More Cooking with Ina Garten - Spring Green Risotto

I want my life back! Seriously... for the last ten days I have been working really hard at my school site, and I made the mistake of over-committing myself last weekend by driving to faraway places. As a result of my crazy schedule, my family has been subsisting on what's in the freezer, restaurants and foraging for food. My poor babies!

Our students have settled back into school as of yesterday (yes, we start early but we end school on May 28th). I'm still exhausted, but I am already gearing up to feeding my family some home cooked meals. I have so missed visiting my regular blogs, and visiting new ones.

Today, I was supposed to post a blog with the Barefoot Bloggers. The recipe was for Ina Garten's Mango Banana Daiquiris. I so wish I could have made these, because I could use six or seven of these tonight! I hope that the Barefoot Bloggers will not excommunicate me from the group, so I am offering an alternative Ina Garten recipe that I did make before my life went into a tailspin.

I love risotto, and I don't know why I don't make this more often. I think of risotto as comfort food, and it's so versatile in what ingredients you can use. I always have homemade chicken stock in my freezer, and white wine is pretty much a staple in my fridge. I had purchased a lovely bunch of asparagus, and so I decided to make this dish that Ina had on her show a couple of weeks ago. I was intrigued by the addition of mascarpone cheese.

My dilemma was that I didn't have mascarpone cheese! I quickly surfed the net and I found several recipes on how to make my own mascarpone-- using cream cheese, sour cream and heavy cream. Once again, I usually keep these ingredients on hand, so I was in luck.

I think that this mascarpone substitute recipe is a winner, and much cheaper than the real
deal -- like a fraction of the cost!


The next step for me was to start a pot of water boiling and I blanched the fresh asparagus for 2-3 minutes. I wanted a bright green color and then I plunged the asparagus into an ice bath, to stop the cooking process...

Then I set them aside...

Then I got busy with the rest of my mis en place-- that would be "ingredient's prep". This is how I roll, because there is nothing worse than finding out you're missing a key ingredient and you've already started cooking! I didn't photograph the chives, because they are growing right outside my kitchen window!

I am thankful to have a lemon tree that is providing this beautiful zest. I decided to use only one lemon, instead of the two that Ina recommends. I read recipe reviews and many people said that two lemons was too overpowering-- you decide!

Risotto isn't hard to make at all! If you've never made risotto, just remember that you need to use Arborio or Carnaroli Rice-- because you want a starchy rice. Plain ole white rice just doesn't work. Trust me.

Traditional risotto uses chicken stock (heated up) and white wine. I had to adapt the recipe a
bit -- Ina's recipe uses fennel, but I didn't have any. Truth be told, I'm not crazy about fennel so I wasn't going to race to the store for any. I didn't have leeks, and I do love them. I did have shallots, so I decided to substitute with those. Either way would be great.

Using good olive oil and butter, I sauteed the shallots and then the rice-- and then I began adding the heated chicken stock a few ladles at a time, stirring constantly.

You can see that there is still some liquid left in the pan, but the rice has released a lot of starch. This is when I added my fresh lemon zest (from my wonderful lemon tree) and I seasoned the rice with kosher salt and fresh ground pepper.

I don't like overcooked asparagus, so I only allowed 5 minutes of cooking time once I added the blanched asparagus, thawed peas, mascarpone cheese, fresh Parmesan and fresh chives (as opposed to Ina's instructions to cook this for 15 minutes).

The beauty of living in California is that I can make a spring risotto in late summer! As Ina would say, how good is that?

Now, that's comfort food! (Pssssssst, you can always serve this as a side dish)

I have missed my food blogger friends, and I cannot wait to see what all of you have been up to!

Ina Garten's Easy Cheese Danish

Hello everyone!

I've been so busy at work, that I've had no time to cook-- let alone to blog about anything at all. I work at a public high school, and it's registration time, and that means that I am racing non-stop. I have so many of my favorite blogs to visit, so I'll catch up within a week. I doubt my work pace will slow down until mid-August, so I might be a little scarce. I miss all of you, and I miss having the time and energy to be in my kitchen.

I did want to share with you an easy recipe I made last weekend. I'm not kidding about this being easy and versatile! It's not a low-fat recipe but once in a while, I crave a fresh cheese Danish pastry. I watched Ina Garten make this on Food Network a couple of weeks ago, and I decided this would make a nice breakfast treat with a cup of dark roast coffee. Wow! This is delicious!

Fortunately, I have recently overcome my fear of working with puff pastry. There's no mystery to it at all, folks. There are two ways I defrost puff pastry-- I either remove it from the freezer and cover it with a damp paper towel and wait about 30 minutes. Or, I put the box of puff pastry in the fridge (overnight) and I'm ready to go in the morning.

With this recipe, there's no rolling pin required. Just cut each sheet into four squares (be sure to flour your surface) and parchment paper makes life a lot easier.

The week before I made the Cheese Danish, I decided to use some of my homemade jams to make a simple puff pastry turnover. I decided to play around with different ways of folding puff pastry. I wanted to play with the sparkling white sugar I had recently ordered from King Arthur Flour...

I had recently made peach jam, so I decided to use this as a filling.

These were delicious-- hot out of the oven.

The following week, I decided to make the cheese filling for Ina's Easy Cheese Danish Recipe. I decided to follow the advice from many comments about this recipe. The suggestion was to make the cheese filling the night before, because other comments said that the filling was too runny if not allowed to chill properly. The filling consists of cream cheese, ricotta cheese, sugar, vanilla, and lemon zest. I also used one lemon, instead of two because reviewers said the lemon was a little overpowering. Before bed, I removed a box of puff pastry from the freezer and put it into the fridge to thaw.

The next morning, I was glad that I chilled the filling. It was delicious and not too lemony.

I filled the puff pastry with the cream cheese filling, and used an egg wash to seal the pastry. I had almost made raspberry jam, so I decided to see what would happen if I added some jam on top of the cream cheese filling...

It sure looks pretty!

Here's a Raspberry Cheese and Peach Cheese Pastry...

Each pastry got a sprinkling of sparkling white sugar and was baked at 400F for about 20 minutes.

The Good, The Bad and the Ugly.

The plain cheese danish looked beautiful...

The raspberry jam kind of oozed over the edges and didn't look very photogenic. I think I didn't seal some of the flaps well, so they came apart. In retrospect, I should have folded it differently, since the jam is much thinner. Still, these tasted great! Overall, my personal favorite is the plain cheese-- but take your pick... just jam, just cheese or both!


Once again, Ina has given a simple recipe that I will use again and again. I think it would be easy to make these the night before and then when you wake up, just pop them into the oven.

These are a special treat, and they really are very easy to make. Your guests will think you are a genius. Your secret is safe with me.

Skillet Chicken, Broccoli & Pasta Dinner - Back to Work Cooking!

I'm back to my full-time job, so I need to readjust my style of cooking. While I was enjoying my month long vacation, I had the luxury of time when it came to choosing recipes for my weekly meal plan (yes, I do make one each week).

I need to readjust what I cook, because I want it on the table in 45 minutes, or less. Ideally, the meal won't take a lot of prep work and (if I'm lucky) I'll have leftovers to take for lunch the next day-- hence, more time in the morning to get ready to leave for work after dragging myself out of bed at the evil hour of 5:30am.

Before I discovered the world of Food Blogs, I used to buy quite a few cookbooks. One of my purchases came from America's Test Kitchen-- "Test Kitchen Favorites" from the Season 2007, with a DVD of all the shows included. I have to say that I enjoyed the cookbook and DVD-- and I think these would be a perfect gift for someone who wants to learn (or improve) their culinary skills.

I give thumbs up to many of the recipes in this cookbook-- they have never failed to deliver delicious meals. This skillet dinner is one of them. HOWEVER, the prep time took about 20 minutes to put together. I'm pretty skilled with a knife, so if someone is just learning how to chop, chop, chop-- then I'd say prep work can take at least 30 minutes. The plus side, though, is that once the dinner is underway in cooking, you can tidy up the kitchen.

Enough said-- on with the recipe:

You'll need boneless, skinless chicken breasts, cut into 1-inch squares, sun-dried tomatoes, minced garlic, dried oregano (fresh is okay, too), red pepper flakes, chicken broth, broccoli, heavy cream (you could substitute half & half, I suppose but I haven't tested that theory), ziti (I used farfalle, because it's what I had), water, Asiago cheese (I only had Parmesan), and fresh lemon juice. I recommend that you do your mis en place ("mess in place"). Once your have all of your ingredients organized, the cooking part goes fast. Ready?

You'll use olive oil and you want to quickly sear the chicken. Be sure the chicken is patted nice and dry, or you'll just end up steaming the chicken. This takes 2 minutes, max. Set it aside in a bowl...

The nice brown bits from searing the chicken will give the chopped onion and garlic a nice flavor and a pretty golden brown... now it's time to cook the pasta...

Since this is a "skillet dinner", you'll be cooking the pasta in the skillet with chicken with water and chicken broth. Once the pasta water looks "syrupy" it's time to add the sun-dried tomatoes, broccoli and a little more water. The asiago or Parmesan cheese and lemon juice are on standby...

Give this a little stir...

Put the lid on and let this cook for 3-5 minutes-- just until the broccoli is tender and a pretty bright green.

Now, add the chicken and accumulated juices, the heavy cream and the cheese. Allow this to cook a few minutes until the sauce thickens a bit. This dish smells fragrantly delicious.

Off heat, add the lemon juice and season to taste with kosher, or sea salt (never table salt...yuck!) and pepper. As far as I'm concerned, this is far better than "Hamburger Helper".


This might not be a 30-Minute meal, but it's very tasty. It reheats well and you could even freeze leftovers for a fast "I'm too tired to cook, what can I defrost?" kind of meal.

I have a feeling I'll be making a few of those when the first day of school starts on August 12th starts-- it's the most hectic time of year at my job! But, I love the high school kids and I cannot say that my job is boring at all.

Rachael Ray-- I'm coming to pay your website a visit! I just wish you tone down your prattling, but I have to give you kudos for your 30-minutes meals! I'm on my way...

Ina Garten's Baked Blintzes with Fresh Blueberry Sauce

This recipe post is dedicated to my dear friend, Monica, of "Lick The Bowl Good". I know that she loves blueberries, because she sent me a jar of her homemade blueberry jam-- which I will use to make her beautiful Lemon and Blueberry Cake. I just need to find the time, but I will make it!

I have posted a few of Ina Garten's recipes from her newest cookbook "Back to Basics", and I still have a few more I am anxious to try. I discovered this recipe the same day that I decided to make her Tomato and Goat Cheese tart.



I was invited to attend an early breakfast buffet and party at my brother's house in Santa Cruz, CA. Fred throws this party during the Santa Cruz Annual Wharf-to-Wharf Race. My brother's house is right along the path where thousands of runners go by, while his band plays music.

We had to leave the our house by 6:30am, in order to arrive before the streets were closed to traffic. When I spotted this recipe, I figured that this could feed a small crowd and it sounded really good. I figured that in the 45 minutes it would take us to drive to my brother's house, the blintzes could stay warm... or, at least, I hoped they would!



I don't have my usual step-by-step photos because it was dark outside, and getting late when I finally decided to make this recipe. I am still waiting for my light box that my husband promised to make for my birthday-- ahem! Craig? However, scroll to the very bottom and I've posted the recipe in a printable format. You won't find this recipe on Food Network.

I can tell you that I made the three components-- The Blueberry Sauce, the pancake sauce, and the cheese filling the night before. I debated baking the blintzes the night before, but Monica talked me out of it. She was right-- I didn't want the blintzes to turn soggy or not taste fresh.

The only ingredient I didn't add to the pancake batter was the baking powder. I left it on the counter, to remind me to add it in the morning...like 5:30am. I was half asleep, to say the least.

I did set the oven to preheat to 350F so that I could jump out of bed and get this into the oven.
I added the baking powder and poured just enough batter to give an even coating to the bottom of the baking pan. Once it baked for 10 minutes, I poured the rest of the cheese filling.


I shot this photo with a flash, so it's not the best. I wanted you to see how I spooned the rest of the batter on top of the cheese filling.


I baked it in the oven for 35 minutes and it turned out nice and golden. I jiggled it, and it was set. It was 6:45am and time to hit the road!

I packed up the blueberry sauce and lightly covered the blintzes with foil-- and off to Santa Cruz we headed. As I had hoped, the blintzes were nice and warm when we arrived.


I lightly warmed the blueberry sauce and placed it on the buffet table-- and then took my first taste. I liked the creamy texture of the ricotta and the mascarpone cheese. The filling wasn't super sweet and I loved the blueberry sauce. I'm not a fan of blueberries, but this sauce changed my mind.


Overall, I think Ina came up with a brilliant way of making cheese blintzes without all the work of making crepes, which I have made and posted here. The pancake batter can be seen on the bottom, as well as being a light crust on top.


I think I would add a little more orange or lemon zest to the cheese filling, next time. Mascarpone cheese isn't cheap to buy, either. I did use an Italian mascarpone, but it cost $6.00 for 8 ounces, and I think that's a little pricey for some folks budgets. I'm also posting a recipe for a mascarpone substitute that I recently made, that turned out to be just as tasty.

There was a lot of food at the buffet, so I took home a few leftover pieces. The blintzes reheated, beautifully, in the microwave. The next time I make this, I could easily cut the recipe in half.


I would describe this version of blintzes as resembling an Italian Ricotta Style Cheesecake. I think this recipe is perfect to bring to a potluck buffet. It makes a beautiful presentation and it's not over-the-top sweet. Good job, Ina!

Monica, I wish I could send you a slice of this. You know I would if I could!

Hugs,