Boo!
In honor of Halloween, I slaved away last night and made Halloween cookies. After I got started, I realized I only had three gel colors left… blue, purple and bright yellow. So they are not quite as colorful as I was planning, but there was just no way I was going to the store for food coloring.
Decorating cookies brought me back to when I worked as a Pastry Chef. It seemed there was always a reason to decorate cookies or cakes. Anyway, this is a really great cookie recipe. Its a bit soft when rolling out, so you must chill it well, but the flavor is very good. This recipe is adapted from Cookies Unlimited by Nick Malgieri.
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Beans and Franks Anyone?
This here isn’t your usual Beenie Weenies! No sir! Instead, this is spicy Italian sausage sauteed with Broccoli Rabe (AKA Rapini) and Cannellini Beans and served over polenta. Yummmmm. Stephan isn’t a big fan of it, but its one of my absolute favorite things to order at an authentic Italian restaurant. Broccoli Rabe has a very distinctive, bitter flavor. Some find it too bitter, but I love the flavor of it and even like it sauteed with a little garlic as a side dish.
Meat and ‘Taters
I’m a carnivore. I don’t try to hide it. I truly appreciate a good piece of meat… and like to *gasp* eat it medium rare. My husband, who is the griller (and chiller) in the house, gets a little grossed out by my bloody steaks, but has, over the years, perfected medium rare on the grill. He gets credit for the lovely steaks. Thanks honey! :)
What is the perfect accompaniment to a beautiful steak, you ask? Mashed potatoes, of course, and I make gooooood mashed potatoes. None of that skim milk and margarine nonsense… but real cream and real butter! Everything in moderation, right?
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Oooh la la… Part Deux
Although this Swiss roll is not French, I’m still calling it a “French Pastry” as its the same size of a traditional petit four. So if you’re French and offended… pardon moi! :) I used the same Genoise recipe as the Chocolate Layer Cakes from the last post.
Oooh la la… French Pastry
We had this past weekend off… no weddings, no photo shoots, just relaxing and hanging out with friends. So of course, I baked something. Originally, I had planned to bake a Genoise sheet and make a multi-layered chocolate ganache filled cake (aka Petit Four). Then, when I took it out of the oven, I thought, oooh… what about a lovely swiss roll? Vat to do, Vat to do??? So I made both. I split up the cake and made half of it into the Petit Fours, and the other half into the Swiss roll. You will have to come back tomorrow to see pictures of the Swiss Roll, though! :)
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Chicken Teriyaki
Now this is what I like to call a 30 minute meal… Perhaps even a 20 minute meal. Grilled chicken teriyaki, served with steamed jasmine rice and shelled edamame. Its a great healthy dinner that takes up maybe 5 minutes of your time to prepare. This is the dinner I make when I’m too tired to cook, and have no desire to go out to eat. I probably make this two or three times a month.
Do you Ragout?
I decided to recreate a fish entree I ordered at a restaurant recently that was pretty good, but lacked a little flavor. I love to attempt recreating restaurant dishes… and sometimes, I think mine is better!
The sauce is a chunky quick cooking ragout (pronounced ragoo.) I honestly just threw it together, hoping for the best. The result was a very flavorful, but uber-healthy topping for the fish. I served it with pearl couscous cooked with chicken stock and finished off with a generous tablespoon of pesto sauce and a bit of parsley.
Cut the Cheese
We eat a lot of cheese in my house, and every once and a while, it’s time to clean out the fridge. What do I make with all the random hunks of cheese in my fridge? Macaroni & Cheese!!! But, no fear, this isn’t the mac-n-cheese you remember. Its made with great, flavorful cheeses and topped with a crunchy panko crust. It was definitely the most fattening thing I’ve made in quite a while, but dangit, it was good! The recipe is adapted from Alton Brown’s on the Food Network.
I served it as a main course with a tomato, cucumber and red onion salad.
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Let’s do the Twist!
I was in the mood for some baking this past weekend. My first thought was bread. However the bread recipes I wanted to make needed at least an 8 hour rise. Well, I wasn’t gonna wait 8 hours, so I decided to make pretzels. In culinary school, I baked every type of bread, pastry, cake, etc… you can imagine, except pretzels. So I figured I’d try them. Then afterwards, while eating a freshly baked, hot from the oven pretzel, I wondered why the heck had I not made pretzels before? Seriously. They.Are.Fantastic. Oh, I will be making these again. Soon.
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Got your gourd?
Now that its fall, I like to make fall themed foods. Pumpkin is one of my all time favorite fall foods… Pumpkin bread, pumpkin muffins, pumpkin pasta… Just all things pumpkin. I even have a pumpkin candle that I only feel its right to burn during the fall. Don’t forget the Pumpkin Spice Latte at Starbucks too, its out of this world! For this recipe, you can adjust the amount of pumpkin to add, but I like my risotto more pumpkiny (if that is a word.)
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