Engaging stories of love, joy, comfort and friendship with proven scrumptious, healthy recipes, we celebrate LOVE as the secret ingredient for wonderful food!

Almond Joy After-Dinner Drink with Catskill Provisions NY Honey Whiskey Truffles

April 13, 2017 by Mary 3 Comments

Ok, so you try to think of something spectacular to serve for dessert, particularly when guests are over, when all you really want is a small super special chocolate thingy, right? Well if you had that “thingy” then how about a terrific, simple after-dinner cocktail to serve with it?

It would work even better than a dessert, right?

So we have it here for you in the MARY’s secret ingredients recent spring box! These artisanal, handmade NY Honey Whiskey Truffles from Catskill Provisions will have you hurrying back to their website for more, I guarantee.

I absolutely adore chocolate truffles and have eaten them from all over the world, but I’m telling you, THESE are THE BEST!!! And I do not say that lightly.

Just look at this cut one where the interior ganache swirls up on just the cut!

And the flavor, with the whiskey and honey, is to die for. Catskill Provisions uses their own honey and their own honey whiskey to make these precious gems. There are only four in this beautifully packaged box. (I told you, you’ll want more.)

100% New York State raw honey is the common ingredient in their all-natural food products, from chocolate truffles and sauces to mixes and marinades to rubs and cocktail rimmers and, of course, their highly acclaimed whiskeys & spirits.

It began with one beekeeping kit—a gift that sparked a passion. Claire Marin, proprietor of Catskill Provisions, was immediately taken with the bees’ Zen-like devotion to their pursuits. She was impressed with how they worked together towards a common goal, in easy harmony with their environment.

Born in Madrid and raised in New York City from the age of fourteen on, Claire had already attained success in the publishing world as Vice President, Publisher of Woman’s Day Brand Group. But after moving to the small, rural town of Long Eddy in the Catskill Mountains, she found herself more and more moved by the bees. Following their example, she began building her own community-oriented business with resources close at hand—the hives, maple trees, and local farmers of Upstate New York.

And so in thinking about my job here, to use these in a different way — I couldn’t use them in a recipe, they are way too special on their own. So I created this delicious drink recipe to go with them! An all around PERFECT dessert in my book!

Make with LOVE and enjoy!!!

ALMOND JOY AFTER-DINNER DRINK WITH CATSKILL PROVISIONS NY HONEY WHISKEY TRUFFLES – serves 1

1 bar spoon (1 tsp.) of very hot tap water
1 bar spoon of honey, preferably Catskill Provisions
Stir to combine in a cocktail shaker

When the honey is dissolved, fill the shaker with ice

Add 1.5 oz. Rye whiskey
and 0.5 oz. Disaronno Italian Liquor or other amaretto liquor

Stir for 30 seconds – do NOT shake

Strain into your favorite straight-up glass (I used our Baccarat Perfection Martini glasses)

Enjoy thoroughly with Catskill Provisions NY Honey Whiskey Truffles.

Go to sleep dreaming the sweetest dreams….

Pecan, Olive Oil and Benedictine Coffee Cake with Magisso Cake Server

December 22, 2016 by Mary 4 Comments

The Magisso cake server, so pretty in pink, is a sleek, sexy little tool that is included in our winter MARY’s secret ingredients subscription box. Beautifully designed, made of undulating curves of plastic with the edge sharpened on one side, makes cutting and serving your cake a singular beautiful motion. Press down to cut, gently squeeze in to lift, and release your grip to place the cake piece on your plate.

It is a most harmonious motion. No sawing with a knife, no messy pieces, just giving you pure unadulterated pieces of cake with a sexy little curve to the shape of your piece.

So I made this nut cake, trying to recapture a nut cake recipe that my mother used to make. It was her favorite cake. Loaded with finely ground nuts and not too sweet, she loved it. Me, as a kid, not so much. But here I was last Sunday craving it!

Here is the recipe:

PECAN, OLIVE OIL AND BENEDICTINE COFFEE CAKE WITH MAGISSO CAKE SERVER – serves 10

Unsalted butter, for the pan
1 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon Kosher salt
3 large eggs, room temperature
3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1/3 cup Benedictine
3/4 cup pecan halves, toasted and finely chopped
Confectioners’ sugar, for dusting
Strawberries, slightly sweetened whipped cream, or ice cream (butter pecan or vanilla) for serving with the Magisso Cake Server

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Toast pecans in a pan in the oven for 7 – 8 minutes. Remove nuts from the pan right away to prevent further toasting and place on a cutting board to cool. Then finely chop.

Generously butter a 9-inch round cake pan and dust with flour, set aside.

Sift flour, baking powder, and salt together in a medium bowl; set aside.

Put eggs in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment; beat on high speed until light in color, about 2 minutes. Reduce speed to medium. Add granulated sugar; beat until mixture is pale and thick, about 4 minutes. Reduce speed to low; mix in oil and liqueur. Lightly fold in flour mixture in 3 batches using a rubber spatula. Fold in toasted pecans. Spread batter into prepared pan.

Bake cake until a cake tester inserted in center comes out clean, 20 – 24 minutes. Let cool in pan on a wire rack 10 minutes. Turn out cake onto rack to cool completely. Turn cake over on a plate and dust with confectioners’ sugar.

Cut with Magisso cake server and serve with strawberries and slightly sweetened whipped cream or ice cream (butter pecan or vanilla). Let the ice cream get a little melty on the cake – pure heaven…

This cake even tastes better after a day or two – wrap it well in plastic wrap. Always serve with LOVE and enjoy!!

Still have a gift to get for that difficult person on your list? We have MARY’s secret ingredients gift cards here!! Gift cards are delivered by email and contain instructions to redeem them at checkout. Our gift cards have no additional processing fees. Easy peasy!

Chocolate Cake Recipe from Jean-Georges

December 11, 2016 by Mary 6 Comments

I realize I don’t post many sweet things. Not that I’m not sweet, mind you. 🙂 I am more of the savory type, loving salty things. But when I entertain, I do like to make a dessert, as long as it’s relatively quick and easy and this Chocolate Cake Recipe from Jean-Georges is simple and easy. It’s from his Home Cooking with Jean-Georges cookbook, which my sons gave me last year for my birthday – a signed copy – no less! The book is a collection of his favorite simple recipes.

Jean-Georges says his mother used to make this for him as an after-school treat. Nice treat! He also says it tastes even better after it sits for a day. We didn’t have a chance to try that as Margaret, our guest, took the last piece home, as her birthday was coming up and this gave us a chance to sing to her. (Maybe she can tell us.) The good thing about it is it’s nearly gluten free with only 1 tablespoon of flour and the rest being almond flour so even my sister-in-law Trish could eat it.

I used to bake all the time for my boys for their school box lunch. That was my Sunday afternoon activity – chocolate chip cookies, lemon bars, brownies, peanut butter cookies, snickerdoodles, and pecan bars – that were so sweet I couldn’t even eat them and those were their favorite! They were like a super, super sweet and buttery pecan pie. I LOVE pecan pie, but I could not stomach these things. Now that they’ve grown up, they do agree with me.

When I was a little girl, about 12 years old, one summer my mother gave me the responsibility to plan and make dessert every night of the week. I grew up in the Midwest – St. Louis suburbs – where in those days, dessert was mandatory. It could be as simple as Jello with Cool Whip (yuck) – which was a newfangled thing then – or more complicated like a pie. This taught me about planning and a lot about making desserts. Mom did a good thing!
This is the same cake recipe that our daughter-in-law made for my birthday a few weeks ago. She garnished it with strawberries and the dusting of cocoa powder on the whipped cream was a nice touch. I garnished it with some raspberries and very slightly sweetened whipped cream. Lacking birthday candles, I used a tea light for Margaret’s birthday celebration. You know, you use what you’ve got. I also did not have a fluted tart pan or springform pan so I just used a regular 8” round layer cake pan and it came out fine.

Here is the recipe and don’t forget to add your LOVE when making. 🙂

CHOCOLATE CAKE – serves 6 – from Home Cooking with Jean-Georges cookbook

4 Tbs. unsalted butter, plus more for the pan
1 Tbs. all-purpose flour, plus more for the pan
3 large eggs separated
1 tsp. granulated sugar
3½ oz. bittersweet chocolate, preferably Valrhona 66% cacao, chopped
½ cup confectioners’ sugar
½ cup almond flour
Dutch-process cocoa powder

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Butter and flour an 8” round fluted tart pan with a removable bottom or a springform pan or an 8” round layer cake pan, tapping out excess flour.

Whisk the egg whites with the granulated sugar until medium-stiff peaks form.

Meanwhile, fill a medium saucepan with an inch of water and bring to a simmer. Combine the chocolate and butter in a heatproof bowl and set over the simmering water. Melt, stirring occasionally. Remove the bowl from the saucepan.

Beat 1 yolk into the chocolate mixture to temper it. Beat in the remaining yolks, then beat in the confectioners’ sugar, almond flour and all-purpose flour until well mixed.

Add a third of the whipped whites to the chocolate mixture and mix well to loosen it. Then gently fold in the remaining whites just until combined. Pour into the prepared pan and gently spread evenly.

Bake until puffed and a knife comes out clean, about 17 minutes. Let cool in the pan on a wire rack for 10 minutes, then invert onto the rack. Let cool completely. Carefully flip the cake right side up. Dust with cocoa powder. Garnish with slightly sweetened whipped cream and raspberries or strawberries.

Enjoy!!

Election night, bread, chocolate and red wine

November 6, 2012 by Mary Frances 3 Comments

We’re a nervous wreck here. The race for the presidency of our country is close. I made a lovely light dinner. (I’ll tell you more about that later.) And now I made a famous Spanish dessert, a favorite for children as a simple after school snack. We served it at a small dinner party this past Saturday night, and liked it so much that we wanted to keep on repeating it and repeating it. It’s simple to make and just the right amount of sweetness, of chocolate and a little bit of saltiness. And, it’s lovely with some red wine leftover from dinner.

The basis of this recipe is from Food and Wine magazine. Use the best chocolate you can find. I used Scharffen Berger 3 oz bars. Buy two bars and put 2 squares on each bread slice.

BREAD AND CHOCOLATE
– serves 4

8 thin baguette slices
Two 3-ounce bars of bittersweet chocolate, cut in 8 pieces to fit, you will not use all of this chocolate
Extra-virgin olive oil
Fine sea salt for sprinkling

Preheat the broiler and position a rack 8 inches from the heat. Spread the baguette slices on a baking sheet and broil until toasted, about 30 seconds – 1 minute. Turn the slices over and set a square or two of chocolate on each one. Broil just until the bread is golden and the chocolate is beginning to melt (about 30 seconds – 1 minute). Transfer the chocolate toasts to plates and drizzle lightly with the olive oil and also sprinkle lightly with the sea salt on the chocolate. Serve right away.

Julia & Eric

August 15, 2012 by Mary Frances 2 Comments

Today would be Julia Child’s 100th birthday!! Happy Birthday to the great chef and instigator of the whole foodie movement that is so prevalent today. There are several articles about her in the Times this morning, one recalling favorite recipes of hers. I have my favorites too – her soy, garlic, rosemary, mustard sauce for a leg of lamb can’t be beat. It is my go-to lamb roast recipe. Leeks braised with a parchment paper cover as a side dish is a really simple dish that seems oh-so-elegant and impressive. I always refer to her for the way she sauteed mushrooms and, of course, boeuf bourguignon. She taught me to smash garlic cloves to remove the skin, but more importantly, she taught my mother the fine art of cooking, which she then passed on to me.

Last night we took our boys out for dinner at Le Bernardin to celebrate our youngest starting on his PhD at Yale next week. My husband and I have not been there in years and yes, it was still so very lovely with superb service. We saw Eric Ripert but unfortunately we did not get to speak. The depth and combination of flavors he achieves with each dish is unique and truly delights the palate. It was a very special evening. We stayed and chatted late into the night.

Here was my third course lobster dish with a stuffed squash blossom – really super delicious. Much to the chagrin of my boys, yes, I snapped these photos.

Date bars!

December 18, 2011 by Mary Frances 6 Comments

If you like dates, you will love this little bar cookie. It’s easy to make and nice to have in your repertoire. Cut your bars skinny. My mother used to say, “Make your cookies on the small side, because your guests and family will want to sample all of them and you just shouldn’t eat so much!”

DATE BARS
Makes 24 bars

2 large eggs
1 cup of powdered sugar
1 tbs. melted unsalted butter
1/4 cup cake flour
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 cup chopped dates
3/4 cup chopped walnuts
1 tsp vanilla
More sifted powdered sugar to roll the bars in

Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease an 8” or 9” square pan. I use a 9” glass Pyrex pan.

Beat 2 eggs a long time until very light and fluffy. Add the powdered sugar and melted butter.

Sift together the cake flour, salt and baking powder and add gradually to egg mixture on a low speed. Then add the vanilla, dates and nuts. Stir well. Pour evenly into your prepared pan and bake for approximately 25 minutes, until nicely browned and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Let cool completely. Cut into 24 bars and roll each one in powdered sugar. Store in wax paper lined tin. Make sure the tin closes tight!