Description

Travel writing of the recipe kind, this cookbook and genealogy hybrid selects the best from tried-and-true, stain-spattered, dog-eared, and time-honored collections. The Ghost in the Pantry dishes up tastes and aromas evocative of other times and places—and invites you to pull up a chair. From Italian-American, Irish-American, and Czech kitchens, these daily recipes are perfect for sampling from-scratch cooking and baking.

From the Bábovka of a Czech country bakery to the Chicken Cacciatore from Denver's Little Italy of the 1930s, this book traces the paths families carve out, generation by generation—and asks what sustains them, and what persists. These are recipes for making in a kitchen crowded with laughter and storytelling.

With something for every season and taste, The Ghost in the Pantry invites you on a historical-culinary journey, one recipe at a time.

This project was completed as part of the DailyLit Externship Program.

Table of Contents

Preface
Appetizers
Stuffed Mushrooms
Sandwich Spread (Pomazánka)

Soups
Grandmother’s Fish Soup (Rybí polévka podle Maminky)
Ukrainian Borscht (Boršč Ukrajinský)
Sour Šumava Soup (Polévka Šumavské kyselo)
Winter Soup from the Krkonošská Mountains (Polévka podkrkonošská zimní)

Vegetables
Stuffed Eggplant (Plněné lilky)
Sweet-Potato and Apple Scallop
Cabbage à la Sedmihradské, or à la Kološvárské (Sedmihradské vrstvené zelí, zvané též kološvárské)

Rice and Pasta Risotto Milanese
Uncle Viktor’s Spaghetti

Entrées
Baked Chicken with Cheese and Ham (Kuře zapékané se šunkou a se syrem)
Chicken Cacciatore
Chicken Paprika (Divoká slepice na paprice)
Black Cherry Chicken Sauté
Rabbit in Cream Sauce (Králík na smetané)
Ragout of Rabbit or Chicken (Ragú z králika nebo kuřete)
Rolled Baked Round Steak
Pork Chops with Apples and Onions (Vepřove žebirko s jabulky a cibulí)
Lamb Roast
Traditional Czech Pot Roast (Staročeské roštěnky)
Baked Trout with Dressing

Breads and Cookies
Quick Cloverleaf Rolls and Butterhorn Rolls
Cream Cheese Dough for Strudel, Pastry, and Fruit Dumplings (Těsto tvarohové na záviny, moučniky, a ovocné knedlíky)
Soda Bread
Nutty Nuggets (Snowball Cookies)
Devil’s Eyes (Čertovy oči)
Pecan Lace Cookies
Italian Knots

Cakes and Desserts
Apple Trifle (Dort s jablek)
Apple Dandy
Aunt Dana’s Oil Bábovka (Olejová bábovka podle Dany)
Apple Dumplings
Parisian Cake (Pařížský dort)
Lady Baltimore Cake
Devil’s Food Cake
Sunshine Cake
Christmas Strudel (Vánoční Závin)
Rhubarb Pie
Apple Brown Betty
Presidential Cake (Prezidentská babovka)
Aunt Laura’s Cake
Old-Fashioned Gingerbread (Maminčin perník)

And Finally
Mint Drink

Extended Copyright Information

Copyright 2009 Erin Ferretti Slattery. All rights reserved.

About the Author

Erin Ferretti Slattery grew up in California and Colorado, and has lived in Europe and the Middle East. A graduate of Hollins College, the University of Missouri-Columbia, and the Sorbonne, she has been published in Poetry, appeared on WNYC's "The Brian Lehrer Show," and written for Jauntsetter about Prague.

Learn more about this author.

Opening Lines (Experimental)

It’s the mid-1890s, and there are no ghosts. My Irish great-grandfather Slattery is a hat-maker and businessman strolling down narrow Stetson Street in Orange, New Jersey, dreaming of New York City. A young great-grandfather O’Neill is getting an earful from his father about deciding to go to ...

Copyright

Copyright 2009 by Erin Ferretti Slattery.

All Rights Reserved.