A Lucky Open House

One of the hallmarks of New Year's Day is an Open House. This is where everyone is invited to celebrate with a delicious meal and a drink.It's a neighborly way of celebrating with those on the block or with family and friends. the foods should have some symbolism to them to ensure luck for the new year.

Regular cotrniburtor David Tanis gives a whole menu for the perfect Open House in today's Wedesday 's New York Times Food section.Black eye peas are usually the star of any New Year's Day dinner. They symbolize good luck in for a brand new twelve months. Thjey're also easy to cook, even the dried ones.The beans (which is what they are) are cooked with some kind of meat. Southern home chefs usually cook them with flavorful ham hocks or even smoked turkey. Mr. Tanis uses the tastier pork belly with them, The meat has a dry rub of salt,paprika fennel and pepper. The pork belly is  cooked in a large Dutch ovenas the black eyed peas are cooked separately. What goes with them is a mix of chopped kale and mustard greens that have been simmered in garlic flavored oil. They are cooked until they wilt  after apple cider vinegar has been added to cut the flavor. The pork belly us cut into chunks and then added to the peas and greens.Mr. Ranis offers a side dish of cabbage salad with jalapeno lime dressing.Red radishes and sliced avocados are also added for bite and creaminess.

Every New Year's Open house should finish with something sweet to ensure a sweet new year. Mr. Tanis has a great recipe of spiced apple fritters with one fo the year's biggest trends  - hot honey. These can be made before the main meal since they shouldn't;t be eaten hot.It's apple chunks mixed in with spicy mix of cinnamon and allspice in with flour, baking powder for life, salt and sugar. The apples which can be any kind should be diced and peeled. These frittrers are unusual because they're baked fried in a Duitch oven. in a 375 degree  Fareneit preheated oven. Let the fritters cook until they puff up for two to three minutes and then let them drain on paper towels. Repeat until all the batter is gone. Mr Tanis suggests first dusting them with cinnamon sugar or confectionr's sugar. They can be drizzled with already made hot honey. This is taking warm honey and mixing it with both a quarter teaspoon of  cayenne and a teaspoons of crush red pepper.It should be steeped for a few hours before serving with the fritters.

Welome the New Year with delicious food , full of symbolism and taste. It;s a great way to welcome 2026 and neighbors. Everyone will love this first meal of the New Year

When Salad Makes A Statement

 Rarely does a food writer  change the world. Yet one  did just that with her newsletter  as she tweets against ageism. Emily Nunn's newsletter shed light on this while giving readers and fans some great salad recipes.

Regular contributor,Kim Severson, wrote about Ms. Nunn in today's New York Times Food section.Ms. NUnn already had an illustrious career as a food writer. Her work has appeared in The New Yorker  and she created their famed column 'Tables For Two" along with reporting for The Chicago Tribune, creating a blog , contributing to the website Food 52  and publishing a book The Comfort Food Diaries in 2017. She started her Department Of Salad newsletter due in part because she couldn't find a writing gig. A fellow food writer suggested on Twitter that she start a newsletter.It was her own tweets, sometimes cranky ,always funny and political kept her in the public eye. They focused on ageism, something she still experiences at the age of sixty-one. She was also good at creating salads, thanks to her living in North Carolina. Southern summers are lush and hot, perfect for yielding tomatoes and cucumber. The actor J.Smith-Cameron of the HBO hit "Succession"  tweeted that she would read a newsletter that featured Ms Nunn's sharpness and culinary creativity. By October 2020 she had created one.It does come with a price of $50 a year or $5.50 a month. Soledad O'Brian is already a fan as is British food writer Diana Henry.

Her salads are interesting and she also collects interesting recipes from other writers and chefs. Her newsletters are a cornucopia of advice, recipes and an interview with someone with a point of view about salads. Ms. Severson includes two of Ms. Nunn's recipes. One is an herby rice salad with peas and prosciutto. This can be a side or a main meal with more meat added. It's combining cooked long grained white rice with peas, a sliced onion and slices of prosciutto. Lemon and a host of herbs such as chives, basil, mint and parsley flavor it while red pepper flakes give it zing. You could also add a dollop of ricotta to it too.The second salad recipe is a nod to the past with a combo of oranges and radishes. This is taking a mix of Cara Cara and navel oranges that have been peeled , de-pithed and cut into rounds. They also have to be deseeded and chilled too. The radishes also have to be chilled after they've been cut into thin matchstick pieces. The dressing is simply lemon juice, sugar and salt, shaken in a jar until the salt and sugar dissolve (although I would add a scant amount of olive oil) and then chilled. The orange slices are arranged first and then the matchsticks are scattered on top followed by the dressing and orange zest.

Emily Nunn is changing the world with her wit, candidness and salads. All are needed today, especially the salads. It can definitely brighten a meal and a day.

A Greener Diet

Earth Day is coming up - April 22nd and it's a good time to re-evaluate  food shopping and eating habits. Not surprisingly what and how we eat does affect the planet.We can make it a better place - even with small changes.

You may begin to see grocery stores and nurseries have seed packet displays. This should spur on the thought of gardening and reliance on home grown produce. Think about the veggies and fruits your family likes and buy those seeds.If you're new to gardening, then also consider the easiest plants to grow. Radishes are one of the simplest along with carrots. Both are versatile in salads and hot dishes.Another easy combo ? Tomatoes and lettuce. These are a snap to plant and grow, plus they're palate pleasers. For those who have more knowledge then try the slightly more demanding melons and strawberries along with eggplants and melons. Another very important aspect of gardening is composting. This is where you can do a lot of green good.  Food waste such as rinds and eggshells make for excellent mulch. Surprisingly bones and gristle can also be added to the heap, although be reminded that their smell will attract wildlife such as raccoons, foxes, and even bears.Think twice before you do this. Leftover rice, moldy bread and doughnuts are all good.Even corn cobs are a great toss in.  Make the garden even more greener with grey water - water left over from baths . Also try to buy garden hoses with water saving nozzles.

Grocery shopping has to change as well. Our choices can directly impact our planet and our futures.Meat has always been considered a threat to our health and now it's a threat to our Earth.It can be an agricultural nightmare. Cattle farms require hundreds of acres of land. This means whole forests have to be cut down to make room for them.Also animal agriculture is responsible for  fifteen to twenty percent of total greenhouse gases globally. It is one thing to have a few herds of cattle for dairy : it's another thing to have thousands of them on a global scale for meat. The best bet is go vegan. If this is too much then think about vegetarianism. This allows you to have dairy and eggs. You can keep the malteds but not the hamburgers. Transitioning can be hard but there are products that can ease that.Try any of the Gardein tofu meats. They have a wide variety of products from hamburgers to even faux crab cakes. The taste is the same as the real thing, and sometimes it's even better. Another company with a huge array of soy products is Morningstar Farms. Their fake bacon is just as tasty and crisp as real rashers and their soy crumbles are great in chili and Bolognese sauce. Once you go from real to the substitute, then you can also change from dairy to nut and soy milks and products. These include yogurts, and ice cream  - which are just as delicious as their cow made counterparts.

It's easy to adapt a greener diet. It'll bring you closer to the Earth and make you more aware of what's happening with this planet. You'll not only eat good but feel good about the change too.

Gardening For Beginners

This is the time for planning your Spring garden. It's a great way to not only have organic foods at your fingertips, it's also a great learning experience.Yet many home chefs have qualms about starting a garden. They're afraid of what to choose and how to prep the ground. Yet, it is easy, if it's kept simple.

The first thing any home chef should do is look into low maintenance veggies . This makes gardening not as complicated or time consuming. Easy plants are the root vegetables such as carrots, radishes and turnips. Carrots are versatile  and can go from salad to cakes to even breads. Radishes, both the veggie and the tops are great in all sorts of dishes from stir fries to omelets. A good turnip crop can be turned into a yummy mash or fun oven baked chips Beets, those ruby red sweet treats, and another root veggie are also a dream to grow. Once boiled, they're delicious in salads..Zucchini is another plant that 's a snap to grow. One of the big plusses is that it produces three to nine pounds of the squash per season. Another plus is that it's incredibly versatile.It can be stuffed , or cut up into rounds or coins to be sauted in butter and garlic. It can also be the base of a summery ratatouille or turned into breads and muffins.For those who love tomatoes, their favorite fruit(yes, it is) is a dream to grow.The only problem and it is a slight one  - is making sure that the soil's pH is around six or seven. Add lime to increase it or sulfur to decrease the level.

Once you have drawn up your list of what to grow, start looking at your both your front and back yards. Yes, it's traditional to always have gardens tucked in some cozy corner of the backyard, but consider the front  yard if you have better soil and plenty of sun there. However, some towns have bans(!) on front yard gardens so please check with yours before you begin or you could wind up with a fine or a citation..The next step is acquiring the right tools. One of the first to get is a good pair of gardening gloves. They protect you from any thorny weeds  or the errant thistle that may invade your plot. Gloves also protect your hands from UV rays and prevent you from having gardener's nails, that crust of dirt that gets underneath them.A hoe is your second need.It has to be sturdy wide one for vegetable gardening. Hand trowels and spade are the next must-haves. Hand trowels are great in digging out weeds and planting herbs. Spades are perfect for digging seed holes and building up mounds around plants. You'll also need a hose nozzle with multiple settings. This can either mist your plants or provide them with a rain like spatter. Also a sturdy hose is a plus too. The last thing you want is one that keeps springing leaks. A small sprinkler is also a good buy too. It waters the garden without soaking the patio.

Gardening is not only useful to home chefs , it can turn into a fun hobby. Growing your own food is exciting  and renews interest in cooking. A garden is only a good thing.

Scandanavian Dishes For Lent

Scandanavian, cuisine whether Icelandic  Norwegian, Swedish, Danish or Finnish has the perfect seafood dishes ready for Lent. The countries share a passion for all sorts of fish , from cod to salmon from herring to shrimp. The recipes are just right for these meatless days.

Salmon is a big dish in Scandinavian cooking, namely in the dish known as gravlax. It's basically curing the salmon for four to five days. It requires both salt and sugar to cure it along with dill and cognac for flavor.. It's an elegant main meal for pescatarians too as well as those who are temporarily off meat. A  humbler recipe is the fish pie, filled with whitefish  and potato, Unlike other fish pies that are usually loaded with onions, this one has the mild ,sweet taste of cucumber to counteract the sharpness of  radishes which also add color. There's also the Scandanavian must have dill in it too for a spark of green and flavor. It's a nice dish to make on a Friday night when the family is gathered. Another cozy recipe is fish soup made with the Norwegian standard - cod. The fish's mildness matches up well with the carrots, potatoes, and mushrooms. Crushed tomatoes are also added to give it a vibe similar to the Portuguese soup, cioppino. It's served with warm crusty bread and butter.Norway also has a great flounder soup, from the seacoast town of  Bergen.Like the other it's a cream soup, but also has flour to thicken it. Julienned carrots give it color. Shrimp can be added to it as well.

Flounder is also used in many other Norwegian and Swedish dishes. Try it baked with shrimp for an elegant spin. It's a casserole, with fish filets layered with shrimp ,  tomatoes, and Parmesan cheese, then topped with pats of butter. Another flounder dish is fish cakes, made with flour and tarragon leaves. Cod and haddock can be used too instead of the flounder. Serve with crispy potatoes as a great Friday night dinner. Not surprisingly Scandinavians  also turn seafood into a pudding called fiskepudding. It's ground haddock mixed with milk and eggs to create a kind of custard. It's served with a shrimp and lobster sauce, heightened with a good  slug of sherry. Herring is a big deal in all the northernmost countries. One of the easiest is a salad made with salted fillets mixed with sour cream, chopped dill and the dill's bulb also chopped. Lemon juice is spritzed in for some tang. Serve on rye crackers or with a  dark bread such as kavring.

Scandinavian cooking is in perfect harmony with Lenten eating. The fish dishes are perfect for meatless Wednesdays and Fridays Try them in any way, from a savory pudding to .fishcakes for tasty dining.

Rethink Turnips

Mention the word turnip and most people will wrinkle their noses in disgust. Yet this root veggie is actually tasty as well as being versatile. It can be made into a number of dishes , from roasted to mashed. It can be used in stews or accompanying roasts. Turnips can be a great addition to any fall feast.

This common root veggie is mostly harvested right now in the autumn. It’s been around for centuries although the name and origin are unknown. There is actually wild version known as a “hot turnip“ and it‘s also a cousin of mustard and radish. The Scandinavians cross bred it with a cabbage in the 19th Century to create the plant rutabaga. It was also the most popular vegetable there until the potato was introduced sometime in the 1700. The turnip was also the precursor of the pumpkin in Halloween celebrations in Ireland and Scotland where it was carved out jack o’lantern style and then had a lit candle placed inside it. Turnips and their greens are one of the healthiest veggies to eat. The root is high in Vitamin C while the tops or greens are high in both Vitamins A and K.

Turnips can be made a variety of ways. Most people simply like them mashed like potatoes and served with butter. You can also make then in a gratin with cream, butter and parmesan Romano cheese. For a tasty side try them Paula Deen’s waywith brown sugar and butter and then mashed. This would be a great accompaniment tot any pork roast or even ham. You can also try a Finnish casserole, or even a turnip salad to go with holiday turkeys or goose.. Many soups call for chopped or diced turnips , especially vegetable and beef based ones.

The turnip isn’t as bad as some make it out to be. It is a tasty root vegetable, good for you and good tasting too. Have some in a tasty side . You’ll be surprised a t just how wonderful they really are!