Apple pie with cheddar cheese crust. (Nikki Sawyer Moore photo)

What if I told you not to worry about baking a pie from scratch on Thanksgiving day?   What if I told you that you could pull it from the freezer and bake it right when you started to feel like dessert? What if I told you that it wouldn’t come in a box,  that it would lack preservatives, and that it would be homemade?   What if I told you that you could make this pie today?  You’d want to keep reading, wouldn’t you?

Years ago I read about the option of making pie dough, rolling it out, and then freezing it to form in a pie plate lined with plastic wrap.  Once frozen, the frozen pie crust could be gently removed from the pie plate, wrapped tightly in plastic wrap and covered with foil, to yield a homemade version of this. Read the full story

Everybody chopped at the chef challenge. See a photo gallery below. (David Boraks/DavidsonNews.net)

Davidson Farmer’s Market kicked off its winter market season last Saturday, Nov. 2, with its annual Winter Chef Challenge, pitting six local chefs against one another in a one-hour cook-off using market ingredients. The duo of Joe Kindred of Roosters Uptown and Zach Renner of Roosters Southpark took the People’s Choice and Best Taste Awards. Read the full story

Herb roasted chicken with pan gravy. (Nikki Sawyer Moore photo)

Pity the cook at Thanksgiving.  The king or queen of the kitchen is not only expected to be a gracious host or hostess, but also must cook multiple sides in an oven that only has room for a turkey while enduring constant advice from family members on everything from whether or not to cook the stuffing in the turkey (for safety reasons, the answer is no) to how to avoid lumpy mashed potatoes.  After all, with talk of giving thanks aside, Thanksgiving is a house full of guests with success dependent upon a giant bird that is notorious for not defrosting in time, taking forever to cook, and then being dry.   It’s no wonder that talented cooks with plenty of expertise start to lose a little sleep this time of year just thinking about the requisite turkey and … dare I mention it … the gravy. Read the full story

Chefs from eight Lake Norman area restaurants will offer up samples on Thursday, Nov. 7, at Our Towns Habitat for Humanity’s annual “Tastes of Habitat” fundraiser. The dining sampler will run from from 6:30 to 9pm at Charles Mack Citizens Center in Mooresville. Read the full story

Beet Tartare

For all the fun and satisfaction that comes from entertaining, it’s very challenging for the cook.  Most of us tend to get creative when we have folks coming to dinner.  I attribute this to the need to impress, but also the desire to break from the normal routine.  The recipe we clipped last year from our favorite food magazine or that trendy ingredient that we’ve needed an excuse to splurge on all seem justifiable with guests invited to dinner.  After all, you’ve cleared some time to prepare dinner so why not go all out? Read the full story

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