Zabar's Blog

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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