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Ingredients For the wraps: · 10-12 rice paper wrappers · 1 package rice or sweet potato noodles, cooked according to package · 1/2 head purple cabbage, finely shredded · 1 small sweet potato, spiralized into thin noodles · 5 large carrots, finely shredded · 1-2 avocados, sliced · 1 yellow beet, thinly sliced · 1 daikon radish, thinly sliced · 4-5 red or Easter radishes, thinly sliced For the sauce: · ½ cup peanut or almond butter · ¼ cup cilantro · 6 tablespoons lime juice · 5 tablespoons soy sauce, tamari or coconut aminos · 1 tablespoon ginger, grated · 1 tablespoon maple syrup · ½ teaspoon sesame oil · water (to thin, as needed) Method: 1. Prep veggies and set aside. 2. Make the sauce: Combine all ingredients into a blender and blend until combined. 3. To assemble your wraps: fill a large bowl with hot water. Insert one rice paper wrapper at a time for 20 seconds. This is all the time it needs to soften. Carefully, remove from water and place on your flat surface. Arrange vegetables in the center, top with noodles and fold in sides and roll your wrap like a burrito to finish. Make sure to roll tightly to ensure that rolls stay together. 4. Dip generously in sauce and enjoy.

Ingredients: 2 egg yolks 2 T. white wine 12 oz butter, melted and clarified Salt, Pepper Dash of Cayenne Dash of lemon juice For Bearnaise Variation: 1/4 C. champagne vinegar 1 T. tarragon, chopped, or chervil salt and pepper Method: 1. Over a double boiler, add the egg yolks and the white wine and whisk vigorously & continuously until the egg yolks have reached a double standing figure 8 stage. 2. At this point, remove the egg yolks from the double boiler, and place in a wet towel ring. Very, very, extremely slowly drizzle the clarified butter into the egg yolks while whisking constantly until every last drop of butter has been incorporated and has made an emulsion into the egg yolks. 3. Season with salt, pepper, cayenne and lemon juice and serve immediately. 4. For Bearnaise - in a small saucepan, combine the vinegar, tarragon and salt and pepper. Gently reduce to 1 Tablespoon. Let cool and fold into made Hollandaise.

“You cannot be nervous and make a sauce hollandaise. The eggs will feel it, and they will separate.”. - Madame Mallory (Helen Mirren), Hundred Foot Journey This is a weird year. I’m not sure what’s more taboo to talk about at this point… Politics or Diet. TV Evangelists on every channel have been replaced by Doctors that are trying to market their latest versions of snake oil treatments that are guised as diet fads and each one is more comical than the last. The Carnivore Diet – a diet that eliminates carbs by cutting out plant material? Am I having a stroke? What’s going on? 😊 What happened to everyone being all goo-goo and gaa-gaa about French food? Well, just like everything else in the world, there is an ebb and flow to culinary trending, and different cuisines come and go, sharing the spotlight with their food friends, so everyone dish from every culture gets its 15 minutes. I feel very fortunate that I came up in the culinary class of French Food. Being an early 20’s cook or sous chef in a French kitchen gives you a certain sense of pride - once you get past all of the yelling and screaming and stuff getting thrown at you for not going a good job, of course… But who cares right? At the time French food was gold, and I wanted to have the Midas touch… so it was worth the torment. The attention to detail I learned in those kitchens fully and completely transformed my mentality about food and about what it is to be a cook, but it wouldn’t be until later in my career that I would fully understand or embrace why I had to endure what I did to get to where I am now. And if it wasn’t for all of those blood, sweat and tears I put in early on in my career, I’d never be able to tell you this story – which is my favorite story of all of my kitchen stories. So I hope you enjoy it. As I mentioned above, I came up in mostly French kitchens. I am very passionate about French food, and have a very special place in my heart for French sauces, more specifically, Mother sauces, and more specifically yet, Sauce Hollandaise. There was a point in my career that I could make Sauce Hollandaise blindfolded. Heck, I even had the time of making it down to three minutes. AND AND – what do you do for someone that can achieve a feat like that? You give them a nickname… And mine was HollanDave. Hollandaise was my favorite sauce in the world and I was not afraid to tell you about it. So when I got my very first kitchen as Chef, and I was tasked with finding a Sous-Chef is where my story begins. I put an ad in the paper, got some resumes, made some calls, and in a few days I had a guy coming in for a working interview to make me an Entrée so I could test out his cooking style and abilities. So, I told the guy he had 15 minutes to go and look around and see what was available and 1 hour to cook me a completed Entrée plate (main item, starch, veg, sauce). The guy asks me if I like Hollandaise Sauce. I told him yes, and not to make it for me as I’ve had the best Hollandaise sauce I’m ever going to have (It was at a restaurant in Jolly Harbour, Antigua btw) and I make a pretty mean Hollandaise myself and to please find something else to make. But this guy was insistent… First red flag. So after and I’m not kidding, 10 minutes of arguing with this guy, I finally relent and tell him to make his Hollandaise. To which his response was, “Do you want me to make it the real way or the quick way?” I ask him what “the quick way” is but he won’t tell me . So I told him to go on and make it the quick way and I found a place to watch where he couldn’t see me. Now, it is at this point of the story that I have to tell you that I have bought food coloring twice in my life, and neither time was it for me. So the idea of me having it in one of my kitchens is out of the question. The guy grabs a pot and puts it on the stove. Then goes into the cooler and gets a gallon of milk and proceeds to pour some into the pot. Next he pulls out some eggshade food coloring, and then dumps cornstarch into the pot of cold milk and food coloring (WITHOUT EVEN MAKING A SLURRY!!!) It was at that moment the buttons started popping off of my chef jacket as HollanDavid Banner morphed into the Hulk. I about took the doors off of the hinges coming into the kitchen to kick him as far out of my sight as possible. I’ve only been that angry a handful of times in my life… Needless to say he didn’t get the job. The reason I’m telling you this story is because I just finished up a Sauce Workshop, and though you might not be making Hollandaise sauce anytime soon, knowing how to make sauces can make the different in something being good and great, and sauces are also very important as the added moisture and fat in the sauce will act as a lubricant and help you to keep chewing – making it possible to finish that whole steak or chicken breast or pork chop you worked so hard to prepare! Next time you need some In-sauce-per-ation, come back and check out some of these recipes that pair well your next meal! Oh, and I’ll throw in my Hollandaise Sauce with Bearnaise Variation so you can practice and become an In-Home Saucier! Salut!

Ingredients: · ¼ cup extra virgin olive oil, plus 1 tablespoon · 4 stems fresh Italian flat leaf parsley · 4 stems fresh oregano · 2 stems fresh rosemary · 2 stems fresh basil, plus 2 more stems for garnish · ½ yellow onion, diced · 3 cloves garlic, pressed or minced · 1-28 ounce can San Marzano tomatoes · Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper · Pinch of red pepper flakes · ¼ cup heavy cream (optional) Method: 1. Add ¼ cup olive oil to a 10-inch high sided sauté pan or a saucepan over medium heat. Add the parsley, oregano, rosemary and 2 stems of basil and cook for about 5 minutes or until the herbs become crisp. Remove the herbs and discard then add the onion and garlic to the oil, lowering the heat if needed so the onions cook gently and don't brown. Cook until the onions are transparent, about 5-7 minutes, then crush the tomatoes with your hand and add to the pan with juice. Season with kosher salt, freshly ground black pepper and red pepper flakes and simmer for 30-40 minutes or until the sauce reduces and thicken, stirring occasionally. 2. Remove from heat and stir in heavy cream, if desired.

Ingredients: · 1/3 cup unsalted almonds · 12 ounces jarred roasted red peppers, plus 1-2 tablespoons juice from jar as needed · 1 onion · 1 clove garlic · 2 tablespoons olive oil, divided · 2 teaspoons smoked paprika · 1 ounce parmesan cheese, grated · Salt & Pepper to taste Method: 1. In a fry pan, add 1 tablespoon olive oil. Cut onion in half and char in a frypan over medium-high heat. Set aside. 2. Using a food processor, chop almonds until coarsely chopped. 3. Coarsely chop onion. 4. Add red peppers, onion, garlic, paprika and parmesan to food processor. 5. Drizzle in olive oil. Add pepper juice to loosen if needed. Season as needed. 6. Serve at room temperature.

We just finished the second day our of Intro to Cheesemaking Workshop and we fell in love with something new - WHEY! This humble by-product of the cheesemaking process captured our interest and inspired us to try some new techniques. This is a perfect example of how a conversation around the Gather table can inspire everyone, including me. While it was not originally part of my lesson plan for this class, but it became clear that we were about to be in WHEY over our heads. What is whey? Whey, from cheesemaking, is the liquid that is leftover after forming curds and straining them. Milky and yellow, this somewhat unappetizing looking liquid offers so much value. There are two types of whey. Acid Whey comes from acid cultured whey products - when you use lemon juice or vinegar to sour milk. This leaves you with a slightly acidic whey. You can use this whey for soaking grains when making bread, feeding to animals and even for your own skin. The second type of whey is Sweet Whey which comes from making cheeses with rennet. You can also drain sweet whey off of yogurt, kefir or buttermilk. It has many uses like using as starter for fermenting vegetables, adding to smoothies or protein shakes, use as a cooking liquid for potatoes, pasta or grains, use in your compost pile - and our favorite - MAKING BREAD! Two of our students went WHEY overboard when they took whey home with them and baked up two different loaves of bread. Talk about dedication - after 3 hours of cheesemaking they both went home and baked bread!! And then the students taught the teacher. After some research we learned that when using whey from a salted cheese, to either omit or add salt sparingly to avoid over salting. Makes perfect sense to us! In both cases the normal water in their recipes were replace with an equal part of whey. And we ended up with two really beautiful loaves. We slathered them with homemade butter and got our taste buds working. We enjoyed our bread and butter along with our homemade mozzarella, Caprese style. And from that homemade butter, we used our extracted buttermilk in our Pressure Cooker Risotto to add a rich, creaminess without being too heavy. In these simple, clean ingredients that would usually get thrown away we struck liquid gold. And that gives me a moment to talk about food waste. If you attend classes, you know my philosophy on food waste. As a nation, we throw away 40% of our food. 72 billion pounds. Let that sink in for a moment. That would be like throwing my own body weight away 507,042,253 times. 507 million me's - in a landfill. It almost pains me just to think about how much perfectly good food is wasted on a daily basis. In fact, whey was commonly dumped in our water source prior to environmental laws. Pumped right into bodies of water. And since we just learned that whey can assist in fermentation, can you guess what happened? It created a massive algae bloom that then killed the marine life. This simple little step of throwing away a forgotten ingredient. An ingredient that you can re-purpose many different ways. So, let's WHEY our options. You can throw it away. Bye bye whey. Or you can save it. Put it in your fridge and start baking some bread. You can bake bread! I know you can!! My favorite - put it in your pizza dough. You'll get a great sourdough like flavor. Use it in your compost pile. Maybe you just don't have time to bake bread. Get it into your garden. I'll admit - I didn't save ALL the whey. We made a lot of cheese in two days. But we did save some and re-use it where we could. There's no shame in that. Just try to use some of what you might have normally tossed. A little bit of that, one kitchen at a time, will make a huge difference in the end. Here are a couple of recipes where you could replace the liquid (dairy or water) with whey. And a little homemade butter for good measure! Click below to see the recipes: Homemade Butter Neapolitan-Style Pizza Dough Cortney's Healthy Honey Wheat Bread Pressure Cooker Lemon Pepper Chicken Risotto

Ingredients 2 packages yeast (equal to ½ ounce or 4 ½ teaspoons) 3 cups warm water ½ cup coconut milk powder (or any milk powder) ½ cup honey 1/3 cup wheat bran 1/3 cup toasted wheat germ ¼ cup ground flaxseed 2 tablespoons walnut oil 2 teaspoons salt 4 cups whole wheat flour 3 cups all-purpose flour Method: In a liquid measuring cup, dissolve yeast in warm water.  Let bloom for approximately 10 minutes. In the bowl of a stand mixer, add coconut milk powder, honey, wheat bran, wheat germ, flax, oil, salt and both flours. Make a well in the flour mixture and pour in yeast.  With a dough hook, turn on low to mix ingredients, then turn up to medium-high to knead mixture.  When mixed, remove from bowl and turn out onto lightly floured surface.  Knead for 5-7 additional minutes by hand, or until elastic. Lightly oil a large mixing bowl with olive oil and place dough ball into bowl.  Cover with plastic wrap and let rise until doubled, about 1 hour. Once dough has risen, turn out from bowl onto surface and punch down.  Divide into two loaves and form as desired (this dough works great for braids and shapes).  Place on baking pan or in loaf pans, cover with plastic wrap and let rise for 30 minutes. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. After second rise is complete, place in middle rack of oven and bake for 30-45 minutes.  Remove from oven and let cool.  Enjoy!

Ingredients 1 cup warm water 1 packet active dry yeast (.25 ounce) 2 cups all-purpose flour 1 cup cake flour 1 ½ teaspoon salt Olive oil as needed Instructions Combine water and yeast in a large bowl and stir to mix.  Allow to bloom for approx. 10 minutes. Combine the flours in a mixing bowl, using a whisk to stir. In a separate bowl, combine 2 cups of the flour mixture with the salt and make a well in the center.  Pour the yeast mixture into the well and stir until it all comes together.  If it gets to sticky to work with add small amounts of flour as needed. Turn the dough out on a lightly floured surface and incorporate the rest of the flour, kneading and working the dough until smooth.  Form into a ball and place in an oiled mixing bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and proof until dough ball doubles in size (about 2 hours).  This can also be refrigerated overnight. When done proofing, punch down the dough and divide in half. Bake as instructed!

Ingredients: For the crust: · 4 ounces butter, unsalted · 8 ounces, all purpose flour · 3 ounces, ice cold water · ½ tsp. salt For the tart: · 2 apples of your choice · 3 tablespoons butter · 1 teaspoon vanilla extract · 1 tablespoon brown sugar · 1 teaspoon cinnamon · Pinch of salt · 1 egg · Sugar, to sprinkle · 3 tablespoons fruit jam · 6-8 sprigs lacquered thyme (recipe below) · Whipped Cream, to serve Method: 1. Cut the butter down into chunks, measure out the flour, and measure out the water. Place all separately in the freezer for 20-30 minutes. Take out of the freezer and combine the flour, salt and butter in a bowl or on the counter. Combine with a pastry cutter. Add the water one tablespoon at a time until dough comes together. Form into a disc and refrigerate for 20 minutes. 2. Preheat oven to 450° F. 3. Melt the butter in a small saucepan. Swirl it around a few times. It will foam and spatter. After 3 to 4 minutes, it will start to smell nutty and brown. When it forms small brown bits in the bottom remove from heat. Cool. Stir in vanilla, brown sugar, cinnamon and salt. 4. Core and quarter the apples and slice into thin slices. 5. Remove the dough from the refrigerator and roll into desired shape. Place on or in baking vessel or pan. 6. Starting about 2 inches in from the border of the rolled out dough, brush a thin layer of jam on the surface. Then make a circle with the apple discs, having them overlap. Continue with a second layer that overlaps the bigger circle. Finish it off with a few discs in the middle in a flower pattern. Paint all exposed apple surface with the brown butter vanilla mixture. 7. Fold the outer border of the dough over the edges of the tart, to leave the middle exposed. 8. Paint exposed border of dough with a thin layer of egg wash. Sprinkle the sugar on the edges of the dough. 9. Bake until apples are golden brown and the crust is crisp, about 20 to 25 minutes. 10. Top each piece with a stem of lacquered thyme and freshly whipped cream. Lacquered Thyme: · 2 T. lime juice · ¼ c. powdered sugar · ¼ tsp salt · 1.5 oz whole stem on thyme Method: Mix lime juice, sugar and salt. Line a sheet pan with parchment. Place the thyme in the lime juice sugar mixture and roll around until well coated. Lay out in a single non-touching layer on a sheet tray and place above the line for 12 hrs. to dry. After 12 hrs, place on a new parchment lined sheet tray so the thyme can finish drying.

Ingredients: · 1-2 sweet potatoes, boiled whole · 2-4 tablespoons olive oil · 2 cloves garlic, minced · 1 tablespoon fresh thyme, chopped · 1-2 tablespoons orange simple syrup (or any sweetener) Method: 1. Read the recipe. Did you read it? Read it again… 2. Season as you go – always tasting along the way and adding salt & pepper, as needed, to every layer. 3. Preheat oven to 450 degrees. Grease a baking sheet or use a liner. 4. Cut the sweet potatoes into small ½” sized cubes. Place in a single layer on the sheet pan, leaving a space around each potato. 5. Spray the bottom of a heavy flat bottomed glass or bowl with nonstick spray or rub with butter. Smash each sweet potato so that they are intact, but have broken edges that will get crispy. 6. Drizzle with olive oil and simple syrup. Sprinkle with thyme. 7. Check after 10 minutes and sprinkle on garlic. Cook for an additional 10 minutes If potatoes need to crisp more, turn broiler on high and continue cooking until well crispy. 8. Enjoy!

Ingredients: · 4 large chicken breasts, halved · ½ cup flour · 2 tablespoons paprika · 1 tablespoon olive oil · 5 tablespoons butter · ¼ cup fresh thyme leaves · 4 large garlic cloves, minced · 1 cup white wine · 12-16 ounces spinach · Salt & Pepper to taste Method: 1. On a plate or in a shallow dish, mix together flour, paprika, salt & pepper. 2. Lightly dredge the chicken breasts on each side. 3. Melt 1 tablespoon butter and add 1 tablespoon oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat and add the chicken breasts in batches. Cook on the first side for three minutes (or until crisping and golden), flip, and turn the heat down to medium, or slightly less. Let cook for another three minutes. Set aside. 4. Add garlic and thyme and saute until fragrant. Deglaze with wine. 5. Nestle the chicken back into the pan. Bring the wine to a gentle simmer and let cook for 10 minutes. It will reduce, so add more if necessary. Remove chicken and set aside to keep warm. 6. Add the spinach and let wilt fully. Remove from heat and add remaining butter. Season with salt and pepper serve with a grain of your choice. 7. Enjoy!

We hope you have enough thyme to talk about this popular, ubiquitous herb! The word thyme comes from the Greek word thumus, which means courage. While they often used it as a purifying incense to cleanse homes and temples, the Egyptians used it for embalming. The warm powerful aroma provides an uplifting quality. In the Middle Ages thyme was introduced to Europe from Greece and it was often given to knights by maidens to inspire courage. It was also placed under pillows to aid sleep and ward off nightmares. In the 16th century as a medicinal plant used to “helpeth the bitings of any venomous beast”. Today we often medicinally use thyme for sore throats and sometimes for a natural antiseptic. Try thyme and honey in your tea to soothe a sore throat. It is also commonly added to over the counter liniments and chest rubs used to treat the common cold. It is common in many cooking applications and pairs well with many different types of food. Add a little to an apple or pear dessert for a nice herbaceous flavor or strip some leaves off and add it into a Mediterranean salad. Make sure to put a few stems in your bouquet garni, French Onion Soup or hearty stews. In the summer, use the flowers in a salad or dessert for a fresh and slightly sweeter thyme flavor. Thyme is a perennial evergreen, with small leaves, sometimes wood stems and small white, purple or pink flowers. It has many varieties like citrus thyme in orange, lime or lemon. You may also see other varieties like caraway thyme, woolly thyme, creeping thyme, English thyme or French thyme. The best way to choose the best thyme for your garden is to look at the growing recommendations and pinching a bit and giving it a taste. If cooking is your ultimate goal, go for flavor! If ground cover is what you are after go for creeping or woolly thyme. If you would like to make sure your thyme survives the winter, plant it in a pot and bring it in to over winter. That way you will have thyme year-round! Start finding the THYME to add this herb to your favorite dishes at home! Here are some of our favorites to get you started - just click on the recipe title to start your cooking adventure: Paprika Chicken and Spinach with White Wine Butter Sauce Pressure Cooker Cognac & Dijon Stew Crispy Smashed Sweet Potatoes Brown Butter Apple Crostada with Laquered Thyme