Orange Creamsicle Ricotta Mousse

My boyfriend loves orange creamsicles, so I decided to try making Orange Creamsicle Ricotta Mousse. When you have super high quality ricotta, it’s really easy to make delicious things. It only involved a few ingredients, but my boyfriend and dinner guests were very impressed by this fancy-seeming dessert. Guessipe 4 cups ricotta, drained over a…

Whipped Ricotta Fettunta

I got another ricotta bounty from my cheese supplier (AKA friend who works for the best Italian cheese company ever). There is an Italian restaurant nearby that I used to go to specifically for their Whipped Ricotta Fettunta… until it occurred to me that with the incredible ricotta from my friend I could probably make…

Peperonata

One day I was looking for something to do with some spare bell peppers, and I remembered having peperonata when I was in Italy. It’s a stewed bell pepper dish which often also includes onion, garlic, and tomatoes. All I happened to have on hand was bell peppers and red onion, but it still came…

Pizza Sauce

My boyfriend is obsessed with pizza. I got him a pizza stone for Christmas one year, and he has been steadily honing his pizza-making skills by throwing regular pizza parties. My role is to make the pizza sauce. This recipe was one from a friend which I have tweaked to give it a bit more…

Spicy Italian Sausage with Kale and Tomato

This dish uses just a handful of ingredients and a single pan, but the flavors of the sausage, kale, and tomato go so well together that you don’t need anything else. My boyfriend says it’s like a really delicious pasta, only without any pasta – that’s a glowing endorsement from someone who would live on…

Persimmon Crisp

Our Cookbook Club tradition is to do a Friendsgiving event in November, where instead of using a cookbook everyone makes a dish that’s either a Thanksgiving tradition for them or something new they want to try this year. It’s persimmon season, and my friend recently gave me a bag full from her tree. I make…

Chocolate Pomegranate Clusters

I got a load of pomegranates from a friend’s tree, and after eating a ton on salad still had so much left and was looking for something to do with them. These chocolate pomegranate clusters are an easy 3-ingredient guessipe, but they look super festive and are a great combo of salty-sweet-tangy. Perfect for holiday…

Quince Custard

A friend of mine gave me some quince, which are in the pear and apple family but aren’t eaten raw. I baked them into a custard which my boyfriend liked so much he said it was the best dessert I’ve ever made (though I should make the disclaimer that he has a really short memory…

Salted Egg Yolk Pumpkin

I ate a fried pumpkin dish in a family-owned Chinese restaurant like 10 years ago and have been dreaming about it ever since. The pumpkin had a salted egg yolk coating that I couldn’t get enough of. So when I saw a package of salted egg yolks at the Asian market, I had to buy…

Passion Fruit Panna Cotta

In my opinion passion fruit is an under-utilized fruit. I love passion fruit’s tropical sweet-tanginess. So I’m ecstatic that I’ve recently come across a local source for purple passion fruit. I’m using some of the seeds to try to grow my own! Until that gets going though, I used some of what I got to…

Cheddar Bay Biscuits

My boyfriend’s dad is obsessed with Old Bay Seasoning. He buys it in bulk and puts it on everything. At his prompting, I bought some and my first order of business was to try my hand at making the cheddar bay biscuits everyone talks about. It’s the basic Bisquick biscuit recipe with some cheddar cheese…

Rosemary Ricotta Lemon Bars

After making a full ricotta-themed meal (appetizer, main, dessert) with the best ricotta ever (no exaggeration), I had exactly 2/3 cup of ricotta left. I figured that was the perfect amount to mix into lemon bars for a little creaminess to smooth out the lemony tang. I also used rosemary in the shortbread crust to…