The 20 Most Famous, Famous Fridays (up until now, that is)
When I first began this blog almost three years ago, I wanted to set aside a day to highlight the cooks and cookbooks that inspired me (and also to justify all the new cookbooks I wanted to buy!!) Thus, Famous Fridays was born. It's been a really fun series and I've learned a heck of lot as I've gone from sharing some signature recipes from my longtime favorites like Maida Heatter, David Lebovitz, Martha Stewart and The Silver Palette Cookbook and branched out into new discoveries like Deborah Madison, Sara Foster and practically anything from Patty Pinner and The Back in the Day Bakery cookbook. Now, some 115 recipes later, in a very official (NOT) ballot cast by my home judges (they're the toughest, you know!), I'd like to share 10 of our favorite savory and 10 sweet Unwritten Recipes Famous Fridays extravaganzas. All of these are dishes we loved and that I've made more than once or would happily make again--would that I had a kitchen!! So take a look, scroll through and see if any of your favorites made the cut. Or let me know if there are any you really love that I've missed. And now, in no particular order...
FAMOUS FRIDAYS SAVORY DISHES
1. ATK's Butternut Squash Risotto
2. Foster's Herb Marinated Grilled Chicken Breasts
3. Sara's Israeli Couscous with Mushrooms, Peas and Sweet Potato Sauce
4. Deborah Madison's Winter Vegetable Chowder
5. Taco Night's Korean Short Ribs Tacos with Crunchy Asian Slaw
6. Carla's Butternut Squash Tarte Tatin
7. Marcella Hazan's Tomato Sauce with Onion and Butter
8. Virginia Willis' Coca-Cola Glazed Wings
9. Cooking for Comfort's Baked Macaroni and Cheese
10. The Southern Vegetarian's Sweet Potato Grits with Maple Mushrooms and Fried Egg
Honorable Mentions: (because these are too good for you not to revisit too!) Wolfgang's Puck's Fresh Tomato Grilled Pizza, The Seasoned Life' Brown Sugar Chicken, Cooks Illustrated Italian Chicken Soup, Cook What You Love's Mexican Corn Soup and Deborah Schneider's Salsa Quemada
FAMOUS FRIDAYS SWEET DISHES
2. Back in the Day Bakery's Plum Tartlets
3. Sweet Mornings' Brown Sugar and Cinnamon Swirl Pancakes
4. Martha's Grapefruit Sandwich Cookies
5. Ovenly's Vegan Salted Chocolate Chip Cookies
6. The SoNo Baking Company's Chocolate Ganache Cake
7. The Loveless Cafe's Muddy Fudge Pie
9. Melissa Clark's Brownie Raspberry Trifle
10. Four and Twenty Blackbirds' Strawberry Balsamic Pie
Honorable Mentions: (this was an excruciating decision!!) Grandbaby Cakes' Snickers Cake, Bobby Flays' Créme Brulee Yogurt Parfaits, Gale's Coconut Chocolate Tartlets, Dishing up Vermont's Maple Apple Waffles, Francois' Warm Chocolate Tart and Dorie's Dimply Plum Cake.
I promise you can't go wrong with any of these--so get yourself into the kitchen this weekend if at all possible and try one or more of them out. And speaking of kitchens check out the progress of our renovation. It's still a mess but we're definitely making progress now. We're loving our new countertops and the grey grout (actually Raven) that we used on the subway tiles. It's truly thrilling to see it all coming together! I think we're looking at a couple more weeks and then we'll be all done. SO miss having an oven and prep space!! Toaster oven cooking is getting kind of old, but we did make these wonderful small batch cookies in the toaster yesterday out of sheer baking desperation and they were totally delish--promise to share next week! Have a great one!!
