Tahini

I haven’t always known that sesame is a great flavor. I mean, when you only eat sesame seeds on hamburger buns and in granola bars, it’s hard to know what they taste like. Then I discovered that toasted sesame oil is a great addition to Thai food. Just recently I discovered how much I love sesame seeds ground up with olive oil and salt – in other words, tahini. When I was in college, tahini was just an ingredient for hummus that I didn’t include because it was too expensive.

Spicy Pickled Okra

I love the blog Homesick Texan because I am also a homesick Texan. Maybe I’m not as homesick as the author of the blog though because the last time I lived in Texas was when I was 8 years old. Still, I love a lot of Texas foods, so I enjoy reading that blog.

My grandmother used to grow okra in her garden in Kansas and I can remember helping her pick them. The plants were so tall! Now they’re still tall in my own garden, but not as tall as I remember them. They’re supposed to reach  6 feet!

Cilantro Sauce

I was listening to the Splendid Table podcast (the October 10, 2009 episode) last week. There was a guest, Martha Rose Shulman, talking about cilantro sauces. I was interested because we had so much cilantro in our garden and we’re going away for 2 weeks, so I needed ideas for using it quickly!

Pizza Crust

pesto bacon pizza

There is one place in town that makes pizza and I used to think it was good until I realized that it’s not that difficult (and much cheaper) to make pizza myself. The main problem with the restaurant’s pizza is that they use ketchup for pizza sauce and that’s just wrong! Their crust could use a little work too.

I use this amount of crust for 1 medium pizza, but it could be made into 2 smaller pizzas as well. I like the thick chewiness of this crust.

Guava Jam (mermelada de guayaba)

We love guava season! Here’s what’s so great about guavas:

• They taste like a tropical version of a pear
• When made into jam, the whole house smells lovely
• Half of them are a beautiful shade of pink on the inside

Here’s what’s not so great about guavas:

• Since they’re small, peeling them for jam takes a long time
• They’re prone to worminess (because they’re so sweet)
• They’re full of seeds

So, making jam out of guavas can be a long process, but for me it’s totally worth it.