My email inbox is filled with emails that are unread.
Most of them from me.
You see, I like recipes. I collect them, you might say. I see a blog with a recipe I'd like to try, I email it to myself. And hope I get to it before I forget what it was.
So here are a couple of desserts that I emailed myself that I actually made right away!
Lis is one of my online friends that I wish I could meet up with one day and have as a real life friend. Plan to meet up with. She always makes me laugh, and is not afraid to laugh at herself if something goes wrong. What a great way to look at life, don't you think?
When she made this Apple Caramel Self Saucing Pudding, it was just what I needed to drive away the chills of a cold day, and treat myself to some comfort.
After our winter, I needed the comfort. So I doubled the recipe.
Warm, caramelly, appley (yes I get to make up words, it's my blog afterall!), and very easy to make. And very good for breakfast.
This one was just fun - hot chocolate cake, made together with my 9 year old, one cold and yucky night. Can you think of a better way to end the day than by warm chocolate cake, drizzled with chocolate sauce, caramel sauce, topped with whipped cream and bits of toffee? No? Well we couldn't either, so when I saw this recipe on Peabody's site, I could not resist making it right away!
A great online friend, she even answered me right away when I emailed her asking what kind of hot chocolate she had used for her cake, as ours did not look nearly as dark and decadent as hers did. But it sure tasted mighty fine!
Now if I was smart, and had lots of time, I would start going through my emails and pick a new recipe each day to make. I bet it would be awhile before I ran out of recipes! Maybe the smarter thing would be to make one a week.
For now, I wish I had a few apples on hand. Despite being a beautiful 25C outside today, I am being dragged down by a mean and nasty cold, and could really use the comfort of that apple caramel pudding. Lis, any chance you can deliver some? :-)
Desserts we've had from other bloggers
The many faces of Marvin
Marvin has been with me for several months now, having been born in January, not because I was dying to try sour dough, but because a friend had asked me if I knew how to make sour dough bread, and learning it needed a starter, I was intrigued. Intrigued enough that my starter has been around, happily, and baked with many times, whereas the friend who wanted it to begin with... well her starter, a cast off of Marvin, made it into her fridge and has likely died a cold death there.
Marvin has made me muffins. He has made pancakes for my children. He has made several loaves of bread, though I still have not quite figured out how to make a boule with him. His bread has made us sandwiches and croutons, as well as bread pudding.
Cinnamon buns, slathered with icing, hinted with flavors of orange, were everyone's favorite. Soft and gooey. Yum.
Time goes on, and despite the neglect to which I've shown him lately (feeding every other day instead of every day, ack!) he lives on. Thrives.
This week was a busy week for Marvin. While he bubbled after a feeding, a muffin "cake*" cooled right from the oven. Dough for cinnamon raisin bread rose in another bowl. And he looked on at products of his work and smiled.
*Muffin "Cake"
I was lazy. I like the muffins that come from Marvin, but do not like scrubbing out that silly muffin pan of mine! Instead, I made a double power starter, 1 cup of starter, 2 cups of flour, 1 cup of water, and mixed it up like muffins, but then baked it in a 9x13 pan instead. This particular cake had chopped fresh strawberries, as well as chopped bananas. Baking time is about 45 minutes, instead of the usual 20 for 6 muffins.
Muffin flavors I've tried:
blueberry, fresh and frozen (like frozen better)
with and without orange and lemon zest
strawberry, fresh
mixed frozen berry
apple cinnamon
banana (mushed)
banana and strawberry (both sliced)
banana and blueberry (my favorite, the bananas mushed instead of chopped, with fresh blueberries)
chocolate chip
cheddar and green onion
cheddar and herb (for these, omit the sugar)
I'm sure there are more, I just can't remember them all right now!
Trying to learn more about my camera
Now to figure out how I got this, and more importantly, how I can do it again. But better.
***Edit***
For those wanting to know, I took this picture with my Olympus Evolt-500, on manual, at 1/25 F22 ISO 400, holding it manually up to the eye piece of my husbands telescope. No idea what lens he was using, and by now, not sure he'd know either.
Is it really springtime?
The warmer weather here (23C today!) has meant the melting of alot of snow. Alot of snow. No understatement, no exclamation marks, just fact. There was alot.
Hogsback Falls is one of my children's favorite places to go for a picnic or just to stand for a few minutes and watch the falls. 
Right now it is a little dangerous to be too close to the bottom edge. Water levels are just a wee bit high.
Hope those trees know how to swim!
However, with all that melt come the signs that tell you spring is really here! 
Like the first sprouts of rhubarb coming up in my garden.
Nice to see green after seeing nothing but white for months.
TWD: When life gives you marshmallows....
Well, what do you think you do with them?
When Judy, of Judy Gross Eats, said marshmallows, I did a little woop! Homemade marshmallows have been on my to do list for this year, and this was just the little push I needed. Plus I could mess with the flavors of a basic marshmallow (which I didn't actually do much of!)
These come together very quickly, or as quickly as sugar and water can get to 265F, so about 10 minutes. Sure, they aren't exactly pretty and smooth the way a store bought marshmallow is, but they are so much fresher and tastier that they are worth the minimum 3 hours of setting time!
Plain, yes, they were good, but why leave them plain when you can play with different variations? Hot chocolate, yes, but of course I had to make s'mores with them! (And it turns out I did not like either of the types of milk chocolate I had in the house for these.)
And last but not least, Rice Krispie squares! Think my rice krispies were stale though, which wouldn't surprise me based on the way my children like to close cereal boxes. Kinda takes away from the gooey vanilla-ness of the marshmallows when your krispies won't krispie, but the kids will eat them anyways.
Last night I decided to make chocolate ones as well, which we haven't really gotten to yet. I tried a bit, they are soft and marshmallowy and chocolaty, so that means the are good!
Many thanks to Judy for a good choice for last week!
Next week we are making that carrot cake that my dentist office liked so much. Do I hope they aren't reading right now so I don't have to share it with them?
Cream Tart Redo, with pictures, and LiveSTRONG
I knew I couldn't leave it alone. I knew that I was going to remake this recipe as many times as I needed to in order to have it come our right.
Isn't it nice that it only took once?
And if I had read ahead in the book, or remembered from when I read the entire thing from front to back, I would have seen the orange tart, seen the gelatin added into the cream. Would not have had blood orange soup. Here is the picture I kept being asked about. Not a bad picture but, ugh, would you want to eat that?
Many thanks to those of you who let me know about the lack of pectin and the need for gelatin. And the need for food coloring if I ever make something blood orange again!
Yes, I made it again. With lemons, following the exact recipe as written. Except that I still could not get it to heat to 180F. Could not get above 168F, but the cream had thickened and the whisk was leaving trails, so I strained it into the blender, let it cool and then made a huge racket by running my blender for a long time. (My kids love it when I do that, complaining that it is too noisy, but I always smile at them and remind them that they picked the blender for me, so if it is too noisy for them, well they have no one to blame but themselves!)
I made mini tarts this time, instead of a full sized tart. Six little tarts, filled with a lovely yellow cream. Tiny little flowers made from the scraps of the dough. And enough left over cream to have two little pots of cream and berries, enjoyed by those who aren't overly fond of pastry. Everyone was fond of the cream itself. Silky and rich, decadent with a hint of tang.
Obviously I did not have the same problems with the redo as I did with the original. Isn't it pretty? So pretty, that lemony goodness, that I have decided to make this my entry into this years LiveSTRONG with A Taste of Yellow, hosted again by Winos and Foodies Barabara.
Don't forget to get your own entry over to Barbara, you have until April 19th to do so. And check out her photo contest as well, part of this years A Taste of Yellow.
Coffee, cake and the price of flour
After months of busy schedules, I was finally able this week to meet up with BC from Beans and Caviar, and have coffee and cake. A chocolate and hazelnut cake that was light and fluffy, but not too sweet!
One of the things BC and I talked about was the recent price increases in flour. I had recently been shocked to see the 10kg bag of Robin Hood flour go up in price from $8.99 to $13.49 a bag! And not only go up in price, but there have been alot of empty shelves where the huge bags of flour normally sit at my grocery stores.
Now Marvin goes through alot of flour. At least 1/2 a cup a day, more if I am making something, and muffins have been ongoing for awhile now and show no sign of taking a break. Add in pizza dough, bread, cinnamon buns, pancakes, heck alot of baked goods, and that's alot of flour!
BC had a great idea over on her website, which you can see here, but I will share in part: What is the price of a large bag of flour in your area? And what type do you use? I personally am fussy and will not use some of the other brands around, even at a cost savings, which isn't a big difference, but I may have to ease up on that flour prejudice if my brand keeps going up in price!
UPDATE!
10kg bag of Robin Hood for $10.49 at Loeb. I bought one bag but will likely go back and buy more.
TWD: The Most Extraodinary French Non-Lemon Cream Tart
For the first time pretty well ever, there is no picture to show what I made. I took a few. I won't show them though. Bad is an understatement.
I have to start out by saying this: Dorie, I still love ya! I'm still very open to being adopted by you, or at least being one of your nieces, who gets to visit alot! And this recipe had me frustrated and scratching my head in confusion. It can't have been you, I must have either done something wrong or my large eggs were very different from your large eggs.
Yes, I had problems. Several problems.
First, I can't read, so my plan to make it Saturday for friends coming over for dinner did not work. Forgot to include the 4 hours of chilling time in my calculations. That was the minor problem.
My next problem was the cream. I started the cream yesterday morning, all my ingredients out and at temperature, my thermometer, my blender, my strainer at the ready. Even the plastic wrap for chilling was ready. Dorie's instructions said about 10 minutes or so until the cream reaches 180F and will begin to thicken. I had decided to go with a blood orange cream instead of a lemon one, so had this beautiful dark red juice ready to go in with my eggs and sugar, then to be whisked over a double boiler. Forty minutes later, whisking the entire time, I still had not reached 180F, and that cream was not thickening!
Another 10 minutes, with me still not dressed, needing to have been out the door 15 minutes before hand, I gave up and walked away. Threw on some clean clothes so I was not driving the husband to work in my pjs and got ready to leave.
At the last second I decided to check the temperature of the cream and, a miracle! It finally reached 180F! Though it didn't seem that thick to me, I strained it into the blender and left it to cool while I drove. Came home and blended in the butter, not really liking the color anymore. That bright, vivid red? Not so much. More like bleh, light brown, not appealing looking at all!
However, it was alot of work to get it to where it was, so I set it into the fridge for an over night chilling and went about my day. Today I tackled the tart shell, which I had my doubts about as I was trying to press it into my tart pan (which is not a removable bottom, had never been used before, and may not get used again!) The tart, though, came out golden and beautiful!
One of my last problems was trust. I did not trust myself, as I looked at the cream in the fridge and thought, "I should just put it into wine glasses and top it somehow with the tart crust. Make cookie spoons, or crumble the tart into it and make a parfait." No, I ignored those thoughts and instead poured a very loose cream onto my tart shell. No smoothing needed at all, it ran all the way out to the edge of the crust! And ran right down into the pan when I attempted to cut a piece for serving!
Like I said, I love Dorie, I'm sure it was me. Though I do hear there were others who had problems as well - those aren't my fault though.
My husband just nodded his head when I told him that now that I've tried and failed, he knows I will try it again until I get it right.
No blood oranges next time though - not only did they not look good at all in the cream, I did not like the flavor. The crust was great, nice and crisp, with a buttery crumb, but the cream was just not right for me. It was good for my husband, who had three slopping helpings of it, despite the appearance.
Next week's recipe for Tuesdays with Dorie was announced earlier, and I'm so much more looking forward to this one than I was the lemon cream. Hey, maybe next time I'll actually make lemon cream!
Don't forget to go see our hostess for this weeks recipe, Mary of Starting From Scratch. I bet she has pretty pictures to look at!
Cooking Rachel Ray without all the silliness
I always plan to make alot more from my feature cookbook than what I eventually end up making. This month is no different. Lots of yellow post it notes sticking out of Rachel Ray's 365: No Repeats: A Year of Deliciously Different Dinners.
Yes, I own a Rachel Ray cookbook. Actually, I think I own three. Not sure, have to check my shelf. This one I think I actually bought myself, whereas any other ones I own were chosen for me by my children as gifts. I like cookbooks as gifts, even if I never make anything from them, because I like to read cookbooks.
This month I set out to make a few recipes from this book, but decided in advance to skip all the silliness of Yum-O, and EVOO, and sammies. Ugh. Those kind of things, plus the excessive hyperness, are part of the reason I stopped watching her shows. But I have made a few recipes from them, with a fair bit of success, so wasn't worried about a high failure rate for this cookbook. In the end, though, I only managed to make 5 recipes from the book of 365. (Guess those two road trips and life took over the month of March.)
Let's start with Mega Meatball Pizza, from page 6. This recipe tastes alot better than what it looks like. Though it doesn't look so bad that the kids argued about eating it. Instead they both dug in with no problems or complaints. Served with a fruit salad, it was a good meal.
I plan to make this again, but will be decreasing the ground beef by a bit, and increasing the tomato paste . I had used my homemade pizza dough for it, and would do that again as well. Maybe make the pizza bit bigger than a round though.
Btw, do you really get 3-ounce cans of tomato paste in the US? Our small sized cans are 5.5 ounces .
My next recipe was pretty as could be: Citrus-Marinated Chicken and Orange Salad, from page 19. It allowed me to introduce my kids to a few new salad greens as well, arugula and radicchio, both listed in the recipe, as well as endive, not in the recipe but I added it in anyways. I was complimented on the dressing and the chicken by both children, and both the husband and I enjoyed the entire salad. I wished there had been a bit more of the salad than there was, even with my adding in the extra endive, and would increase it the next time I make it. I think this would be a great thing to make in the summer for company. It does plate up on a platter very nicely and looks impressive.
Which is not something I can say at all about this next recipe, Smoky Turkey Shepherd's Pie, found on page 2. Again, this tasted better than what it looked like. Though its flavor was very mild, unlike the smells it gave off, which was mouth watering.
I had to make a small change or two to this recipe. I took out the two cups of frozen peas and replaced them with corn. Not only does corn make more sense to me, but peas are not universally enjoyed in this house. I didn't want to eat the full batch of pie myself! I also had run out of sour cream (think I used it for a cake actually) so had replaced it with a touch of cream instead, to give the creaminess, and increased the flour a bit. Despite the increase in flour, however, the sauce never did thicken up much and was very watery.
The general agreement was make again, but with another change or two. Cutting the turkey bacon smaller and making it crispier, cooking the celery and carrots a bit longer, staying with the corn, and increasing the amount of mashed potatoes. The potato layer was very thin. Either that or I had alot more filling than I should have.
Oh, and increase the spices some as the flavors were very, very mild, essentially too mild.
One extra note about this one - It made alot, so both my husband and I had some for lunch the next day, reheated. I don't know how he felt about it, I forgot to ask, but I found it had tasted much better the first time and was not nearly as enjoyable the second day.
I think this next recipe was the only one of the five that I would not make again, Island Bird: Pineapple-Rum Chicken, found on page 86. This one looked better than what it tasted, and in the pot, it did not look very good at all. I ended up taking the liquid out of the pot with the chicken and adding it to another pot, trying to reduce it (alot) before adding it back in. Sure, I wanted sauce with the chicken, but not soup!
The adults ate this, grudgingly, but the kids, including the extra one I had that night, picked at it. One ate all the chicken, one ate the pineapple only and the other complimented me on my rice and noticed the green pieces looked like leaves. Yes, they were parsley leaves, which I guess he had never seen before.
The fact that there was alcohol in the recipe gave it the "wow" factor for the kids, getting them to try it, but frankly I think that is all that did it. 
This last one was on my plan ahead list alot. I seem to have one of those every month so far, one recipe that I plan to make, then remove from the list, put somewhere else, remove from the list, move somewhere else, repeat, repeat, repeat. And this month the Sausage and Spinach Pastry Squares, on page 44, was the recipe.
A few changes: I skipped the salad part. I actually made this at the same time I was making homemade turkey soup, which the kids had for dinner, while the husband and I had the squares. Or rectangles I should say, as that is how mine turned out. I also did not put the sage in. Not only did I not have any, fresh or dry, but I had accidentally bought medium Italian sausages instead of sweet, so we wouldn't have been able to taste the sage in it anyways.
These were okay, nothing special, but not horrible either. A good hand meal as I did not need a knife and fork to eat it, just pick it up and nibble from it. Be prepared for puff pastry crumbs on your clothing. They would make a good appetizer, in small format, and probably would taste better that way.
Lots more recipes in the book to try. Heck, I never even got half way into the book with my post-it notes before I ran out of time! I could probably use the same book for the next few months and not repeat anything. Yes, I know that is the intention of the book, but there are plenty of recipes in it that I would never bother to make in the first place, which reduces that 365 by a significant number.
No idea yet what book I am going to look at for this month, despite it being the second of April. I plan to pull out a few options in the next day or two and make a decision then. I had been thinking of doing the Moosewood Cookbook, lent to me by a friend, but so far in reading it over, nothing really appeals to me. The recipes seem fine but every day, standard recipes, not try something new recipes. I'll figure something out.
A few notes, not related to my cookbook choice of the month, but related to food, of course.
Notice a few new little tags on the side of my blog with my links? One of them is for the Foodie Blogroll, run by fellow foodie Jenn, the Left Over Queen, as a way for us bloggers to get to know each other a bit better. As I told Jenn, I was sure I had done earlier, like back when she first started it, but that was awhile ago and I could be confusing it with something else. When you have time, go check it out, and then sign up yourself.
The second one you might notice is my FoodBuzz Featured Publisher badge, which will link anyone who clicks it over to FoodBuzz. Feel free to drop in there as well, vote me up if you'd like, add me to your friends list or peruse the multitude of other blogs that are also shown there. And notice the little picture of me on my profile, or of my camera actually, taken by my five year old actually. He is quite proud of the picture and is on his way to being a budding photographer.
TWD: Gooey Chocolate Cakes
Well it is my second week with TWD (That's Tuesdays with Dorie for those who live under a rock, one with no food near it.) I was a bit more prepared for this one, not rushing at the last minute. Or theoretically not rushing at the last minute. Reality was a bit different.
This week the choice was made by Leigh over at Lemon Tartlet. Her choice was for the Gooey Chocolate Cakes, found on page 261-262. A good choice, but then, really, is there a bad choice to be made from Dorie?
So I had a full week to do this, and planned to do it as dessert on Sunday night. Then my bbq was unsnowed (isn't that a nice thing to do for your wife?) and I ended up having a bbq for dinner that night, baking two loaves of sour dough bread and making the cakes at the same time! So in the end I was running, running, running, from one thing to another, with all the stuff ready to go for the final mix and then into the oven while we ate dinner.
I admit I don't understand the point of the finely chopped chocolate on top before baking the batter, as it didn't sink into the batter but only left an extra trail of chocolate. But what the heck, how can more chocolate hurt?
Now I had planned on making these either with creme anglaise, or ice cream, but ran into more time confusion. I didn't read through the sauce recipe long enough to catch the 24 hour rest period, until about 30 minutes before I put the cakes in the oven. And I had been in such a tizzy over the price increase to flour that I had refused to spend $8 on a carton of good quality ice cream to go with the cakes, thinking I was still going to make the creme anglaise.
Instead we had to eat them with whipped cream, such a hard ship to us all!
So far I've seen a number of variations on this, from mini ones, to those involving caramel. I will have to revisit this recipe, make it for company, maybe with milk chocolate and caramel. And plan ahead this time so I can make the creme anglaise, which I still haven't done!
Daring Bakers: Let Them Eat Cake!
It took quite awhile, but someone from the Daring Bakers finally chose a recipe from Dorie for their choice of challenge. Morven, you made a great choice!
Her choice was so good, I'd actually made it already: Dorie's Perfect Party Cake.
Its a good cake, even though it involves the dreaded buttercream icing that so threw me for the Yule Log challenge. The buttercream that I made successfully the first time I made this cake, and was able to turn to when having so many problems with the Yule log, restoring my confidence.
I had no worries making this recipe. I'd done it before, I knew I could do it again. Only this time, I was taking the challenge on the road. That's not my kitchen counter in the picture.
Yes, Bob went on a road trip. Along with a few other items, like my cake flour and cake pans. Should have brought a few other things with me though, like good spatula, my homemade vanilla, some parchment paper..... The list could go on.
You see, I decided to make the cake for Easter weekend, where I would be making dinner for my family, some of which I only see once or twice a year. This dinner was going to be at my mother's house, though, and even though my mother used to cook, she doesn't anymore. And her kitchen is lacking in a few things that I find essential. Like a good sharp knife. And a spatula. And baking powder.
I managed to work around the lack of stuff, though, and turned out a reasonable looking cake. Morven had given us a bit of leeway with the filling, written as raspberry preserves, so at the last minute I substituted huge, beautiful and fragrant strawberries instead.
At the end of a huge meal for my family (I had bbq'd a very large roast beef, and roasted a turkey), everyone made room for at least a slice of this lovely looking cake. At least three people went back for seconds.
Every months' recipe provides a different challenge: When will I find time to make it? OMG, I need to do what with the sugar?!? Yeast? But I'm afraid of yeast! Sometimes the challenges are easy to over come, other times require a bit more courage and just diving into the recipe, hoping for the best. It is ironic that with this recipe the biggest challenge for me was working in someone else's kitchen. (Okay, and having to remake the buttercream after I put it in the fridge to go do something else and could not get it to soften up again without breaking, that was a challenge as well.)
Many thanks to Morven for giving me a bit of a break this month, a recipe I could dive into with my eyes wide open, and enjoy. I'm sure I'm not the only Daring Baker who enjoyed this challenge, but just in case there is any doubt, check out as many of them as you can, over here on the Daring Baker's Blogroll. Get cozy though, there are well over 600 of us now!
Now, must run off to the DB site and see who is up next! My cupboards are a bit bare, in need of a new recipe.
Tuesdays with Dorie: Last minute everything
When Laurie of Quirky Cupcake first proposed doing a weekly recipe from Dorie Greenspan's Baking From My Home to Yours, I liked the idea, but didn't join. I think I actually commented on her blog saying that, yes, I owned the book and loved it (can you tell from my blog?), but I had made so many wonderful things from the book already, it seemed kinda silly to join in. So I didn't.
Since then, the group has grown to 100 bloggers, and the only things they've made that I also made was the Orange Berry Muffins, page 3, on January 29, and the Brown Sugar-Apple Cheesecake, pages 238 and 239, on February 12th. Alot of recipes, not alot of repeats for me. Which made me question.... "Why didn't I want to join up and bake more from Dorie again?"
I give up, I don't know either. Silly me.
So I asked to join. Sunday night, less than 2 days before the posting date of the Caramel-Topped Flan (chosen by my Aussie friend Steph of A Whisk and a Spoon.) Sure, Laurie got back to me ASAP, but if you don't check your email Sunday night and get the email the next day, then that cuts the time down even further! I was even given the option of waiting until next weeks recipe, based on the lateness of my joining, but hey, if I was going to do this, I was going to do this right away! No more waiting!
Oh wait. No milk. How the heck did that happen? I just bought milk last week, right before we went away for the weekend. Where did all the milk go? And typical me, I learned this later in the evening, after I was already in my pj's, unwilling to go out the door to a store. And well after I had already been grocery shopping, sure that there was 4 liters of milk in the fridge.
So here I sat this morning, post day, with no flan and still no milk. Book open to the right page, instructions read through at least twice, but no milk. And could not leave the house until my youngest child woke up. Of course he slept in until about 9am, something he rarely ever does, but hey, that was to be expected!
Fortunately this recipe is a snap to put together and the instructions are very clear. I didn't have the proper sized pan, at least not one that wasn't non-stick, but I did have a pan that would work, and there was no rule (that I know of) that said I had to follow the recipe exactly, specifically, to the letter. And as it needed chilling time and I had to go to work in the afternoon, making it this morning was wonderful timing. Run out and grab milk, throw it together and into the oven, get stuff together for lunches and work, allow flan to chill while I was at work, enjoy it for dessert after a long day.
My children gave me funny looks when I said there would be a caramel flan for dessert after dinner tonight. So they don't know what a flan is, that's not such a bad thing, is it? (Oh wait, children of foodie.... Okay, but they know lots of other food related things!) At least one of them giggle when they heard the flan make a rather rude noise as it slid out of the pan and onto the plate. Then oooh'd when he saw the topping and caramel dripping out over the sides of the flan.
He was even inhaling it until I told him what was in it, then told me he didn't really like it and stopped eating it. Oh well, more for the rest of us!
This flan is one step away from Creme Brulee. And if I owned a torch, I'd have bruleed a piece of it, just to see what it would be like. I still want to try it, but there isn't much left of the flan to play with. Not even enough, really, to share with the neighbors, who do own a torch (okay, a proper blow torch, not a mini kitchen torch.)
I think I need to find a fun colored highlighter in my drawer of school supplies and start highlighting all the recipes I have made from Dorie already, with a second color for all the recipes I will make over the next while as a happy member of Tuesday's With Dorie.
If you are looking for the recipe for this lovely dessert, you have three choices: Try and read what you can from my picture above; Go see Steph's post, where she will have the recipes; Or go buy the book already!
Fried Ravioli, the recipe
It seems the fried ravioli from my February cookbook post brought about some interest. Some serious interest.
So, here is the recipe for those crunchy little bundles. Make them for your dinner tonight!
Fried Ravioli
from Giada De Laurentiis' Everyday Pasta
Olive oil, for frying (I used canola oil)
1 cup buttermilk
2 cups Italian-style bread crumbs
1 box store-bought bite-size cheese ravioli (I could only find spinach and cheese)
1/4 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
1 to 2 cups marinara sauce (store bought or homemade), heated, for dipping
Heat 2 inches of olive oil in a large frying pan over medium heat until a deep-fry thermometer registers 325F.
While the oil is heating, put the buttermilk and the bread crumbs in separate shallow bowls. Working in batches, dip the ravioli in the buttermilk to coat completely, allowing the excess buttermilk to drip back into the bowl. Dredge the ravioli in the bread crumbs. Place the ravioli on a baking sheet, while you coat the remaining ravioli.
When the oil is hot, fry the ravioli in batches, turning occasionally, until golden brown, about 3 minutes. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the fried ravioli to paper towels to drain.
Sprinkle the fried ravioli with Parmesan cheese and serve with a bowl of warmed marinara sauce for dipping.
Happy St. Patrick's Day!
There is no Irish in our family. British, yes, French, yes, but no Irish.
Nor was there any green beer or milk, in our St. Patrick's Day, though I did go out and buy a can of beer. Or Guinness, actually, which isn't exactly a "normal" beer, is it?
Instead I went with more traditional types of Irish fare for us to have a quiet St. Patrick's Day celebration, one that would not involve the nasty side effects that would come from spending your night down at the local pub, enjoy a pint or two. Or three, as some people do.
Before I had a chance to go searching for recipes, Anna, went and posted up a selection for people, over on her blog Cookie Madness. Thank you Anna, you saved me some work! From her list, I selected three things, Irish Stew, Irish Soda bread, and Guinness Cake.
Which means I should have bought TWO cans of Guinness, and not one. Oh well, we made do.
Dinner started out with this Irish Stew, which ended up being short changed on the Guinness it required, plus a bit short on the red wine, again, because I can't read a recipe or the volume on a bottle of wine. Not that the stew was lacking in flavor because of this. No, instead it had great body, taste and texture. So much so that even both my children ate their entire bowls, including the broth.
I will make this again, probably with the proper amounts of beer and wine, but will increase the carrots and I may want to thicken up the broth a bit as there was alot of liquid. As my husband said, it was unlike an English style stew in the thickness of the broth, which was not great for dipping bread into it.
Speaking of the bread, I continued with the Irish theme and make Irish Soda bread, again posted by Anna.
This bread was as simple as could be, and came together in minutes, which was good because I was trying to assemble it around the 5 year old who was unloading the dishwasher in front of me, and asking questions a mile a minute. (Yes, I get my 5 year old to unload what he can of the dishwasher, a job that he is happy to do at this point and let's him feel like he's contributing, which he is.) I admit I wasn't sure about the raisins in this, and considered omitting them entirely. Afterall, I was after a bread to go with a lovely, savory stew, and the raisins seemed out of place. In the end they worked out well, though this bread was not really suitable for dunking in the stew. It had good flavor though, warm with melted butter, so it was all good.
The last part of our Irish dinner was Guinness Chocolate Cake. Yes, I baked a cake with beer in it, as well as putting some Guinness in the icing. I was a bit skeptical about the beer in icing, mostly because I do not like beer, either the smell or the taste, but this worked out well. I needed to be a bit more generous on the icing between the layers though, but had been concerned there would not be enough icing for the entire cake, so had been frugal. In the end I had a bit left over.
This cake was not only enjoyed by my own family, but was shared with the neighbors, who claimed it "the best chocolate cake ever!" Guess it was success!
I hope everyone had a lovely St. Patrick's Day, however you celebrated it. Even if it meant green beer for dinner.
Cookbook of the month - for February, of course!
February was a short month, with lots of little obstacles in this way of good cooking and baking, and March is turning into a very busy month, hence I am very late in my post about February's cookbook. Sticking to the theme of celebrity chef's, last month I went with Giada De Laurentiis' Everyday Pasta.
This is my first book by Ms. Everyday Italian, though I have watched the show on a number of occasions. Seeing as my boys all very much like pasta, this looked like a good choice of cookbooks to invest in for a bit more variety.
So far, not so much though. Sure, lots of pasta recipes in this book, alot of them looking quite good to me, but not so much so to the boys, who are a bit more fussy than I am. I like seafood in my pasta, I like variety and different flavors and textures. They like spaghetti with meat sauce.
I decided to start this book out with a big leap into the unknown, with Fried ravioli, page 33. Yes, I deep fried pasta and it was great! This was actually my initial jump into deep frying, and was such a success that it lead to donuts shortly afterwards.
This recipe is very simple and would be great as a starter for company. It is actually listed as a starter, but I doubled it and made it dinner on a Friday night, when we tend to go a bit more casual for dinner. It requires store bought ravioli, buttermilk, breadcrumbs, parmesan cheese and oil. Heat up a bit of sauce for dipping and you are set!
These little puffs of crispiness were very, very good. And still good reheated the next day. 
With the success of the ravioli, I moved on to something a bit more adventurous, Italian Vegetable Soup, page 70, and Parmesan Popovers, found on page31.
I don't know now what I was thinking when I saw this soup recipe and thought it might go over well with the boys. Sure, it has pasta in it, but it also has sliced zucchini and artichokes. Adventurous, yes, disaster at dinner? Also a big yes. Actually, none of us liked it. We did the hands in the table in a fist, one, two, three, thumbs up or thumbs down vote, and every one of us gave it a thumbs down. I gave the entire pot to my neighbor and never did hear back from her on it.
The Parmesan Popovers I think I will need to remake though, just to see if I undercooked them or something. They were a bit denser than I expected, and though they tasted alright flavor wise, they didn't really grab anyone either. My 5 year old liked them dipped in the broth of the soup, and ate two of them. These got three thumbs sideways for iffy, and one thumb down.
It was just not Giada's night.
Oh somewhere in between those two recipes, I made the Spinach Salad with Citrus Vinaigrette on page 49, though I didn't make the Parmesan Frico from page 229 that went with it. And I forgot to take a picture, so very unlike me, because I was busy eating it and enjoying it. My kids aren't big salad fans, but did enjoy the flavors of the dressing and the oranges. They also like raw spinach because they like the shape of it, looking like leaves.
So not having had a major success with my last attempt, I decided to move on to something a bit simpler and try the recipe for Basic Marinara Sauce on page 224. Yup, it's basic. Plain, simple, basic sauce. A bit sweet, sweeter than I like, but then it really is a basic sauce with not very many ingredients and no extra seasoning. The 5 year old loved it though, asking for more sauce on his pasta, something he has never done before.
Unfortunately I did not have time to try the Arrabbiata Sauce (page 225) that used this basic sauce as part of it's base, but I will have to go back and try it. 
My final attempt at the book, before the month ran out, was very adventurous for my guys: Pork and Lemon Orzotto (page 198), with Sauteed Spinach with Red Onion, page 58. A bit too adventurous. I'd forgotten that they didn't like orzo, to start. Nor do they really like risotto, which this orzo was imitating. So two strikes against it before I even started. This dinner was obviously not going to go down as one that everyone liked.
The pork was moist and flavorful, with a nice citrus tang from the dressing. The orzotto, it was okay, though I found the same dressing that worked well with the pork was over kill on the orzo. And it made way too much for me, seeing as I was the only one eating it.
The sauteed spinach with red onion, well it was just spinach and red onion, something I like and my husband tolerates from time to time, but nothing special. Maybe Giada gets better spinach than I do? I dunno, but she and her husband must eat alot of it, as I halved the recipe and there was plenty for us.
As expected after my January try at this, I'm never going to find one cookbook that has nothing but recipes that everyone likes. Heck, even Dorie makes recipes that I know the family won't eat (and that is almost heresy to say!) So I was a bit disappointed in the failures, but also happy with the successes. And I still have at least two more recipes to try, one of which was on my menu plan at least 4 times during February, Rigatoni with Sausage, Peppers and Onions, page 95, but was never made because sometimes life sucks! And sometimes, despite a meal plan and grocery list built together, you still miss an important ingredient or two.
One thing this experience of trying a new book each month is doing is allowing me to explore the cookbooks I own for actual cooking, instead of just pleasurable reading material. It is letting me test the boundries of what the boys will and will not eat, though they have all been very cooperative to try anything out that I am testing for this. Not as cooperative as Freddy from The Great Big Vegetable Challenge, but still cooperative.
It is part way through March now, where I am having more opportunities to cook from this months book of the month, but still owing a post or two about the life of Marvin, my friendly sour dough starter. In the meantime, my little guy is about to ask for breakfast, and Bob is on standby for making a cake to go with dinner tonight.
Btw, on a totally different bent, and speaking of Bob, I have found that Bob has a face. My lovely little 300W KA Standmixer, in his black jacket, has been a fixture on my counter since he came into my home, but recently I discovered the face that goes with him. Yes, Bob is also a wizard. He just doesn't live in a skull.
Did I mention....
That my pal KellyPea over at Sass & Veracity was kind enough to honor me with this lovely award, an E for Excellent! Woot!
You don't know Sass & Veracity? Why the heck not? Get moving, click on the link!
Actually she did this awhile ago, which I knew about, hence her page has been open on my pc for about 2 weeks now. (If you get an analytic page for your blog, your average time spent has skyrocketed thanks to me!)
Uhm KellyPea - am I supposed to pass this one along to some other deserving bloggers? And any chance those cookies were lost in the mail somehow, somewhere? Maybe?
When Mother Nature dumps snow on you....
You make ice cream, of course!
Well, after you manage to either shovel your way in, or out, of your home. In our case, it was shovel our way in, which we did, with the help of kind neighbors and their snow blowers.
The snow shoveling was yesterday, the ice cream from today, when the sun was shinning down on the mountains of snow that surround all of us. And being March Break for the kids, they were both out playing in it, with some of their friends. Until they got bored. (Which, to be fair, took several hours.)
So inside they came. Which sent me looking for a recipe to make with them, something easy, with a quick result, that would satisfy the children. Now numbering three instead of the usual two. Snow ice cream sounded about right to me.
And once again Mary came to my rescue with a recipe for the ice cream, before I even had a chance to go looking for one on the internet! She even knew how many liters in a gallon for me (3.8 for those of you who are curious.)
The three kids thought this was a crazy idea, making ice cream from snow, but none of them turned down the chance to try it. Especially when it came together super quick and they could try it right away. Two of the three kids loved it.
We went with vanilla, but next time might try the chocolate. Which I bet would get a three out of three.
Snow Ice Cream
1 gallon snow
1 cup sugar
1 cup whole milk
1 cup half and half
2 tbsp vanilla
Mix it all up, adding half and half first then enough milk to the
consistency you want. Then put in freezer for about 20 minutes if you
want "hard" ice cream and serve immediately if you want soft
If you want chocolate, add 1/2 a cup of liquid chocolate milk stuff and
cut back half and half by 1/3 of a cup
Monthly Mingle: How crayons started dinner
Yes, I said crayons. No, we didn't eat them. (What were you thinking?!?) But they were responsible for the start of this dinner.
We had this for dinner last night, and I enjoyed every bite of it. And the idea of it started last week at work, where I was coloring. You know, crayons and paper, coloring. In this case, I was coloring with a couple of little girls, R and V. I was coloring a picture of spaghetti and meatballs.
I don't know why, but we started talking about food and dinner. Maybe it was my picture. I can't remember, but we were talking about foods we liked and dinner, when R said she loved chicken pot pie. I agreed, but said I couldn't make that for dinner because my boys were fussy. She crinkled her little nose and said, "Fussy! Why are they fussy?"
And with that, she challenged an assumption I had been making. I had never made chicken pot pie for my family. I had bought a few frozen ones before, mostly for me, because I like them, but had just been assuming that my boys would not like it. "But why won't they like it?" I thought to myself. It's chicken, which both my children like, my choice of vegetables (and I wasn't going to pick veggies that they don't like!), pie crust of some kind and a bit of a cream sauce. Why wouldn't they like that? Sure, my husband isn't fond of chicken, it usually isn't his first choice, but then he is more likely to order it out than I am, and he tolerates it. He's also been very good at trying everything lately, so I thought, "Why not?"
See? Crayons = dinner. Easy, right?
This chicken pot pie did not involve pie dough, but did involve puff pastry. Which reminds me to never buy this type of puff pastry again - you'd think that a local bakery that makes their own puff pastry on site from scratch would make a butter one, but noooooooo, this one didn't. Never again. It tasted okay, but I know what good, homemade, from scratch, butter puff pastry tastes like, and am fussy myself about a few things. This is one of them.
Under the puff pastry top, a creamy mixture of chicken, onions, carrots, green beans, red and yellow peppers, and mushrooms bubbled and steamed. This was one of those meals that takes longer to assemble than anything else. Chop this, dice that, stir this, season that. I was hungry when I started and even hungrier when I was finally able to pull it out of the oven.
So the verdict on fussy? I think we had a split vote actually. On the like it side was myself, obviously, and my little five year old foodie, who was inhaling his as fast as the heat would allow, when he suddenly caught his brother's "I don't like this" attitude and stopped eating it. He got more than 3/4 of the way through it first though. My husband was iffy on it. Didn't dislike it alot, ate it, and took the extra I made for his lunch in with him today. My oldest was the hold out. He crinkled his nose at it, and eventually ate everything but the puff pastry and the mushrooms. Mostly because he wanted dessert.
I could probably make it again for dinner and people would eat it, but it wouldn't be something they would request.
I'm submitting this pie for Meeta's Monthly Mingle for March, One-Dish Dinners. Sure I made mine in individual containers, but it could easily have been done as a single, large pie. Which is how I was planning on making it initially but, you know, mini is funner in cooking!
Chicken Pot Pie
1 package frozen puff pastry (1 lb), defrosted
3 chicken breasts, diced and seasoned with salt and pepper
1/2 large red onion, diced
1 large carrot, diced
1/4 each, red and yellow peppers, finely diced
handful green beans, trimmed and cut into small pieces
8 mushrooms, quartered
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 tablespoons butter
1/4 cup flour
2 cups milk
1/4 tsp nutmeg
Salt and pepper to taste
Preheat oven to 425F.
Heat large pan over medium high heat. Add 1 tablespoon olive oil and brown chicken. If necessary, brown in batches. Set aside. Add remaining oil into pot and saute the onions and carrots for a few minutes, before adding in the mushrooms, peppers and garlic. Be careful not to burn the garlic. Stir and saute for 3-4 more minutes before adding in the green beans. Saute an additional 2 minutes before adding the butter. When the butter is melted, add in the flour and stir carefully. Cook for 3 minutes before gradually adding in the milk, stirring continually. Add in the nutmeg. Allow the mixture to come to a boil, thickening. Taste for seasoning and adjust as necessary.
Spoon mixture in good sized casserole dish, or individual sized dishes (I had 5.) Cut puff pastry to fit inside the dish or dishes. Lay the pastry over top and place dish on a baking sheet before placing in the oven. Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until the pastry is puffed, golden, and the sauce is bubbling around the edges.
Allow to cool some before eating. Unless you like having a burnt tongue.
