Happy Holidays from Special Fork

By Sandy Hu

Special Fork bloggers will be on vacation beginning next week, to enable each of us to spend time with family and friends through the holidays. We’ll return January 2 with a look back at the best of Special Fork from 2011; all bloggers will return beginning January 9 with new recipes and fresh insights.

While there are no new blog postings, remember to check our database of recipes for your everyday cooking and holiday needs.

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Clams are Great for One or Two Bites

By Lori Powell

I have a fantastic fishmonger in my town that has the freshest littleneck clams that are truly littleneck (less than 2 inches in diameter and 10 to13 clams per pound) and not middleneck (3 to 4 inches in diameter and about 7 to 9 clams per pound). Yes there is such as thing.

Since the clams are super fresh, they’ll keep in the fridge for up to three days after purchasing. Also they cook up super-quick for a healthy weeknight dinner and you can buy a small quantity of clams. It’s definitely a win-win for cooks needing One or Two Bites.

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Very Merry One-Pot Pasta

By Katie Barreira

It’s lovely to go about making everything merry and bright, but it sure takes a lot of huffing and puffing. Here’s a weeknight meal that’s perfect for the holiday season: filling, festive and on the table in 15 minutes flat.

Ruby Pasta
Add a few glugs of red wine to your pasta pot and turn ho-hum into ho-ho-ho! Choose an inky, jewel-toned red, like Garnacha or Tempranillo, and trim the plate with a dash of greenery and a flurry of cheese.

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It’s a Wrap!

By Sandy Hu

Part of the fun of homemade food gifts is wrapping them for giving. Here are some of the foods we’ve cooked and baked recently, and how we packaged them for presents.

First the food gifts, all taking no more than 30 minutes of prep time (except for the sugar cookies):

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Dinner of a Lifetime

By Andrew Hunter

Last week I returned home from two weeks in Afghanistan. I was invited by the U.S. Army Special Forces Command to cook Thanksgiving dinner for the Green Berets downrange. This was the first time in history that a group of chefs have cooked at the “tip of the spear” as the soldiers call it, in hostile and kinetic forward operating bases.

All week long the soldiers were asking me why I would travel half way around the world and leave my family and the comfort of home to cook for a bunch of guys I have never met. My reply was, to say thank you the best way I know how…by cooking dinner. I told them I may only be one person, but I speak for millions of Americans, by bearing a simple taste of home during the holidays. My menu featured roast turkey, ham, grilled lobster tails, Cornish game hens and a giant steamship round of beef with all the traditional fixings including stuffing, sweet potatoes and honey ginger carrots, to name a few.

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