Cooking with Brook

With a dish that is pretty much as simple as pre-cooked cornmeal and water, it is amazing how arepas are so much more than a delicious sum of their parts. This hybrid of bread and tortillas from Colombia/Venezuela is a delicious side to…

Spaghetti and meatballs are synonymous with kids being happy about what’s for dinner. “Mom, can I go over to Johnny’s house for dinner tonight? They’re having spaghetti and meatballs!” Why? Because they are delicious. Maybe Johnny had…

Curry is not a single flavor, nor is it a single ingredient (powder, paste or leaves). Indian curry can be any sauce with spice. Each region, state and family has a different curry. Some things may be curries and you don’t even know it. It…

There is just something about freshly made tortillas. All it takes is masa, water, a little salt … and maybe a little fat. I know adding fat to corn tortillas is not necessarily traditional, but as you can imagine, it does make them…

Photos by LG Patterson When walking through a fair, you will smell a variety of foods. One food smell stands out more than the rest: funnel cake. Once you have smelled a funnel cake, the aroma is embedded in your brain forever. Funnel…

Biscuits have a multitude of savory and sweet preparations. Two of my favorites are strawberry shortcakes and biscuits and gravy. You can make a double, or triple batch of biscuits in the morning, and use some for B&G at breakfast, then…

My 6-year-old will go weeks at a time where she eats nothing but waffles. No, I do not make them every time she wants them. I will make a few dozen at a time, freeze them on a tray, bag them and store them in the

When cooler weather comes calling and we spend more time inside, we tend to lean more on items in the pantry rather than the garden or market, says Inside Columbia’s Food Editor Chef Brook Harlan. We also tend to turn to hearty, filling…

This recipe is written for butternut squash but could be made with pumpkin, acorn squash, sweet potato, French turban, spaghetti squash, or any other type of root vegetable or winter squash.

It’s a weird time. I know there are a lot of uncertain things going on, but I’m talking about that weird time between the end of the summer and beginning of fall. You may still have some tomatoes to harvest and eat, but there is also fall…

It is time to harvest tomatoes. You can peel plain tomatoes and freeze or can them. You can also make salsa or tomato sauce and have them to use all winter. One of my favorite uses for tomato sauce is to top chicken parmesan. The sauce does…

I have loved shortbread cookies since I was a kid. I love sugar, but I may love butter more. Shortbread is like the best of both worlds. I remember eating Archway shortbread cookies; all of my grandparents lived in Boonville, and for many…

If you’re like me, you’ve been cooped up all winter cooking in the kitchen and you’re ready to get outside and grill. This article is more of a concept as opposed to a recipe. You can take about 10 or 15 minutes to prep all the ingredients…

If you can make a pancake, you can make a crepe. “Really thin pancakes” seems to be the most common way we like to describe them. If you have made crepes before, note that this recipe is a little different. This crepe recipe gets most of…

To my knowledge, there are three types of court bouillon (French translation of short broth). The first type is the very simple quick broth for poaching fish with a small amount of onion, carrot and celery with aromatics and white wine.…

Good bagels are hard to come by in the Midwest. Technology has helped us with many things, but automating procedures to help streamline the process can sometimes affect the result. Traditionally bagels were proofed, boiled, then baked. It…

I have been a big fan of grits for a long time, or at least what I thought was grits. About 10 years ago I got to try some OG Grits. They were coarse-ground with a stone mill powered by the War Eagle Creek (a tributary of the White River)…

Spoonbread is like polenta met cornbread — and they called up soufflé and custard to have a party. This recipe is gluten-free, but not because the ingredients are left out that need to be there, but because it is naturally gluten-free. It…

Cooking scalloped potatoes has always been more of a method as opposed to a recipe for me. I never look up a recipe to cook rice — I just make sure I know the ratio of liquid to rice, depending on the grain type, then make sure to use the…

Just about every culture has some type of dumpling. They range from elaborate fillings with intricate folds, to seasoned clumps of dough with no filling. Dumplings can be steamed, fried or cooked in soup. The potsticker combines the best of…