Posts Tagged With: herb

Cardamom Cookies

Posted on December 11, 2021 by pauldelancey

Afghan Dessert

CARDAMOM COOKIES

INGREDIENTS

¼ cup shelled pistachios (36 more later)
2¾ cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ tablespoon cardamom
1 cup confectioners’ sugar
⅔ cup vegetable oil
⅓ cup butter, softened
2¼ teaspoons rose water, orange water, or lemon
no-stick spray
36 shelled pistachios (1 for each cookie)

SPECIAL UTENSILS

spice grinder
electric beater
cookie sheet

Makes 36 cookies. Takes 1 hour.

PREPARATION

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Use spice grinder on ¼ cup shelled pistachios until you get little bits. Add flour, baking powder, cardamom, and confectioners’ sugar to mixing bowl. Stir with whisk or fork until well blended.

Add oil to pan. Warm oil using low-medium heat for 90 seconds. Gradually blend in oil to mixing bowl with beater set to low. Gradually add in butter with beater still set to low. Add rose water. Blend for 5 minutes with beater set to medium or until you get dough.

Spray cookie sheet with no-stick spray. Form dough into 1″ balls on cookie sheet. Don’t let them touch each other. Make imprint in middle of dough balls with thumb. (Hold sides of cookie as you do. This prevents the cookie from crumbling.) Bake at 400 degrees for 10 minutes or until cookies are crumbly, start to crack, and are just starting to brown around the edges. Sprinkle pistachio bits over cookies. Gently push a shelled pistachio into the imprint of each cookie. (Hold sides of cookie as you do. This prevents the cookie from crumbling.)

TIDBITS

1) Cardamom cookies are fun looking. See them in the picture above playing “Guess the herb.” There is no rule against the cookies bringing books on herbs. Cardamom cookies can’t read. Can other cookies read? I don’t think so and and anyway, they’re not talking.

 

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef, Ph.D.

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, international | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Greek Lemon Potatoes

Posted on June 9, 2013 by pauldelancey

Greek Entree

LEMON POTATOES

INGREDIENTSLemonPotato-

6 potatoes
3 garlic cloves
4 tablespoons lemon juice
1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
1 bay leaf
1/2 teaspoon oregano
2 teaspoons lemon zest
1 parsley
1/4 pepper
1 teaspoon rosemary
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 thyme
1/2 cup chicken broth

PREPARATION

Preheat oven to 425 degrees.

Peel potatoes. Cut potatoes into 1″ cubes. Mince garlic cloves. Put all ingredients except potato cubes in mixing bowl. Mix with fork or whisk. Put spice/herb/mixture in casserole dish. Add potato cubes. Turn potato cubes around until coated with spice/herb mixture.

Put casserole dish in oven. Bake at 425 degree for 1 hour to 90 minutes or until potato is tender and starting to turn golden brown.

TIDBITS

1) Rosemary has long been held to improve memory.

2) Rosemary was sometimes worn at the wedding ceremony to remind the happy couple to always remember their wedding vows and to bring good luck. At funerals, it meant the living would always recall the dearly departed.

3) The Chinese used rosemary to get rid of headaches and cure baldness.

4) Rosemary has long been held to improve memory.

5) The Greeks thought rosemary could aid the liver and improve digestion.

6) In the wonderful British television series, “All Creatures Great and Small,” the main characters wax ecstatic over the prospect of having rosemary added to lamb. This is the only time out of more than a hundred episodes that they ever mention a spice or a herb.

7) Rosermary branches were used in Medieval Europe to combat the plague.

8) Rosemary is a safe herb for “brown thumbs” to grow.

9) Rosemary is connected with the Virgin Mary. Their flowers obtain their color from the shawl Mary placed over the shrub.

10) Rosemary is a happening herb.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, food, humor, international, recipes | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Herb Substitutions

Posted on March 7, 2013 by pauldelancey

HERB SUBSTITUTIONS

There comes a moment in every chef’s life when he or she simply doesn’t have every herb needed for that devastatingly delicious recipe and guests are arriving in 10 minutes and my gosh, oh my gosh. Fret not, simply consult the below list of herb substitutions and restore serenity to your life.

Basil – Italian seasoning, marjoram, oregano, thyme
Chervil – parsley, tarragon
Chive – green onion, leek, onion
Cilantro – chervil, parsley
Italian seasoning – basil, marjoram, oregano, parsley, red pepper (ground), rosemary, sage, savory, thyme
Mint – basil, marjoram, rosemary
Marjoram – basil, Italian seasoning, oregano, savory, thyme
Mustard, powder – horseradish powder, wasabi powder (1/4 times as much), prepared mustard (3 times as much)
Oregano – basil, Italian seasoning, marjoram, thyme
Parsley – basil, chervil, cilantro, Italian seasoning
Poultry seasoning – marjoram, rosemary, savory
Rosemary – Italian seasoning, poultry seasoning, thyme, tarragon
Sage – marjoram, poultry seasoning, rosemary, savory,
Savory – Italian seasoning, marjoram, poultry seasoning, sage, thyme
Tarragon – chervil, fennel seed, aniseed
Thyme – basil, Italian seasoning, marjoram, oregano, savory

According to my Webster’s New World Dictionary, an herb is, “any seed plant whose stem withers away to the ground after each season’s growth, as distinguished from a tree or shrub whose woody stem lives from year to year.”

Hot stuff, you betcha.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, food, humor, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Create a free website or blog at WordPress.com.