Sugar Snap Pea and Radish Salad

While wondering what I was going to make for lunch, I stumbled upon this recipe on Bon Appetit's website. Sugar snap peas? Radishes? A little mint? This was just the spring fix that I needed. Add a little crumbled cheese, and I am pretty much in heaven.

 I was surprised to see that the original recipe called for boiling the sugar snap peas. To me, snap peas are in their perfect state when raw, and nobody wants to turn on the stovetop if they don't have to, so that step was omitted. Now this dish is just spring perfection. Crunchy, a little sweet, creamy, radishy, fresh. So fresh.

If you have some hard-boiled eggs left over from Easter (and do I ever!), they go extremely well with this salad. We served this up for lunch, and modified it only slightly to put together an excellent kids' lunch for our 3 year olds. All it took was removing the offending radish slices, subbing in some orange pepper slices on the side, and these kids gobbled up their meals.

Sugar Snap Pea and Radish Salad

adapted from Bon Appetit

• 3 Tbs olive oil
• 1 Tb fresh lemon juice
• 1 tsp white wine vinegar
• 1/2 tsp sumac 
• 1 1/2 lbs sugar snap peas, trimmed, stringed, cut in half on diagonal
• 1 bunch radishes, trimmed, thinly sliced
• 4 ounces feta, crumbled
• 2 Tbs coarsely chopped fresh mint 
• Freshly ground black pepper
• kosher salt

1. In a small bowl, whisk together olive oil, lemon juice, white wine vinegar, and sumac. 

2. Toss together snap peas, radishes, feta, and mint cheese in a large bowl.  Pour dressing over, and mix together to coat evenly. Season with salt and pepper.

Apple Brie Baguette

Let me tell you what’s on this delicious (but simple!) sandwich:  brie, tangy apple slices, spicy arugula, and honey.  On a fresh baguette. With a little sprinkle of coarse salt. It’s so easy that it barely counts as a recipe, but it is so delicious that we got really excited about it and had to share.

I’m not much of a sandwich person, but when it is on a baguette I apparently change my mind. I have been thinking about this sandwich every day since we made it. 

Do you see those patient baby hands up there? We had to share our sandwiches with two hungry toddlers, and somehow managed to take these pictures to the slightly stressful chant of "More cheese please! Are those apple slices?! I would like some MORE HONEY!" etc, etc.

The honey we used was a little special, which was fun. We tried out this raw Colorado clover honey. It came in a jar with a chic label and was much more solid than our usual honey, but had a really nice texture and floral taste. 

This recipe makes about 3 to 4 sandwiches depending on the size of your baguette.

Apple Brie Baguette

• One baguette
• 6 oz sliced Brie
• 1/2 thinly sliced tart apple
• handful of fresh arugula
• drizzle of honey
• sprinkle of coarse sea salt

Slice the baguette lengthwise. Spread the honey thinly on the bread, then layer on slices of brie. We recommend sprinkling with coarse salt on top of the brie, by the way, so it sticks and doesn’t fall off the sandwich. Finish by layering the apples slices, the arugula. Slice into sandwiches and you’re done.

Apple Brie Tart

This simple tart with flaky crust and tart apple slices sandwiching a layer of bubbling brie is a perfect fall dish.

The fun part of this tart is it’s very simple to make – it really only has three ingredients if you count “crust” as one ingredient.  But the final product is gorgeous and impressive.  The thinly sliced apples arranged in a pretty rose shape with brie bubbling up between them is basically irresistible.

I recently had a little house warming party and served a couple of these tarts (one was apple brie, the other pear camembert) as appetizers. They were perfect – not too sweet, not too savory, and easy to eat while socializing with our park playdate group.

Most of the toddlers in the group seemed to like them, too, which is always a nice surprise!

Thank you to A Spicy Perspective for the recipe inspiration!

Crust (makes 2, so save one for later):

• 2 cups all purpose flour
  
• 1/2 tsp salt
  
• 12 Tbsp (1.5 sticks) butter, cut into small 1/4” cubes
  
• Have measured 1/2 c ice cold water

From the Alice Waters classic. Mix the flour & salt together.  Cut or work the butter cubes into the flour mixture, leaving some fairly large irregular pieces.  I do this in the food processor, and just hit pulse a few times until it just becomes irregular and grainy.  Pour in about 3/4 of the ice water, pulse a few more times, then add the rest of the water if needed until the mixture sticks together into a rough ball.
Divide the dough into two, wrap in plastic, flatten into discs, and refrigerate for a few minutes or days (depending on when you want to use the dough, you can make it a day or two in advance). 
Roll one of the discs out in a circle to fit a 10” tart pan. No need to prebake the crust.

Filling:

• 2 large apples.  I like honeycrisp best.
  
• 8 oz brie, approx.  This is about the size (maybe a little less) of one of a standard smallish wheel of brie that’s commonly available at the supermarket.

Slice the brie into 1/4” thick planks.  Core & quarter the apples, then slice them as thinly as possible.   Line the bottom of the tart evenly with slices of brie, then top with the apple slices.  To arrange the apple slices, start at the outer edge to create the first circle of overlapping pieces.  Line the pieces up very closely in order to create a good total thickness of apple for the top of the tart – you don’t want to wind up with a paper thin layer of apples in the end.  For the center, stand the apples up with skins out in concentric circles to form a rose shape.  Bend the apples into smaller & smaller circles to create the pretty rose shape.  I learned how to do it here, at a Spicy Perspective, which is also the source of my recipe inspiration!
Bake at 400 for 40 minutes – until the brie is bubbling up and golden.
Let rest and cool for at least 15 minutes before cutting & serving.  This helps it hold together and not completely slip apart due to the hot bubbling brie!

Ricotta Breakfast Bowl

With a few cups of delicious homemade ricotta on hand, I wanted to find a recipe where I could use it and fully experience its wonderfulness without masking it by baking it into pancakes, muffins, etc.

I came up with the idea for a ricotta breakfast bowl with honeycomb, fresh winter fruit, walnuts, and of course – homemade ricotta.

We used to eat honeycomb at my grandparents house – spread on toast with butter.  I remember it being so delicious then but hadn’t had it since, so I was excited to incorporate it into a breakfast bowl.

The fruit & honeycomb are sweet, the ricotta is creamy but substantial, and the walnuts add a little crunch here and there.  I’m obsessed with this as a new item in my breakfast rotation!

 

Ricotta Breakfast Bowl

• 3/4 c. ricotta (homemade if possible)
• 1 pink grapefruit
• 1 clementine
• 2 Tbsp chopped walnuts
• 1/4 c. honeycomb cut into tiny cubes

This meal is easy to assemble.  Start with the ricotta in a big bowl (you’ll want room to mix it up a bit).  I supremed the grapefruit, which basically means you cut off the outer peel and then insert your knife alongside the inner membranes to extract slices of membrane-free grapefruit.  Here’s a tutorial from my friend Jim, if you’re interested.  I peeled the clementine and cut it into small pieces, then sprinkled the walnuts and small cubes on honeycomb over the top.  Enjoy!

Homemade Ricotta

We’ve been working on another homemade dairy project over the past few weeks.  This one is our first cheese – ricotta!  This fresh cheese doesn’t require any aging, special equipment or ingredients, and is amazingly fast and simple to make.

Here’s what you need:  whole milk, fresh lemon juice, and salt.  That’s it!
Interesting side note: I compared our homemade ricotta with store bought organic ricotta and was very surprised at how different they were.  The store bought has a kind of pasty texture, and is a little gritty.  The homemade stuff is more firmly curd textured, more creamy and fresh tasting, and doesn’t have any grittiness to it.


The process is simple.  Heat milk and salt, add an acid to curdle it, then drain the whey from the curds.
The first step is to heat the milk.  No thermometer is required, which might seem a little nerve wracking but it’s actually very easy.  Use a large sturdy pot with a thick bottom (to avoid scorching) and heat the milk until it is  just about to boil – but not quite.  You’ll know it’s the right temperature when the milk gets all foamy and puffy and almost seems to be expanding in volume.  Right when you start to wonder “Is this milk coming up higher in the pan?  Why is it getting higher…is that an optical illusion, or am I crazy?”  That’s when you remove the milk from the heat. 
With the milk off the heat source, get out your lemon juice and slowly drizzle it across & around the whole surface of the hot milk.  Then take your spoon and very gently stir the milk to incorporate the lemon juice.  Don’t do any vigorous stirring, you really just want to do one gentle swirl to get the lemon juice dispersed throughout the liquid.  Let the mixture sit for a minute or so and you will see tiny milk curds beginning to form.  Like so (pic on left):


You can do another very gentle stir at this point.  It’s hard to resist poking at those newly forming curds!  They’ll continue to coagulate and after another minute they’ll look more like the above right picture.  Beneath the white curd will be the whey – it’s a yellowish clear liquid.  If it’s milky that means the curds haven’t fully separated from the whey.  Wait another minute and if the whey is still milky put it back on the heat source until it’s back to that just below boiling point.

When the curds are well formed and the whey is clear yellow, skim the curds off with a slotted spoon.  Look at that pretty steam!



Spoon curds directly into a strainer lined with cheese cloth.  We folded ours so the cheese cloth was 4 layers thick.


Let the ricotta drain in the cheese cloth for 1-2 minutes for softer cheese, and 15-20 minutes for drier firmer curds.  We let ours drain for 20 minutes while we went outside to play with the babies and were surprised by how firm it became during this time.

We thought the ricotta could have been a little more salty to fit our tastes, especially if you’re planning to use it in a savory dish.  If you want to create a sweeter creamier ricotta, stir in 2 Tbsp of heavy cream at the end (after draining the curds).  This would make it delicious as a spread on toast for breakfast.

Homemade Ricotta

• 1 gallon whole milk, pasteurized  (that’s 16 cups)
  
• 2 tsp salt
  
• 6 Tbsp fresh lemon juice
  
• optional, 2 Tbsp heavy cream (to make a sweeter, more rich ricotta)

Heat the milk & salt in a large pot until just below boiling.  You’ll know it’s the right temperature when the milk starts to get foamy and appear to be expanding upward.  Remove from heat. Drizzle the lemon juice slowly all over the surface of the milk.  Give it one very gentle stir, then let sit for 2 minutes or so, as the curds separate from the whey. Spoon the curds into a colander lined with cheese cloth.  Let drain for 2 minutes for moist ricotta, or 20 minutes for more dry ricotta. Stir in 2 Tbsp of heavy cream if you’d like a sweeter, more rich ricotta. Yield is about 2 cups of fresh ricotta.  We’ve read other online reports of a 3 cup yield but definitely didn’t get that much.  We maybe got 2.5 cups…but probably closer to 2.

Ricotta Breakfast Bowl

Lemony Barley Salad
Cherry Ricotta Muffins

Need more ideas? Here are our Top 10 Ricotta Recipes.