Sherry's Russo's Ravioli Dinner

Here's what our friend Sherry had for dinner last night:

it looks so gorgeous and tasty, I can't stand it!

This is what she had to say about the meal:
"I went to Russo's [our wonderful local fresh food market: http://russos.com/] and bought butternut squash ravioli, goat cheese, lots of mushrooms, and cherry tomatoes.  Cooked the mushrooms with garlic and chopped lots of fresh basil and hazelnuts for the top. Yummy."
It sounds fast and straightforward to prepare: just the thing after a long, hungry day.  This definitely qualifies as an 'Off  The Top Of My Head' recipe.  Thanks,  Sherry, for one of those genius ideas that makes you wonder, 'why didn't I think of that?'

e-mail us: you can send your comments, recipes, or a personal message to Anne and Colin at: everything-tasty@annedesigns.com

Highland Kitchen Reviewed

Highland Kitchen Reviewed

Last night, I finally had a chance to try Highland Kitchen in Somerville (617) 625-1131 http://www.highlandkitchen.com/,  a restaurant people have been telling me good things about for a very long time.  Folks were right.  Although it's located in a gentrifying, vaguely hipster neighborhood, this isn't just another upscale gastropub.  Instead, Highland aims for half local hangout bar, half s**t-kickin' Southern-inspired dive, and somehow nails this eccentric target dead on.   There's live blues and a bluegrass brunch on Sundays, karaoke night on Wednesdays.  There's seafood gumbo, pulled pork, and deviled eggs on the menu.  There's a wall of sound—equal parts TV, jukebox, and loud, happy patrons—that engulfs you the minute you walk in. 

Shrimp and Girts at Highland Kitchen

There's friendly service, too, and best of all, genuinely terrific food and drink.  Appetizers looked most intriguing, so we tried (and would recommend) the fried green tomato special—a salad presentation with arugula, cherry tomatoes and blue cheese dressing sharing the plate with the crisp, delicious tomato slices.  After pausing for a briny, super-fresh Cape Cod Bay oyster apiece, we moved on to shrimp and grits: sheer heaven, with slow-smoked bacon, mushrooms, and tangy, meaty, perfectly-cooked shrimp.

ButterGirl Baking Co.

ButterGirl Baking Co.

 A while ago, I sat down with Laurelyn Roberts, whose ButterGirl Baking Co. http://buttergirlbaking.com/
in Somerville, MA is a delightful new presence on the Southern New England food scene. Laurelyn, a former marketing exec. with Swarovski Austrian Crystal, decided to leave her position in the corporate world to pursue her passion in the very different sphere of baking. She opened ButterGirl recently to loud acclaim, and has been selling her wares—cookies, brownies, tarts and cakes—by speecial order http://buttergirlbaking.com/custom-requests/, online http://buttergirlbaking.com/cookiesandbars/ and at local Farmers' markets in the greater Boston area.  (See this twitter link for ButterGirl's upcoming events: http://twitter.com/ButterGirlBakin.)

Laurelyn brought samples of her work—in a recycled paper bakery box tied with a blue satin ribbon,

World Spice Merchants: My Khmeli Suneli Heroes

I just have to give a quick shout-out to one of my favorite suppliers.  

The other day, I decided to experiment with some Georgian recipes (more about this later), and quickly realized I'd be needing Khmeli Suneli, a traditional Georgian spicy herb mixture containing coriander, dill, basil, bay leaf, marjoram, fenugreek, parsley, safflower or saffron, black pepper, celery, thyme, hyssop, mint, and hot pepper, among other spices.  It wasn't available locally; I could learn to make the spice blend myself (and may eventually do so) but in the meantime, when would I get a chance to try my Georgian recipes?

Improving on a Tucson Original

So, on lunch break with my mother a few weeks back, we went to the Time Market. For those of you who haven’t been, it’s a real Tucson institution and absolutely essential if you visit. For a place as small as it is, it’s got an excellent variety of cheese, chocolate, artisanal cooking oils and the like, an awesome selection of beverages, both alcoholic and soft (Virgil’s Root Beer—mmm), more kinds of interesting chips than you could shake a stick at, as well as some excellent bread they bring in from a local bakery, and some of the best tortillas in town (though they go very quickly). Besides all this, they’ve got a brick oven that turns out great (and cheap) pizza, and the subject of the rest of today’s column—a deli counter with a large and unique selection of sandwiches.

When I’ve gone to lunch there by myself, I’ve mainly gotten the pizza; when I have had sandwiches there, it’s mostly been in the company of my stepmother, who tends to complain when I order something weird, so to placate her I’ve stuck for the most part to the more conventional offerings—tuna salad etc.—which were unfailingly quite good. But each time I’ve gone in, my eye has strayed to one fascinating item: the Green Gringo. This hot sandwich, a mad-scientist melding of American and Mexican tradition, advertises shredded chicken and a green corn tamale on sourdough bread, along with salsa, green olives, and cheddar cheese. And this time, I was going to have it.

We ordered, I grabbed a Mexican grapefruit soda from the cooler, and soon the sandwich arrived. The first thing I noticed was that it had a soft, buttery looking roll instead of the sourdough—so much the better really. I took a picture, picked up the sandwich, took a bite and…

A Boston Organics Challenge

I want to recommend—and generally celebrate—a great local business, which is also one of my favorite food sources: Boston Organics http://www.bostonorganics.com.  This wonderful company works hard to source organic produce from an array of farms throughout the year, using as much locally grown produce as they can, and then...get this...they deliver the produce to your door!  Click here to see if you're in their delivery area.

Dinner at Sofra

Spinach felafel with beet purée on flatbread

I had dinner for the first time this evening at Sofra, a wonderful new-ish café and bakery on the Cambridge/Watertown line, run by the owners of the fabulous, famous (and fairly pricey) restaurant Oleana in Cambridge.

Support Taza Chocolate!

Taza Chocolate Cherry Cookies recipe
Traditional Taza Hot Chocolate Mexicano recipe
Quick-and-Easy Taza Mexican Chocolate Cocoa recipe

On Saturday, July 10th, nearly 4 inches of rain fell in less than an hour in the Boston area, completely swamping the newly-renovated manufacturing facility of long-time local favorite Taza Chocolate on Windsor Street in Somerville.  Taza, which has been making mouth-watering, organic, stone-ground chocolate in the Mesoamerican tradition here since 2006, is trying valiantly to find the money to rebuild and stay in the community.  They asked their loyal customers and vendors to buy as much chocolate as they could right away. The response has been huge, but Taza still has a long way to go before they're really back on their feet.
I'm sure you see where I'm going with this: