Party Food!

We love to celebrate at CSL and seem to find many times and ways to bring people together with food.  We love lots of color, variety, tastes and textures. Veggie trays have green beans, steamed broccoli, jicama, cucumbers, celery, carrots cut on the diagonal, colored peppers and cherry tomatoes. Dip goes into a hollowed out red cabbage, veggies stand up in hollowed out red, yellow and orange peppers, little tiny sweet colored peppers get cut a week in advance and left in the refrigerator to turn into flowers for garnish. Arrange it all on top of some collard greens or ruffled lettuce for a spectacular and appetizing array.

Hello Fellow Foodies,

As many of you know, I was in the restaurant and catering business for many years (many years ago) and The Silver Palate Cookbook was my bible. It was the one cookbook that never failed to stir my imagination and get me excited about cooking for dozens, even hundreds of people. Even now, as I cruise through it, I find new recipes and ideas I have yet to try. Ah, so many recipes, so little time!

When I get an idea to make a dish, either from some craving, or some group of vegetables in my refrigerator drawer, or when my freezer and pantry are overflowing with staples I bought on sale, I like to look through three or four or more resources. I have my assortment of favorite c ...

Happy New Year Foodies!

We had a fantabulous night at CSL on New Year’s Eve. The best dance music ever, the best food ever, gorgeous decorations, and the most beautiful people ever. It was definitely a night to remember.

If you weren’t there, or even if you were, the food was delicious, perfectly presented and heartily consumed. We had a whole smoked salmon with dill mayo, horseradish cream, and pumpernickel toasts, shrimp with cocktail sauce, shrimp cheesecake, baked brie with cranberries and pecans, stroganoff meatballs, smoked sausage bites, assorted imported and domestic cheeses, a wonderful variety of veggies with pesto ranch dip, bruschetta with tomato medley and olive artichoke ...

Thank You to everyone who has enjoyed my food after the services at CSL on Sundays. You have given me so many compliments that I want you to know how much I appreciate all of you who love to eat! It certainly makes it so much more fun to cook and try new ideas. I have also had many requests for recipes, so I will continue to share my vegetarian food ideas with you in hopes of inspiring you to have more fun and freedom in the kitchen.

Some of my favorite food in the winter time is casseroles. My Mom was the queen of leftovers! It seemed she would toss everything together, put it in a casserole dish and send it to the oven. Most of the time her combinations came out very interesting, a term we use when the dish is not really fantastic, but not really awful either. Occasionally her experiments wouldn’t come out at all and we would moan and groan until the next ro ...

Do you find you are spending lots of time in the kitchen this time of year? I love baking in the winter time. Nothing is better than turning the oven on to 350`, dragging out all the big bowls and rummaging around in the pantry and refrigerator. I love to get creative and use up all those little bits of stuff left in the fridge. I just made a wonderful vegetarian lasagna using this method. I had a big bag of spinach from Sam’s that was about two thirds full, half a red pepper, one small zucchini, three tablespoons of olive tapenade, a few sun dried tomatoes, and a cup or so of parmesan cheese. Here’s what I did:

Put water on to boil for the lasagna noodles. In a deep skillet put two tablespoons olive oil, a couple cloves of garlic (I keep a jar of roasted garlic in oil on hand) and sauté for a minute or so until the oil is hot and garlic nicely golden if using fresh. First I add zucchini sliced very thin on the mandoline, then a tablespoon of Italian Seas ...

Hello CSL Foodies!
First I would like to thank you for your generous donations of food for our Sunday Celebrations. We have had some beautiful and tasty treats from some of the fabulous cooks that come to CSL. The intent of this blog is to:
1. Have Fun
2. Share Recipes
3. Get to know the Foodies

Secondly, the recipes I will be sharing will be vegetarian. I have been a vegetarian for 13 years. I love to cook and I love to present beautiful food. I also like preparing food to be simple, easy and fairly quick. Most of the recipes I will provide will be simple, with few ingredients and a little twist - something that makes it jolt your tastebuds. I like to use as much fresh ingredients as possible, and I love to take an old classic and spice it up!

That being said, here is my recipe for Pumpkin Bread Pudding. It has been a big hit at CSL and is perfect for the season and upcoming holidays.