Recipes

Smoked Sausage, Onions & Peppers

When the weather gets warm, my thoughts turn to baseball and grills. And while hot dogs are my quintessential baseball food, brats and sausages rank pretty high up there.

I’m between business trips this week, and I wanted something quick and light to throw together after teaching at the gym. This is a high-protein, lower carb meal that comes together quickly, with minimal cleanup. Not bad for a Tuesday night. :)

Smoked Sausage, Onions and Peppers

Inspired by Bon Appetit
Serves 3-4

1 small onion, cut into 1/2″ slices
5-6 sweet peppers, seeded and cut into 1/2″ slices (or substitute your favorite peppers)
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
Kosher salt and freshly ground pepper
12 oz. smoked sausage or kielbasa, cut on a diagonal into 4″ pieces and halved lengthwise
Mustard and sauerkraut for serving, if desired

Place a 16×12″ sheet of heavy-duty foil on a large rimmed baking sheet. Toss vegetables and oil in a large bowl; generously season with salt and pepper.

Mound vegetables in center of prepared baking sheet; top with sausages. Place another large sheet of foil over. Fold and crimp all edges tightly to form a sealed packet. Make ahead: Can be made 4 hours ahead. Chill. Let stand at room temperature for 15 minutes before continuing.

If using a grill, heat to medium-high. If using an oven, adjust oven racks to the top third and bottom third; preheat oven to 350°. Grill or bake packet until onions and peppers are softened (carefully open the packet to check; steam will escape), about 25 minutes.

If grilling, remove sausages from packet and grill until browned and crisp, about 5 minutes. If using an oven, turn on broiler. Carefully cut open packet. Arrange sausages on top if necessary. Broil until sausages are browned and crisp, about 5 minutes.

Serve with mustard and sauerkraut.

The Strawberry Muddle

June is my favorite time of year, and not just because it’s my birthday (although that certainly doesn’t hurt). The weather is just right, the days are long, pools are open, it’s baseball season. It’s really the perfect month, except that it is fleeting. Thirty days is never enough.

I love wine, and I am especially partial to red (the blog name isn’t a coincidence). Some people don’t like to drink red in the summer. I won’t go that far, but when the weather turns warm, I do tend to swap my reds for roses, whites, and bubbly a bit more often. A couple summers ago, I found this drink recipe, and it’s become one of my summer staples, whether I’m entertaining friends or just sitting on my imaginary porch and enjoying a summer nightcap.

Prosecco is an Italian sparkling wine, usually dry or extra dry, which in wine-speak means it isn’t sweet. It’s about $6-10 a bottle at Trader Joe’s, making it an inexpensive alternative to champagne and a great option for budget-friendly entertaining.

This is one of those drinks that would look better if I were a professional photographer and food stylist… Meh. I’d rather be sipping my cocktail, thankyouverymuch. :)

The Strawberry Muddle

From Bon Appetit
Serves 6

1 1/2 cups chopped hulled strawberries
6 tablespoons simple syrup*
6 thin lemon slices
Ice cubes
750-ml bottle chilled Prosecco

* To make simple syrup: combine equal parts sugar and water in a heavy saucepan over medium-low heat until sugar dissolves (for this recipe, try 1/2 cup). Increase heat and bring to a boil. Cool syrup.

Divide strawberries among six 6- to 8-ounce glasses; add 1 tablespoon syrup to each and mash with muddler or handle of wooden spoon. Add lemon slice to each and mash to release flavor. Add several ice cubes to each glass, then fill with Prosecco.

Strawberry Fool

A few days ago, I read a great column in Buzzfeed about food blogging become a victim of its own success.

As food blogs have become more popular and more competitive, the author writes, successful food blogging “doesn’t have much to do with cooking food that tastes good, or writing a recipe that works. Instead, it’s about cute plates, perfect lighting, photography, and social media networking. In other words, as they say on the internet: It’s about building a brand.”

Well, s***.

That’s never going to be me.

Look, I get it. I really do. I don’t just accept or tolerate marketing, social media, or branding. I work in freaking market research for a public relations company. Part of my job is helping clients understand perceptions of their brand and how to improve them.

But let’s be real for a minute. I leave home between 7 and 8am and am pleased when I make it home before 8pm more nights than not — and that’s a slow week. I’m an amateur cook and a sub-amateur photographer. I own one set of dishes, plain white. My kitchen window is too small and faces the wrong direction to get the right natural lighting for food photography (d’oh! what was I thinking, buying this place?). I don’t own an SLR camera, and if I had an extra $700 sitting around, I certainly wouldn’t spend it on a food styling course.

(Sidebar: Seven HUNDRED dollars? Seriously?)

And even that is not the point. I love the fellowship of cooking and eating as much as the food itself. My dear friend Danielle and I, 800 miles apart, use Facebook to share everything from which Bon Appetit recipe we’re cooking first this month to what to a discussion about the best use for two extra stalks of rhubarb. My husband-wife friends Mike and Lisa not only are willing guinea pigs any time I’m looking to cook, I thought I might die from Mexi-Korean fusion food bliss at the Cinco de Mayo party I talked them into throwing. Then there’s the time my brother, around 23 at the time, called me and proudly declared that for the first time, he had eaten the piece of leaf lettuce on his cheeseburger. (When asked how it tasted, he replied, “Crunchy.” This was not a compliment.)

I started a blog because for me, food is about community — creating and sharing experiences together.

There aren’t enough hours in the day to do everything I’d like; I’m not going to go out of my way to make a pot roast at 6am so the lighting is just right, or find the perfect piece of parsley to garnish my plate. My pictures aren’t magazine-worthy. I don’t have hundreds of readers, let alone thousands. I’m okay with that.

I’m not digging on any food bloggers who do those things. To the contrary, I have a deep admiration for them — as artists, photographers, marketers, and especially as chefs, cooks and bakers. I draw as much inspiration from fellow bloggers as traditional food magazines and cookbooks.

And that’s also not to say I don’t hope to improve my skills. I’m just saying, that’s not my primary focus here. Yes, I want to share beautiful food accompanied by heartfelt and well-written prose. But choosing between getting a better picture of a cake or diving in and spending more time with the person I made it for? That’s not even a question.

Tonight, I’m not dwelling over an imperfect photograph. I’m capping off a near-perfect holiday weekend by savoring every last bite of a simple, delicious dessert: strawberries, whipped cream, and Ladyfingers. Pull up a bowl and join me.

Strawberry Fool

From Bon Appetit

Yield: 6 Servings

2 cups chopped, hulled fresh strawberries (about 8 oz.) plus 6 whole berries for garnish
1 tablespoon sugar
2 cups chilled heavy whipping cream
Seeds scraped from 1/2 vanilla bean or 1 teaspoon vanilla bean paste
3/4 cup homemade Strawberry Conserve (if using store-bought, use 1/2 cup, stirred to loosen)
3 crisp ladyfingers (savoiardi, Boudoirs, or Champagne biscuits), crushed (or substitute graham crackers)

Place chopped strawberries in a small bowl. Sprinkle sugar over; let sit, tossing occasionally, until juices are released and sugar is dissolved, about 20 minutes.

Beat cream and vanilla seeds in a large bowl until soft peaks form. Add conserve; fold to blend. Add berries with juices; fold almost to blend. Divide among bowls. Sprinkle crushed ladyfingers over. Garnish with whole berries.