Festive Dishes for NYE
Including a cheese soufflé recipe for my paid subscribers!
Welcome to issue #41 of Susanality. Thanks for being here! If you’re loving this newsletter, please consider a paid subscription. Having your support would mean a lot to me, as I continue to work hard to bring you fresh content on a weekly basis with additional posts (sharing how-to videos, technique tips, and extra recipes) going out to paid subscribers at least twice a month. Thanks again!
Happy New Year’s Eve eve! I hope you have had a very merry—and healthy—holiday season. I was so impressed by all the cookie baking I saw on Instagram this month. You all baked your way through the holiday season, and I am proud that my recipes were a part of so many of your menus!
After the pre-Christmas parade of cookies, we are taking a turn to the savory this week (well, mostly—you will still find one sweet dish below). I have rounded up some of my favorite recipes to serve on special occasions or for at-home gatherings of any size. My hope is that this list will help make it easy for you to pull together a fun and festive menu to round out 2021 and start the new year. I was originally going to send this out on Friday, as usual, but wanted to give you an extra day before the weekend to plan and shop.
Further down, this newsletter also contains a recipe for my Stress-Less Cheese Soufflé, accessible only to my paid subscribers. You can take a peek at a finished version of it in this cooking demo and conversation I had with Mariana Velásquez on Cherry Bombe as part of The Julia Jubilee, their recent virtual celebration of the life and legacy of Julia Child. I pull the soufflé out of the oven at 18:52—take a peek! (P.S. Speaking of Julia Child… Julia—the Julia Child documentary I recently food styled for—was just shortlisted for an Oscar!)
Thank you all for being here, and for supporting my efforts to bring you this independent publication. It means the world to me! Here’s wishing you all the peace and happiness possible for 2022 and beyond.
xx
Susan
Festive Dishes for NYE + New Year’s Day
A round up of some of my favorite festive recipes for hosting—many of which are from my cookbook Open Kitchen
Blistered Shishitos with Avocado Crema
This is one of my favorite starters. It’s not too filling but still substantial, so it’s perfect to take the edge off before the meal begins. The creamy avocado puree gives the peppers another delicious dimension. Click here for the recipe. (Also on page 67 of Open Kitchen.)
Avocado Tahini Dip
I almost always include raw vegetables in my nibbles spreads (which my husband is mostly in charge of setting out), and this creamy dip makes crudités a little more exciting and indulgent. If you are prepping the vegetables in advance, store them in a container of lightly salted water in the fridge to crisp them up and add a little extra flavor. Here’s my recipe, shared by Pure Wow. (Recipe also on page 71 of Open Kitchen.)
Cassoulet Toast
Cooking cassoulet is a project, to be sure. There are a lot of good recipes out there, but it is not for the faint of heart! For this recipe from Open Kitchen, which my friend David Lebovitz shared here, I distilled the essential flavors of cassoulet into a hearty toast. It’s simplified, of course, and it isn’t cassoulet, but it is very, very good. You could cut this into little bars as a pre-dinner bite or serve one toast per person alongside a crisp salad of bitter greens for a delicious New Year’s lunch. (Recipe also on page 44 in Open Kitchen.)
Every Kind of Hummus
FYI, hummus does not have to be boring. I developed a festive trio of hummus recipes—including beet and spinach-and-herb versions—for Food & Wine. Find them here.
Whole Grain Cumin Crackerbread
And to go along with all your dips, try these big, amorphously beautiful crackers that are easy to whip up and will up your nibbles game by a lot. They are better than anything you can buy, and they keep well for a couple of days. You can change the seeds to suit your taste, adding sesame or poppy in addition to or instead of the cumin. You can find the recipe right here on my site. (Recipe also on page 73 of Open Kitchen.)
Warm Ricotta with Roasted Grapes
Here’s an appetizer I shared with Food & Wine nearly a decade ago (can you believe that 2013 is almost a decade ago??). As they wrote, “This is an elegant appetizer for any party, but it's most lovely during colder months, topped with sweet roasted grapes.” I agree—it makes a perfect appetizer for a winter night like NYE! Click here for the recipe.
Apple Tarte Tatin
After all the cookies we ate in December, I am ready for a change in dessert. My mind went straight to this Apple Tarte Tatin, which I originally developed for Baked from Scratch magazine. Their March/April 2019 issue was French themed, so this fit right in. My neighbor Deb, the talent behind the blog Smitten Kitchen, shared the recipe—and notes from watching me cook it!—in this post. You can also find a delicious and time-saving riff on it here.
If you cook any of these over the weekend, please share a pic on Instagram and tag me in it—I just love seeing your creations. Or leave a note in the comments section here!
My Stress-Less Cheese Soufflé
And now for what’s probably my number one dish for wowing an intimate crowd… a cheese soufflé. Making a soufflé isn’t as tricky as you might think, given all the dire warnings (Don’t you dare open the oven! Avoid loud noises!) that usually come with recipes for them. In fact, you can assemble a soufflé many hours ahead of time, as long as you put the soufflé mixture in the dish it will be baked in and stick it in the fridge (yes, really!).
Also, let’s manage our expectations of loftiness, and let’s be OK with a slightly sunken soufflé. Your guests will think you are a real genius pulling this thing out of the oven and serving them scoops of piping hot cheese heaven. Making it in a flat baking dish means it doesn’t have so far to fall, and also creates a lot more surface area to brown, turning it into something a little different and more casual than the classic toque-like affair. You can add any herbs you like to this soufflé, or even finely chopped cooked spinach. I like to serve this for brunch, lunch, or a light supper with a simple green salad. I do suggest you time this so you can serve it immediately upon removing from the oven for the best effect.