Red Jacket Orchards Apple Juice

I am convinced that I have found the most incredible apple juice on the planet. Red Jacket Orchards, located in the Finger Lakes, makes apple juice by pressing whole fruit and they use Fuji apples. The juice is cold pressed, flash pasteurized and it is highly addictive. There are different varieties of the juice like strawberry apple juice and rhubarb apple juice; there are others as well. I love their straight-up Fuji apple juice. Luckily, it is available at Whole Foods.

Ridiculously Good Oatmeal

Here are the keys to making amazing oatmeal.

Start with old fashioned rolled oats.

Use half water and half milk. Bring to a boil on the stovetop.

Add the oats, as well as any or all of the following:
dried cherries
dried cranberries
dried blueberries
raisins
drizzle of honey
chopped walnuts
chopped apple

Stir over medium heat, and when the oatmeal is ready, remove from heat and stir in vanilla extract.

This is oatmeal. Makes a wonderful breakfast on a crisp autumnal morning.

Pan Roasted Fingerling Potatoes

Today, I made one of my all-time favorite things to eat: pan roasted fingerling potatoes. The best way to make these is to wash the potatoes, halve the potatoes, parboil the potatoes for two to three minutes and drain. In a heavy saucepan, melt some good butter, toss the potatoes with the butter, and sprinkle with Kosher salt. Cook covered for twenty minutes or so, shaking the pan regularly while holding the lid to ensure even cooking. I like to add fresh rosemary. Pan roasted fingerling potatoes with fresh rosemary is quite possibly one of the most amazing things to eat. I'm a fan.

Awesome Chocolate Chip Cookies

Do you want to know how to make the best chocolate chip cookies? Don't use chocolate chips. Use bars of semi-sweet chocolate for baking like Ghirardelli. Chop the bars into pieces; the bars will break up into very irregular pieces as you chop. This is the way to make chocolate chip cookies. Chopped walnuts are also a must! Use baking powder and not baking soda; baking powder helps make the cookies chewier as opposed to puffier. Take the cookies out of the oven when they are just ever so slightly undercooked. The cookies will set as they are cooling. Now these are chocolate chip cookies. Oh, yeah!

Trader Joe's in LA

One night, I was in LA. It was late, and I was exhausted. The night was dark, and I had no idea where anything was in Hollywood, where I was staying, as I had just arrived from the east coast. I used my GPS to guide me to the nearest Trader Joe's. As I walked through the store, I realized it was my first time in a Trader Joe's on the west coast. I bought random things: Ritter chocolate, watermelon juice, and bottled water. Grocery shopping becomes quite simplified when you are staying in a hotel room and have no food storage capabilities. It was exotic walking through a Trader Joe's in a place 3,000 miles from home. Yet, at the same time, the inside of the store was exactly the same as Trader Joe's in Boston. I found comfort in this. Trader Joe's is cool.

Amazing Salad

I love making salads with lots of interesting ingredients; it makes a great meal. The beauty of salads is that you can use almost any combination of produce and other ingredients like dried fruits and nuts.

This salad had the following ingredients: 

spring mix

carrots 

dried pomegranate seeds

chopped walnuts

red peppers

chopped hard-boiled eggs

apples

olive oil

Morgan's Bleu Cheese Dressing

No-Knead Bread with Rosemary

Mark Bittman's no-knead bread is even more amazing when fresh rosemary is added to the dough just before baking. Try it with butter and coarse-cut Seville marmalade. It will astound your taste buds.

Cold Fusion Gelato

Do you want to try some of the most astoundingly good gelato out there? Go for Cold Fusion Gelato. It is an artisan gelato and it is made in Rhode Island. The containers are nondescript white pints with homemade labels. The gelato inside the container is stunning and will blow your mind. Of course, there are rave reviews on TripAdvisor for the Cold Fusion storefront in Newport.

I met the guy who owns and makes the gelato, and he is super nice; he loves to make people smile. You can also get Cold Fusion Gelato at Whole Foods. This is going to make your day!

Sunday Brunch

Today, I made Sunday Brunch, which is a favorite of mine.

The Menu:

Freshly squeezed orange juice: Breville makes an awesome citrus press.

Banana walnut muffins: From Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything cookbook. Next time, I'm making blueberry muffins instead. These were good but not stunningly good.  

Homefries: Made from red and yellow potatoes from the farmers market. I parboiled the potatoes the night before, refrigerated them, and then cut them into smaller pieces and pan fried the potatoes in two tablespoons of olive oil and two tablespoons of butter. Awesome.

Scrambled Eggs: Made with marscapone cheese.

Toast: Mark Bittman's no-knead bread toasted up and brushed with butter.

Fruit Salad: Made with cantaloupe, honey dew melon, grapes, apples, and blueberries.

Yeasted Coffee Cake

I just made Mark Bittman's yeasted coffee cake. Late last night, I decided to make this for breakfast this morning. Since I had no raisins on hand, I used dried apricots and crystallized ginger instead. The ginger is a must! It would be interesting to make this next time with ginger and raisins while omitting the apricots. The dough rose overnight and this morning, the kitchen smelled like a B&B. It's a yummy coffee cake. The recipe is from Mark Bittman's How to Cook Everything.