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

Lemon Zest Pork Sausage Patties for Mother’s Day

May 7, 2016 by Mary 8 Comments

When I was young, my brothers and I would serve my Mom breakfast in bed for Mother’s Day, with a single red rose in a bud vase on the corner of her tray. We had this little rectangular bench that had legs just the right height to fit over her legs in bed, and we put her tray on top. I think one of her brothers made the bench but it was really sturdy, not like a tray with collapsible legs that can buckle under and spill everything. She also used that little bench for us when we were sick in bed.

My husband talks about doing the same thing for his mom – serving her breakfast in bed. We usually went the bacon and egg route with our mom. He did pancakes. Only he got clever. One year he decided, who needs syrup on top of your pancakes, why not put it in your pancakes and save that step! Clever, eh? Well he made some nice flat plates with those babies – a new kind of Frisbee!

My kids served me breakfast in bed once when they were young and we lived in NJ. But we didn’t have that little bench I grew up with and having a tray on my thighs all wobbly and eating in my bed just kinda grossed me out. I am not OCD but crumbs in my bed just don’t work for me so we stopped that nonsense.

We moved on to them making me multi-course special dinners and I’m so excited for tomorrow as we’re going over to our oldest son’s house. He and his fiancée – oh did I tell you that both boys are engaged? Yes!!! We’re so excited and love love love both of their girls. The oldest one will marry this September in NYC and the younger one in July of next year in Poland. All great!!!

So we are going to oldest one’s house tomorrow (yes they bought a house together in Brooklyn, with a back yard!) and he is grilling up something – ribs and a surprise – so I am psyched!

But back to breakfast and sausage patties. I know I posted 2 other sausage patty recipes but lately, I’ve been obsessed with acid. No, not the drug kind. Lemons, limes and various vinegars have been on my experimentation list. Acid in dishes really perks things up. Acid in unusual places adds a brightness that wakes up your taste buds. So I thought, why not grated lemon zest in sausage patties.

And I didn’t just add a little, I wanted you to taste it. I remembered a delicious pork roast I had made once with lots of strips of lemon peel plastered on it so I went for it in these sausage patties and they were delicious!! With the added unusualness of garam masala and the touch of red chili flakes, these patties will produce the mmmm’s you’re looking for.

Try these tomorrow. So good!! Even if there’s only 2 of you, these rewarm so nicely in the microwave to have during the week. And it’s nice to have a proper breakfast on weekday/workday!

LEMON ZEST PORK SAUSAGE PATTIES FOR MOTHER’S DAY – makes 12 -14 patties

1 lb. ground pork
1 shallot, minced
¼ cup minced fresh herbs – parsley, thyme and oregano
1 tsp. garam masala
1/8 tsp red chili flakes
½ tsp Kosher salt
12 grinds of fresh ground pepper
1 small egg
1/3 cup panko
2 lemons – finely grated zest from each – use a microplane

Combine everything together well, but try not to handle too, too much. Form into small patties. Coat a non-stick skillet with a little olive oil and sauté until done on medium high heat, about 5 – 7 minutes per side. Pork should be at 155 – 160 degrees. There should be no pink left in the meat. (The egg and panko make the patties light.)

Enjoy!!

Happy Mother’s Day to all of you mothers out there!! Straighten your tiara and milk it for all it’s worth!

Baby artichokes and Mother’s Day!

May 12, 2013 by Mary Frances 14 Comments

Happy Mother’s Day to all you Moms out there!! This is my favorite holiday! Milk it for all it’s worth. I like to think of it as Mother’s Day WEEKEND! Yesterday we saw Gatsby at the movies. It is one of my favorite novels, having read it at least three times. The movie was just great, full of glitz and glamour, I could not stop grinning from ear to ear during all of the party scenes, wishing I could have been there. Steve made me breakfast this morning, (not in bed – that’s gross), complete with roses and a hysterical card. I got to garden and go bike riding. And my boys are making me a surprise dinner tonight in the city! I can’t wait!

But first, let me tell you about our dinner salad last night because it is the season for all these rare and young things! Ramps, fiddlehead ferns and now baby artichokes. At my stores, they sell them by the dozen, boxed. With just the two of us, that makes it challenging to use. So last week, I made salads with them raw and thinly sliced on a mandoline. Then I steamed some, like you would a regular sized artichoke and then the rest were now several days old and 2 kids came home for dinner by surprise last Thursday. The artichokes were not fresh enough to serve raw, so I decided to slice them up and sauté them with my baby bok choy and garlic. They were delicious!!
So last night, I just went straight to that method and put them on top of an arugula salad, with a fresh lemon juice and olive oil dressing and some slices of Parmigiano reggiano. Delish!! The lovely woody, warm, tender artichokes on top of the cool crisp arugula, combined with the Parmigiano and lemon and olive oil – so simple – yet different and delicious!! It is always about the quality of the ingredients in any dish but particularly in something as simple as this. Because it is so simple, each ingredient can shine. And if something is not the greatest quality, it will scream out too. So use the best you can.

The thing about baby artichokes that kills me is that you have to throw so much away to get to the tenderness inside. I guess that’s my depression era mother rising up in me again. Happy Mother’s Day to my Mom!

SAUTEED BABY ARTICHOKES AND ARUGULA SALAD WITH PARMIGIANO
– serves 2

4 baby artichokes
½ tbs. unsalted butter
salt
pepper
1 tsp. fresh lemon juice or more to use on the artichokes to prevent browning
1 bunch of arugula
Parmigiano Reggiano cheese, thinly sliced with a vegetable peeler
2 tbs. fresh lemon juice
½ tsp. Dijon mustard
Scant ½ cup olive oil

Wash and spin dry the arugula and chill in the refrigerator. Make the dressing by combining the mustard, lemon juice and salt and pepper to taste. Slowly whisk in the olive oil. Slice your cheese and cover with plastic wrap so it doesn’t dry out.

Wash the baby artichokes and remove all the outer leaves, peel the stems, and cut off about 1” from the top. Slice each one in half and then slice each half in 3 or 4 slices. Work quickly and drizzle a little lemon juice on, to prevent them from turning dark, which they will do rather quickly.

Melt the butter in a non-stick skillet on medium-high heat and add sliced artichokes. Saute until tender and golden brown, using a cover for the pan to produce some steam and moisture, stirring often. This will take 10 – 15 minutes. Salt and pepper to taste and remove when fork tender.

Distribute your washed arugula on two salad plates. You probably won’t use it all.

Scatter the artichokes over the plated arugula, along with the slices of cheese. Drizzle on some dressing and serve immediately. You will have dressing left over which will keep in the refrigerator.

Zach’s quinoa vegetable dish

June 16, 2012 by Mary Frances 2 Comments

This was the dish my youngest made for me as part of my Mother’s Day dinner. I figured I’d better get this to you before Father’s Day!

While I loved their meal, what I love most is watching the two boys cook. They discuss, they gossip, they argue, and then they break into a dance. They are so funny. They planned the meal together and then each was responsible for certain dishes, as opposed to one being the chef and the other being the sous chef. This dish Zach made up while the older one was a Mark Bittman devotee that night.

I hope you enjoy it!

ZACH’S QUINOA VEGETABLE DISH
5 cups of chicken stock (preferably homemade)
3 zucchinis
3 large carrots, peeled
1 onion
Olive oil
2 cups of quinoa
salt and pepper to taste

Prepare the zucchini and carrots, slicing them thinly, and set them aside. Chop the onion fine as well.

In a large pan, heat a tablespoon of olive oil, add the onions, and cover. Let them simmer, break down and become sweet. While those are cooking, put 4 cups of chicken broth in a saucepan, and bring to a boil. When that boils add the 2 cups of quinoa, turn down the heat, stir and cover; let simmer on low heat for about 12-14 minutes. But don’t forget to stir your onions and check on them!
When your onions look good, add the carrots and final cup of broth. Turn up the heat and let the carrots cook in the boiling broth uncovered. After much of the broth is gone, turn down the heat to a simmer, add the zucchini, and cover the pan. When the zucchini is cooked down, after about 5-7 minutes, add your cooked quinoa and stir. Salt and pepper to taste, but be careful, some store-bought chicken stocks can be salty!

Mother’s Day!

May 15, 2012 by Mary Frances Leave a Comment

It is my all-time favorite holiday. I get to feel like a queen and do whatever I want for the day and my boys and husband are just the BEST!

This past Sunday I woke up to a dining room table set for four, which meant that my oldest son was even joining us for brunch! The younger one made fabulous waffles from scratch, with maple syrup from upstate New York, thanks to our friend Mary Beth who was just over for dinner and brought it as a gift! The meal was complete with artisanal sausage and tea.

And now dinner was amazing. They had asked me what I wanted and I said, “Surprise me!”

They started with a baby arugula salad with roasted beets, toasted walnuts and English Stilton. Yum! The main course was swordfish steaks, stuffed with a parsley, anchovy, caper, pesto sauce and topped with it too (a Mark Bittman recipe) and a quinoa vegetable dish that the younger one made up and promises to share. Dessert was vanilla ice cream with sauteed figs in butter with a vanilla bean, plus my husband supplied some fantastic chocolate truffles. But the boys did everything! I could truly taste the LOVE – everything was scrumptious! I am very lucky.

And then dessert was followed by gifts! A totally fantastic day!

Baby arugula, roasted beets, toasted walnuts and English Stilton

Broiled swordfish with parsley pesto and quinoa with sauteed vegetables

Ice cream and sauteed figs in a white bowl.

Ice cream with sauteed figs

Can’t you just smell the chocolate?!!

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

Lemon Zest Pork Sausage Patties for Mother’s Day

Baby artichokes and Mother’s Day!

Zach’s quinoa vegetable dish

Mother’s Day!

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