The Summer Party Guest Potluck Scramble
I am about to out myself as an obsessive of New York Times Cooking, and I need you all to be very normal about it (also if you can’t access any of the recipes just shoot me a message and I’ll type them up for you :)). This was supposed to be the year I finally, really dive into all my cookbooks, but I’m not doing a great job so far. That’s okay. We’ll get there.
I did a lot of cooking this past week, and my thought for this newsletter was that I would show you all the lovely pictures I took and I would give you the recipe for each dish. But then, of course, I didn’t take any pictures of any of the food I made, because when I am supposed to do something, I forget to do it. Also I am not an influencer.
But I am a writer! I think! Or that’s what I keep telling people! So I thought I would still tell you about everything I cooked and give you the recipe, but paired with a little vignette. Where are the spaces where we can put vignettes nowadays? I guess in places like this newsletter.
Blueberry Galette
I need all of you to know that I am absolute shit at baking. I am not being humble here. I am shit. Perhaps not, “I burned everything black” or “used salt instead of sugar” shit, but still shit.
Let me explain.
I simply never understand how much time something is going to take. In some areas of my life, I have gotten better at this, simply by greatly overestimating how much time it will take me to accomplish a task and then giving myself six hours to do something. But with baking, I still never seem to understand how long something will take, especially because I do not understand that baking has several steps, which often include chilling. I always think I can do something else while I’m baking, or bake something while I’m cooking. You cannot do this. Or at least, I cannot do this. Bread is the exception, as it’s meant to be left alone for several hours. But I digress.
For the 4th of July, my mother’s side of the family always has a big party to celebrate the holiday and my Uncle Stephen’s birthday, which falls on the same day. The past several years, we’ve had the gathering at Stephen’s house on the lake, where we spend the afternoon on the boat tubing with his grandkids (my second cousins, I think is how it works?) and watching fireworks at nine o’clock sharp. Unfortunately, due to the rain and my aforementioned inability to plan when baking, I missed the boat excursion, but the fireworks were thankfully still on. And of course, there was plenty of food. I arrived two hours after start time and still only the appetizers had been touched.
My mother is obsessed with this influencer grandmother named Babs and also knows how obsessed I am with French culture and French cooking. Last summer, she sent me a text, unprompted, that said, “Babs made a blueberry galette on her trip to France.” So, since I had gone blueberry picking the week before, and because I wanted to impress my mother, I made Babs’ blueberry galette inspired by Julia Child and her trip to France. I even made the pie crust myself, but more on that to follow.
We can’t know for sure if my mother was impressed. She only tried it after I begged her to before the end of the evening, and all she said was, “It’s good!” I guess we can choose not to read into that any further, huh?
Here’s Babs’ recipe. She uses store bought pie crust so you should feel no shame in doing so also:
Blueberries:
Pint of blueberries
1 tsp sugar
1 tbsp cornstarch
1/2 tsp lemon zest
1 tbsp lemon juice
Cream cheese layer:
4 oz cream cheese
1 egg yolk
2 tsp sugar
Squeeze of Lemon juice
Crust:
Store bought pie crust (mix with granulated sugar and roll out for a sweeter crust) or you can use as is
2 egg yolks
Granulated sugar for sprinkling
Instructions:
Mix blueberry ingredients and set aside
Mix cream cheese ingredients until smooth
Brush pie crust with TWO beaten eggs yolks
Cover with cream cheese mixture but leave 2 inch boarder
Cover cream cheese with blueberries
Fold crust over
Brush edges of galettte with egg whites and sprinkle with granulated sugar
Bake at 350 for 20-30 min
Heirloom Tomato Tart
I am actually a tomato pie person, not a tomato TART person. If you’d like to know the difference you can ask. But being a tomato person overall trumps that I suppose. This recipe is much more like a quiche than a tart or a pie, but I suppose we can’t hold that against the New York Times. Not everyone understands the intricacies and distinctions of a summer tomato dish. And I also suppose it doesn’t matter when it’s this delicious and pretty.
I was hoping I’d have fat, gorgeous heirloom tomatoes in my garden right now, but unfortunately that is not the case. I know I’m not a great gardener, but I am choosing to blame the insufferable heat in addition to my lack of talent when I wonder why I still have no tomatoes. Anyway, I got my heirlooms from the grocery store. They’re required for this recipe.
I may not have grown my own tomatoes, but I did make my own pesto with basil from my garden (here’s the recipe I used if you’re a from scratch pesto newbie) and make my own pie crust, using this recipe from a baking blogger I might be in love with.
I definitely gave what the recipe said was enough time to chill, but I would recommend more. I would also recommend having more surface area in your kitchen than I do, and using a lot more flour when rolling out the dough. My pie crust cracked a good bit and was a little difficult to work with. No crimping on the edges in the dish here, just rough and ready and edible.
I’d also recommend keeping baking weights or beans on hand for blind baking so you don’t have to borrow beans from your boyfriend because your deepest most embarrassing flaw is that you really don’t like beans. Don’t be like me kids. But, I am happy to report, the tart had a beautifully crisp and flaky bottom, even with all my fuck ups.
Finally, I suggest taking your time with this one, and getting heirloom tomatoes in a variety of different colors. Yes, this is delicious, but the real payoff is in that multicolored, heirloom tomato pinwheel pattern peeking out the top of all the pesto-tinged, custardy goodness. Once again, I went for rough and ready, but if I had the time, I would really, painstakingly fan those gorgeous tomatoes.
Paloma Pitcher
I fucking LOVE big batch cocktails. Mostly because, though every part of me absolutely aches to pick up bartending, I cannot make individual cocktails for a party of people. I can make maybe three cocktails max, slowly, without getting forgetful and sloppy. Maybe someday.
The paloma is my drink of the summer, if I’m not having a beermosa or Stiegle Grapefruit Radler (I can’t find them anywhere here in Jackson this summer and I am pissed). I think I now have to make a pitcher of this every summer for a party. Last year, before Bright Lights Belhaven Nights, the prep turned into an event because, again, I forgot how time worked, and I squeezed I can’t remember how many grapefruit in the kitchen with friends as the party began.
The best part of this drink is there’s no complicated mixing, during prep or the party. The hardest part is telling your guests to top off their drinks with soda water. You don’t have to use agave syrup in my opinion; simple syrup is fine, and you can make it at home in the microwave or on the stove by just heating equal parts sugar and water until the sugar dissolves.
In my humble opinion, however, you should absolutely double this recipe. And maybe drink straight from the spigot of your massive mason jar-esque serving jug.
Smashed Pickle Salad
My boyfriend hosted a fish fry this weekend, complete with a badminton net in the yard and also a sprinkler. I, unfortunately, had no time for badminton (one day soon I hope), but I did have time to make this salad. This is maybe like if potato salad and cucumber salad were lovers? Maybe?
I am a pickle fiend. Lately I’ve been buying jars of cornichons and just popping them into my mouth from the jar, sometimes with a wedge of cheese. The brine and tang you get from this salad is absolutely delicious, and it pairs really well with fried food, especially the fish from Saturday. It cuts through that delicious, heavy fried taste beautifully and adds a nice cold, sharp bite.
If you’re looking for a tip when frying fish, the secret is to double fry and have your girlfriend help you slice all the filets and dredge them for the first fry the morning of.
Salted Margarita Bars
Remember when I told you I was shit at baking? This is a good time to reflect on that so my actions make sense, especially considering I had been planning to make these bars for weeks.
I, of course, spent the morning lazing about at my boyfriend’s house. What’s one more episode of Bar Rescue? Who cares if I have to drive all the way to Madison and back to pick up extra chairs? It was my birthday the day before! I had been at Fenian’s til past one in the morning! I needed to rest! What’s time? Never heard of her!
Of course, I ended up scrambling. You freeze the crust, you bake the crust, then you bake the filling in the crust and then you freeze it all for two hours. Thankfully, I read all the instructions, including the warning that you should absolutely not wait more than 10 minutes before baking the filling because the lime juice will then start to thicken the curd and perhaps compromise the bake.
So did I give up, standing with no pants on with dripping wet hair in the kitchen, already half an hour late? Why, of course not. I kept the filling split in half in old cleaned pickle jars, lime juice mixture in one, egg and condensed milk in the other, threw them in a tote bag with a container of salt that exploded in transit, pulled the crust out of the oven and baked at my boyfriend’s while everyone stood in the kitchen drinking Modelos and palomas.
These bars weren’t ready until we were all hammered playing poker much later. They were a little sticky and not quite set, and I definitely served them to everyone one by one in the palm of my hand, but oh my god, let me say, nothing hits like a salted margarita bar after a long day of drinking while you’re losing a poker match. Follow with birthday cake if you’re so inclined and it’s the day after your birthday. Would recommend.