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Woodford Salad — The Winter Edition
It’s sunshine on the plate, full of bright flavor!
Woodford Salad
This bright and festive salad brings the party to any meal with friends and family. Created by Chef Ouita while she was chef-in-residence at a well-known Woodford County distillery, it marries local sorghum and Kentucky bourbon in a lively vinaigrette you'll want to put on everything.
Roast Squash with Porcini Cream
Foraging for fall flavors, we were inspired by this simple yet sublime dish of squash roasted with dried porcini and heavy cream. It's perfect for an autumn side or vegetarian main.
Our Home Place Pastitsio
Tootsie Nelson’s It’s All Greek to Me cooking class left us hungry for more flavors from Greece! Our pastitsio recipe, named for Our Home Place Meats, was inspired by one from Ronald Johnson, the late American poet and cookbook author. Back in the 1960s, Ronald Johnson briefly taught a creative writing class at the University of Kentucky while Wendell Berry was on leave.
Hecker Family German Potato Salad
Hecker family cookouts always included three non-negotiable dishes – metts and brats and German potato salad. No steaks or chops or boneless chicken breasts for us. Just these and a few equally non-negotiable garnishes – sauerkraut, mustard, dill pickles and Swiss cheese.
Cheesy Grits Frits
Whether you're working from leftover grits or making a batch fresh, these bites are always a good idea. Cheese grits just got even better.
Apple Chutney
Savor our sweet and tangy chutney on a cheese or charcuterie board, with a grilled cheese sandwich, and alongside baked ham or roast pork, chicken or winter squash. We even snuck a spoonful onto our apple cornmeal crepe and approved.
Dried Apple Peels
Easy oven-dried apple peels let you get one more treat out of an ingredient that would otherwise be discarded. They’re great for topping cereal, yogurt or a salad; or eating au naturel.
Apple Cornmeal Crepe
This apple cornmeal crepe makes an excellent base for a green salad dressed with a punchy vinaigrette. It’s neither completely savory nor completely sweet, but always completely right when made with local apples on a crisp autumn day.
La Pitchoune
Julia Child’s husband Paul was famous for concocting fanciful cocktails. We created La Pitchoune in homage to Paul and Julia and their home in Provence where they spent many happy holidays and where Julia taught her cooking classes.
Greased Pig Salad
Use this recipe as a guide for flavor, scale it up or down and feel free to use more of a preferred ingredient but don’t skimp on the salt or the toppings!
Watermelon Marga-Ouita
Holly Hill founder and Chef Ouita Michel loves to relax with a refreshing margarita; we love to create different flavors as summer unfolds! Here’s a watermelon version from Honeywood Bar Manager Leah Craig
Watermelon Salads
With so many watermelon salad options out there, we asked three of our chefs how they like to prepare this summertime treat.
Pickled Watermelon Rind
When it’s all said and done and you’ve savored the last of its sweetness, you’re still left with a lot of watermelon rind. Don’t toss it; make these delicious pickles instead and enjoy them after summer’s long gone!
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!
Green Gazpacho
Chef Hannah’s Green Gazpacho is the amuse bouche on Holly Hill Inn’s Restaurant Week menu and we’re already getting customer requests for the recipe. Enjoy it at Holly Hill Inn, then recreate its refreshing flavor at home when Restaurant Week is done!
Three Sisters Succotash
In honor of Jim Embry’s work on sustainability, we coaxed a recipe for Three Sisters Succotash out of Honeywood Chef Cody DeRosett. We took a few liberties with Chef Cody’s recipe but you can enjoy his version at Honeywood during Lexington Restaurant Week.
Farmers Market Panzanella
Our panzanella recipe was inspired by Marcella Hazan’s “Bread and Vegetable Salad with Anchovies” from The Classic Italian Cookbook, first published in 1973.
Holly Hill Inn Corn Sticks
We’re exploring the Peytonia Cook Book, written in 1906 by Atholene Peyton, a domestic science teacher at Louisville’s Central Colored High School during the first half of the twentieth century. Try our Holly Hill corn sticks, based on her 100+ year-old corn muffin recipe.
Bread & Butter Pickled Poke
Pokeweed is a foodstuff that people turned to when little else was available. In spite of its natural toxicity, it was and still is valued as a reputed spring tonic. If you’re feeling adventurous (and in good health), here’s a recipe from Chef Ouita Michel’s great-grandmother Myrtle Molly Zimmerman.
Peytonia Picnic Punch
It’s picnic season! Mix up a pitcher of this fruity, bourbon-spiked wine punch, adapted from the Peytonia Cook Book, written in 1906 by Atholene Peyton, Kentucky’s first Black cookbook author.