Home At Last! with Patty Gironda

    Last night we opted for appetizers for dinner. . . just like Will's dad. . . in one of my favorite Will and Grace episodes. I turned a couple of large, firm green tomatoes into one of our favorite appetizers of buttermilk-soaked green tomatoes with a fire-roasted red pepper sauce with goat cheese! It just doesn't get much better on a summer night. As a companion I made one of my favorite South African salads. Mixed field greens with fried chicken livers and an easy potato salad with wasabi oil. Loads of flavor and a great way to engage a loved one in the kitchen. I had Ron help me with prepping while I turned the charred pepper into a simple sauce with garlic olive oil and a little sour cream and fresh cracked pepper. The tomatoes were soaked in buttermilk before dredging them in a mixture of yellow and white corn meal and flour. The chicken livers were dredged in flour, salt and pepper. Not too many clashing flavors-I let the sauces do the heavy duty. I drizzle t...

  Another easy salad idea for the hot days ahead. This Asian-inspired salad is easy to prepare and delivers complex layers of flavor and texture. I cook all the components in my black iron skillet or wok and remove each cooked layer to bowls until I'm ready to assemble the individual salads. I have my cold items sliced, diced and seasoned-ready to be served before I even begin the cooking process. Experience and repetition have taught me how to prepare ingredients in the proper order to ensure that each stage of a recipe is ready when I need it. Learning the art of combining ingredients on hand comes from years of studying the core ingredients of different ethnic recipes and finding their common denominator(s). And finally, stocking my pantry with ingredients that allow me to grab ordinary ingredients and creating a tasty meal without a recipe. For this simple salad, I boiled the chicken wings with fresh garlic and saved my stock. For the black iron skillet I created an essentia...

      Two of the most interesting salads I have ever enjoyed were in Europe. My all-time favorite salad was at the Hotel Guittard in Zug, Switzerland. We checked into this small boutique hotel late one summer night. Perched high on a hill overlooking a beautiful lake the hotel offered amazing views from the balcony-including an inviting patio restaurant engulfed by candlelight. On a recommendation I ordered their specialty salad and was delighted with the beautiful presentation. The variety of fresh ingredients-each neat pile complimented by a unique dressing provided a memorable dining experience and great Swiss beer. I enjoyed a similar style of salad on the Rhine River in Germany. A tuna salad-not in the Nicoise-style but more like the Swiss-style I just mentioned. Both of these salads left a lasting impression and I regularly make similar interesting varieties in hot weather. Although last night's salad was informal and quickly pulled together it delivered an int...