Forum

Now that we are officially in the winter season, are you looking at wintry cookbooks in your collection? Or have you added some new ones?

Recently I purchased "Home Made Winter" by Yvette van Boven. Made her quinoa cake which sounds iffy but it was very nice; healthy, filling but it was full of good flavors from the apple chunks and raisins.  Will definitely make again.

Another new addition is "Muffin Tin Chef"(Kadey). Great for portable food to bring to work for breakfasts and lunches, especially.  My favorite so far is the granola cups.  I was surprised how good these are; filling and full of healthy ingredients, too.

I've also taken a pile of my slowcooker books out to tag with a plan to make a big pot of soup per week to use for work lunches. In the pile are old standbys "Not your Mother's"(Hensperger) and "Slow Cooker Ready and Waiting"(Rodgers) in addition to "50 simple Soups" (Alley).  I also pulled out a few vegetarian/vegan slow cooker books I have.

Finally, I've been perusing some cookbooks for healthier cooking, including " the Nordic Diet"(Hahnemann), some by Michael van Straten, and "Whole Grains for a New Generation" (Krissoff) and "Washoku".

One that I have made multiple times and has become a favorite is the Adzuki Miso Soup.  So simple but great to bring in the thermos to work. I've frozen it, and reheated as well.

Others I will make again soon:

-Spinach Dal with Coconut Milk. To this one I added some chunks of fresh pumpkin which turned out to be a great addition.

- White Miso Winter soup. Didn't know how this would be but I liked it, another good one for the lunchtime thermos.

These were good, and I would make again but not as often due to the cream and cheese which I love but don't always love me:

- Cauliflower soup with Stilton - tasted great, but I didn't think it would freeze well.

- Cream of Tomato Soup - I added cream to the bowl I was having and not the whole batch so that I could freeze it.

Winter is the season when a warm kitchen is a good thing and I spend a lot more time indoors.  What better time of year for recipes that have many steps or take a long time to prepare?  I have already taken all my Paula Wolfert books down from the shelf and made a daube from The Cooking of Southwest France.  And no doubt I will be baking some bread - the kind with multiple slow rises and plenty of flavor.  Dan Leader's Bread Alone was my introduction to traditional bread making and it is still the book I return to first when I feel that urge for a really good loaf.

What a great idea to bake bread.  Tonight I have a loaf going, albeit in the bread machine.  Using the Beth Hensperger bread machine book, making a buttermilk whole wheat loaf (which I subbed spelt and a little buckwheat flour for the whole wheat, and added some ground chia seeds and oats for more protein)).

My favorite Beth H. recipe is from her book "Bread".  It is for Dijon rye bread.  Perfect for substantial big-flavor sandwiches.  Not a bread machine recipe, and rye doughs can be sticky, but definitely worth the effort.

Nigel Slater - kitchen diaries and Tender 

Not only is he big on the warm comforting things you are after in winter he evokes the feeling of the weather outside with his writing 

great stuff 

I second Nigel Slater's Kitchen Diaries Volumes I & II and Tender - for winter especially.  Slater's writing just seems to gather one around his kitchen table ready to make and eat anything he's got on offer.  Very lyrical and evocative - I love the restrained and subtle photography, too.