It might be a bit of an understatement to say that I like chocolate. In fact, I would even say that I have a love affair with chocolate. No, it would probably be more apt to say that chocolate and I are basically the same person. Which makes the idea of eating it a little strange if you look at it that way…but since when have I ever worried about sounding rational?
Anyway, I love chocolate and all the ways to eat it—in brownies, frozen desserts, cookies, and of course, the old fashioned way—by the handful. And sometimes that hand is full of bark. Chocolate bark. If you’ve never had bark, it is basically akin to a candy-bar that you can make at home super easily and you can put all sorts of ingredients in it, like nuts, fruits and spices. Chocolate almond bark is my personal favorite. You create a big sheet of molten chocolate and your add-ins, chill it and break it apart into big or little pieces. They’re great for just a big of snack…and are excellent for bagging up and giving away as gifts. Read the rest of this entry »
Long Live Jack, the Pumpkin…Seed
Despite the variety of pumpkin dishes that I have made, some recently, I am actually not that big a fan of pumpkin. Josh is. There is, however, one pumpkin thing that I adore: the seeds. In fact, ever since I was a little kid, one of my favorite things about Halloween was carving my pumpkin and roasting the seeds. We did it every year, even after I got too told to trick-or-treat, and it’s a tradition I carry on now. I mean, sure I could do this anytime of year just by buying some raw pumpkin seeds from the store but that’s not nearly as fun. I mean, if you’re going to carve pumpkins for Halloween anyway, why let all those delicious seedy innards go to waste? No, no, that’s precious currency right there. However, it has come to my attention–namely through my husband Josh, who, before meeting me, had never roasted pumpkin seeds before–that there are actually people in the world that have never roasted pumpkin seeds before. And this sort of injustice cannot stand. How can I just ignore the sad, desperate pleas echoing out of the darkness from those who’ve never experienced the crunchy, salty, buttery goodness of a freshly roasted bowl of pepitos? Read the rest of this entry »
According to a super-scientific quiz on Facebook, I am well prepared for the inevitable (Inewitable!) zombie apocalypse and will survive for at least a month, probably more. And you know why that is? Because I watch my zombie movies. I will even admit to seeing Zombieland twice in the theaters. What can I say? I have a thing for watching Woody Harrelson kill zombies. Between that and my numerous viewings of Shaun of the Dead, Night of the Living Dead, Day of the Dead and many others, I know the rules of surviving a zombie horde: don’t get attached, don’t get eaten, don’t go in the basement or upstairs, to defeat the zombie you have to remove the head or destroy the brain and of course, rule number one: cardio.
Thankfully, all you’ll need to defeat these zombie cupcakes with is a hearty appetite. And maybe a pitchfork. Or a regular fork. These cupcakes were originally done by the Sweetest Kitchen and after I saw them, I figured—hey! That’s a cute cupcake trick that I can actually do! My friend Lindsay can decorate awesome cupcakes. Me? Not so much. I’m a pretty good cook and an okay baker but decorating? Not so much. I lack the artistic talent to do anything beyond rudimentary. So I was very excited to find these cupcakes because not only do I have an obvious, alarming and awesome affinity for zombies, but these are a tasty, fun and festive way to celebrate Halloween. Read the rest of this entry »
So I’ve come across a few recipes for cha siu bao in the past few months and thought, this is fascinating. Sure the closest I’ve ever gotten to actually seeing one in my own life was while watching Hayao Miyazaki films. That doesn’t matter. I could make these.
The pound-plus of barbecue pulled pork meat I had leftover from slowcooking on Saturday lent itself pretty well to my plan today to make these buns. I also maybe cheated just a tiny bit by buying a fresh ball of pizza dough from the store instead of making my own. I won’t apologize for that, though; it speeded up the process AND you know how much I hate to knead dough. But either way, they were pretty easy to make! And quite tasty. The great thing is that you make quite a few with a recipe and you can very easily make and freeze them for later. They steamed up in 15 minutes and were fabulous dunked into some extra barbecue sauce. Josh thinks they’ll be ever better baked, and with some cheese added. So basically what Josh wants is an empanada. But he enjoyed them anyway.
This what I had for lunch today. The squid ink pasta came from my mom. It’s an egg pasta that’s been dyed a deep black color with squid ink, which also gives it a salty, kind of oily taste as well. The great thing is that it cooks in 3 minutes. For Halloween, I will probably make a “spooky” pasta with a nice bright orange pumpkin sauce, but today I just wanted a very simple, very light lunch, so this is what I made. Note: this makes a light pasta dish for one; to make it more hearty, add in any of the following: 1 c. chopped broccoli, 3/4 c. shelled edamame, 4 ounces of cooked shredded chicken and/or 1 small zucchini chopped.
However, as it is, this is a very simple 5 ingredient recipe, not including the salt and pepper. Read the rest of this entry »
So an apricot walks into a bar. Which would be funny if it weren’t so terribly sad, seeing that alcoholism runs rampant in the apricot population. It’s an epidemic. You can do your part to help quell this senseless march towards destruction by donating your dried apricots to a nobel cause: baked goods.
I love dates. I don’t get them often but they’re always nice. Oh, and the fruit too. The fruit is good. And I like to make date bars. Delicious, sweet, chewy. However, today I had a bag of dried apricots I purchased awhile ago and I figured, why not substitute them in place of dates in the bar recipe?
So I did. These bars are extremely easy to make, and fairly quick too. They’re also sweet, chewy and utterly delicious, with a nice crunchy crust. Oh, and alcohol free. Read the rest of this entry »
Pumpkin Caramel Cheesecake Turtle Bread from Closet Cooking
Vanessa Dualib’s Food Art
Zombie Halloween Cupcakes!! OMG!! Completely awesome. From the Sweetest Kitchen
Chocolate Peanut Butter Cake from the Smitten Kitchen (did I just hear you joygasm?)
Banana bread roll? I’m intrigued. From Pinch My Salt.
How Stuff Works: 10 Quirky Facts about Mass Produced Food
Oven fried onion rings-Not Without Salt
The finger test for checking for doneness, from Simply Recipes
My dear friend and fellow foodie/home cook and vegetarian extraordinaire Paul came over to hang out with us for a while tonight and in honor, I made a simple, tasty dinner of a mushroom and leek ragout. Mostly because I had most of the stuff for pasta and needed to fill my quota of 2 or 3 pasta dishes a week.
Like…well, every dish I make, this is a fairly flexible recipe. And by “recipe,” I mean “guideline.” And by “guideline,” I mean, “loosely affiliated series of ingredients, directions and methods.” Read the rest of this entry »
Meal in a pot: baked mac and cheese
I think there’s one basic truth in this world that we can all agree upon: macaroni and cheese is freaking awesome. It’s like pizza-even when it’s bad, it’s still macaroni and cheese.
There’s a de facto rule in my family that every holiday meal must contain at least one pan of baked macaroni and cheese. To not have it is a sin against God. And taste. And delicious flavor.
I do have a go-to recipe for mac-and-cheese that I like to pull out for such meals, and it never fails. But tonight, I was on my own and I wanted to make something that would a) use up some leftover chicken from last night’s sammiches and 2)have all my carbs, veggies and protein in one pot.
I ended up combining influence from my usual recipe and from this baked penne with cheddar and leeks recipe from Bon Appetit, and threw in a few other things I had on hand. Read the rest of this entry »
eat mor chikn: chicken and avocado panini
Farmer Lauren had a chicken, e-i-e-i-oooo, and with this chicken she made a sammich, e-i-e-i-ooo, with an apple slice here and an avocado there, here a spice and there a slice, eveywhere it’s nice nice, Farmer Lauren had a chicken avocado paniniiiiiiiii.
This is one of those recipeless recipes. Pretty much you can insert just about anything you think sounds tasty. Like the rest of my life, I didn’t have a plan…I just went with what I had. Read the rest of this entry »
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