Homemade Pumpkin Gnocchi

On October 30, 2025October 30, 2025 By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Column, dry storedLeave a comment

Look online for gnocchi recipes, and you’ll find all sorts of variations on the classic potato dumplings, from easy substitutes like sweet potato to more unexpected ones like spinach, ricotta, or semolina. Of the replacements I have tried, I have the most success with pumpkin and other winter squash, as I share this week in my Twice as Tasty column for the Flathead Beacon.

Culinary experts who prefer store-bought pumpkin puree to homemade for pie generally give the same recommendation for gnocchi. But with repeated draining and the right accompanying ingredients, Roasted Winter Squash Puree works as successfully in dumplings as in Creamy Roasted Pumpkin Pie. A 3-pound sugar pumpkin or other squash usually creates enough puree for a batch of gnocchi.
Learn to make Homemade Pumpkin Gnocchi

Homemade Pan-Fried Potato Gnocchi

On October 24, 2025October 24, 2025 By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Column, dry storedLeave a comment

It can be easy to write off certain recipes as too much work, but sometimes the effort really is worth it. That’s how I feel about the detailed recipe for gnocchi that I share this week in my Twice as Tasty column for the Flathead Beacon. When I crave gnocchi, only the scratch-made version satisfies me.

Gnocchi take both hands-on and rest time, and even with a large batch, the results only last a couple of meals—although they do freeze well. Once I start the project and get my hands right in the dough, I find it soothing to feel how it comes together and to repeat the roll, cut, and imprint process until I have dozens of neat rows of dumplings lined up on baking sheets.

Potato gnocchi also became more fun to make when I found just the right balance of ingredients and techniques to use my homegrown potatoes yet keep them light and fluffy. When testing showed that a local chef’s recommendation to pan-fry the dumplings produced less gummy gnocchi than boiling, along with a lightly crisped surface, making gnocchi became one of my favorite rainy day kitchen projects.
Learn to make Homemade Pan-Fried Potato Gnocchi

Double Apple Muffins

On October 16, 2025October 16, 2025 By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Column, quick breadsLeave a comment

One of my favorite baked goods tricks is to replace some of the fat in the recipe with homemade applesauce. It works well with all sorts of muffins and quick breads, but it’s particularly delicious when you’re already featuring apples, like in the muffin recipe I share this week in my Twice as Tasty column for the Flathead Beacon.

I make two types of applesauce: Frozen Chunky Applesauce and Canned Smooth-Style Applesauce. Both work as replacements for up to half of the oil, butter or other fat in many baked goods that get their rising power from baking soda or baking powder, especially when that fat is liquid rather than solid. Use canned smooth applesauce if you want the substitution to blend in seamlessly. Chunky applesauce does the job when you don’t mind bites of apple in the mix or when pureed before measuring to make it smooth.
Learn to make Double Apple Muffins

Fresh Pear, Goat Cheese, and Rosemary Galette

On October 11, 2025October 11, 2025 By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn baked, ColumnLeave a comment

I’ve baked more galettes than usual in the last few months, and not because I harvested more fruit or went to more parties. What inspired me to create more of these freeform tarts was a new-to-me technique that kept their filling from becoming a runny mess that oozed out the sides of the folded pastry. It even improved the galette made with sturdy pears that I share this week my Twice as Tasty column for the Flathead Beacon.

The technique is simple: sprinkle absorptive cornmeal or breadcrumbs over the pastry before you spread out the fruit. The result is marvelous. I first used a cornmeal layer in one of my juiciest galettes, filled with fresh tart cherries and raspberries. In the past, I would pull a pan holding a berry-heavy galette from the oven to find the pasty sitting soggily in a pool of juice, leaving a sunken filling—and quite the mess to clean up. This time, the pan and parchment it rested on were bone dry, and the tart looked beautiful.

Credit goes to Clair Saffitz for this fabulous technique, which I learned from her Plum Galette with Polenta and Pistachios recipe in her Dessert Person cookbook and saw put to good use in recipes for apple and for apricot and strawberry galettes in her latest book, What’s For Dessert. Even her simplest recipes have highly detailed instructions and loads of tricks to improve your dessert making.
Learn to make Fresh Pear, Goat Cheese, and Rosemary Galette

Meatless Taco Salad

On September 25, 2025September 25, 2025 By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Column, salads2 Comments

Sometimes you want salads to be simple and light, especially when served alongside an entree. But when the salad is the meal, it’s time to pile on the layers and hit as many food groups as possible. That’s the idea behind the hearty, filling, plant-based taco salad I share this week in my Twice as Tasty column for the Flathead Beacon.

I’ve long loved this salad because it has so many delicious ingredients that it doesn’t need the ground beef often found in such a one-bowl meal. Kidney beans and cheese provide plenty of protein, and the crisp tortilla chips and other fresh layers supply contrasting textures. The vegetables become the salad’s stars, and I pile on as many as my garden is producing—roasted garlic, corn, cherry tomatoes, greens, onion tops, and cilantro—with avocado, lime and green olives that I can’t grow in Montana for bonus fun. With so many fresh ingredient options and a homemade salad dressing built around my favorite salsa, I could eat this salad every day and never tire of it.
Learn to make Meatless Taco Salad

Corncob Stock

On September 18, 2025September 18, 2025 By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Column, frozenLeave a comment

I love recipes like Corncob Stock because they turn food scraps into something delicious that you can’t easily buy. As I explain this week in my Twice as Tasty column for the Flathead Beacon, stock made from corncobs not only uses scraps but helps the cobs to break down faster in the compost.

I make this versatile stock from a large batch of Husk-Grilled Corn after I’ve stripped the kernels off of the cobs to freeze for year-round use in recipes like Corn Kernel Muffins with Sage. With the kernels set aside to eat and the cobs simmered into a flavorful stock, you’ve minimized waste and captured maximum flavor with little effort.
Learn to make Corncob Stock

Goat Cheese and Smoked-Beet Sandwiches

On September 11, 2025September 11, 2025 By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Column, fresh eatingLeave a comment

I was introduced to smoked beets as a sandwich filling, and it’s still one of my favorite ways to enjoy them. As I’ve been explaining in my most recent Twice as Tasty columns for the Flathead Beacon, beets need to be cooked—preferably roasted—and peeled before you smoke them, so it is an extra step. But smoking makes them twice as tasty.

The flavor and texture of smoked beets make them a natural fit for a Vegetarian Smoked-Beet Reuben, but you can slide them in with any sandwich fixings you have at hand. They hold up well against robust ingredients, so the recipe in this week’s column suggests mustard, roasted garlic, goat cheese, and arugula and other spicy greens. Mellower layers include aioli, egg salad, and sliced avocado. Create an even more filling sandwich by spreading on hummus or another bean dip.
Learn to make Goat Cheese and Smoked-Beet Sandwiches

Roasted and Smoked Beets with Orange Vinaigrette

On September 5, 2025September 5, 2025 By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Column, grilledLeave a comment

Until I began growing beets, I underrated these fully edible plants and the many ways to prepare them. I prefer beet greens and stems when they’re young and tender, either raw or lightly wilted. But when it comes to the bulbous roots, I think that the more time you invest, the better they taste.

Raw beetroots sometimes taste slightly bitter. Boil or steam them, and their earthy flavor starts to sweeten. Roast them in the oven or on a grill, and their natural sugars caramelize. For ultimate flavor, I give cooked beets a secondary treatment and smoke them, as I explain this week in my Twice as Tasty column for the Flathead Beacon.

All beet varieties smoke equally well. Red ones retain their rich wine color, and sliced Chioggias show off their candy cane stripes. Golden ones keep their sunny hue when smoked and carry more flavor into Roasted Golden Beet and Garlic Salad.
Learn to make Roasted and Smoked Beets with Orange Vinaigrette

Smoky Homemade Chili Paste

On August 28, 2025August 28, 2025 By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn Column, refrigeratedLeave a comment

Homemade hot sauces have become all the rage, because they’re simple to make, last for months, and customizable to an ever-widening variety of chilies at a range of heat levels. I included several in my pickling cookbook, from long-fermented red hot sauce and garlicy sriracha, to quick green and red vinegar-based hot sauces with red chilies and tomatillos, to thicker spicy pastes popular in Southeast Asia and North Africa. A home-smoked chili paste, the result of my first exploration into making hot sauce, didn’t make it into the book, but I share it this week in my Twice as Tasty column for the Flathead Beacon.

Like other hot sauces, you can make this paste as spicy as you like. My batch varies every year because I typically make it as the growing season is winding down. I usually grow a half-dozen types of hot peppers, from mild pepperoncini to spicy Thai chilies, and whatever is left on the plants in small enough quantities not to pickle or dry on their own ends up mixed together on a grill tray over a smoke tube.
Learn to make Smoky Homemade Chili Paste

Grilled Tomatillo Margarita

On August 21, 2025August 21, 2025 By Julie Laing | Twice As TastyIn beverages, ColumnLeave a comment

The margarita recipe I share this week in my Twice as Tasty column for the Flathead Beacon is one of my favorite summer beverages—and one I mix up throughout the year when I need a homegrown hint of summer in my day. I grow and grill the tomatillos in summer and then freeze the strained juice in cubes. They’re easy to thaw and combine with agave, lime juice, tequila, and Homemade Triple Sec for a fresh homemade margarita.

To grow tomatillos, you need at least two plants so that they can cross-pollinate. That produces a big enough harvest to create plenty of grilled tomatillo juice cubes and turn the solids into Grilled Tomatillo Salsa—and still have tomatillos to use. I include recipes for quick fresh salsa and hot sauce that use tomatillos in The Complete Guide to Pickling. I’m increasingly using one or two at a time in nightly meals too, like salads and stir-fries.
Learn to make a Grilled Tomatillo Margarita