go all out and make a deliciously complex and impressive dish like Garlic and Mustard Crusted Standing Rib Roast Au Jus, Rosemary and Garlic Rubbed Pork Loin with Apple Pecan Stuffing, or Herb Crusted Leg of Lamb with Red Wine Sauce.  Other times we make a simpler roast like beef tenderloin and serve it with a terrific sauce, although it’s hard to choose which one to make from a selection that includes Dried Cherry Cognac Glace, Madeira and Stilton Sauce, Sauce Merlot, Wild Mushroom Sauce, Bordelaise Sauce, Sauce Chasseur, or a simple, classic Au Jus.  Any of these can make your roast into a masterpiece.

For side dishes, we want some choices that are flavorful and interesting but won’t overshadow that masterpiece.  For a starch, Yukon Gold Garlic Smashed Potatoes, Wild Rice with Walnuts, Rosemary Roasted Potatoes, and Maggie’s Rice Pilaf with Butternut Squash, Pine Nuts, and Dried Cherries are great options.  For a veggie, we make Julia’s Carrots over and over, and we also recommend Butternut Squash Gratin, Kale with Caramelized Shallots, Root Vegetable Sauté, and Braised Red Cabbage with Apples.

Finally, there’s dessert.  We discovered the perfect sauce to drizzle over a flourless chocolate cake or scoops of vanilla or coffee ice cream, or a simple apple or pear tart: duck fat caramel sauce.  It has a deep, sweet caramel flavor that is accented beautifully by a hint of rich, savory goodness from a spoonful of duck fat swirled into the warm sauce. It can be made in advance and gently reheated to embellish your dessert, making a lovely finish for a special dinner.

May your Big Meal be a grand success, and best wishes from MTG for holidays filled with warmth, laughter, and plenty of good food.

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Posted in Cooking with the Seasons, The Holiday Kitchen

Savoring Potatoes

Friday, September 21st, 2012

One of my favorite comfort foods is a humble, warm, baked potato, its light, fluffy center encased in toasty, crisp skin.  Or maybe a potato gratin with tender, creamy layers of potato slices topped with gooey melted cheese or toasted bread crumbs.  Or maybe a hefty serving of mashed potatoes topped with a pat of butter or a generous spoonful of tasty gravy.  Something about the full, earthy flavor and hearty texture of potatoes reserves a special place for them on our plates.

Potatoes have been a favorite food for a long time.  They were first cultivated by the Incas in Peru around 200 B.C.  The Spanish Conquistadors brought them to Europe in the 1500’s.  Today, hundreds of varieties of potatoes are grown worldwide, and they’re literally grown from coast to coast in the U.S.  California and Maine are among the top ten potato-growing states, with Idaho taking the number-one spot.  Americans eat an average of 117 pounds of potatoes each year.

You’ll see four basic types of potatoes in markets:

  • Russet potatoes are elliptical in shape and have rough brown skin with lots of eyes.  Their white flesh is light, fluffy, and slightly grainy after cooking.  They are lower in moisture and higher in starch than other potatoes, and they’re best baked, mashed, or fried.  They take well to toppings of all kinds.
  • Long white potatoes are similar in shape to russets, but their skin in thinner and pale gray brown in color, with nearly imperceptible eyes.  Their flesh is dense, creamy, and subtly sweet when cooked, and they can be baked, boiled, or fried.  Their thin skin also makes them a good choice for skin-on “smashed” potatoes.  Small long whites are referred to as fingerlings.
  • Round red and round white potatoes are commonly known as boiling potatoes.  Their flesh is lower in starch and higher in moisture than russets and long whites, and they’re better boiled than baked.  They also roast and fry well.

Other types of potatoes are finding their way onto our plates, as well.  Yukon golds are a boiling potato with a pale brown skin and nutty, buttery flavor that make great mashed potatoes.   Heritage potatoes, old varieties that have made a comeback, can be found in a variety of shapes and colors like blue, purple, pink, and red.  New potatoes are very young potatoes of any type that have had less time to convert their sugars into starch.  Their undeveloped, thin skins and small size make them perfect for boiling, steaming, or roasting whole.

The thing about potatoes is that they’re delicious on their own, but they also marry beautifully with a variety of other foods.  At MTG we’ve found a number of great ways to enjoy potatoes.  One of our favorite treats is Hazelnut-Crusted Potato Balls fried in duck fat.  We love potatoes roasted with rosemary, smashed with garlic, mashed with a little horseradish, or made into a salad with a tangy mustard dressing.

Potatoes are a key ingredient in hearty, chunky soups and stews like our Classic Minestrone, Lamb Stew, Chickpea and Potato Stew with Tomatoes and Picada,  and Pork and Pumpkin Stew. They make a luscious crust for our Beef and Spinach Shepherd’s Pie, and they’re a must for one-dish meals like Steamed Tilapia with New Potatoes, Carrots, and Leeks and Slow-Cooked Chicken with Baby Potatoes.

Potatoes can star in sides like Braised Butternut Squash and Potatoes and Potato Parsnip Gratin, and they make the perfect foil for many a dish, from Coq au Vin to Corned Beef and Cabbage to Braised Winter Vegetables with Butter and Herbs, all even better served over a steaming mound of mashed potatoes.  Whatever your comfort food craving, a recipe with potatoes is likely to satisfy.  Happy cooking from your friends at MTG.

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Posted in Market to Table, Tips and Techniques

Vegan Sauce Recipes with the Sauce Maker’s Dozen

Thursday, September 13th, 2012

Vegans love good food just as much as omnivores. The exclusion of animal products doesn’t have to translate to the exclusion of flavor! Delicious vegan sauce recipes become easier with More Than Gourmet’s starter sauces. Our Sauce Maker’s Dozen for Vegans provides a great starting point for amazing vegan dishes. These starter sauces allow you to easily create healthy, all-natural meals, without the use of chemicals or preservatives. All the included sauces are certified vegan by the AVA. Vegetarian recipes are easily converted to vegan by replacing the butter with olive oil. You can either omit the cheese, or use your favorite vegan cheese substitute.

Veggie-Stock Gold is a versatile stock that goes well with a host of vegan sauce recipes. This stock transforms plain rice into a side dish and boosts the flavor of more complex soups and braises. Mushroom Olive Sauce goes well over noodles for a delicious meal. It also works as an appetizer when served with chunks of toasted bread. Veggie Stock is also a necessary component for soups. Mix the stock with a little water during the cooking process to make your vegan soups stand out.

Our Veggie-Glace Gold provides even more options for the vegan cook! This sauce is rich in flavor and texture, allowing you to create wonderful French dishes without using meat. For the onion lover, there’s our recipe for Sauce Lyonnaise to serve over a grilled or roasted root vegetable medley.  Sauce Fines Herbes is a white-wine-infused sauce with a delicate flavor that goes well with just about anything.

Mushroom Essence is the third cooking sauce in our Sauce Makers Dozen. The hearty, earthy flavor makes it perfect for vegan comfort food. These vegan sauce recipes are ideal for any time of day. Mushroom Gravy is a delectable breakfast option when served over home fries or biscuits. Our recipe for Mushroom Risotto stands out as a side dish or as an entrée. Try topping it with stuffed portabellas for a complete meal.

Our vegan sauce recipes are sure to delight vegans, vegetarians, and omnivores alike. These recipes are healthy and delicious. As an added bonus, our Sauce Maker’s Dozen includes two free sauces chosen by our sauce team.

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Posted in Tips and Techniques

Planning Your Summer Picnic

Friday, June 22nd, 2012

Whether you’re headed to a concert under the stars, a romantic getaway to the beach, fireworks in the park, a sailing or hiking expedition, or just want to have some fun with your family in the back yard, summer is picnic time.  The old cliché that food tastes better outdoors is still with us because it’s mostly true—there’s something about being outdoors that seems to sharpen our senses and whet our appetites.

Picnics also require a bit of know-how—corralling all the stuff you need to make the experience fun and comfortable for everyone and making clean up as easy as possible, not to mention planning, packing, transporting, and serving the food, are key to enjoying a picnic.  I’ve done my fair share of picnicking and have had a few mishaps (lovely chilled bottle of rosé, no corkscrew; settling in on a comfy blanket soaked with moisture from the ground; fresh, crisp salad turned to a wilted, sad heap by the heat . . . ), as well as many grand successes.  Here are a few tips to help keep your next picnic in the success column.

1.  Choose food for your picnic that travels well (won’t crumble, melt, or fall apart), can be made mostly in advance, and is tasty (and safe) served at room temperature.  I try to avoid anything that involves lots of sauce or other ingredients that can make food soggy, and I try to select finger foods or dishes that can be eaten with just a fork or a spoon for most of the picnic menu. Chilled soups (brought in a thermos), hardy sandwiches and wraps, sturdy salads based on cut vegetables and/or whole grains, and cookies and fruit (frozen grapes are a favorite) are standard fare at most of my picnics.  Here are a few delicious, proven picnic fare recipes from MTG:

2.  A few things to keep in mind when packing the food:

  • The ideal ratio (by volume) of ice to food in a cooler is 25/75.  The more food you pack in proportion to the ice, the harder it is to keep cold.  Chill food and beverages before packing them in the cooler.
  • If possible, use square or rectangular food containers.  They fit better in a rectangular cooler and use space more efficiently than round containers.
  • Pack the meal in the cooler in reverse order–dessert first, then side dishes and main dish, then the appetizers.  That way you don’t have to dig around to get food out as you serve it.  A separate cooler for beverages is useful, too.
  • Remember food safety: perishable food should not sit out for more than 2 hours, 1 hour if it’s warmer than 90 degrees outside.

3.  If you can, forego the disposables.  Use “real” cutlery, plates, and glassware.  They’re easier to eat and drink with, and food and beverages (especially wine) taste better served in/on them.  Don’t drag out the fine china and grandmother’s crystal, though.  Use lightweight discount-store, garage-sale, or “vintage” cutlery and plates (enamelware or melamine are ideal), and look for sturdy wine goblets or glasses that won’t tip over or shatter easily.  Cloth napkins and tablecloths are nicer than paper ones and great for wrapping up cutlery, plates, and glassware for transport.  The other good news: losing the disposables reduces the amount of trash.

4.  For clean up, bring trash bags, dish towels, wet dishcloths in resealable bags, and some extra resealable bags for leftovers.  I also like to bring several plastic grocery-store bags to wrap dirty dishes in afterwards—that way you can put them back in the container you used to bring them without dirtying the container, too.

5.  Keep a list of the equipment and supplies you like to bring to picnics and keep updating it as you discover new things that work well and things that weren’t really worth bringing.  You’ll eventually arrive at the perfect list for you.  Some of the best recent additions to my list are a tarp to put down under the picnic blanket, a couple of large serving spoons, a dedicated picnic corkscrew that stays in the beverage cooler, bug spray, and a lightweight polar fleece throw in case it gets chilly after the sun goes down.

The most important thing to remember for your next picnic?  Relax, unwind, and have a good time.

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Posted in Cooking with the Seasons, Tips and Techniques

White Wine Sauce

Thursday, May 24th, 2012

At More Than Gourmet, we know that adding a sauce to a food—like roasted chicken or poached fish or sautéed vegetables—completes it.  Sauce can take your dish from ordinary to superb.  Imagine that roasted chicken smothered in a savory mushroom sauce, or the fish with a zigzag of creamy lemon sauce, or the vegetables with a glaze of buttery herb sauce.  It’s all about the sauce.

When you don’t have an afternoon to spend in the kitchen making a complex, multi-layered sauce from scratch, you can achieve the same result with our White Wine Sauce.  It’s what we call a foundation sauce, good on its own, but also versatile enough that you can make creative additions that transform it in minutes.  Our white wine sauce is a ready-to-use classic velouté (a sauce made with flavorful chicken stock and thickened with a small amount of flour and butter) enriched with white wine.

Why the white wine?  For one thing, it contributes its characteristics to the sauce. The wine’s color, aroma, and complex flavors all take the sauce to a new level.  Wine also carries and enhances other flavors.  It actually helps release flavor molecules in foods and assists in dissolving fats, allowing the flavors of other ingredients in your sauce to intensify.  Other liquids, like stock or water, and fats, like olive oil or butter, cannot do this.

What do you do with our White Wine Sauce?  We have a few ideas:

  • Make a classic French sauce in minutes.  Swirl some tomato purée into White Wine Sauce and then whisk in some butter to make a Quick Sauce Aurore for chicken, veal, fish, or vegetables.  Simmer a minced shallot and some herbs in white wine, then add White Wine Sauce to make a Quick Chivry Sauce for seafood or egg dishes.  Cook some minced garlic in butter, then simmer it in white wine and add White Wine Sauce, plus some chopped tarragon and a little cream, and you have an elegant Tarragon Cream Sauce that’s perfect over roasted salmon or seared pork medallions.
  • Need a simple garlic sauce for pasta or a dipping sauce for bread?   Add some quickly sautéed garlic and a pinch or two of herbs to White Wine Sauce and you’re done.
  • Create a delicious chicken entrée by sautéing some onion, mushrooms, and thyme, and adding White Wine Sauce, cream, and chunks of tender cooked chicken.  Simmer the sauced chicken for a few minutes, then ladle it over crisp puff pastry shells and garnish with some snipped fresh chives.

You probably have a few ideas of your own for our White Wine Sauce, too.  The beauty of it is that this sauce gives you the perfect canvas for creating your own custom sauce—something that goes perfectly with the meal you’re serving.  That’s what a good foundation sauce does.

 

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Posted in Market to Table, Tips and Techniques

Menus for Mom

Wednesday, May 9th, 2012

Pondering the best way to treat the mom in your family to a special meal this Sunday?  One of the best gifts you can give is a dinner at home, cooked with love by her nearest and dearest.  The only difficulty may be figuring out what to make.  Here are a few options for you from the kitchens of More Than Gourmet:

Option 1: If you need something simple (life tends to get incredibly busy for many families around the middle of May), or if you’re a novice cook, here are a couple of  delicious menus that are relatively quick and don’t demand the skills of Jacques Pepin to prepare.

Simple Green Salad
Chicken and Wild Mushrooms Supreme 
Quick Fudgy Brownies or Brownies from Mom’s favorite bakery
OR
Braised Shrimp with Pancetta 
Rice Pilaf with Onions and Fennel 
Steamed Green Beans with Butter
Vanilla Ice Cream with Sliced Strawberries

Option 2: If you want to impress Mom a bit, put in some time in the kitchen, and maybe draft some other family members to join in the fun of cooking, here are two menus that will allow you to show off a little.

Braised Salmon with Asparagus and Mushrooms 
Yukon Gold Garlic Smashed Potatoes 
Lemon Bars with Fresh Raspberries
OR 
Pork with Cherry and Port Wine Sauce
Rosemary Roasted Potatoes 
Julia’s Carrots 
Chocolate Hazelnut Tart (a delectable, simple recipe found in Gourmet magazine back in the day . . .)

Option 3: If you love to cook and want to spend a day in the kitchen creating a to-die-for family feast, turn on the jazz (or Beethoven), roll up the sleeves of your chef’s jacket, and try out one of these menus.

Toasted Almonds Tossed with Smoked Paprika
Arugula and Frisée Salad with Oranges, Red Onions, Black Olives and Red Wine Vinaigrette
Seafood and Chorizo Paella 
Flan (creamy caramel custard) 
OR
Antipasti Platter (marinated roasted veggies, olives, sliced cured meats and cheeses)
Veal Osso Buco 
Risotto Milanese 
Roasted Asparagus
Chocolate Polenta Pudding Cake with Coffee Gelato

Whatever you cook for Mom this Sunday, she’ll know she’s loved and appreciated when she sits down to the meal you’ve prepared for her.  Happy Mothers’ Day from our kitchen to yours.

 

 

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Posted in Cooking with the Seasons, The Holiday Kitchen

Savoring Ireland

Tuesday, March 13th, 2012

Forget about green milkshakes, green beer, and plastic shamrocks—St. Patrick’s day is a great reason to explore and enjoy fine Irish food and drink:  artisan cheeses, from vintage Cheddar to Cashel Blue; rich, creamy butters; salmon from the rivers and scallops, oysters, and mackerel from the coast; venison, beef, and lamb transformed into stews and pies with flaky, golden crusts; dark soda bread studded with sweet raisins; earthy carrots, parsnips, turnips, and cabbage.

And then there is the Irish potato: grated and formed into cakes, it’s boxty; mashed and combined with spring onions and topped with melted butter, it’s champ; mashed and melded with savory cooked cabbage or kale, it’s colcannon.  What to drink?  Silky black dry Irish stout, sweet and toasty Irish red ale, or crisp, light-bodied Irish lager.  For dessert?  Often a humble cake, pie or pudding made with apples, or perhaps with chocolate with a whisper of fine Irish whiskey (and the whiskey is very nice by itself, too).

So much great inspiration comes from Irish cooks, brewers, distillers, and food artisans, it’s hard to narrow it down enough to choose what to eat come March 17.  At our house, I think it will be lamb stew, or maybe corned beef and cabbage, or maybe shepherd’s pie.  Maybe we should just celebrate a St. Patrick’s week instead—so we can get it all in.

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Posted in Cooking with the Seasons

Pot Pie

Thursday, March 1st, 2012

It’s a blustery day, just about right for the first day of March, and just about perfect for making a quintessential comfort food—chicken pot pie.  Something about tender chunks of chicken and vegetables swathed in a savory sauce and blanketed with buttery, golden pastry makes the gray skies and damp, chilly winds seem not quite so gray and chilly.  I remember burning my mouth nearly every time we had pot pie when I was growing up.  I’d be so eager to dig in that I couldn’t wait for the thing to cool first.

Pot pies are a little homely and old-fashioned, perfect for hungry kids or hungry grownups, but they’ve attained a sort of retro glamour lately.  You see pot pie proudly featured next to the gourmet mac and cheese on many restaurant menus now.  And guess what Wolfgang Puck included in the feast he prepared for the Governors’ Ball at this year’s Oscars?  Yes, chicken pot pie, with shaved black truffles, of course.

What I like best about pot pies is how simple and versatile they are.   There are just two basic components, the filling and the crust, and both can be easily varied, depending on what you have on hand.  For the basic chicken pot pie filling, you sauté some vegetables, sprinkle them with flour, stir in some stock, and cook for a few minutes.  Then you stir in a little cream if you like, along with chunks of cooked chicken and a handful of peas.  The filling goes into a pie dish, you top it with pie crust, and into the oven it goes.

The ingredients in the filling could be almost anything—leftover roast beef and mushrooms make a delicious pot pie, as do turkey, roasted vegetables and seafood.  As far as the crust goes, if you’re not a baker, you can buy commercially prepared pie crust dough or puff pastry.  If you want to change things up a bit, try making the crust with buttered layers of filo dough.  You can also substitute a layer of mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, or butternut squash for the pastry and voilá, you have an equally delicious dish, a shepherd’s pie.  One of my favorite pot pie variations is a Tex-Mex style one with a cornmeal and Cheddar crust.

The pot-pie possibilities are probably endless, but I can tell you one thing.  No matter how much the howling winds of March make you want to go for some instant gratification when your pot pie emerges golden and great-smelling from the oven, do your best to give it time to cool a bit before you devour it.

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Posted in Cooking with the Seasons, Tips and Techniques

Leftovers, Anyone?

Wednesday, November 30th, 2011

One of the best things about Thanksgiving is the leftovers, which, at my house, we tend to enjoy in phases.   First comes the sandwich phase, tender slices of turkey with mayo and cranberry sauce stuffed in a split dinner roll (or 3).  Then, after the guilt for how much we ate on Thanksgiving day passes, we start to have a hankering for just one more plate of turkey, mashed potatoes, and maybe some of that great stuffing, with a little nice warm gravy drizzled over the top.

The final and most interesting phase is the creative phase, where the leftover turkey is STILL in the frig, and something MUST be done with it.  This is the phase we’re in now.  In case you also may have a little—or a lot, if you were a little too ambitious this year like I was—of the turkey on hand, here are a few ideas:

Chili: Nothing counteracts that overstuffed Thanksgiving sweetness (I’ve neglected to mention that leftover pie figures prominently in the first two leftover phases and is usually gone by the final phase) like bringing in some onions, and chilies, and salsa.  This year I made a batch of wonderful turkey chili by substituting turkey and turkey stock for the chicken and chicken stock in our Chicken and White Bean Chile with Green Chilies recipe.  (Use 2¼ ounces of our Roasted Turkey Stock dissolved in 6 cups hot water.)

Risotto:  Try tossing some leftover roast turkey into your favorite risotto, or make our Luxurious Turkey-Mushroom Risotto with sautéed mushrooms, white wine, and Parmesan—this risotto alone is worth roasting a turkey for.

Pot Pie:  Who doesn’t love this quintessential comfort food?  You can make a delicious pot pie with leftover turkey and turkey stock—just top it with a simple pastry crust (or a store-bought one if you’re not a pastry chef) and bake it for a one-dish meal.

Soup: Roast turkey is the perfect thing to build a soup around.  One of our favorites is Turkey and Wild Rice Soup, a rich, creamy concoction spiked with sherry and bacon.  Add a green salad, a thick slice of good bread, and you have dinner.

By the way, chilis and soups usually freeze well.   You can always use turkey in a couple of large batches of chili and/or soup and freeze them.  This way, you can have the satisfaction of using up ALL the leftover turkey and treat  yourself to a freezer full of thaw-heat-and-eat meals that will bring back that Thanksgiving gratefulness in January or February.

 

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Posted in Cooking with the Seasons, The Holiday Kitchen

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