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My dessert obsessed father was at it again today; he just couldn't resist this berry crumble recipe he found in the New York Times. He used fresh strawberries, blueberries, and some of our frozen boysenberries. Our boysenberries tend to be pretty tart, so with the 3 Tbsp of sugar, the crumble ended up rather tart. Perfect for my dad and me, but my mother complained ("why can't you make it the way I like it? Why do you always have to make things like this so tart?") Mom knows she's welcome to bake anything she wants the way she likes it, so this conversation didn't go very far. But check your berries if and when you make this recipe. Add more or less sugar depending on your preference and how sweet the fruit is. By the way, one thing we've noticed lately is that the strawberries we get by Driscoll haven't been very sweet, and don't have nearly the flavor of the strawberries we get at the farmer's market or at the local fruit stand.

Happy July 4th!

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Please welcome guest author Hank Shaw who shares the recipe for his favorite BBQ sauce with us. This sauce is, btw, outrageously good. ~Elise

All barbecue cooks have their own "secret sauce," but for the most part, each relies on some sort of sugar, something acidic like vinegar, fat – typically butter – and something else to make it special. This sauce uses molasses, lemon juice, bourbon and Worcestershire sauce as its main flavors. It has that tart, sweet, salty, rich and spicy combination that I think all great barbecue sauces need. Use this with ribs, pulled pork or even tri-tip.

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Hank Shaw spent a day this week with my father and me, showing us how to smoke ribs on my kettle grill. As worried as I was that the ribs were going to end up dry, they weren't, and they were the some of the best I've ever had. Here's the process from Hank. ~Elise

Barbecue can be a serious business. Hard-core 'cue mavens buy or build special smokers with custom-made rotisseries and fireboxes in order to precisely control the level of heat and smoke needed for each type of meat or fish. Most of us aren't ready to drop several hundred – even several thousand – dollars on a special smoker. But you can 'cue at home, even with that simplest of grills – the "egg" or kettle grill Weber made famous in the 1950s.

No, you will not get competition-class barbecue every time, because you cannot control your temperature with a kettle grill as well as you can with the expensive smokers. But you can still easily achieve the proper "slow and low" cooking so critical for barbecue.

Continue reading "How to Turn Your Kettle Grill into a Smoker" »

The world of food blogs and the Internet is indeed a serendipitous one. A while ago I discovered a fellow named Hank Shaw in the comments section on Michael Ruhlman's blog. Hank seemed to know what he was talking about, especially in the area of preparing game. After a few emails back and forth about various ways to cook rabbit, it turns out Hank lives just a few minutes down the road from me. And not only is he one of those rare people who hunts, fishes, or grows almost all his own food, but he's a gourmet cook to boot. Last year Hank started his own food blog, Hunter Angler Gardener Cook in which he writes about charcuterie, wild game, fish, the fruits of his garden, and Greek and Italian cuisine. (BTW if you're into game, check out Hank's girlfriend Holly's hunting site, NorCal Cazadora.)

The purpose of this introduction is to let you know that Hank is joining us as a Simply Recipes guest author and will be writing a post here and there, focusing on meat. Please help me in welcoming him to Simply Recipes. ~Elise

My father should have a t-shirt that reads "I've never met a dessert I didn't like" or in this case, "Have Plums Will Bake". His baking endeavors might not always look their bakery best (please don't ever ask him to frost a cake and sometimes his pies are downright scary-looking) but more often than not the results taste fabulous. This plum upside-down cake is actually quite pretty and is based on a recipe he found in an old issue of Fine Cooking magazine. The taste idea is that of slices of tart plum balanced by a sweet cake base. He used red Santa Rosa plums that are just now coming ripe. My mother thought the cake was just a bit too tart for her, but dad and I love it just the way it is.

Now that I think about it, the t-shirt should simply say "Real Men Bake". Because if you could just see my 6'2", 200 lb, works out 3 times a week at the gym, mows the lawn, splits the wood, 78-year-old father in his striped apron, gently arranging plum slices on top of melted butter and sugar in ramekins, that would be the T that fit the best.

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