Creative cooking and living in the fertile Salinas Valley, east of Eden, along California's central coast
“Well, right now you can buy fruit and all kinds of vegetables for two bits a lug.”
East of Eden, John Steinbeck
We often enjoy salads for dinner. I wanted to make a salad with the fruits and colors of summer as a main dish. The chicken could easily be omitted and the salad would still evoke summer on a plate.
Inspired by The Wild Plum restaurant in Monterey, California.
Their cookies are really good, but so are mine!
These cookies are a bit more sophisticated than traditional Oatmeal Raisin. Although, raisins and walnuts may be substituted and will make a divine oatmeal cookie, just omit the almond extract. For a more unique cookie I use a raisin assortment that includes golden and flame raisins in addition to regular raisins. A sophisticated variation of this recipe is dried tart cherries with almonds but omit the cinnamon. I like these three variations so much I haven’t tried any others. I’d love to hear what you try!
“Lee was stewing apricots. He left the stove and closed the kitchen door and went back to the stove.”