Favorite Fall/Winter Dishes
 

With temperatures finally beginning to drop in the Northeast (at least I am no longer wearing shorts), it is time to think about fall/winter foods that I love.
The type of food that you want when the temperature is below 40 degrees F.
For me, 2 things come to mind:
1) Chili. I know, some folks can eat chili when it is 95 degrees in the shade. While it still tastes good, there is nothing like a bowl on a cold winter night....
2) Osso Bucco. When prepared properly, with the meat falling off the shank...simply delicious. Matched with the proper wine, it makes an incredible cold weather meal.
So....what do you like to eat during these colder months? (And yes, those of you in southern CA and FL can play along too !!!).

It hit 90 here today so I'm grilling again tonight.

When I finally turn my oven on it will be for roasted acorn squash with butter and cinnamon.

things are so relative, I'll be grilling at 20 below:)
yes, good soups/stews, gumbo, chili, pho, cassoulet. We are using our crock pot more and more as the weather gets cooler. Ginger chicken was last night.

Also roasts in the oven: duck, turkey, pork etc etc. The oven warms the kitchen and the smells that go through the house with a roast, YUM.

I like almost anything slow-cooked when the weather is cold. One of my favorites is a Beef Carbonara recipe I discovered a few years ago.

For me, as a warmer, nothing beats a home cooked Lasagna made from scratch. A good lasagna is a labour of love and it takes time. I am not a fan of the American style lasagna which uses Ricotta as a filler. That's not lasagna to me.

Mrs. MileKing likes to rollout her Pfaltzgraff Winterberry collection of dishes for the fall/winter.

I, on the other hand, am content with a good bottle of Zin.

I've just made a pot of potato soup with a lovely piece of shin beef. It's 46 degrees here. Brrr!

My Mom's steak and vegetable soup, with an update...in a bread bowl!

Potato soup sounds so good. I'm going to make some this weekend. Thanks for the reminder!

The crockpot/slow cooker definitely gets more use out of me in the colder months. I especially love those recipes (beef short ribs, lamb shanks, braised poultry of any sort) that let me fill the crock in the morning, go off to work and come back in the evening to wonderful smells and tender hearty fare.

If you're not a cook, such crock cookery is simple: insert some tough and/or collagen-laden piece of meat (brown it first if you like). Add roughly chopped onion/carrot/garlic/celery/fennel/etc. Pour in a half bottle of wine (your preference). Set to low, come back in 8 hours and you have dinner. Easy! :D

I'm with Sweet Willie -- I live in Minnesota, and it's NEVER too cold to grill!

As for fall/winter dishes, a good homemade soup always hits the spot. Tonight I'm heading home to my wife's butternut squash soup and some homemade 9-grain bread. Mmmmmmmm!!!!

Soups - salmon soup with black bread and salted butter, mushy pea/lentil soup with cooked sausage, Hungarian Goulash on ski trips, Borsh with smetana...

Also have a weakness for Russian fatty blinnis with various fillings, my favourites are vendace roe and mushroom salad.

And too many Asian winter dishes to start counting...

definitely soup.

It's just been too warm here to even think of these types of foods yet. I can't wait till it cools down and can have homemade chicken and dumplings!

btw- my dad just left from a visit from PHX and landed in RST to some snow flurries.

All kinds of yummy foods like my egg battered fried chicken with a side of blue cheese scalloped potatoes. Of course since it's now November, I'm already thinking of Thanksgiving and the bird! Garlic Whipped Potatoes, my homemade Old-Fashioned Turkey Gravy, Sourdough Sage Stuffing, Cranberry Apple Relish and other treats.

Grrrrr.... It is 40 here right now... And a great weather for hot pot - a simmering pot of soup stock at the center of the dining table, and plenty of food ready to be thrown into the simmering pot...

Gather a few friends... Sit around the table... Cook, eat and yak and yak and yak...

Couple things are staples of fall/winter food for me:

Matzah Ball Soup
Sam Adams Winter Lager
Homemade Hard Cider
Elk Steaks
Venison Stew

wow, this is making me hungry....too bad the food options at TRI don't offer any of that!!!

Major YUM!!! I'm coming over to your house for dinner :D

Speaking of Asian, when the weather gets colder I absolutely love Hakka style hot pots...I'm not skilled enough to prepare them (see my earlier post on crockpots for the cooking-challenged), and Hakka style can hardly be found in BOS, but winter trips to NYC or SFO give me the opportunity.

pumpkin or butternut squash soup! i can actually have that any season but in the winter it's like wrapping yourself with a fleece blanket.

I've never tasted that soup. Is butternut squash an acquired taste?
Margaret

#1 fav is Braised Oxtail with garlic mashed potatoes and roasted carrots. It takes hours but so worth it; a lot of fat skimming involved and is probably one of the most grease-free dishes I do.

I've never understood the crock-pot thing; it sounds totally convenient and it does smell good in people's houses but what about all the fat?

If you plan ahead, you can cook it a day or so before, shove it into the
fridge overnight, and lift the fat off when it congeals.

OTOH, some of us rather like fat in moderation.

I can't get enough pumpkin dishes...bread, soup, ravioli, lattes, etc...MMMMMM.

and I'm also a big fan of oven-roasted veggies (esp. sweet potatoes and squashes) over quinoa.

Chili
 

I made some chili the other night with Carrol Shelby's Chili Kit - it was very delicious. They sell it at Safeway and other stores, too, I'm sure. I used some Jennie-O ground turkey, chopped onions, a can of tomato sauce, a can of Del Monte chopped tomatoes with onion/garlic, a can of organic kidney beans, and the mix. Very easy and in less than 15 minutes it was ready. So good with some fresh sourdough bread (or cornbread if you're more ambitious).

The kit comes with four packets: the "main" seasoning packet, a cayenne pepper packet, a salt packet, and a masa flour packet. I only used the first two (about half the cayenne pepper). It made a big batch and it tasted even better reheated for lunch the next day.

Well it depends on what you crockpot and what you do. If you use less fatty cuts of meat, you can avoid the fat issue---slow braising doesn't depend on fat for the unctuous result. But even with more fatty cuts (like your oxtails which you skim while cooking) you can still skim the fat off the top and enjoy the fat-lesser result.

So when you get home, skim the fat off the top and enjoy :)

Another advantage of the crock pot is its ability to cook the toughness out of most any tough (and cheap) cut of meat.

Chili in any way shape and form is the best.

All year I look forward to autumn and locally grown squashes. I love to dice an acorn and a butternut - roast them with lots of butter, honey and brown sugar.

Definately soups - Potatoe, cream of broccoli, meatball soup, Irish stew, etc.
Also chicken and dumplings.

Going home to some minestrone and herb bread tonight.:cool:

Another vote for the crockpot. Broke mine out today and made Tuscan White Bean Soup. Mmmmm. Can't beat coming home to the smell.

I'm also a big fan of Carrol Shelby's chili.

For those worried about the fat, Prevention has a pretty good crockpot cookbook with low calorie/fat recipes.

Roasted root vegetables. Buy mine at a Santa Monica Farmer's Market. I know it's fall when all of the yummy root vegetables appear and all of the stone fruit disappear. (Unfortunately, all of the good tomatoes disappear :()

Cooking Light also makes a Crockpot cookbook...lots of variety in there too.

Wow, I'm not the only person left with a taste for grease...:D

We have traditionally done "Western" dishes on Christmas eve and then hotpot or dumpling style stuff on Christmas/Boxing day. It'll be the same this year, I guess.

Sorry if I gave the impression of being anti-fat ~ I love a well-marbled steak , I adore fresh Foie Gras, Rillettes not to mention potatoes sauteed in duck fat :) ~ it's just that a lot of the things I cook such as the oxtail has oodles of it.

I am currently cooking a lot of vegetarian dishes (houseguests) and speaking of roasted roots, last night I made a wonderful vegetarian Shepherd's Pie. The roasted veggies, covered with a layer of chunky tomato/onion sauce, topped off with a thick layer of mashed potatoes. It was easy and good!

82F right now. Still have not pulled out the stockpots/crock pot or turned the oven on. Grilling again tonight.

1) Garlic Bread
2) Ham & Cream Soup
3) Congee

Hearty soups and stews as well as risotto

Being in South Florida going on 2 years now, I still have yet to get used to what I consider a climate that is only hot and hotter. At least in Texas it does get cold, and Chili is always good at this time of year or my mom's teriyaki steaks, which is what I would like right about now.
So for me it is a liquid diet, brewed and bottled, at this time of year.
Happy Thanksgiving

a hearty chilli on a cold fall day always hits the spot.