When a chill in the air rears its ugly head, I crave soup. I’m not a big fan of winter, but I adore the fall and I’ll tell you that by the end of summer, I’m getting a little sick of grilled meals … I long for the comfort foods that sustain me through the cold months here in New England.

You knew Heidi Swanson was going to show up on this list sooner or later, so we might as well get it out of the way with her dried fava bean soup with mint and guajillo chiles. Wow, does this sound unique and hearty and interesting and complex. I’m anxious to try this one.

The opposite of that gorgeous, complex soup above has got to be this gluten-free black bean soup with chorizo. I’m not one to criticize a soup with only five ingredients (anyone smell a lie?), but I just can’t imagine this time-saver is worth my time … though there is that argument that almost anything with chorizo in it is worth eating. What do you think?

Now that I’ve got chorizo on the brain, this sweet potato chorizo soup recipe may be just thing to make me forget about that bizarre recipe above.

Lately, when I think of soup, I admit that my egomaniacal self thinks of my very own minestrone my way. We all love this soup so much in my house that it’s one I make often, and thanks to the glut of veggies from our farm this summer, we’ve got some frozen for those lazy winter days too.

Molly makes her rustic cabbage and white bean soup in a pressure cooker, a tool I lately reserve for cooking corn on the cob. Really, when I used to make complex stews in it, I’m not sure how it got relegated to corn status … maybe it’s time I give this soup a try because I love just about anything with cabbage in it.

Cate says she makes the best vegetable soup you’ll ever have — could she possibly be right? Her recipe is very similar to me minestrone recipe, but I like the way she leaves it open to trying different vegetables in the recipe, and I love the way she includes cabbage — brilliant.

Before my minestrone my way, there was easy lentil and vegetable soup, my go-to recipe. Now I have to go back and forth between the two and it’s always such a hard decision to choose which one to make. This one’s got corn, a big it with the kid….

Cate makes some serious soups and her pasta e fagioli, though she says it’s very nontraditional, is no exception. Pasta, beans and veggies? Yes, please!

This easy vindaloo squash soup has very few ingredients. It’s basically an acorn squash soup highlighted with some vindaloo spices to make it different. Love it!

Bob has made Tyler Florence’s clam chowder several times, and I’ve been the recipient of a bowl or two. He mixes it up a bit my using sweet potatoes and white potatoes, but this is a really great recipe.

How interesting does apple mulligatawny soup with chicken sound? Apples, winter squash, curry, coconut, fresh ginger … I’m all over this, and the fact that I have every ingredient for this soup in my house right now if both exciting and scary at the same time. You totally want to be here when a natural or man-made disaster strikes. We could eat for years.

Something about this very simple broccoli soup appeals to me. I’d definitely use plain yogurt instead of heavy cream, and I’d probably leave out the flour. But I’ve been craving broccoli (not a vegetable we got a lot of from our CSA farm this summer) and this just sounded so perfectly lovely to me.

I give the credit to Keith for this one, because I would have just done takeout after this busy week. But seeing as he was willing to make this ribeye steak with sauteed grape tomatoes and brie, the least I could do was something beside steamed green beans.

After blanching the green beans, I sauteed them with garlic, sliced scallions, chopped Roma tomatoes and chopped Kalamata olives. When done, I sprinkled with a bit of fresh parley and some freshly grated pecorino romano cheese.

We rounded out the meal with half a butternut squash, simply baked at 400 degrees until tender, with a bit of olive oil.

Simple, but with just a few special touches to make our meal feel more like a weekend feast than a weeknight necessity eat.

I’m definitely not into the vegan thing. Eggs are a gift from the food gods not to be squandered. But I will say those feisty vegan bakers and their recipes saved me when my kid was allergic to eggs in the first three years of his life. in fact, almost any recipe by Isa was a big hit in our house with anyone … not just the eggless. And I have a really mean extended family who’s not afraid to tell me when my cooking sucks.

One of our favorites is Isa’a chewy chocolate chocolate chip cookie recipe. I have a cousin who has specifically requested these cookies, so that’s very telling. For years, it was revered and I wouldn’t mess with it even a little bit (I’m such a liar … I never use canola oil, so I’d use butter, rice bran oil, or coconut oil). Lately, though, I’ve started messing for a couple of reasons.

I’m sort of off chocolate, in theory. I’ll eat a chocolate dessert now and then, but I’m proud to say I no longer hoarf down a handful of chocolate chips every time I pass the pantry closet. Yeah, I’m prouder than the mom of a round-headed newborn.

I really don’t like the kid to have too much chocolate either since caffeine and the under-6 crowd of bad sleepers really don’t mix. We’ll try anything, even tricking him.

And now we’re back at the messing. A couple of weeks ago, I made Isa’s recipe with half cocoa powder and half carob powder. No one could tell, so I started getting crazy. I added, substituted and made the recipe mine, all mine. And in my house, anyway, we think it’s better.

It’s healthier, super-delicious but still “normal.” I held myself back from adding pureed spinach, but used the most nutritious unrefined sugar I could find, used coconut milk instead of soy milk and some of the oil and this and that until it fit my specs for healthy. Try it and see what you think.

Carob Chocolate Chip Cookies with Coconut and Cranberries

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup rice bran oil + 1/4 cup coconut milk
• 1 1/2 cups palm sugar
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• 1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon whole flax seeds
• 1/2 cup coconut milk
• 2 cups whole spelt flour
• 3/4 cup unsweetened carob powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup grain-sweetened chocolate chips
• 1/2 cup fruit-sweetened dried cranberries
• 1/2 cup unsweetened coconut flakes (optional)

Grind the flax seeds in a blender until they become a powder, then add the 1/2 cup of coconut milk and blend more, until the mixture thickens a bit and gets gooey.

Meanwhile, mix flour, carob powder, baking soda and salt together in a separate bowl.

Using a mixer (yes, Isa, I’m willing to lose the punk points), cream together the oil + coconut milk and the palm sugar, then add the flax mixture and vanilla and keep on mixing until mixture is almost fluffy.

Slowly add the dry ingredients while mixer is set to low speed. Blend well then stir in chocolate chips, cranberries and coconut.

Plop onto greased cookie sheets and make semi-pretty circles almost 2 inches around, slightly flattened in the middle. These do rise and expand, so leave at least an inch between cookies.

Bake for 10 minutes, let cool for 10 minutes on the pan and then cool the rest of the way on wire racks.

Cooper just turned two, so it stands to reason that he’s obsessed with Elmo. Elmo, after all, is the Muppet equivalent of Cheerios, AKA “baby crack.” There’s something primal about babies’ love for both of these things that I simply do not understand (although I do think that Elmo’s World is a perfect example of absurdist humor, but that’s a different post for a different time). So when it was time to figure out Cooper’s birthday cake, Elmo immediately came to mind.

This was going to be for the big party; the one to which we invited all of the kids from his daycare, so naturally I wanted to do something special. I decorated my first cake for his birthday last year, and was quite happy with the way it turned out. However, I’m certainly not an artist, so I needed to find something that was basically “cake decorating for dummies.”

I searched online and came across this design for Elmo cupcakes on amazingmoms.com. Amazing mom? That’s what I want to be! It seemed pretty simple: red frosting, white Necco wafers, black icing, and orange gumdrops. They say to use a licorice strand for the mouth, but I decided to just use the black decorator icing that I was already using for the eyes. Plus, I couldn’t find orange gumdrops that weren’t gigantic, so I used orange jelly beans instead. The recipe does mention using gel food coloring in order to get a true red, so I made sure to get some.

Unfortunately, that’s where the train went off the track. My friend Elizabeth came over to help me out, as she knows that I tend to melt down when faced with artistic baking endeavors. In addition to some wine (a key ingredient when trying anything new), she brought over some decorating bags, tips, and some Wilton food coloring gel. Here’s the thing though: that business did not turn red. Instead, the icing turned a crazy Barbie hot pink. We added more and it just became darker pink. We added blue, and it just turned a lovely shade of mauve. WE CAN’T HAVE MAUVE ELMOS!

After spending close to an hour playing food-coloring alchemists, I made a last minute late-night run to the grocery store. I returned with red decorating icing– the kind that comes in a can and has a few different decorating tips. It looked kind of gross, but it was 11:00 and I was desperate. The plus side: It was red. Unfortunately, I was only able to get 11 cupcakes out of it.

The end result, at nearly 1 AM and after several glasses of wine between the two of us, was 11 red Elmos, 1 sad mauve Elmo, and two dozen lame mauve cupcakes. Some would call this a failure, but the next morning, when Cooper was sitting on my lap as I loaded the photos onto my computer, he saw the pictures and squealed, “Elmo!” And that, my friends, is a big win.

Lauren’s back Guest-clacking for us again, after last sharing with us her diatribe on the atrocity that is mayonnaise.

I wouldn’t want anyone to think from my last post that I am a picky eater. I am, but I don’t want you to think that because I hate mayonnaise. Indeed, there are foods out there that other people looooooooathe — like I loathe the dreaded mayonnaise — that I just love.

My love of the fungus took a long time to procure. One of my first memories is sitting in preschool, in a big circle, and our teacher asked us to tell the class what our favorite food was. To say I was painfully shy when I was a kid is like saying Waterworld was a little bit terrible — a vast understatement. I was nearing the point of hyperventilation by the time the circle got around to me, and the only word I could manage to spit out was “mushrooms.” I had never eaten them, never even seen them outside of that one (kinda racist) scene in Fantasia, never had the desire to eat them at all. Yeah, I don’t know.

Well, somehow word got back to my parents that mushrooms were my favorite food and instead of rolling their eyes and going on about their day since kids lie all the time about random crap, WE WENT TO THE GROCERY STORE TO BUY MUSHROOMS. OMGWTFNOOOOO. The rest of the day is pretty hazy for me, but I probably cried a lot. And it took me years to finally give ‘em a whirl.

You have to start small when it comes to new foods, so I think the mushrooms started in good ol’ Campbell’s Cream of Mushroom soup, probably in a casserole at a friend’s house. The trick is to not tell me what I’m eating until well after the fact. It worked out, because casseroles featuring cream of mushroom soup are delicious. From the casserole came soup, still cream of mushroom but in bread bowls at sandwich places.

Then my dad started making the Holy Grail of mushrooms: marinated portobellos on the grill. OH. MAH. GAH. It’s like steak. STEAK. But it’s a MUSHROOM. A giant, delicious mushroom with a texture like meat. I am not a vegetarian, nor have I ever entertained the idea, but man … if you said to me I could never eat steak again, but rather these delectable fungal steak substitutes instead, I would probably be less inclined to beat you upside the head.

While I get that the idea of eating a fungus is not so appealing to some people, those people just need to get over themselves. I have some good friends, some of whom are even vegetarian, who won’t eat mushrooms. And frankly, it makes-a no sense to me. There are so many different types of mushrooms to try! Spinach and porcini mushroom quiche? YUM. The portobello mushroom sandwich with spinach, goat cheese, and roasted red peppers at Caliente here in Richmond? DEAR GOD, YES PLEASE MORE OF THAT. Spinach, mushroom, and Vidalia onion pizza with feta? IN MAH BELLY! Mushrooms on salad, mushrooms in dips, mushrooms in lasagna, mushrooms atop a hamburger with onions! Truffles! More mushrooms! All the time! The flavor and the texture just meld together to form a perfect union, and their uses are plenty! Hooray!

Look, all I’m saying is that I gave mayonnaise a chance — over and over. And it did nothing but disappoint, enrage, and sicken me. But you mushrooms haters who have never had mushrooms because you can find them growing on a rotted out log? MISSING. OUT. So go on, give mushrooms a chance. You might be pleasantly surprised. Or maybe you’ll want to throw up. But at least you’ll know, and I’ll still think you’re wrong.

I loves me my beer. I’ve had many different kinds through the years, from the cheapies to the premiums, and I’ve had a hand in making my own batches from time to time. I’m sure many of you are reading this and thinking one of three things:

“I don’t drink.”
“Only 16?!”
“I need but one reason: it’s beer.”

No matter what your reaction may be, you might be surprised to learn some of the beneficial and extraordinary uses for beer around the home, both for drinking and not drinking. Here’s a small list of some of the reasons why you might want to keep some handy, though there are plenty more where these came from….

1. Due to its high content of brewer’s yeast, beer is a source of B vitamins, which contribute to a healthy nervous system and digestive system. Vitamin B-complex also helps to improve and stabilize moods. I can think of a few people who could use a bit more of that.
2. Beer is fat and cholesterol free.
3. Beer can help reduce stress.
4. I have it on good authority that it works excellently as Wil Wheaton bait and in some cases can be used as currency.
5. You can cook with beer. It’s especially good as a meat marinade. I’ve also used it for the ever-awesome beer can chicken recipe in the summer.
6. A 2006 study published in the journal “Stroke” shows that moderate alcohol consumption of the likes of beer can help reduce the risk of strokes.
7. Lactoflavin and nicotinic acid, both found in beer, can help with sleeplessness. Hops have been used for centuries as a sedative and has even been used to cure insomnia.
8. It’s Friday.
9. Beer can help prevent heart attacks by improving blood circulation.
10. Take a bath in beer: the yeasts are good for softening and soothing the skin. This just makes me cry a little at the thought of it all going down the drain.
11. Trouble on the can? The barley malt in beer makes it a good source of fiber.
12. The mineral silicon in beer can help improve bone density. A study has shown that people who have one drink each day have about a 20 percent reduced risk of hip fracture.
13. Use beer to get rid of slugs in your garden. A can or bottle of beer set out overnight will often be full of slugs in the morning. The slugs are attracted by the yeast smell and fall into the beer, where they are anesthetized by the alcohol and drown. Insert Homer Simpson gurgling sound here.
14. A 2005 study published in the European Journal of Cancer shows that the bioactive compounds in beer can help battle cancer. Those same bioactive compounds help speed up metabolism.
15. Beer can help keep a man’s junk working in top form. Beer is high in zinc, which is essential for male potency and prostate health.
16. You never know when I’ll be over for a visit.

Disclaimer: The above mentioned is for entertainment and recreational purposes only. Always drink responsibly and legally or not at all.

Once upon a time, I got it in my head that root vegetables were not tasty.  Well, potatoes and sweet potatoes and carrots were fine, but parsnips?  Turnips?  Rutabagas?  Honey, no.  I was certain that they were bitter and nasty.

I’m not sure of the origin of this undeserved prejudice.  Perhaps from a story I once heard about overcooked mashed turnips or from some novel about a poor heroine suffering from terrible deprivations and subsisting on the moldy remains from a root cellar.  I certainly had never tasted them before.  And until a couple of years ago, I never had any interest in trying them, either.

I think my interest in these funny vegetables was piqued on a visit to that foodie wonderland in Watertown, MA, Russo’s, one winter.  Russo’s had heaps of these strange vegetables hanging about, and I wondered what one could do with them.  They looked quite fresh — so very different from the shriveled versions one might find at the grocery store.  My ever-patient and adventurous mother agreed that I could take some home to try, and so I gathered up some parsnips, a couple of rutabagas and a celeriac root.

Some days later, we incorporated them in Mom’s standard oven-roasted potatoes with chicken recipe.  And what a revelation they were!  The parsnips were far from bitter.  In fact, they were sweeter than the carrots.  The rutabagas tasted slightly of cabbage, and the celeriac of celery, but their mild flavors gave way to the salty deliciousness of the chicken juices in which they had been roasted. Needless to say, I was a convert.

Parsnips are great paired in soups with carrots, lending a certain sweetness and complexity, and turnips and rutabagas can be mashed together with potatoes for an interesting turn on an old favorite.  But oven roasting is still my favorite way to prepare these delicious veggies.  Recently, I modified a fantastic Cook’s Illustrated recipe (subscription required) to roast an enormous pile of potatoes, carrots, celery, leeks, parsnips and turnips.  Their revelatory trick was to roast the veggies on their own, separate from the chicken I was pan roasting.  About 25 minutes into the roasting process (at 500 F), the nearly cooked veggies were coated in the pan sauce from the chicken and returned to the oven for 5 more minutes.  After 30 minutes in the oven, the veggies were perfectly cooked and had a lovely chicken taste that complemented their individual flavors so nicely.  Yum yum yum.

I love to sneak some anchovies into my pasta as well. You can build a sauce up around the little fish — chop a couple fillets up and let them cook down with some garlic and oil or butter in a pan. That’s pretty much all you need to do. Add some pasta and you have a meal. I made a great dish a couple weeks ago that had an olive and anchovy sauce. Lots of strong flavors, but it was really good.

I would be remiss if I didn’t talk about Puttanesca sauce in this anchovy conversation. Mostly because I want to mention that in Italian, Puttanesca means “in the style of the whore.” Call me immature, but that always makes me giggle. This delicious sauce of tomatoes, capers and anchovies was apparently so quick and easy to make that many Italian ladies-of-the-night would make it in between … appointments.

In any case, if you’re one of the many people who think they hate anchovies, I would urge you to reconsider.

Do you have any favorite uses for this salty little fish?

Yep, we’ve got ourselves a texture boy, one who’ll eat anything because he loves trying new flavors, but sometimes he just can’t get past the texture. Sure, I could give him spinach in a salad, I suppose, but he’s got a funny thing about big pieces of greens.

I’ve discovered the perfect way to prepare spinach for my mush-hater, and it’s something that can translate into an easy yet classy appetizer too.

How will my son devour spinach? When I take each leaf, fold it in half, roll it and put it on a toothpick. No stems can be sticking out, of course, but that’s easily remedied. So that’s kind of cute, right? And it really doesn’t take too long. Here are a few ideas of combinations you could add to the toothpick for a fun appetizer with lots of taste and a funky little presentation:

• a chunk of manchego cheese, prosciutto, a dried fig and rolled spinach.
• feta rolled into the spinach leaf, half a grape tomato, and a Kalamata olive.
• half a strawberry and goat cheese rolled into the spinach, with an aged balsamic dipping sauce.
• caramelized onions rolled into the spinach, a chunk of gouda and a slice of apple.
• jalapeno jelly rolled into the spinach and a chunk of brie.

The combinations are endless! So whether you’re preparing a quick and easy appetizer for some impromptu guests, or desperately trying to get your little one to ingest some leafy greens, the rolled spinach is sure to be a winner.

What other combination ideas do you have?

Yesterday evening, at the suggestion of some savvy Chowhounds, a friend and I rode the 7 train to the end of the line, Flushing-Main Street, the real NYC Chinatown.  There is nothing like playing tourist in your own city!  Flushing is a world apart from Manhattan.  Beijing opera music blares from streetside speakers, and open air markets are replete with vats of fresh tofu, curious vegetables, and for the more adventuresome, live frogs and turtles.

I had visited Flushing once before to seek out authentic northern Chinese dumplings at a fantastic little restaurant called Best Northern Dumpling Shop, another Chowhound recommendation.  But given the recent below-freezing temperatures in the NYC area, I had been craving the warming spiciness of Sichuan cuisine.  And boy if we didn’t ever find it!

Our destination was Chengdu Tianfu, or loosely translated, Chengdu Heaven.  As the Chowhound post promised, it was little more than a hole in the wall.  Since it was New Year’s day, the main cook wasn’t there, and the menu was somewhat limited.  But what flavors awaited!

We ordered:

• 痲辣汤 (málà tāng; numbing-spicy soup)
• 痲辣兔丁 (málà tùdīng; numbing-spicy diced rabbit)
• 担担面(dāndān miàn; “dan dan” noodles)
• 红油水饺 (hóngyóu shuǐjiǎo; boiled dumplings in chili oil)

Authentic Sichuan cuisine is a revelation.  Contrary to popular belief, the food isn’t always overwhelmingly spicy.  While all of the dishes were excellent, one of the favorites yesterday was the rabbit, which was served cold and featured diced rabbit (bones included) and peanuts (an unexpected surprise).  The dish featured a strong “málà” (痲辣, or numbing-spicy) flavor: there was both a lovely, back-of-your throat spiciness and a tongue-and-lip tingling numbness, each in perfect balance, and neither too intense (at least to my taste).  Perfect with the cold beers we were drinking.

The numbing part of the málà flavor comes from sichuan peppercorns (花椒, or huājiāo).  The flavor itself is delicate, and the numbing effect is unexpected and a lot of fun, especially paired with chili peppers.

I’m inspired to head out to an Asian grocery this weekend to pick up some peppercorns and make some 麻婆豆腐 (Mápó dòufu, or Mapo Tofu), a rightfully famous Sichuan tofu dish.  If I had been thinking about it, I would have picked some up in Flushing!