FoodFixe

Favorite Recent Recipes

I read a lot of recipes. A lot. Sometimes they provide inspiration for my own culinary creations. Many times, I'll make the recipe just as it is. I thought I'd share some of the stand-out recipes I've made recently.

Enjoy!

Zucchini Bread

After taking the summer off, I resumed my Farm Fresh to You CSA subscription a couple weeks ago. My first delivery was a tribute to the end of summer in a box—pluots, grapes, arugula, sweet peppers, and zucchini. And though I can certainly stand to eat more veggies, I was bent on baking that zucchini into bread.

I had just the recipe—one my friend Shelly  passed onto me eons ago. I’ve tweaked it over the years, never making it the same way twice. That’s why it’s such a great recipe; this zucchini bread is incredibly versatile. You can add whatever suits your fancy at the time.

A bread-baking class to relish

For all the cooking classes I’ve taken over the years, the one area in which I’ve felt undereducated is bread baking. Somehow, even during my pastry school experience, I managed to miss most of the bread-baking segment (don’t ask). So when a bread-baking class opportunity appeared in my Facebook newsfeed a few months ago, I jumped at the opportunity. How could I resist—the class location was Healdsburg, my favorite area of wine country.

It was with much excitement that I woke up w-a-y too early on a Sunday morning a couple weeks ago to make the 100-mile trek to Healdsburg for the bread-baking workshop. The class was held at Relish Culinary Adventures, which originally started as a “roving” cooking school before opening a culinary center in 2008. It’s a beautiful facility; and though decked out with the high-end appliances and video setup you’d expect to see in a demonstration kitchen, it’s small enough to make you feel part of the action and not merely a spectator.

Pumpkin Breads

I’m apologizing in advance for the plethora of pumpkin recipes. Before I even posted the Enchiladas with Pumpkin Sauce recipe last week, I received a request from my friend Leslie O. for a pumpkin bread recipe. She explained that her previous attempts had “failed miserably” and that they had produced “disastrous brick-like loaves that taste more like ass than pumpkin.”

How could I not answer that call for help? I offered her two pumpkin bread options – one plain and another with chocolate chips. (Some of you might be questioning the combination of pumpkin and chocolate. Let me assure you that it is absolutely delicious and one of my favorite flavor combinations. In fact, I often serve my Pumpkin-Hazelnut cheesecake and Pumpkin tart with a drizzle of chocolate sauce.) Leslie opted for the regular pumpkin bread recipe.

In the meantime, our friend Jessica D. had chimed in on the conversation, questioning the pumpkin-chocolate flavor combination. After I convinced her that it was yummy, she decided to give it a go and requested the pumpkin-chocolate chip recipe. (For those of you who don’t know, Jessica is the one who inspired and encouraged me to start this blog. Yea, Jessica!)