Top: Use a cookie cutter to make cut-outs or shape marzipan shamrocks on a pie crust (photo courtesy American Pie Council). Bottom: Our favorite: a Grasshopper Ice Cream Pie (photo courtesy Taste Of Home). The recipe is below.

Make a Leprechaun Pie for St. Patrick’s Day.

What’s a Leprechaun Pie? It’s anything you want it to be, as long as it has a St. Pat’s theme: green color and/or shamrock decorations, Irish cream liqueur for adults.

Just pick a “base” pie and decorations. Most of these recipes are so easy, you can enlist a willing tween or teen to do the prep work.

LEPRECHAUN PIE OPTIONS

 
Decorations

If your pie has no top crust, you can decorate the surface with:

 
RECIPE: ICE CREAM GRASSHOPPER PIE

You can make this pie (photo above) in 10 minutes plus freezing time, using store-bought mint chocolate chip ice cream and a chocolate cookie crust.

If you don’t like mint, add 2 tablespoons of Irish cream liqueur to softened vanilla ice cream. You can also tint the vanilla green with food color.

 
Preparation

1. SPREAD the ice cream into the pie crust. Sprinkle with the cookies and candies.

2. DRIZZLE with the ice cream topping and freeze until firm. Remove from the freezer 15 minutes before serving.
 
RECIPE: CHOCOLATE COOKIE CRUST

Ingredients

 
Preparation

1. COMBINE the wafer crumbs, sugar and butter in a bowl. Pat the mixture onto the bottom and up the side of a buttered 8- or 9-inch pie plate.

2. BAKE in the middle of a preheated 450°F oven for 5 minutes. Set aside to cool.

We love this idea from Elegant Affairs Caterers: a St. Patrick’s Day dessert or snack with Lucky Charms!

Just use a green filling layer: pistachio Jell-O pudding, vanilla pudding or whipped cream tinted green, mint chip ice cream, etc.

RECIPE: LUCKY CHARMS PARFAIT FOR ST. PATRICK’S DAY

Ingredients

 
Preparation

1. PLACE the optional chocolate coin at the bottom of a sundae or parfait dish. You can use any other glass vessel, from a mug to a goblet wine glass.

2. ALTERNATE layers of cake, filling and optional dessert sauce.

3. GARNISH and serve.

On a recent trip to a churrascaria to indulge in the salad bar, our colleague Hannah Kaminsky discovered something more memorable than the jumbo asparagus and whole cloves of caramelized garlic: pão de queijo, Brazilian Cheese Bread.

Not a conventional bread (no kneading required), pão de queijo (pow de KAY-zoo) is a Brazilian variation of gougères (goo-ZHAIR)—airy cheese puffs made from savory choux pastry mixed with grated Gruyère cheese.

A key difference: Pão de queijo is made from gluten-free flour, either yucca (a.k.a. cassava or manioc) or tapioca flour. This makes pão de queijo gluten free, and also more dense and chewy (much like savory, baked mochi, Hannah notes).

They’re delicious with beer, wine and cocktails.

 
RECIPE: BRAZILIAN CHEESE BREAD (PÃO DE QUEIJO)

Ingredients For 2 Dozen Puffs

 
Preparation

1. PREHEAT the oven to 450F. Lightly grease two mini muffin pans.

2. COMBINE the milk, oil, and salt in a 2-quart saucepan and bring to a gentle boil over medium heat, whisking occasionally until large bubbles form.

3. REMOVE the pot from the heat and add the flour, stirring until it is fully incorporated (it will be gelatinous and grainy). You don’t need to worry about over-mixing the dough, since there’s no gluten to toughen. Pause as needed to scrape down the sides of the blender to ensure that everything is thoroughly incorporated. Once the dough is completely smooth…

4. TRANSFER the dough to the bowl of a mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Beat at medium for a few minutes until it is smooth. When it is cool to the touch…

5. WHISK the eggs in a small bowl; then mix into the dough on medium speed. Incorporate half of the eggs first, incorporate fully and add the second half.

6. BEAT in the cheese with the mixer on medium. The dough will become very sticky.

7. DISPENSE the dough into the muffin cups, filling 3/4 of the way to the top. Dip your spoon or scoop in water to prevent sticking.

8. LOWER the heat to 350°F and bake for 25-30 minutes, until puffy and lightly golden. Remove from the oven and let cool on a rack for a few minutes. Don’t be alarmed if some of the centers fall as they cool.

9. ENJOY them warm and crisp. Leftover puffs can be kept in an airtight container for up to a week and re-crisped in a warm oven or toaster oven.
 
*Use sweet (untreated) cassava flour if you can’t find the sour version. The sour style provides a nuance of dlightly fermented flavor.

Top and second: Brazilian Cheese Bread photos © Hannah Kaminsky | Bittersweet Blog. Third and fourth: Check natural food stores or Latin American markets; or order online.

Both cassava flour and tapioca flour are made from the cassava root. However, the process and end result differ.

 
Among the gluten-free flour options, cassava and tapioca flours are most like wheat flour. Unlike almond or coconut flour, they have a mild, neutral flavor and are powdery like wheat flour—not grainy or gritty.

They can be replaced for wheat flour on a 1:1 basis in many recipes. Note, though, that when mixed with liquid, the dough turns gelatinous and sticky. Keep a bowl of water and paper towels handy for rising your fingers and utensils.

You can find these flours in health food stores and natural food stores such as Whole Foods Markets; and of course, online.
  

Add Guinness stout to your BBQ sauce. Photos and recipe courtesy Tony Roma’s.

You don’t need the luck of the Irish to get some: Here’s the recipe, which combines the dark, malty flavors of Ireland’s favorite beer, Guinness stout, with the sweet and savory flavors of good barbecue sauce.

Don’t want to cook? Head to the nearest Tony Roma’s restaurant for Irish Baby Back Ribs and the Irish Burger.

If you don’t need as much sauce, cut back the recipe. Or, gift some to friends and family.
 
 
RECIPE: TONY ROMA’S GUINNESS BBQ SAUCE

Ingredients For 2½ Quarts Sauce

 
Preparation

You can buy steak seasoning or make your own.
 
Ingredients

 
Optional Ingredients

 
Preparation

 
To season meat prior to grilling:

“What is cold-pressed juice,” our aunt asked us recently, “and should I be drinking it instead of Tropicana?”

While we don’t focus on health foods, we’ll give the topic a bit of attention.

Cold-pressed juicing has existed for decades among health-food devotées, and generated attention in the 1990s as more sophisticated home juicers came onto the market.

But it has become much more visible over the last few years as some celebrities (Gwyneth, Kim et al) have publicized their juice fasts for dieting and/or health.

This engendered the current juicing fad, made more visible by the proliferation of shops and delivery services selling pricey cold-pressed juice. (By the same token, buying produce at retail for pressing juice at home is not inexpensive.)
 
SHOULD YOU SWITCH TO COLD-PRESSED JUICE?

If you’re a juice drinker, or are thinking about it, know that there is little scientific evidence to support the claim that cold-pressed juice contains more nutrients than pasteurized juices, or those you could hand-squeeze at home. However, when the juice is unfiltered and cloudy, it indicates a higher level of fiber.

What is known is that any juice begins to lose nutrients immediately after squeezing, and should consumed quickly if you want to capture every iota of nutrition. Those juices made commercially under high pressure processing (HPP) hold their nutrients longer. Hard-core juicers argue that cold-pressed is better than HPP. Here’s the argument.
 
PRESSING JUICE AT HOME

There are two main categories of home juicers:

 
OUR AFFORDABLE SOLUTION

Before we had ever heard the term “cold-pressed juice,” we were hooked on a Red Jacket Orchards, a family juice brand produced in New York’s Finger Lakes region that’s delicious, nutritious, unfiltered and affordable.

They’ve been selling cold-pressed apple juices and blends for 50 years. We’re not a committed juicer; we just love the refreshing flavor as a glass of juice or a cocktail mixer.

We like every flavor, but are hooked on Joe’s Half & Half.

The company sells it online; use the store locator to find a retailer near you. Online, three 32-ounce bottles are $31, including shipping.

Top: The Kuvings NJ-9500U Centrifugal Juice Extractor, $149 on Amazon.com. Second: A masticating juicer from Omega, $299.99 at Amazon.com. Third: Cold-pressed juice at Trader Joe’s. Bottom: Red Jacket, a brand that’s been quietly selling cold-pressed juice for 50 years.