If I told you I had a recipe for peanut butter cookies with three ingredients would you call me crazy? Oh, they're gluten free and taste awesome too. Just read on...

 

Three ingredients, no mixer necessary, and these peanut butter cookies are mighty tasty. Now, they might not have a chewy texture or a a perfectly sized crumb - in fact, they might not have any crumb at all - but they do have what is necessary and sufficient to receive the title of excellent peanut butter cookie:  peanut butteryness.

Because really, what does flour do to a peanut butter cookie? Flour makes the cookie taste less like peanut butter. Get rid of it!

 

So here you go. Mix these three ingredients together. Plop them onto a cookie sheet and don't over-bake. Serve them to your friends  and try to get someone to guess what the other two ingredients are. I have yet to find a taste tester who can tell these cookies are missing the flour - it's all delicious fun. This recipe is a great choice for individuals who cannot have wheat gluten.

 

Simply Peanut Butter Cookies

 

1 cup creamy peanut butter

1 cup granulated sugar, plus extra for rolling

1 egg

 

Thoroughly mix all three ingredients together. Roll into teaspoons of dough into small balls and roll into sugar; and flatten cookies onto a baking sheet by pressing fork tines into the top. Bake at 350 degrees for ~8-10 minutes. They'll seem underdone and way too soft, but they'll harden up as they cool.

 

You can also press a chunk of chocolate into the top before putting them in the oven, if desired.

Biscotti Biscotti

William-Sonoma, you tricked me. You, master of cookie cookbooks, king of classic cookie recipes... you, you failed me.

Sort of.

Actually, these biscotti are amazing and I think you should make them first thing tonight before you go to bed. I can't stop eating them. What I take issue with is that William Sonoma makes a whole big pointed fussy scene about how you should cream the butter and sugar until no grit can be felt between your fingers. Now, I've used this advice in other recipes and been very happy with it - properly creamed butter and sugar provide for moist, substantial cookie crumb. Whenever you've tasted homemade cookies with perfectly moist, even texture, they probably creamed the butter and sugar really, really well.

But I made these biscotti twice - once, in a rush, with fridge cold butter and just incorporated sugar, and a second time, with fridge cold butter that I creamed with the sugar for almost 15 minutes over a bowl of steaming water to help the butter along - and the verdict's in: biscotti do not benefit from properly creamed, room temperature butter, at least in this recipe. In fact, they're better off with gritty bits of butter and sugar that cut into the flour. The first batch came out crumbly and dry but not hard. They melted in my mouth. The second batch was more cake-like or cookie-like than biscotti-like. I didn't want cake-like or cookie-like, I wanted biscotti-like: crumbly, dry, melt in your mouth biscotti. Then I sent samples of both batches to my grandmother - queen of all things biscotti - and she declared her preference for the well-creamed-butter batch. So, take your pick.

My advice would be to cream your butter and sugar for about four to five minutes in a stand mixer. Oh, and make these: they're nutty, crumbly, buttery, not too hard, not too sweet, perfectly crisp, flecks of orange zest balanced by loads of cinnamon and toasted, fragrant hazelnuts...last for at least a week...so simple and delectable.

By the way, last Saturday morning, our alarm clock self-adjusted for daylight savings time one day too early. We scrambled out of bed because I was frantic to get to lab on time, and then I found myself with one extra hour before needing to go take care of my experiment. So I made biscotti. In scrolling down the past few entries of this cooking blog, I just realized that it is has been fairly heavy on the sweets and low on the savory. I figure I owe y'all an explanation. See, I've been working crazy hours for the past two weeks and we've been, <gasp>, surviving entirely on take-out. This schedule was all supposed to last for the entire month of April, until a fellow lab member kind of screwed me over in an aggressive battle for the surgical space that I needed and the remaining half of my experiment has pushed until the end of April. </rant>. Her rudeness = my inconvenience = better for our sustenance!

Hazlenut and Dried Cherry Biscotti

Recipe reworded from William-Sonoma Cookies. Note that you could substitute any toasted nut or dried fruit that you wish - I tried macadamia nuts too, but I prefer the hazlenuts by far.

Makes ~24 biscotti

1/2 cup unsalted butter

3/4 cup granulated sugar

1 tbsp grated orange zest

2 large eggs

2 tsp vanilla extract

1 3/4 (280g) unbleached all-purpose flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

1/4 tsp salt

1 cup hazlenuts, toasted and skinned, coarsely chopped

1/2 cup dry cherries, coarsely chopped, optional

Preheat the oven to 350. Line a baking sheet with parchment*.

Cream the butter and sugar with the zest. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well on low speed after each addition. Beat in the vanilla on low speed until blended.

Sift the flour, baking powder, cinnamon and salt together onto a sheet of parchment paper. Add the flour mixture in two or three additions to the egg mixture, stirring just until incorporated. Stir in the hazlenuts and cherries until evenly distributed. The batter should be very soft.

Turn the batter out onto a floured surface and divide in half. Shape into a log about 12" long and 1.5" in diameter. Press lightly on the top to flatten the log into a biscotti shape. Shape the second log, leaving at least 4" between the two (they will spread as they bake).

Bake the logs until the edges are golden, 25-30 minutes. Let the logs cool for 10 minutes. Using a serrated knife, cut the logs on the diagonal to 1/2" slices. Turn the slice on their sides and return them to the oven. Bake them until the edges are golden, about 10 minutes longer. Cool completely and store in an airtight container.

*You can toast the hazlenuts at this point if needed. Just put them in the oven for ~10 minutes, then skin them between hands or a towel - don't let them burn.

Tori's Drunk (on Pear Infused Vodka)

 

Tori, the dog, was drunk before noon this Saturday. It might be my fault.

 

Mmm, pear infused vodka. This turned out soo good...

See, lately I've been into flavored Vodka, and by "flavored" I don't mean Raspberry Stoli. I mean, flavors I choose. Thanks to my dad for passing this tip along to me: if you'd like to make an infused vodka, just pour cheap vodka into a sealable contained and toss in dried fruit, coffee beans, citrus peals, or whatever individual item strikes your fancy. Let it sit for a few days or weeks, and viola: your own, personal, preservative free Kahlua is on its way to completion.

The coffee-bean Vodka was so rapidly saturated with, err, coffee-beanyness, that it became opaque after only a few days. I tried getting a photo by holding the bottle up against a light source, and this is what I got. See the coffee beans all the way on the right?

I've used this technique to great success with dried pears. The shriveled up pears already have natural (or added?) sugar, and this sweetness rounds out the flavors of the infused vodka enough to have a sip-able or mixable concoction. Last night, I decided to churn up a Vanilla Pear Vodka ice cream (akin to Rum Raisin). Well, of course, the alcohol content was too high and the ice-cream was really more like cold-cream-not-iced, but after 3 hours in the freezer, it was semi solid enough to eat with a spoon. The flavor was excellent, though next time I'd lower the Vodka content and increase the pear content.

Thief. I might find it cuter if, in the last hour, she hadn't slurped up a bowl of soup, polished off our gnocchi leftovers, and gorged herself on a to-be-thrown-out macaroni casserole. Greg and I look forward to a sleepless night with multiple trips to the front yard...

It was Friday night and Greg and I had already devoured a hearty vegetable pot pie for dinner -- we didn't actually finish our boozey cream. We fell asleep, forgot about the cups sitting on the coffee table, and Tori found them the next morning. Needless to say, she was overly friendly for around 20 minutes before passing out for a nice Saturday morning nap. Boozehound.

This picture is from a while ago for another purpose. We used Gordon's Vodka for this recipe.

Soft Ginger Cookie-Land

I searched for a long time to find a soft ginger cookie that would match this Lemon Gelato Recipe. The recipe I finally found has many enviable merits:

• Strong molasses /ginger flavor
• Incredibly soft. In fact, in the week that it took us to eat all 40 of them (with friends! other people helped!), the cookies became softer every day; the ginger flavor intensified, too. This is the perfect cookie to make if you need something that won't go stale quickly. These would be fantastic care-package cookies.
• You add boiling water to the dough. Why is this a merit? Because there's no "cutting of butter" or "mix just until incorporated" - these cookies couldn't turn out tough if you tried

With all these merits worth detailing, this cookie is not - a very unfortunate not - so great for you (not that cookies are healthy food, but I'd rather eat butter than hydrogenated oils any day). It calls for 1/2 cup of vegetable shortening which amounts to a very small amount of trans fat per serving (even if you get "Trans fat free" shortening, don't be fooled). Next time I make these, I'll substitute butter or oil and see if they still hold their texture.

Super Soft Ginger Cookies

Slight modification to Bon Appetit's Recipe

Makes ~40

I had the same difficulty that other bakers noted: these cookies are messy to make, since the dough is so soft. But do not despair! Rather than refrigerating for an hour, I would suggest several hours of chill time. I left mine in the fridge overnight and had little difficulty forming them out of damp hands. Lots of excess sugar helped create that mouth-watering crumbly top, and a push in the center helped keep the cookies thin and flat. I kept these cookies non-fussy by removing the extra spices.

• 4 cups unbleached flour
• 1 cup sugar
• 5teaspoons baking powder
• 3 teaspoons ground ginger
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup molasses
• 1/2 cup pure vegetable shortening
• 1 large egg, beaten to blend
• 1/2 cup boiling water
  Additional sugar

Preparation

Add the flour, sugar and spices to a large bowl. Add molasses, shortening, and egg. Using electric mixer, beat until well blended. Beat in 1/2 cup boiling water. Chill dough 3-4 hour or overnight

Preheat oven to 400°F. Lightly moisten your hands and roll chilled dough by generous tablespoonfuls into balls. Roll in additional sugar to coat. Place dough balls 2 inches apart on ungreased baking sheets. Bake until cookies are puffed and cracked on top and tester inserted into center comes out with some moist crumbs attached, about 12 minutes (do not overbake). Transfer cookies to racks and cool.

Pieces of Peace

This cookie recipe mocks me, I think. For I am a cookie-person: above anything else, I know and love cookies. Whether it's peanut butter, oatmeal, sugar or chocolate I am craving, I will make it happen with a little butter and a stand mixer. Just yesterday, a friend asked me if there was anything in that exact moment that would make me a happier person, and I said, "if I had a chocolate chip cookie, fresh baked out of the oven, in my hand, I would be happier." Not, "if my research was doing better", or "if I didn't worry about my family", or "if my husband and I could stop arguing about hanging shirts on the back of the bathroom door", or better yet, "if there was world peace" - no, all I wanted was a cookie.

Seriously. This is serious stuff. Especially because I knew that two days hence (tonight) cookies would be required for the cookie exchange that I had organized.

Tonight's loot

So this cookie, this cookie that I chose to make for my cookie exchange, for my craving of happiness, it mocks me. It will not slice right. It will not bake right. It will not keep its shape. It will foil my multiple attempts to make it. It will crumble into tiny pebbles of chocolatey goodness.

They're called "World Peace Cookies" because if everyone had one of these we might just all stop fighting. I'm renaming them World Piece Cookies, because they fall to so many pieces that everybody could have a bite if we just learned to share - and the making of these cookies surely didn't put me at peace. I don't have a solution to the crumble problem - which not everyone encountered (according to the others who made the recipe) - except to say that if the dough looks too dry, it probably is. Either bake it, and enjoy the flavor completely, or do what I plan to do next time, and reduce the flour by two tablespoons and stir in an extra two teaspoons of whole milk or heavy cream until things look "about right".

As for the problem of world peace? Well, I don't have a solution for that either, except to say happy holidays, and remember, for the people reading this blog at least, that small everyday joy is always within our reach - especially when you keep a supply of cocoa powder in your pantry door.

Recipe for World Piece Cookies

Original Source

Having my cake and eating it too

Do you remember very much from your childhood?

As a very young child, I remember fleeting moments of frustration mingled with happiness. I couldn't always make things work like I wanted to exactly when I wanted them. For instance, I knew that if I found the square plastic case with the picture of a jean pocket and a red cap sticking out of it, and I got the round disk into the player and pushed a certain button, my favorite song would come on ("Born in the USA" by Bruce Springsteen, in case you wondered). But sometimes the CD wouldn't be the right one; or I'd put it on upside down; or there'd be no CD in there at all. Or I'd push the wrong button or push it too many times and then the wrong song would come on and I never knew why.

Life as a little kid was a confusing world of rules that I couldn't control. Adults never understood me, eating chocolate for breakfast was Definitely Out of The Question, and whenever I tried to make cupcakes out of the box, they just tasted funny. It never occurred to me that there would come a day when my knowledge base (or physical skills) would be to my own satisfaction, but it did occur to me that as far as stages in life, I was just starting out. There were bullies at school, bees that that would sting a person for (apparently) no reason, and, time-outs that seemed as arbitrary of an occurrence as seeing a falling star. In short, being a child for me was about unpredictable, unavoidable circumstance. My world felt out of my control, and I didn't like it that way.

Of course, like every other grown person out there, I figured it all out eventually. There were those brilliant years of independence, of new skills and talents, of feeling like I knew it all even while I mistakenly thought I was humble, of reinventing myself every 30 seconds only to discover that the new me still wasn't quite right, of realizing that I didn't know anything at all but still wasn't humble, and of pure desperation for just not being able to be the person I wanted to be with the life that I thought I really wanted to have. Then I slowly began to construct my adult world. It started with a canine companion, an apartment, some important friends, the relationship, the career path and ultimately a personality that seems to be here to stay. There was a moment in life when things, attainable, tangible things (goals?) were finally within my grasp.

Suddenly I find myself with a pathetically mundane life filled with various goals I have invented for myself: the house, a good haircut, two dogs, my husband... we take them to the park in our Volvo wagon, which is where we met, under the big tree at the bottom of the hill. It's so picturesque some days that I almost want to gag (the fact that anybody is still reading this is promising). You see, it turns out that exactly what I wanted as a young kid - dessert before dinner, a big wheels truck, to watch cartoons on Saturday morning - really wasn't actually that important. Those exact things changed from day to day and year to year in as capricious of a manner as I choose my hair color. I think I finally figured out that the most important thing I have, the thing that keeps me together when I'm stressed out or feel like I'm losing it, is knowing that what I control is merely a state of mind. Sometimes, getting my control fix after a bad day is as simple as turning on the oven and grabbing a recipe. In the world of baked goods, it's easy to measure out exactly 1 cup of sugar, and to feel pretty good about that small success while you're at it.

I'm an adult now. I get to have my cake and eat it too. Chocolate, with beer in it, for breakfast even, if I want.

Chocolate Guinness Cake

Serves: don't ask

My posts have been full of "bests" lately, but this really is the best chocolate cake I have ever had. By now you should realize that I am a cookie person; the Chocolate Guinness Cake may change my dessert preferences forever - seriously. It is unbelievably moist, fail-proof, chocolatey, complex, dense and light all at the same time. It is amazing. I will be singing the praises of this cake for years to come. It'll take you several bowls and at least a half hour of hands on time to make it, but it's worth it. I should add that while about 80% of the people who ate this sang its praises repeatedly, the remaining 20% (Greg included) said that it was pretty good but didn't knock their socks off. I say, just try it and decide for yourself.

"Original" Source: Barrington Brewery in Great Barrington, MA

Modified Source: Deb at SmittenKitchen

The "original" epicurious recipe makes a gigantic cake. I made 75% of the original recipe in three 8" rounds. Deb made a 50% batch for a Bundt pan. One 8" round would easily serve 6-10, which is the recipe I am providing here. I think these would make fantastic cupcakes, especially with a gooey ganache or jelly filling.

Here is the recipe for one 8" round pan:

1/2 cup Guinness

1/2 cup butter

6 tbsp unsweetened cocoa powder

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 cup sugar

1/4 tsp salt

1 large, preferably organic/free-range egg

5 tbsp sour cream

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter one 8-inch round cake pan with 2-inch-high sides. Line with parchment paper*. Butter paper.
2. Bring stout and butter to simmer on stove or in microwave. Add cocoa powder and whisk until mixture is smooth. Cool slightly.
3. Whisk flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt in large bowl to blend. Beat egg and sour cream in another large bowl to blend.
4. Add stout-chocolate mixture to egg mixture and beat just to combine**.
5. Add flour mixture. Using rubber spatula, fold batter until completely combined (the batter will be slightly lumpy - that's okay).
6. Pour batter into pan and give the pan several good thumps flat against the counter***. Bake until tester inserted into center of cakes comes out clean, about 25-35 minutes; remember to turn halfway through the cooking time. Cool 10 minutes. Turn cake out onto rack, brush tops with extra stout****, and cool completely before frosting.

*Note: my favorite trick for chocolatey things is to butter the pan thoroughly, add cocoa powder to coat, shake around the pan, and tap out the excess (see photo up top). I do this instead of parchment paper - way easier

**If the chocolate mixture is too hot to comfortably hold a finger in, just temper the eggs by mixing them with a half cup of the hot mixture at a time. I figure if it burns my finger it'll curdle the eggs.

***Thumping cake batter is always a good idea. It gets the air bubbles out so that the cake will cook evenly. Plus, it is good satisfying fun.

****I added this part. : )

Frosting

I made a chocolate ganache with Baileys in it that I wasn't psyched about. For frosting, I refer you to either of the two sources above, or else just search the web for chocolate ganache recipes (whipping cream + bittersweet chocolate = great) and drizzle over the cake after it has cooled completely.

I promised you blueberry buckle (P.S. I won't spoil HP7)

FYI: no spoilers here! I don't believe in spoiling plotlines so I won't. Read on safely...

I am a terrible person. A truly awful, tempted, weak person, acting of my own accord for my own personal gain (as more than one Harry Potter character has pondered, ack, do I belong in Slytherin?!) I read Harry Potter Seven two days before its official release. I soaked in every last word, knowing full well of JKR's desperate please to save any advanced copy access until the 21st. It took me about 8 hours on Wednesday night and 2 hours this morning to work my way through the giant (and quite certainly authentic) PDF file, but the deed is done.

Why, why would I do such a thing? Well, I had already bought the book. It's on its way via overnight fedex for Saturday. I knew the book could be found online, and, err, I just... I couldn't help myself. It was out there: tempting me, luring me with a promise of my own 5 years of reader expectation to be immediately and thoroughly satisfied (in short, I was greedy). I had also rather unintentionally stumbled on some spoilers, and after reading those little supposed-snippets, I had to find out for myself if they were true - they weren't, thank goodness. I hated it, I loved it, heck, it almost made me cry. For better or worse, the story is finished, and I'll save my analysis until after more people are likely to have finished the book.

There. I did a bad thing. For some reason I felt the urge to share this with the world...



Speaking of guilty consciences, I did promise the blueberry buckle, and here it is! This recipe resulted from one of Greg's coworkers sending him home with two cups of delicious, perfectly ripe blueberries that she brought back with her on a plane from Washington. I made a half batch but I'll give you the full recipe.




The blueberries were amazing; the buckle was even better. You can make this in one bowl if you wish, and the vigorous stirring involved means it's literally impossible to go wrong since the batter is not likely to get tough like other muffin or quickbread recipes. Coming from someone who despises working with pastry dough, I truly appreciate that such quick recipe could give such a nice silky texture to a baked good (no worries about butter temperature here). The resulting concoction, not unlike a coffee cake, was amazingly buttery and rich. It was the perfect way to make the perfect blueberries... perfectly unhealthy.



I made some very slight alterations to this recipe (more blueberries, less streusel). When I made the buckle with the full amount of sugary/buttery crust, it was just a bit too much. If you like things rich, just make twice the topping per the original recipe's request. I also threw in two heaping tablespoons of corn starch, an addition that I had read would help all purpose flour achieve a similar texture similar to cake flour (this is the same idea as tossing in a package of instant pudding to make cake stay moist). This simple recipe would be delicious with any other sweet berries, or maybe some chopped apples sauteed first with a little butter and sugar. It would also be great minus the streusel and plus a little drizzled honey. Or with toasted walnuts on top. Or... mmm...




Blueberry Buckle
Adapted from The Desert Book by Nancy Baggett
Serves: At least one, I think : )

Batter:
200g all purpose flour (~1 2/3 cup, but I implore you to weight it out if you've got a scale)
2 tbsp corn starch
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 cup granulated sugar (generous 3/4 cup if the blueberries are tart)
10 tbsp very soft butter (do not melt)
2 large organic eggs
1/4 cup milk
1 1/2 tsp vanilla
4 cups blueberries

Topping:
1/2 cup, scant, sugar
1/4 cup all purpose flour
1 tsp ground cinnamon
3 tbsp butter

1. Sift the flour, corn starch, baking powder and salt together into a bowl. Add the butter and sugar. By hand, or in a mixer on low speed, stir until mixture is blended and crumbly (about 2 minutes)
2. Add milk, eggs and vanilla to a small measuring cup or bowl. Whisk together with a fork. Pour on top of flour mixture and beat together until the egg mixture is incorporated. Raise your hand / the mixer's speed to medium and beat for an additional 1 1/2 minutes, scraping down the bowl as needed
3. Gently fold in the blueberries*.
4. Pour batter into a greased 9x13 pan.
5. Make the streusel: mash together all of the ingredients with a fork until crumbly. Sprinkle on top of the batter.
6. Bake 35-45 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean and the top is crispy.

*Note: as with all blueberry dishes, if you let this sit for too long it will turn green...

Let Me Count The Ways

I've always had mixed feelings about Valentine's day. Sure, it's commercialized. Sure, it's cheesy. Sure, I hated it when I was single and chalked it up to a money making crap of a day. But all the same? It is nice to have a perfectly ridiculous excuse for a lovely, relaxed and romantic evening with one's significant other. And such a day needn't involve overpriced flowers or bad chocolate - such a day can be romantic in its own simple right.

Smile

When Greg and I were trying to decide what to do for Valentine's day, the first thought was to have a special meal at home. But I cook so often, it just wasn't appealing to me. Then we thought, let's go out. But the prix fixe menus turned us away. Finally, Greg came up with a great idea: he made me dinner instead.

Spanish White Wine: Really Good

I give great kudos to The Boy Who Does Everything. From hard wiring fog lights on his car, to redirecting plumbing lines, to replacing the entire exhaust system on my car, to digging up the main sewer line under our house and repairing it, to buying a tile cutter and tiling our bathroom, (all without having any experience with any of things before attempting them), to being successful in his career and family life, to being a kind and caring person at heart... he literally does it all. If he doesn't know how to do it, he figures it out how, and he does a better job than anyone else could. I could write pages about what an amazing guy he is in the practical ways, and that doesn't even begin to touch on what a great partner he is.

So on top of all of this talent in the ways I've gotten used to him being talented about, Greg, who doesn't cook much (though when he does, it's always good), decided to make Valentine's Day dinner while I sat on my bum in the living room. Whata' guy : )

First course: amazing fried oysters. He breaded them in pancake batter with various spices and used the Le Creuset to bring them to a perfect brown, served with a horseradish dipping sauce. They were, quite frankly, amazing. I've never had oysters, but if he'll make them this way, I could eat them every day.

Pancake Batter Fried Oysters with Dipping Sauce

Next came the main dish: lemon dill pan fried salmon with herbed potatoes. It was light but filling, herby and buttery. Paired with a bottle of Spanish white wine, it felt like summer by the sea in February.

Main Course: Lemon Dill Pan Fried Salmon and Rosemary Red Potatoes

I was in charge of dessert. For a Salmon dish, I decided on a dessert I had recently at Greg's company Christmas Party, held at an upscale French restaurant called Union League: poached pears. I poached the pears in Riesling wine and vanilla based on Alton Brown's recipe, with a little added sugar for sweetness.

What I'm really proud of, however, is the homemade caramel sauce. I wanted a soft, creamy caramel sauce to serve over fragile, poached fruit and ice cream. That sounded like heavy cream should be involved, but I didn't have heavy cream last night and I couldn't find a recipe I liked. Thus, I started with a basic sugar caramel and tried some things till I figured it out. The right ratio of butter and coconut milk did the trick. It was creamy, smooth, and the perfect texture to go on top of the pears. If you don't like the flavor of coconut, don't worry - you can't taste the coconut here, it'll just be creamy.

This dessert was really, really good: ice cold pears, rich vanilla ice cream, reduced wine sauce the bottom of the bowl, and hot caramel sauce to pour over top.

Poached pear out of focus on the left, vanilla ice cream our of focus on the right, and delicious creamy caramel right in view

The highlight of the whole night was when Tori wanted to see what was in a paper bag, and Greg gave it a little nudge to wedge the bag onto her face. She proceeded to stumble around the kitchen and then ran into the parlor to say Hi to me with a giant paper bag over her face, smashing into walls and tripping over her own paws. Moments like those are ones that remind me of what it is that I love about her silly, food loving, uncoordinated self.

Having finished dinner, dessert, and a bottle of wine, suddenly it seemed as if, okay, "that was really nice. This feels so nice and normal". Then I realized the kinds of lives we are fortunate enough to lead. Greg and I sit down to a romantic dinner at least 4 times a week. We go out once or twice a week. We watch movies together and hang out together almost every evening. We take the dogs to the park and come home to the home that we've built together.

Thanks, Greg. Love ya'.

Nothing left but melted ice cream and a pear stem!

Poached Pears in a Riesling Vanilla Sauce
Serves 2

1 bottle Riesling Wine
1 cup sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 Red Bartlett Pears

1. Find a saucepan of the right size to provide depth to submerge the pears. Bring the wine, sugar and vanilla extract to a slow boil.
   
2. Meanwhile, peel skin from pears and slice in half. Remove the core from the entire length of the pear
3. Add pears to boiling poaching liquid and poach until almost cooked through (depending on the ripeness of the pear, 10-30 minutes).
4. Remove pears and reduce poaching liquid by one half. Cover pears with reduced poaching liquid in a small bowl and chill at least several hours, or overnight

Coconut Caramel Sauce
Makes, quite a bit

2 tbsp corn syrup
1.5 cups white sugar
Just enough water to cover
Pinch salt
1/4 cup unsalted butter
3 tbsp coconut milk

1. Add corn syrup in a dollop to the bottom of a small saucepan or saucier. Pour sugar into the pan and add just enough water cover the sugar. Turn heat to medium and observe the sugar careful. Do Not Stir! Instead, use a pastry brush dipped in water to brush down the sides of the pan (this will prevent recrystallization of the sugar solution before it caramelizes, something that would ruin the caramel).
   
2. The sugar will not caramelize until the water evaporates off, but once this occurs it will start turning a golden color. As the color gets darker, lower the heat (there is some carry-over cooking that occurs, since both the sugar solution and the pot hold on to quite a bit of heat). Once the caramel deepens to the right color, turn off the heat completely and stir in the butter and coconut milk.
3. Be careful. Caramel is very hot and can be dangerous.

Poached Pears with Ice Cream and Caramel Sauce

Serve one pear with a scoop of ice cream, a few spoonfuls of reduced poaching liquid, and hot caramel to top. Enjoy.

Crumble Pie

*My CF card's almost a gonner and my harddrive is full, so until my new external harddrive and working CF card arrive, I'm limiting the number of photos I take to the end result...sorry bout that...should be back to normal soon...

The funny thing about keeping a food blog (and reading others' blogs) is that it makes me realize all of the different kind of foods that I just don't like. I just don't want to eat what I don't want to eat. That's it. I'm a food snob. I am a picky-eater. Fastidious in my food fancies. I am grade-A-annoying-to-feed.

Am I really a picky eater? Am I so bad for disliking a few foods? There aren't that many, I don't think... Foods like:

• - Chipotle
• - Ginger
• - Tumeric
• - All-spice
• - Tomatoes that haven't been cooked first
  
• - Cucumbers with seeds
• - Jello
• - Most vinegars
• - Soup from a can
• - Pasta cooked more than 1 minute over al dente
• - Cooked fruit, or, for that matter, jarred fruit matter containing intact items
• - Mango
• - Anything that has meat in it
• - Overcooked green beans
• - umm...

Okay. You've got me. I better loosen up... yikes. I have been doing my best to shorten that list, by the way, but sometimes it feels like I haven't made a dent at all. Thus I often snag items in the grocery store or earmark recipes that describe food items I normally wouldn't enjoy.. Which actually brings me to today's topic: white chocolate, or, That Other Thing I Don't Like. After seeing this adorable recipe on Deb's blog, I felt an urge to recreate it. Also, we've been eatin' pretty healthy these days (sort of, or rather, I'd like to think so), and that generally leaves me with a craving for a cookie and the self satisfied feeling that I deserve one. The original recipe described lovely, crispy green tea shortbread cookies cut into cute little green leaf shapes and sandwiched with a white chocolate ganache.

That's the one. White chocolate. Bleg. Buttery, smooth, flavorless most of the time. White chocolate always seems to lack something - yet, I had some that had been sitting neglected in my pantry for quite some time, and in the green tea shortbread recipe described, it sounded all sounded so yummy. Imagine the texture: buttery smooth ganache + crispy, frail cookie. Imagine the flavor: delicate green tea with a subtle influx of dull, soothing cocoa butter. Mmmmmmmm. Perfection.


The only trouble was, I lacked green tea powder. And also didn't have cute little green leaf cookie cutter. Darn. I decided instead to go oreo-chocolate-style cut into wedges from a cake round, with a recipe from epicurious that I really should have known better than to get past first base with. Everyone booed it, saying the flavors could get bitter and the dough just fell apart when cooked. Only 50% said they would bother making it again But I persevered: I was determined. I had faith in the appealingly straightforward recipe, with its teasing claims of "sublime and delicious!" or "these shortbread were divine" that somehow masked the "this turned out terrible" and "crumbling to unservability". That wouldn't happen to my dough, would it? My dough would be perfect. I could fix it!

Ha. Told ya' so.

3 hours and a failed shortbread recipe later, I was left with two 8" rounds and a blob of chocolate I hadn't yet melted. The first round was intact but I daren't remove the shortbread. I already destroyed the second round, having pulverised it to a fine crumble after a few well intended inversion attempts.

This is when invention struck. Could I use the ganache as glue? Maybe it would hold together the broken crumbles into something edible. I melted the white chocolate, stirred in some light cream, tempered it and poured it over the intact base. I tapped out all of the air from the mixture, allowed it to cool for several minutes, then sprinkled my shortbread crumbs atop the mess.


The result? Surprisingly all right, and a lesson learned to listen to epicurious reviews. I present to you a little bit of Crumble Pie. It reminds me of a sweetened condensed milk chocolate cake a coworker of mine often makes (known as the Better Than Matt Damon cake, since in her family they couldn't use the Sex word). It was a little too sweet with so much white chocolate ganache oozing all over,but balanced when you get the right portion of chocolate crumble on the fork. I'd encourage you to try to fix this recipe rather than duplicate it! Unless, if you're craving something very sweet and buttery, go for it. The absolute best part was sweeping up the crispy chocolate and gooey white chocolate bits with the tart strawberries. At the very least, Greg and I polished our plates.

Chocolate Shortbread Crumble Pie
Serves 10

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 tsp salt
1.5 cups (185g) all purpose flour
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 tbsp instant coffee powder *
2 tbsp corn starch *
9-10 oz white chocolate, chopped into bits
8 tbsp light cream

1. Using a mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, cream the butter for several minutes, or until butter has aerated and lightened in color. Scrape down the bowl at least twice.
2. Add powdered sugar, vanilla and salt. Continue creaming for another 3 minutes. Scrape down the bowl at least twice.
3. Sift together the flour, cocoa powder, instant coffee and corn starch. Pour dry ingredients into mixing bowl, then continue mixing by hand or on low speed, just until ingredients are incorporated
4. Chill for two hours, then divide evenly and press into the bottoms of two 8" round cake pans. Bake in a 325 degree preheated oven for about 20 minutes, or until set through. Remove and cool completely.
5. Meanwhile, melt chocolate in microwave (small 15 second increments) or double boiler. Stir in warm cream and whisk until incorporated.
   
6. To make a little crumble pie, stir up one round until shortbread is crushed evenly. Pour chocolate mixture over intact base, given several rough taps against the counter (to remove air bubbles), and pour in shortbread crumbles. Cool completely before serving; dust with cocoa powder and powdered sugar for decoration
   

* The recipe advice on epicurious called for the addition of 2 tbsp corn starch to help overcome the crumble problem. I'm convinced the maker of the recipe measured, not weighed the flour, as I was very precise with my flour measurements and chilled the dough quite thoroughly before baking. Ultimately, the recipe is flawed. (Shoot, I really need some more of that crumble pie -- and no, the pun will not get old)

Chocolate Mink Heaven

I love to travel - I really do - and not in the sense of "I love going to see new places and new things". I love travel in the sense that I actually enjoy sitting in cars and airplanes undisturbed in my own little world of excitement. I know: insanity you say. But it's true, and I haven't met many people who would say the same thing. There was even once an extended argument that occurred with a hardly memorable ex-boyfriend about how anyone could possibly enjoy air travel for something other than the sake of Where They Are Going To. Was there something wrong with me, the hardly memorable He wondered? What could I say?


Since I was very young, it was what my father and I did together. Our traditions always involved car trips: small mining towns in Arizona, beautiful desert mountains and, every once and a while, a trip out to nowhere. There was an undefinable "cool" factor in it for me - we were escaping the boundaries of what held everyone else down. I have always felt that traveling people are people who are headed somewhere, in a way that means more than their physical destination. As I grew up and found myself struggling through embroiled teen angst years, my car (a 95' Thunderbird) was my escape. In it I would go, and away my troubles I would leave. When I moved out of my parent's house and picked up a rescue dog, Tori, there were two of us in it together: lonely, bored, and in need of late night adventure that didn't involve booze. Out onto the Phoenix freeways we drove. I would dream of missing my exit and ending up in California, though I am sure Tori merely enjoyed the warm desert air. When I moved to New Haven and the loneliness seemed to overwhelm me once more, my $300 car and I would hit I95, north, south, and back again, 91 towards Hartford and turned around towards the coast. Movement was escape, freedom and excitement.


From my young moments and on, I have enjoyed the sensation of being oriented in a known direction, headed so quickly towards it. Regardless of the path, even sometimes regardless of the destination, I like feeling that I'm going somewhere. Nowadays, I'm not lonely anymore, but I still savor the feeling of motion. The best part about going to Toronto for a week? Coming home - traveling towards something truly worthwhile.

(Thanks for the 'Future Mrs. Sirianni' sweatshirt, Leslie! Greg is scrubbing a salad spinner - what more could I ask for? What a guy : ) )

Philosophical reflections aside, I think I could have been spared Friday Night's travesty of a flight from Toronto to New York. I warned you that something unexpected would happen, and it did, this time in the form of an 8 hour delay spent sitting next to the two most obnoxious and morally offensive women I have ever had the unfortunate opportunity to be within earshot of. I left my hotel room at 12pm and sat in the tiny airplane at Pierson International from 4pm to 12am. I was finally dropped off at my front door by the airport shuttle at 3am on Saturday. It was excitin', let me tell you (what the hell does "your captain has been 'detained'" mean anyway?): having the wings ice over, the fuel run out, the crew leave, the flight canceled, a funny smoke fill the cabin room, being given customs forms to re-enter Canada, and oh, so many other things I honestly can't even remember. I even stood up to One Of The Obnoxious Women and gave her a piece of my mind. It was that bad. By the time we took off I was more than ready to be home.


Other than my desire to form an I Hate Air Canada Slash United Club, Toronto was great. I spent most of my time doing things for work, though I did get to wander around the city in the evenings. I ate at an absolutely wonderful French Bistro on Tuesday night, a place where the waiter was friendly and sat me in the best seat with a garden view. I ate my perfectly prepared meal while I watched the snow delicately flutter onto a fountain. It felt like I was in a snowglobe: I was Mrs. Snowman eating seared scallops in some sort of wine butter concoction that I feel like I'll never be able to recreate. Once I got back, of course, I went straight to the grocery store and picked up all sorts of ingredients to prepare for a week of cooking. I present to you tonight a trio interesting recipes, a Threefer if you will.


On Sunday night we had our upstairs tenants (Travis and Kristen, also our friends) down for a meal: Fried Gnocchi with Sundried Tomato and Roasted Pepper Cream Sauce and Chocolate Minks with Coffee Ice Cream for desert. I am a little proud of the roasted pepper cream recipe in all honesty - it was really, really good. The sundried tomatoes and roasted red peppers brought a rich, hearty sweetness that was complemented by zesty tomatoes. Cream rounded together the flavors, giving the sauce a smooth flavor that took a while to develop in your mouth. To add that necessary punch to each first bite, the gnocchi were fried in a tiny bit of butter with plenty of red pepper and salt. All and all, it created a perfectly palette-filling flavor. For desert, I found a recipe in Gourmet that was truly drool worthy. Called "Chocolate Mink", it is a flourless chocolate cake (AKA Amazing Gooey Pudding) served alongside melting coffee ice cream. It made Greg speechless (Unless, "uhhhhhhhhhhhh" counts as speech) and me contemplate licking my plate clean. If I had to live on one dessert alone, this would be the one.


As a balance to last night's indulgences, I toned down the flavors for tonight's dinner: Ginger Spiced Carrot and Bulgar Wheat Stew. I broke in the brand new (in the right color) Le Crueset! Wow. That dutch oven can cook. Thanks again to the Boy That Is Perfect, for getting me such a great holiday gift. I slowly simmered a mayan onion with 2 pounds of carrots, an entire head of garlic, one cup of red wine, a little brown sugar, ginger and schwarma spice. I served this stew with leftover spicey gnocchi on top, and although my original intention was simply to use up what was in the fridge - the spicey flavor and crispy texture of the gnocchi were a nice complement to the sweet and slow-cooked stew. I think it would be just as good to boost the spice value of this soup with extra red pepper or some cayanne alongside additional schwarma spice. I also would have upped the bulgar wheat if I had more on hand (I only had 1/2 cup. I bet 1 cup would be perfect).


It's great to be home. Enjoy!


Sundried Tomato and Roasted Pepper Cream Sauce with Fried Gnocchi
Serves 4

1 large shallot, diced
1/2 16 oz jar sundried tomatoes, packed in oil, roughly chopped
1/2 8 oz jar fire roasted red peppers, roughly chopped
1 tbsp tomato paste
1 tbsp lemon juice
1/2 cup crushed tomatoes
1 cup light cream
1.5 lb store bought gnocchi
3-4 tbsp butter (to coat bottom of pan)
1-3 tsp red pepper flakes (to taste)
Salt and white pepper to taste
Freshly grated Romano cheese

1. Add 1 tbsp oil from the sundried tomatoes to a saute pan, bringing to medium heat. Saute the shallot until translucent (about 5 minutes). Add chopped sundried tomatoes, roasted red peppers, tomato paste, lemon juice and crushed tomatoes. Bring to a slow simmer and allow sauce to cook for 10-15 minutes (until flavors mellow)
2. Puree sauce in a food processor until smooth, adding salt and white pepper to taste. Stir in light cream and set aside
3. Start butter heating in clean saute pan with red pepper flakes. Fry gnocchi, stirring constantly, for about 5 minutes, so that the gnocchi are crispy and golden.
4. Serve dishes with sauce, gnocchi and freshly grated Romano cheese
   

Chocolate Minks with Coffee Ice Cream
From Gourmet Magazine
Serves 4

4 tbsp unsalted butter
7 oz bittersweet chocolate (no more than 70% cocoa)*
2 eggs, separated
Pinch salt
2 tbsp sugar
Coffee Ice Cream
Cocoa powder for garnish

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Assemble double boiler: place a metal bowl on top of a saucepan with simmering water. Add butter and chocolate and melt slowly (be careful not to overcook - the chocolate can separate). Take chocolate off the double boiler and cool for 5 minutes, whisking occasioanlly
   
2. Meanwhile, beat egg whites to soft peaks. Add sugar and continue beating to stiff peaks.
3. Stir egg yolks and pinch of salt into now-cooled chocolate. Fold in 1/4 egg whites to distribute. Fold in remaining egg whites
4. Divide chocolate into four oven-proof ramekins. Cover in tightly cripped silver foil and place in a deep baking pan. Add boiling water to halfway up the sides of the ramekins.
5. Bake for 30 minutes (the center will still be wobbly). Cool slightly and then unmold onto ice cream, with cocoa powder to garnish

*The chocolate should be chopped or in chips. I used Ghiradelli bittersweet chips and it was gooood
**Chocolate minks may be prepared ahead of time and either dipped in hot water to unmold or heated until warm and gooey again

Ginger Spiced Carrot and Bulgar Wheat Stew
Serves 2-4, depending on the portions

4 tbsp light olive oil
1 mayan onion, diced
3 tbsp brown sugar
1 head of garlic, crushed with the back of a knife and roughly chopped
2 lb carrots, sliced on the diagonal (1/4")
1/2 cup bulgar wheat (or more if desired)
2 tbsp tomato paste
1 cup red wine
2 tbsp schwarma spice (available at specialty grocery stores)
1 tbsp fresh ginger, grated
1 tbsp tumeric
Pinch of red pepper flakes
Salt and pepper to taste
Handful flat leaf parsley, chopped

1. Heat oil to medium-high in a dutch oven. Add onion with sugar and cook, stirring, for 10 minutes, or until color starts to develop on the onions
   
2. Add garlic, carrots, bulgar wheat and tomato paste with two cups water. Cook, covered on high heat, for 45 minutes
3. Remove cover and add red wine with the spices (ginger, schwarma, red pepper flakes, tumeric, salt and pepper). Cook for an addition 10-15 minutes, uncovered, or until stew reaches desired consistancy
4. Serve with freshly chopped flat leaf parsley over desired carbohydrate*
   

*I, of course, served this with spicey fried gnocchi, and it was delicious. I imagine this would be good with rice, hunks of good bread, or soft boiled potatoes