Roast Lamb Loin Persillade

April 21, 2011 Clare Schapiro

Just in time for Easter, the quintessential thing! You must make this! It fulfills all of the necessary requirements: lamb (means spring to me, how about you?); wonderfully green, minty, herby presentation; ridiculously easy; stunningly delicious. In short everything you need but the bunny.

A persillade is a mixture of chopped parsley (persil in French)and garlic, which I've stretched to include some mint and fresh rosemary. After chatting with my guru Pooh, I added a glaze of red pepper jelly on top which was the perfect "glue" for a nifty coating of persillade mixed with breadcrumbs.

Oatmeal Coconut Raspberry Bars

April 15, 2011 Clare Schapiro

I'm always on the lookout for something new to grace my grandmother's cookie tin. Said cookie's starring role in Jeff's lunch sack every day means it needs to be tasty and portable too. I struck the mother lode the other day when I stumbled upon this great recipe in theGourmet Cookbook edited by Ruth Reichl in 2004. I'm very much inclined to try things I find in this estimable yellow tome--because I miss Gourmet, because I'm a Ruth Reichl fan and because seldom does it steer me wrong.

Pesto Pasta with Cannellini Beans and Shrimp

April 8, 2011 Clare Schapiro

I'm positive that this isn't an original thought, merely original to me. However, that being said, I did stumble into a delicious and embarrassingly easy dinner last night. Earlier in the week I had a lovely dinner at Bacchus on Main where I had just the thing for comfort induced carb loading: an enormous bowl of penne and white beans tousled with pesto sauce.

Several days later, while looking through my fridge for something to make for dinner with the beautiful shrimp I'd just scored, I remembered that soothing pasta , and what I've always considered to be a great affinity between shrimp and white beans.

Hummingbird Cake

April 1, 2011 clarefare

it happened to you. So the very best thing about my age and station in life is that, when it's my birthday, I get to make exactly what I want. One thing I've noticed is that, though I bake all sorts ofcakes for all sorts of occasions throughout the year, when it's pure and simply what I like, that ol' hummingbird cake is bound to fly into my head and out of my kitchen.