S'more Meringues

Shula had this idea and we found a fun recipe by Jamie Geller. It worked perfectly. We did have leftover melted chocolate and graham cracker crumbs, which we combined and spread out thin. Here's our double recipe.

4 egg whites
2/3 c sugar
1 c graham cracker crumbs (smash in a bag if you don't have them already ground.) - for Passover, sugar and matzah meal would probably be good
6 oz Hershey's chocolate bars

Heat oven to 215 degrees. Spread a large cookie sheet with parchment paper. These don't spread much at all, so just leaving a little space is enough.

Beat the egg whites, slowly adding the sugar, until stiff an glossy.

Drop a tablespoon of batter and pull up the spoon so it has a nice twisty top. Shula took a butter knife and made shapes and designs.

Bake for 90 minutes. Leave in the oven overnight if you do these in the evening.

Melt the chocolate on the induction burner set at 2. Stir while melting; it goes fast.

Set the cracker crumbs on a small plate. It's fine if there are some bigger pieces. Dip each meringue in the melted chocoate and then set it on the crumbs. Put them on their sides to harden. You can refrigerate.

For Passover, just leave off the crumb layer, or try sugared matzah meal for some crunch.

Very pretty! 

Blackberry Cobbler

I predict we'll be making this often. Micah's blackberry bushes are producing prodigious amounts of lucious blackberries, and their ripening is staggered throughout the summer. It's pretty quick to pick a quart of blackberries in this orchard!

It's from a The HIllbilly Kitchen, a very simple concept!

Spray a flat ovenproof dish. I use a Dansk round metal casserole or a ceramic casserole.

Preheat oven to 375.

Lots of 1s in this recipe.

1 quart berries - splashed with 1 t. vanilla
1 egg
1 stick of butter, melted
1 cup flour/s (any combination - you can include some oats)
1 cup sugar

Place the berries in the pan, splash the vanilla on them.

In a bowl, combine the flour, egg, and sugar until it's crumbly, with a big fork or fingers.

Drop it on the berries.

Pour the melted butter over the top. Sprinkle a little sugar on top (optional).

Bake for about 30 minutes.

Norwegian Crepe Pancakes

These were inspired by my going to NetCost, a super store in NE Philly specializing in Russian and Eastern European foods. They had a huge section of "preserves", many from Israel with Hebrew and Russian. They are a genre of fruit somewhere between what we call jam and pie filling. I brought some cherry preserves and then tried to figure out what to do with them. Rolling them up in a crepe is perfect. Three or four make a very nice meal.

These remind David of the thin pancakes his Aunt Ruth made in Salt Lake, rolled up with fruits. Happily so!

It's from How to Feed a Loon, two guys with a blog and lots of YouTubes. I have modified it, using more whole wheat, natch.

3 eggs
1½ c whole milk (up to 1/3 can be buttermilk)
1 c all-purpose flour (half white, half whole wheat)
¼ t salt
1 t sugar
¼ t cardamom ground, optional
1 t vanilla 
2 T butter melted, plus more for the pan
Preserves or jam, for spreading and rolling. Optional: ricotta cheese.
For a savory crepe: chop an onion, saute, and throw in a lot of fresh spinach. Add a little grated cheese. Yum!

Use a blender, mixing the eggs and milk til smooth. It’s easier to pour the batter from the blender.

[or, easier: use a pancake dispenser. It has measures on it, so put in the milks and add eggs, and use a whisk to beat. Add the dry ingredients. You can put the top on and shake it. Lumps will not be gone, but disappear when you cook them.] 

Add the flour, salt, sugar, cardamom, vanilla extract, and melted butter, and continue mixing until most of the lumps are gone.

Heat a large griddle/skillet , and a second smaller fry pan ( perfect for kid sized crepes) over medium heat and coat with a small amount of butter (about 1 tsp). Swirl the pan until the pan is fully coated. Let it heat - it takes longer than you expect, in my experience.

Scoop about ⅓ cup of the batter and then pour into the center of the skillet, immediately swirling the pan until most of the batter has been distributed along the bottom of the pan. You can do this with the bottom of a 1/3 c measure. [or pull the handle of the dispenser.]

Cook until the edges begin to curl up slightly and some bubbles begin to appear, usually about 2 minutes. Carefully slip a rubber (or silicone) spatula under the side of the pancake and flip.
Cook for another minute and then transfer the pancake to a serving plate. I put the tray in the Breville, without heat, closed - the steam keeps them warm.

This makes about 8-12, depending on size. Serve with fruit preserve, jam, or fresh fruits and yogurt.

 They go pretty fast!

If desired, roll the pancakes, or serve flat with toppings on the side.

Persimmon Picking & Pulping + Persimmon Bread

Micah spotted persimmon trees on the trail to the Gesher Tsar Meod, and in 2023 Jo, Micah, and I picked a bunch. Then he found an even bigger tree and I went with Jennifer Paget and we picked a half a pot full.

In 2025, on a day Micah spent doing chores and exploring in fall, he counted 17 persimmon-bearing trees along the trails! And, he brought home a huge collection, and learned that they continue to ripen, called climacteric fruits.

Today, I stopped by Fredi Cooper's house, which she is moving out of shortly, and she gave me a beautiful Nordic Ware loaf pan, with a pumpkin vine pattern. It would be perfect for baking a persimmon bread! Can't wait to try it.

in 2023, I purchased a vintage Foley Food Mill on Ebay and it worked wonderfully, though it's slow. Eventually you collect pulp, which you can eat as a kind of cross between jam and sauce. It's a beautiful color. The dark flecks in it are completely edible.

We baked three loaves with this recipe. It's dark and moist. Nice with cream cheese. You can use pumpkin pie spice in lieu of the cinnamon/nutmeg/cloves.

This recipe is from Feast Magazine, doubled.

2 1/2 c (175g) flour (1/2 each whole wheat and white is fine)
1 t baking soda (all the recipes I have found use baking soda, not baking powder. Apparently it reacts with the fruit.)
1 t  salt
1 t ground cinnamon
1/2 t fresh ground nutmeg
1/2 t ground cloves
1 1/3 cup  sugar
4 eggs
2 t vanilla 
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
2 c (260g) persimmon pulp

Preheat oven to 350˚F and spray pans. 

Whisk together flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves in a medium bowl; set aside. 

In a larger bowl, beat sugar, eggs and vanilla together until combined and fluffy, 3 to 4 minutes. With mixer running, stream in melted butter; continue to beat until incorporated, scraping sides of bowl down with a spatula as needed. Fold in persimmon pulp and mix until incorporated. 

Fold flour mixture into butter mixture just until combined, then fold in persimmon pulp until incorporated and no streaks remain. Divide between your pans.

Bake on middle rack of oven for 45 to 50 minutes, rotating pan after 20 minutes of baking. Bread is done when a wooden skewer comes out clean or with a few crumbs. Set on wire rack to cool completely.

In 2025, I used Fredi's loaf pan and two pumpkin layers. Nordic Ware calls it the Great Pumpkin pan. They came out of the pan very easily. So pretty.

Main trick is using a lot of Bakers Joy spray, which is flour and oil already combined.

 

Sweet Potato Gnocchi

Sweet potatoes are more nutritious than white potatoes, and prettier, so I decided to give Sweet Potato Gnocchi a whirl. They are fun and delicious. Could be a side, or a main. The ingredients are pretty flexible.

2 medium/large sweet potatoes
3 T (or so) grated parmesan
3 T (or so) ricotta, or 1 egg
1.5 c white flour
1/2 c. whole wheat flour
salt to taste
dash of nutmeg

For frying:
10 leaves or so fresh sage
2 T. butter + olive oil

For topping: parmesan, + chopped walnut or hazelnuts

Optional: spinach, to fry along in the pan with the gnocchi

Microwave or boil the sweet potatoes til cooked. Let cool. Peel and if you have a ricer, process them with it, or scoop into a large bowl and use a potato masher. You want some texture, not a puree. Add the other ingredients. This is easiest to work by hand. 

On a large board, cut the dough in quarters. Roll each quarter into a log and cut pieces about the size of a small grape. Smaller is better. You can flatten the log and cut it laterally and then in 1/2" pieces.

Flour a gnocchi board, or just the back of a fork. Press your thumb to flatten the dough and roll it from the top. This creates a hollow, ridged gnocchi.

Repeat with each quarter. This makes a lot of gnocchi. I froze half for another meal. 

Boil a large pot of water and then drop the gnocchi in a few at a time. They pop up pretty quickly.

In a large skillet, add some olive oil and butter. Fry the sage leaves. When they're crisp, remove them, and add a few dozen gnocchi. Brown on both sides. Yum!

Serve with grated parmesan, chopped nuts, pesto, or whatever you like.

If you throw some spinach in the pan with the gnocchi, it will be even more nutricious and colorful.

 

Claudia Roden Persian Chicken w Apricots, Pistachios, Pomegranate Syrup

This beautiful recipe was featured in Hadassah Magazine. It's perfect for Sukkot. I've made it several times in Chestertown, since it keeps well for winter shabbatot when you cook in advance. 

I have made some changes, like adding rice for the last stage, making it a kind of arroz con pollo. The biggest task in this recipe is browning the chicken, which I find is hard to do. But, it pulls the juices into the pan for the sauce and, I think, prevents the chicken from getting soggy?

2 T sunflower oil
2 onions, chopped
8 bone-in, skin-on chicken thighs (they are usually sold six to a package. 8 barely fit in a big skillet.)
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
7 oz soft dried apricots, chopped
1 t ground cinnamon
1 t ground coriander
1 T pomegranate molasses
Juice of 1/2 lemon

optional: 3/4 c. of rice plus extra water
Generous 1/2 cup pistachios, coarsely chopped

1. Warm the sunflower oil in a large sauté pan (with a lid) over low heat. Add the onions and cook, with the lid on, stirring often, for about 10 minutes, until soft and golden. 

2. In a second saute pan, with a lid, put the chicken thighs into the pan, skin-side down, add salt and pepper and cook over medium heat, with the lid on, for about 10 minutes, until the skin releases its fat and the chicken pieces are well browned. Turn them over and cook the other side for 10 minutes, until browned, adding more salt and pepper. 

3. Add the apricots and add the onions to the pan, lifting the chicken pieces so that they sit on top of the apricots and onions.

4. Measure 3/4 cup water into a liquid measuring cup, stir in the cinnamon, coriander, pomegranate molasses and lemon juice and pour over the chicken.

5. Optional: add 3/4 c. rice plus the appropriate amount of liquid (can be a little less than for just cooking rice, since you're also adding the 3/4 c water in Step 4.

Cook, covered, over low heat for 25 minutes, until the chicken is very tender and cooked through and the liquid is reduced.

5. Serve the chicken sprinkled with the pistachios. It's not super-colorful but very, very delicious!

Claudia Roden's Yogurt Cake

A 7" cake. It puffs and settles.

Here is Claudia Roden's Yogurt Cake. It's the same idea except adding yogurt gives it more heft. Eyal and Nadav love it! They call it yogurt muffins, for mysterious reasons. Note it has flour. Probably you could sub almond flour if you wanted to do this on Pesach, or make it gluten free. It's much lighter than cheese cake, but similar.

4 large eggs, separated, at room temperature - put the yolks in the larger bowl

½ cup granulated sugar
3 T [try doubling this for a denser cake] all-purpose flour (can be whole wheat)
1 ⅔ cups whole-milk Greek yogurt, or strain regular yogurt in a coffee filter for an hour or two.
1 lemon, zested and juiced

Optional: 1/2 c blueberries
Pinch of salt (optional), cinnamon to taste

Heat oven to 350 degrees and butter an 8- or 9-inch springform pan, or two smaller (A 7" and 5" works well).

• Using an electric hand mixer, beat egg whites until they're stiff peaks
• Using the same mixer, combine yolks and sugar (no need to wash beaters after the egg white). Beat on medium-high until the mixture is very pale and fluffy, about 3 minutes. 
• Mix in flour, yogurt, lemon zest and juice, and salt until fully incorporated.
• Gently fold half of the egg whites into the yolk-yogurt mixture until only a few streaks remain. 
• Fold in the remaining whites, scraping the bottom and sides of the bowl, until the batter is evenly mixed, light and smooth.
• If you add blueberries, add a little flower to coat them. Take about 2/3 of the blueberries and mix in the batter. Save the rest for the top.
• Scrape the batter into prepared pan(s) and smooth into an even layer. Set the balance of the berries on top of the cake/s. These will not sink.
• Bake until the top is speckled with golden brown and puffed, 35 to 55 minutes. ( This burns if you don't watch it! You can cover with tin foil if it's browning too fast.
• Transfer the pan to a wire rack and let cake cool before cutting. Serve warm or cold.