Weekend Cooking: The Kitchen Journals 10

Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. You do not have to post on the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog's home page. For more information, see the welcome post.

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Although I have a couple of cookbooks and some food writing books to review, I thought I'd take a break and settle in with another entry in my Kitchen Journals.

Adult Beverages. Let's start with drinks, shall we? We've been in a bit of rut with wine over the winter, but this week we bought a new-to-us red blend from Gnarly Head, called Authentic Red. It was quite drinkable for a weekday table wine, and I'm sure we'll be buying it again. We have been long-time fans of their old vine Zin.

The latest star though was the discovery of a pleasant Irish whiskey. Right around St. Patrick's Day, our local state store had an Irish whiskey tasting, and although we're Scotch fans, we couldn't resist giving some a try. Our favorite of the batch was Bushmill's Irish Honey whiskey, and Mr. BFR made sure we brought a bottle home. Despite the addition of honey, the whiskey is not sweet, just very smooth. A little bit straight up, in coffee, and even over fruit salad is a great evening treat.

After taking a 10-mile hike last weekend, we were in the mood for an ice-cold brew. Our choice? Dogfish Head Indian brown ale. We've always liked their beers, and after a fun, active spring day, this ale went down easily. It made us wish for warm summer nights on the deck, sipping a beer and reading or talking.

Culinary Cozies. I have a small stack of food-related cozy mysteries in my sights, and I'm looking forward to nicer weather and some lazy weekend afternoons indulging in one of my favorite escape reading genres. Here are five titles that caught my attention. I haven't read any of these authors yet, so I'm hoping to find a new favorite series. I admit I like the corny, punny titles of cozies and their fun covers. Have you read any of these?

Fonduing Fathers (Berkley Prime Crime, 2012) is the sixth entry in Julie Hyzy's White House Chef series, starring Olivia Paras, the assistant chef to the president. Of course, these books are set in Washington, D.C. Bewitched, Bothered, and Biscotti (Obsidian, 2012) by Bailey Cates is the second book in the Magical Bakery series. Our hero is Katie Lightfoot, a witch and a baker living in Savannah, Georgia.

Liz Lipperman's Murder for the Halibut (Berkley Prime Crime, 2012), the third in the Clueless Cook series, is about Jordan McAllister, a foodie journalist working out of Ranchero, Texas. A Broth of Betrayal (Berkley Prime Crime, 2013), by Connie Archer, is the second Soup Lover's mystery book. Lucky Jamieson, our amateur sleuth, runs the By the Spoonful Soup Shop in Snowflake, Vermont. Finally, Paige Shelton's If Mashed Potatoes Could Dance (Berkley Prime Crime, 2012), is the second book in the Country Cooking School series. Betts Winston and her grandmother run the Broken Rope, Missouri, cooking school when they aren't solving murders.

Like all good culinary mysteries, each of the five novels listed here includes a handful of themed recipes. It'd fun to make one of the treats to serve at a mystery book club meeting.

What I've Been Cooking. You can sure tell that we're in the heart of changing seasons in my kitchen. We started out the week eating kale lentil soup and roasted root vegetables and ended the week with asparagus risotto and fruit salad. That's winter to spring in just a few days! Our Community Sponsored Agriculture (CSA) food shares will start with the reopening of the farmer's market in just a few weeks. I wish it it were already May.

The soup  recipe I used came from Ellie Krieger's So Easy, which I reviewed way back in 2010. And I always make pressure cooker risotto following Lorna Sass's directions. I introduced you to Sass a couple of springs ago; check out that Weekend Cooking post if you've been scared to try a pressure cooker.

What food or drink adventures have you had this week?