Breakfast
Madeline is quite focused on her Papa these days. We hear her little voice calling out 'Papa' from her crib when she wakes up in the morning; she sits riveted in her highchair in the middle of the kitchen to watch Paul cook; she babbles on early morning walks with Paul, trying out her new words of the day; Madeline bangs on the door when Paul is working, shouting 'book... Papa;' and she maintains a steady chant of 'Papa....home,' as we drive home after an overnight at her grandparents. My favorite though, is her own made up game of Marco-Polo with her father. Throughout the day, Madeline will frequently interrupt her playing, eating or reading to say; 'Papa?' with a questioning lilt. Paul will respond 'Yes, Madeline.' and she will give a small nod of satisfaction, and go back to her play.
This year our Father's Day celebrations will be spread over both this weekend and the next, as we plan to welcome our new baby next Friday. For me, celebrations bring to mind cakes, and given my dislike of baking, fool-proof is a requirement. This Rhubarb Strawberry Cake has a rustic moist vanilla base, with jammy pools of cooked strawberry and rhubarb dotted on top, and a sweet crunch of caramelized sugar.
It is high rhubarb season here in Northern Indiana where Rebecca and I are spending these last weeks of her pregnancy. Since rhubarb is something we can't find in Haiti, Rebecca has been doubling down on it while we are here. We eat rhubarb strawberry jam on our toast, in yogurt, and as a topping for ice cream. We make batch upon batch of rhubarb strawberry jam bars, and of course many a rhubarb cream pie. These Simple Rhubarb Danishes are easy (for a pastry), delicious, and elegant -- great for a crowd, or in scaled down version for a weekend breakfast.
We made these Old-Fashioned Rhubarb Strawberry Jam Bars five times in the last two weeks. Each time we swore to ourselves it would be our last. But then another picnic would pop up on the calendar. Each time we turned to the jars of crimson hued roasted strawberry rhubarb jam perched in the fridge, tempting us. And so another batch of Old-Fashioned Rhubarb Strawberry Jam Bars would hit the oven, followed by much happy gobbling.
Every year, in the hot months of summer, my Oma would make oven jam. My Opa would buy her bushels of fresh apricots and plums from the farmers markets, and she would slow roast the fruit until they caramelized and the juices thickened, creating silky fruit jams that she tucked into layers of her torte cakes for celebrations throughout the year. In the years since she died, I find myself craving the custardy texture, and caramelized fruit taste of her jams. I started experimenting with my own oven jams recently, and found them to be simple, fail-safe, and delicious. My favorite is this tangy spring rhubarb strawberry jam, with rhubarb fresh from a friend's garden.
The smell of roasting potatoes makes my mouth water every time. These golden brown orbs of puffed potato deliciousness have been my dish of choice this past month. And I think the addition of rosemary and lemon makes the house smell like Sunday dinner. Happy roasting!
Rebecca and I have been traveling a lot recently, often improvising, cooking in new kitchens and without access to our own pantry supplies. This Potato Crusted Quiche with Bacon and Caramelized Onions is a slam dunk for these situations. It is a reliable crowd-pleaser built on a simple shredded potato crust and easy pantry staples (milk, cream, eggs, onions, and bacon). The result is a sublime quiche with caramelized onions, a creamy custard, and smokey bacon. This recipe is also very adaptable...add cheese for extra richness....take out the bacon to make it vegetarian...or substitute your favorite topping.
For my father's family, Christmas Eve, Heiliger Abend, is the heart of Christmas. It is a magical dark and cold night, where old hymns are sung by memory in German, acapella, by candlelight. My sister and I would look forward to the special appearance of traditional Christmas sweet and savory foods made by my Oma for Christmas Eve snacking. For Heiliger Abend this year, our young family of three is once again together. We will start new traditions as a family, and borrow from the past. Tonight we will be making my Oma's roast meat filled pastries, fleisch pieroshki with pickles. As a nod to our ravenous little eater's current favorite breakfast, will crank up the oven Christmas morning to make a batch of these airy buttermilk popovers with homemade strawberry jam, before an afternoon Christmas feast with our family. We will be thinking of our family and friends far away this Christmas as we celebrate, Merry Christmas! This recipe is inspired by Jenny Rosenstrach and adapted from King Arthur Flour.
Despite living in the city, our small courtyard here is full of life. We have mango, coconut, key lime, sour orange, moringa, and papaya trees, a small herb garden with lemon grass, chives, and basil, and maybe, most importantly, two chickens. For me, having a daily source of beautiful backyard eggs is hard to beat. Since Madeline is an early riser, she and I often go out just as the dawn is breaking and collect fresh eggs for breakfast. Madeline knows what comes next and will crawl excitedly across the kitchen floor to her high-chair and stand babbling waiting for her breakfast to be ready (often two scrambled eggs and fresh fruit). These Lemon and Parmesan Scrambled eggs are quick and easy to make and packed with flavor. The generous parmesan adds richness and umami, while the lemon brightens up the dish and gives it a light tropical spin.
November means fall back home; the smell of mulled cider, pumpkin picking, and trick-or-treating. Feeling nostalgic for the tastes and colors of fall, while sweating in the 90s here in Haiti, we created a Caribbean-fall dessert, Easy Guava Jam Bars. These easy to make, and addictive bars combine the warm spices of cinnamon and allspice with the tropical sweetness of fresh guava jam. It is a stunning match of tart bright guava enveloped in a warmly spiced buttery crumble.
Madeline's grandparents from Indiana arrived for a visit this week. It was lovely support to have in the midst of our coordination and response to Hurricane Mathew. With grandparents here to watch Madeline in the early morning hours, we made a big batch of Chewy Coconut Honey Granola to feed the early risers. This Chewy Coconut Honey Granola is our favorite here in Haiti. It is dead simple to make, and a fantastic balance between sweet and salty with a satisfying chew.
Hurricane Matthew is churning through the southern Caribbean this weekend, and we can already feel the winds picking up and the temperature falling here in Port-au-Prince. Currently, it looks like the eye-of-the-storm is likely to pass just off the southwestern tip of Haiti, but the damage may be significant. People are bracing for the storm; battening down the hatches and stocking up the larders as they are able. Keep Haiti in your prayers.
One of the new additions to our pantry stock, in addition to some pickled red onions and granola, is Fresh Guava Jam, courtesy of jam making with our staff this week. Rather than traditional Cuban-style guava jam, which relies on long cooking to create a darker caramelized flavor, our Fresh Guava Jam has a bright fresh fruit flavor. It is not too sweet and has a tart bite from fresh squeezed key limes, which balance the warm tropical sweetness of the aromatic guavas.
Tortillas are a food we sometimes overlook. We find ourselves too busy focusing on the fillings to pay much attention to the tortilla itself. But we've discovered that a well done flour tortilla (not to be confused with a masa corn tortilla) is a marvelous thing: flaky and tender, with the just the right amount of chew, and a subtle sweet and nutty richness. Tortillas, like any bread product, can be intimidating. But they don't have to be. At heart tortillas are a simple, versatile, and rustic bread that is quick to make and forgiving for newbies. Tortillas don't have to be perfect circles or exactly uniform. Homemade fresh tortillas coming hot off your stove will be miles ahead of their store-bought competition. A recent trip to San Pedro Sula, Honduras re-ignited our passion for making Homemade Flour Tortillas, and we've been making them regularly ever since.
We have been in Honduras this past week for work meetings with our regional colleagues. One thing that makes our organization unique, is an emphasis on cultivating relationships and being a good host. In this spirit, our Honduras-based supervisors welcomed us into their home with delicious home cooked meals, among them a scrumptious breakfast of baked oatmeal with fresh strawberries. Not only did we stuff ourselves, but coincidentally, we had been experimenting with our own baked oatmeal recipe over the past month. Our version of Easy Coconut Baked Oatmeal is a hearty, crunchy, warm and filling breakfast. This simple to make breakfast dish will perfume your house with cinnamon and oats and is best hot out of the oven, doused in cold milk, a perfect meal to share with guests.
If you want to try out a spring-ish baked oatmeal recipe, check out our Strawberry Rhubarb Baked Oatmeal.
A quick trip out to get ingredients can be a big ordeal here in Haiti, especially this time of year. May marks the start of the rainy season. We’ve seen torrential downpours almost daily for several weeks now here in Port-au-Prince. These heavy rains wash out main roads, swell the region’s rivers, overflow the sewers, and cause flash floods which can destroy the fragile homes that line the city’s narrow ravines. Add to this near daily political protests, that bring traffic to a halt with barricades and can shut down whole sections of the city. Recently, two of the three main bridges to the north (on our side of the city) have been out of commission after one collapsed when critical bolts were pilfered. So when I woke up this morning, craving a hearty pancake breakfast, convincing Paul to brave the traffic for butter, milk, or any other breakfast staple was a no-go. This recipe emerged from the bounty of our backyard; toasted coconut from our coconut tree and fresh-as-they-come eggs from Paul’s chickens. These Fresh Coconut Pancakes are absolutely delicious, custardy, and with just the right amount of chew, a perfect start to a rainy day.
It's my first year as a Mother, and we have big cooking plans to celebrate Mother's Day this weekend! We've put together three menu ideas to inspire cooking and good food shared with the ones you love.
Food cravings can come at inopportune times...such as Rebecca's craving for fresh-from-the-oven bagels while living 1,500 miles from a New York deli in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. Homemade bagels are a rewarding DIY project with easy to find ingredients that will yield bagels more delicious and toothsome than you can buy at your local deli (assuming you have one). A great Saturday project to keep you cozy in the winter months (or even toastier in the tropics), invite your friends over for a homemade bagel brunch with a smorgasbord of creamy toppings.
Thanks for following along with our new adventures! We recently moved from Pittsburgh to Haiti where we are starting a 5 year volunteer assignment with a non-profit relief and development organization. We will be in transition for the next few months as we complete our in-country orientation, language study, spend time living with host families in both the countryside and capital... and lest we forget, have our first baby somewhere in there as well! Please bear with us as we will not have ready access to internet or a kitchen throughout this time. We will continue to share new recipes that we've prepared in advance, and updates on our new life in Haiti as often as we are able.
As much as we love the tropical fruits and Caribbean flavors of our new home in Haiti, we are nostalgic for the apple and spice combination, so classic to this time of year in North America. We love this old-fashioned Apple Walnut Bundt Cake with Caramel Glaze, pungent with cinnamon, allspice, nutmeg and ginger, glazed with a salty caramel.
I was in the mood for a new breakfast dish one morning a few years ago, as I hungrily browsed the web for inspiration. The promise of both incredible lift and alluring creamy texture initially drew me to the Dutch Baby. This is an odd name for a fantastic hybrid dish that brings together the best of a popover, crepe, and pancake: spectacular poof, crispy edges, and subtly sweet custard-like middle. Rush your guests to the table as this flamboyant beauty of a breakfast dish comes out of oven!
We just got back from a weeklong trip to Canada for my sisters’ wedding, it was a magnificent weekend of celebrations, and we are thrilled to have a new brother-in-law! Driving home yesterday, we realized that in all the wedding festivities, it sort of slipped our minds that we have a food blog to write!
In the meantime, we have been busy cooking and eating summer produce and I wanted to share a simple make-ahead breakfast I have been eating this berry season. It all started with a craving for a decent berry yogurt cup; just a simple cup with plain yogurt and some fresh tasting berry puree that didn’t have the caloric count and saccharine sweetness of an ice cream Sunday. It turned out that this was a tall order! My grocery store hunt yielded a host of unpalatable and over-priced results, so I decided to try my hand at making yogurt cups at home. These Homemade Berry Yogurt Cups are simple to make and delicious to eat, a refreshing summer breakfast on the go.
It's a weekend morning, and by the time we figure out that we want brunch, it's 11am and everyone else is also coming to that same realization, ergo long lines. Since we are particularly line-averse, we often choose to stay in for brunch; there's no crowd, the coffee and tea are plentiful, and it's a-la-cart the whole way. We've put together 12 of our favorite sweet and savory brunch options that we hope inspires you to stay in, and brunch on.
The mercury is rising, and the days are lengthening. It is the season of backyard barbecues and farmers markets. We find ourselves craving Strawberry Shortcakes this time of year, and wanted to remake this classic dessert to feature the seasonal bounty. To highlight the first stalks of rhubarb and early strawberries, we made a tangy strawberry rhubarb sauce, sweetened with handfuls of fresh strawberries. For shortcakes with bright flavor and fantastic crunch, we mixed together a dough dotted with citrus zest and crisp cornmeal. Top these lovely Strawberry Rhubarb Shortcakes with heaps of fresh whipped cream, and your family and friends will thank you.
May is cooperating rather well, and we are eating our way into spring with Asparagus. We threw a crisp bunch on a hot grill this week, along with cherry tomatoes and local halloumi cheese, and drizzled the chunky spears with a fresh and summer inspired tomato and basil vinaigrette. To a lovely weekend of eating!
Last week we got a gorgeous bunch of multicolored carrots in our Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) weekly delivery box. We roasted our carrots to beautiful morsels of caramelized goodness, tossed them atop an herb and ricotta smothered puff pastry, and crunched away with taste buds dancing.
Hello Spring, let’s milkshake! We’re feeling pretty chipper this week with balmy breezes and glimpses of sun, and we thought we'd celebrate the changing of the seasons with Roasted Strawberry Buttermilk Milkshakes. To make these ridiculously good milkshakes, we roasted strawberries to concentrate their rich sweetness, and boosted the flavor with tangy buttermilk. Feeling like spring cooking? Try our Roasted Asparagus with Lemon, our decadent Hazelnut Tart with Fresh Strawberries, a light Herb Potato Salad or make-ahead Strawberry Rhubarb Baked Oatmeal.
Our Roasted Strawberry Buttermilk Milkshakes recipe is also featured this week by our friends at The Food Tasters!
One unlucky night last week, I got stuck. Our house is perched high atop a series of three steep hills, and sometimes the perfect combination of slick icy snow, and lack of plowing makes the drive impossible. The sound of spinning tires, grunting anti-lock brakes, burning rubber, and my slow slide backwards meant I could go no further. As I left my car and trudged up the hills to our house, visions of a greyhound and whippet propelled dogsled pushed me onward. My groceries got stuck, along with my car, which left a pitiful fruit bowl occupied with some droopy black spotted bananas for sustenance when I got home. I thought to myself, when life gives you bad roads and black bananas, make banana bread. This banana bread is easy, deeply flavored with the triple dynamo of vanilla, coconut, and bananas, and tastes fantastic. I have been making and tweaking this moist coconut banana bread for years, and we love it. Paul tends to be a little obsessed and through our first few years of marriage had coconut banana bread for breakfast almost every morning.
It’s a weeknight and you want pie. Unfortunately, you’re husband (and resident crust-maker) is still at school and you are not confident enough (read: too lazy) to make a crust. My solution: Caramelized Cardamom Spiced Apples with Pistachio Cream, essentially an Indian scented pie filling without the bother of a crust. We have had Indian flavors on the mind recently and have served this as an accompaniment to Pork Vindaloo.
I crave porridge for breakfast on cold winter days. Growing up, my sister and I ate porridge for breakfast most mornings. At some point along the way, things got a little creative, with my sisters’ addition of chocolate chips to her bowl, and my own garish sprinkle of mouth puckering vitamin C powder to mine. I think you could say that these add-ins remain a fairly accurate representation of our adult taste preferences. When I saw the title ‘very best oatmeal’ in Whole Grain Mornings, I couldn't resist. Our slightly adapted version, Toasted Oat & Honey Porridge, is fantastic and speedy, and I have been obsessively making it on weekdays and weekends for the past month. The texture is incredible, no more gummy, thick porridge. Instead, the technique preserves the shape and texture of the individual oats through a two-step toasting and steaming process that leaves you with a surprisingly soft and chewy texture. We liked that addition of honey for just a hint of sweetness, and a flurry of crunchy almonds and pomegranate seeds to make this into a quick, beautiful, and delicious bowl of porridge.
Blood Orange & Ginger Shrub- we are talking about an odd sounding, old fashioned beverage that has nothing to do with gardening or hedges. The shrub was a popular drink in America during the colonial times, and referred to a vinegared fruit syrup mixed with water, alcohol or sparkling water, also called a drinking vinegar. The British have their own version of a shrub, a fruity alcoholic cordial, without the vinegar. Recently, shrubs have had a revival in bars and restaurants, and for good reason, they are refreshing, tangy and delicious! Shrubs are easy to make, and have only three ingredients, fruit juice, sugar and vinegar. They can be made in two ways, hot or cold, and in our recipe for Blood Orange & Ginger Shrub, we opted for a slightly modified cold version.
Some mornings call for decadence. Whiskey Custard French Toast is ready in under 10 minutes, rich and custardy in the middle, golden brown and lightly crispy on the outside, delicately sweet, and spiked with the vanilla and peppery notes of a good whiskey. Being back in school this week has meant rushed chilly mornings without time for breakfast. With the weekend here, I was ready for an indulgent start to the day.
As many of you may have noticed, we at the Hungry Hounds took a long break over the holidays from posting. Of course, that didn't mean a pause in cooking and eating, just a pause in posts while we relaxed with family, enjoyed time with our kids, and caught back up on work. This week our Madeline turns two, and last month Gideon passed the six-month mark. Gideon is (finally) mostly sleeping through the night, and Madeline is getting more and more fascinating as her vocabulary grows and she is able to share what she's thinking. Last week when we mentioned her upcoming birthday she asked us if "Maybe...maybe...I can eat cake....that'd be DEEEELicious!" Well cake you shall have, Madeline! We will be making her this subtly sweet Haitian classic ginger cake, Bonbon Siwo. It is a warmly spiced Haitian gingerbread cake that is dark and dense with coconut milk and blackstrap molasses, and boldly flavored with fresh ginger, cloves and cinnamon.