[Mike Nolan]

We were at a pot luck last Saturday and someone brought cauliflower olive salad. My wife had several helpings of it, though she generally doesn't like cauliflower.

Asked for the recipe, tested it, and posted it. (I think it is better with a little cracked pepper in it, but that's not listed on the recipe. I also tweaked the amount of olives to match what we ate last week.)

[Mike Nolan]

We had salads for supper tonight.

[Mike Nolan]

Well, so far it's just one, but there are quite a few green ones and I just saw two that are showing some color. I think there may have been another ripe one that got gobbled up by a critter before I could pick it.

[Mike Nolan]

We got our first tomato from the outside garden today (appropriately, a '4th of July' variety) and although it was pretty small, we sliced it thin and had it on sandwiches.

[Mike Nolan]

Give another couple of tests and I should be able to post a good recipe for sumac muffins.

[Mike Nolan]

Today I made some epis and chocolate croissants for a dinner party this evening.

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[Mike Nolan]

I let my Post subscription lapse as well.

[Mike Nolan]

I made another batch of sumac muffins, dividing it into 4 parts:

Part 1 was the base batch, the same recipe as last time but with a little more honey and with some za'atar. The originals definitely had some za'atar in them, but I think I used too much.

Part 2 had some cinnamon as well.

Part 3 had additional sumac.

Part 4 had additional sumac and cinnamon.

Of these, the 3rd one was closest to what we remember from the restaurant in Pittsburgh.

I liked the ones with the cinnamon in them, but we're both pretty sure that the ones we had two weeks ago didn't have cinnamon in them.

The next batch will definitely cut back on the za'atar, increase the sumac and cut back on the sugar/honey.

[Mike Nolan]

I'm going to be making epis de bles and chocolate croissants for a pot luck event on Saturday, and baguettes for another event on Sunday, gotta start the preferment and detrempte on Thursday.

[Mike Nolan]

I have at least two tomatoes starting to ripen in the outdoor garden, I'm fairly sure they're '4th of July' ones, so they're living up to their name.

[Mike Nolan]

Not sure if I'll get to it this week, but I'm going to make a batch of laminated dough for croissants using some of the pastry flour I bought while in Pennsylvania. (Gotta find a way to use up 50 pounds of it!) Some sources recommend a bread flour for croissants, others recommend a pastry flour, so I'll be curious to see if I can notice any differences.

[Mike Nolan]

When I made the sumac muffins last week, they were good but not the same as the ones we had in Pittsburgh. Doing some researching, I decided to order some za'atar to see if that might be what was actually in them. Diane took one sniff from the bag of Lebanese za'atar (hyssop, sumac, sesame, coriander and salt) that came today and said, 'Yes, that's the right smell.' So, I'll try making some with that later this week.

[Mike Nolan]

No yogurt maker here, Diane sometimes eats yogurt, I don't, though I have on occasion used it for baking.

We have two OXO salad spinners and one Tupperware salad spinner. Somehow the OXO one always reminds me of a children's top, I almost expect it to make a musical sound when I use it.

[Mike Nolan]

Oops, I put the sumac muffins post in the wrong category. Too hard to move. :sigh:

We both liked this first batch, though more sumac may be needed. I deliberately put in only 3 ounces of honey when the recipe called for 4, but we don't think it desperately needs more sweetness. I might try adding a little cinnamon. I've also got some za'atar on order, I know it's used more in flatbreads, but I might try splitting a batch, some with za'atar, some with cinnamon.

[Mike Nolan]

There was a lot of wild sumac where I grew up (the good kind, genus Rhus, not poison sumac, which is genus Toxicodendron.) The genus for the latter even sounds dangerous, doesn't it? They're not all that closely related, though they are both in the Anacardiaceae family.

It is more commonly found in savory Middle Eastern foods, and is frequently an ingredient in za'atar. The Casbah restaurant in Pittsburgh where we had the sumac muffins was quite interesting, I'd like to eat there again some time.

We planted some sumac in the NE corner of our yard to hide the utility posts, but over the years other plants have pretty much crowded them out. They tend to grow in thickets.

I'm making my first attempt at sumac muffins today, they look similar but the taste is different. Not bad, just different. May need a little more sweetness and more spices. Has anyone baked with za'atar?

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