Grandma Sonya's pasties

One of the tastiest, most versatile, and easiest side dishes to make is polenta. It makes a wonderful serving base for osso bucco, short ribs, or oxtail. It also makes a great base for vegetables, such as mushrooms or roasted broccoli.

What Is Polenta?
Polenta is a porridge type dish popular in Northern Italy. In Italy it is often made with various ingredients, including cornmeal, ground rice, buckwheat, and chestnut flour. Here in North America, it is generally made exclusively with coarsely ground cornmeal. Think of polenta as an Italian version of grits! But made with yellow corn instead of the white corn of grits.

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You can make and serve polenta warm and porridge-like, or you can let it set and slice it to grill or fry.

How to Make Creamy Polenta
For this recipe, we are making a particularly creamy polenta, through the addition of butter and cream cheese. To make it, we first whisk polenta (coarse cornmeal) into boiling salted water. Then we lower the heat, stir in a little butter and cook the polenta for about 25 minutes. When the polenta is cooked through, soft and tender, we stir in some cream cheese to serve. Easy, right?

This polenta is so light, so fluffy, and creamy, it could almost be a dessert.

Change It Up!
This recipe is meant to be a guideline, feel free to experiment with it.

Swap some water for stock — We are using all water as the liquid in this recipe, you can easily swap out some of the water with chicken stock or broth.
Change the cheese — Cream cheese gives this polenta its creamy taste. That said, you could also use goat cheese, Parmesan, ricotta, mascarpone, or Mozzarella. All will result in a beautiful, delicious polenta.
Herb it up — Stir in a little dried or freshly chopped green herbs like parsley, chives, sage, thyme, or oregano.
Chill it and grill it — Make the polenta ahead, pour it into a loaf pan to set and chill it. Once set, you can slice it and grill the slices or toast them on the stovetop.
Elise Bauer
What Kind of Cornmeal Should I Use for Polenta?
Look for a coarse grained yellow cornmeal; this will give you the right polenta texture. Fine grain cornmeal tends to cook up to mush. There are many brands that sell cornmeal specifically for polenta and say so on the package. Those are a good bet.

How to Make Ahead and Reheat
If preparing polenta in advance, cool, cover, and refrigerate it. Reheat the polenta on the stovetop or in the microwave (about 5 minutes on high), stirring in more liquid if necessary to loosen it. Stir vigorously after reheating to fluff. Serve immediately.

Method
Brown the rice:
Heat the olive oil in a medium saucepan on medium high heat. Add the raw rice and stir to coat with the olive oil. Cook, stirring occasionally, until the rice has started to brown.

Add the garlic and cook a minute more.

Add water, salt, zest, then simmer:
Add water, salt, and lime zest to the rice. Bring to a rolling boil, then cover and lower the heat to low to maintain a very low simmer.

Cook undisturbed for 15 minutes (check your rice package instructions), then remove from heat and let sit for 10 minutes.

Fluff the rice with a fork.

Stir in lime juice and cilantro:
Transfer the rice to a serving bowl. Pour lime juice over the rice and toss with chopped cilantro.

Serve with chicken, steak, shrimp, Mexican or Asian food.

"I seriously can’t stop eating these!" mumbled my partner, with his mouth full, as he nibbled on yet another wing for dinner. Though chicken wings are often served as an appetizer or snack, if I make chicken wings in my home, they become the main component of a meal—and often the only things we eat!

Slow Cooker Mashed Potatoes
My love of chicken wings means I’ve basically tried them all, from sticky-sweet to spicy-savory, and these honey buffalo wings combine all of those favorite flavors together. Even better, they’re made in a slow cooker, which means you can make them with minimal effort.

Why Make Chicken Wings in a Slow Cooker?
Three reasons: easy prep, flexible timing, and tenderness!

The only thing you need to do to get these wings cooking is quickly toss them in a spicy rub and a hot honey sauce, which you do right in the slow cooker. That's it! It takes less than 10 minutes. Then turn your slow cooker on, and forget about them until they're ready.

Thanks to the slow cooker, you also don’t have to worry about the wings getting cold or drying out, which means you have more flexibility in serving them. If the folks you're serving are running late, you can leave those wings in the slow cooker for up to an extra hour without any issues.

Most importantly, though, chicken wings prepared in the slow cooker are super tender. Though they won't have that crispy skin you get from deep-frying, the soft, juicy meat more than makes up for it, and you still make them a little crispy by broiling them!

How to Make Your Slow Cooker Wings Crispy
To add a bit of crispness to your wings, I like to do this: After cooking, reduce the sauce on the stovetop until it's a sticky glaze; coat the wings in the glaze, then give them a quick broil. This gives the wings a little smoky char flavor and crisps the skin slightly.

Method
Pre-heat oven, prepare mini-muffin tin:
Preheat oven to 400°F. Spread a small amount olive oil around the insides of each well of a mini-muffin tin.

Blend ingredients:
Put all of the ingredients into a blender and pulse until smooth. You may need to use a spatula to scrape down the sides of the blender so that everything gets blended well. At this point you can store the batter in the refrigerator for up to a week.

Pour into mini-muffin tin:
Pour batter into prepared mini-muffin tin, not quite to the top; leave about 1/8 inch from the top.

Bake:
Bake at 400°F in the oven for 15-20 minutes, until all puffy and nicely browned. Remove from oven and let cool on a rack for a few minutes.

Eat while warm or save to reheat later.

Note that Brazilian cheese bread is very chewy, a lot like Japanese mochi.

What Ingredients Do You Need to Make Homemade Yogurt?
You only need two ingredients:

A yogurt starter
The pasteurized dairy milk of your choice. Some sources say ultra-pasteurized milk won’t work, but where I live, that’s all I can get, and it works just fine for me. Reduced-fat milk makes a thinner yogurt than whole milk, but you can certainly use it. You can even make yogurt with half-and-half!
Some recipes call for adding nonfat dry milk to the regular milk before adding the starter. I used to do this, but I’ve not found it to make a difference in the final product, so now I don’t bother.

You can technically make an entire gallon at a time in the Instant Pot, but for your first few attempts, it’s good to keep it manageable, minimizing any (unlikely!) failures. Also, even in your trusty Instant Pot, the larger the volume of milk, the harder it is to keep the incubation temperature steady.

Can you use raw milk? You can use raw milk, but because it has its own microbial life already happening, your results might be inconsistent (the microbes in the raw milk and the starter sometimes compete).
Can you use non-dairy yogurt? Yes, but the process isn’t quite the same. Here’s a rundown on using soy milk, and one on coconut milk. People report having the most success with those.
What about goat or sheep’s milk? Those will work just as well as cow’s milk, though the texture and flavor won't quite the same as cow’s milk yogurt. Goat milk yogurt is tangy and goaty, with a looser body; sheep’s milk is rich and intense.
Alison Conklin
What is Yogurt Starter, Anyway?
A yogurt starter is the collection of desirable, living bacteria that turns milk into yogurt. You have a few different options here.

Any plain yogurt from the grocery store can be used as a starter, as long as it says “active cultures” on the carton. This will work, but only for a few batches, because the culture isn’t strong enough to go on for more than two or three generations.
Heirloom starters can also be purchased from a specialty retailer (I like Cultures for Health). It comes to you as a freeze-dried powder in small envelopes. “Heirloom starter” sounds fancy, but it’s just a starter that can culture batches of yogurt more or less indefinitely. This includes making a new batch every week or so to keep the culture healthy and robust. Usually there’s a packet of starter for your initial batch, and one for a back-up if something goes awry. Freeze-dried heirloom starters keep in the freezer forever. When selecting an heirloom starter, make sure yours is thermophilic, which incubates at 110°F. Cultures that incubate at lower temperatures won’t work in an Instant Pot.
You can use fresh yogurt gifted to you by someone who has made their yogurt with an heirloom starter (for you kombucha fans, this is like a friend giving you a SCOBY).
The flavor of your finished yogurt is going to depend a lot on the starter you use and the milk you use. Some starters make thicker or tangier yogurt than others. Think of this as an adventure! Consider how different the texture and flavor of assorted commercial yogurts are—same goes for homemade yogurt.

Get in the habit of setting aside 1/4 cup of your batch of yogurt to use for making the next batch. You’ll only need 2 tablespoons to get that next batch going, but I like to have 2 extra tablespoons around as insurance. I’ve also used a few tablespoons of whey as a starter, which worked well enough, but took a few batches to get ideal.

Have you ever tried hanger steak? One of the best things about having a butcher close by who knows a thing or two about meat is that we are often inspired to try cuts that would otherwise be unfamiliar to us.

Hanger steak is one of those cuts.

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What Is Hanger Steak?
Also known as a "butcher's steak", the hanger steak "hangs" down from a steer's diaphragm, the plate, between the brisket and the flank (according to the Wikipedia). It's one of the most flavorful cuts of beef.

Shopping for Hanger Steak
Hanger steak is sold either whole, looking somewhat like a "V", or trimmed of the center gristle, in which case they resemble a tenderloin. If you get a whole piece, make sure to cut away and discard the center main gristle that connects the two tenderloin-ish pieces.

If hanger steak isn't available where you are, you might want to try this recipe with a flank or skirt steak.

Elise Bauer
How to Cook Hanger Steak
Hanger steak is highly flavorful but isn't perfectly tender, so it responds well to quick cooking with searing heat. Simply heat a skillet with oil over high heat, sear the steaks on all sides, and cook until done to your preference.

Hanger steak is best served sliced thinly across the grain.

What to Serve With Hanger Steak
This recipe calls for a delicious shallot sauce drizzled on top of the sliced steak. We picked up the recipe from our local butcher at Corti Brothers who in turn got it from Chef Daniel Boulud. According to Chef Boulud, French bistros traditionally serve this hanger steak along with pommes frites (French fries).

We passed on the fries and went with broccoli and boiled potatoes. Outstanding! And very easy to make.

The Secret to Juicy Turkey Burgers
Ground turkey is typically much leaner than ground beef. In order to keep the burger from being too dry it helps to use ground dark meat from thighs and legs if you can get it. Adding a little olive oil to the mix helps, too.

As for flavor, ground turkey on its own just isn't as flavorful as ground beef, even if you use ground dark meat as we recommend. But jazzed up with some chopped fresh herbs, a little onion, and garlic? The result is exquisite.

A turkey burger worthy of the name "burger."

Cambrea Bakes
Cook on the Grill or Stovetop
You can cook these turkey burgers on either the grill or the stovetop. Make sure your grill or pan is very hot and well-oiled to prevent the burgers from sticking. For either grilling or stovetop cooking, cook the burgers for 5 to 6 minutes per side, until cooked through (165°F if using a meat thermometer).

Make Ahead and Freeze
Like most burgers, these turkey burgers freeze well. Shape them into patties, then wrap the raw patties in plastic wrap and freeze in a single layer on a plate or baking sheet in the freezer. Once solid, gather them into a freezer bag and freeze for up to three months.

Thaw overnight in the fridge, then cook as per the recipe.

With warmer weather comes grilling season, and one of the easiest foods you can prepare on a grill, whether it's gas or charcoal, is salmon. There is a trick to grilling salmon, though, that once you know will transform your success with grilling this fish forever.


How to Make Easy Salmon Patties
How to Grill Salmon with Skin
Use skin-on fillets and place the salmon fillets on the hot grill skin-side up (flesh side down) first.

The fillets, when raw, won't flake and fall apart like they will when they are cooked. So, you sear the raw flesh side first, only enough to get some good grill marks and an edge of cooked fish, then you carefully flip it and finish your cooking at a lower temperature with the skin-side down (flesh side up).

This way, the skin will help keep the fillet together and help keep it from flaking apart and falling into your grill while the fish cooks.

A friend of mine taught me this approach years ago and it makes a huge difference. If you do it the other way? Skin-side down first? It's a mess.