Cooking for Friends and Fun

Edited by John Preston

Acknowledgements

Thanks to my wife Sally for her advice and expert services as an editor. Thanks to the excellent cooks with whom we share food, friendship, and love.

About the Cover

Sally and I have several groups of friends, all of whom love to eat. The women in this photo are Sally’s hiking friends with whom we often share meals on holidays and just for the fun of it.

Styles

Each recipe has the same layout and format. The descriptions and lists of ingredients and equipment are on the first page and the table of process steps is on the second. Each recipe is a two-page PDF file that can be printed separately so the steps can be checked off as they are performed. The sections of each recipe are:

· Title

· Description and introduction of the dish

· Picture of the finished dish

· List of ingredients—unlike many recipes, the list does not contain hidden processes, e.g. 1/2 cup diced onions. Instead, the list of ingredients describes what you should buy. If that isn’t clear, both are provided, e.g. 1 medium onion (1 cup diced). The list of ingredients corresponds to the order in which they are used in the process section.

· Equipment—I assume that you have a selection of mixing bowls, knives, and sauce pans. When a recipe calls for a tool that might be a bit unusual or something you might not normally have in your kitchen, I list it under equipment

· Process—a table is provided of sequential steps along with an estimate of the time it takes for each step. When steps can be performed at the same time—simmering a liquid and dicing the next ingredient—a second column is used for time estimates. You may take more or less time for your processes, but you can develop a feel for how much to adjust my estimates to your style. The first column is reserved for check marks to keep track of what steps have been performed. Cooks may prefer to print the page and mark up the copy in the kitchen using the check box column to make sure they don’t miss a step (I made my crusty bread recipe the other day from memory and didn’t remember the yeast until the loaf was in the oven!)

Recipes that are suitable for vegetarians or vegans are noted in the table of contents with a V for vegetarian, and V for vegan. Dishes that are suitable for transportation to a potluck dinner are marked with (P).

Sources

This book is an unauthorized collection of recipes from a variety of sources. Most of the recipes in this book are adapted from copyrighted sources. Technically, the changes I make to each recipe are enough to avoid copyright infringement, but I prefer to honor the spirit of the law. For this reason, this book is privately distributed rather than sold publicly. I provide information on how to obtain the original recipes where practical. I encourage readers to support the efforts of those who write professionally by buying their work. I buy cookbooks from Cooks Illustrated and subscribe to online websites such as Food Network, and Americas Test Kitchen and I encourage the reader to do likewise.

Updates

The recipes that are referenced from the following Contents page may be updated or removed without notice. If you have favorites and wish to preserve a copy in case it is no longer available in the future, I suggest that you print out a copy. If a recipe contains an error or if the link isn’t working, let me know at john@pctraining.net.

Contents

(V) = vegan, (v) = vegetarian, (GF) = gluten free, (P) = suitable for transport to a potluck

Breakfast or Brunch

· Canadian (pea meal) Bacon

· Egg, Asparagus, and Mushroom Strata

· Eggs Benedict

· Eggs - Fried (v)

· Eggs - Hard Boiled (v)

· Eggs - Scrambled (v)

· Mexican Eggs (v)

· Pancakes--Banana, Chocolate Chip, and Blueberry (v)

· Pancakes—Buttermilk with Blueberries (v)