olive oil & maple granola.

Hear me out. I know I bombard you with granola recipes at every opportunity, and if granola isn't your thing, you've probably long checked out of this blog and decided that I am a tree-huggin' hippie who lives on nuts and seeds and chants in my backyard.

But the trouble is, I want to believe everyone likes granola. I mean, don't get me wrong, I feel like a loser every time I try to explain to someone just how fantastic that last batch of homemade granola was! Then I realize they are staring at me like I've got three heads and they smile politely and walk away.

I know, it doesn't sound terribly exciting, and how many granola recipes does one person need? But I've eaten a lot of granola in my lifetime - some delicious and some positively horrible - so I consider myself a granola authority of sorts. (I should be on Food Network's Unwrapped where they all have titles like Cheez Wiz Connoisseur and Twizzler Enthusiast.) But I do this for you! So you can have the best granola around each morning, for your afternoon snack mixed with a bit of Greek yogurt, to spread the good news that homemade granola is a world away from that pasty-pale store-bought garbage!

So about this particular recipe - it balances sweet and salty in a way most granola recipes do not. Rather than a slick of flavorless vegetable oil to keep it crisp, this recipes uses hearty olive oil that gives the brown sugar and maple syrup lacquering each crispy bit a good kick in the pants. And while we're talking about the syrup, and I hesitate to tell you this because I never want to be the sort of person who insists upon a particular ingredient or the entire batch will be ruined! But in this case, do your best to seek out a good, rich maple syrup. I'd never tasted Grade B syrup (for some reason I had it in my head that it was inferior to Grade A and if I was going to spend the $8, I was getting Grade A - this could not be farther from the truth) before this recipe but found a jug of it on sale at the Common Market and decided to give it a go. It came from a local sugar shack in Western Maryland called S&S and it's unlike any syrup I've ever had - it's sweet, of course, but it's also a touch bitter at the end, and to me, it tasted like coffee. A delicious cup of rich-bodied coffee that happened to pour out of a maple tree.

But moving on and off my maple syrup high horse. Besides that, there's the coconut chips. I've always used sweetened, shredded coconut for my granola recipes, but I found a bag of these at that same Common Market and as it turns out, they crisp up like tropical chips in the oven, lightly coated with that magical maple slurry and just a bit salty from the coarse salt sprinkled over the top. And it's that same salt that keeps this granola grounded, keeps it interesting, keeps you reaching back into the back for another handful on your way out the door.

Now I realize that nuts and seeds can certainly add up, but I usually hit the bulk section of my local grocer and it isn't too bad - I keep the nuts in the freezer and it'll last through several batches of granola (and I'm convinced it ends up costing less than buying multiple boxes of cereal).

I love this recipe as-is, but I also like to stir in a handful of dried cherries once it's cool enough to handle. Their tart chewiness lends a great contrast to the crunchy granola and were it not for my dried-fruit averse husband who doesn't like when I add the "chewies" to the mix, I'd eat it that way every day.

One last thing and I promise I'll shut my trap and let you get on with it - don't skimp on stirring the granola really well in the 15 minute increments mentioned below. I neglected it once before and the maple-sugar mixture tends to pool in the center of the pan (or maybe I just need new, less warped pans?) and I ended up with a handful of gluey pieces once it finished baking. So just keep stirring! All will be right with the world.

Olive Oil & Maple Granola
Adapted from Food52 & Nekisia Davis

Makes about 7 cups

3 cups old-fashioned rolled oats
1 cup raw pumpkin seeds, hulled
1 cup raw sunflower seeds, hulled
1 cup unsweetened coconut chips
1 1/4 cup raw pecans, left whole or coarsely chopped
1/2 cup packed light-brown sugar
3/4 cup pure maple syrup, preferably Grade B
1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
Coarse salt
Dried cherries, optional

Preheat the oven to 300 degrees F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper.

In a large bowl, mix together the oats, pumpkin seeds, sunflower seeds, coconut chips, pecans, brown sugar, and a hefty pinch of coarse salt.

In a measuring cup, whisk together the maple syrup and olive oil. It won't really come together in any sort of cohesive manner, but give it a good stir and then quickly pour it over the oat mixture. (I've made it before just by mixing everything together in one bowl from the get-go, but I got it into my head that some bits were becoming saturated in olive oil, others in just syrup, and vowed to just mix the syrup and oil together and sleep peacefully at night.)

Toss it all together with a rubber spatula until well coated - really make sure you get all the way to the bottom of the bowl where the dry bits of oats and coconut shards tend to hide. Tip the mixture onto the baking sheet and spread it evenly.

Bake for 45-55 minutes, stirring and flipping the granola every 15 minutes, until golden brown and crisp. As soon as you remove it from the oven, sprinkle it once more with a good pinch of coarse salt and toss it every 30 minutes or so until the granola is completely cool. Mix in a handful of dried cherries, if you like.

The granola will keep in a plastic bag or container at room temperature for about a week, but we keep ours in the freezer. I find the dried fruit will soften the crisp of the granola after a few days unless it's frozen, plus my baby Daddy says he enjoys the ice cold milk that results from frozen granola.

strawberry cake.

Well, this feels a little awkward. I've been away from this blog since last October when I made a little announcement that is not so little anymore. It sort of has that feeling when you're home from college and you know you're home but its just funny enough that you feel you should ask to get a glass of milk rather than helping yourself. I never, ever intended for that to happen and I'm so grateful for those of you who have checked in to see how things are going. I've missed this place quite a bit, my friends.

Truthfully, it's been a rough ride. Like, 22 weeks of daily toilet-hugging followed by another few weeks of zero appetite and now onto waddling about with just a few days to go and trying to get down my required protein each day. I've only cooked a handful of meals this entire time and almost no dessert - even the simplest of recipes seemed daunting and the idea of having to burn valuable energy on something as silly as washing dishes was enough to make me put the cookbooks away.

I miss being hungry. I miss it a lot. But I made you a cake. A cake!

Now, it's not a terribly fancy cake, mind you. It's more of a Sunday-afternoon-I-have-some-strawberries-on-the-counter-and-I-did-just-take-a-nap sort of cake. But I'm just so grateful that I rustled up the chutzpah to hull a pound (a whole! stinkin'! pound!) of strawberries. That sounds like an awful lot when you're nine months pregnant. Then again, getting out of bed without assistance and tying my shoes and trying not to cry at Campbell's soup commercials all sound impossible these days, but I make it happen.

This cake, this humble looking vanilla cake with the dozens of strawberry slices wedged into the buttery batter, is exactly the sort of thing you'll want to put in your oven and forget about for a while. Of course, until you smell the berries turning into jammy pockets of berry goo and you pat yourself on the back for turning such simple ingredients into something so splendid.

It may seem like there's too many berries to go around, but if you really squeeze 'em in there, let them overlap just a bit and don't worry if "just a bit" turns into "one on top of the other," then you'll be rewarded with a cake that is more strawberry than cake. The batter crinkles up around the strawberries as it bakes and really, the cake is more of a vessel for getting all those summery berries into your belly without too much hassle.

You'll want to add this to your recipe box for those summer days when it's unbearably hot but you'd still like dessert before the sun goes down. I can't imagine a summer night without dessert, but then again this summer will be different for me. I'll have a newborn to snack on anytime I please, but for those of you don't, you can have this cake.

Recipe here.

where i've been.

I've missed this place. I've missed the smirking little girl up at the top of the page there, the one with the mixing bowl and freckled cheeks. I've missed cooking, and I've missed hearing from you, dear readers.

Since it's been just shy of two whole months since my last post, I'll just get right to it. I'm a little pregnant. We're due in April, and no one was more surprised than me. And while some bloggers seem to chug happily along, posting the standard cinnamon-bun-in-the-oven recipes to announce their pregnancies, I have been down for the count. I wish I had more to share, but I've been on a steady diet of cereal and toast for the past twelve weeks and frankly, the very thought of stirring a pot sends me running for the facilities to hug my new BFF, Mr. Toilet.

I'm praying things are on the upswing, but between graduate school, a new job, married life, and worrying if my lunch will come up any second, there hasn't been much time for brownies. I think that's the worst.

Be back soon. Promise.

almond torte with sugared apricots.

Fruit and I have come a long way. I used to stuff myself silly with every kind of peach, plum, and apple I could get my hands on, nothing was off limits. So it was a terrible surprise when one day, in between fifth and sixth grade, a red apple turned against me.



We had just moved to a new town and my parents took me and my siblings on a picnic at a local park to blow off some steam before the school year started. There were a few rusted out swingsets and an oversized Coca-Cola can you could crawl through, although that's only entertaining for so long. I think we had sandwiches or some other picnic fare, but I can't remember exactly. It's all been blocked out by that terrible episode of The Apple.



My Dad packed a tub of caramel dipping sauce for our apple slices, and when it was time to eat, I didn't waste a minute. I ate half an apple worth of slices before taking off for the slide again, but by the time I reached the top of the ladder, my lips were tingling. I chewed on them a bit, thinking it was nothing, but it got worse. Within a few minutes, my tongue, cheeks and gums were all itchy and swollen, and we didn't know why.



Through a few rounds of trial an error (a horrible reaction to some peaches at my friend Natalie's house was the clincher), my allergist diagnosed me with a fruit allergy, and the only thing I could have for years was watermelon. Anything else and I swelled up like a balloon. It was really ridiculous, I had to carry an Epi-Pen around school and the nurse called me down to her office to see if I needed specially made lunches. I mumbled something like, "I'll just pack, thanks..." and walked sheepishly back to class.



Over the years, it has gotten better. I still can't eat apples, and I still react to some fruits, but apricots are back from the Dark Side. Just touching them to my lips 5 years ago would've made me look like a puffer fish, but they've since apologized and begged to come back. I'm starting small with this apricot torte, and I think apricots and I are back on track to being fine friends again.



First, you blitz a handful of almonds into a powder, perhaps leaving a few crunchy bits in there because you are lazy or just enjoy your cake batter studded with almonds. Then you whip up a quick and dirty batter with your standard butter, eggs, sugar and flour and top the whole thing off with a ring of halved apricots, bright orange and juicy. Now, because apricots tend to be on the mouth-puckering side of the fruit spectrum, it would serve you well to sprinkle a bit of sugar over the tops before sliding it into the oven to bake. Once it gets going, it perfumes your whole house with the scent of toasted almonds and blistering fruit, the sort of fragrance that forces you to walk in and out of the house just to have it register in your senses again. Once it's ready, the top crackles and shatters in spots and some apricots nestle down beneath the surface of the cake (a welcome surprise upon slicing). The few wedges of fruit that stuck around will fill with a little puddle of apricot juice and you might be sorely tempted to scoop them out with a spoon and forgo the cake altogether.

But don't. Let it cool ever so slightly, pour yourself a cuppa, and call it breakfast.



Almond Torte with Sugared Apricots
Adapted from Orangette & Marion Burros

1/3 cup finely ground almonds
2/3 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking powder
Pinch of salt
8 Tbsp. (1 stick) unsalted butter, at room temperature
¾ cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs

For topping:
6 ripe apricots, halved and pitted
1-2 Tbsp. granulated sugar

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. In the bowl of a food processor, pulse the almonds until they are finely ground. Don't worry about overdoing it, I let mine whirl for a good while with no sign of almond butter in sight.

In a small bowl, whisk together the ground almonds, flour, baking powder and salt.

In the food processor, pulse together the butter, sugar and eggs until just combined. Add in the dry ingredients and mix in short bursts until the flour just barely disappears. Scoop the batter into a 9-inch spring-form pan and spread it evenly with an offset spatula.

Arrange the apricot halves evenly across the top of the batter and sprinkle with sugar (1 tablespoon if they are plenty sweet, or 2 tablespoons if they need a little boost. I find most apricots are fairly sour, so I used two).

Bake for 40-50 minutes or until the top is a bit crackly and golden brown. Cool for about 15 minutes before serving.

summer succotash.

I haven't spent nearly as much time in the kitchen this summer as I'd hoped. That sounds awfully backwards given that this summer was one of the hottest to date and no person in their right mind would want to spend it next to the hot stove, but I can't help but feel I missed something along the way.



Perhaps it was the adjustment of married life that swallowed up the time, or that our house insisted on being an absolute nuisance more often than not, or that I found myself slurping up bowls of cereal for dinner (save for the tomato + fried bread which was positively divine) while my darling husband was out policing the streets, but I have that sort of hollow feeling in my belly. Do you ever get that? That strange sensation that you've forgotten something? I think, for me, it was the kitchen.



Now I know I must sound awfully melancholy and you might be thinking, "C'mon, Britt! You've still got a good chunk of summer left! Think of the tomatoes! The pie! Think of Arnold Palmer!" And oh, I suppose you might be right. But now that I am scheduled for a return to graduate school (I do hope I am not completely rusty after a semester's vacation), there's that sinking feeling floating just below my ribcage. I miss my free time already. I ought to buck up, really, I should. It's just that I spent the first half of my summer battling with that same graduate school after I ended up with a professor whose vacation was interrupted by his obligation to teach the class. Honestly.



It's possible you're wondering what on earth any of that has to do with succotash. You might even be sitting there, jaw squared and lip nearly curled, thinking of how much you hate succotash. The first time I ever had succotash, it was at an old boyfriend's grandmother's house for dinner. She made Swiss steak, mashed potatoes and succotash - better known as a humble mixture of corn and lima beans. I didn't see the hype at first, but with a little salt and a nub of sweet butter, it wasn't so bad.



But this is hardly succotash at all. It starts with a bit of bacon (or country ham in our case), then you toss in a few handful of juicy tomatoes, garlic, and onion right into the bacon fat. It will sizzle and pop and hiss for a moment or two and while you listen, you can spend a few moments cleaning up the rogue corn kernels that have bounced all over your floor like pearls from a broken necklace.



Once all the vegetables are cooked but still a bit toothsome, you mix in a good bunch of arugula and fresh basil, perhaps a cup of brown rice or chewy farro to round it out (one! bowl! meal!). We ate on the back porch with a tall glass of sweet tea and a fluffy cloud of Parmesan cheese while the sun sank down. And that's what I'll miss about the summer: No lingering thoughts of homework to be done, the clinking of silverware against a bowl on the porch, a bottomless pitcher of iced tea, and perhaps even a bowl of this succotash.

Adapted from Gourmet.