This is a very quick and easy appetizer that is a great crowd pleaser. The slight difficulty is finding sashimi-grade hamachi (yellow-tail tuna). In San Francisco, my go-to fish monger is Billingsgate.
Category: appetizer
Banitza – a Bulgarian classic
Banitza (also known as bоrek in Turkish, and tiropita in Greek) is a phyllo dough pastry with eggs, feta cheese and lots of butter. It is one of the few dishes that small kids and adults delight in equally.
Caviar service
We fell in love with caviar in the now defunct San Francisco restaurant Jardiniere. It had the best caviar service, and what we do at home is very much an imitation / homage to Jardiniere. Btw, the best caviar service in town is currently at Spruce.
Crab salad with avocado and grapefruit
When life gives you lemons, you make a lemonade; and when friends give you a Harry and David grapefruit basket, you … keep making dishes that involve grapefruit: Braised endive and citrus salad, Caramelized fennel and grapefruit salad, and now crab salad with grapefruit.
Crab cakes (with shrimp)
I have been making crab cakes from the same recipe for years, but at my recent cooking bootcamp at the Culinary Institute of America I learned a new one. In this recipe shrimp paste is used as the binder to hold the crab cakes together.
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Octopus on patatas bravas
This dish can be served as canapés, as an appetizer or even a main course. I use it mostly as canapés when I host large groups of people for Thanksgiving or Christmas.
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Dungeness crab salad
This is probably the only crab salad that is not doused in mayo. I have done this many times over the years, and it is one of my all time favorites during the “r” months – i.e. when we have Dungeness crab in San Francisco – November through April (although it is best December through…
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Beet tartare
I know that red beets aren’t on the approved list of vegetables in America but I love them. And I regularly impose them on my dinner party guests, sometimes just to watch them push the bright red mixture around the plate. This tartare makes the most of their naturally gorgeous color. It keeps well in…
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Crab cakes
Follow me on Instagram. These are perfect for the holiday season entertaining. Serve as a first course, or as finger food while your guests are enjoying their cocktails. Perfect with a nice glass of champagne.
