New Recipes of Late Winter

Hey-yo, reader, I hope you're well. I am on my final days of Spring break. Despite my lofty intentions to do a ton of academic writing and editing, none of that has happened. Instead, I've slept in, read too many Twitter feeds as I continue to vacillate about creating one of my own, and done a lot of rambling along the River Witham.

 

the Viking Way

 

My cooking feels like it's in the same slump as my writing and editing, so it's fun to look back and see evidence to the contrary. While I am not trying new recipes at the rate I did during the first lockdown, I'm still managing to get to about one new thing a week, and sometimes two. Some of these have been recipes I've wanted to try for a few years, like the Sicilian Vegetable Pizza Roll from The Bread Bible, or the Spice Cookies from Jerusalem, which are extraordinary wonderful.

 

I was given my copy of Luisa Weiss's Classic German Baking the Christmas after my PhD viva, and it is one of my favourite cookbooks because of the memories that surround it. After I submitted the corrections requested by my examiners I went on a MASSIVE grocery store trip to get fancy high-fat butter and other baking ingredients, and dove headlong into German baking. If you like cooking as a process and a project, you will probably enjoy this cookbook. None of the recipes are especially quick but in my experience all are worth the investment of time and groceries.

 

It was around February 2017, when I finished my PhD for good, that I started really wanting to bake a Dunkler Kirschkuchen (Spiced-Cherry Chocolate Cake), except I couldn't find sour cherries in any grocery store in Lincoln, and still couldn't even after I started going to the Super Lincs, the largest local international supermarket, in 2019. However, just before Christmas 2020, my luck turned, and I discovered where the store shelved the canned sour cherries, and then when I went back six weeks later, they were still available AND still in the same place (a thing which does not often happen with this particular grocery store), so I was able to get a jar to make a Dunkler Kirschkuchen.

 

And lo, it was worth the four year wait. I've so glad I still have a few pieces left in the freezer.

 

Here's the rest of the list of what I've been cooking of late! 

January 2021

• Pork Roast with Orange Glaze from Cooking from Quilt Country
  
• Chicken with Leeks and Apples from A Bird in the Hand
  
• Sicilian Vegetable Pizza Roll from the Bread Bible
• German Cabbage Rolls from Cooking from Quilt Country 

Sicilian Vegetable Pizza Roll...much tastier than this photo makes it look

February 2021

• Chicken with Anchovies, Lemon, and Rosemary from A Bird in the Hand 
  
• Cornmeal Pancakes from Cooking from Quilt Country
• Quick Pickled Carrots and Rutabaga from Cooking with Shelburne Farms 
• Celery Root Soup with Blue Cheese from Cooking With Shelburne Farms 
• Pureed Beetroot Salad from Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian
• Mushroom and Root Vegetable Pot Pie from Cooking with Shelburne Farms 
• Reuben's Legendary Apple Pancake from Classic Home Deserts

 

Mushroom and Root Vegetable Pie

March 2021 

• Costa Rican Black Bean Soup from Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian 
• Potato Leek Pizza from Good and Cheap 
• Red Lentils Cooked in the Bengali Way (Masoor Dal) from Madhur Jaffrey's World Vegetarian
• Fuscia Dunlop's Sichuanese Celery with Beef from the Wednesday Chef  
• Chili and garlic cucumber from Mamushka 
• Tagine of Chicken, Carmelized Onions, and Pears from A Bird in the Hand 

chicken and pear tagine

And so far this month...

•  Spice Cookies from Jerusalem
• Vietnamese Caramelized Ginger Chicken from A Bird in the Hand 
• Dunkler Kirschkuchen (Spiced-Cherry Chocolate Cake) from Classic German Baking