Zabar's Blog

Recipe for Turkey Leftovers

from Betty Crocker Best 100
Cookbook review by Tracey Zabar

I love old-fashioned recipes that work today. After the holiday, try this wonderful pot pie instead of another turkey sandwich. Then, bake some sweets from this amazing cookbook. Perhaps a pumpkin loaf, studded with chocolate chips; an apple bread glazed with caramel; or some rainbow-frosted doughnuts.

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Recipe excerpted with permission from BETTY CROCKER BEST 100: Favorite Recipes from America’s Most Trusted Cook © 2021 by Betty Crocker. Photography © 2021 by General Mills. Reproduced by permission of Mariner Books, an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers. All rights reserved.

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Recipe for Banana & walnut bread

Cookbook review by Tracey Zabar

There are lots of yummy banana bread recipes in this sweet cookbook, some with caramel or chocolate chips. I loved a clever version with passion fruit in the batter and dried banana chips topping the sweet icing of the finished cake. But start with this classic, studded with nuts. Next on my list: tea bread that is soaked with booze; Japanese sponge cake; and pain d’épices, a spicy cake that is way better than any gingerbread I have ever tasted.

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Recipe excerpted with permission from Banana Breads, Loaf Cakes, & Other Quick Bakes: 60 Deliciously Easy Recipes for Home Baking, Ryland Peters & Small Recipe: Julian Day, Photo: Steve Painter © Ryland Peters & Small

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Marcella Hazan’s Tomato Sauce

from The Essential New York Times by Amanda Hesser
Cookbook review by Tracey Zabar

This amazing cookbook is bursting with over one thousand recipes. You will be cooking through the book for years. Buy the book to get the marinara recipe. Your repertoire needs that one too. Next on my list: baked mushrooms from 1877; sweet potato Cecelia; Lee Lum’s lemon chicken; the classic purple plum torte; and the world’s best chocolate cake.

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Excerpted from The Essential New York Times Cookbook: The Recipes of Record, 10th Anniversary Edition. Compilation copyright (c) 2021, 2010 by The New York Times Company and Amanda Hesser. Used with permission of the publisher, W. W. Norton & Company, Inc. All rights reserved.

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Recipe for Little Jam Flower Cookies

from La Vita è Dolce by Letitia Clark, photographs by Charlotte Bland
Cookbook review by Tracey Zabar

These little morsels can be made in any shape for your sweetie. Buy the book for the jam recipe mentioned in the headnote. Next on my list: Torta della Nonna; Chocolate, pear, brown sugar and hazelnut cake; and the One True Apple Cake. What could be better?

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Recipe excerpted with permission from La Vita è Dolce by Letitia Clark, published by Hardie Grant Books, June 2021

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Recipe for Semolina gnocchi in broth from Istria by Paola Bacchia

Cookbook review by Tracey Zabar

What to cook this weekend? Gnocchi. These little dumplings will warm your heart and tummy. Next on my list: hand-rolled macaroni with asparagus, walnuts & mint; goulash; and apricot strudel.

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Recipe excerpted with permission from Istria by Paola Bacchia

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Recipe for Peanut butter & jelly brownies

from Brownies, Blondies, and other Traybakes (Ryland Peters and Small)
Cookbook review by Tracey Zabar

Peanut butter and jelly, great combination. Peanut butter and chocolate, even better. But, good grief, pb&j and chocolate? So good I can barely stand it. For your next month or two of baking, try this brownie goodie, then butterscotch blondies, then Bakewell slices, then gingerbread brownies, then pistachio, and then cherry. Finish with Brookies, which are an adorable cross between a cookie and a brownie.

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Recipe excerpted with permission From Delicious Brownies, Blondies and Other Traybakes: 65 Delicious Recipes for Home-Baked Sweet Treats, Ryland Peters & Small, 2021

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Recipe for Pasta alla Norma

from Sicilia by Ben Tish, photographs by Kris Kirkham
Cookbook review by Tracey Zabar

This lovely book is an armchair traveler’s dream, filled with recipes of my grandparents’ home. Here is Pasta alla Norma, a quick and easy dish to make for dinner. It's the perfect pairing of tomatoes and eggplant. Next on my list: flat bread with grapes; spaccatelle pasta with ricotta and pistachio pesto; and the adorably named Kissing Biscuits. Buon appetito!

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Recipe excerpted with permission from Sicilia by Ben Tish (Bloomsbury). All rights reserved.

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Recipes for herb-crusted roasted chicken with lemon garlic orzo and curried chicken sheet pan dinner

from Cook Once Dinner Fix by Cassy Joy Garcia
Cookbook review by Tracey Zabar

Preparing a meal and reserving some of the ingredients for tomorrow. So clever. Try the herb-crusted roasted chicken with lemon-garlic orzo for your first dinner, and reserve some of the meat to make second meal—a sheet pan, bursting with veggies and curry. Another night, make some tuna steak with chili-lime sauce, serve it with quinoa, and use some of the fish for a tuna-noodle casserole for another dinner. A falafel bowl morphs into goat cheese-mushroom quiche for tomorrow’s lunch. The book has tons of tip on how to transform the recipes to lower your carbs, or eliminate dairy, gluten, grains, nuts, or eggs. Healthy and delicious. What could be bad?

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Recipe excerpted with permission from Cook Once Dinner Fix by Cassy Joy Garcia, photos by Kristen Kilpatrick (Simon & Schuster, Inc). All rights reserved.

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Recipe for Scorched ricotta with herbs & honey

from Sharing Food with Friends by Kathy Kordalis
Cookbook review by Tracey Zabar

Celebrate a sweet new year with this herby cheese dish, drizzled with honey. There is even a recipe in this cookbook to make pizza topped with this ricotta! Next on my list: a no-pastry chicken pie, with thyme-sprigged potatoes; primavera risotto; and the cutest individual apple tarts.

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Recipe excerpted with permission from: Casual Dining and Inspiring Recipes for Platters, Boards and Small Bites by photography by Mowie Kay (Ryland Peters & Small)

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Recipe for Chocolate Chip Cookies

Cookbook review by Tracey Zabar

Here is a recipe for something delicious to start off a sweet year. This enormous book is a chocolate lover's dream. It contains step-by-step instructions, with illustrations and photographs, to guide you to make bonbons, tartlets, and an opera cake (Aunt Stacey’s favorite!) that is fancy dinner party-worthy. It also has very clear instructions on how to temper chocolate, which was the hardest thing I learned in culinary school. Today’s recipe is the simplest in the book—amazing chocolate chunk cookies.

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Recipes excerpted with permission from The Ultimate Book of Chocolate by Melanie Dupuis, published by Hardie Grant Books.

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