Top: The ingredients for guasacaca. Center: Simply add them to a blender or food processor. Bottom: The finished sauce in its original consistency. Photos courtesy Cory of TheAmuseBouche.com. Here’s her recipe.

A few nights ago we had a revelation. A great chef did an irresistible spin on guasacaca, the popular Venezuelan green sauce for grilled meats.

Chef Karlos Ponte, who ws born in Venezuela and worked at El Bulli and Noma, is now executive chef at Taller in Copenhagen. He and his team came to New York City to cook a one-night-only tasting dinner at The Pines in Brooklyn.

Chef Ponte changed the proportions of the classic guasacaca sauce: less avocado, more vinegar. In fact, we tasted herbs and acid instead of avocado.

While Venezuelan guasacaca is often made thick and chunky like guacamole, his interpretation is thin and acidic, like a French persillade (parsley, garlic, herbs, oil and vinegar).

This balance was perfection: We actually turned our backs to the room and licked the sauce off the plate. Thanks go to Taller’s general manager Jacob Brink Lauridsen (born in Venezuela, raised in Denmark), for taking this as a compliment.
 
WHAT IS GUASACACA SAUCE?

Guasacaca (wa-sa-KA-ka) combines avocado with vinegar and herbs. It can be made with with bit of jalapeño or hot sauce, although like guacamole, it is not intended to be a hot and spicy sauce.

Guasacaca is served with beef, chicken and sausage grilled on a parilla.* It’s also a popular condiment with arepas and empanadas.

We generously received a container of the sauce “to go,” and have since served it with eggs, fish and seafood; as a salad dressing; and as a dip with crudités.

Chef Ponte’s sauce was so splendid, that our group of sophisticated palates used it with the breads (Chef Ponte’s recipes, also splendid), and drank some of it from the container on the way home from the restaurant.

Here’s the catch: We now have to work out proportions similar to Chef Ponte’s. We started by eliminating one avocado and doubling the red wine vinegar. Our first batch was delicious, but not yet perfection.

In the interim, here’s the classic guasacaca recipe, a real find for summer grilling. Add less oil for a dip.

Prep time is just 10 minutes, no cooking involved!

Ingredients For 2 Cups

 
Preparation

1. PLACE all ingredients except the olive oil, salt and pepper into a food processor or blender. Pulse until the vegetables are finely chopped, scraping down the sides of the container as needed. Process until smooth.

2. DRIZZLE in the olive oil in a continuous stream through feed tube (or top of blender), with the motor running. Process until smooth.

3. TASTE and season with salt and pepper to taste. Let stand at room temperature for an hour for the flavors to blend. Taste again and add more seasoning as desired.

4. SERVE the sauce at room temperature. You can make it in advance and store it in the fridge, but bring the sauce to room temperature before serving.

NOTE: If made in advance, the avocado portion can darken. Tamp a piece of plastic wrap on the surface of the sauce.
 
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*A a parilla is a simple grill comprising an iron grate over hot coals.

†You can use less herbs—as little as 1/2 cup parsley and 1/4 cup cilantro—to taste. Save the stems for stock, soup or other recipes. You can also chop them and toss them into green salads.

‡In Venezuela, corn oil is used instead of olive oil.
  

With Father’s Say tomorrow, we couldn’t wait to test these French Toast recipes.

First up: French Toast sandwiches.
 
 
SWEET OR SAVORY FRENCH TOAST SANDWICHES 

Use French Toast slices as bread to make a sandwich.

We made a wonderbar French Toast sandwich with smoked salmon, soft goat cheese (substitute cream cheese), onion, and tomato. Then we tried other favorite fillings:

 
To make Grilled Cheese French Toast: Sauté the second side of the bread to a lighter “toast,” add the cheese (and ham or other meat), add the top slice, and grill until the cheese melts.
 
 
RECIPE: APPLE PECAN FRENCH TOAST

This recipe isn’t a sandwich but was such a delight that we had to include it.

The recipe is from Zulka Morena, producers of top-quality, minimally processed sugars (granulated, confectioner’s, brown) made with freshly-harvested sugar cane. The sugars are not refined, which helps preserve the fresh flavor and natural properties of the sugar cane. You can taste the difference in a cup of tea. Zulka makes.
 
Ingredients

 
Preparation

1. CORE, peel, and quarter the apples, then slice into ¼-inch thick slices. Place in a bowl and toss with 1 tablespoon of cinnamon and ¼ cup of sugar, making sure the apples are well coated. Set aside.

2. WHISK together the eggs, ¼ cup of sugar, the remaining tablespoon of cinnamon, vanilla, milk, and cream in a large bowl.

3. GREASE the bottom of a large baking pan with the butter. Dip half of the slices of bread in the egg mixture quickly so they are not saturated, one at a time, and place in the pan. Spread half of the apple mixture over the bread. Repeat with the remaining bread and apple mixture. Then pour the remaining egg mixture over the top of the pan.

4. SPRINKLE the top with the chopped pecans and the remaining ¼ cup of sugar. Cover with foil and refrigerate overnight.

5. PREHEAT the oven to 350°F. Remove the pan from the refrigerator 30 minutes before baking, warm to room temperature, and bake for 45 minutes, covered. Remove the foil and bake for an additional 10 minutes. Serve warm, drizzled with maple syrup.
 
FIND MORE FRENCH TOAST RECIPES

[1] French Toast sandwich with fig jam.

[2] French Toast sandwich with Nutella and jam on pandoro yeast bread with fruit (photo © Bauli USA).

[3] Grilled Cheese French Toast—even richer than grilled cheese because of the egg-milk batter (photo © Arla USA).

[4] Not a sandwich but a delicious French Toast recipe with apples and pecans (photo © Zulka Sugar).

Take your choice: innovative Mac & Cheese (photo courtesy Chef Eric LeVine) or a conventional preparation (photo courtesy Dietz and Watson).

What’s on this plate?

 
This may be just the thing for a fun food-loving dad on Father’s Day.

The concept is from one of our favorite innovative chefs, Eric LeVine.

Chef Eric is the author of Small Bites Big Flavor: Simple, Savory, And Sophisticated Recipes For Entertaining.

This imaginative cookbook is written for home chefs who want to expand their repertoire with fun and unconventional dishes.

The 100+ recipes also include mid-sized, larger and sweet bites, and even some signature cocktails. It demonstrates how much fun it can be to prepare, present, share, and of course, eat food.
 
MORE FUN MAC & CHEESE RECIPES

These are a bit more conventional, yet still fun food:

Here’s one of the easiest, tastiest “sticky buns” recipe. It was developed by the master bakers at King Arthur Flour.

Simple biscuit dough is dropped atop a sweet and salty maple-bacon-brown sugar syrup. Once baked, the biscuits are turned out of the pan upside down, so the sticky topping drips down their sides.
 
BACON STICKY BUNS

Ingredients For The Syrup

 
For 16 Small Biscuits

 
Preparation

1. Preheat the oven to 475°F. Lightly grease an 8″ square or 9″ round pan; whichever size you choose, make sure it’s at least 2″ deep, to prevent any boil-over.

2. MAKE the syrup: Chop the cooked bacon into 1/2″ pieces. Combine the bacon with the remaining syrup ingredients, stirring until well combined. Spread in the bottom of the prepared pan.

3. MAKE the biscuits: Whisk the dry ingredients together in a bowl. Work in the butter until the mixture is crumbly; some larger, pea-sized pieces of butter may remain intact. Add the milk or buttermilk, stirring to make a sticky dough.

Top: Bacon sticky buns. Bottom: Maple syrup and bacon go into the sticky bun syrup.

5. BAKE the biscuits for 10 minutes. Turn the oven off, and leave them in the oven for an additional 5 to 10 minutes, until they’re golden brown. Remove the biscuits from the oven and immediately turn the pan over onto a serving plate. Lift off the pan, and scrape any syrup left in the pan onto the biscuits. Pull biscuits apart to serve.
 
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*You can easily make buttermilk at home. For one cup of buttermilk, add 1 tablespoon of white vinegar or lemon juice plus enough milk to measure 1 cup. Stir, then let stand for 5 minutes. You can also use 1 cup of plain yogurt or 1-3/4 teaspoons cream of tartar plus 1 cup milk.

Top: Chocolate-dipped macaroons (photo courtesy McCormick). Center: Plain coconut macaroons (photo courtesy Recchiuti Confections). Bottom: Up close (photo by Georgie Grd | Wikipedia).

If you like coconut, don’t wait until Passover* to make coconut macaroons. They’re a great treat year-round, and gluten-free. Bring them as house gifts: They travel well without breaking.

We adapted this recipe from one by Serena Rain of VanillaQueen.com, purveyor of top-quality vanilla beans, extracts, pastes, powders, sugars and salts.
 
RECIPE: COCONUT MACAROONS

You don’t need to add chocolate to macaroons; but if you want to, there are two options:

 
Ingredients For About 24 Cookies

 
Preparation

You can incorporate the orange peel into the dough or the glaze. We like the “lift” it gives to the recipe.

1. PREHEAT the oven to 350°F. Line baking pans with parchment paper.

2. COMBINE the ingredients in a medium bowl and stir until well incorporated. Use a spoon to scoop tablespoon-sized mounds of the coconut “dough.” Shape into round balls and place on the parchment paper. Alternative: You can drop the dough as unshaped mounds. See the difference between the top photo (dropped) and the bottom photo (shaped).

3. BAKE for about 20 minutes or until golden brown (aim for the color in the center photo). Let cool.

4. MAKE the glaze. Place the chocolate in a bowl and microwave for 30 seconds. Stir, and if necessary, heat for 30 more seconds until fully melted. Dip the bottoms of the cooled macaroons into the chocolate. Alternatively, place the cookies on a tray lined with parchment paper and drizzle the tops with chocolate; let cool until set. Some people prefer the glaze on top: a chocolate dome. Take your pick.

Macaroons appeared in the late 15th or early 16th century in Italy. The historical record isn’t clear, but they are believed to have been created by monks. There were thousands of monasteries in medieval Europe, and monks created different types of beers, brandies and liqueurs, cheeses, pretzels, sweets, wines and spirits.

The first macaroons were almond meringue cookies similar to today’s amaretti cookies, with a crisp crust and a soft interior. They were made from egg whites and almond paste.

Italian Jews adopted the cookie because it had no flour or leavening‡, so could be enjoyed during the eight-day observation of Passover. It was introduced to other European Jews and became popular as a year-round sweet. Over time, coconut was added to the ground almonds and, in some recipes, replaced them. Today in the U.S., coconut macaroons are the norm.

Macaroons came to France in 1533 with the pastry chefs of Catherine de Medici, wife of France’s King Henri II. In France they evolved into delicate meringue cookie sandwiches filled with ganache or jam.

Here’s more about the different types of macaroons.
 
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*During the week of Passover, in April, celebrants eat no leavened grains. Macaroons (all varieties) are grain free.

†Almond meal, or almond flour, is ground from whole, blanched sweet almonds. The nuts are very low in carbohydrates and very nutritious.

‡Leavening is the agent that raises and lightens a baked good. Examples include yeast, baking powder and baking soda. Instead of these, macaroons (all types) are leavened with egg whites.