Celebrate Easter with macaroon pie

Gotta blog quickly. It's 5 a.m. and I have a plane to catch-- I'm off to join my kids, brothers, sister, mom for Easter. Before I go, here's a very nice dessert to make for Easter dinner. This delectable recipe comes from my Aunt Katie. I took it to a dinner party last week and it was a hit.

Macaroon pie

1-1/2 cups crushed soda cracker crumbs (more commonly known, I guess, as saltines)
3/4 cup pitted, chopped dates
3/4 cup chopped nuts
1 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
4 egg whites
1 teaspoon almond extract

Beat egg whites until very stiff. Slowly add sugar. Fold in all other ingredients. Pour into well-buttered pie pan and bake 30 minutes at 300 degrees. For serving, top wedges with sweetened, almond flavored whipping cream, or (my preference) add 1/4 cup sugar and 1/2 teaspoon almond extract to a cup of sour cream and spread over the top of the pie. Sprinkle with sliced almonds.

Add a cup of cranberries to oatmeal cookies

I love making oatmeal cookies. I add handfuls of extras to pack them with goodness: chocolate chips, coconut, raisins and nuts. I've just made a big batch and added dried cranberries for a little variety. They're yummy. Here's the basic recipe for about four dozen cookies:

1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
3/4 cup no-transfat Crisco
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 egg
1/4 cup water
1 teaspoon vanilla
3 cups uncooked oatmeal (quick or old-fashioned)
1 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda

Heat oven to 350 degrees (325 if using convection oven). In large bowl or standing mixer, mix brown sugar, shortening and granulated sugar until creamy. Add egg, water and vanilla. Beat well. Add oats, flour, baking soda; mix well. Add handfuls of anything else that sounds good-- chocolate chips, peanut butter chips, dried fruit, nuts, coconut.

Line cookie sheets with parchment paper. Drop dough by rounded teaspoonfuls onto sheets. Bake 11-13 minutes or until edges are golden brown. Remove to wire rack. Cool completely. Store tightly covered or freeze in plastic freezer bags.

Happy birthday: Bell pepper chicken with orzo

For my birthday last week, Dave gave me a cookbook, "Cooking Light Weeknight," along with a promise that he would cook recipes from this book on a regular basis. This was an excellent gift, as my schedule is so packed lately that weeknight cooking has become something of a challenge. Dave made good on his promise Thursday night. It was lovely to come home to find him sautéing chicken with peppers and cooking orzo with feta to go with. In the time it took him to cook this fine, healthy meal, I was able to slip into my jeans, take the dog on a nice walk, and then enjoy dinner feeling pampered and relaxed.

Feta orzo is a cinch. Two ingredients-- cooked orzo (start with 4 ounces uncooked), mixed with three ounces crumbled feta. A nice pasta variation.

Here's the chicken recipe:

Bell pepper chicken with lemon juice

4 teaspoons olive oil
4 skinless, boneless chicken breasts (Dave used a package of chicken tenders)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/8 teaspoon ground red pepper
1 cup red bell pepper strips
1 cup green bell pepper strips
1 teaspoon dried oregano
2 garlic cloves, minced
1-1/2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice

Heat two teaspoons olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Sprinkle chicken with salt, pepper and red pepper. Cook chicken in oil 4 minutes to each side. Remove chicken from pan and place in warming oven.

Add remaining oil and bell peppers to pan. Sauté 2 minutes. Add oregano and garlic. Sauté 1 minute. Remove from heat. Stir in lemon juice. Serve with feta orzo.

Look mom, no iodine: Cranberry orzo salad

We have a friend, Mike, who is being treated for thyroid cancer. For the next few days he needs to be on a low-iodine diet. My impulse when someone is sick is to take them something to eat, so I was grateful when Chris, one of the women at book group, shared some of her own experience with this illness (check out her blog entry on the topic)-- and a good link for recipes at http://www.thyca.org/. She recommended an orzo salad that I made today. It turned out so nicely that I think I will make this again and again. I didn't add any salt, although the Web site version says it's OK to used the non-iodized variety. I left a container of this, along with a card and the recipe, on Mike's porch this afternoon.

Orzo salad with cranberries

1 16-ounce box orzo pasta
1 cup dried cranberries
1 large diced red onion
1 red pepper, diced
1/2 cup pine nuts
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup vinegar
1/4 cup olive oil

Cook orzo according to package directions. Drain, mix with remaining ingredients. Serve warm or at room temperature.

"United States of Arugula" alive at the olive bar

I've joined a book group -- a terrific circle of smart, funny women. This month's reading selection was "The United States of Arugula: The Sun Dried, Cold Pressed, Dark Roasted, Extra Virgin Story of the American Food Revolution ," by David Kamp. What a great read. Kamp examines how the American food scene has evolved, thanks in large measure to foodie pioneers such as James Beard, Julia Child, Alice Waters and Craig Claiborne. I loved the book-- it's a lively examination of how what we eat has changed for the better over the last 50 years.

Book group is a potluck event, and for this week's get-together I really wanted to cook something excellent to match our subject matter. But I had no time, so I decided to just stop at the store after work to pick up munchies. Cop-out, yeah. But what first caught my attention when I walked into the new Dillon's store on Douglas Avenue was the olive bar, filled with all kinds of beautiful olives, stuffed grape leaves, marinated cheese, mushrooms and cherry tomatoes. It was beautiful, and illustrated perfectly what Kamp describes in his book-- the wonderful supply of delectable ingredients available everywhere we shop, a different food universe than the landscape Julia or James or Craig inhabited when they started out in the middle of the last century. So I bought several plastic containers of goodies from the olive bar, picked up some water crackers and some goat cheese brie. Also a little jar of yummy oily sundried tomatoes. Used to be you only found this kind of stuff at Dean & DeLuca's (the founders of which were also significant characters, by the way, in Kamp's book.) Now good food surrounds us everywhere. I felt very happy.

I went home, arranged my cheese, olives and everything else in a white serving dish I'd picked up at DeHillerins in Paris. I packed this off to book group with a bottle of wine. Life is good. And food has gotten really good.

This mac and cheese suits grown-up tastes

Tonight I made mac and cheese that suited our adult tastes just a bit more than the blue-box variety I used to serve my kids. I just threw in some ingredients we happened to have on hand-- a bit of ham, some fresh spinach, three different kinds of cheese, a shot of Chardonnay. It was really quite good-- a bit lighter on the butter than a traditional recipe.

Macaroni and cheese for grown-ups

1 pound of pasta (rotini, penne, whatever you like)
2 cups grated cheese (I used a mixture of jack cheese, sharp cheddar and colby)
1/2 large onion, chopped
1 cup ham, cut into small chunks
1 fresh tomato, chopped
2 tablespoons butter
1-1/2 cups fresh spinach leaves
3/4 cup white wine
1 teaspoon marjoram
1 cup milk
1/2 cup panko crumbs

Cook pasta in a large pot according to package instructions. While pasta cooks, melt butter in a deep skillet. Cook onion pieces over medium high heat until soft, about 5 minutes. Stir in ham, spinach and tomato pieces. Stir for about two minutes. Add milk, reduce heat and stir with a whisk for about three minutes until milk is heated through. Add wine and all by 1/4 cup of the cheese. Continue stirring until cheese melts and sauce is smooth. Add marjoram. Drain pasta, and pour back into the pasta pot. Stir in cheese sauce. Butter an 11-by-13-by-2 inch casserole dish and spoon in pasta with sauce. Top with panko crumbs. Top with 1/4 cup cheese. Bake at 375 degrees for 30 minutes.