CHUsday, and We’re Waiting For You
Last Tuesday I introduced you to a new idea. If you’re like me, you have lots of cookbooks you haven’t used in a long time. You are, in short, a cookbook hoarder, and quite possibly instead of using your old cookbooks, you’re still collecting new ones. It’s time to change that. So I proposed that all who want to participate choose one of their “unused” cookbooks, either an old one or a new one they haven’t yet opened, and make a recipe that’s new to them from the book.
Are you with me so far? I hope so, because at the end of the month, I’ll choose a cook who has commented on any of our CHUsday blogs, and that person will receive an autographed copy of one of my novels and a silly kitchen gadget. And trust me, having said this and done the research I can say there are MANY silly kitchen gadgets to choose from. I have my eye on several.
So all you have to do is:
- Choose an unused cookbook from your collection (a new one, or an old one you haven’t used in the past year or so–no one’s counting).
- Choose and make a recipe you have never made before.
- Comment on this blog or any CHUsday blog and tell us what you made, the name of the cookbook, and any other details you’d like to share.
Clearly since this was my idea, I had to lead the way. I’m at my summer cottage, but I brought three cookbooks with me, two that have never been used, one I love and haven’t used for a while. I decided to start with The Healthy Hedonist, by Myra Kornfeld, a recent birthday gift, but between writing and teaching a writing class this week, the recipe I chose was too time-consuming to make in time to write this blog. I’ll make it by next week.
Instead, I broke out an old Cooking Light Cookbook from the year 2000. This is an old edition, which I hunted down from a rare bookseller (talk about hoarding) because I loved my daughter-in-law’s edition. I also have the newer edition. (Unused as well, I’m sad to say.) This afternoon I hunted for something to make that fit into our meal schedule and settled on a Romaine Salad with Tangy Lemon-Dijon Dressing. I didn’t have high hopes. I chose it because I had all the ingredients and salad went with the “market dinner” sitting in my refrigerator from Wegman’s Grocery Store, in nearby Jamestown.
Imagine my surprise when not only did both my husband and I love the entire salad, the dressing went right to the top of our list. I’ve never found one with so little fat and so much flavor. There was plenty left over for another meal, and paired with whole grain croutons I made on my panini grill, the salad was simple and terrific.
So chalk one up for CHU. If the other recipes in this cookbook are half as yummy, I’ll be using it a lot more. Tonight was proof that cooking new things can be fun and sometimes a roaring success.
So what’s your recipe? How’d it turn out? Just tell us here by clicking on comment above, and you’ll be entered in the giveaway. Plus, best of all, you may discover a new favorite recipe. And even if you find that at long last, you’re ready to give away a cookbook, isn’t that progress.
Have fun and tell us how it goes.
The recipe for my first cooking experiment,fajitas, ended up in the recycling bin. Too much lime juice? Not even our bottomless pit of a 19 year old son would finish a serving! The second recipe, a chicken salad with craisins, toasted pecans and tarragon, was a keeper! I will definitely make this again, perhaps with variations on a theme. Thanks again, Emilie, for inspiring us to try something new!
Kay, so glad one of the two was a success. Can you tell us the name of the cookbook and recipe? Will you try others from the same book? Did the fajita cookbook head off to a library sale?
My recipe is Farfalle with Arugula Pesto from the Sunset 2004 Recipe Annual. It’s made with farfalle (bowtie pasta), green beans and cherry tomatoes with pesto and topped with Parmesan cheese. My daughters were here and we made it with green beans and tomatoes that I have growing in my back yard. The only change we made was the pesto. We made it with half arugula and half basil because we all love basil. It was yummy as a hot dish and left-over as a cold dish. And my granddaughters helped me pick the veggies.
We had extra pesto so the next day we brushed it on shrimp before grilling.
I found a link with the recipe: http://www.myrecipes.com/recipe/farfalle-with-arugula-pesto-10000000633311/
I made Tamale Pie last Thursday because of you posting last week and Blogged it for today. It was from a cookbook given to me about 35 years ago for our wedding- “Happiness is Homemade” even in cookbooks. http://mary-quiltingrandma.blogspot.com/2011/08/just-for-emalie-richards.html
For a family reunion, with a cast of thousands, I chose chicken salad, with celery, grapes, and walnuts, from an old Good Housekeeping cookbook (my grandmother’s, I suspect). The chicken salad was delicious, after my sister taught me how to debone whole chickens.
Another family cookbook, Liz. Bravo. I think I have this one, too. I bought it at a second-hand bookstore on my 50th b’day because it was my mother’s favorite and she’d lost her copy in a move. It almost felt as if she led me there to buy it so I could make her Statler Rum Rolls the next Thanksgiving, which I did. But honestly, they weren’t as good as hers. Probably because she was no longer there to make or enjoy them.
The recipe, Chicken salad w/ cranberries & pecans, was one I clipped and saved in my overflowing 3-ringed binder. There is a notation that the recipe came from “The Encyclopedia of Sandwiches.” I made several changes in the original recipe – adding pickle relish didn’t appeal to me, but adding tarragon did. I also toasted the pecans and sauted the Vidalia onions. Now as for that fajita recipe? Since it was also clipped & filed, it was re-filed…into paper recycling! I did find a taker for the cookbook w/ the OLD recipes: the chef at our local UCC seminary wants to check out the bread recipes! 🙂
The receipe for my CHUsday meal was Herbed Oven Crisp Chicken. From the cookbook,Adventures In Cooking,1962,by Sunnyside Presbyterian Church in South Bend,In. I choose this receipe becaused it used sourcream. I have never used sourcream to make chicken before. It was a sucess!This was my great grandmother B’s book. My Mamaw gave the book to me a while back. She wrote me a letter to go alone with it. She pasted away this June. Her sister has many receipies in the book, as well as many of her friends. I will be making more from this wonderful cookbook.
Lee Ann, what a wonderful story and what a wonderful gift this was. Every time you use it, you’ll think of your family. Mary, too, has a sentimental connection to her recipe, too, which makes it special. All of you “done good!”
Poem in the Adventures In Cooking, by Sunnyside Presbyterian Church in South Bend, IN, 1962
ODE For A Cookbook As you thumb thru the pages of this very special Book, Looking for a receip to bake, or roast, or cook. You see the names of many friends and persons you hold dear. The ones you’ve known in happy times, and some you’ve shed a tear. The names of Fran, and June, and Marge, of Irene, and Grace, and Nelle, And many, many more too numerous to tell. You’ve come to know these people and tasted of their wares. You have stood beside these women and joined them in their prayers. So when you try the receipes, and point to your food with pride. Remember that they came from the women of Sunnyside. Beverly Heater
I love this, Lee Ann. And how true. Food brings extraordinary memories along with it, doesn’t it?
I also made your salad, Romaine Salad with Tangy Lemon-Dijon Dressing. My son(13yrs)loved it!
So glad he liked it. I used it on tomatoes last night and it was scrumptious.
I pulled out my Williams Sonoma Ebelskivers Cookbook & made Lemon Poppyseed Ebelskivers with mixed berry filling this morning for one of my best friends who was visiting this weekend! I used to make Ebelskivers every Sunday morning. This is the first time in over 6 months. I use rice flour instead of wheat, so then also use more baking powder & salt so they rise. Ebelskiver are tiny,round ball shaped pancakes made in a special pan & turned with a curved, pointy tool or you can use wooden skewers. The recipe originated in Denmark & knitting needles were often used to turn the ebelskivers!
Ah, memories of Solvang, California. This sounds scrumptious.