"Thistle Be Fun"

Eric and I had a few close friends over for brunch yesterday and I wish I had taken a picture of the table! Christine made a beautifully plummy fruit salad which perfectly complemented the quiche and the french toast. Thanks to Regine, Christine, Madhavi, and Eric for such a perfectly pleasant final fall Saturday in Washington Heights!

I have been wanting to upload some of my most successful cooking recipes here for a while. After some rather extensive Internet research, I found this lovely artichoke quiche recipe at Food.com. (I did double the amount of mozzarella from 4 oz. to 8 oz. per the suggestion in the comments section.) I (heart) brunch!

ARTICHOKE QUICHE

Serves: 6
Servings: 1 nine inch quiche
Prep Time: 10 mins
Total Time: 45 mins

Ingredients:
• 1 (14 ounce) can artichoke hearts, well drained
• 2 garlic cloves
• 4 eggs
• 3 -4 tablespoons grated romano cheese
• 4-8 ounces mozzarella cheese, diced
• 1 -2 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1/4 cup light cream
• 1 (9 inch) pie crust (bottom only)

Directions:
1. Cut artichoke hearts into quarters, or large dice.
2. In frying pan over low heat, add oil, saute whole garlic cloves for a minute or so.
3. Add artichoke hearts and saute them until they start to brown.
4. Remove garlic cloves, and let the artichokes cool.
5. In a bowl, beat the eggs, add the cream, Romano and mozzerella cheeses and pepper, mixing well.
6. Add the artichokes and the oil from the pan to the egg mixture, mix well.
7. Spoon mixture into pie crust.
8. Bake in preheated 350°F oven for 35 minutes or until filling is set and just starts to brown.

P.S. Heads up, book your flights, and mark your calendars! Saturday and Sunday May 21st - 22nd, 2011 the Castroville Artichoke Festival will be here before you know it!

Thanks NY!

Well NY, what can I say? It's starting to get cold and dark and I didn't bring anything warmer than my windbreaker–so I'm thinking that I should start heading home. (I told my mom I’d be back before Thanksgiving.) It's been really nice meeting you.

They don't have a subway system like yours where I am from. Which makes me a little sad. So thanks for the MTA. And the red line especially. Thanks for Washington Square’s fountain and Union Square’s farmers' market. I’ve reconsidered the square and appreciate its possibilities now more than ever. Thanks for Fairway–I will never think of another grocery store as disorganized ever again. Thanks for the watery time and open sky at Riverbank and Brooklyn Bridge Parks. And all your beautiful bridges. Thanks for Delicioso Coco Helado. Thanks for the flea market that Saturday morning in Clinton Park and making the Staten Island Ferry free–though the advertising in that terminal is sort of a high price to pay. Thanks for July’s fireflies and your complicated Septembers. And thank you for all the brave and creative people I’ve had the pleasure to meet. Even if it was just for a moment or a few hours or through something they left behind for me to find. Please help them to prosper so they might bring their gifts to SF sometime.

Yeah–I'll be in SF. Another seductive well-loved world-class town, but with less bricks and more electric buses. A little younger and somewhat curvier than you and not quite so tall, SF had my heart before I ever had a chance to consider otherwise. Still, I’m going to miss you NY–but I plan to return to SF with the ambitious new insight you’ve offered me. That's a great gift. So thank you for that.

Speaking of great gifts–thanks especially for Eric. He says he's ready to go, so I'm bringing him west with me. I know you'll miss him, but I promise to take good care of him and I'm sure we'll be back before you know it.