This turned out to be a pretty good way to use a lot of dill at once. The recipe, which calls for ¼ cup fresh dill, isn’t overwhelmingly herbal, but the bread itself baked up a little dry. I might take a hint next time from my friends and their super simple beer bread recipe: add a little sugar to the batter, and bake with some melted butter on top.

Once out of the oven and cooled, we spread sweet, unsalted butter on slices of the bread and topped them with briny smoked salmon. The balanced combination of salty, sweet, and herbal – with a hint of hops from the beer – harmonized well in this Scandinavian-esque snack.

Dill Beer Bread

from an about.com recipe

• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 2½ tsp. baking powder
• 1 tsp. salt
• 2 tsp. ground mustard seed
• ¼ cup minced fresh dill
• 12 oz. porter or other dark beer

Heat oven to 400F. Grease an 9 x 5 loaf pan.

Mix all the dry ingredients together.

Add beer and mix until just blended, then spoon into pan.

Bake for 50 – 60 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out dry.

This quick and simple dinner, which showcased many of the veggies from this week’s share, also turned out to be more delicious and satisfying than expected.

The pesto chicken cutlets were a twist on the standard way of preparing a fried chicken cutlet. I followed the same steps of dredging chicken breasts in 1) flour, 2) egg (beaten), then 3) breadcrumbs, but only after whisking one or two spoonfuls of leftover pesto into the egg. I also used panko breadcrumbs, which fry up lighter and crispier than the bland and grainy breadcrumbs usually found in grocery stores.

The lettuce mix from our CSA share formed the base for the garden salad. I added sliced cucumbers and grated carrots – also from the CSA – and tossed everything in a balsamic vinaigrette. The freshness of the vegetables really shone through in the salad, and reminded me of how fortunate we are to have regular access to local organic produce.

I first tried beer bread this summer, when my friend made it for a potluck. One bite of the crisp, buttery crust and the soft, yeasty inner crumb had me sold, and I knew I had to make it myself. This recipe, which originates from another mutual friend of ours, is surprisingly simple, and makes for a hearty addition to a weeknight dinner.

Beer Bread

recipe courtesy of Sarah M. (and Wendy C.) – thanks, guys!

3 Tbsp butter, plus more for greasing pan
3 cups self-rising flour
½ cup sugar (some prefer adding a couple tablespoons more, for a sweeter taste)
12 oz bottle beer (this determines the flavor of the bread)

Preheat oven to 375°F. Butter a 9″x5″ loaf pan.

Melt butter; set aside.

In a large bowl, whisk together flour and sugar. Add beer, and mix until just combined. Pour batter into prepared pan, then pour melted butter on top of batter. (Allow the butter to sit on top of the batter; do not mix it in.)

Bake for 45-50 minutes, until golden.

The late night munchies crept up on Señor Habanero and me after attending Philharmonic in the Park a couple weeks ago. (You can see more pictures from that night here – including a shot of someone’s sparkler suspended by a balloon, which in turn was lit up by another person’s green laser pointer. It was quite a hit with the crowd.)

Stomachs grumbling, we hopped on the N train to Astoria and headed straight to the Bohemian Hall and Beer Garden (29-19 24th Ave., Astoria), where a few of our friends and a pitcher of pilsner awaited us.

Thankfully, the concession stand for food was still open, and we made a beeline for it. The menu consists of simple Czech pub fare – sausages, goulash, fries – and of course, we went for the klobása.

[piclens-lite-link]

There was plenty of saurkraut, horseradish, stale rye bread, and grainy yellow mustard to accompany these glorious pieces of processed meat, but really, the klobása was more than fine on its own. (It was nice to have the pilsner with it, though.) Crispy fried skins encased a juicy, garlicky filling (which is a combination of pork, beef, and bacon), and each bite left a telltale grease smear on our lips.

So tasty – but so bad for you! At that point in the evening, though, we didn’t really care. Those slick links were worth the damage done to our arteries.