Here is a mango chicken curry I whipped up the other day. I love it, but my father thinks it’s a little on the sweet side, so feel free to reduce the amount of mango the recipe calls for if you want a little less sweet. Or add a little more vinegar. The amounts are approximate, feel free to experiment! Our mango chicken curry uses fresh mangoes, full-fat coconut milk for richness, ginger, curry powder, cumin, and vinegar to offset the sweetness of the mango....

Mango chutney is easy to make! And a great way to take advantage of mangoes when they are in season and plentiful at the market. A Sweet Chutney With Notes of Spice This chutney is spiced with ginger, mustard seeds, garlic, and red chili pepper flakes. It gets its tangy-ness from the acidity in the mangoes and added vinegar, and it gets its sweetness from the mangoes, raisins, and sugar....

I think the answer is always no, and since the nightmare of any holiday celebration is running out of mashed potatoes, most hosts make too much. It’s common for me to have an entire leftover container of just mashed potatoes that sits in my fridge, languishing, for a week after any celebration. Enter these Mashed Potato Pancakes to save the day! Fold cheddar cheese and chives into mashed potatoes of pretty much any sort, form a patty, then lightly pan fry them to yield a cheesy, fluffy interior and a golden crispy exterior....

I grew up in a New Jersey town with lots of Jewish people, so I received an early education in things like the Seder, or Purim or Hannukah. I remember this dish as a quick meal my friends’ mothers would make when I came over during Passover. I remember it as “maht-zuh-brai,” with the “brai” rhyming with “try.” I only later learned that it’s spelled matzo brei. What is Matzo Brei?...

We always invite to Thanksgiving dinner any soldiers from our unit who can’t go home for various reasons – we can’t leave them to eat pizzas in the barracks! You probably have your Thanksgiving menu all planned out already, but just in case, I’m sharing my menu for that meal, too. Meal Plan for November Week 4 1 Roasted Sweet Potato Soup: Monday’s meal, meatless as always around here, is going to be Roasted Sweet Potato Soup with a side of toasted naan bread....

That is, except for the citrus. All over Sacramento, and most of California, orange, grapefruit, and lemon trees are laden with bright fruit. Meyer lemons in particular are well suited for home landscapes, which is why so many people have their own backyard tree. Supposedly they don’t orchard well, but if they are spaced out enough, as in one in my backyard and one in yours, they’re fine. The fruit is a cross between an orange and lemon, so the peel is a little more orangey than a regular lemon, and the juice is not nearly as tart....

My grandmother used to bake oatmeal raisin cookies with me from the time I was old enough to stand on a chair and hold a spoon. Making these cookies taught me how to measure, how scrape down the sides of a mixing bowl, and the purest pleasure of all—licking the bowl. Whoever helped with the cooking got first dibs on the bowl, so guess who was the first to volunteer to help?...

Sometimes I just want a quick cookie. Something simple, yet flashy, with very little work on my part. A quick rendezvous in the kitchen with near instant cookie gratification. The answer to this cookie conundrum is the palmier, or elephant ear cookie. A simple French classic, and even though it’s French don’t let that scare you. Puff pastry and sugar. Bake. Done. Class dismissed. This cookie, due to its simplicity, pairs well with many other desserts or after dinner espresso, coffee, and tea....

Now that I’m an adult and the lazy days of summer are long behind me, I kind of think seasonal eats are summer’s biggest prize. A Pie with Pennsylvania Dutch Origins This recipe gets its start from my Great Aunt Charlotte’s peach pie recipe, but I’ve made many tweaks over the years to the topping, in favor of more butter. And sometime I add berries, sometimes I don’t. She was Pennsylvania Dutch (a....

Juicy plums are excellent for eating out of hand, but baking with them is one of the finest pleasures of summer. Their flesh is sweet and their skins are tart, so they inspire use in tarts, crumbles, muffins, coffee cakes – or in this case, an easy walnut cake. The walnuts also give moistness and earthy flavor to the cake, which is heavily scented with the zest of an entire lemon....

Both are made with a thin egg batter, but popovers were traditionally baked in special cast-iron pans with deep, straight cups that are hard to come by today, while Yorkshire pudding is made by pouring the batter into a roasting pan with the drippings of the roast. You Can Make Popovers Without a Popover Pan A popover pan is deeper than a muffin tin and has straight sides, but you don’t need one to make popovers....

The first time I had these I was 21 years old, at an outdoor cafe on Newbury Street in Boston; I thought I had died and gone to heaven. Oh for the days of youth when one could eat potato skins with wild abandon! I could eat a whole plate back then (and drink a pitcher of beer along with it) and be none the worse. Sigh. The Secret to the Best Potato Skins: Bake, Don’t Fry!...

Elise makes a recipe for Moroccan-spiced chicken using the slow cooker that is absolutely fantastic, but I wanted to adapt it for the pressure cooker so I could make it at a moment’s notice on a busy weeknight. A Beloved Chicken Recipe Adapted for the Instant Pot To adapt Elise’s recipe for the pressure cooker (I love my Instant Pot!), I started off by sautéing the onions and garlic for a few minutes, then stirring in the spices to release their complex aromas....

For this recipe, I add a combination of salty prosciutto (an Italian cured ham), parmesan cheese, and fresh herbs to the puff pastry. It is rolled and sliced into pinwheels, which get crisp and flaky as they bake. These are a real crowd-pleaser! It’s nice to have a warm starter that’s really a breeze to prepare before the big feast. Plus, it’s hard to have just one, trust me, I tried!...

Ramps arrive in the East Coast well before good basil can be found, so I’ve adapted a classic cool-weather pesto from Liguria, in Northern Italy, that uses walnuts and parsley instead of basil and pine nuts. Only, in this case, I am substituting the garlic in that pesto for fresh ramps, which are a kind of wild onion that has a pronounced garlic flavor. How to Keep Your Pesto Green!...

Sadly, peak berry season is always too short. So a few years back, I started making liqueurs using the bounty of fresh berries to keep on hand for when I needed a berry fix. If I can’t eat them fresh, an infused liqueur makes for a delicious alternative. It’s also super easy! The hardest part about making this liqueur is the waiting while it steeps (about 4 weeks), but it’s well worth it....

It’s the law. Certain migratory birds can be hunted in season, but not sold. We were the lucky recipients of some teal ducks recently from our hunting friends Hank and Holly. I had never eaten, let alone cooked wild duck, and let me tell you, it is an entirely different experience than working with ducks from the grocery store. What follows is a loose recipe and several notes on cooking wild duck, for my own benefit so I remember the next time, as well as for anyone else out there who may have the opportunity to cook wild duck....