On our honeymoon we ate at the Napa Rose in Disneyland’s Grand Californian Hotel and had a great meal, but one of the highlights was the Star Anise Dark Bread they served from the La Brea Bakery.  Evidently it’s made only for the Napa Rose, so since we couldn’t buy it, I had to make it!

It’s a dark, whole wheat bread, flavored with molasses and star anise. (more…)

Nothing beats home-made latkes (potato pancakes).  They are primarily potato and onion, but some people make them “mushy” with the potatoes and onion ground to a pulp.  Others make them with the potatoes shredded like hash browns.  Either way there’s a lot of prep on the day you make them. 

This recipe was designed to accomplish two goals:  Have the latkes pre-made so they could just be fried on the day you want to eat them, and to be able to make them in a deep fryer.  Both goals are accomplished by freezing the latkes and frying them direct from the freezer.  (more…)

This recipe was inspired by a potato dish I had as a teenager at a cookout while on summer vacation.  It was a simple combination of sliced potatoes, onions and butter.  It was made in foil and cooked on an open fire.  My first All Clad pan was their 3 qt Cassoulet and I thought it would be the perfect pan to recreate this recipe, but in the oven instead of the campfire.  (more…)

I was at a party and along with the usual carrot, celery and jicama sticks there were these interesting looking purple/red sticks.  Some of the party-goers thought they were simply dyed jicama, but they were immediately identifiable to me as raw beet sticks.  They had a really interesting flavor, and they didn’t bleed when you held them.  Some people though they had seen them at Trader Joe’s but I decided to try and make my own. (more…)