Although, today is not a Monday but I feel this post is very appropriate for Easter. It was my husband’s idea to make a post about this salad. He loves it and remembers eating it back home on every holiday. The dish is very simple, but I am sure you will love the taste. Pick your favorite cheese or combination of cheeses. Amount of garlic is totally up to you, our family loves a lot of it-)) Also you can serve it on top of cherry or plum tomatoes, and fresh spring herbs would be a wonderful addition.
Showing posts with label Spring. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Spring. Show all posts
Russian Monday: Cheese & Garlic Salad
Carrot & Green Apple Salad with Lime Vinaigrette
Carrots and green apples, both of them crunchy and sweet, are a winning combination in this tangy salad. Serve this salad as an accompaniment to a smoked turkey sandwich or grilled chicken, shrimp or fish. Look for interesting varieties of carrots in different colors, and use a Thin Julienne Slicer to slice them perfect thin strips.
Happy Spring Gardening #OXOSpringGardening
Tucked behind a tangle of brush at the bottom of the gentle hill of our townhouse backyards is a cleared space of about a quarter of an acre. Several of our neighbors proudly refer to it as "the community garden".
Beet Tower Salad with Goat Cheese
I just love tower salads, I think they even taste better because of their unique presentation. I already have two tower salad recipes with fresh spring ingredients on my blog (Tomato Salad with Mozzarella & Avocado, Pear Arugula Salad with Walnuts & Blue Cheese), and now I am happy to add one more to my collection. Simple but yet elegant and sophisticated, great for any occasions, from luncheon with a girlfriend to spring/summer appetizer for dinner with friends and family.
Cinnamon-Pecan Buns/Rolls with Butter Frosting
These cinnamon buns/rolls are very special, sweet, gooey and irresistible. You fill the dough with sugary pecans, mixed with cinnamon, butter and cocoa powder, that produces beautiful, buttery layers. These bear no resemblance to anything store-bought.
Green Salad (Cucumber, Zucchini, Avocado) with Plum Sweet & Spicy Dressing
The spring is finally here and I feel like eating more vegetables, fresh fruits and berries. I start mornings with a glass of freshly made juice and my lunch becomes lighter and healthier. I present this special salad which is good for any diet. It has few ingredients but many flavors. I use all organic vegetables and highly recommend the same in your cooking. The dressing is slightly sweet with a touch of cayenne pepper, but you may change your ingredients if you’d like. My husband had this salad with broiled salmon for dinner and he was very pleased. Enjoy these simple, but nutritious recipes.
Sunday Brunch: Arctic Char with Tomatoes & Asparagus
Letting people serve themselves is the simplest way to host a sunday brunch. Preplanning the food table as well as the drinks makes for an event where you can actually sit down and enjoy your quests. After deciding on your menu, choose your serving platters and tools. Set up your buffet table starting with plates, utensils, and napkins, then lay out the food in the order you would like to serve it, savory dishes first, sweets and fruits at the end.
For drinks, set out glasses in a few different sizes, a bucket of ice, and selection of drinks. Have a bottle of champagne open and be sure to offer orange juice and a pitcher of water with lemon slices.
Blackened Shad Roe & Sautéed in Butter
Shad was known as elft, the eleven fish, to the early Dutch settlers. It was on the 11th day of March each year that the first shad were caught and cooked on a plank, a method the settlers learned from the Indians. Shad were so abundant in colonial days that it became quite fashionable among some of the well-to-do. Many of them ate shad on the sly, fearing others would think them unable to afford more expensive food.
Are You Ready for Spring? #OXOSpringCleaning
Spring is finally around the corner after the endless cold days and this means new start and new beginning. Everything slowly starts to wake up as sun warms up the ground. I love first sunny days, I open my windows to let fresh air to come into our bedrooms. Once you can see first flowers under the trees you know Easter is coming soon. Along with cooking special foods during such time, I like to give my house a spark and start my spring cleaning. I do laundry almost every day - all winter jackets, scarves and sweaters need a good wash. Winter boots are going into their boxes until next cold season. When all of this is in order, I start freshening up room by room. I buy many flowers and herbs in early spring, something unique for every room. Tulips usually go on my dining table, lilies of the valley – to bedrooms. Fresh mint on a countertop brings lovely aroma in a kitchen. Don't you just love new beginning?
Springerle Cookies for Easter
I bake Springerle cookies twice an year, in winter for Christmas and in spring for Easter. "Springerle" are traditional German Christmas biscuits which were used as gifts just like these days we give each other greeting cards for the holidays. It was a matter of pride to have a unique dough mold unlike anyone else's, so the "baked greeting card" would be very special. Cookies were baked, put in jars and kept for six months. After few weeks they would become very hard, but tasty, and in order to soften them up you would have to dunk them into tea or coffee. This is why Springerle were also called "dunking cookies". Special molds for these used to be carved from pear trees. I got only three different molds like this and I love and cherish them. Maybe next Christmas I will make one more addition to my Springerle family.
Honey Glazed Roasted Chicken Sandwich with Cabbage & Corn Salad
The tender chicken breast contrasts with crunchy texture of the cabbage salad, and the honey glaze add color and flavor.
Romaine Salad with Couscous & Soft Boiled Egg
A galaxy of color and texture, with a soft boiled egg and couscous, will make this a favorite salad.
Spring Strawberry Tapioca Soup
This winter has been so long with a lot of snow and cold nasty winds. Sometimes snow turned into rain which froze and turned back into snow. I don't mind winter and I love snow days when fluffs are falling and covers trees and roofs of our houses. Snow days mean no school for kids and many cups of hot coco by the fireplace. But this winter was too cold and too unpleasant and I am tired of it. I need spring badly and I miss long walks in a park with my lovely daughter. Where are those yellow flowers you can see in March? Where are green leaves?
Pea Shoots & Asparagus, Lemony Spring Soup
Asparagus is part of a springtime triumvirate, joining sweet peas and fresh mint as cherished sign of the season. Pea Shoots & Asparagus spring soup can be served hot or cold. Lemon zest is tasty flavor accent with asparagus. I ladle the soup into small cups for a refreshing start to a meal.
Arugula and Sweet Violet Salad
This salad idea is for you if you are keen gardener with a vegetable plot or if your flower beds are a riot of color in spring. The ingredients could be something your might have grown as part of your favorite pastime. Any harvest can be served at the table to the amusement of your friends invited to a truly garden-grown lunch.
Still Life with Strawberries and Yellow Flowers - Spring Collection
Have a beautiful weekend, my dear readers!
"Heated spring air
In tiny waves of an inch or two -
Above wintery grass."
Matsuo Basho's Haiku
Watermelon Salad with Radish and Sage
Watermelons in great variety are one of the most refreshing of fruits. Serve them well chilled, in combination with other fruits and vegetables, for example - radishes. And why not? Use other herbs if you like - fresh dill, cilantro. Everyone seems to have different tastes about the proper seasoning.
Hello Spring!
"I went out in the Spring
To gather the young herbs.
So many petals were falling,
Drifting in confused flight,
That I lost my way."
Ki no Tsurayuki, One Hundred More Poems from The Japanese
Turnip Soup with Carrot Crisps
The spring is here, I can feel it! The birds are singing and the air is so fresh. I love the early mornings, when I come down to my patio to check out the weather and I can feel how the earth is waking up after a long sleep. But before we all dive into yellow colors, Easter eggs and pink flowers I would like to say good bye to the winter, to those cold days when we were sharing great food with our dear friends by the fireplace, to winter holidays and to snowflakes (we had snow only 3 times this winter), and many more unforgettable moments of the past season. We had a long walk with my daughter in Taylor Park on a beautiful sunny and warm day, and yet the presence of winter is still here. We are in a middle of season change and I love the times when winter is holding hands with spring.
