Veteran cooking teacher Carole Kotkin is the manager of the Ocean Reef Cooking School in Key Largo. She co-hosts ''Food & Wine Talk'' from 11 a.m. to noon Mondays on WDNA 88.9 FM, and is the co-author of MMMMiami-Tempting Tropical Tastes for Home Cooks Everywhere (Henry Holt). She is a founder of the American Institute of Wine and Food's South Florida chapter and a charter member of the International Association of Culinary Professionals and the Miami chapter of Les Dames d'Escoffier.
E-mail her at ckotkin@miamiherald.com.
Thanksgiving means pie, and for me, that pie is pumpkin. Happily for busy holiday cooks, pumpkin pie lends itself to cooking ahead. You can prepare the pastry dough a day or two in advance, roll it out, place it in a pie plate and parbake it (15 to 20 minutes in today's recipe; then poke the venting holes).
Many years ago, I went to Paris to study cooking. On the first day of class, the schedule listed pain perdu as one of the dishes we would prepare. After perusing the recipe, I realized it was simply French toast -- something I'd been making for years without benefit of expensive lessons.
If you thought chocolate topped the hit parade, you would be wrong. It's vanilla that is America's No. 1 flavor. And it's far from ``plain vanilla.''
One of the least familiar and most intriguing vegetables of fall is fennel (sometimes labeled sweet anise), a Mediterranean favorite. It looks like a bulbous head of celery and has a licorice-like taste.
Many island dishes, from rice and beans to fried plantains, are shared across the Caribbean, but jerk belongs to Jamaica. It began as a way for the Maroons (runaway slaves and their descendents) to preserve wild pork, and evolved into the island's most famous dish.
Nothing's more refreshing in the heat of summer than sorbet, and homemade is, as always, fresher and more flavorful than store-bought. An array of glorious-tasting, fruit-flavored sorbets could become your signature dessert.
When we had a vacation home in the North Carolina mountains, I adored blueberry picking with my family. There was always a race to see who could fill their container first and another race home to bake those berries into pies or muffins.
Few seafoods bring to mind the taste of the sea as readily as mussels. These meaty mollusks are also a pleasure to cook -- a quick burst of heat will open them, releasing natural juices that form a ready-made sauce.
If you're firing up the grill for dinner, keep it going for dessert. Pineapple was made for grilling. Direct heat caramelizes its natural sugars with scrumptious results.
Quesadillas, Mexico's fun take on grilled cheese sandwiches, can be as simple or sophisticated as you want. The basic quesadilla is nothing more than cheese wrapped in a tortilla and heated until melted inside and crispy outside.
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