What to Do with Trader Joe’s Italian Bomba Hot Pepper Sauce

Trader Joe's Italian Bomba Hot Pepper Sauce ($2.99 for a 6.7 oz. jar) is one of the items I've been looking forward to most this summer. Calabrian chile paste adds a nice kick to a whole host of dishes, but I usually have to go to an Italian specialty market to pick it up. I…

ByMichelleAugust 1, 20190Comments

Recipes Salads

Grilled Panzanella Salad a la Tom Douglas

On a recent episode of the Seattle Kitchen podcast, Chefs Tom Douglas and Bridget Charters were talking summer grilling tips and Tom mentioned panzanella salad with grilled flank steak as a perfect one dish meal. Everything about it sounded delicious -- greens, mozzarella, asparagus, basil vinaigrette. It was all the suggestion I needed. We ate a…

ByMichelleMay 31, 20170Comments

Cooking Pizza Recipes

Friday Night Slice: Zucchini Cherry Bomb

The door's open and I'm staring into the fridge. What've I got that might make a good, simple flatbread? No time for sauce, what can I throw on there for a quick snack? What did I get at the farmers market? Zucchini. Corn. Chiles. A basket of grape tomatoes. The dough was already stretched out on the board, so I needed to be fast. I took out the zucchini and remembered that julienne peeler I bought a couple of years ago. It seemed like a good idea at the time, the whole zucchini noodle thing. The truth is, I made "zoodles" about three times before that peeler went in to the drawer, got shoved to the back, and didn't come out again. Turns out, it's the perfect tool for shaving down a medium zucchini so it'll cook up quickly without making a watery mess of your pizza. In celebration of actually using that damn peeler again, this week's Friday Night Slice is the Zucchini Cherry Bomb. It's vegetarian, it's sauceless and it's delicious.

ByMichelleAugust 22, 20140Comments

Cooking Pizza Recipes

Friday Night Slice: Soppressata Styles

We’re almost a week into Daylight Savings Time and I still haven’t quite adjusted. 7 am, when it’s just getting light, feels like the right time to get up. Any earlier, it’s pitch black and I just don’t want to roll out of bed, not even for coffee. This week’s Friday Night Slice falls on Pi(e) day, so if you happen to not be fan of flaky-crusted sweet or savory pies, or you just don’t have the time or inclination since we're all in a bit of a haze, a slice of pizza pie is here to mark the occasion. So let’s get to this week's topping inspiration – Fra'Mani soppressata, red onion and cherry tomatoes.

ByMichelleMarch 13, 20141Comment

Main Course Pizza Recipes

Easy Peasy > Gemelli w/ Sausage & Cherry Tomatoes

This wasn't supposed to be a blog post, just dinner on Monday night. There are no photos of cherry tomatoes casually rolling toward the edge of the counter, or a scatter of pasta strategically positioned behind the bowl. There's not even a fork, just a quick snapshot because I was texting it to Wolf to get him to hurry up on home. Then, I was pleasantly surprised by how fast and delicious it actually was, so, well, here we are. Gemelli con salsiccia e pomodorini…which sounds fancy, no? Gemelli with sausage and cherry tomatoes. Let’s go.

ByMichelleJuly 30, 20130Comments

Photo One-offs

Photo One-Off: Goodbye Summer

This year I only had one hanging cherry tomato plant -- yep, just one. I almost killed it twice this summer, with um, inadvertent dry farming experiments (aka vacations). I did find out that poking holes in the bottom of a water bottle and jamming it into the pot does work, I probably just needed one bottle for every day we were gone since that little Tumbler tomato was sucking down the water. Even still, it gave one big push in mid-July and then ramped up for a second push in September, and then the weather cooled off just after Labor Day.

ByMichelleOctober 17, 20110Comments

Recipes Salads Side Dishes

Great Grains: Farro Salad with Kale, Cherry Tomatoes & Feta

When I was in high school, my best friend from elementary school dated a guy called Farro. By that time, we went to different schools, so I only met him once and I think we had dinner at his family's restaurant. Maybe my memory isn't what it used to be, but I'm pretty sure Farro wasn't his real name, and now that I've made the grain, I'm dying to know how Farro ends up being your nickname. Is it a diminutive of something like Bobby is for Robert? Or are you just nutty? Are you hard-headed? I don't know. But unlike quinoa, which I find just ok (and not a good nickname), I like farro's heft. That chewy bite, even after 30 or 40 minutes of cooking, with a nutty flavor - I like it. And after this salad, I'm excited to try making a risotto -- a farrotto -- out of it.

ByMichelleAugust 15, 20112Comments