Four Nights A Week

Adventures in Eating

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Amy’s Writing, Photography and Art can be found at amybisson.com

09 October 2025: Mulled Wine Pâtes de Fruit

October 9, 2025
I opened a bottle of Pinot this week which was not unusual, but the bottle was truly not to my liking. Not wanting to waste it, I looked a ways to cook with it other than as a braising liquid.

Andrea Geary recently published some interesting recipes for Pâtes de Fruit in America’s Test Kitchen, and I am here to tell you that the bottle of Pinot was put to good use. In fact, I’m just a little hopeful I come across another similar bottle before the holidays so I can gift these fruit squares to friends.

One of the most challenging aspects of the recipe is sourcing Certo liquid pectin. Whenever I’ve made jelly or jam, I’ve used powdered versions; Certo definitely took some sleuthing, but I did locate it. My advice is that if you are considering making these confections, forward-thinking will be your friend.

We had encountered these candies on our travels to France, but this version has a definite New World flavor. Mulled wine makes the Pâtes subtly spicy and thanks to the addition of unsweetened apple sauce, very apple-y.

The recipe is available on America’s Test Kitchens subscription website, and I’ve included an ingredient list for convenience:

Mulled Wine Pâtes de Fruit

Ingredients:
- Certo liquid pectin
- red wine
- orange zest
- cinnamon stick
- whole cloves
- sugar
- unsweetened applesauce
- brandy
- lemon juice
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05 October 2025: The Most Pumpkin Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread

October 6, 2025
I’ve been testing out quick breads that will eventually find the way to our Garden Club’s bake sale, a fundraiser we hold around Thanksgiving. So when King Arthur Baking featured this pumpkin recipe, I gave it a try. And as usual, it did not disappoint.

The recipe yields 1 larger loaf (8-1/2 x 4-1/2), but because I wanted to try this out for a possible bake sale item, I used 3 small-sized disposable pans. That worked well, with a small tweak to the baking time. The consistency of the baked loaf holds together really well, so if you are baking for a bake sale, individual slices could also be portioned and wrapped up.

King Arthur Baking has a treasure trove of free recipes and this is one of them. The ingredients to have on hand are below, click on the link here for the instructions.

The Most Pumpkin Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bread

Ingredients
- 15 oz can of pumpkin purée
- granulated sugar
- cinnamon
- ginger
- turmeric (optional – adds color)
- all purpose flour (King Arthur’s is best)
- baking powder
- baking soda
- salt
- eggs
- vegetable oil
- chocolate chips
- sparkling sugar for topping the loaf before baking
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26 Sep 2025: Miso, Mushroom & Leek Pasta

September 25, 2025
We received some beautifully grown organic leeks in our Clark Farm CSA Share over the past couple of weeks, so when I noticed Yasmin Fahr published a pasta dish featuring leeks and mushrooms in this week’s NYTimes, I was intrigued. Sautéeing leeks and mushrooms then adding miso’s yumminess along with some sherry vinegar was absolutely inspired.

With my subscription to the New York Times, I am able to share this recipe. The ingredient list follows:

Miso Mushroom and Leek Pasta

Yasmin Fahr, cookbook author found in New York Times Cooking

Ingredients
- Olive oil
- Leeks
- Mushrooms (cremini, shiitake, oysters)
- Short pasta (like ziti or cavatappi)
- White miso
- Parmesan
- Sherry (or red wine) vinegar
- Fresh parsley
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24 Sep 2025: Stovetop Cherry Tomato Confit

September 24, 2025
Here’s another great way to make use of all of those tomatoes!

This confit, unlike others I’ve found recently, is completely cooked on the stovetop. Since my slow-cooker is also an Instant Pot, and therefore the nuance of slow cooker temperature choices is non-existent, this one made sense for me.

One of my sisters lives in San Miguel, Mexico and gifted me with a delightfully smoked olive oil. So I used about half regular EVOO and half of the smoked olive oil. To say it came out well is an understatement!

If interested, the artisans who make and bottle the oil are online at https://www.fincalunaserena.com.

This recipe was developed by Lisa Porter and is published on her blog, Parsley and Parm. The link is below and the ingredient list follows. Don’t be overly concerned about generating a lot of oil – that makes a great dipping oil for crusty bread, and is an elegant way to make a unique and tasty salad dressing.

The tomatoes were part of our Fall Share from Clark Farms in Carlisle – if you are local to Massachusetts, check them out.

Stovetop Cherry Tomato Confit

Ingredients
- cherry tomatoes
- extra virgin olive oil (see headnote)
- salt
- Options: peeled garlic clove, fresh thyme, fresh basil, fresh organo, or saffron (I used garlic)
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18 Sep 2025: Seared Scallops with Jammy Cherry Tomatoes

September 18, 2025
Believe it or not, we seem to live in a fresh seafood desert, even though we are about 30 miles from the Atlantic. While fresh seafood is pretty hard to come by, I have found that some fish, scallops and shrimp, are just fine in the frozen version.

We have been treated to a bumper crop of fresh tomatoes with our CSA share from Clark Farm in Carlisle. As New Englanders will tell you, the rock-hard versions supplied to grocers in the tomato off-season, can never compare to fresh, homegrown, farm tomatoes. And so, whenever we can get our hands on locally grown tomatoes, we go for it.

This recipe (gifted below through my subscription to the New York Times), was a fancy yet simple supper – and honestly, aren’t those the best? Developed by NYT Cooking contributer Lidey Hauck, cherry tomatoes form the basis of a jammy savory sauce which is best sopped up with a crusty bread. Add a glass of perfectly chilled crisp wine, and you’ve got yourself an elegant meal worthy of celebrating.

Seared Scallops With Jammy Cherry Tomatoes

Ingredients:
- unsalted butter
- shallots
- garlic
- dry white wine
- cherry tomatoes
- sea scallops
- lemon
- fresh basil or min
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17 Sep 2025: Slow Cooker Moroccan Lentil Soup with Mustard Greens

September 17, 2025
I had not been a big fan of bitter greens until this year. But… finding new ways to use greens of all sorts has been part of our cooking expeditions since we joined Clark Farm CSA. This week, we received mustard greens as part of our share, and tried them in a fall(ish) soup recipe from America’s Test Kitchen (subscription access only) and was developed by Meaghen Walsh.

Cooked in a slow cooker, once prepped, this is a hands-off meal until serving time. Then, by mixing up a yogurt topping (yogurt, parsley and lemon juice), the soup is transformed into something creamy and quite spectacular. I did the slow cooking on a weekend day along with other meal prep, making this an even easier meal to get to table on a busy weeknight.

Slow Cooker Moroccan Lentil Soup with Mustard Greens

Ingredients:
- onion
- garlic
- ground coriander
- garam masala
- cayenne
- broth (vegetable or chicken)
- French green lentils
- mustard greens
- pitted dates
- plain green yogurt
- fresh parsley
- lemon juice
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14 Sep 2025: Dijon Chicken with Tomatoes and Scallions

September 14, 2025
It seemed to take a long time to get here, but it is finally tomato season here in the Northeast. After eating hothouse tomatoes – or the gassed and golf ball like ones that get shipped here in the winter months – eating a fresh, juicy tomato is one of life’s great pleasures. So we use them and enjoy them while we can.

Sometimes it’s those simple pleasures that make a meal memorable, and such was the case with this tasty main dish. Add some crusty bread to sop up the sauce and a fresh green salad, and you’ve got yourself a meal worthy of a dinner party.

This one-pot dish from New York Times contributor Yasmin Fahr is quick and delicious. Those fresh cherry tomatoes from Clark Farm in Carlisle make the dish, as do the fresh herbs we picked at the farm this week.

I’ve gifted the recipe through my subscription to the New York Times below. The ingredient list follows.

Dijon Chicken With Tomatoes and Scallions

Ingredient List
- Olive oil
- boneless, skinless chicken thighs
- scallions
- garlic
- oregano
- Dijon mustard
- white wine
- cherry (or grape) tomatoes
- leafy herbs (cilantro, parsley, basil)
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09 Sep 2025: Pasta alla Norma

September 9, 2025
This past spring, Adrien and I were privileged to travel to the land of my ancestors – Sicily. Sicily is such a marvelously complex mix of cultures, but one of the most striking things about it is the food. Sicilians take the abundance of the land and sea and create some of the most wonderful things ever imagined.

Pasta alla Norma is just one of those dishes. Eggplant, tomatoes, ricotta and pasta all co-mingled into a dish that, if you were not before, will make you an eggplant-lover.

The origins of this recipe come from Fabrizia Lanza‘s The Food of Sicily, but the preparations have been adapted by cookbook author, reknowned pasty chef and ex-pat, David Lebovitz. David published his version of Fabrizia Lanza’s recipe, which differs only slightly in that the eggplant is baked, not deep-fried.

When our Clark Farm CSA included eggplant last week, I knew exactly what we were going to do! The recipe, as adapted by David Lebovitz, is linked below, the ingredient list follows, but to dive deeply into authentic Sicilian cooking, I highly recommend Fabrizia Lanza’s book.

Pasta all Norma as adapted by David Lebovitz
- Eggplant (will need about 2 lbs)
- Extra-virgin olive oil
- Dried chile flakes
- Tomato sauce (pre-made Marinara works well here – or make your own)
- Tomato paste
- Dried tubular pasta, such as rigatoni or ziti
- Ricotta salata cheese, grated, plus more for serving
- Fresh basil
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06 Sep 2025: Basil Viniagrette

September 6, 2025
This week, our Clark Farm CSA share included a ton of basil – basil tops, basic leaves, basil abounds at this time of year. With all the gorgeous basil in our share, I have lined up a bunch of ways to use the leaves and the tops. More on that coming soon.

Tonight, I used basil leaves two ways. One was to muddle with lemon to make a refreshing aperitivo mocktail. The second basil-based concoction was a basil viniagrette which followed a recipe from The Kitchn. Paired with some leftover burrata and the beautiful slicing tomatoes we also took home from Clark Farm this week, we had a lovely Mediterranean-based salad to go with our meal tonight.

The addition of dijon mustard in the viniagrette along with some honey gave this an unexpected boost to the basil The link to The Kitchn’s recipe is here, but I’ve included the ingredient list below.

Basil Viniagrette

Ingredients
- Fresh basil
- Garlic
- Red or White Wine vinegar
- Dijon mustard
- Honey
- Salt
- Extra Virgin Olive Oil
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01 Sep 2025: Dandelion Tart

September 1, 2025
This week our CSA share included a bunch of dandelion greens. Admonished to “try them”, we took the challenge, and in all honesty, enjoyed them!

The creative behind this recipe, Martha Rose Shulman, is an American cookbook author and one of the New York Times Cooking Columnists that I seek out. Her recipes are creative and reliably tasty. While the originally published recipe calls of a yeasted olive oil crust, “we” (meaning this family’s pie-crust expert, AKA Adrien) chose to use a savory pie crust we’ve perfected over time.

The recipe for Dandelion Tart, was first featured in a New York Times article published in 2009 – “Just Don’t Call Them Weeds”. After this adventure in cooking, I promise I won’t! The recipe is gifted through my subscription to the New York Times, and the ingredients to have on hand are listed below:

Dandelion Tart

Ingredients:
- Generous bunch dandelion greens
- Extra virgin olive oil
- Onion
- Mushrooms
- Garlic
- Large or extra large eggs
- Low-fat milk
- Gruyère cheese
- Yeasted olive oil crust (see headnote)
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