foodperson.com

More hot-weather cooking (or mostly noncooking) for me this weekend. It included a no-cook pasta sauce, homemade sorbet, and a cookie recipe scaled back to six cookies to bake in my toaster oven. It all was quite delicious, if I do say so. (Alas, no photo but I am getting a digital camera! Yea!)

Tomatoes, basil, brie

I had guests last night and brought out the trusty and slightly decadent Linguine with Tomatoes & Basil recipe to serve. Only cooking involved is the pasta. (Great minds obviously are in accord here; as you can see, the recipe link goes to another blogger who also cooks it this time of year. She saved me the trouble of typing this favorite from The Silver Palate Cookbook.) I used penne this time instead of linguine, which I think kept more of the sauce on the pasta, but you be the judge.

Blueberry sorbet the odd way

I intended to make blackberry sorbet, but, since I was in a fog when I went to the Farmers Market early, I forgot to buy any, and when I returned, they were all gone. I settled for Michigan blueberries instead and made up (although I’m sure it’s been done before by someone) an unusual prep method that worked just fine.

Blueberry sorbet

• 1 cup sugar
• 1 cup water
• 1 pint fresh blueberries (or other berries, I assume)
• 1/3 cup fresh lemon juice
• Grated rind of one lemon

1. Combine sugar and water in small heavy saucepan. Bring to boil and stir until sugar is dissolved to make a simple syrup. Cool. (I set the pan in fridge about 30 minutes.)
2. Puree the berries in a food processor or blender with a little bit of the syrup. Add the remaining syrup, juice and lemon rind and blend well.
3. Transfer mixture to a zipper lock freezer bag, removing most of the air, and toss in freezer for 1-2 hours. Remove, squish contents around with your finger until of uniform consistency, then return to freezer another hour or two. Again, squish contents till uniform consistency. (Total time for mine was about 4 hours.)
4. When contents are of a uniform, soft-serve consistency, scrape into bowl, seal tightly and freeze. About 30 minutes before serving time, move bowl to refrigerator to allow sorbet to soften slightly, then serve. Makes 6 servings.

Toaster oven cookies

As dinner approached, I couldn’t see not having a cookie with the sorbet, but I didn’t have much time and didn’t want to turn on the oven. I picked a recipe that required no eggs (they’re hard to divide into fourths), stirred them up in a little bowl and, voila!, six tasty and delicious ANZAC cookies (Here’s one version of the story of ANZAC cookies.) I didn’t use Golden Syrup so I don’t know if an Aussie would claim them, but they were quite tasty.

ANZAC for the toaster oven

• 1/4 cup flour
• 1/4 cup old-fashioned oats
• 1/4 cup sugar
• Scant 1/4 cup unsweetened coconut flakes
• Scant 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 1/2 tablespoons butter
• Scant 1/2 teaspoon dark corn syrup
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 1/2 teaspoons very hot water

1. In small bowl, blend flour, oats, sugar, coconut and salt.
2. In another small bowl, melt butter with corn syrup in microwave. Blend well.
3. In a cup, or tiny bowl, mix soda in water to dissolve, then stir into butter mixture.
4. Stir butter mixture into flour mixture and blend well. Dough will be crumbly.
5. Using a pair of teaspoons for handling the dough, form into six little mounds and place about 1 1/2 inches apart on greased toaster oven baking sheet.
6. Bake 10 minutes at 300 degrees. Turn sheet (for even cooking) and bake about 8 minutes more, until golden brown. Cool 5 minutes on sheet, then transfer to racks to finish cooling. Makes 6 cookies.