• Greek,  Potatoes,  Vegan,  Vegetarian

    Patates Elinora (Greek-Style Potatoes)

    You’re low on flour, rice is scarce, and your pasta stash is down to one lonely box of elbows. Thank Heaven for potatoes. Especially when it’s easy to dress them up Greek-style—bright, pungent and with an aroma so intoxicating it could serve as stress-relief therapy. “Greek-style” is simply shorthand for “lemon, oregano and olive oil” (the way “Florentine” means spinach). But this is not your standard dish of crispy potato wedges done up Greek-style. Here, layers of thinly sliced potatoes roast and steam, soaking up caramelized lemon sauce and blissing out on oregano. Cut into the casserole and you’ll find strata of textures and flavors, from soft and creamy on the bottom to crispy…

  • Breakfast,  Cakes,  Desserts,  Snacks

    One Bowl Apple Cake

    If you’ve got two apples and some baking basics, you can make One Bowl Apple Cake without even having to take out your mixer. Luxuriously moist and studded with soft apple chunks, this lightly spiced one-bowl wonder is as at home after a dinner party as it is at breakfast or snacktime. This cake’s versatility stems from its Jewish heritage. It purposely contains no dairy, so those who keep kosher can enjoy it any time, with meat or dairy meals. This recipephany comes from my earliest baking bible (Old Testament version), From Manna to Mousse. Born in 1969 as a plastic-spined fundraising cookbook produced by the Sisterhood of Congregation Beth El in New London,…

  • Breakfast,  Cakes,  Desserts,  Recipes

    Julia Lipman’s Cinnamon Tea Cake

    This Cinnamon Tea Cake comes from Elinor Lipman. A best-selling novelist who serves up social comedies with affection and wit, Elinor has a talent for observing and carving up our culture — which of course includes food. Most notably, she can remember every meal she ever ate. While critics have praised her pitch-perfect ear for dialogue, I would also like to extol her taste buds. Everything she cooks and bakes and every restaurant dish she recommends is a winner. So I am overjoyed she has let me feature her mother’s recipe for Cinnamon Tea Cake. Like a Drake’s crumb cake, it’s delightfully light and luscious with cinnamon. And it performs the brilliant trick of…