The NEXT BIG THING. Everyone wants to know what it is, before it is.  Who is bringing sexy back?  What’s the new black? Which restaurant is about to be so popular, it’ll be impossible to get a table?  And of course, what’s the newest food trend?  We all want to know.

Just so, I got asked to blog about what THE NEXT BIG THING is in my little world, as part of a blog “tag,” wherein other esteemed food writers talk about what they’re working on, their next big thing, as it were.  I got invited into this  exchange by my pal Sandra Gutierrez, author of The New Southern-Latino Table, and for this I am very flattered.

So here it is, my Q&A with myself about THE NEXT BIG THING: my newest cookbook, Crackers and Dips (available for preorder on Amazon now!)

Who is publishing your book, and when will it be available to the adoring public?

I was lucky to hook up with Chronicle Books in San Francisco, who did a beautiful job producing my book about homemade crackers and dips. It looks like those cute books you can’t resist in Anthropologie.   It’s officially released on May 7th, but you’ll be able to meet me and buy the book before then (see the Appearances page), or you can buy preorder it now, just click on the cover of the book in the upper right hand corner of this screen.

What inspired you to write this book?

I’m a snack tooth; I don’t like sweets and desserts much, but put me in front of a bowl of salty snacks, and oh boy! I’ve been making crackers since I worked in restaurants in college, and then continued to make crackers for catering gigs, in classes, and for home use.  They never fail to impress people. The funny thing is, they are so easy–it’s just flour, salt, oil/butter, and water. But bust out a bowl full of Sicilian cracker sheets at a cocktail party, a cup of goldfish crackers for a hungry toddler (or mom), or make a batch of amaranth, cheddar, and pumpkin seed squares for a gluten-free friend and they go on and on about how you’re a genius. I like being told I’m a genius, so I’ve gotten rather good at making crackers. And the dips? Well, they’re just the frosting on the cake, as it were.

How long did it take you to research and write this book?

It took about 4 months to actually write the book, but I’ve been thinking about this topic for years, and I’ve been making crackers for over 21 years (careful darling, your age is showing). I’m so glad that Bill Le Blond, my editor at Chronicle Books, saw the potential in me and this idea. I believe my book proposal began with “Cracker is the new cupcake!” and he apparently agreed with me.

What is your favorite aspect of writing a cookbook?

I love the daily grind of it. I developed a spreadsheet with all the recipes named with a time line, and I just loved getting up everyday and writing the recipes and testing them over and over until they came out perfectly. Crackers and dips are such a passion, that it didn’t often feel like work (except for the damn beet chips).  Then I got to share my work with friends and get feedback, everyone I know got crackers and dips, I even had parties just to serve them…because when you’re working on recipes you’re surrounded by food and you need a way to shove it off on someone!  I even brought 5 kinds of crackers and 5 dips to an outdoor concert we were attending and passed them around to all the picnickers sitting near us and asked things like, “Do you like these crackers? What would make you love them?”

What is the hardest aspect of writing a cookbook?

The endless dishes. Especially baking sheets. I must have washed a million baking sheets while working on this book.

What interesting things would we find in your refrigerator right now if we were to open it?

Let’s just say there has been an official household moratorium on the purchase of any more condiments. I have 6 kinds of soy sauce, 3 kinds of miso, half a dozen mustards, 3 fish sauces, 2 anchovy pastes, 2 shrimp pastes, and about a million other little jars. And let’s not even talk about the cheese drawer. I buy cheese like some people buy shoes. I am the Imelda Marcos of artisan-made cheese.

What is your favorite sound in the kitchen?

I have a Logitech streaming radio, so I can listen to any station from just about anywhere in the world. If I’m doing a curry, I tune into a Mumbai pop station. If I’m cooking sopes or tacos, it’s David Byrne’s station with hot Latin music. If I’m making pasta, Radio Monte Carlo does the trick.

What three ingredients can’t you live without?

Flour, salt, oil (see above description of cracker ingredients).

So, do you have an agent? 

I do! I am in the capable hands of Betsy Amster. I can’t get her to like sake (I have tried), but she’s great fun to go out to dinner with (v. important), brilliant, and a great advocate and agent.

Which actors would you chose to play you in the film rendition of this book?

I was just told by a man in the grocery store that I reminded him of Parker Posey. So there ya go. But…can she bake?

HEH!  Are you a food writer interested in a review copy or in more information about my upcoming book? Send me an email (click the Contact link at the top of the page) and I’ll do my level best to get you a copy.

Being from a small town in the Midwest named Sheboygan has its pluses and minuses. As a gothy punkette in my teens, I would have told you it was all minuses. I would have snarled when I said it, too. Sheboygan is an industrial town on Lake Michigan halfway between the cosmopolitan metropolises of Green Bay and Milwaukee. It was once know for the “4 C’s”–churches, chairs, children, and cheese.  So not cool.

I moved away 22 years ago to somewhere cooler,  but as the years go by, I miss certain things about that earnest little Midwest town, especially the food. Sheboygan was founded and peopled by German immigrants and they brought their recipes along with them. Thus, German food like bratwurst, kruellers, and homemade kraut are in my blood, though my family isn’t German.

I’ll talk about the proper protocol for doing up a brat fry another day, but in this post I want to share with you the bacon-laced, tangy-sweet, lovely dish known as “German potato salad.” It’s a simple peasant-ish dish of boiled sliced potatoes dressed  with a warm vinegar and liquid bacon fat dressing with mustard and caraway seeds. It’s the sort of food one might load up on before going out to milk several hundred head of Guernsey cows. It’s also what one must have if one is eating bratwurst. And as far as attending a tailgate party to watch football (especially the Green Bay Packers)? Well, I’ve never been to a tailgate that didn’t have a big bowl of German potato salad plunked down in the center of the table. Ever.

The key to success here is to slice waxy (Yukon or red salad) potatoes evenly, so they will cook evenly. I use a plastic mandolin slicer set to about 1/4-inch and use the plastic guard it came with; bits of finger won’t help this recipe. I boil the spud slices in salty water until they are just-tender when pierced, you want them to hold their shape in the salad. Let’s say 4 minutes.

 I add bacon and a dressing made from bacon fat, vinegar, and good grainy mustard. You really have to spend a little more than perhaps you’re used to on the bacon or this salad will come out like cafeteria fare. I use apple wood smoked bacon from Nueske’s, a family owned pork outfit from Wittenberg, Wisconsin. As for the mustard, I like Edmond Fallot‘s (the Burgundian family has been making it since 1840), but any good grainy will do.

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At first when you toss it all together, it will look too wet. Wait about an hour, toss once in awhile, and you’ll find that the spuds will begin to drink up the dressing, and therein the magic lies.  Don’t chill the dish. Refrigerating potatoes changes their texture and makes them starchy, and the bacon fat in the dressing will solidify…it’s not quite the mouth feel you’d welcome. If you must refrigerate the salad, warm it up a little before serving it.

Follow this recipe and tips, and you’ll have a bowl of bold-but-honest flavors. A “kill-hunger” dish that’s humble but generous. Just like my hometown itself.

German Potato Salad

Serves 6

8 ounces apple wood-smoked bacon, such as Nueske’s

6 tablespoons white wine vinegar

1/2 cup warm chicken stock

2 1/2 tablespoons grainy mustard

2 tablespoons packed light brown sugar

2 teaspoons caraway seeds, or 1 1/2 teaspoons ground caraway

3 pounds small waxy potatoes (Yukon or red new potatoes)

1 tablespoon sea salt, plus more for seasoning

1/2 cup finely chopped sweet onion (Walla Walla, Vidalia)

1/3 cup finely minced chives or green onion

Freshly ground black pepper

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Place the bacon on a rimmed baking sheet, bake until it is crisp and browned, 15 to 20 minutes. Reserve 2 tablespoons of the drippings. Place bacon on paper towels, set aside. Place the reserved drippings, vinegar, brown sugar, mustard, caraway seeds, and stock in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil, reduce heat, and keep warm over low heat.

Place 4 quarts of cold water in a large pot. Peel the potatoes and slice them thinly and evenly into 1/4-inch thick slices. Add the potatoes to the water, bring to a boil, add 1 tablespoon of salt and cook until tender when pierced with a fork, 3 to 4 minutes. Drain and place in a large serving bowl. Toss with the dressing, sweet onion and let the mixture stand for at least 1 hour. Crumble the bacon and add it to the salad right before serving, and then season to taste with salt and pepper.

Ahoy Foodies!


Sorry I’ve been MIA, Mr. Tofu and I have been traipsing about Norway and Denmark, eating fish and taking pictures for the last few weeks. Several posts are to follow on that.  In the meantime, I needed good ol’ comfort food. The kind of comfort that only a casserole could provide.

So I picked up author Faith Durand‘s new book, Not Your Mother’s Casseroles for inspiration, and yowza, did I ever find it! I’ve marked 30 pages of recipes to try right away–from Lemon Brioche French Toast to Asian Cabbage Rolls. True to its name, this book has nothing to do with the tater tot-topped casseroles we grew up with.

The first recipe to really catch my eye and send me marching to the kitchen was Faith’s recipe for oven-baked Mushroom and Rosemary Risotto. Faith starts the recipe with dried porcini and shiitake mushrooms, so you know it’s going to be full of savory umami-ness. 

When it comes to dried shiitake mushrooms, I don’t mess around. I buy my shiitakes from Serenity Art, a wonderful tea shop in the Fubon shopping center where Mr. Tofu buys his ultra premium green tea.
In a huge glass apothecary jar right next to the gnarled roots of ginseng and shaved chips of cloud ear fungus, you will find dried shiitake mushrooms that have dark, meaty caps with deep white fissures in the top. The nice lady lifts the heavy glass lid, you get one whiff and you’re in mushroom heaven! The tiny dried mushrooms sold in tiny cellophane packs in grocery stores simply cannot hold a candle to these babies.

The combo of really good dried mushrooms, fresh rosemary, and a few spoonfuls of mascarpone cheese make this one of the best and easiest ways to make risotto I’ve ever attempted. We had it with slow baked salmon since we still haven’t had our fill of fish, even after the fish 3-meals a day diet we were on in Scandinavia. More about that soon. Until then, enjoy Faith’s hard work, and read more of her stuff at The Kitchn.com.

Baked Mushroom and Rosemary Risotto
from Not Your Mother’s Casseroles, by Faith Durand

1/2 ounce dried porcini mushrooms
1/2 ounce dried shiitake mushrooms (about 5 caps)
2 cups boiling water
2 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 small yellow onion, finely chopped
4 cloves garlic, minced
One 4-inch sprig fresh rosemary
1 cup Arborio or other short grain white rice
1/2 cup dry white wine, such as Sauvignon Blanc
2 cups low sodium chicken or vegetable broth
1/2 teaspoon salt, or to taste
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, or to taste
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
4 ounces mascarpone cheese
Parmesan cheese curls, for garnish

1. Preheat oven to 300 F. Rinse the dried mushrooms lightly. Place the mushrooms in a ceramic bowl and pour the boiling water over them.

2. Heat the butter in a Dutch oven over medium heat. Add the onion and cook, stirring occasionally, for about 8 minutes, or until soft and golden.

3. Drain the mushrooms, reserving the liquid. Chop the mushroom caps, discarding shiitake stems. Add the mushrooms, garlic and rosemary sprig to the pan and saute on low heat for about 10 minutes, or until the mushrooms have sweated out some moisture and the garlic is fragrant and golden.

4. Add the rice and cook, stirring once or twice, for about 4 minutes, or until the rice begins to turn transparent around the edges.

5. Turn the heat to high and add the white wine, broth, and reserved mushroom steeping liquid. Bring to a boil, cover the pan and put it in the oven to bake for 20 minutes.

6. Remove and stir in the salt, pepper, nutmeg, and mascarpone cheese. Return the casserole to the oven for 15 minutes. Remove from oven and stir vigorously. Serve garnished with Parmesan curls.

Ahoy Foodies!

When my husband Mr. Tofu talks about our early courtship, he likes to tell the story about the day he took one of my homemade pies to work.  He put it on the break room table and co-workers flocked. One particularly astute pie-loving colleague took a bite, smiled at Mr. Tofu and said, “This is pretty much the best dating experience for you ever, isn’t it?”

Which is funny, because I’m not even good at pies.   I fall down when it comes to the crimping part, every time. My crust is flaky, my fillings divine, and I dare say I’m a struesel specialist. But when it comes to the edges, my pies are not perfect, they’re shaggy as hell.  I end up apologizing for my crimping and every time Mr. Tofu looks deeply into my eyes and says, “Hon, it’s fine. It’s perfect. It’s the best pie I’ve ever had.” Sigh. He always does that,  assures me when I’m freaking out because it’s not perfect. 

But come to think of it,  that’s a good part of why I married the guy. Who doesn’t need that assurance now and then? Especially when it comes to pie dough. That’s why Shauna James Ahern has decided to put all of the blogosphere’s pie dough fears to rest with this pie e-event. Well, I can’t really coach you on perfect crimping technique (see the photos), but what I can do is give you a really kick-ass huckleberry pie recipe and some pie dough tips.

In this recipe, I use pie filling from Packard Orchards and Bakery, a nice stop on the stunning Hood River Fruit Loop here in Oregon. They are also at farmer’s markets around Portland, and if you call them in advance, I’m sure they’d be happy to bring some huckleberry filling with them to the next farmer’s market.

Huckleberries are wild, tiny, and they’re only around for a fleeting week or so in summer. They also cost a mint when they are around.  Add all this up, and I don’t feel too bad using a pre-made huckleberry pie filling. Packard’s pie filling is a really good choice–full of the sweet, grapey, blueberry flavor that only my favorite berry can deliver.

And as for the crimping? Well, Mr. Tofu swears the crust is just fine. That’s good enough for me.

Makes 1 8 to 9-inch pie

Ahoy Foodies!

My very favorite quote by a famous person is from Dolly Parton, who once was asked is she had a sweet tooth. She batted her long, plastic eyelashes and said, “Oh honey, I’d much rather eat one potato than a whole pie!”

I remember thinking, “I like Dolly. She’s my kind of gal.” 

Just like Miss Parton, if I’m given the choice between one salty pretzel or a whole pan of brownies, I’ll pick the pretzel every time. I love salty snacks that much. So it would follow that I’d be a huge fan of potato chips, right? Nope.  To these tastebuds, deep fried potato chips are greasy, too salty, and actually too crisp, especially the thick cut “kettle cooked” chips.  Bleck, why eat a snack that requires a shower afterward?

 I do love potatoes, however, and I adore anything “sour cream and onion” flavored. So I figured out how to make homemade baked potato chips that were thin, crispy, and not at all greasy.  The recipe is something like a tuile, in that they’re baked rounds of thin batter made up of egg whites, starch, oil, and seasonings. 

Instead of flour and sugar though, these tuiles are made with instant mashed potatoes. I know, I know, instant mashers can hardly be considered food, especially when prepared as directed.  BUT,  make a thin batter with them and add a little onion-chive-garlic seasoning blend and you’ve got a stack of incredibly thin, airy, potato crisps that are very hard to stop eating. Plus, they’re a lot healthier than the chips in a bag.  I think Dolly would approve, don’t you?

Makes 2 dozen three-inch rounds


4 egg whites
1 1/2 cups warm water
3 tablespoons olive oil
1 cup dry instant mashed potatoes
3 teaspoons onion-garlic seasoning blend, such as Spice House Lakeshore Drive Seasoning 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line 2 rimmed baking sheets with Silpat mats or stiff (bleached) parchment paper. 


In a medium mixing bowl, whisk the egg whites until frothy. Add the water, olive oil, potatoes, and seasoning blend. Stir until smooth with a rubber spatula and set aside for 5 minutes.


Drop even tablespoons of the batter onto the prepared baking sheets (6 crisps per sheet) and use an offset spatula to spread the batter out evenly into 3-inch rounds. This takes a bit of practice, but after the first few, they get easier to smooth out fully. 

Bake the crisps for 20 to 25 minutes, rotating the pans once during cooking, until the crisps are golden brown. Transfer the crisps to a cooling rack. (You may need to return a few of the crisps to the oven to further dry them out while the others cool.)  Keep in an airtight container for up to 3 days.

Ahoy Foodies!

I was wandering through the produce aisle yesterday and blammo! I got one whiff of the sweet, floral, fruity poem of white peaches and I totally forgot what I was doing. My nose drove my cart over to the delicate little pyramidal configuration of white peaches. I picked one up, closed my eyes, and put my nose to the peach’s belly button. The aroma.  It’s like standing under a lilac tree while chewing on a Jolly Rancher. Fruit, floral, fuzz. It’s all there. I probably murmured to myself as I sniffed. I probably made a scene. I don’t recall. I did come home with a dozen peaches, this I know.

When delicate California white peaches first come into season, I dare to eat them one after the other. Preferably with my hair parted behind,  while walking upon the beach in white flannel trousers. You know, while listening to mermaids singing, each to each. ‘Cuz that’s how English majors do.

But after eating my 6th peach out of hand, I began to think that perhaps I should do something different with peach number 7.  It’s never wise to mess with perfection, and raw peaches are indeed the highest form a fruit can take, but I’d been working on a story about cooking in parchment paper (en papillote), so I’ve had high temp roasting in paper on the brain. Tender fish is good baked in parchment. Tender meat and vegetables are good baked in parchment. Why wouldn’t tender white peaches and raspberries work in parchment? 

They do. Very well. Toss some sliced white peaches and raspberries with sugar, real vanilla bean, a bit of Grand Marnier. Place the fruit on a square of buttered parchment. Gather up the ends to make a wee beggar’s purse and tie it with a string.  Bake it until the fruit ant the kitchen smell really, really good. About 10 minutes. 

Then the really fun part comes. Put the wee purse in a bowl, open it up at the table, spoon in hand. There will be a rush of juicy, fruity steam rising from the packet as you open it that can only be described as scrumtrulescent.  Plop a scoop of ice cream in the center of it all. Perfect summer fruit. 

PS. I’ll be migrating over to WordPress soon to bring you a more delicious blog. Hopefully you’ll be automatically redirected if you come to this site, but stay tuned for the big move. Thanks for reading. 

Makes 4 individual purses, serves 4

Recipe by Ivy Manning, photos by Gregor Torrence, copyright 2011.

Ahoy Foodies!

If you’ve picked up a food magazine or newspaper food section in the last year, you’ve been informed that foraging is hot hot hot. Chefs like René Redzepi of NOMA, Matt Lightner of Castagna, Dominique Crenn of Atelier Crenn are all scouring the forest floor looking for wild edibles, or they’re hiring foragers to do it for them. 

In an effort to keep up with all the wildness, I’ve been reading The Forgotten Skills of the Kitchen by Darina Allen. Allen is the Irish owner/instructor of the famed Ballymaloe Cooking School in County Cork, Ireland and knows a thing or two about wild eats, foraging has been an Irish tradition spanning back generations. Her amazing book includes a whole chapter on wild foods, and the lady picks her own limpets, for Pete’s sake!

I was particularly taken with a recipe in the book called Forager’s Soup. In the recipe, Allen suggests you should use dandelions, watercress, wild sorrel, nettles, etc. to make a pureed soup thickened with potatoes and cream, finished with sizzled Spanish chorizo.  I riffed on the idea here,  using stinging nettles I found at the farmer’s market instead of a wide selection of greens.

I added ramps to the soup, because they are stunningly beautiful and their tender greens and purplish/white stalks add a snappy garlic flavor to everything they associate with (including your refrigerator contents…wrap them up tightly in a ziplock bag when storing!)

A quick saute of everything in butter, some mild vegetable stock, and a 20 minute simmer and the soup was done!  To make the soup silky and smooth, I used a stick blender to blend the soup.  And as always, I tasted the soup a few times to correct the seasoning. It was wonderful…green, garlicky, soothing.  I set the table, sliced some homemade rye bread, and then offhandedly mentioned to my husband Mr. Tofu that I suddenly had a scratchy throat that was really bugging me.  

He responded, “Yeah, that happened when I took stinging nettle tablets to try and correct my allergies. Are you allergic to nettles? I am.”

Sigh. I took one longing look at the delicious pot of beautiful green soup and decided it probably wasn’t worth eating a bowl of it if it meant running the risk of  having my throat close up.  IF you’re NOT allergic to nettles, I really recommend this recipe. It’s delicious. 

Serves 6


8 ounces stinging nettles
2 tablespoons butter
2 young leeks, white and green parts only, thinly sliced
1 bunch ramps
1 (12-ounce) russet potato, peeled and thinly sliced
4 cups mild vegetable or chicken stock
2 cups warm water
Salt and pepper
2 ounces Spanish chorizo, diced


Bring a large pot of water to a boil. Wear gloves and use tongs to transfer the nettles to the pot. Cook, stirring frequently, until the the nettles are wilted and tender, 4 minutes. Drain. Use sharp little scissors to clip off the nettles largest stems, discard. 


Rinse the ramps well, trim off root end and discard. Thinly slice the bulb end. Roughly chop the green part of the ramps and set aside with the nettles. 


In a large soup pot, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the leeks and white part of the ramps and saute until they are translucent, 5 minutes. Add the nettles, green ramp leaves, potato, stock, and water. Bring to a simmer, cover and cook until the potato is fall-apart tender, 15-20 minutes. Do not overcook or the greens will go drab. Puree the soup, season with salt and pepper.


In a small saute pan, cook the chorizo over medium heat until it has rendered all it’s fat and is slightly crispy. Drizzle the chorizo and fat over bowls of the soup. Recipe by Ivy Manning, Photos by Gregor Torrence (Mr. Tofu), 2011, all rights reserved.

Ahoy Foodies!

Finally, spring is here. You can’t tell by the weather around these parts, but I know it by the little rhubarb plant in my back yard. We accidentally built our raised bed garden over it, but it keeps coming back around one edge of the planter box, year after year. A faithful and loyal plant that announces that spring has, if not sprung, at least decided to be near.

Since the little plant is challenged, what with tons of soil and wood pushing down on part of it, I always feel just a little guilty cutting the stalks for pie. This year, to honor the little-plant-that-could, I made something really special with it. Not just a plain ol’ rhubarb pie, but a tart, a really special tart.

I treated the stalks to a long, slow stew with a whole vanilla bean, and not too much sugar. I tucked it into a butter-egg yolk tart crust.  I sprinkled the tart with a cinnamon-oat streusel, for a crispy counterpart to the creamy rhubarb. And then I topped it with a scoop of homemade sour cream brown sugar ice cream, a crown befitting royalty.  

So now that is done, Spring has officially sprung.   Now, I’m going outside to tell my little pea shoots that it’s time for them to get going. Maybe if I blow on them, they’ll grow a little faster…

Makes 1 9-inch tart


For the Tart Crust:
1 1/2 cups flour
1/4 cup sugar
1 pinch salt
1/2 cup cold unsalted butter, diced
2 egg yolks
For the Streusel:
4 1/2 tablespoons cold unsalted butter, diced
1/4 cup sugar
1/3 cup flour
3 tablespoons old fashioned oats 
For the Filling:
1  pound rhubarb, thinly sliced (about 4 1/2 cups)
2/3 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 vanilla bean
For the Ice Cream:
2 cups half-and-half
1 1/4 cups brown sugar
8 egg yolks
2 cups sour cream


In a food processor, pulse the flour, sugar, salt, and butter until butter is in little pieces no larger than a pea. Whisk yolks in a measuring cup and add enough water to make 1/4 cup of liquid. Add to flour mixture and pulse until dough just comes together. Wrap in plastic and chill for 1 hour. Roll out on a lightly floured surface into a 12-inch round. Ease the dough into a tart pan and trim ends. Refrigerate until ready to use.


Preheat the oven to 375 F. Make the streusel by pulsing ingredients in a food processor until crumbly. Refrigerate until ready to use. To make the filling, combine the rhubarb, sugar, and cinnamon in a medium saucepan. Split the vanilla bean lengthwise and use a butter knife to scrape out the seeds. Add the seeds and pod to the pan. Bring to a simmer over low heat and cook, stirring frequently, until the rhubarb is tender, almost falling apart. Place in a wide bowl and refrigerate until filling is room temperature.


Place the tart shell on a baking sheet lined with foil. Fill with the rhubarb, discarding vanilla pod. Sprinkle with the struesel mixture and bake until bubbly and golden brown, 45 minutes. When cool enough to handle, remove tart ring and serve with ice cream.


For the ice cream, scald the half and half over medium heat. In a large bowl, whisk the brown sugar and egg yolks together. Slowly whisk in half the half-and-half. Return mixture to saucepan and cook over medium-low heat, stirring constantly, until the mixture coats the spoon, 5 minutes. Do not simmer. Strain mixture through a fine sieve, whisk in the sour cream and chill until cold.  Freeze in an ice cream maker according to machine instructions. 
-Adapted from The Farm to Table Cookbook, by Ivy Manning (Sasquatch, 2008)

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Ahoy Foodies!
 Happy St. Patrick’s Day (and week) to you all. As I’ve mentioned here before, this time of year has always been a big deal for me and my family. Being of Irish decent on my father’s side, there is a certain unspoken pressure to be just a little MORE Irish during the week of St. Patrick’s Day. Extra pints of stout and so forth, you know, to reconnect with my roots.  

Of course I’ll be making my famous-in-Sheboygan Guinness Irish Stew on Thursday. If you don’t have the gumption to make it yourself from my recipe, you can always go to Manning’s Irish Pub in Sheboygan, Wisconsin and get yourself a bowl, if you’re in the neighborhood. 

But there are other ways to enjoy Guinness, and some are less obvious than lifting a pint glass. Rich, malty Guinness Irish Stout, it turns out, is really excellent in desserts, especially spiced cake recipes. Take this easy gingerbread-inspired cupcake recipe I came up with. I name it for Paul Simon’s character, Mrs. Robinson, because he admonishes her to  “keep it in your pantry with your cupcakes…” He’s likely talking about pills in the song, but I’m sure Mrs. R had some hooch in the pantry, too.  These boozy little cakes would be right up her alley– not only do they have Guinness Irish Stout in them, there’s also a wee bit of Bailey’s Irish Cream in the cream cheese frosting too, for good measure.

 Hope you enjoy them and have a happy St. Patrick’s Day!  Oh, and word to the wise: 
“Steer clear of the green beer or you’ll feel queer.” I recommend that you stick to the thick, creamy black stuff. Much better for your constitution.