Sweet Dumpling

Where the heck have I been?

2009-06-29T06:27:00.000-07:00

Uhh, Paris. Of course.
Sure, maybe that was over a month ago. And maybe I've baked a million things since then and took pictures of many of them and really really thought about blogging but instead decided to check and see if any friends updated their Facebook. Whatever. Call me lazy.

I'm lazy and a procrastinator and have been happily baking and eating my way through the month of June without paying any attention to my blog, but perhaps you'll forgive me if I tell you I brought you a souvenir from Paris?

First, I have to back up a little bit and say (once again) that I've got a fantastic husband. Ugh, I know, you're tired of hearing it. But he really is super great. So great that he got me maybe the best Mother's Day present ever... a weekend in Paris PLUS two days of classes at Le Cordon Bleu. Seriously awesome. On the first day I did a market tour and then watched the chef prepare a beautiful meal with fresh ingredients. And then on the second day I did a more hands-on class where I learned how to make croissants, pains au chocolat, and several variations of brioche. Ohhh, the pastries. Ben signed me up for that one just so he could have as many croissants as his tummy could hold (he was not disappointed).

But the recipe that I bring you today is not pastry. It is instead from the market tour demonstration and it is much easier! No rolling and folding and chilling and rolling and flouring and praying! And wonderful for summer! And easy! Magnifique! I highly encourage you to make this and sit outside and eat while closing your eyes and transporting yourself to France. Sipping a glass of the leftover cabernet isn't a bad idea either....

Chilled Strawberry Soup

500 g strawberries
250 ml freshly squeezed orange juice
250 ml cabernet
100 g sugar
20 black peppercorns
50 fresh ginger, grated
1 vanilla bean
3 star anise
3 cardamom pods (whole or crushed)

Pour the juice into a small saucepan. Split the vanilla bean and scrape the seeds into the juice and then add the pod as well. Add peppercorns, ginger, star anise and cardamom and bring to a boil. Lower heat and simmer until reduced, and then remove from heat and place the pan in an ice bath.

Halve the strawberries and place them in a large bowl with the sugar and let sit for a few minutes. Add the wine to strawberries, and when the orange juice is cool, strain and pour over strawberry mixture. Cover and chill in the refrigerator for about 30 minutes.

You can serve this with whipped cream, or if you're like me and routinely forget to buy things like cream, a little yogurt with honey and vanilla beans is also lovely.

Bon appétit!

Iron Cupcake Earth: Soda Pop

2009-04-22T06:31:00.000-07:00

I'm a bit of a procrastinator. I always have a list of things I should do and I never seem to get to them. At least, not in a timely manner. For example, I should put Wesley's too small clothes up in the attic to make room in his dresser, read the baby sleep book that Ben finally got around to finishing (we're a procrastinating family), wash the dogs because they're getting a little ripe (but they go to the dog farm when we go on vacation next week, so a bath now would be useless, right?), and perhaps finally put away the Christmas decorations that we stuck up in the guest room "temporarily" when we finally managed to de-Christmas our living room in January.

So, yeah. I put things off. That it why I am super proud of myself for managing to bake appropriately themed cupcakes for Iron Cupcake before the deadline! Two months in a row now! Miracle! I even managed to plan ahead and have my wonderful parents send me ingredients that I can't get here.

And my superb planning and motivation + great parents who put up with my postal requests =

Root Beer Float Cupcakes!

The theme this month was Soda Pop, and my immediate thought was root beer floats. I had about 800 other ideas too, but Ben immediately suggested root beer when I asked him for ideas, and I trust his cupcake eating expertise so I went with it.

The result? We thought they were delicious, but you absolutely must use the glaze. The cupcakes themselves are nice enough, but somehow even with the massive amount of sugar and sweetness from the soda, they still tasted more like a sort of nice muffin to me. And muffins are good and everything, but cupcakes should taste like dessert. The glaze pushed them just over the edge into the sweet and wonderful dessert category. The frosting didn't hurt either.

Root Beer Float Cupcakes

2 1/2 cups root beer
1 tablespoon root beer extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups dark brown sugar
1 cup butter
2 eggs
3 cups all purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
Root beer glaze
Vanilla buttercream frosting
Crushed root beer candies

Preheat oven to 350ºF.
In a bowl, mix together root beer, root beer extract and vanilla extract and set aside.
In a separate bowl, cream together butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs, mixing well after each one. Sift together flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Mixing at a low speed, add flour mixture and root beer alternatively, beginning and ending with flour. Mix until smooth and pour into a lined cupcake pan, filling about 2/3 full. Bake cupcakes about 15-18 minutes for normal cupcakes and 12 minutes for the mini cupcakes, until golden brown and cake springs back when touched.

Root Beer Glaze

1/2 cup root beer
1 teaspoon root beer extract
2 cups powdered sugar

Whisk together root beer, extract and sugar in a small saucepan and bring to a boil. Reduce heat and cook, stirring occasionally until reduced by about half. Let cool.

Spoon a little root beer glaze over each cupcake and let set until cupcakes are completely cool and tops are dry. Top with vanilla buttercream and crushed root beer candies.

Yum!

The voting begins on April 29, and you can go vote for me at http://www.ironcupcakemilwaukee.com. Please vote for me! Pleeeeeeease! If I win, I will be the proud recipient of many fabulous prizes:

Our April ETSY PRIZE-PACK is from artists:

A creation by FRUITFLYPIE, http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=16748
a pair of cupcake earrings from LOTS OF SPRINKLES at http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=6057281.
a sweet surprise from Sweet Cuppin' Cakes Cupcakery, http://www.acupcakery.com/
PLUS, IronCupcake:Earth can not forget our good friend, CAKESPY, http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5243382, who is now going to be doing a piece for our winner each month until further notice - sweet!
Last and certainly not least, don’t forget our corporate prize providers: HEAD CHEFS by FIESTA PRODUCTS, http://www.fiestaproducts.com, HELLO CUPCAKE by Karen Tack and Alan Richardson, http://blog.hellocupcakebook.com, JESSIE STEELE APRONS http://www.jessiesteele.com; TASTE OF HOME books, http://www.tasteofhome.com; a t-shirt from UPWITHCUPCAKES.COM http://www.upwithcupcakes.com/. Iron Cupcake:Earth is sponsored in part by 1-800-Flowers, http://www.1800flowers.com .

Cocoa Apple Cake

2009-04-15T12:18:00.000-07:00

Living abroad brings lots of good things - adventure, travel, new experiences, new points of view, the opportunity to learn, grow, eat. I am so grateful that we had the opportunity to move to the Netherlands and I haven't regretted it once.

But even though I wouldn't trade our experience for anything, it has its downside, too. Sometimes I just get lonely and homesick. It's natural, I guess. You miss things - your favorite places, your favorite people, conveniences that you took for granted, speaking English, and just the comfort of feeling like you are where you are supposed to be.

I can't do much about the thousands of miles between our house and "home", but I can find a little bit of comfort here.

Comfort in the form of cake.

Cocoa apple cake has been one of my favorites for years. This might surprise those who know me because, while the cake does have a little chocolate, it is not chocolate with milk chocolate mousse and dark chocolate ganache and white chocolate shavings. Nope, no death by chocolate. It's just simple and happy and sweet and good. And it tastes kind of like home, and that's just what I need. And licking the cocoa glaze pan doesn't hurt either.

Cocoa Apple Cake

3 eggs
2 cups white sugar
1 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup water
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
3/4 cup semisweeet chocolate chips
2 apples, chopped
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Cream together the eggs, sugar, butter or margarine, and water until fluffy . In another bowl, sift together the flour, cocoa, baking soda, and spices. Add dry ingredients to egg mixture and mix well. Fold in chocolate chips, apple, and vanilla extract. Spoon into a buttered and floured bundt pan. Bake at 325 degrees F (165 degrees C) for 60 to 70 minutes until cake tests done. Let cool completely and then drizzle cocoa glaze over the top.

Cocoa Glaze

2 tablespoons butter
1/4 cup cocoa
3 tablespoons water
1 1/4 cups powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Melt butter in a small saucepan with cocoa and water. Blend in sugar and vanilla. Let cool slightly, stirring again if necessary before drizzling over cake. Mmmmmm.

Love affairs

2009-04-02T02:31:00.000-07:00

Do you ever wonder how I'm not 800 pounds? I mean, have you seen all the cupcakes and cookies and cake and ice cream and... well, everything? Truly, I have a love affair with frosting. Sugar is my kryptonite. Chocolate will always have a special place in my heart and in my fridge. Cookies have never let me down.

But... One cannot live on sugar alone. So I have to confess... I'm in love with vegetables. My heart skips a beat when I see the beautiful piles of produce at our market. I dream of roasted zucchini, grilled portabellos, sauteed spinach. The phrase "Oooooh, vegetables!!!" often escapes my lips in moments of glee.

Dessert may be my one true love, but I eat vegetables on the sly and I just can't quit them. This works out well for me, though. Because while I indulge my dessert loving side every once in a while (and exile the brownies to Ben's workplace the rest of the time), I eat piles and piles of vegetables on a daily basis and it balances out the frosting habit. Often I can think of nothing better than a big plate full of veggies for dinner.

With this in mind, it should come as no surprise that I'm a big fan of ratatouille. My ratatouille recipe (which I borrowed from Epicurious and tweaked to my tastes) is not fancy. It doesn't have carefully arranged slices of squash, artfully displayed in a beautiful dish. It doesn't need it, because it's got flavor and love and comfort. And enough vegetables to make me smile and sigh and rub my belly happily.

Ratatouille

* 1 eggplant, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
* 400 grams of shallots, quarterd
* 3 tablespoons olive oil
* coarse salt to taste
* 2 zucchinis or yellow squash, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
* 2 large red bell peppers, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
* 2 cans diced tomatoes
* 7 garlic cloves, minced
* 1 teaspoon chopped fresh thyme
* 1 teaspoon chopped fresh oregano
* 1/4 cup finely chopped fresh basil

* grated Parmigiano-Reggiano

Preheat oven to 450°F.

Stir together eggplants, onions, 2 tablespoons oil, and kosher salt in a large roasting pan, then roast mixture in middle of oven, stirring occasionally, 15 minutes. Stir in squash, bell peppers, 1 tablespoon oil, and more kosher salt and roast mixture, stirring occasionally, until bell peppers are tender, 25 to 30 minutes.

While vegetables are roasting, simmer tomatoes, garlic, thyme, and kosher salt in a heavy saucepan, stirring occasionally, until thickened, 12 to 15 minutes. Stir tomatoes into roasted vegetables and season ratatouille. Top with grated cheese.

Left to my own devices, I would eat this all by itself, day in and day out. But it is also delicious as a side to roasted chicken, with polenta (as we have it here) or a nice crusty bread, or served over pasta.

And then have a cupcake for dessert!

It's that time again...

2009-04-01T07:00:00.000-07:00

Time to support our military with baked goods!

For this round of Baking Gals, I'm not hosting a team, but I didn't want to miss out on my chance to say thank you to our hardworking deployed military men and women, so I signed up for a team and got down to baking! I highly encourage you to do the same! It will make you feel good and you can munch on a cookie or two while you're packing them up. Everybody wins!

This month I made Chocolate Crinkle Cookies and Snickerdoodle Blondies. I wanted to good, simple, yummy treats that would hold up well when shipped and I think these fit the bill.

Chocolate Crinkles from Betty Crocker

1/2 cup vegetable oil
4 oz unsweetened baking chocolate, melted, cooled
2 cups granulated sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
4 eggs
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup powdered sugar

1. In large bowl, mix oil, chocolate, granulated sugar and vanilla. Stir in eggs, one at a time. Stir in flour, baking powder and salt. Cover; refrigerate at least 3 hours.
2. Heat oven to 350°F. Grease cookie sheet with shortening or cooking spray.
3. Drop dough by teaspoonfuls into powdered sugar; roll around to coat and shape into balls. Place about 2 inches apart on cookie sheets.
4. Bake 10 to 12 minutes or until almost no imprint remains when touched lightly in center. Immediately remove from cookie sheets to cooling racks.

Snickerdoodle Blondies

2 2/3 cups all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon grated or ground nutmeg
1 teaspoon salt
2 cups packed brown sugar
1 cup butter, room temperature
2 eggs, at room temperature
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
2 teaspoons cinnamon
a pinch nutmeg

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease and/or line a 9×13 inch pan. Combine the flour, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg and salt and set aside.
2. In large bowl, beat together butter and brown sugar for 3-5 minutes. Add in the eggs one at a time, then the vanilla, and beat until smooth.
3. Stir in the flour mixture until well blended. Spread evenly in prepared pan (mixture will be somewhat cookiebatter-ish, so it’s best to spread it out with a greased spatula or your hands). Combine the granulated sugar, cinnamon, and nutmeg in a little bowl. Evenly sprinkle cinnamon sugar mixture over the top of the batter.
4. Bake 25-30 minutes or until surface springs back when gently pressed. Cool before cutting. Makes 20-24 bars.

2009-03-29T11:08:00.000-07:00

You know those cupcakes down in my previous post? They look good, huh? Wanna go vote for them in this month's Iron Cupcake challenge? Oui?

Okay, go to No One Puts Cupcake in a Corner, check out all the amazing entries, and vote from now until Friday, April 3! It's fun!

And if you vote for me, I'll give you a cupcake!*

*offer good only you come visit me in the Netherlands.

Iron Cupcake Earth: Nuts and Seeds

2009-03-23T04:12:00.000-07:00

I was trying to think of a witty story to tell about my cupcake baking adventures and mishaps this weekend, but I kept coming up with nothing. Just cupcakes, yummy cupcakes. I joined Iron Cupcake last month, but didn't make a coffee themed cupcake because... well... baby, tired, sniffly, bored, baby, excuses, excuses... And so last week I was sitting, looking at frosted food porn on my computer, and all of the sudden realized, "Shoot! I'm going to miss the deadline again! I need to make cupcakes!"

So I did. I made cupcakes. This month is Nuts and Seeds, so I brainstormed a list of ideas and sent them to work with Ben so he could poll his colleagues. I figured I would let them choose because A) Once I start coming up with cupcake ideas I can't turn off my brain and there's no way for me to pick just one, and B) They are the lucky consumers of all of my baked goods, so I thought it might be nice to leave the choice up to them.

And they chose...

Chocolate cherry cupcakes with an amaretto cream filling and almond buttercream.

a.k.a. the only nutty cupcakes that will ever grace Ben's tastebuds.
Ben absolutely abhors nuts, all nuts, anything vaguely nutty, and yes, that includes peanut butter, pistachios, Nutella, and anything else that might fill in the blank in your question, "But what about ____? Not even ____?" Nope. No nuts. The only teeny tiny exception is almond flavoring. The actual nut is out, but he finds almond extract downright pleasant. Go figure.

So even though this month's Iron Cupcake theme is nutty, Ben was able to taste (and taste, and lick the bowls, and pat his stomach contentedly) and declare that my cupcakes were good.

Chocolate Cherry Cupcakes
* 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
* 2 cups all-purpose flour
* 1 1/2 cups sugar
* 1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
* 3/4 teaspoon baking powder
* 3/4 teaspoon salt
* 2 large eggs
* 3/4 cup warm water
* 3/4 cup sour cream
* 3 tablespoons canola oil
* 1 teaspoon almond extract
* 1 cup cherry preserves

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line standard muffin tins with paper liners; set aside. Sift together cocoa powder, flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder, and salt into a large bowl.
Add eggs, warm water, sour cream, cherry preserves, oil, and almond extract, and mix until smooth.

Fill muffin cups about 2/3 full and bake until tops spring back when touched, about 20 minutes, rotating pan once if needed. Transfer to a wire rack; let cool completely.

Amaretto Whipped Cream
* 1/2 tsp gelatin
* 1 tbsp water
* 1 cup heavy cream
* 2 tbsp powdered sugar
* 1/4 cup amaretto

In a small bowl, sprinkle gelatin over 1 tablespoon of cold water. Set the container into about 1 inch of hot water in a saucepan and let stand until gelatin dissolves. Remove from the hot water. Set aside for a minute to cool slightly. Whip the cream until almost stiff, then add the gelatin, amaretto, and confectioners' sugar. Continue whipping until stiff.

For the frosting, I used my regular buttercream recipe, found here, but I used a tablespoon of almond extract instead of the vanilla.

Cupcake assembly

Using a small knife, cut a cone shape out of the top of each cupcake. Set aside. Spoon a bit of whipped cream into the hole and replace the top of the cupcake. Frost. I topped the cupcakes with maraschino cherries because I love them and they're pretty. I think they would also be good with chocolate shavings, slivered almonds, or all of the above.

Competing in Iron Cupcake is not only fun, but also comes with prizes for the winner!

The March ETSY PRIZE-PACK is from artists:

A Bunnycake Easter Plushie by DOGBONEART, http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=21636297.
A whimsical piece by CAKEASAURUS, http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5729584.
as well as a pair of cupcake earrings from LOTS OF SPRINKLES at http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=6057281.
a collection of all new printed cupcake liners, 200 in all from Sweet Cuppin' Cakes Cupcakery, http://www.acupcakery.com/
PLUS, IronCupcake:Earth can not forget our good friend, CAKESPY, http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=5243382, who is now going to be doing a piece for our winner each month until further notice - sweet!

Last and certainly not least, don’t forget our corporate prize providers:
HEAD CHEFS by FIESTA PRODUCTS, http://www.fiestaproducts.com,
HELLO CUPCAKE by Karen Tack and Alan Richardson, http://blog.hellocupcakebook.com,
JESSIE STEELE APRONS http://www.jessiesteele.com;
TASTE OF HOME books, http://www.tasteofhome.com;
a t-shirt from UPWITHCUPCAKES.COM http://www.upwithcupcakes.com/.
Iron Cupcake:Earth is sponsored in part by 1-800-Flowers, http://www.1800flowers.com .

I'm a little cupcake, short and stout

2009-03-19T06:53:00.000-07:00

I've been wanting to try making chocolate stout cake for quite some time and I've had my eye on this recipe from Epicurious. And I figured that St Patrick's Day would be a perfect occasion to break out the Guinness. And I could add some Bailey's Irish Cream in there somewhere! Totally appropriate, right? And potentially delicious! I was going to bake up a big batch and send them to work with Ben on Tuesday.

I was totally planning on baking Monday. I had the Guinness in the fridge and some mini bottles of Bailey's. And chocolate, I always have a few pounds of chocolate in my kitchen. (I'm serious. If you ever are having a chocolate crisis, you know where to find me.) Ben thwarted my cupcake plans, though. The guy offers me a last minute weekend trip to Paris. How is a girl supposed to turn that down? So instead of spending Monday in the kitchen I woke up, got some croissants, strolled through Montmartre, enjoyed some pastries made by people much more talented than me. Rough life, I know.

The cupcakes were not forgotten, though. I just made them a couple days later than intended. And who are we kidding? Ben's colleagues couldn't care less when delicious treats arrive, just as long as we keep them coming.

I made the chocolate stout cupcakes, but halved the original recipe because the reviews all said that the recipe made an insane amount. With the halved recipe I got 24 cupcakes, so unless you really want to make a huge cake, I wouldn't make the full recipe.

I then filled it with a Bailey's and white chocolate whipped cream. Yum. And then frosted the cupcakes with a simple dark chocolate ganache. Because, you know, I wouldn't want to overdo it. Ha.

These were really delicious. Really. Really. Really. I want to eat this cake every day. Ben and I agreed that it was a practically perfect chocolate cake. Deeply chocolatey, but not too rich. Dense, but not heavy. Moist, light, but holds together well. I'm in love. And no, we couldn't taste the Guiness in the finished cupcakes. Just chocolatey wonder. And the cream filling was really good too. In the picture, you can tell it's soaked into the cupcake a bit. This is because I'm impatient and can't wait for cupcakes to cool completely. If you prefer your filling to hold its own better, sit on your hands, go for a walk, resist the urge to play with the cupcakes until they are completely cool.

Another note on the filling. White chocolate can be fussy to work with sometimes. Be sure you use really high quality chocolate, and if you wanted to just make a Bailey's whipped cream, that would be perfectly wonderful in these cupcakes too.

Cupcakes

1 cup stout (such as Guinness)
1 cup unsalted butter
3/4 cups unsweetened cocoa powder (preferably Dutch-process)

2 cups all purpose flour
2 cups sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
2/3 cup sour cream

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line cupcake tin with paper liners. Bring stout and butter to simmer in heavy large saucepan over medium heat. Add cocoa powder and whisk until mixture is smooth. Cool slightly.

Whisk flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt in large bowl to blend. Using electric mixer, beat eggs and sour cream in another large bowl to blend. Add stout-chocolate mixture to egg mixture and beat just to combine. Add flour mixture and beat briefly on slow speed. Using rubber spatula, fold batter until completely combined. Fill cupcake tins about half to two thirds full. Bake cakes until tester inserted into center of cakes comes out clean, about 25 minutes. Turn cupcakes out onto rack and cool completely before filling and frosting.

Bailey's White Chocolate Cream

4 ounces good-quality white chocolate (such as Lindt or Baker's), chopped
4 tablespoons Bailey's Irish Cream
1 cup chilled whipping cream

Combine chopped white chocolate and Bailey's in small metal bowl. Set over small saucepan of simmering water and stir until white chocolate melts and mixture is smooth. Remove bowl from over water. Cool white chocolate mixture about 10 minutes. Beat chilled whipping cream in medium bowl until soft peaks form. Whisk in white chocolate mixture.

Chocolate Ganache

6 ounces dark chocolate, chopped
3/4 cup heavy cream

Place chocolate in a bowl. Bring cream to a simmer in a small saucepan. Pour hot cream over chocolate and let sit for 1 minute. Stir chocolate and cream until chocolate is melted and mixture is smooth. Let chocolate cool until it reaches desired thickness.

Cupcake assembly

Using a small knife, cut a cone shape out of the top of each cupcake. Set aside. Spoon a bit of whipped cream into the hole and replace the top of the cupcake. Spoon a bit of ganache over the cupcake. Eat 5 cupcakes and pass out on the kitchen floor. Repeat.

Pizza My Heart

2009-02-23T06:16:00.000-08:00

If you know us at all, you probably know that we have plans on Friday nights. And even though we are flexible and willing to break our plans, our friends usually don't ask us to do things on Friday nights. So it's either because people don't actually like us very much (always a possibility), or they know that we are looking forward to sitting at home in our jammies, curled up on the couch with a Lifetime movie, a bottle of wine, and pizza.

We love our Friday nights. We look forward to them all week long. There's no better way to unwind after a long week than with wine, a bad movie, and a delicious pizza. And for our pizza to be truly delicious, it has to start at home. We used to be more open to ordering pizza back when we lived in the U.S., because sometimes after a particularly long week, even pizza is to tiring to think about. But here, well, Ben works fewer hours, I don't work, and delivery pizza just isn't the same. The Dutch just don't have Papa John's. Or good local places (in our area, anyway). It's just not the same.

So of course we make our own! Would you expect anything less?

We start with a whole wheat pizza crust, which we have adapted from a recipe on epicurious, and which Ben has perfected. I may often be the kitchen genius around here, but Ben, he is the pizza dough master. It's light and puffy and slightly chewy, but it's not too much. It's just substantial enough to hold up whatever toppings we pile on.

Sometimes we follow a recipe if we're feeling adventurous and want a new flavor, but often we just go with some of our standard toppings including, but not limited to: canned diced tomatoes with basil, garlic and oregano; fresh tomatoes slow roasted with garlic when they're in season; spinach; caramelized shallots or grilled cipollini onions; shredded mozzarella, provolone, feta, parmesan; fresh basil. We also have guest appearances by ingredients such as portabello mushrooms, chicken, sun dried tomatoes, roasted garlic, steak, peppers, artichoke hearts... Whatever sounds good. That's the joy of making our own pizza.

The other joy is sitting on the floor in pajamas and watching the pizza cook.

Mmmm...

And voilà! Pizza!

Since we don't follow a recipe most of the time, I can't give you directions for our particular brand of pizza. You'll have to find your own signature flavors. But we can give you a good starting place, our pizza dough recipe (from epicurious, as adapted by Ben)

Pizza Dough

Ingredients

1 (1/4-ounce) package active dry yeast (2 1/4 teaspoons)
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1 1/2 to 2 cups bread flour plus additional for kneading and dredging
1 cup warm water (105 - 115°F)
1 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons italian seasoning (or grated parmesan, or whatever sounds good to you)

Preparation

Make dough:
Whisk together yeast, 1 tablespoon flour, and 1/4 cup warm water in a measuring cup and let stand until mixture develops a creamy foam, about 10 minutes. (If mixture doesn't foam, discard and start over with new yeast.)

Stir together salt and 1 cup bread flour and 1/2 cup whole wheat flour and seasoning in a large bowl. Add yeast mixture and remaining 3/4 cup warm water and stir until smooth, then stir in another 1/2 cup bread flour. If dough sticks to your fingers, stir in just enough flour (up to 3/4 cup), a little at a time, to make dough just come away from side of bowl. (This dough may be wetter than other pizza doughs you have made.)

Knead dough on a lightly floured surface with floured hands, lightly reflouring work surface and your hands when dough becomes too sticky, until dough is smooth, soft, and elastic, about 10 minutes.

Or, if you have a mixer with a dough hook, mix on low until the dough comes together and then on high until it's nice and smooth. Then knead it by hand for a minute or so and form into a ball.

Place the dough in an oiled bowl, cover, and let rise in a warm place until doubled in bulk, about an hour. Divide into two balls. If you only want to use one, the extra dough keeps well in the freezer. We just put in a ziploc freezer bag and then bring it out several hours before we need it and set it on the counter to let it come to room temperature.

To bake the pizza, preheat the oven and pizza stone (or cookie sheet) at the highest temperature possible for an hour or so. A very hot oven and pizza stone makes the crust nice and crispy on the bottom. Roll dough into a circle with a rolling pin or work it into a circle with your hands and place it on the pizza stone. Top the pizza with whatever you want and bake for about 12-15 minutes, or until cheese is turning golden brown at the edges.

Turn on your Lifetime movie, open your wine, enjoy!

This is how I roll

2009-02-20T07:33:00.000-08:00

Today I offer a little insight into what goes on inside my mind and inside my kitchen when I'm left unsupervised.

I spend a lot of time thinking about food. When I'm not browsing food blogs, I'm playing games with myself, thinking up new flavors of ice cream, cupcakes, whatever. Recently, I was brainstorming cupcake ideas with Ben and he was thinking raspberry, I was thinking something with a caramel filling. And, oooh, raspberry caramel would be good. Taking stock of my kitchen, I decided to attempt a raspberry flavored dulce de leche.

It was good, definitely tasty. A nice combination of the sweet caramel creaminess and the slight tartness of the raspberries. It was lovely. But I didn't want to use it in my cupcakes. It just wasn't right.

So then I had a container of raspberry caramel sitting in my fridge. Taunting me. Every so often I would go back to it and take a little spoonful and ponder its fate. Cupcakes? Still no. Filling for sandwich cookies? Maybe. But I don't know what kind of cookies to make. Use it in/on ice cream? Nah. Toss it and call it a day?

I was actually about to just get rid of it because I didn't know what I wanted to do and I'm a little obsessive (who me?) about having a neat and tidy refrigerator, free of rogue leftovers and random items. But then Ben got around to finally tasting it and said, "Oh, that's nice".

"Oh, well, I was about to throw it away. It's been sitting there and I don't know what to do with it."

"Well, it's good. Don't throw it out just yet."

"Ehhh..."

"Give it until the end of this weekend. Maybe I'll just eat it."

"Okay."

So the raspberry dulce de leche got a stay of execution. And Ben's admiration of it inspired me to get cracking and just try something with it.

This is what I came up with.

Raspberry Dulce de Leche Balls

1/3 seedless raspberry preserves*
1 14 ounce can sweetened condensed milk
8 oounces dark chocolate
Fancy colored sugar (optional)

*I only found raspberry jam with seeds, so I heated it a little to make it liquidy, and then strained it. Easy peasy.

Pour the sweetened condensed milk into top of double-boiler pan and stir in raspberry Usually when making dulce de leche, I know it's done because it gets a lovely golden caramel brown color, but with the raspberries it will be harder to judge. Because it's pink. I would err on the side of a few more minutes if you're not sure.

Remove from heat and whisk until smooth. Put in the refrigerator to chill. Once the dulce de leche is nice and cold and firmed up a bit, scoop spoonfuls and then roll into balls. It'll be sticky, so I found it's easiest to roll with slightly damp hands.

Put the balls of caramel on a parchment lined cookie sheet and place in the freezer.

Chop the chocolate and place in the top of a double-boiler, or a bowl set over a simmering pan of water. Melt the chocolate, stirring occasionally and then remove from heat.

Working quickly, take each cold caramel ball and drop into the chocolate using two forks to turn, coat, and remove from chocolate. Tap off any excess and place the caramel on a silpat or piece of parchment paper. Sprinkle with fancy pretty sugar, if desired, and let set. Eat. Admire the pretty chocolates. Eat another.

And they're pretty good. A sweet, fruity, soft caramel that melts in your mouth after your teeth crack the bittersweet chocolate shell. And pink sugar sprinkles! Just for fun! Something pretty for me to make, and a more dignified way for Ben to eat a bowl of caramel. Everybody wins!

Except for Wesley.

We keep telling him he at least needs to grow some teeth first. Man, he's gonna be disappointed when he gets teeth and I still don't give him candy.

Sweets for the sweet

2009-02-13T03:35:00.001-08:00

What better way to say Happy Valentine's Day than with some sweet chocolate treats with a pretty, fluffy pink frosting?

I haven't baked many good treats recently and I have been missing them. I've been more on a bread kick lately, and while bred is nice and tasty and good, it's just not very pretty or fun. So I thought that I should bake something a little more decadent to send to work with Ben this week in honor of Valentine's Day.

Now, I know to some Valentine's Day is nothing but a Hallmark holiday, consumerism at it's finest, unrealistic expectations of fairytale romance that are doomed to failure in the cold, harsh reality of the world. And there are also those who say, indignantly, "Why should we have to confine romance to one day? The Man is just trying to get us to spend money on commercial junk! I'm perfectly capapble of showing my love every day of the year!" But to those people, I have to ask... Do you really buy your sweetheart a big bouquet of flowers on a random Tuesday? A box of chocolates to celebrate a long and dreary work week? Do you bake them little chocolate cupcakes with fluffy pink frosting just for the heck of it? If so, then go ahead with your romantic self.

If not, however, I suggest you make these for your favorite person. They might just agree to be your Valentine.

Flourless Chocolate Cupcakes (from Cupcake Project) with Raspberry Cream Cheese Frosting (from me)

Makes about 18 cupcakes or a bajillion mini cupcakes

1/2 cup water
1/4 tsp salt
18 oz bittersweet chocolate chopped into small pieces
1 C unsalted butter (room temperature)
3 eggs
3 egg whites

Combine the water, salt, and sugar in a small saucepan over medium heat. Stir until completely dissolved and set aside.
In the top half of a double boiler, melt the bittersweet chocolate, then pour the melted chocolate into the bowl of an electric mixer.
Cut the butter into pieces and beat the butter into the chocolate, one piece at a time.
Beat in the hot sugar-water. Next, slowly beat in the eggs and the egg whites one at a time.
Pour the batter 3/4 to the top of lined cupcake tins. These don't rise so you can go higher if you'd like. Have pans larger than the cupcake tins ready. Put each cupcake tin in a larger pan and fill the pan with boiling water halfway up the sides of the cake pan. (Don't be like me and accidentally overfill the water. You may have to eat any flooded cupcake casualties.)
Bake cupcakes in the water bath at 300 degrees F (150 degrees C) for 30 minutes. The center will still look wet.
Do not take the cupcakes out of the tin until they are completely cooled! Once the tins are cool enough to handle with your bare hands, put the entire cupcake tin in the fridge until it is cool. Then remove the cupcakes from the tin and frost. If you take the cupcakes out of the tin while they are still warm, they will lose their shape.

Raspberry Cream Cheese Frosting

4 oz cream cheese
4 oz butter
1/4 cup raspberry jam
3 1/2 cups powdered sugar

Beat cream cheese and butter together until creamy and fluffy. Add raspberry jam and beat well. Add powdered sugar and beat for a long time until frosting in smooth, light, and fluffy. When in doubt, just keep beating the icing. I tend to just turn my mixer on and let it go for a little while. Otherwise I get too impatient standing around and I want to use the frosting before it's reached its true fluffiness potential.

I also added about two drops of red food coloring to make it just a little bit prettier, but the frosting had a nice pink color already, so that is completely optional.

Makes about 4 cups.

2009-02-08T05:56:00.000-08:00

Corn fritters, that's where is started. This week while idly gawking at all the food pictures on foodgawker, my heart stopped. Corn fritters! I love corn! Fritters! I've had them before, but it had been a while and I couldn't for the life of me understand why I have not been making them all this time. So I bookmarked the blog that had these little bites of corn wonder and decided that we should have corn fritters for dinner one night.

Ben was not as enthusiastic. So I proposed corn fritters and a really nice salad. "Okay...", he said. I sensed that he did not feel the same joy at the idea of corn fritters as I did. Hmph.

The corn fritters stayed on my mind. Then... ding! (That's the sound of my mental light bulb) I could make the corn fritters, but just serve them as a small side to a spinach salad topped with pan seared scallops. Oooh, that could be good. Scallops make everything better! I proposed this to Ben and his eyes lit up, "Scallops! I love scallops!" Excellent.

And it was excellent until I went to cut the corn of the cob.

Why am I lying on the floor of the bathroom?

And what is Ben doing with that first aid kit?

That's right, folks, Ellen has still not mastered the art of sharp objects. I'm lying on the floor because while Ben was trying to bandage me, I got a little woozy. It was no good. Luckily no corn was injured. Just my finger. Sigh.

Back in the kitchen, Ben took over the chopping and I got to crack the egg and put everything in the bowl.

And against our better judgment, I went on to actually cook the fritters. In oil, no less! And I am pleased to report there were no more injuries, to myself or the food.

For me, the corn was the main focus, but I know I'm probably alone in that, so for the rest of our meal I put together a salad of spinach, arugula (Ben's suggested addition, caramelized shallots, and roasted red peppers (from a jar! The shame!). I then seared a few scallops and added them on top. The corn fritters went around the edge of the plate with some chili sour cream.

Ben loved the scallops, and surprisingly enjoyed the corn fritters immensely too. He gave them a big thumbs up, so we'll have them again. Maybe next time I can convince him to just have a big plate of fritters for dinner. Or maybe not.

Corn Fritters from I Found Happy

(I made half the recipe and we had a few extra to snack on while assembling dinner)

Corn Fritters (adapted from the Joy of Cooking)
Makes 24 fritters
Ingredients:
16 oz. frozen corn, thawed and drained (I used corn on the cob. It's what I had. I learned my lesson. Frozen corn requires no knives.)
2 egg yolks
2 tbsp flour
1 tbsp sugar
1/4 cup chopped chives or green onions
1/4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp garlic powder
1/8 tsp ground black pepper
2 egg whites
2 tbsp oil

Directions:

Combine first 8 ingredients in large mixing bowl and mix well. Gently mash corn a little with a fork until it's a little pulpy. In a separate bowl, beat egg whites until peaks form. Gently fold into corn mixture and be careful not to over mix it.

Heat oil in large skillet over med-high heat and drop in corn mixture by the heaping tablespoon. Cook 2 minutes on the first side or until nice and golden brown, then flip and cook until browned on the other side.

Pancakes!

2009-01-26T12:08:00.000-08:00

I have been wanting to write this blog post forever. But there's always been one slight problem.

Let me start at the beginning. First, I have a really great husband. An understanding husband who recognizes that I cannot, cannot, function in the morning but also knows that I loooove breakfast. I especially love "special" breakfasts, like french toast, waffles, and pancakes. Oh, pancakes. A while back, my dad e-mailed me a pancake recipe that they got from a friend of theirs, and I was intrigued by it. We had previously been Bisquick devotees, but as delicious as they could be, Bisquick pancakes were a little too much for me and I was dreaming of something better, maybe something whole grain, but not all dry and yucky. So when I saw this recipe that included oats and cottage cheese and no flour, and that came with high praise from my parents (a couple of serious foodies), I had to give it a shot.

And by give it a shot, I mean decided to have Ben make them for me. I'm serious. I don't do stoves in the morning, unless it's Ben's birthday and then I am oh so wonderful and I even make bacon (it should be noted that I don't do meat and splattering grease in the morning either). And, good man that he is, he made them without even a little protest.

And lo and behold, these funky little oatmeal and cottage cheese pancakes were delicious! They taste like normal pancakes, but don't leave me slumped over my chair saying "Uhhhh... too... many... pancakes". They're just plain yummy. And, lucky girl that I am, Ben makes them for me on a semi-regular basis.

So, back to this problem I mention earlier. I know you're thinking, "Problem? What problem could you possibly have? You laze around in bed on weekends while your husband makes you your favorite breakfast. Whatever, lady."

But really, this is kind of a problem. You see, I've been wanting to blog about this pancakes joy for ages, but every time he makes pancakes, I find myself with an empty plate, a full belly, and I smile on my face, and then I say, "Doh! I was going to take pictures and blog this!" I just could never contain my happiness on pancake day long enough to maintain rational thought and get the camera.

Until now.

When we went grocery shopping on Friday, I saw Ben put cottage cheese in the cart. And then he told me to pick out some sausage. Ooooh, it was gonna be a pancake weekend! And it was! On Saturday morning, Ben and Wesley got up and headed down to the kitchen to make something special for Mama.

Yum, yum, yum.

Wesley was very interested, and felt that he deserved a pancake for all his hard work helping his Da with breakfast, but we're mean parents. No pancakes for baby!

Ellen's Pancakes
Makes about 16 silver dollar sized pancakes, enough for 2 hungry people

4 eggs
8 oz cottage cheese
3/4 cup oats
2 tablespoons oil
1/4 teaspoon salt

Put everything in a blender and mix until smooth. You can do this the night before if you want, especially if you are morning non-functional like me and don't have a Ben around to make you pancakes.

Drop batter by heaping tablespoons on a greased hot griddle. Flip when under side is golden brown. They need to be cooked just a tiny bit longer than normal pancakes to make sure the oats are cooked and the insides aren't goopy. And they shouldn't be big pancakes because they won't cook as well.

Top with fruit and/or nuts if you're feeling virtuous, or butter and maple syrup if you're not. Either way, they are healthier than your average pancake with fiber, protein, etc etc. So I vote that you give them some real maple syrup, you deserve it! Enjoy!

Tastes like victory

2009-01-11T07:14:00.000-08:00

I've been cursing a lot lately. Why? Is it because I want my baby's first word to be @&#$@!? Or because I'm trying on a new, meaner, cruder personality? No... It's just because I'm frustrated. Here's how things go: 1)I find a recipe I want to make. 2) I think "Oooh, I just need to go get ____ and then I'll make this for dinner! 3) I go to the store, where I know they should carry ____, because it's not something totally crazy and unheard of, and sure enough they don't have it. 4) I then try every possible grocery store and come up empty-handed every time. 5) I curse.

This has happened with various ingredients - Panko crumbs, tahini, spring roll wrappers, peppermint extract. And now, the most recent, spinach. Yes, spinach. Most of the time this only happens with ingredients that I don't buy regularly, but that I know I could find pretty easily if we lived in Minneapolis. Spinach, though? We live on spinach. We buy it all the time, just to have it around. Just in case we need a salad or something. So when I found a recipe for a spinach and chickpea curry, I thought my real problem would be finding the garam masala (it was a problem, by the way. Stupid stores had 8 million Indian food spices, pastes, etc etc etc, but no garam masala. This makes no sense to me. I found it eventually, though, at the same place I find my spring roll wrappers), and that I could just pick up some spinach whenever. What a joke. No spinach at the commissary for about a week straight. No spinach at various Dutch grocery stores. Something labeled as spinach at the market, but it really looked like no spinach I had ever seen before. Hmph.

Imagine my delight as I went in to a local grocery store on Friday to look for garam masala and saw huuuuge bags of spinach as I passed through the produce department! Victory! On to the "Ethnic foods" aisle to concur Indian spices! Err, or not. They had no garam masala, of course, so I stood clutching my basket full of spinach, scanning the shelves, wavering between my feelings of triumphant victory and crushing defeat. And then... delight! They had no garam masala, but they had my favorite stir fry sauce! And a new section of spices in the Thai foods section! Spices that I've been wanting badly but hadn't even bothered looking for! Thai basil! Kaffir lime leaves! Lemongrass! I gleefully put them in my basket and headed off to curse their lack of greek yogurt in the refrigerated section.

When I got back out to the car, Ben was waiting for me. While I had been in the store, he and Wes had been circling the parking lot (it was busy, and full, and costs money to park) where I had left him with an assignment. I had told him to think about what he wanted to do for dinner the following night since he would be leaving for a business trip this week and we would only have one dinner together until he got back. So after I got back in the car and we started to head to the commissary to finish our shopping, I asked if he thought of anything. "Well," he said, "I thought maybe we could cook something together".

Yay! Another episode of Cooking with Ben and Ellen! "Ooooh! Maybe we can find a recipe that uses THESE!" I said, brandishing my shiny new containers. We agreed, and when got home, Wesley and I settled on the couch for a nice bottle of formula and some internet food searching. And we came up with this: Cod with Coconut, Lime, and Lemongrass Curry Sauce. Mmmm, and it required lemongrass AND kaffir lime leaves! Also, it calls for cilantro, but I hate cilantro with a passion, so I decided could sub my new thai basil for cilantro. Three for three! This was definitely taking the sting out of my lack of garam masala.

So last night, armed with fresh and delicious cod from the market, we set to work.

This doesn't look very pretty, but can I just tell you how incredibly amazing it smelled? Shallots, garlic, ginger, lime, curry... amazingly good smells were happening in our kitchen.

We added some coconut milk and let that sauce simmer and tried not to eat it with a spoon as it cooking, and then strained it. And promptly decided that the shallots, garlic, etc that we strained out shouldn't go to waste and that we would eat those too.

And then it was time for the cod. Fish is easy usually, but not very exciting.

The recipe called for baby bok choy, but we only could find very large bok choy, so Ben had an interesting time fitting it in the pot o' boiling water.

The finished product might not look terribly exciting, but it was really really delicious. We had some sauce and bok choy left over, so we ate a couple bowls of bok choy with curry sauce too. Yum. Yum. Yum.

Cod with Coconut, Lime, and Lemongrass Curry Sauce

Epicurious | 2005

yield: Makes 4 servings

Ingredients
The Sauce:

* 1 tablespoon butter
* 2 shallots, thinly sliced
* 3 garlic cloves, thinly sliced
* 1 lemongrass stalk, thinly sliced
* 1-inch knob ginger, thinly sliced
* 3 kaffir lime leaves
* 1 tablespoon Madras curry
* 3 cups chicken stock
* 3/4 cup fresh coconut milk, or canned
* 4 cilantro sprigs
* Fine sea salt to taste
* Freshly ground white pepper to taste
* 1 tablespoon fresh lime juice

The Cod:

* 2 tablespoons canola oil
* 4 7-ounce cod fillets, 1 1/2-inches thick
* Fine sea salt to taste
* Freshly ground white pepper to taste

The Garnish:

* 1/2 pound butter
* Fine sea salt
* 9 heads baby bok choy, divided in half (quartered if large)
* 1/4 cup kosher salt

Special equipment:

* 2 10-inch nonstick ovenproof skillets

Preparation

Preheat the oven to 400°F.

To make the broth, melt the butter in a small sauté pan or wok over medium heat. Add the shallots, garlic, lemongrass, ginger, kaffir lime leaves and curry and sweat until tender and with no color, about 5 to 6 minutes. Add the chicken stock and bring to a boil. Lower the heat simmer for 15 minutes. Add the coconut milk and cilantro, and simmer for 5 minutes. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Strain through a fine chinois and set aside.

Divide the 2 tablespoons of canola oil between the skillets. Place over high heat until oil is just smoking. Season the cod on both sides with salt and pepper. Put 2 pieces of cod in each skillet and sauté until golden brown and crusted on the bottom, about 2 1/2 minutes. Turn and sear on the other side for 30 seconds. Put the pans in the oven and roast until a metal skewer can be easily inserted into the fish and, when left in the fish for 5 seconds, feels hot when touched to your lip, about 6 to 7 minutes.

In a large pot, heat 4 quarts of water, the butter, and the kosher salt. Bring to a boil over high heat. Add the bok choy and cook until crisp tender, about 4 minutes. Remove with a slotted spoon and set aside on a sheet pan in the refrigerator to cool quickly so they retain their bright green color.

To serve, reheat the sauce and finish with the lime juice. In each of 4 bowls, place a piece of cod. Place 3 to 4 pieces of bok choy around the cod. Pour the sauce over the cod and serve immediately.

2009-01-10T14:23:00.000-08:00

I was going to post a Baking Gals Round 5 round up post ages ago, but somehow life/holidays got in the way and before I knew it we were traveling around the world, eating, drinking, opening presents, and then eating some more. And blogging got postponed and postponed.

And now that I'm back, I seem to have, um, er, lost my stuff. I know I have the Round 5 pictures somewhere. And info on what people made. But I can't tell you where it is. Oops.

I can tell you that I made a ton of Christmas treats, including Trios, Gingerbread, Brown Sugar Fudge and Mini White Chocolate Cranberry Oat Fudge Cups. And that we had a great team and Steven received lots of yummy things from lots of great people. But, uh, that's all I got right now.

A big thank you to everyone who participated in Round 5, and I'm sorry, and I hope you'll forgive me and accept as a peace offering a brand new blog post in the next couple days. With pictures and everything!

Lucky girl

2008-12-05T07:48:00.000-08:00

Today we have a guest chef, but he's only a guest on the blog. In our kitchen, he is a permanent fixture, often seen chopping, snacking, or stealing cookie dough as I slap his hands away. And although I'm the one with the foodie reputation around here, Ben has a little secret...

He cooks! And he is really good at it!

He usually takes over dinner duty one night a week (and is master of breakfasts on the rare occasion we have something other than cereal), and he doesn't take his dinner duty lightly. No mac and cheese or tuna casserole here. In the summer he is the resident grillmaster and makes a mean chicken breast. But he also has a secret signature steak rub, makes the most delicious Chicken Monterey ever, and will go on epicurious to try new recipes when he needs ideas. Swoon...

One of my recent favorites from Ben's dinner nights is Lentil and Roasted Garlic Soup with Seared Steak.

This soup is perfect for us. It's got lentils and sweet potatoes (mmm, sweet sweet potatoes) and it's topped with steak for the carnivores. I like mine sans steak, but I usually can't help sneaking a slice or two because it just looks so good.

We've changed the recipe slightly because buying garlic olive oil is easier than making it, and spinach is much more readily available to us than kale, but no matter what this soup reduces me to a blubbering happy mess.

Lentil and Roasted Garlic Soup with Seared Steak, adapted from Bon Appétit, March 2006

* 1/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon garlic olive oil
* 1 medium leek (white and green parts only), thinly sliced
* 1 tablespoon chopped fresh sage
* 7 cups (or more) vegetable broth
* 3 tablespoons soy sauce
* 3/4 cup red lentils
* 1 1/4 pounds yams (red-skinned sweet potatoes), peeled, cut into 1/2-inch cubes
* 12 ounces spinach
* 1 1 1/2- to 1 3/4-pound flank steak

* 6 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
* Chopped fresh parsley

Preparation

Heat oven to 375. Drizzle olive oil on garlic and wrap well in foil. Roast for about an hour, until soft and delicious. Squeeze roasted cloves out of their skin, into a bowl.

Heat 1/4 cup garlic oil in heavy large pot over medium heat. Add leek and sage. Cook until leek is soft, stirring frequently, about 10 minutes.

Add 7 cups vegetable broth, soy sauce and lentils to pot. Bring to boil. Reduce heat to medium, cover, and simmer until lentils are almost tender, about 15 minutes. Add yams and garlic and cook until yams are tender, adding more broth by 1/2 cupfuls as needed to cover vegetables, about 10 minutes. Add spinach to soup. Simmer until spinach is wilted, about 5 minutes. Season with salt and pepper.

Meanwhile, heat 1 tablespoon garlic oil in heavy large skillet over high heat. Sprinkle steak with salt and pepper. Place steak in skillet and cook until brown and cooked to desired doneness, about 4 minutes per side for medium-rare. Transfer to cutting board; let stand 10 minutes. Thinly slice steak.

Divide soup among 6 bowls. Arrange sliced steak atop soup. Sprinkle with cheese and serve.

2008-11-25T03:30:00.000-08:00

Hello, blog readers! Just wanted to mention that I am once again hosting a team for Baking Gals and this month we are sending treats to Steven, a young Marine who is deployed to Iraq. You should head over to the Baking Gals website and sign up so you, too, can send cookies, candy, or whatever to our troops!

It's fun! It's tasty! It makes you feel warm and fuzzy inside!

And for those of you who come to the blog just to look at the pictures, here are some cupcakes for you:

Sometimes you don't wanna know

2008-11-19T09:59:00.000-08:00

So, let's talk about Paula Deen for a minute. If you are not familiar with Paula Deen, she is a personality on the Food Network (and beyond) and famous for her southern home cookin'. And in her case, this means everything that she makes has a big heap of butter, mayo, or cheese added to it and she is not ashamed to fry things. Often her recipes look delicious, but...

Let me present to you a series of self portraits to illustrate my typical reactions to a Paula Deen recipe.

"Oooooh, that looks goooood."

"Oh my god. How much butter? Oh noooo."

"Errr, is this a good idea? Really?"

And then most of the time I just walk away, shaking my head and wondering how Paula is still alive.

Other times I get sucked in. Like with this Brown Sugar Pound Cake I found in my daily perusal of food blogs. I had to make it. It called my name. Actually, I think it called Ben's name. He's a sucker for things like brown sugar and caramel and when I saw the picture of this cake, all I could think was "Oooh, Ben might like that". So I gathered my arsenal of heart stoppers and got to mixin' and bakin'.

Now, I'm a believer in not knowing what goes into the most delicious foods. Like hot dogs. I know it's bad, but I don't wanna know. Don't wanna know what's in it, how it's made, how bad it is for me. Because if I don't know, it doesn't matter, and I can just enjoy. If you want to want to just savor the photo and the thought of this cake, stop here and gaze at the dripping sugary frosting and take a few minutes and dream happy cake dreams.

But if you want to know what made me say, "Oh my gahhhh, Paula Deen!" check this out:

Yes, that's 2 sticks of butter AND 1/2 cup of shortening. And a cup of granulated sugar and a whole box of brown sugar. Oh, and 5 eggs, just for fun. And that doesn't even count the 3 more cups of sugar and stick of butter in the frosting. Arrggg... arteries clogging, heart speeding up, and... done. But, with all that bad stuff it's bound to be absolutely delicious, yes? Yes.

Brown Sugar Pound Cake

Adapted from Paula Deen’s “The Lady & Sons Just Desserts”

Cake:

* 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
* 1/2 cup shortening
* 1 16-ounce box dark brown sugar
* 1 cup granulated sugar
* 5 eggs
* 3 1/2 cups cake flour
* 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
* 1 cup milk
* 1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
* 1/2 teaspoon salt

Frosting:

* 1 egg, beaten
* 1 cup milk
* 3 cups granulated sugar
* 1/2 cup water, room temperature
* 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
* 1 teaspoon white vinegar
* 1/8 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 300 degrees F. Grease and flour a 10-inch Bundt pan.

Using a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, cream together butter and shortening, and add the sugars, 1 cup at a time, continuing to beat. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Sift flour and baking powder together in another bowl, and add alternately with milk to creamed mixture, beginning and ending with flour mixture. Add vanilla and mix well. Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake for 2 hours.

To prepare frosting, mix together egg and milk and set aside. Place 1/2 cup of the granulated sugar in a large heavy saucepan. Cook over medium-low heat, stirring constantly until melted and brown. Slowly and carefully, add lukewarm water, and stir until sugar is dissolved. Add remaining 2 1/2 cups granulated sugar. Mix egg with milk, and stir into sugar mixture. Add butter, vinegar, and salt. Cook to soft-ball stage (236 degrees F on a candy thermometer), stirring constantly. (A small amount dropped in a glass of water will form a soft ball. If you remove it from the water, it will flatten out.) Cool to lukewarm. Beat until creamy and spread on cake.

I sent this to work with Ben today, and he confirmed that it was indeed very heavy, but ohmygoshsogoodespeciallythefrostingmmmmmmm.... So, make this cake. Have a small piece. Savor it. Then have maybe another small piece. And don't think about the butter.

2008-11-13T12:59:00.000-08:00

As you may recall, I have baked in the past for Operation Baking Gals, and in this past round I signed up to host a team to send all sorts of baked goods to one of Ben's colleagues who is currently deployed to Afghanistan. The time period for shipping the treats ended a few days ago, and Dan has already started receiving boxes of goodies.

A big thank you to all the members of Team Sweet Dumpling for all their baking!

Some of the things heading to Afghanistan...

Malt ball and world peace cookies from Dana at The Go Lightly Gourmet

Snickerdoodles, chocolate chip cookies, and world peace cookies from Leah at All ABout Growing Up

Chocolate chip cookies and candy from Janet

A bunch of cookies from Donna that she baked with a great group of home schooled kids, as well as some hot drink mixes and paperback books.

Chewy cocoa cookies, chocolate chip cookies, oatmeal cookies, chocolate chip espresso bean cookies from Dalia

Gingerbread bars, chocolate chip cookies, and oatmeal raisin cookies from Katie and Abby from Pittsburgh

And peanut butter and chocolate chip cookies from Sandy at Got Stamps

As for me, I made the infamous Gooey Butter Cake, as well as some Mississippi Mud Bars.

The Gooey Butter Cake was absolutely heart-stoppingly delicious, as always. The Mississippi Mud Bars were pretty good, but the cake layer was a bit dry. I think next time I would make a batch of good, fudgy brownies as the base and add the marshmallows and fudge layers to that. And then I would eat the whole pan. Or maybe just half, because they're pretty sweet and the whole pan could kill me.

Mississippi Mud Bars

Cake Layer
3/4 cup butter
1 3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa
4 large eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
12 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup chopped pecans
3 cups mini marshmallows

Fudge Layer
5 tablespoons butter
1 oz unsweetened chocolate
1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa
1/8 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup heavy or whipping cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup confectioner's sugar
1/2 cup pecans roughly chopped

For Cake: Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease and flour a 13"x9" baking pan. In a saucepan over the stove, melt butter on low heat. With a whisk, stir in granulated sugar and cocoa. Remove from heat. Beat in eggs, one at a time. Beat in vanilla and salt until blended well. With a wooden spoon, stir in flour just until blended. Then, stir in pecans. Spread batter into pan. Bake 25 minutes. Remove from oven. Sprinkle marshmallows in an even layer on top of the cake. Put the pan back in the oven and bake about 10 minutes until the marshmallows are golden and puffy. Cool on a wire rack.

For Topping: When cake is cool, make the topping. In a pan, melt butter and chocolate over low heat. Stir frequently until smooth. With a whisk, stir in cocoa and salt. Stir in cream and vanilla. Beat in confectioner's sugar. Pour over the cake and even out. Cool for about 8 minutes. Then, sprinkle the remaining pecans over the fudge topping. Cool completely and cut into bars.

The verdict from the troops?

I think they were happy.

Thank you so much to everyone who baked for Dan! And for those of you who missed out, you can always join in the the next round! Head on over to the Baking Gals website and check it out!

Que j'aime les macarons!

2008-11-10T06:47:00.000-08:00

After my first macaron making experience, I've been wanting to make more. Last time I started simple, with vanilla macarons with vanilla buttercream and chocolate ganache. But there are so many possible flavors out there! So many! And so little time, especially with an energy sucking little bundle of joy who doesn't appreciate baking as much as he appreciates formula and being cooed at.

But with Ben home for a few days while Uncle Duck visits, not only do I have an extra mouth to feed treats to, I also have a bit of spare time with with extra baby-adorers in the house. An extra person to eat the treats AND hold the baby? Bake-a-palooza!

I've made several attempts to get Duck's opinion on what would be good to make, but he's pretty easy to please, so just about anything would make him happy. He did, however, mention that the macarons that I made before looked good. Aha! I was off and running with flavor ideas and we all agreed that chocolate macarons, half with vanilla butter cream and half with coffee buttercream, would be a great idea.

What do you think?

I used the same recipe for macarons that I had used before, with the addition of 3 tablespoons Valrhona cocoa to make them extra chocolate-y. And for the buttercream I used this recipe here. I split the recipe in half and scraped a vanilla bean into the vanilla batch and for the coffee flavor I dissolved 1 tablespoon espresso powder in the 1 tablespoon heavy cream that I added in.

And they were good. Fudgy but light and puffy and the buttercream was magnifique.

My mind is already racing toward the next batch and new flavors. Any suggestions?

When life gives you ice cream...

2008-11-09T02:58:00.000-08:00

...make ice cream sandwiches!

Okay, so maybe "life" didn't "give" me ice cream (although I wouldn't ever object to that). Perhaps the real story is that I made ice cream last night because our good friend Duck is visiting and I'm using the presence of an extra person in the house as an excuse to cook, bake, make things as much as possible. An extra mouth to feed? Yay!

After polling my consumers, I decided on white chocolate ice cream with dark chocolate chunks. I was leaning towards cinnamon ice cream, but I think I'm the only person around who thinks that sounds so good. I suggested white chocolate as something different but not too crazy and Ben voted on the addition of dark chocolate chunks. The result:

Despite me cooking the custard about 15 seconds too long and uttering a few curse words in the kitchen as it began to curdle, it turned out amaaaaaazing. Smooth and creamy and so delicious.

After we all tried it and proclaimed it "really good", I saw the dwindling supply of chocolate chip cookies on the kitchen counter.

Me: "Ben, what if I made ice cream sandwiches with the white chocolate ice cream and the leftover cookies?"

Ben: "Mmmmmm."

Me: "It shall be done."

The cookies were great, the ice cream was fantastic, the sandwiches...? We haven't tried them yet, but I have a pretty good feeling about them.

White Chocolate Ice Cream with Dark Chocolate Chunks

(adapted from Dorie Greenspan's Dark Chocolate Ganache Ice Cream)
Yields about one quart

* 6 ounces white chocolate, finely chopped
* 1 1/2 C heavy cream
* 1 C whole milk
* 4 large egg yolks
* 1/3 C granulated sugar
* 2 ounces dark chocolate, finely chopped

1. Put the chocolate in a large heatproof bowl. Bring 3/4 C of the cream to a boil. Pour the cream over the chocolate and let it sit a minute. Using a rubber spatula, slowly stir the cream into the chocolate until smooth.
2. Bring the milk and the remaining cream to a boil. Meanwhile, in a medium bowl, whisk the yolks and sugar together until well blended and slightly thickened. Still whisking, drizzle in about a third of the hot liquid to temper the yolks. While continuing to whisk, slowly pour in the remaining liquid.
3. Pour the custard back into the sauce pan and stir constantly, until the custard thickens slightly and coats the back of a spoon. The temperature should be between 170 and 180 degrees F, but not higher. Remove the pan from the heat and stir the custard into the ganache.
4. Refrigerate the custard until well chilled. Churn the mixture into ice cream following the instructions for your ice cream maker. Mix in the dark chocolate chunks in the last minute of churning. Put ice cream into a container and freeze until firm enough to scoop.

Nostalgia: tastes like chocolate

2008-11-06T06:20:00.000-08:00

When we were younger, my brother was the baker in the family. He didn't bake much and he didn't bake often, but he was the one whose brownies were requested and swooned over. And they were pretty good, I have to admit. However, as much praise as was lavished upon him and his brownies, I had a few of my own favorite recipes, too.

One of the recipes that I remember making on a regular basis in high school was the famous Neiman-Marcus Chocolate Chip Cookies. Mmm, they were good. With about 8 tons of chocolate chips, a large quantity of grated Hershey Bar (and I had a real thing for Hershey Bars back then) and ground oatmeal, there was no way they could be bad. As I've moved on in my baking adventures, however, the recipe was forgotten/abandoned in my quest for newer, better, and different.

These days I have a new favorite chocolate chip cookie recipe that never fails me, but I've read here and there throughout the blogosphere about the Neiman-Marcus cookies and I was struck with a bit of nostalgia, and a longing for grated Hershey Bars. So I dug up the recipe and got to grating.

A few minutes into grating, though, I said to myself, "This bites. Hey! I'll use my food processor!" Ahh, the joys of being all grown up with fancier toys. Within minutes, voilà!

I also have to admit that I did not (gasp!) use a big Hershey Bar. I feel a little guilty and stuff, but the A) cookie making was a last minute decision and I don't keep Hershey Bars around the house, B) Hershey Bars are hard to come by in the Netherlands, and I could have gotten one at the commissary but that's a half hour away and generally more trouble than it's worth, and C) We had a couple bars of Ritter Milk Chocolate in the freezer and it is so so good. So, Ritter it was.

I also departed from the original recipe a little bit (I feel so ashamed! I couldn't admit any of this to my 10 years younger self! She would call me a snob!) by using chopping up some Ritter Dark Chocolate instead of using chocolate chips, because I never use chips anymore unless I can find fancy snooty gourmet ones.

Oh, and I chopped up some earless chocolate bunnies I found in the freezer because I was a little short on chocolate bars. They had been living there since Easter and I thought it was their time.

So with my food processed oats and chocolate and my snooty chocolate chunks, I set to work. But there was one more difference in my cookie baking adventure now compared to the good old days. These days I have assistants, an entourage if you will:

Not a one of them is very helpful in the kitchen, but they do enjoy the music I play while baking and the dancing around the kitchen. They might enjoy it more if I shared the cookies with them, but they can eat my cookies once they learned to grate chocolate bars for me.

The final cookie result...

And were they as good as I remembered?

I'd answer you but my mouth is full of cookies.

She works hard for the money

2008-10-25T00:09:00.000-07:00

Do you know what this is?

Here, I'll make it easier for you with multiple choice.

That is:
A) a cake, duh.
B) delicious.
C) my first paid baked good order.
D) All of the above

Correct answer: D

That's right, not only is it a delicious cake, someone actually PAID me to bake it. How cool is that? I'm going to frame my 20 euros as I'm on my way to being the Donald Trump of the baking world!

Ben called me on Thursday morning from work and informed me that I'm now famous. Huh? A woman that he works with (who doesn't even eat the treats that I send with him to work each week) came to him in a slight panic and explained that her grandson's birthday was the day before and she was wondering if I could bake a cake by the next day. Apparently she knew of my baking reputation and thinks my baked goods are gorgeous. Sweet.

So Ben called to ask. Hmmm. My previous plan had involved sitting at home with Wesley, watching some Sex and the City and relaxing a tiny bit because I didn't have to go anywhere or do anything for a change. It was going to be peaceful. Well, peaceful-ish. I do have a tiny baby that sucks all my time and attention. But still.

But baking? For money? I was giddy!

I gave him a bunch of cake options and she picked Caramel Cake with Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting from Cottage Living. I left of the pecan praline because I just didn't want it on there, and I decorated it with a milk chocolate caramel buttercream.

Yum.

Caramel Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting
MAKES: 1 (9-inch) 2-layer cake
PREP: 45 minutes
CHILL: 4 hours or overnight
BAKE: 35 to 40 minutes

3 1/2 cups sifted cake flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 3/4 cups granulated sugar
1 3/4 cups light brown sugar, divided
1 1/4 cups butter, softened and divided
6 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup milk
1/2 cup evaporated milk
Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting
Garnish: Pecan Praline

1. Preheat oven to 350°. Grease 2 (9-inch) round cake pans; line with lightly greased parchment or wax paper.

2. Combine flour, baking powder, and salt in a bowl; set aside. Place 1 3/4 cups granulated sugar, 1/4 cup light brown sugar, and 1 cup butter in a large bowl; beat with a mixer at medium speed 5 minutes or until well blended. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Stir in vanilla. Add flour mixture and 1 cup milk alternately to butter mixture, beginning and ending with flour mixture and beating at low speed after each addition. Pour into prepared pans; sharply tap pans once on counter to remove air bubbles. Bake at 350° for 35 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pans on wire rack 10 minutes; remove from pans, and cool completely on wire rack. Place 1 layer on a cake plate.

3. Combine 1 1/2 cups brown sugar, evaporated milk, and 1/4 cup butter in a saucepan. Cook over medium heat, stirring until sugar is dissolved. Cook (without stirring) until a candy thermometer registers 238°. Transfer to a heat-resistant bowl, and beat 3 minutes or until thickened and easy to spread. Quickly spread filling over cake layer on plate. Cover loosely with plastic wrap; chill 15 minutes or until set.

4. Spread a thin layer of Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting over filling. Top with second layer. Frost cake. Chill 20 minutes or until frosting sets, then cover and chill 4 hours or overnight. Let stand 10 minutes at room temperature before serving. Garnish, if desired.

Caramel Cream Cheese Frosting
PREP: 5 minutes
CHILL: 35 minutes
COOK: 5 minutes

1/4 cup light brown sugar
10 tablespoons butter, divided
1/3 cup heavy whipping cream
8 ounces cream cheese, softened
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
Dash of salt
1 3/4 cups powdered sugar

1. Melt brown sugar and 4 tablespoons butter in a saucepan over medium heat. Stir until sugar dissolves. Bring to a boil over medium heat; remove from heat. Whisk in cream; blend well. Transfer to a heat-resistant bowl. Cool at room temperature, stirring occasionally.

2. Place remaining 6 tablespoons butter and cream cheese in a large bowl; beat with a mixer on medium-high speed until smooth. Beat in vanilla and salt. With mixer running, slowly pour in cooled brown sugar mixture; beat until smooth. Add powdered sugar gradually, beating well after each addition until completely smooth. Chill slightly for a firmer texture, stirring occasionally.

Ellen's Chocolate Caramel Buttercream

1/3 cup cream
1/3 cup caramel bits, or chopped caramel candies
3 ounces milk chocolate, chopped
1/2 cup butter
3 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup cocoa

1. Melt caramel with cream in a small saucepan, stirring until smooth. Put chocolate in a bowl and pour hot caramel mixture over it. Let stand 1 minute, and then stir until smooth. Cool to room temperature.

2. Mix sugar and cocoa in a bowl and set aside.

3. Beat butter in the bowl of an electric mixer until fluffy. Add powdered sugar and beat until smooth. Slowly add cooled caramel mixture and beat until smooth and fluffy.

*The frosting was sort of an experiment because I needed something to decorate the cake other than the pecan praline. I was going to make a chocolate ganache frosting, but decided at the last minute that it just wouldn't be quite right with this cake. So this is what I came up with and it was SO good. It was light and fluffy, much like a chocolate mousse. Ben and I both thought it was the best part of the cake. He took the leftover frosting for breakfast yesterday. He said it was lovely with his morning coffee.

Watch out, world. Ellen's got 20 euros in her frosting covered hands and she's off to spend it on baking stuff! My baking empire is growing, one spatula at a time.

Chocolate Caramel Cupcakes

2008-10-19T12:42:00.000-07:00

Ben informed me recently of another bake sale at work and asked if I wanted to make something. Duh! I love bake sales! Free reign to bake as much as I want! No people saying, "Oh, I just can't. I'm getting too fat." And it's for a good cause! So as soon as the words "bake sale" come out of his mouth, my brain starts churning. What can I make? How many things should I make? Mmmm... cupcakes.

I've been wanting to make cupcakes for a while, because I haven't used my mechanical pastry bag nearly as much as I've wanted to. And cupcakes are great bake sale items. They're so pretty and little and tempting and delicious. People love cupcakes. I love cupcakes. Unfortunately, I love them so much I couldn't even begin to narrow down the field of flavors I wanted to explore. So I went to Ben, my baked goods taster and decision making hero.

I have a game that I play with myself when I can't sleep at night, or when I'm on long car trips, or when I'm not listening to people who are talking to me. It involves picking a category like ice cream, cakes, cookies, etc, and inventing new flavors. A while back I shared this game with Ben, and he will play along on occasion. Once he gets into it, he's pretty good. He came up with honey ice cream and several variations on it, which is now one of his favorite things to eat in the whole world.

Me:"So, if you had to come up with a cupcake flavor right now, what would it be?"

Ben:"I don't know..."

Me:"Come on... please? You know, cake flavor, filling, frosting, toppings...?"

Ben:(The wheels begin to turn) "I think I would want chocolate cupcakes. With caramel inside... and vanilla frosting."

Me:"Oooh, that sounds good."

And so it was.

I used Hershey's Perfectly Chocolate Cake, filled the cupcakes with dulce de leche, and then topped them with vanilla frosting and Heath bits.

The verdict? Soooo goooood. Ben especially liked the frosting. I think we could have both eaten with a spoon. Oh, wait, we did do that. But we could have eaten a whole bowl of it if not for those pesky cupcakes waiting to be frosted.

Hershey's "Perfectly Chocolate" Chocolate Cake

2 cups sugar
1-3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup HERSHEY'S Cocoa
1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1-1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 cup milk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup boiling water

Directions:
1. Heat oven to 350°F. Line muffin cups (2-1/2 inches in diameter) with paper bake cups.

2. Stir together sugar, flour, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda and salt in large bowl. Add eggs, milk, oil and vanilla; beat on medium speed of mixer 2 minutes. Stir in boiling water (batter will be thin). Fill cups 2/3 full with batter.

3. Bake 22 to 25 minutes. Cool completely. Frost. About 30 cupcakes.

*I got about 24 cupcakes (plus a little left over batter that Ben volunteered to eat with a spoon), and used half of them for the Chocolate Caramel Cupcakes.

Dulce de Leche

1. Pour 1 can (14 oz.) sweetened condensed milk into top of double-boiler pan. Cover and place over boiling water.

2. Cook over low heat, stirring occasionally, for about an hour or until thick and light caramel-colored.

3. Remove from heat and whisk until smooth.

Easy Vanilla Buttercream (from Cooks Illustrated April 2007)

The buttercream frosting can be made ahead and refrigerated; if refrigerated, however, it must stand at room temperature to soften before use. If using a hand-held mixer, increase mixing times significantly (at least 50 percent).

Makes 3 cups

Ingredients:

20 tablespoons (2½ sticks) unsalted butter, softened
2½ cups Confectioners’ sugar (10 ounces)
1/8 tablespoons table salt
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 tablespoons heavy cream

Directions:

1. In standing mixer fitted with whisk attachment, beat butter at medium-high speed until smooth, about 20 seconds.

2. Add confectioners’ sugar and salt; beat at medium-low speed until most of the sugar is moistened, about 45 seconds.

3. Scrape down bowl and beat at medium speed until mixture is fully combined, about 15 seconds; scrape bowl, add vanilla and heavy cream, and beat at medium speed until incorporated, about 10 seconds, then increase speed to medium-high and beat until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes, scraping down bowl once or twice.

* I beat my frosting a bit longer than it called for and it was wonderfully fluffy and creamy and delicious. I also used milk instead of cream and it was just fine.

Cupcake assembly

Using a small knife, cut a cone shape out of the top of each cupcake. Set aside. Spoon a bit of dulce de leche into the hole and replace the top of the cupcake. Frost. Don't eat too much of the frosting. Top with toffee bits. Eat lots of cupcakes, or quickly send them off to a bake sale so that you don't go into sugar overload and die a fat and happy death.

Operation Baking Gals - Round 4

2008-10-16T11:23:00.000-07:00

If you’ve followed the blog at all you know that I’ve participated twice in Operation Baking Gals, and I’ve had a great time baking treats for deserving troops.

This month, I’m hosting a team! One of Ben’s colleagues is deployed to Afghanistan, and so I’m hosting a team on his behalf. He is a true lover of baked goods, and a genuinely good guy. If you’re interested in joining my team and sending off some treats between Oct 30 and Nov 10, head on over to Baking Gals to check it out and join my team.

Cooking with Ben and Ellen, en France!

2008-10-06T09:18:00.000-07:00

So, you go to stay with your parents in a lovely little gîte in the Dordogne region of France for a week. It's very relaxing, très beautiful. The region is known for it's foie gras (delicious!), goat cheese (delicious X 2!), and various duck products (Mmm....). It is, however, a little lacking in the nightlife department. What to do, what to do...

We shall do zee cooking en famille!

My love of cooking was passed down to me by two very foodie parents, so it seems only natural that visits with them are celebrations of food, and this visit I referred to more than once as foodapalooza. There were a lot of good meals, wine, cheeses, and desserts. And it was all great, but I thought since we were in France with fellow food lovers, we should take advantage and go all out.

We decided on duck because we're all about using what the area has to offer so after much searching and ooooohing at epicurious, we picked fig balsamic-glazed duck with pearl onion and pear hash with a romaine and mushroom salad on the side and chocolate honey mousse for dessert.

So we headed off the to local canarderie (is that a real french word? Maybe, maybe not) and the supermarché and came back and got to work.

Don't these magrets look merveilleux?

And the pearl onion and pear hash became shallot and pears because, honestly, shallots are always better. Trust me, we voted, and the overwhelming love of shallots in our family won.

The finished product:

As good as a real french bistro, less expensive and more fun!

Zee recipe, pour vous mes amis:

Fig balsamic-glazed duck with pearl onion and pear hash

Bon Appétit - January 2005

Servings: Makes 4 servings.

Ingredients
4 duck breasts
2 tablespoons olive oil
2 ripe pears, halved, cored, cut into 1/4-inch slices
1 10-ounce bag pearl onions, blanched, peeled, halved
4 medium Yukon Gold potatoes (about 1 1/2 pounds), boiled until just tender, peeled, cut into 1 1/4-inch pieces
2 tablespoons chopped fresh sage

3/4 cup low-salt chicken broth
1/2 cup fig balsamic vinegar

Preparation
Using small sharp knife, score duck skin in 1-inch-wide grid pattern. Season duck generously with salt and pepper. Heat oil in large skillet over medium-high heat. Add duck; cook about 6 minutes per side for medium. Transfer to cutting board; tent with foil. Discard all but 1/4 cup drippings from skillet. Heat drippings in skillet over high heat. Add pears, onions, and potatoes; sauté until beginning to brown, 5 minutes. Stir in sage; season with salt and pepper. Transfer hash to bowl; cover to keep warm.

Heat same skillet over high heat. Add broth and vinegar; bring to boil, scraping up browned bits. Boil until reduced to glaze, about 5 minutes. Season glaze with salt and pepper.

Divide hash among plates. Cut duck into 1/2-inch-thick slices; fan over hash. Drizzle glaze over and serve.

*We used shallots instead of onions, and I made my own fig balsamic vinegar by soaking some figs in vinegar for a while and then pushing it all through a strainer. Don't skip the fig balsamic vinegar! It was soo good that we were practically licking the plates. Okay, I may have actually dipped my finger in it and licked it once or twice, but that can be our secret, oui?

And let's not forget the dessert!

When we make this at home, it's the super-easiest mousse ever and so so delicious. Here, without a mixer, it's not quite as easy

But we all worked our arms on the whipped cream and found that it is still delicious, especially with a dollop of crème fraîche and a drizzle of honey. Mmmm!

Bon appétit¡

Supporting the troops times two

2008-09-29T04:29:00.000-07:00

It's been a very busy baking week for me and a fattening week for soldiers everywhere. Sunday afternoon in the Sweet Dumpling kitchen there was a full scale battle being waged.

In corner number one, we have Bake Sale.

My mission: bake up as many treats as I can to send to work with Ben for a bake sale for his unit.

In corner number two, Operation Baking Gals.

This week is Round 3 for bakers all over to send treats off to deployed service members to brighten their day and say thank you (because what better way to make someone feel good than with boxes upon boxes of baked goods?).

I couldn't say no to either cause. So, it was time to get down and dirty (and chocolately, buttery, and sticky) in the kitchen. After much flipping through cookbooks and browsing my favorite food blogs, muttering to myself, smacking my lips and saying "Ooooh, that looks so good" more than a few times, I narrowed it down to three recipes that I would bake and then split between the two causes.

First, we had Brrrrr-ownies from Dorie Greenspan's Baking: From My Home to Yours

and Coconut Caramel Pecan Shortbread that made me want to lick the screen over at Vanilla Sugar

But they weren't the stars of the show. Oh no. That honor goes to my very special Gooey Butter Cake. Oh yes, you heard me right. Gooey. Butter. Cake.

This is the one recipe I have that guarantees to make everyone in its path stop and melt into a puddle of "ohmygahhhitssogoodwhatisitsogoodsogoodahhhh". It will also probably be the cause of many cases of heart disease among my friends and family, so if you're watching what you eat, just plug your ears, close your eyes, and ignore how insanely bad for you these little slices of deliciousness are. And have another piece. At least you'll die fat and happy.

So here's the recipe. I tend to think of it as my secret weapon, but I've shared it so much already, and it's so easy to google, that I might as well put it out there. Hopefully my biggest fans won't read this and discover how insanely easy it is to make.

Gooey Butter Cake
1/2 cup butter
1 box yellow cake mix
3 eggs
1 - 8 oz. package of cream cheese
1/2 t almond extract
4 cups of confectioners' sugar

Preheat oven to 350. Lightly grease one 9x13 cake pan.

Melt butter. Empty cake mix into a large bowl. Stir melted butter, along with one egg, into the cake mix. Press mixture into pan.

In a large bowl, mix cream cheese, almond extract, confectioners sugar and the remaining two eggs. Beat for three minutes with an electric mixer set on medium high speed. Spread over top of the cake mixture in the pan.

Bake for 35-45 minutes until golden brown on top. Allow cake to cool. Eat. Eat some more. Mmmm. So good.

I know already that all three treats were quickly devoured at the bake sale, and I hope the troops on the receiving end of Operation Baking Gals enjoy them as much as the troops here did!

Last tastes of summer

2008-09-16T12:14:00.001-07:00

I'm getting greedy.

As summer slips away and the weather gets colder (not "gets cold", since it didn't really get warm here this summer), I know that my days are limited. I don't have much more time for wonderful tomatoes, zucchini, sweet corn, strawberries, and blueberries at the market. Even my fresh basil will be harder to find soon. So I spend my time sighing and weeping and going to the market each week to buy as much summer produce as I can before it's all potatoes and apples and hearty cold weather food.

And then I come home and greedily eat blueberries by the handful and plot which dishes to use my prized, delicious sweet corn in. This one usually wins:

Sweet Corn and Salmon Risotto

I'm sucker for risotto.It's delicious. It's not all that hard, despite it's reputation. And it's open to so many variations. Sometimes I'll make it once a week, putting in whatever is in our kitchen. I've had a lot of good flavor combinations over time, but this one is one of my favorites that I just keep coming back to.

Sweet Corn and Salmon Risotto
* 6 cups chicken stock (I always want to use vegetable, but I never have it. You'd think I'd learn, but no)
* 1 tablespoon olive oil
* 1/2 cups finely chopped onion
* 4 cloves garlic, minced
* 1 cup Arborio rice
* 1 cup white wine
* 8 ounce salmon filet, cut into small cubes
* Kernels from 1 ear of sweet corn (or more if you love corn the way I love corn)
* 1/4 cup chopped fresh basil
* 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
* Salt and freshly ground black pepper

Directions

1. Heat stock in pan over high heat. Keep at simmer over medium heat.
2. Heat oil in heavy-bottomed saucepan over medium heat. Add onions and garlic; cook, stirring, until translucent. Add rice; cook, stirring, until rice begins to sound like glass beads, 3 to 4 minutes.
3. Add wine to rice. Cook, stirring, until wine is absorbed. Using a ladle, add 3/4 cup of hot stock to rice. Using a wooden spoon, stir rice constantly, at medium speed. When rice has absorbed most but not all of the liquid and mixture is just thick enough to leave a clear wake behind the spoon when stirring, add another 3/4 cup stock.
4. Continue adding stock in this manner, stirring constantly, until rice is mostly translucent but still opaque and slightly crunchy in center. Add salmon and corn; continue stirring and adding stock until rice is still al dente but not crunchy and shrimp is cooked through, about 3 minutes. As rice nears doneness, watch carefully, and add smaller amounts of liquid. The mixture should be thick enough that grains of rice are suspended in liquid about the consistency of heavy cream. It will thicken slightly when removed from heat.
5. Remove from heat. Stir in basil and parmesan cheese; season with salt and pepper. Spoon into bowls, and grate or shave Parmesan over risotto, if desired. Serve immediately.

Someone's in the kitchen with Mama

2008-08-28T02:17:00.000-07:00

Q: What kind of person decides to bake scones upon arriving home from the hospital after having a c-section several days earlier?

(Ellen looks around the room and slowly raises her hand)

A: Me.

I know, I'm crazy. But I was so BORED in the hospital, I wanted to take something over to our neighbors to thank them for taking care of the dogs, and I thought baking might take the edge of the searing pain in my abdomen. And the scones were delicious.

This isn't actually about the scones though (Whole Grain Maple Oatmeal, if you were wondering, and I found the recipe here).

It's about the treats I baked 2 days later, Chocolate Malted Whopper Drops from Dorie Greenspan's Baking: From My Home to Yours and Blondies adapted from Smitten Kitchen.

Now, if you're wondering what the heck I'm doing spending so much time in the kitchen when I should be recuperating on the couch with my sweet little baby and a pint of Haagen Dazs, well there are a few answers (see above excuses for scone making), but the most important one is Operation Baking Gals.

A few weeks ago, while perusing Dorie Greenspan's website, I learned of a fantastic group of food bloggers who were joining together to bake for the troops. Basically, once a month all these wonderful people were going to bake treats and send them to a designated service member. Okay, so cookies? I love cookies! Supporting the troops? I love the troops! How could I not be a part of this? So I signed up and this week was my first round as part of Operation Baking Gals, and I figured what better time to introduce Wesley to the joys of baking? It's never too early, you know!

I had been wanting to make the Whopper Drops since forever, but I'd had to wait because it's darn near impossible to find certain ingredients around here, like malted milk powder. The Dutch just don't have it, and the commissary, well, I think I've voiced my displeasure with the selection of food at our commissary before. So I had to wait until Ben's recent trip to Chicago when he brought back all sort of goodies and hard to find items like tahini, turkey jerky, and malted milk powder. Mmm... but I digresss.

I had been dying to make these because:

Exhibit A

and

Exhibit B

How do you go wrong there?

And the finished product turned out very nicely.

I found myself wishing that the cookie itself was just a little more chocolately, but too much chocolate is never enough for me. I think for a person of normal tastes these would be lovely.

Wes agrees.

No, no, no feeding the baby cookies. I'm only teaching him to bake, not to eat. More treats for me that way.

Up next was the blondies, which I added a little espresso powder to and stirred in chopped white and milk chocolate as well as Kraft caramel bits (which I was VERY excited to find at the commissary this week. They stocked something I've been wanting! Hallelujah! I bought 6 bags because I know they'll probably be gone soon and then I'll never see them again).

Wesley was a super helper.

And the finished product was awfully good.

Ben was my taste tester and insisted that supporting the troops includes feeding him, too, so that batch may have been short a few blondies by the time I shipped it. Hopefully the soldier I sent it to enjoys them as much as mine did.

So, you may think I'm crazy with this baking thing, but as least I'm crazy for a good cause, right?

J'adore...

2008-08-12T07:57:00.000-07:00

Ben, of course, but also macarons!

My love of Paris is inextricably linked with my love of pastries. Every trip involves at least one patisserie purchase, even if we're only there for a day, and walking by many many patisseries in order to lick the windows. And on our last few trips, I have been struck with a love of macarons.

They've become something of an obsession, and I have wanted desperately to make my own. I saw plenty of examples and recipes on the bajillion food blogs I read regularly, but my problem was that the ingredients are always in grams. This makes sense because A) They're French, and B) They are fussy and delicate and I would expect no less of these magnifique little treats. Soooo, I had to get a food scale. I eventually did, and after marveling at how I could now tell you how much my food weighs at any given meal (those chocolate chip cookies in my previous post were about 35 g, in case you needed to know), I finally made my macarons!

I searched the blogosphere for just the right recipe, and I kept coming back to Tartelette and her Macarons 101. She explains it so well and so thoroughly, not to mention the fact that her pictures are mouth-wateringly pretty.

I followed her recipe almost exactly. The only change I made was to substitute vanilla sugar for the plain granulated sugar. And then I filled half with the bittersweet chocolate ganache, and half with a vanilla bean buttercream that I found the recipe for somewhere. But I won't share that recipe because, for whatever reason, it just didn't work for me and I had to wing it and experiment with powdered sugar to get it to a decent consistency. And in the end, my macarons... were delicious! They looked like macarons (although they were a tiny bit flatter than I wanted them, but that's just something to improve for next time) and, more importantly tasted like macarons. Ben proclaimed them as good as Pierre Hermé. I don't know about that, but I'm glad he loves me and my baked goods.

Macarons (recipe from Tartelette)
For the Macarons:

3 egg whites (I like to use 2-3 day old egg whites)
50 gr. granulated sugar
200 gr. powdered sugar
110 gr. ground almonds

For the whites: the day before (24hrs), separate your eggs and store the whites at room temperature on a covered container. If you want to use 48hrs (or more) egg whites, you can store them in the fridge.

In a stand mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, whip the egg whites to a foam, gradually add the sugar until you obtain a glossy meringue. Do not overbeat your meringue or it will be too dry and your macarons won't work.

Combine the ground almonds and powdered sugar in a food processor and give them a quick pulse. It will break the powdered sugar lumps and combine your almonds with it evenly.

Add them to the meringue. Fold the mass carefully until you obtain a batter that flows like magma or a thick ribbon. Give quick strokes at first to break the mass and slow down. The whole process should not take more than 50 strokes. Test a small amount on a plate: if the tops flattens on its own you are good to go. If there is a small beak, give the batter a couple of turns.

Fill a pastry bag fitted with a plain tip with the batter and pipe small rounds (1.5 inches in diameter) onto parchment paper baking sheets.

Preheat the oven to 300F. Let the macarons sit out for an hour to harden their shells a bit and bake for 8-10 minutes, depending on their size. Let cool.

If you have trouble removing the shells, pour a couple of drops of water under the parchment paper while the sheet is still a bit warm and the macarons will lift up more easily do to the moisture. Don't let them sit there in it too long or they will become soggy. Pipe or spoon some ganache on one shell and sandwich with another one.

Bittersweet ganache:

3/4 cup heavy cream
1 cup bittersweet chocolate

In a heavy saucepan set over medium heat, bring the heavy cream to a boil. Remove from the stove and add the chocolate to it. Let stand 2 minutes and then stir until fully combined. Let cool until firm enough to put in a small piping bag.

Les macarons!

Tofu for the doubters

2008-08-09T11:37:00.000-07:00

Some of you out there may have certain ideas about tofu and its tastiness (cough...Dad...cough). Ben used to be one of those people too. I would mention a potentially good recipe and he would raise his eyebrows or wrinkle his nose or just say no.

When he took his recent two week trip to Chicago, however, I went to the commissary and gleefully bought a package of tofu to cook for me, just me. I also bought some stir fry sauce from the local supermarket. The sauce I have is a product of the U.K., so if you're one of my loyal American readers, good luck finding it, but it's Sweet Soy and Roasted Red Chili, so you could try using a combination of, oh, maybe soy sauce and chili sauce.

Then, I sat at home, alone. And I pondered what I wanted to do with my previously forbidden tofu and my tasty looking new sauce. I ended up deciding to stir fry the tofu with some snow peas, scallions, and portabella mushroom and serve it over some soba noodles that we had lying around. And it was SO. GOOD.

It was so good, in fact, that I thought I could make it for Ben and he would probably eat it without making barfy faces or gagging sounds. So when he returned, I told him my plans. He looked at me doubtfully but agreed to try it. And lo and behold, Mikey liked it! He liked it enough that he agreed to tofu for dinner again the next night! And he's eaten it multiple times since then! It's a miracle!

So for the doubters, my Yummy and Easy Tofu Stir Fry That Ben Not Only Chokes Down But Actually Likes.

Serves 2

Ingredients:
1/2 block firm tofu, cubed
2 tsp each minced garlic and ginger, or if you want it easy a few spoonfuls of jarred minced garlic and ginger stir fry seasoning
1 cup snow peas
2 cups portabella mushrooms, chopped
2 cups scallions, chopped
90 grams (about 3 ounces) soba noodles
Sweet Soy and Roasted Chili Stir Fry Sauce (or something close to that)

Heat a little oil in a pan, add ginger, garlic and tofu and cook until lightly browned. Set aside.
While the tofu is cooking, bring a large saucepan of water to a boil and add soba noodles. Boil for about 5 minutes, drain and rinse with cold water, and set aside.

Heat a little oil in a wok, or if you are wok-less like me, a large pan, and add the vegetables. Stir fry for a few minutes until they are nice and cooked. Add tofu and stir fry sauce and stir together for another minute until everything is heated through.

Serve over soba noodles.

Yum!

Proof that Ben eats tofu:

And likes it:

Delicious!

The baby liked it too...

Baby's gonna be so disappointed when he comes out and doesn't get fun foods anymore. At least not until he can chew. Then we'll go nuts.

2008-08-04T01:34:00.000-07:00

I love cookies. A lot. And in my mind, nothing come close to the chocolate chip cookie. Yeah, sure, it's fun to have double chocolate raspberry caramel macadamia nut cookies dipped in white chocolate, but for pure cookie enjoyment I can't help but go back to the old standard.

So it might be a little surprising that I have just now gotten around to making the New York Times recipe from a whole MONTH ago! But the problem, you see, is that I already have my perfect chocolate chip cookie recipe. I found it a few years ago, made a few slight modifications, and haven't been able to beat it since. And then I recently found another that looked really good that I wanted to try. And then, I read the article that goes with the New York Times recipe and know that I have to experiment with chilling the dough for different amounts of time. Do you get where I'm going here? Not only do I have new recipes to test out, I also have to make test batches after different periods of time in the fridge and compare them to my own fail proof recipe. That's a lot of chocolate chip cookie making! Not to mention the fact that Ben was gone so I couldn't send cookies to work with him, I needed to make biscotti for a going away gift for one of his coworkers, and I had to bake Ben a fabulous cake for his birthday last week. That's a lot of baking! And a girl can only eat so many cookies. You might think it would be easier for me being 9 months pregnant because I should be able to sit down with my round self and polish off a batch of cookies, right? Wrong. There is no room in my stomach. And I've been pretty healthy throughout my pregnancy, so now when I eat too many cookies, the sugar overload makes me feel really yucky. So no cookie binges here.

All this to get to the point that last night I FINALLY made the fabulous cookies that the baking world was buzzing about weeks ago. And they were, in fact, fabulous.

The jury (consisting of me and Ben) is still out on whether they replace my chocolate chip cookie recipe or not.

Pros: They are really delicious. They are absolutely gorgeous. They live up to all the promises of the article. I feel like I could be buying them for too much money from an expensive bakery.

Cons: They call for cake flour and bread flour and that seems a little pretentious to me. The recipe makes a massive batch of dough compared to my usual recipe, but the quantities don't seem easy to cut in half, so I'm stuck with a big batch of cookies. You have to let the dough sit for at least 24 hours. That means advance planning for what should be one of the kinds of cookies you whip up on a lazy afternoon.

I think there will be further deliberation this evening after we have both snacked on more cookies today. I have a feeling, though, that these cookies will stay, but only with special occasion status. Even though they are so so so good, there's just not enough room in my regular baking rotation for pretentious chocolate chip cookies. My recipe will stick around as our old faithful. And no, I'm not sharing my own recipe. I'm a cookie tease.

Le dessert

2008-07-30T14:18:00.000-07:00

Every once in a while, we like to pretend that it's actually summer here (even though most days it's still cold and rainy and I have to wear a sweatshirt to walk the dogs), and the best way to enjoy summer is, of course, with ice cream. I love all kinds of ice cream and I love to make sorbets and gelatos at home, but there has always been a special place in my heart for Drumsticks. The chocolate covered tops, the caramel cores, the little plug of chocolate at the bottom of the cone... Mmmmm. The problem is, I could never share this love of Drumsticks with my favorite person and partner in ice cream eating because Ben does not eat nuts. Ever. He just doesn't like them in any form. And if you're tempted to ask, "Not even _____ (pistachios, peanut butter, almonds, etc)?" The answer is no. No nuts. So Drumsticks in every form are out of the question because they are always covered in peanuts.

So imagine my delight when I found this, a recipe on one of my favorite blogs for homemeade drumsticks. That's ingenious! Such a simple idea! Why hadn't we thought of it? Even better, our local grocery store actually sold sugar cones for a brief period of time! (Because of course the commissary doesn't have them.) We stocked up while we could, and have been working on perfecting our drumstick making techniques this summer. We made them again a couple nights ago, and I think we're getting pretty good. Allow me to share with you the magic of ice cream and chocolate from the Morrison kitchen.

First, we found a delicious ice cream flavor, no boring vanilla for our cones! And improvised a way to keep the cones upright for freezing periods in between steps. Little glasses work well, but we've also cut out holes in a cardboard box to serve as a cone-holder. We like using the glasses because we can easily move them around and work with one cone while sticking the others in the freezer if needed. Before scooping I spooned a tiny bit of melted chocolate into the bottom of each cone to act as a plug and then stuck them in the freezer for a few minutes to let it set. Then, Ben got to scoopin'.

After scooping the ice cream, we make holes in each one for a caramel center. The caramel is, in our opinion, the very best part of the drumstick.

Next, the carmelling! I feel like a mad scientist with my syringe of caramel deliciousness. The squeezable bottles of caramel topping work just as well, but aren't nearly as exciting.

After that step the cones need to go in the freezer for a few hours to harden so they don't melt and drip and fall apart during our next step. While they are chilling, we assemble our toppings: chocolate for dipping, and white chocolate, butterscotch chips, rainbow sprinkles, and chocolate espresso beans as substitutes for the dreaded peanuts. We've also used crushed Oreos in the past and they were pretty delicious, too.

When the cones are good and frozen, we dip...

And add toppings...

And voilà! Homemade drumsticks! With better ice cream, better chocolate, and tastier toppings than the original! Yum!

Now quit reading our blog and go eat some ice cream!

Summer has (allegedly) arrived!

2008-06-23T14:16:00.000-07:00

According to the calendar, it's officially the season of sunshine and ice cream! I, however, am not entirely convinced. You see, it's still not really warm here. When we moved here, people kept saying, "Oh but it gets really hot and sticky in the summer". We looked at them suspiciously and waited for the hot weather. It never came. It got nice and sunny and pleasantly warm, but never HOT. We were assured that last year was abnormal. Suuuuure. This year we're still waiting and wearing sweatshirts when we take the dogs on walks. Maybe now that it's "official", the weather will get the memo and adjust itself accordingly. In fact, it was relatively pleasant at times this weekend, but I'm almost afraid to talk about it out of fear that I'll jinx it and tomorrow it will snow or something.

There has, however, been evidence of the impending ice cream season.
Exhibit A:

Exhibit B:

Exhibit C:

Exhibit D:

Our market has been FULL of beautiful, wonderful, fresh summer fruits and vegetables and we have been buying bags and bags full of produce. We've been eating more pineapple, strawberries, sweet corn, asparagus, zucchini, and tomatoes than you can imagine and we're loving it. And the raspberries up there actually came from a friend's backyard! For free! It's like heaven! Or summer!

In honor of all the marvelous produce, I'm leaving you with the recipe for a delicious light potatoey salad with marinated tomatoes that we had for dinner last night.

Ensalada Rusa with Marinated Tomatoes from Clean Eating Magazine

2 Yukon Gold potatoes
2 large carrots
1/2 large sweet potato
2 eggs
6 oz tuna, packed in water
1/2 cup diced white or yellow onion
1/2 cup diced sweet red bell pepper
1 cup peas

1/4 cup plain low fat yogurt
1/2 cup low fat sour cream
zest of 1 lemon
1 tbsp dijon mustard
1 tbsp freshly squeezed lemon juice
1/8 tsp sea salt
freshly cracked pepper,to taste

Put potatoes, carrots, sweet potato and eggs with shell in a medium pot. Cover with water and place over medium-high heat. Bring to a boil, and then let boil for 10 to 15 minutes, or until vegetables are soft but not mushy. Drain and rinse with cold water Remove skins and dice vegetables. Remove shells from eggs and cut in half to remove yolks. Dice whites and discard yolks.

In a large bowl, combine potatoes, carrots, sweet potato, eggs, tuna, onion, red pepper and peas.

In a separate bowl, whisk together yogurt, sour cream lemon zest, mustard, lemon juice, sea salt and pepper. Add yogurt mixture to vegetables. Stir gently to caot. Serve with marinated tomatoes on top.

Marinated tomatoes

2 Roma tomatoes, diced (I used about 2 cups mini Roma tomatoes slice in half)
3 tbsp sherry wine vinegar
1/8 tsp sea salt
freshly cracked pepper, to taste

Mix tomatoes and vinegar. Season with salt and pepper and chill for at least 20 minutes before topping salad.

Enjoy!

Ooh la la!

2008-04-29T14:14:00.000-07:00

For those who don't know, I spend quite a bit of time in the kitchen. In addition to making fabulous dinners, as previously posted here, I also bake a lot. I probably bake something at least once a week, and I would do it more often if I had more people to feed. However, I can only send food to work with Ben about once a week or so before people start mumbling something about getting fat from all the treats. I can't really blame them. I mean, why do you think the treats all go to work with Ben? We don't want to weigh 800 pounds either.

I usually stick to relatively easy things like cookies, bars, muffins, etc., but this week is special. In honor of my last week of French classes before having the summer off, I decided to make croissants and pains au chocolat for my students. I've wanted to make croissants for a long time due to my love of French pastries, but have you ever looked at a croissant recipe? It is, how you say, intimidating. Hours upon hours of chilling the dough, rolling it out, folding it, repeating the process. Plus, I know how delicious real croissants are and how pathetic the ones you can buy in the grocery store are in comparison. I didn't want to fall short and disappoint myself after a day and a half in the kitchen.

The good news? Actually it's all good news. 1) I made the croissants; 2) They are absolutely completely totally delicious; 3) I used half the dough to make pains au chocolat, which are equally delicious (according to me, Ben just wants the croissants. In fact, he ate two in class last night and was wondering how many he could eat for breakfast today without dropping dead from butter consumption.); and 4) They really weren't very difficult to make.

Sure, they really did take a loooong time. But after reading the recipe and being prepared, I had no kitchen emergencies, no peeking in the oven and gasping, no suspicious poking of what may or may not be a ruined pastry. Nope, just buttery goodness from the oven. If you're interested, I used recipes from epicurious.com for the dough, croissants, and pains au chocolat which you can find here, here, and here.

If you're not feeling that ambitious, you can just look at the pretty pictures and dream that someday I might be in the same city as you and bake them for you.

Bon appétit! And au revoir for the time being; we're heading to Portugal for some sun, good food, and relaxation! Fantastico!

Cooking with Ben and Ellen, again

2008-02-18T14:12:00.000-08:00

If you have been paying attention even just a tiny bit, you should know by now that we love our food. So I was very pleased when Ben gave me a gift certificate to make a personalized cookbook for Valentine's Day. He explained that I can upload my recipes and photos to a website and then they print up my very own book of deliciousness!

I thought it was a pretty cool idea, especially because I had been longing to do another episode of Cooking with Ben and Ellen, and this gave me a perfect excuse. So I proposed to Ben that we find fun and fancy recipes, make them together, and then put them in our cookbook.

So I present to you our first cookbook dinner project (and second documented episode of Cooking Chez Morrison), Veal with Roasted Shallots, Arugula and Soft Polenta.

The first step was probably the most difficult. Before we started anything else, we had to actually find veal chops. The commissary is usually pretty lacking in anything outside beef and chicken. Really, they're pretty lacking in everything. When we went grocery shopping this week, they were out of spinach, AGAIN. So Ben asked the guy who was stocking the produce department if they had any. The guy said yes, and then looked utterly puzzled when Ben asked if maybe we could actually get some. So we weren't expecting to find any veal there. And we didn't. The next step was looking up the Dutch word for veal chops. We found out that veal is kalfsvlees, but no word for chops. And then it turns out kalfsvlees isn't really what they say around here. Also, they don't seem to eat much veal, because Ben hit the market and three butchers, and only found veal "chops" in one place, and a pulverized veal-like substance in another. And it wasn't even really the cut we were looking for, but we decided we can't really be that picky, so we bought the "chops" and called it a day.

So, back at Chez Morrison... Step 1, season the chops:

A little salt, pepper, fresh thyme, and then we poured a mixture of lemon juice and olive oil over them and let them marinate for a little while.

Then Ben got to choppin'. He is the resident chopper and knife expert, so he started in on the shallots and tomatoes that we were going to roast with some balsamic vinegar.

Since I am not allowed to play with knives due to too many bloody kitchen emergencies, I was assigned polenta duty. Stirring. That's what I'm good at.

Then we got the veal cooking, and as everthing was going along as planned we had some time to goof off.

And then magically, all around the same time, the vegetables were roasted, the veal was cooked, and the polenta was the right consistency! Voila!

We are masters of our little Dutch kitchen!

And for dessert (yes, there's more! Try not to be too impressed) we made lime and strawberry sorbets, with little chocolate decorations in the name of fun and fanciness.

Bon appétit!

Things from our kitchen

2007-07-23T14:09:00.000-07:00

It has come to my attention recently that I am apparently a lazy blogger. I tried explaining that, well, we're boring. I doubt anyone really wants to know about how I walked the dogs this morning again or that we want to rent a carpet cleaner from the shoppette on post, but the people who rented the two that they have are never ever bringing them back. Or that I vacuum every day and Ben is still training for a triathlon. This is boring stuff.

But as much as I know that I am, in fact, boring, I would hate for people to be bored with the blog due to lack of updates.

So for those of you who may be accusing me of slacking in the blog department, let me take you on a virtual tour of some things I love about the Netherlands. This episode of "Why I love the Netherlands" comes to you straight from my refrigerator. One of the most exciting things about being in a foreign country, at least in my opinion, is exploring foreign grocery stores. I never cease to be amazed by all the cookies, pasta, frozen meals, and types of bread that I have never seen before. If I could, I would spend our entire time here eating. And then traveling and eating some more.

So let me share with you some of the exciting things that we keep in our kitchen now.

Okay, yes, I know that everybody has fruit. We are not special. But I wanted to show you the fruit first because it is fresh and declicious and cheap from our local market. Every Saturday we go and load up on all sorts of yummy produce for mere pennies (or euros, whatever).

And also at the market you stumble sometimes on something unexpected and wonderful, like mini bell peppers

I knew they existed because Martha Stewart has used them in recipes, but Martha uses a lot of things that normal people don't even know exist, so the mini peppers seem ridiculous to me, in a tasty sort of way. They're delicious stuffed with feta, tomatoes, and a few herbs. Yummy.

And next we have the Smoeltjes, or "Smilies" as I call them.

They taste kind of like Fig Newtons and come in several different flavors. And they really are assorted little faces, some smiling, some screaming "No no no! Don't eat me!". Fantastic.

Next, you knew it was coming, the chocolate.

Just a few of the kinds that are currently living in our refrigerator. How can you not love a candy bar called "Wunderbar"?

And finally, the pièce de résistance... poffertjes!

They're like miniature pancakes!

I sprinkled mine with cinnamon and sugar like the bag suggested

And they are delicious!!!

Mmmmm.

Cooking with Ben and Ellen

2007-06-19T14:07:00.000-07:00

What do you do if have a Saturday night with no plans and you aren't in Paris?

You make Beef Wellington!

On the way home from a long and lazy Starbucks trip, Ben and I decided to go home, pick something fun out of a cookbook and spend the evening chopping and sauteeing and stuff. We ended up picking "Beef Wellington for Two" out of The New Basics Cookbook. We had never made it before. Ben loves steak. I love pastry crusts. Beef Wellington would be perfect!

First we had to make Potted Mushrooms. Hmm, okay. So Ben prepared for choppin'.

And went to work on the mushrooms.

Ben does most of the chopping work in our kitchen, because I do not play well with sharp objects. Note the band-aid on my finger.

That was from just taking the knife out of the drawer. Imagine what happens when I actually try slicing things.

I am fabulous at sautéeing though.

And in case you were wondering, Potted Mushrooms are made with finely chopped mushrooms, leeks, shallots, chives and about 12 pounds of butter.

And what on earth do you DO with Potted Mushrooms? You put them on your steak!

And then, it was time for the puff pastry. I love pastry of any sort. And wrapping a hunk of beef in a rich, buttery crust sounds so heart-attackingly delicious, I knew this would be the best part of the dish. Apparently Spud thought so too, because when our backs were turned his little nose made its way up to the counter where he managed to chew the corner of the sheet of pastry before we saw him and yelled.

He looks so innocent. But that little bottom lip that's sticking out so sadly is the same one that drips with drool at the thought of your Beef Wellington. Don't let the beagle fool you.

So we draped the pastry all around the meat, and the recipe said we could use any excess pastry to decorate the crust. Excellent idea! So after a few minutes of deliberation, we decided on a jungle theme!

You won't get elephants and rhinos in any fancy restaurant. Only Chez Morrison.

And then they go in the oven. And we wait, some more eagerly than others.

And finally...

Elephant and rhinoceros decorated Beef Wellington in a jungle of fresh greens! And a carrot, hand-carved into a flower by Ben. Amazing! I don't even want to think about how many band-aids I would need after I tried to do that.

Cheers!