Molly Yeh’s dad was the one who persuaded her to make her grandmother’s braised pork for the first time. It was one of his favorite foods growing up, and when Molly got the recipe from her grandmother Mary, she understood why. “I love how heavy it is on the sugar as well as the star anise, which I don’t use a lot in my cooking,” she says. “It’s so comforting and has this warm, nostalgic quality.”
Cookie salad is my favorite of the Midwest dessert salads and it's typically made with fudge stripe cookies, whipped cream, pudding and fruit. Rugelach is a rolled Jewish cookie that's usually filled with jam, chocolate or cinnamon sugar. I got the idea to combine the two when my friends kept calling rugelach "arugula" (they kind of sound the same!), so the whole thing is a play on words and it's really really tasty because the cookies get a little soft, almost cake-like, and the flavors all play so well together.
Since everyone in Molly’s house loves eggs, ham, and tots AND Molly’s a sucker for clever wordplay, the fri-tot-ta is a definite crowd pleaser. It’s a frittata with tots! It’s creamy, crispy, cheesy, and basically all of your favorite breakfast foods in one dish.
When it’s beet harvest on the farm, Molly loves making the farmers field lunches to fill them up during the long working days. This hearty, melty, meaty burrito, stuffed with crispy tots, is the ideal handheld situation to be scarfed on a tractor, and pro-tip: the farmers even can warm these up in aluminum foil on the engines.
Carrots were the only vegetables Molly would eat for the first 16 years of her life—and she still loves them! This dish is very loosely inspired by the traditional Jewish dish tzimmes of stewed carrots and dried fruit, but this bright version has super colorful and bitter radicchio balancing out the sweet glazed carrots.
These are Molly’s giant version of those tiny peanut butter blossom cookies that are a staple for any holiday season, particularly in the Midwest. She started making these with flat chocolate to enhance the textural variation and give them such a satisfyingly chewy and dense bite.
Before having kids, Molly would have never batted an eye at the idea of spending all day basting a big Christmas bird, but these days, she values spending time with her family and playing with Bernie and Ira over hours in the kitchen. She says that’s what makes this salmon dish awesome; it’s simple, fast, colorful and delicious as a Christmas main—a lovely alternative to your typical turkey or huge hunk of holiday meat.
It is customary on Passover to avoid baked goods with flour and leavening agents (baking powder, baking soda and yeast), so desserts and especially cakes can be a challenge! This pavlova is a perfect Passover dessert because it avoids all of those things and is cloud-like and satisfying, not to mention beautiful! The flavors are inspired by charoset, a traditional Passover dish of fruit and nuts. I love apples and pomegranates in mine, so I've used them on this pavlova.
Is French Onion Dip Actually French is what I just googled and it turns out that it was invented in California! So that’s a fact that you can rattle off if ever you’re standing near the dips and need something to talk about that’s not the weather. This here is a French Onion dip that is made with—
Baby Beluga has officially been replaced in our house by Biscuits in the Oven as the #1 most sung song. Raffi enthusiasts: am I right that it’s so catchy and much more fun to jiggle and dance to than Baby Beluga ? Also the imagery of biscuits in the oven makes me ever so slightly more excited th
Molly’s family represents the Grand Forks chapter of the World’s Smoothie Fan Club…they make smoothies at least every other day! This version tastes exactly like a blueberry muffin…mmm, but don’t tell the kids…there is some sweet spinach in there to make them good for you too!
We had the best weekend ever in Fargo!! We were there for the first annual Fargo Hotdish Festival which was the greatest thing in the world. We ate 11 different hotdishes that were all unique and amazing. There was a spätzle hotdish, a hotdish with gigantic homemade tater tots, a hotdish with li
This time last year when I was a million months pregnant, I got the wildest craving for Stollen, the yeasted spiced Christmas cake that has a bunch of tasty mix-ins (most notably, marzipan). This craving came out of nowhere because I don’t think I’d even ever had Stollen before?! I guess I wanted al
When Molly first experienced Korean corn dogs, she was floored and thought they were incredible. The skewered combination of a fried hot dog and string cheese felt like a mozzarella stick and a corn dog made a delicious baby. This is her take on recreating that recipe: deep-fried and crispy all-beef hot dogs and cheese, dusted in sugar to finish, with ketchup and mustard for dipping. They’re sure to send anyone to corn dog heaven.
These are a variation on the classic Black and White Cookie. Black and white cookies are actually thin flat cakes that are popular at Jewish delis, and I've loved them since childhood because of how soft they are. The cookies themselves are typically flavored with vanilla as well as something tangy, like buttermilk or sour cream, and some lemon which brightens them up under their thick blankets of glaze. They have such great personality, and I love both sides equally.
Molly Yeh lives on a farm with her family, where she gets farm-fresh ingredients and uses them to the very best of her abilities!
These are inspired by one of my favorite things ever to get at a Chinese bakery, hot dog buns! When I was growing up, the kind that I would get would simply be a puffy round bun with a hot dog in the center. But recently on Instagram, I've been seeing them shaped like these beautiful flowers and fell in love immediately! It's basically a bunch of pigs in blankets stuck together. And they are such cozy pigs because the dough is really soft and a little sweet. In a nod to my Chicago upbringing, there's some mustard in the dough, which adds a nice zing.
One of the questions I get most these days is how my cooking has changed now that Bernie is around. The answer is that I have a whole new appreciation for quick one-bowl recipes, recipes that require minimal chopping or actual heating, and anything that can sit nicely and well-behaved for 10 minutes
These are inspired by one of my favorite things ever to get at a Chinese bakery, hot dog buns! When I was growing up, the kind that I would get would simply be a puffy round bun with a hot dog in the center. But recently on Instagram, I've been seeing them shaped like these beautiful flowers and fell in love immediately! It's basically a bunch of pigs in blankets stuck together. And they are such cozy pigs because the dough is really soft and a little sweet. In a nod to my Chicago upbringing, there's some mustard in the dough, which adds a nice zing.
Holy guacamole snowstorm almond paste, where did January and the better part of February go?? It seems like just yesterday that I was rolling around with Bernie under the Chrismukkah bush and staring down my kransekake asking what am I going to do with you? (Oh wait, that definitely was yesterday
Paprikash is a Hungarian dish that consists of chicken, tons of onions and a creamy paprika sauce. It’s really comforting. This version takes the best part of a hotdish, the tots on top, and puts it all together for a hot, cozy, casserole take on paprikash.
Shrimp toast is one of the tastiest bites at the dim sum table. I didn't actually like shrimp toast growing up, but when I finally got around to trying it, I couldn't believe how much flavor was packed into one tiny unassuming square. These are crunchy on the outside, soft in the middle and really dangerous because they are so so addictive.
The Girl Meets Farm star discusses her hot take on mug cakes, the first dish she ever mastered, her sprinkle collection and more.
“The dried rose petals and colorful pistachios give these doughnuts an extra spark,” says Molly.
These are inspired by fried mozzarella sticks, briny Greek salad and falafel pitas. The only thing better than fried cheese on a salad…is stuffing that salad in a fluffy pita. The result is a party of textures, flavors and colors in one delicious handheld bite.
