Featured
Adventures in Bitters
The hidden ingredient in your cocktail
Okra Fritters
Okra was just coming on at the Whitesburg Farmers Market while we were there. For this recipe, seek out the smallest okra you can. And don’t be deterred by okra’s mucilaginous quality; it’s the secret ingredient to successful fritters!
Arwen’s Hippie Salad
Arwen Donahue shares her recipe for this “freaking beautiful” salad made with odds and ends from the garden she tends with her husband (and our staff farmer) David Wagoner at their Three Springs Farm.
Get Your Grill On
We took the heat for you and fired up our grill. If your vibe is a charcoal grill, no sweat. These tips work well either way and will show you how to get the most out of a hot grill.
Ouita’s Great-Grandpa Zim
Aaron Rufus Zimmerman was Chef Ouita Michel’s great-grandpa on her mother’s side. He lived in Thermopolis, Wy. where he grew a vegetable garden big enough to feed his family and neighbors, and loved to entertain his great-grandchildren with tall tales and silly rhymes like the one about a possum eating pawpaws.
Queenie’s Pickled Peaches
We’ll only have local peaches for a few weeks (if we’re lucky!) so pickling is a great way to enjoy their precious flavor in unexpected ways. Try this recipe for Queenie’s Pickled Peaches, which former sous chef Lisa Laufer used to prepare every summer.
Building a Better Charcuterie Board
Who doesn’t love a good charcuterie board? It’s the perfect summertime/anytime way to feed a crowd or a couple of close friends. Before you go shopping, check out these tips from Chef Ouita Michel
Sustaining One Another
Chef Ouita Michel just got back from the 2022 Food & Wine Festival in Aspen, Co. While there, she participated in a panel discussion on sustainability in the restaurant industry and had her expectations upended in an eye-opening way.
Summer Tea Tips
It’s official! Summer has arrived. When hot and muggy team up to wear you down, fight back with a tall glass of iced tea, preferably while lounging on the porch under the whirring blades of a ceiling fan.
Carrot Top Pesto
Use this recipe as a guide and let your taste buds and crisper drawer inspire your own unique creation.
10 Tips to a More Sustainable Kitchen
With help from Chef Ouita and Culinary Director Tyler McNabb, we’ve pulled together some creative ways you can integrate sustainability into your kitchen by reducing food waste, lowering energy consumption, and eating well.
Hunting Morels
Alex Babich and Robin Reed took the stage at the Mountain Mushroom Festival in Irvine, Ky. to share tips and stories about hunting morels.
Our Bouquet Garni
A bouquet garni flavors everything we do. It’s the perfect illustration of our focus on Kentucky’s food culture – and how our stories grow richer together. Farmer and long-time collaborator David Wagoner has brought our bouquet garni to life on the grounds of Holly Hill Inn and is a wealth of knowledge and creativity.
The Measure of Her Worth
Freda Raglin is 100% genuine. We can’t resist the pull of her stories or the lingering aroma of her famous yeast rolls or the realization that Freda is a self-taught culinary genius. Her innate skill and ability to create delicious dishes by taste and touch are a treasure worth preserving.
Salad for Ouita
Pamela Sexton wrote a poem called “Salad for Ouita.” It’s an ode to salads, a lyrical recipe. Chef Ouita built a salad with her mother’s poem as a guide and the contents of Holly Hill’s refrigerator as an inspiration. Where will Pam’s poem take you; what will go in your salad bowl?
Living Our Salad Days
Maggie Dungan grows fresh produce on her Salad Days Farm in rural Woodford County. We cherish her green lettuces in the dark days of winter and celebrate living our salad days all year round.
Foraging Fools
Forager Storey Slone explores a local wildlife area with us, looking for edible wild plants and fungi. Along the way, she shows us that collecting and preparing wild-harvested products is a labor of love. A connection to the natural world and a reminder to be thankful for those things that are often invisible and yet bountiful in our daily lives.
Earth Apples and Shrooms
The beauty of this dish is that you can make it with whatever is fresh and in season locally; this is what we recently found at the Lexington Farmers Market. Measure with your heart and based on your audience. Cooking for yourself? Maybe two potatoes, a handful of mushrooms and a fried local egg on top for a great meal. Cooking for a group? Go for a couple pounds of potatoes, more mushrooms and serve it as a side!
Lisa’s Étouffée
Former Holly Hill Inn sous chef Lisa Laufer loved New Orleans. Countless cooks in our kitchen learned techniques and dishes at her side but when it came to writing down actual recipes, she liked to keep some things to herself. That’s why we say our recipe for Étouffée was inspired by Lisa. Because we’re pretty sure we’ll never be able to duplicate the secret ingredient she added to every dish ~ her own ineffable touch.
Qabuli Pulao
Qabuli Pulao is not a dish to be rushed. It’s not a difficult dish to make but multiple bowls and pots and pans will be used! It’s best made on a snowy weekend afternoon while sipping a leisurely cup of tea. Even better, play a little game of Barfi on a friend and have them make it for you!
Southern Collard Greens
Chef Chris Cain in collaboration with Black Soil: Our Better Nature presented his collard greens at Kentucky's AgriTech Council and shares his mouthwatering recipe here