Books I like about cooking...and some I don't!

Julie and Julia: 365 Days, 524 Recipes, 1 Tiny Apartment Kitchen by Julie Powell. It's about a young woman who spends a year cooking every recipe in Julia Child's "Mastering the Art of French Cooking". It is the book version of a blog she kept of the experience. Very funny!


Home Cooking: A Writer in the Kitchen by Laurie Colwin. Laurie Colwin wrote in a way that makes you want to cook something. She was a columnist for Gourmet, and she died young at 48.

Speaking of Gourmet, I loved everything Ruth Reichl has written, especially
Comfort Me with Apples: More Adventures at the Table . It describes her coming of age with food and love and motherhood. She now edits Gourmet.

Pot on the Fire: Further Confessions of a Renegade Cook by John Thorne and Matt Lewis Thorne. They can really write beautifully about simple foods.

Books about food I wanted to like more than I actually did:

"Heat: An Amateur's Adventures as Kitchen Slave, Line Cook, Pasta-Maker, and Apprentice to a Dante-Quoting Butcher in Tuscany" by Bill Buford is about working in a restaurant and it was really whiny and uninspiring.  I think that Kitchen Confidential: Adventures in the Culinary Underbelly by Anthony Bourdain covers the subject of working in a restaurant better.

The Raw and the Cooked: Adventures of a Roving Gourmand by Jim Harrison. I don't know why I didn't like it, but I didn't. He is a Michigander and an excellent writer. Anyone like it?

Brownies - the Magic Kind....

Zingerman's Magic Brownies

13 T butter
6.5 oz unsweetened chocolate
1.5 C cake or all purpose flour
3/4 t baking powder
1/2 t salt
4 eggs
2 C sugar
1.25 t vanilla
1 C coarse chopped walnuts, toasted

Grease a 13x9x2 inch baking pan. Preheat oven to 325. In a heavy small saucepan, heat the butter and chocolate over low heat, stirring, till chocolate is melted and smooth; set aside to cool. In a small bowl sift together flour, baking powder and salt. In a large mixing bowl, beat eggs and sugar with an electric mixer on high speed for 5 minutes or till light yellow and fluffy, scraping side of the bowl occasionally. Add cooled chocolate mixture and vanilla. Beat on low speed until combined. Add flour mixture; beat on low speed until combined, scraping sides of bowl. Stir in walnuts. Spread batter in pan. Bake 30 minutes or until brownies appear set. Cool in pan on wire rack; cut into bars.

The Anti Christmas Cookie

Here's a cookie recipe that doesn't taste anything like Christmas - it tastes like a pina colada. Because it's different than the usual fare, I guarantee it will be snatched up first off of your holiday cookie tray. This recipe made me a finalist in the 2006 Detroit Free Press Holiday Cookie Contest.

Key Lime Bars

3/4 cup granulated sugar
8 tablespoons (1 stick) butter softened
2 cups quick OR old fashioned oats, uncooked
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 (14-ounce) can sweetened condensed milk (not evaporated)
1/2 cup sour cream
1/2 cup fresh key lime juice
1/2 cup shredded coconut
1 (3 1/2-ounce) jar macadamia nuts, chopped (about 3/4 cup)

Heat oven to 350ºF. Lightly spray 13 x 9-inch metal baking pan with cooking spray.
In large bowl, beat sugar and butter until creamy. Add combined oats, flour and salt; mix until crumbly. Reserve 1 cup oat mixture for topping; Press remaining oat mixture onto bottom of baking pan. Bake 10 minutes. Transfer to wire rack

In same bowl, combine sweetened condensed milk, sour cream, lime juice, mix well. Pour evenly over crust. In medium bowl, combine reserved oat mixture with coconut and nuts; mix well. Sprinkle evenly over filling, patting gently.

Bake 30 to 34 minutes or until topping is light golden brown. Cool completely in pan on wire rack. Cut into bars. Store tightly covered in refrigerator.

Makes 32 bars.