For my father's family, Christmas Eve, Heiliger Abend, is the heart of Christmas. It is a magical dark and cold night, where old hymns are sung by memory in German, acapella, by candlelight. My sister and I would look forward to the special appearance of traditional Christmas sweet and savory foods made by my Oma for Christmas Eve snacking. For Heiliger Abend this year, our young family of three is once again together. We will start new traditions as a family, and borrow from the past. Tonight we will be making my Oma's roast meat filled pastries, fleisch pieroshki with pickles. As a nod to our ravenous little eater's current favorite breakfast, will crank up the oven Christmas morning to make a batch of these airy buttermilk popovers with homemade strawberry jam, before an afternoon Christmas feast with our family. We will be thinking of our family and friends far away this Christmas as we celebrate, Merry Christmas! This recipe is inspired by Jenny Rosenstrach and adapted from King Arthur Flour.

November means fall back home; the smell of mulled cider, pumpkin picking, and trick-or-treating. Feeling nostalgic for the tastes and colors of fall, while sweating in the 90s here in Haiti, we created a Caribbean-fall dessert, Easy Guava Jam Bars. These easy to make, and addictive bars combine the warm spices of cinnamon and allspice with the tropical sweetness of fresh guava jam. It is a stunning match of tart bright guava enveloped in a warmly spiced buttery crumble.

Here in Haiti, we are entering hurricane season, which often brings fronts of cool air and cloudy weather (just enough to trigger memories of cozy fall days further north). Back home, in Pittsburgh, the first tastes of fall are just around the corner. The summer's bounty of fresh veggies is still going strong, but the hint of cooler weather here has gotten us thinking about warm and satisfying comfort foods. This Simple Fresh Tomato Sauce is perfect for this in-between season: a fool-proof sauce packed with the bright fresh flavors of summer tomatoes, but warm, buttery, and comforting at the same time. This is hands down my favorite tomato sauce. Whether you're looking for a quick and easy, kid-friendly tomato sauce for pasta, or a rich and simple sauce that lets your summer tomatoes shine, this is the sauce for you.

We are both great lovers of butter in all its forms. Since butter is a luxury product in Haiti running around $12 a pound, we feel like it deserves special treatment and the addition of roasted garlic and the warm, sweetly spiced, and earthy flavors Yucatán Spice Rub, Xac, takes things to a whole different level. In this flavorful butter, a base of roasted garlic is mixed with the pungent flavors of Mexican cinnamon, oregano, allspice, pepper, cloves, bay and cumin. Slather this on garlic bread, meat, fish, roasted vegetables...we haven't found a medium yet that doesn't benefit from this punchy butter.

In the countdown before our departure, we have been cooking and eating our favorite things... with maple syrup topping the list! We are both mad for maple; we like it in baklava, with smoked salmon, in granola, mixed into french toast, even baby back ribs, and we stockpile it compulsively. Last month we set out to make a fall/winter dessert that would showcase this extraordinary elixir at it's finest, and a dark almost bittersweet Blackstrap Molasses and Fresh Ginger Cake with Salted Maple Buttercream was the delicious result. This dessert was a team effort, while I whipped up a spicy molasses cake, Paul boiled down dark amber maple syrup, whipped eggs yolks and butter to a creamy consistency for a transcendent, incredible salted maple buttercream. Paul made Salted Maple Buttercream no less than 4 times in the past month, and while we try to avoid superlatives, I'm pretty sure this is the best flavor of buttercream I have ever tasted. Paul's comment, as he made batch after batch; "remember this one, I want a big bowl of salted maple buttercream for my last meal." 

The first time I met Rebecca's grandmother (Oma, as we called her), she made me chicken schnitzel. This was not your cafeteria or greasy diner schnitzel. Oma's ability to transform the humble chicken breast in her old cast iron pot, into something both simple and sublime, was incredible. Her schnitzel had a buttery flavor without being greasy, a perfectly fried crisp exterior with a moist, juicy, flavorful interior. Nearly every time we visited, regardless of the time of day, even breakfast, Oma would have a fresh plate ready for me. With Oktoberfest celebrations upon us, we thought it was time to share her Butter Chicken Schnitzel. If you're worried about frying in butter, remember that when properly fried, only a small fraction is absorbed during cooking.

Everyone needs a go-to chocolate chip cookie recipe. This is mine. This Oat Chocolate Chip Cookie combines the luscious butteriness of the classic grandma-style cookie with the chewy texture and nutty flavor of oats and the rich warmth of extra vanilla. While Rebecca (and the health department) may not approve, I'll also share that this dough is almost as good raw, as it is baked!  Our recipe is relatively light on chocolate chips, but feel free to amp up the chocolate if you prefer. Treat yourself!

These Blue Corn Blueberry Griddle Cakes with Lime Butter are a fresh and flavorful take on a breakfast classic and a healthy way to use the ripe blueberries bursting from farm stands and fields. These Griddle Cakes are bursting with blueberry flavor and the subtle earthy sweetness of blue corn. Using a high quality fresh blue cornmeal (we prefer Bob's Red Mill) and a light overnight sourdough technique brings out a gentle nutty sweet corn flavor and a surprisingly crunchy (not gritty) texture. A perfect accompaniment to Blue Corn Blueberry Griddle Cakes is a fresh whipped Lime Butter. The Lime Butter, which is also delicious in its own right, accents the fresh blueberry flavor to take these Blue Corn Blueberry Griddle Cakes to the next level. 

Buckwheat Buttermilk Pancakes are a healthy, delicious, and easy weekend breakfast with warm malty flavors not usually found in your run of the mill pancakes. The whole buckwheat flour gives these pancakes a rich brown flecked color and hearty nuttiness which pairs beautifully with tangy buttermilk and caramelly maple syrup and molasses. The result is a perfect pancake texture, dark earthy flavor,  and enough nutritional goodness to make you feel good about slathering your Buckwheat Buttermilk Pancakes with butter and maple syrup. This recipe is adapted from King Arthur Four's wonderful Whole Grain Baking.

Paul requests buttermilk biscuits for his birthday every single year.  In fact once he even specifically asked that I forgo making any other dish for his birthday meal as he was concerned that ‘other foods’ might detract from his enjoyment of these buttermilk biscuits.  

We do love our buttermilk biscuits and these are a scrumptious version;  the epitome of flaky dough, tangy flavor, delicate crumb and buttery mouth feel.  Behind the exquisite taste and texture of these buttermilk biscuits lies a genius recipe.  This buttermilk biscuit recipe is designed to be successfully turned out by baking pros and baking novices alike.   The ease of making the biscuit dough corresponds to its quick prep process with minimal ingredients, allowing for the biscuit dough to be started and finished before the oven even finishes preheating.   This deceptively quick and easy recipe relies on some very effective food science.  These biscuits get their impressive lift from the combined powers of baking powder and soda, and their consistent flakiness from the small granules of butter evenly distributed through the dough. Melted butter whisked into cold buttermilk creates the perfectly sized grains of butter, which when shocked with high heat create pockets of steam and flaky layers.  Crank up your ovens and don’t delay, these delicious biscuits are within your reach.

With 89 votes, the good readers of The Hungry Hounds clearly had a hankering for a Hoosier (or Indiana) style dessert. Having spent a combined 14 years in the Hoosier heartland, this mandate warmed our mid-western bellies!  One of Indiana's finest culinary traditions is Hoosier Milk Pie (alternatively known as Indiana Sugar or Cream Pie). Hoosier Milk Pie came to Indiana in the mid 1800's with Quaker and Amish homesteaders. It is a homey, dairy-rich custard-style pie with a stove-top filling. Hoosier Milk Pie is egg-less, which is great for those with allergies, makes it easy to cook (no curdling), and allows the clean milk flavor to take the limelight. A crisp flaky crust (whole wheat in this case) paired with the milk custard partners beautifully with fresh ripe berries.  To make this pie your own, substitute any fruit you'd like, eat it unadorned, or add whipped cream as is traditional in some parts of Indiana. Either way, you are going to love this easy and versatile pie. 

Sometimes you just need a mouthful of umami: that indescribable savory unctuousness, even meatiness, that defines many of our favorite foods.  This dish is quick to prepare (about 30 minutes if you've got a bread/dough on hand), and will leave you satisfied without feeling heavy. It was inspired by the the last delivery of our winter CSA from Penn's Corner, which included chives, local pecorino style cheese, and fresh crimini mushrooms. Mushrooms and aged cheese each pack an savory wallop, and when you bring this together with deep browning of the mushrooms and flat-bread crust, it makes for an unbeatable combination.  For those less inclined toward vegetarian cooking, this recipe will not let you down.