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Holiday Recipes From Boston Chefs

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(Photo credit: PHILIPPE LOPEZ/AFP/Getty Images)

This Christmas season, a couple of Boston area chefs are dishing out the recipes for several culinary treats. The dishes are simple, fast and make for delicious holiday dining. These are some of the best holiday recipes from Boston's best chefs. 

John Norton

Home Stage Catering
(617) 230-6088
home-stage.yolasite.com/

Roasted Butternut Squash Bisque

1 pound butternut squash, diced
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 quarts heavy cream
1/3 cup maple syrup
3/4 quart vegetable stock
1 1/2 tablespoons fresh thyme
1/2 tablespoon nutmeg, ground
Salt and pepper to taste

Toss the butternut squash with olive oil, half of the brown sugar and a little salt and pepper. Roast in the oven, then set on broil until it's slightly brown, stir and toss halfway through cooking.

Slowly heat cream in a pot and add the cooked squash and scrapings from the pan. Add the rest of the sugar, stock and syrup. Puree and simmer on low for 10 minutes while stirring. Adjust the consistency with the stock and add the remaining ingredients. Adjust with salt and pepper. Garnish with some fresh thyme, drizzle of maple syrup and bread.

Braised Lamb Shank with truffled wild mushroom risotto

Lamb Shanks
1quart stock
1 white onion,chopped
1/2 stalk celery, chopped
2 large carrots, chopped
2 bay leaves
2 whole stems rosemary
2 whole stems thyme

French the bone of the shanks and remove tendons. Heat a pan and sear all sides of the shanks until well browned. Add the remaining ingredients (including scraps of shanks) to shanks in hot pan and bring to a simmer. Cover tightly and put into a 300-degree oven for 2.5 hours. The meat should be very tender but not quite falling off of the bone.

For the sauce, remove whole shanks and bay leaves. Puree the liquid and simmer until it's thick or add any thickening agent.

For the risotto, use your favorite recipe and add these ingredients.

1 pound wild mushrooms
2 teaspoons white truffle oil
Olive oil
Fresh chopped thyme
Fresh parmesan
Salt and pepper

Sautee the mushrooms with a little olive oil, fresh herbs and mix into the risotto with two teaspoons of white truffle oil. Top with fresh, shaved parmesan. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Lazy Man's Pumpkin Creme Brulee

1 1/2 cups heavy Ccream
1/2 cup milk
1 each vanilla - split and scraped
1 tablespoon nutmeg. ground
1 teaspoon ginger, ground
1 teaspoon clove, ground
6 egg yolks
1/2 can pumpkin pie filling
1 cup sugar
1/3 cup corn starch
about 1/5 cup water
Whip cream and berries

Make a slurry with the corn starch and water. Add the water to the corn starch, and mush them together with fingers until it is not a paste. Heat the milk, cream, vanilla, spices and pie filling to a slight simmer. Slowly whip in the egg yolks to temper. Add half of the sugar and remove from heat. While still very hot, add the corn stach/water mix slowly while stirring. It should thicken to a pudding-like consistency (add more slurry to thicken more). Put back on low heat for two minutes, stirring constantly. Do not simmer. Strain through fine chinois (mesh strainer) into serving dishes. Cool in refrigerator to set.

For serving, put a few pinches of sugar on top and shake off the excess. Caramelize the sugar by passing a flame over it until it's golden brown. Garnish with whipped cream and berries.

John Norton is a local chef who has been in the industry for 17 years. He grew his expertise as a chef at Walt Disney World, Starwood Hotels and more recently at Boston Beer Works. He also recently embarked on a career as a private chef. He does small dinner parties and private culinary classes at student homes.

Related: Guide to Celebrity Chef Restaurants in Greater Boston

Tricia Childs
Cohasset Golf Club Chef and Personal Caterer
175 Lambert's Lane
Cohasset, MA 02025
(781) 534-5292
www.cohassetgc.org

Goat Cheese Stuffed Figs in Prusciutto with Balsamic Glaze

8 oz goat cheese
Pint fresh mission figs
4 oz prusciutto-thinly sliced
1 oz balsamic glaze

Split figs, stuff them the with the goat cheese, and then wrap them with prusciutto. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and cook them until warm. Serve with a garnish drizzle of balsamic glaze.

Herb-Rubbed Roasted Veal Roast

2 Tbsp dijon mustard
1 Tbsp prepared horseradish
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 tsp fresh rosemary, finely diced
salt and pepper to taste
1 Tbsp oil
1 veal roast

Stir mustard, horseradish, oil, garlic and rosemary together to make a wet rub. Rub the ingredients over the roast until it's covered completely. Preheat the oven to 425 degrees, and cook for seven minutes. Turn the oven down to 350 degrees, and cook until the roast is an internal temperature of 115 degrees.

Apple Pie Egg Rolls with Ginger Ice Cream

1 can apple pie filling
1 package egg roll wrappers
1 Tbsp cinnamon-sugar

Fill the egg-roll wrappers with canned pie filling. Roll them and seal the edges like an egg roll. Fry in 350-degree vegetable oil until wrapper is lightly golden brown. Drain on paper towels and then toss in cinnamon sugar.

Ginger Ice Cream (Prepare the day before serving)

2 Tbsp ginger (more or less to taste)
1 pint ice cream

Soften vanilla ice cream, stir in crystallized ginger bits, and then refreeze.

Tricia Childs has been cooking at the Cohasset Country Club for five seasons. Before that, she worked in several restaurants and trained at a local trade school in the same class as "Next Great Baker" contestant Johanna Lyons. Childs has extensive personal party catering experience with fine dining, classic American fare, pastries and wedding cakes. This year, she is cooking butternut squash lasagna, apricot and fig in puff pastry with goat cheese, apple streusel pie and hot curry pumpkin malt for her family, but shared simple recipes for the holidays here.

Shelly Barclay is a professional freelance writer and amateur author. She writes on a variety of topics from food to mysteries. She loves to share the culture and rich history of her birthplace and home, Boston, with the rest of the world. Her work can be found at Examiner.com.

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