delish

French Macarons

2011-06-20T19:17:00.000-07:00

Not to be confused with coconut macaroons.

Have you ever seen these little cookies? I think they are becoming trendy. Maybe they'll be the next fad. Like cake pops. But better.

Max and I first tried macarons last year when I bought a box of them from a local French cafe. We were instant fans. We have been wanting to try making some for awhile, but I'd heard they are tricky. So we studied up a little before attempting to make them.

I don't know what all the potential pitfalls are, but I thought they were actually fairly easy. Our batter came together just fine, and piping them onto the pan was easy enough (although messy). I have large tube cake decorating tips, but I imagine you could just cut the corner off of a zip lock bag and that would work fine.

We did have one problem when it came to baking. Our first pan of cookies, baked on a dark teflon coated pan, came out perfectly. Our second and third pans, light-colored aluminum pans, came out gooey and we couldn't get all of them off the pans without destroying them. We cooked them longer, but I think we still didn't cook them long enough. They looked set, but they sank as they cooled. So make sure you wait till they are brown around the bottom edges. Next time, we'll err on the side of overcooking instead of undercooking our cookies.

If you're interested in trying them, these are helpful resources.

Demystifying Macarons (PDF -- Includes recipe we used)
Joanne Chang demonstrates (YouTube)

We added lemon zest to our batter and made lemon buttercream frosting and lemon cream cheese frosting to go on them. I preferred the lemon cream cheese frosting because it wasn't quite as sweet. I also tried using some leftover chocolate ganache frosting I had in the fridge and it went together surprisingly well. I think some kind of a raspberry frosting filling would have been fantastic. Maybe we'll try that next time.

There are so many flavor possibilities with macarons that I can't wait to try them again!

California Eggs Benedict

2011-06-13T12:08:00.000-07:00

A few months ago my husband made the poached eggs from Good Eats. He makes them almost every Saturday now and the whole family loves them. I occasionally make mine into Eggs Benedict, which is great but a little heavy. I found this amazing recipe for California Eggs Benedict and wanted to share. It is amazing. You really can't go wrong with avocado, basil, roasted tomatoes and cheese sauce. Check it out.

California Benedict
From Katie Sweeney

Ingredients
6 roma tomatoes, sliced lengthwise into four thick slices
Olive oil for drizzling
Salt and freshly ground black pepper
Flesh of 1 1/2 avocados, diced
3 tablespoons basil, julienned
2 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons flour
1 cup milk
1/3 cup white cheddar cheese, grated
2 tablespoons parmesan cheese, finely grated
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
Nutemg, for sprinkling
4 large slices of sliced sourdough, lightly toasted
4 poached or fried eggs

Directions

Preheat the oven to 400°F. Arrange the tomato slices on a baking pan covered with foil. Drizzle with oil and season with salt and pepper. Roast for 40-45 minutes while you prepare the rest of the dish.
In a small bowl mash the avocados to make a spreadable paste. Mix in the basil, and season with salt and pepper. Set aside.
In a saucepan, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the flour and whisk constantly for 2 minutes.
Slowly add the milk and cook, whisking constantly until the mixture comes to a boil. It will thicken. Remove from heat and add the cheddar cheese, parmesan cheese, Dijon mustard, and season with salt, pepper, and nutmeg.
To assemble, spread each piece of toast with a thick layer of mashed avocado (about 2-3 heaping tablespoons). Cover with 4-6 slices of tomato. Top with a poached or fried egg. Drizzle 1/4 cup of the cheese sauce over the top of each egg. Enjoy with a knife and fork immediately.

Serves 2-4.

Melanie's Root Beer Bundt Cake

2011-06-05T19:28:00.000-07:00

I decided to go back to the beginning of Delish time and try the Root Beer Bundt Cake. I think it was the first recipe posted? I was living in Ecuador at the time and I didn't have a bundt cake pan, plus root beer was very difficult to find, so I wasn't able to make it. Recently, I saw it pop up on a couple food blogs that I follow which was a reminder to try it out!

This past weekend we had some friends over for a BBQ so I figured it would be a great opportunity to make it (because as much fun as it would be, I just can't eat a whole cake by myself!). Everyone said they really liked it and they all ate it, but maybe they were just being nice because it wasn't my favorite cake.

First of all, like others said, you just can't taste the root beer (I used IBC brand). The chocolate is just too overpowering, but yummy though! Also, the instructions say not to overmix and that it should be lumpy, but to me that was a bad idea because I had little flour clumps in my cake piece. Not pretty or appetizing. The frosting was yummy, but I put it on while the cake was still warm (they suggest to cook it the day before- I wasn't that organized) so the frosting sort of slid down the cake. It tasted ok, it just didn't look as pretty as the picture in the book.

So, despite it not tasting like root beer, having flour clumps, and melty frosting, it still got eaten up. It was a decent chocolate cake, I just don't think I'll make it again. Oh, and serving it with vanilla ice cream is absolutely essential!

that's a ton of frosting!

Chili x2

2011-05-15T20:49:00.000-07:00

This is the Sweet Potato Chili that Danielle recommended.

So, here I am, two months after requesting chili recipes. I made them both!

I made the Chipotle Chocolate Chili from Melanie first. Despite everything she said and everything I've read on adding chocolate to savory dishes, I still thought that putting it in would somehow give a hint of chocolate-y flavor, but now I know for myself that is not the case at all. It just adds extra depth, exactly like Melanie said. I almost didn't add it, but I'm really glad I did! I decided I had to risk it after test-tasting and thinking it seemed to be missing something. I really liked this chili and my family did too. My husband loves chipotle flavor and I wish so much that I loved it, too, but I prefer it to be subtle, so the diced tomatoes I used were the Mexican-style ones with chipotles in, rather than the chilis in adobo sauce, which I find to be too strong for me.

The Sweet Potato Chili from Danielle was good too! I did miss the meat flavor some (not the meat texture, though--this chili has great texture and the sweet potatoes are a good addition), but I think that's partly my taste buds expecting meaty flavor since my brain knows I'm eating chili. I'd give this one a shot again before trying another vegetarian chili. I cooked it in the crock pot and it smelled so delicious all day while it was simmering! The spices on this one are really nice.

Thanks again, Danielle and Melanie, for providing those recipes!

Chicken Quinoa Stew

2011-05-08T20:41:00.000-07:00

I finally made something blog-worthy! This Chicken Quinoa Stew was pretty amazing. I found it here:

http://recipeshoebox.blogspot.com/2011/02/chicken-quinoa-stew.html

If you haven't heard of quinoa, or if you have heard of quinoa but haven't cooked with it, you should definitely make this recipe to try it out! I first heard of quinoa while I was living in Ecuador because it orginates in the Andes Mountains there, but it has recently become a lot more popular here in the U.S. Quinoa is a grain that I like to describe as a cross between rice and pasta, but the grains are teeny tiny. It's very healthy because it's super high in protein and a good source of fiber, phosphorus, magnesium, and iron. It's also gluten-free! It doesn't have much flavor, but just adds texture.

We told my 2 1/2 year old boy that the quinoa were monster eggs, and he gobbled it right up. His exact words were "monster eggs good!" And I'm happy that he's eating something good for him.

I love making stews and soups because they are so healthy and always delicious! This stew has a nice spicy kick to it that could be doctored up or down, depending on your spiciness preference.
Also, the recipe says to cook the quinoa beforehand, but I had to simmer mine for 20+ minutes to get the potatoes tender enough, so you could probably throw the uncooked quinoa in with the potatoes and it would get cooked while you simmered. It would save you time and a dirty dish.

I wasn't going for presentation with this picture, but you can see waht it looks like.

Grasshopper Cake

2011-04-22T13:18:00.001-07:00

Long time no post! I'm still here and rarely cookin' anything blog-worthy since my kids never eat what I make...with the exception of cheese burgers, chicken nuggets, PB sandwiches, pizza...and I can't really think of anything else they will both eat. Not kidding.

I finally made this cake! I'm so glad Jeff's birthday gave me an excuse.

I am happy to say that I mastered the frosting! Okay, so I failed miserably the first time and had outstanding success the 2nd. Here are my secrets:

1. Use a narrower pot. I don't know why this made such a huge difference, but I reduced the 1st batch for 30 minutes and the 2nd batch in the narrower sauce pan reduced much better.

2. Don't bother trying to mix it to cool it. I think this is a silly way to let something cool. Sure it might cool a bit faster, but don't waste precious energy...just let the reduction sit for an hour or 2 until it is room temperature with absolutely no warmth.

3. Do not use soft, but cool butter. Use the butter straight out of the fridge and cut it into cubes. This is the only way I use butter anymore. It makes my cookies much softer. If you let butter get too soft it is going to separate and never return to its original form.

4. In addition to the above changes I also replaced some of the milk with some heavy cream. However, I don't think it is necessary if you use the method I've said.

I can't wait to eat this cake!!!! I had to blog about it now cause otherwise it would never happen.

The end product. I used Oreo Thin Crisps to make little sanwiches and they were perfect.

Use a pot like this...

Not like this...

Squint your eyes to get past the slight blur, but there is a little of both batches in this bowl. The failure on the bottom right and remnants of the success around the bowl. I had to use a bit of the bad batch since I only made 1/2 a batch the 2nd time. You can definitely taste the difference, but it will be okay. Certainly didn't have another 3 hours to make it again.

And can someone please tell me how to train this dragon?

Isn't creating food is exhilarating isn't it!

A Great Dessert for a large family function: Cake Doughnut Bread Pudding

2011-04-11T20:49:00.000-07:00

Recipe: Cake Doughnut Bread Pudding

I've made this for the past few years now for our Christmas Eve dessert. Its a big hit and the only changes I make are no raisins and we don't do the rum sauce since there are a few kids and some people who don't drink.

This recipe is from the food network and Recipe courtesy Michael Chiarello specifically.

Cake Doughnut Bread Pudding

Prep Time:
15 min
Inactive Prep Time:
10 min
Cook Time:
45 min

Level:
Easy

Serves:
8 to 10 servings

Bread pudding:
1 stick unsalted butter
1 cup sugar
5 large eggs, lightly beaten
2 cups heavy cream
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 tablespoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup raisins
16 cake doughnuts

Rum sauce:
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
1/2 pound confectioners' sugar
Dark rum, to taste

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a food processor, combine butter and sugar briefly, just until it forms into a ball. Add eggs, heavy cream, cinnamon, and vanilla, and process until blended.

Lightly butter a 9 by 13-inch baking dish. Break up the doughnuts into 1-inch pieces and layer in the pan. Scatter the raisins over the top. Pour the egg mixture over the doughnuts; soak for 5 to 10 minutes. You will need to push doughnut pieces down during this time to ensure even coverage by egg mixture.

Cover with foil and bake for 35 to 40 minutes. Remove foil and bake for additional 10 minutes to brown the top. The doughnut bread pudding is done when the custard is set, but still soft.

Make the rum sauce: melt butter over medium heat in a saucepan, and take off the heat. Add confectioners' sugar to the melted butter and whisk to blend. Add rum, to taste. Pour the sauce over the bread pudding and allow to soak in

A Favorite Recipe of mine--and a family pleaser

2011-04-11T20:46:00.001-07:00

Made this meatball soup from the Williams Sonoma Soup Cookbook.
Albondigas with Beef-and Tortilla Meatballs

Ingredients:

Meatballs
1 lb lean ground beef
4 eggs
1/2 small red onion finely chopped (for meat balls)
3/4 cup crushed tortilla chips
4 tbsp finely chopped fresh cilantro
1 tbsp dried oregano
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp ground pepper

Soup:
7 cups meat or chicken stock
1 can (1 lb) tomatoes with their juice
2 tsp sugar
1 tsp red pepper flake
2 carrots corsely chopped
2 celery stalks, chopped
1 onion, chopped (for soup)
1 bay leaf

In a mixing bowl, stir together the beef ( you can use turkey or ground pork instead) eggs, onion, tortilla chips, cilantro, oregano, salt, cumin, and pepper. Cover tightly and refrigerate for 1 hour.

Put the stock in a large sauce pan. Add the tomatoes, crushing them slightly with a wooden spoon, along with the sugar, red pepper flakes, carrots, celery, onion and bay leaf. Bring to a boil and reduce the heat to a simmer.

Moistening your hands with cold water, form the beef mixture into balls 1-1 1/2 inch in diameter and slip them carefully into the simmering stock. Cover and simmer gently until the meatballs are cooked through and the vegetables are tender about 20 minutes.

Discard the bay leaf. Taste the stock and adjust seasoning.

Notes: I used some corn chips I had for the tortilla chips and used a 1 lb can of chopped tomatoes. This was a great soup especially on a cold night. I didn't take any pictures so you'll have to make it yourself.

Home Runs.

2011-04-02T10:21:00.000-07:00

I get most of my recipes from blogs or websites.

I have a few that will knock your socks off.

Roasted Parmesan Creamed Onions

My husband and I fought over the leftovers.

I followed the recipe exactly. I didn't know that onions could be so amazing.

Cauliflower Soup

I just so fantastic.

I add extra veggies. I also make a few healthy adjustments.

But if you make it as is... oh ya... your welcome.

Mint Chocolate Crunch

So easy. 4 ingredients.

I was sneaking these until they were gone.

I think about them all the time.

Barley

2011-03-20T20:35:00.000-07:00

I recently cooked with barley for the first time. I'm not exactly sure why I never used it before, I guess I just never came across a recipe that called for it. Until a few weeks ago that is. A food blog I frequent is http://www.melskitchencafe.com/. I love this blog because most all the recipes are winners! I make at least one recipe from this blog each week, if not two or more. Recently two recipes calling for barley were featured: Split Pea Soup with Barley and Ham (you can find the recipe here), and Southwestern Chicken Barley Chili (find it here). They both sounded delicious so I made them both.

(sorry, no picture of the chili)

I LOVED the split pea soup! It's a slow cooker recipe and was very easy. The flavor and texture were phenomenal. My husband was skeptical but he loved it and even ate all the leftovers. The chili was alright but I thought it needed more salt and seasonings. It tasted more like taco soup rather than chili, but that's ok because taco soup is yummy! It isn't a slow cooker recipe, but it probably could be adapted to be one.

I really like the texture and flavor the barley added to both of these recipes. I would like to add more grains to my diet and barley is such an easy grain to cook with. If you've never cooked with barley, try one of these recipes! I know we're getting out of soup and chili season, but if you're like me you enjoy them all year round.

Chipotle Chocolate Chili

2011-03-03T15:16:00.000-08:00

Here's another chili recipe. I found this one on Our Best Bites and saved it to my recipe collection (click here then you'll have to do a search for the recipe). I thought chocolate was strange, but you don't really taste it, it just adds nice depth to it! In my recipe notes I just said go easy on the chipotle, but if you really like chipotle, then don't hold back!

Chipotle Chocolate Chili

Ingredients:
1 lb. lean ground turkey
1 large onion, chopped
1 red bell pepper, minced
1-3 cloves garlic, minced
2 cans diced tomatoes
2 cans kidney beans, drained and rinsed
1 can beef broth
3 Tbsp. brown sugar
2 Tbsp. chili powder
1 tsp. ground cumin
1 Tbsp. unsweetened cocoa powder (NOT Nesquick! That would be very bad!)
1/2 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
1/2 tsp. Kosher salt
Chipotle sauce (from the can of chipotle chilies)
1/2 oz. unsweetened chocolate (1/2 unsweetened baking cube), chopped (optional; use to taste as needed, too much will make your chili bitter)
3-4 Tbsp. red wine vinegar
light sour cream
chopped green onions
shredded cheddar cheese

Directions:
Heat some olive oil in a large soup pot over medium heat. Saute onion, garlic, bell pepper, and ground turkey until meat is cooked through. Add salt, pepper, cumin, chili powder, brown sugar, unsweetened cocoa powder, tomatoes, kidney beans, and beef broth. Add all of the chipotle sauce from a small can of chipotle chilies. Heat to boiling and then reduce to a simmer (uncovered), stirring occasionally, until thickened as desired (about 30-40 minutes). If desired, add some chopped chipotle chilies. Add 3 Tbsp. red wine vinegar and a small amount of chopped chocolate at a time until desired richness is reached. If necessary, add more red wine vinegar to cut the sweetness of the chili. This is where you can play around a little with the flavors.
When thickened and seasoned as desired, serve with green onions, sour cream, and cheddar cheese

Sweet Potato Chili

2011-03-02T21:15:00.001-08:00

I had this in a comment, but then I figured I'd just go ahead and post it. I think it's worth sharing with everyone.

Vegetarian Chili with Sweet Potato

I came across this recipe in Real Simple a few months ago maybe. It is not a traditional chili, but I loved it! Anything that has sweet potato in it catches my eye, and I was intrigued that cocoa powder was an ingredient. I don't know that I could really taste the cocoa, but this chili definitely has a unique taste. Max and I both really liked it. It's my new go-to chili.

The recipe says to cook it for several hours in a slow cooker, but I just made it on the stove. Well first, I roasted the sweet potatoes in the oven. Then I sauteed the other vegetables in a large pot; added the liquid, sweet potato, and spices; and let it simmer for maybe 30 minutes. Easy!

Good luck in your recipe search Maren!

Great Chili?

2011-03-02T19:43:00.000-08:00

Greetings to all you makers of delicious food!

I could use some help getting a great chili recipe. I'm doing a family birthday party soon and need to feed 11 people dinner. I have some chili recipes that are fine but I'm still on a quest for a chili recipe I really resonate with.

Does anyone have a chili recipe they love that they'd be willing to share?

New Delish

2011-02-26T10:30:00.000-08:00

Thank you guys so much for posting your opinions on the last post. I think we should go ahead and switch things up! Lets open it up as a general recipe blog. If you have a recipe that you love and are willing to share, please post it. I am fine if you want to use this as your "recipe book" to store all your favorite recipes for easy access.

Anyone can post whatever type of recipe they would like. There are labels that can be helpful in searching and I suggest you use them. For example: main dish, appetizer, drink, salad, soup, bread and dessert.

To keep in the spirit of delish I would like to encourage you to try other people's recipes and post about it. Along with that, try not to be offended if someone doesn't like the recipe you posted. You may end up with suggestions that would make your dish even more amazing.

I would also like to encourage you to post a picture if you can. I am such a visual person I prefer to make recipes that I've seen a picture of.

So, lets do this! I'm excited to see what you've all been eating!

Catherine's Squash Revisited

2011-02-22T18:52:00.000-08:00

This is another recipe I made a while ago but didn't post. I wanted to try acorn squash, so I decided to make stuffed squash. I cut the acorn squash in half and baked it until it was almost done (I don't remember now how long that took; probably half an hour). I stuffed it with sausage stuffing (this recipe, only I made it on the stovetop instead of in a crockpot), then drizzled melted butter and grated parmesan cheese on it and baked it again for another 10 minutes.

(I made a lot because I was visiting family in Utah.)

So, what did we think? Well, I got rave reviews from all my family, even the one who doesn't really like squash, and the one who doesn't like sausage. But... I didn't really like it. I guess I was expecting it to taste more like butternut squash, which is sweet. It didn't. My mom described it as an "earthy" taste, which I guess is pretty accurate, but I wanted a sweet contrast to the stuffing. So I tried it again after Christmas using butternut squash. Definitely tastier, although not nearly as cute. I do like that the acorn squash makes a perfect individual serving, which you don't get with the butternut.

Catherine's Poached Eggs

2011-02-22T18:44:00.000-08:00

I made this a long time ago, but I'm finally getting around to posting it. I can't eat eggs, so I used my husband and daughter as taste testers. Both like eggs, and both are a little picky, so I figured they'd be good judges. I thought the texture was very interesting, like a mix between a hard-boiled and a fried egg. Both my judges liked them, although not enough for me to try it again except on special occasions. When they're perfectly happy with an easier egg, why change it up?

Posting Behind the Bird: Turkey Salad

2011-02-13T07:56:00.000-08:00

Going to post regarding the turkey salad recipe in this episode later today. We had a roasted turkey breast last night so I thought this would be a good way to use some of it up.

I couldn't actually find the recipe on the food network website but this is the episode when the crew was "snowed in" and had to do what they could during that time. Here is the link to utube for the episode.

Here's the recipe:
1 lb Roasted Turkey meat
1/2 c mayonnaise
1/2 small lemon freshly squeezed
2 stalks celery, thinly sliced
1/2 small red onion, finely chopped
1/2 c pecans, toasted and roughly chopped
1/4 c dried cranberries, roughly chopped
2 TBSP fresh sage, chiffonade
1/4 tsp kosher salt
black pepper, to taste

Combine everything in a large airtight container. Refrigerate for 1 hour before serving. Store in the fridge for 3 days.

I normally don't like fruit mixed with my meat. But this was great. I think the fresh sage really added a lot to this salad.

It is on page 163 if you have the book.

Next Rotation?

2011-02-12T14:37:00.000-08:00

As we're entering our last week of this rotation I want to hear your thoughts on delish. So, if you could all just answer the following questions in the comment section, that would be great!

1. Do you want to continue choosing recipes from the Good Eats cookbook? What are your general thoughts about this book?

2. Do you like the structure of delish? Would you rather make it more or less formal?

3. Danielle and I have been tossing around the idea of making delish more of a place where we all submit recipes we like and recommend from any cookbook. Do you like this idea?

4. Do you find it too hard to make the recipes in the one week time frame?

5. What is your favorite and least favorite part of delish?

Thanks a bunch! I'll post my thoughts down there later in the week, but I would love to know what you guys have to say!

Cami's Yogurt

2011-02-12T14:29:00.000-08:00

This was a total flop for me. I have heard of people making yogurt in their crockpots and I thought this would be a good idea. I used the Good Eats recipe but changed the cook times to the crockpot recipe. This resulted in thicker milk like substance, but not quite yogurt. It just didn't thicken up. So, I tried cooking it a little longer which resulted in a tan colored mess that didn't look or taste like yogurt. It was more like spoiled milk. A total flop. I do want to try again, but if anyone has tips for making yogurt, please pass them along!

February 6 Episode: Yogurt: Good Milk Gone Bad

2011-02-06T17:29:00.000-08:00

I chose this recipe because I've wanted to make my own yogurt for a while but just haven't. I also chose this one because the list of recipes you can make are huge, so hopefully there is something for everyone. You can find the episode here. It includes:

I can't wait to see what you guys choose!

Cami's Lava Cakes

2011-02-06T17:21:00.000-08:00

Although I thought these were good I didn't get a lava center and therefore was also disappointed. I was worried they would be too soft and left them in for an extra minute or two. I was wrong. If I had not had lava cake before I probably would have been thrilled since they taste like a flourless chocolate cake, which I like.

I didn't do the melted ice cream because I prefer warm cakes with cold ice cream. I may try these again and decrease the cooking time by a bit.

Melanie's Chocolate Lava Muffins

2011-02-06T14:14:00.000-08:00

I was super excited to make these! Then, I was super disappointed with the results. Like Danielle, my centers didn't have any gooey lava. I think the reason was because I added too much flour. I was following the recipe from the book when I made it, and the book only gives measurements for the flour and sugar in weight, not volume. Since I don't own a food scale (it's on the wish list, but the wish list is long so I don't know when I'll actually ever get one), I did my best to estimate based on an online weight to volume conversion tool. My conversion came out to about 1/3 cup for 1 1/2 oz. of flour. I halved the recipe, so I used about 1/6 cup. Again, this was an estimate since the smallest measuring cup I have is 1/4. Anyway, after I made them I happened to look at the online recipe and saw that the ingredients were listed by volume rather than weight, and I should have only used 1 1/2 Tbsp. (since I halved it) rather than 1/6 cup. Big difference!

So, my muffins turned out pretty dense. They were still pretty good, especially served with lots of vanilla ice cream (first I served it with the sauce, but then decided I preferred the cold ice cream) but I wanted to see a lava center. I used 70% cacao dark chocolate, and I think it was a little too rich for me. If I were to try again, I'd just use regular semi-sweet chocolate chips or maybe even some milk chocolate. I have another recipe I'd like to try that calls for putting a chocolate chip cookie on the bottom of the muffin tin, then you invert the muffin to eat it and you have a cookie on the top!

Cami's Black Beans

2011-02-01T16:25:00.000-08:00

These are quite tasty! I've never made beans that didn't come from a can before. These are significantly better than canned. I slightly undercooked mine but I liked the texture better than if they were all mushy. I made mine into burritos with broccoli and cheese and served them on handmade tortillas. Delicious! Okay, I thought they were delicious. Calder asked me to pick out the "mommy onions" and Jason said they were okay but he doesn't like black beans. So I now have 10 burritos in my freezer waiting for ME to consume them. All well, I still thought they were delicious.

I can't wait to try the baked beans but I'll probably have to wait for an occasion to do it so I don't have a freezer chock full of beans.

Danielle's Chocolate Lava Muffins

2011-02-01T11:26:00.001-08:00

I don't have a picture because I actually made these a long time ago, way before we decided to use Good Eats as our new book for delish.

I saw this episode and really wanted to try the lava muffins. They looked so easy, and they were. They were a piece of cake to throw together, and they cook VERY quickly. And they were delicious.

But there was no lava flowing from our muffins... I made a half batch (six muffins), but I should've filled only four muffin cups. Each muffin was really small and cooked faster than I anticipated. If you do divide them as the recipe says, you might want to cook them for a little less time -- or just watch them closely.

Danielle's The Once and Future Beans

2011-01-31T21:36:00.000-08:00

These were really good! Max said he doesn't like beans and he really liked these.

I replaced the bacon with smoked ham, and instead of tomato paste (cause I forgot to buy some) I threw in a can of fire roasted tomatoes. We cooked ours in the oven for about five hours, but they were done to our liking after four or four and a half hours. This was really easy to throw together and made a ton. It's a good thing to make at the beginning of the week and have for lunch for the next few days.

I would definitely make these again.

The Art of Darkness I

2011-01-30T14:12:00.000-08:00

I chose for this week's recipes to come from the episode "The Art of Darkness I" which can be found on page 68 of the book or online HERE. You can choose between the chocolate lava muffins or the chocolate mousse.

In my last post about my puff pastry experience, I said I'd rather save my calories for something containing chocolate. Well, both these recipes are all chocolate, so bring on the calories! And, as a side story, I have to have a cavity filled this week and when talking to my dental hygienist about how I was surprised because I brush and floss all the time, I don't usually drink soda or sports drinks, etc., but I do like chocolate, she said "but chocolate doesn't cause cavities!" She did fail to mention that sugar does lead to cavities and most chocolate we consume contains sugar, but for now I don't have any reservations about consuming chocolate!

I've never made any sort of chocolate lava cake or muffins and have wanted to for a long time now (like, two or three years!). I'm excited to try. I plan to make mine at the end of this week. I've also never made a mousse because it just seems so difficult. Maybe I'll go chocolate crazy and try both recipes.

Black Bean Salad

2011-01-27T19:45:00.000-08:00

I made the black bean salad and actually used it for filling in burritos. The beans turned out soft, but I did cook them for about 3 1/2 hours in addition to the first 30 minutes. They were very easy to make just took cooking time, but a couple of the ingredients were difficult to find. For some reason I could not find the butcher's twine, and I kept having flash backs to the movie "Bridget Jone's Diary" when Bridget made the blue soup so I figured I better get the right item. I eventually found it in the fresh meat area of the grocery store. Also, I could not find a dried arbol chile so I settled for dried anaheim chiles. After some research I realized that an arbol chile is really hot it is used in cayenne pepper, and the anaheim chile is mild so I used 3 when I made the beans. I like a little kick, and these did not have any so in the future I will add extra chiles or cayenne pepper.

Overall, the beans were good, but I think I would like a little more flavor like I said more spice and maybe a little garlic. I do not normally have these ingredients on hand, and I have a black bean recipe that I like so I will probably use that one more often. Also, I think adding flavor to canned beans is a bit easier than the dry beans.

Also, I will not be making the hummus recipe on the website because it calls for peanut butter, and I have made hummus with peanut butter before and it is not good. Stick to recipes that call for tahini.

Melanie's Puff Pastry Dessert

2011-01-24T15:31:00.000-08:00

This was my first time ever using puff pastry. I didn't let it thaw long enough before I put it in the oven, so I had to bake it for more than twice as long. It still turned out ok, despite a few burnt spots around the edges, but those just flaked off.

This was very easy to make. I had a difficult time slicing the apples with my peeler like Alton suggests, so I just used the slicer side of my cheese grater and I got nice thin and smooth slices. I didn't make two small tarts, I opted to make one large tart to make things easier.

I thought this was good. The light and airy texture is nice, but since it doesn't fill you up quick I found myself eating 3/4 of this! (my husband ate the other 1/4 or I'm sure I would have eaten that too.) The fruit and lightness of this is deceiving as to how calorie-dense this really is though! According to my puff pastry box, each sheet has 36 grams of saturated fat and 66 grams total fat. Since I ate 3/4, that means I consumed 27 grams of saturated fat!! And nearly 50 grams of total fat!!!!

Ok, this shouldn't be surprising for a pastry, and sure I should have controlled my portion size better. But, I was quite shocked to see how easily I consumed way more than my recommended daily allowance of fat in one simple dessert! And maybe this just bothers me since I'm still trying to shed some baby pounds. But, I figure if I'm going to eat that much fat calories, I'd rather save it for something that contains chocolate. :)

Danielle's "The Chewy"

2011-01-23T18:45:00.000-08:00

I never much liked the Tollhouse cookie recipe growing up, although we often made it for lack of a better recipe. I always thought they were too cakey. But when Alton Brown said it's the only recipe he uses for chocolate chip cookies, I thought it was worth another shot -- especially with his adjustments.

I followed "The Chewy" recipe, with the exception that I used two whole eggs instead of replacing one of the whites with milk. All I had was skim milk and I didn't know how that would turn out. I also don't really like cookies that spread a lot, so I thought I might prefer it with the whole eggs.

I have to say that after making these, I remembered why I didn't like them growing up. Although these were a little less cakey and puffy than what we made growing up, I just don't like the texture of these cookies. I like my cookies to be more dense. I have another recipe that I got from my grandma called "Mrs. Fields Cookies" -- I have no idea if it's really the Mrs. Fields recipe -- but I like it a lot more than these. They are dense and chewy and just a little crunchy on the outside. I haven't found a recipe to beat it yet.

I made one pan of these, and I've just been eating the rest as cookie dough. Cookie dough is always delicious!

Maren's Salmon Turnovers

2011-01-23T17:07:00.000-08:00

I have never tried puff pastry before and I thought I'd give the salmon turnovers a go. I've never bought canned salmon before, either. I went for the "wild caught" like Danielle did and got a 5-oz. can, but I had better luck in that there was only fish flesh in mine--no bones or skin. It seemed quite a lot like tuna, actually, but that may have been just the canned taste I was getting.

The turnovers themselves came out quite well. We had to eat two each to get full enough so it was only a two-person recipe. (This, despite my having really stuffed them. I was a little too liberal with some of the ingredients and had probably two turnovers' worth of filling leftover.) My husband and I liked the idea of it a lot; they reminded us of the pierogi we've had in Seattle. I thought the filling was a little dry and would like to try again with other filling variations. All in all it was a very satisfactory experiment!

Pantry Raid III: Cool Beans

2011-01-23T16:28:00.000-08:00

This week's recipe comes from Episode 38, Pantry Raid III: Cool Beans (page 182 in the book, and here). My house we are bean lovers. Lucas has loved beans since he started eating solids, and my husband lived off of beans while he lived in Brazil. I generally use canned beans, but a while back I bought some bags of dried beans in hopes of saving money. Well, I soaked one bag and cooked them and they turned out bad. I thought if anyone could help me figure this out Alton could. I have sick kids so I don't have the ingredients, but I am planning on making Black Bean Salad and probably the hummus that is on the website later this week.

Danielle's not-really-salmon turnovers

2011-01-23T14:52:00.000-08:00

Well, I fully intended to make the salmon turnovers in the puff pastry episode. I bought the puff pastry and a can of salmon. However, I made the mistake of buying the can of "wild caught Alaskan salmon". I keep hearing that wild caught salmon is so much better, so I thought I should go with that.

It turns out the wild caught Alaskan salmon was neither boneless nor skinless. What am I supposed to do with a can of fish with a whole fish spine in it?? Bleh. So then I had a defrosted sheet of puff pastry and no salmon. So we made turnovers but threw in what we had on hand -- red pepper hummus and cilantro. I topped mine with sharp cheddar cheese.

I was disappointed that we weren't able to try the salmon turnovers, but our hummus turnovers tasted really good. I imagine just about anything would taste good in crunchy, puffy, buttery pastry! We're going to try some dessert turnovers at some point, and I still want to try salmon turnovers eventually.

Cami's Chocolate Chip Cookies

2011-01-23T10:30:00.000-08:00

I made a huge mess of these cookies but it all came out in the end. For some reason when I was measuring the dry ingredients I accidentally measured twice as many as the recipe calls for. So I had way too much sugar, flour etc. I didn't realize this until I was adding the flour at the end and thinking "Wow, this is not wet at all". Thanks to Maren for having wet dough so I knew mine was wrong. I quickly added more wet ingredients in hopes it would all work out in the end. It did! When I baked them that night I didn't love them. The dough was good though. The next day though, the cookies were great. I was surprised they could have such a change overnight.

The picture is what the balls look like right now. They are in my freezer setting up so I can move them to a baggie. That's how I store dough. We only bake 6-12 and then leave the rest in the freezer until we need more.

I used white whole wheat flour and Jason couldn't tell! If I would have told him he probably would have found something wrong with them but he said they were great. I've replaced all of my regular white flour with white whole wheat. It really is very similar in taste but just better. I get it at Trader Joe's for pretty cheap.

Melanie's Puffy Cookies

2011-01-20T14:56:00.000-08:00

I like my cookies big and soft, so I decided to make the Puffy version.

To start off, I'll say that they turned out puffy but not quite as soft as I like them. I know my first batch was slightly overcooked, so I turned the cooking time down to about 10 1/2 or 11 minutes. The rest were a little better.

I'm not opposed to baking with shortening, but real butter definitely would have been better. Real butter just tastes SO much better! Cookies just need butter. And maybe the shortening added to the crispiness?

Despite these cookies not being my favorite, I thought this episode was very educational! (I watched the episode on youtube and took notes). Now I feel like I better understand what elements give cookies their texture.

I would like to make another batch of cookies and try to do a combination of the puffy and the chewy...using real butter, maybe melting the butter, using more brown sugar, excluding 1 egg white, only using baking powder. I'm not sure what type of flour I'd use. For these I used cake flour, but I'd like to try the bread flour and see how different it turns out. I usually only keep all-purpose flour on hand, but I'd like to learn the properties of different flours.

Danielle's Mac N Cheese

2011-01-18T09:52:00.000-08:00

We wanted to make baked macaroni and cheese, but based on the reviews of Alton's baked mac & cheese (here and online), we decided to switch things up a bit. So we made a hybrid of AB's stove top and baked mac & cheese. We basically followed the stove top recipe, added ham, stuck it in a pan, and topped it with the panko crumbs.

Our hybrid version turned out great! It was delicious, and tasted just about as good the next day as leftovers (reheated in the oven) -- although the leftovers were a bit dry. Oh, one other change we made was that we used a mix of smoked cheddar and sharp cheddar. I loved the smokey flavor, especially with the ham.

Growing up, I never had baked macaroni and cheese. In fact, it's possible that the first time I ever had it was in the last year or so. So I'd never had mac & cheese with bread crumbs on top, but I love the crunchiness added to it! I'm a big fan of baked mac & cheese now. I think we will definitely make this again (the hybrid version) -- although not often for the sake of our arteries. :)

Three Chips Transcript

2011-01-17T08:49:00.000-08:00

This is one episode I highly recommend reading (or at least skimming) the transcript. I saw this episode last year and, no joke, I got out a notepad and vigorously took notes. This was the kind of baking chemistry stuff that I have no idea about.

Alton Brown talks about how the different ingredients change the type of cookie you end up with -- thin, crunchy, chewy, puffy, etc. This is the kind of info you can take and tweak any cookie recipe to make it more to your liking.

You can find the episode transcript HERE.

Here are some of the basic takeaway concepts:

- More baking soda makes a thinner cookie
- More baking powder makes a puffier cookie
- Butter makes cookies spread, use chilled butter for a cookie that spreads less
- Brown sugar makes chewier cookies
- Cake flour produces more steam which creates more lift and results in puffier cookies
- Bread flour produces more gluten and results in chewier cookies
- Substituting milk for some of the egg makes a cookie that spreads more

Hope that helps!

Three Chips for Sister Marsha

2011-01-16T20:43:00.000-08:00

Above: Post-refrigerator but pre-oven. Below: The slightly over-finished product.

I chose this chocolate chip cookie recipe (found on p. 166 in the book) not because I need another one but because of Alton's claim that it would help me understand how to change other cookie recipes. I'm not quite sure I learned that because I'm still deciding on how this went, but anyway, here goes:

I followed his recipe with these exceptions: I didn't use bread flour, I had 1% milk and used that instead of whole milk.

I came up with the gloopiest, wettest cookie dough I have ever seen--there will be no skipping the step of a one-hour refrigeration, I'm afraid. I refrigerated mine probably double that. Even so, the last cookie I popped into the oven should have gone back into the fridge first. It was too gooey and came out as flat as a pancake and didn't look appealing at all.

Since Alton recommends against doing half-batches, I decided to take his advice to make a full batch and freeze a bunch of dough instead. I plan to pop those straight from the freezer into the oven later this week and see how they turn out. (If I haven't eaten all the dough straight out of the freezer yet, that is!)

But back to the batch at hand: I overcooked them a bit. Alton says 15 minutes for two sheets in the oven at a time. I only put in one and forgot to adjust the baking time. We ate them warm and I didn't think they were that great and pronounced myself disappointed. I wouldn't have guessed I was eating a cookie called "The Chewy." However, the next day I ate one and I liked it very much! I shouldn't have been surprised because I usually like cookies better the next day, after the chocolate is hard again (am I the only one??) and it was the case with these too. The leftover ones were chewy, just like Alton claimed they should be--and this in spite of my having overcooked them!

Overall I'd say I had a successful cookie experience, but I don't know yet if I'll be making these again.

Cami's Puff Pastry Dessert

2011-01-15T18:31:00.000-08:00

Holy cow this is good. I followed the recipe exactly and it turned out great. I love that it feels light because it doesn't have much sugar. I used sugar free apricot jam as well and thought it was just the right sweetness.

With the extra pastry I made a blueberry version. I just added frozen blueberries before putting it in the oven. It could not be easier. I still used some apricot jam on the blueberry and it was really good. I think it would be great with pears, assorted berries or cherries.

It's a good thing I weren't serving this to anyone but my family because as I was doing the pastry part I looked over and found this:

Yep, he ate 3-4 bites in my apple. Oh and then he tried to drink the lemon water. After I took the apples out I let him have a taste. He loves it. Crazy kid.

On Christmas eve I made this Floret Cheese Strudel using puff pastry. Prior to that I haven't ever used it. I think I will probably try the salmon recipe in Good Eats. I'm curious about his manwich filling version but probably not enough to make it. I do like that about Alton Brown though. He isn't a pretentious chef. He doesn't assume you're only using whole, organic foods. I'm not saying you shouldn't it's just he isn't listing ridiculous ingredients that the average home cook doesn't have access to. And he seems to understand my desire for quick food.

Puff the Magic Pastry

2011-01-09T19:08:00.001-08:00

This week's recipes come from Episode 53, Puff the Magic Pastry (page 244 in the book, here online). I chose to make the fruit tarts, as Alton Brown called them "the best easy dessert I know." I love easy. These days, I only cook if it's easy. And this really was easy. I followed the recipe exactly, and they turned out beautifully. The recipe makes two 6" tarts, and I also made two 2" tarts with the leftover pastry. The small tarts cooked exactly the same as the big ones, and tasted just as great, which I liked because a 6" tart is a little too much for me. These were fancy, easy, light, and tasty, and I definitely will make them for company some time. I just won't mention how easy they were.

The crust looks a little burned, but it really wasn't. The tarts are crunchy and not very sweet. Perfect! However, if you like them sweeter, add more sugar or use a sweeter jam (I couldn't find any apricot jam, so I used apricot Simply Fruit, which isn't very sweet).

Cami's Waldorf Salad

2011-01-09T12:08:00.000-08:00

I don't remember having Waldorf salad in the past but I've definitely heard the name before. I was excited to try it though because I love salad. Jason teases me a lot because we eat salad for 2-3 dinners a week. It's easy, fast and can sit in the fridge until he gets home without being gross.

I used pecans because that is what I had and I didn't toast them because I'm lazy like that. I don't think it hindered the flavor. I decreased the amount of mayonnaise because 1 cup seemed like a lot. I used 3/4 cup and felt like it was plenty moist. I served mine on spinach because that is what I had. Otherwise I followed the recipe exactly. (I know I just said I changed half of the ingredients but whatever)

We ate the leftovers for lunch today and it tasted just as good as yesterday. This is definitely a win and I will be putting it in my regular rotation.

Melanie's Applesauce

2011-01-08T19:39:00.000-08:00

The only time I've ever made applesauce was when I used to make my oldest child's baby food. Since it was baby food it contained only apples and water. I would never have thought to add butter and honey to applesauce! They were nice additions. I only used 2 Tbsp. of honey due to Maren's comments, but I think it would have been good with 3 or more Tbsps. Mine turned out a bit more tart than I prefer. Using different types of apples might help this also. I couldn't even tell that the butter was in it, so I think next time I'd leave it out just to cut out the calories. Since I didn't have apple juice on hand and had to go to the store, I splurged and got the unfiltered stuff. Really, I don't see why it really makes a difference if you use that over filtered juice. Next time I'd probably use regular apple juice since it's typically less expensive.

I liked Alton Brown's suggestion of using a melon baller to scoop the core out. Very easy! I only cooked the apples for the 10 minutes called for, then tried to use my stick blender to blend it up. I'm not sure if the apples weren't soft enough or if my stick blender just isn't very good (I did buy it used), but it wouldn't blend it up all the way, so I ended up putting it all in my regular blender which quickly made it nice and smooth. If you prefer your applesauce chunckier then you should use a potato masher or a food processor.

Early Years Episodes

2011-01-06T16:33:00.000-08:00

I figured I'd repost this for everyone's benefit. Good Eats: The Early Years covers Season 1 through just over half of Season 6 (up through the episode called "Casserole Over").

You can find episode lists either here on the Food Network or here on Wikipedia.

Also, at the top of the blog is a page called "Good Eats Resources". You can find a link to the episode list on the Food Network there as well as a link to a Good Eats fan site that has transcripts for all Good Eats episodes.

New Year New Round Rotation

2011-01-06T12:12:00.000-08:00

Here is the schedule for the next round. If you don't see your name listed below and want to participate, just let me know.

January 2: Danielle
January 9: Catherine
January 16: Maren
January 23: Melissa
January 30: Melanie W.
February 6: Cami
February 13: Jen

Maren's Applesauce

2011-01-05T17:34:00.000-08:00

I chose to make the applesauce. I followed the recipe except that I didn't have unfiltered apple juice--just the regular stuff--and substituted 2 extra tablespoons of that for the alcohol.

Although I was a little skeptical, I used his microwave method. I put the apples in a big Corelle salad bowl and overturned a dinner plate on top of that for the lid and it worked out pretty well. The apples just fit. I tried blending them after the recommended 10 minutes but they weren't soft enough yet so I put them back in for another 5 and they were just right. I don't think they need a quarter-turn every 2 minutes like Alton says; every 4 or 5 should be fine. All in all it worked fine but using the stove seems like it might actually be less fussy. I do have to note that the smell of the apples cooking was downright heavenly!

And the applesauce was delicious. My kids loved it and even my husband had a serving!
I really liked it myself--the only thing I'd change when I do it again is to take the honey to 2 Tbsp.; I thought 3 was a bit too sweet. I like my applesauce on the tangy side. I could probably try some other apple varieties to get more tang, too.

I'd never made my own applesauce before today, but now I know how good it can be I think I will have to do it again!

Danielle's Waldorf Hysteria

2011-01-04T07:45:00.000-08:00

This salad was really delicious. I've only had Waldorf salad maybe a couple other times, so I don't have much to compare to. But Max and I both really enjoyed this.

I didn't follow the recipe exactly, but I was able to make this with stuff I already had. And I was excited to be able to use some of the things that are growing in my front "yard" (lettuce and mint).

Here are the changes I made:

I used craisins instead of raisins
I left out the celery (I'm not a fan)
I used only Fuji apples
I decreased the amount of onion and sliced them really thin
I used pecans instead of walnuts (cause that's what I had)

We put this on lettuce, but I thought the lettuce was unnecessary. I would've rather left it out. Max liked it with the lettuce though, so it's a toss up. I really loved the combination of the curry with the mint and apples. It's a great flavor combination. This was really easy to put together, and it tasted great. Since I keep these ingredients on hand, I can see myself throwing this together often when I don't feel like cooking.

Apple Family Values

2011-01-02T17:48:00.000-08:00

I'm sure a lot of you, like me, are not in the mood for anything really heavy this week. I wanted to pick something light and easy. I almost got sidetracked into picking Crust Never Sleeps (that galette sounds really really good), but I didn't want to make or buy a pound cake. And I think it's for the better that I settled on this episode instead.

I'm going to make The Waldorf Hysteria sometime this week, so I'll post about it later after I've made it. You can find this episode on pages 86 through 89 in the book. You can find the recipes for this episode on the Food Network's website here.

Enjoy!

New Year, New Round

2011-01-01T10:03:00.000-08:00

Hi Ladies!

I hope you all had a peaceful, happy Christmas and are enjoying the new year! I also hope you are ready to start cooking with delish again. We're going to keep going with Good Eats, The Early Years as our book. Danielle is going to start the rotation tomorrow and I'm sure it will be something yummy!

I would like to get the rest of the rotation organized so please either leave a comment on this post or email me if you're ready to go with this round. I hope you are! It is a lot of fun! In your comment, please let me know if there is any week your would prefer to choose a recipe or any time that doesn't work for your schedule.

Danielle's Southern Biscuits

2010-12-14T15:15:00.000-08:00

These were delicious! I tried some with poached eggs (my new favorite way to eat eggs) and some with butter and maple syrup. With eggs was good, but with butter and maple syrup was fantastic. I think I liked them better than pancakes with syrup. These might be a new go-to breakfast food for me.

I halved the recipe since it was just the two of us eating. I just used a glass to punch out my biscuits, and the diameter may have been more than 3" (not by much, though, I don't think), but I only got 3.5 biscuits! I wished I'd made the whole recipe. Maybe I didn't roll them out thin enough... Although it ended up being plenty for both of us. We were pretty full.

Does anyone have an opinion on how well these keep? I only wanted to make as much as we would eat that night because I've never had a leftover biscuit that I thought still tasted good. Cami, you said Calder had these for breakfast and lunch the next day. Did you try any of the biscuits the next day? How were they?

Holiday Break

2010-11-21T18:31:00.000-08:00

As Thanksgiving and Christmas are fast approaching and everyone's schedules are picking up with holiday related activities we are going to take a break from delish. We will start up again in January. In the meantime, if you make any of the past recipes, feel free to post about them! We'd love to see what you make!

Happy Holidays!

Cami's Potato/Portobello Gratin

2010-11-19T19:55:00.000-08:00

I chose to make the Potato/Portobello Gratin this week. I have to admit, I didn't love it. The mushroom flavor was a bit overpowering. All well. I think I will try it again without the mushrooms and maybe add some onions.

As a side note, if you have a KitchenAid mixer but don't have a shredder/slicer attachment put it on your Christmas list. It took about 4 minutes to shred the cheese and the potatoes. It was awesome!

Cami's Biscuits

2010-11-19T19:41:00.000-08:00

I've never been a biscuit maker. I generally make rolls if I'm going to make a bread to go with dinner but I really liked these and could see myself making them again. They were quick, puffy and perfect with butter and honey. Calder requested them for breakfast with jam. Actually he requested them for lunch too. I have a feeling I'll be making these a lot.

Jen's Smores Bars

2010-11-17T16:35:00.001-08:00

These are one of my favorite things from the Baked cookbook. I love the mix of chocolate with the salty peanuts. Yum. I think I'll have to make these again soon.

Melanie's Baked Meatballs

2010-11-17T13:51:00.000-08:00

These are awesome! So flavorful! I saved them to my recipe folder and would love to make them again. I used 1lb. ground pork and 1/2lb. ground beef (I had never used ground pork before), I added a little extra spinach (maybe 7-8oz.), and I needed a lot more breadcrumbs than called for to coat them (probably 1 cup instead of 1/4 cup). I don't have a kitchen scale so I just guessed how big to make them and I ended up with meat leftover after the muffin cups were filled, so I put the remaining meatballs on a cookie sheet. I liked baking them because they stayed fairly round. When I cook meatballs in a skillet they end up sort of square or triangle shaped. I think I'll try to bake my meatballs from now on!

This Spud's for You

2010-11-14T11:13:00.000-08:00

One of my favorite foods at Thanksgiving is mashed potatoes. Yum!!! Since Thanksgiving is just around the corner, I chose the episode This Spud's for You from season 1 (I'm not sure what page it's on in the book). You can choose to make Mashers, Potato/Portabello Gratin, or The Baked Potato. I chose to make the mashers.

I don't have the book anymore (it's always checked out from the library when I look for it) so I'm not sure what it says about potatoes, but I watched the episode on YouTube and learned some interesting potato facts. I lived in the Andes Mountains of Ecuador for several months and potatoes were found everywhere there! All sorts of varieties (but they don't have any sweet potatoes!). Watching this episode made me wish I had tried cooking with more of the varieties while I lived there, but I tended to stick to red potatoes which are my favorite. I was happy to see that this recipe called for red potatoes. They just tend to hold up better and have a more appealing texture.

This recipe makes a lot of potatoes! I only used 6 red potatoes rather than 8, but I should have just halved the recipe. The online recipe says to cover the potatoes with cold water, but the episode I watched says to cover with hot water. I'm not sure which is best, but I used cold water because that's what I usually do. I think I cooked my potatoes a bit too long, but it made for easy mashing. I wasn't sure if I was supposed to mash the whole garlic cloves in the potatoes so I left them out and there was still plenty of garlic flavor.

These potatoes were alright, but not my favorite. They need to be dressed up a lot to give them more flavor. I only served mine with salt and pepper, but I should have put butter or sour cream in them as well. I usually whip my potatoes and I add lots of butter, salt, and pepper, and I think I prefer my potatoes that way.

Maren's Baked Meatballs

2010-11-13T17:12:00.000-08:00

On top of spaghetti . . .

What sold me on trying these was Jen saying you don't have to stand over the stove to cook them, you can just pop them into the oven. I didn't know meatballs could be so easy!

The next great thing about making these was that there was no question of how big the meatballs should be since Alton just has you measure each one. I really like that, since in the past my meatballs have seemed to be all different sizes no matter how much I eyeballed, and so I'd worry some were overdone while others could be underdone.

I used 1 lb. pork and 1/2 lb. ground beef also, and it was a nice combination. I left out the spinach, and didn't roll in extra bread crumbs (since I planned on putting them into sauce). I didn't have a miniature muffin tin so I was worried they would slump in the oven on a regular baking sheet, but they were fine. Very tasty and I'd eat them plain! I'll definitely be making these again.

Melanie's Southern Biscuits

2010-11-11T20:17:00.000-08:00

Let me first say that I usually hate making any sort of bread. Whatever I make usually never turns out right for me! Luckily, these were so easy to make that there really wasn't any way they could have gone wrong.

I made mine 2 1/2 and 2 3/4 inch wide, and I got 12 from the recipe. The only thing I'd do differently next time is cook them about 3 minutes less. They were in the oven about 17-18 minutes, and I should have stuck closer to 15 minutes because they turned out slightly too crispy. Still, they puffed up nicely and tasted great with the beef stew I made.

Melanie's Butternut Squash Soup

2010-11-09T09:37:00.000-08:00

I couldn't remember if I had ever eaten butternut squash soup, and since Lisa loved it I thought I'd give it a try. I didn't roast it the way Alton says to because I already had some leftover puree from another recipe I had made. Because I already had the puree, this was super fast and easy to make! The honey and nutmeg give it the perfect flavor. Butternut squash isn't my favorite soup so I don't think I'll make it very often, but, this was a perfect autumn meal.

I have really enjoyed making meals with winter squashes. Since I had never made or had spaghetti squash before, I went ahead and made some (just using a recipe from allrecipes.com). It was good, but I think I undercooked the squash. I'll have to try again!

Cami's Swedish Meatballs

2010-11-08T19:29:00.000-08:00

I chose to make the Swedish Meatballs for last week's recipe. I've never made meatballs before and was surprised how easily these came together. I was also surprised how cheap ground pork is. Who knew?

I found these to be really tender and moist with a flavorful exterior. The gravy is perfect and in a lot of ways it reminds me of meatballs from Ikea. I love Ikea meatballs, so it's a compliment. Calder often asks if we can go to lunch at Ikea because he loves them as well. He ate two servings of these. I'd say they were a hit.

Cami's Pumpkin Bread

2010-11-08T19:24:00.000-08:00

I finally convinced Calder to cook his pumpkin. I never did convince him to carve a face into it, maybe next year.

This bread was well worth the convincing. I love it. It turned out just perfectly. The flavor is awesome. It's moist throughout and the exterior was perfectly crisp. I'm signed up to bring pumpkin bread to a church meeting tomorrow so I thought I would double the recipe and make two loaves. I used the whole pumpkin.

I also added a delicious topping which is a perfect addition to this bread. To make the topping you take 1/2 cup flour, 1/2 cup sugar and 1/2 cup butter and mix them together using a pastry blender. Put it on top before baking. You won't be disappointed.

The Dough Also Rises

2010-11-07T17:09:00.001-08:00

I love biscuits! And unlike bread or rolls, you don't think ahead to make them, since these mix up quickly and only take 15 minutes to bake--perfect time to set the table, toss a quick salad, or maybe get a head start on the washing up. I served these biscuits with lentil soup and they were quite good--but I am getting ahead of myself:

I chose The Dough Also Rises and tried Alton's Southern Biscuits (p. 42 in the book). I wanted to compare it to my mom's biscuit recipe, which I've been using up to now. I'd like to point out that the book recipe and the online recipe are slightly different: the one online calls for equal parts shortening and butter, while the book calls for a 2:1 ratio of shortening to butter. (If I'd realized the difference before I made them, I'd have done equal parts since I happen to adore butter.)

Biscuits should definitely be puffy, and my mom's biscuits never puffed very much, but the picture of Alton's looked nice and puffy. They didn't disappoint, either--they puffed way bigger than my old biscuits. Since the flavor is very similar, I think I might switch recipes based on puffiness alone!

I used a pastry cutter instead of my hands to to work the fats in, which was fine, but I wished I'd used a rolling pin to roll the dough after it was kneaded, because I found I couldn't press very evenly so some biscuits were thick and some thin. Alton says to make a round that is 1" thick and I made mine between 1/2" and 3/4" but I only punched 10 biscuits and one of them was runty. That could just be the nature of biscuits, though. I don't come out with the same number each time with my old recipe either.

My kids loved to help me punch them out and love to eat them too. I served the leftovers to my husband the next morning with Alton's Sawmill Gravy (p. 49), since he's been asking me for a long, long time to make him that breakfast. :)

Danielle's Baked Meatballs

2010-11-04T11:31:00.001-07:00

These were delicious! I didn't end up making a sauce to go with them as I planned to last night, but they were even good plain. They'd be great in spaghetti sauce, though, so I'm going to try that with my leftovers that are in the freezer.

I also couldn't get ground lamb at the local Vons, so I used half pork and half beef. Maybe I'll pick up some ground lamb at Costco for next time. In the book, Alton says his wife makes them with ground turkey to make them healthier -- and he says they definitely taste like it. If I hadn't read that, I would've gone for the ground turkey also probably. That's my default. I'm sure they would've been a lot drier with turkey instead of beef and pork, but I might still try them with turkey next time because hey, it's healthier.

And as Jen did, I also used the whole 10 oz. of spinach. I don't think it detracted from the meatballs at all. In fact, you couldn't really taste it so certainly no harm done.

Max and I both really liked these meatballs, and they were really easy to make. I can definitely see us making these again.

Great Balls of Meat

2010-11-03T18:40:00.000-07:00

You can find the episode on the Food Network HERE.

This episode comes from the Middle Years cookbook, which I have, so I thought I'd scan the "Knowledge Concentrate" section and post it for anyone who is interested. Sorry, the edge of the page is cut off a bit.

Click to enlarge

I Found It.

2010-11-01T18:28:00.000-07:00

In 2003 I had Butternut Squash Soup for the first time in my life at Einsteins Bros. Bagels.

It changed me for life.

Since then, I've wanted to find a recipe I could make at home that was as good as theirs.

I can't believe I found it on the first try. Awesome.

Thanks Catherine for picking Squash Court.

Alton's recipe is so so sooooo good.

Mine turned out just a tad thicker than I'd like. Next time I will add more liquid. And I didn't measure exactly, but I think I put more pepper in than the recipe calls for.

So yummy.

Jen's Baked Meat balls

2010-10-31T18:12:00.000-07:00

I made Alton's baked meatballs from the great balls of meat episode.

I couldn't get a half lb of ground lamb so i used 1 lb pork and 1/2 lb ground beef. I also used the whole 10 oz pkg of frozen spinach. Instead of the 5 oz that was called for in the recipe.

The kids thought it was too spicy but there was only 1/4 tsp of red pepper flake. I thought they were pretty good. It was interesting idea to make them in a mini muffin pan. I like baking meatballs as I'm impatient to cook a large amount in a pan on the stove top.

I will post my pictures tomorrow.

Happy Halloween.

Posting this week from "Great Balls of Meat" episode

2010-10-30T21:54:00.000-07:00

I will be using the Baked Meatballs recipe and posting my findings tomorrow.

Danielle's Squash Dumplings

2010-10-29T09:38:00.000-07:00

This was kind of a weird recipe for me. In the end, the dumplings tasted pretty good. But the process was off.

Alton says at the beginning of the recipe (in the book) that this was not a favorite with viewers, but I decided to give it a shot anyway. The biggest complaint in the online reviews seemed to be that the dough was really wet and required way more flour than called for. In the book, Alton added weights to the amount of squash and potato you need, presumably to address the wetness issue. I weighed my ingredients, but I made a mistake and used double the potato I was supposed to (I was making a half batch and forgot to halve the potato). I don't know if that's why my dough ended up so loose, but like many of the online reviewers, I had to add TONS of extra flour... and I still had a wet dough that was difficult to work with.

After adding lots and lots of extra flour, I decided I better stop adding more because I was sure I had already overworked the dough. There was no way I was going to be able to roll out the dough so I just grabbed clumps of dough, rolled it in my hands, and plopped it in the boiling water.

My dumplings were kind of tough, but they tasted pretty good. I loved the sage flavor, but it was overpowering when I got an actual piece of sage in my bite. I think when I make these again (I have lots of dough still in the fridge), I'll add the sage to the butter while it browns but then skim it out before adding the dumplings.

One of the online reviewers said she squeezed her squash with paper towels before mashing it to get rid of excess water. She said she was able to get a good texture just with the amount of flour called for in the recipe. I wonder why Alton doesn't say to do this in his recipe...

Squash Court

2010-10-24T19:24:00.000-07:00

This week's recipes come from Episode 65 - Squash Court. I love, love, love squash, although I don't actually have very many different squash recipes. My favorite is yellow squash and zucchini fried up with onions and bacon. Mmm! Those are summer squash, though, and with winter approaching it's harder to find, so I've switched to winter squash. I'm very excited to try acorn squash, as I've never before known what to do with it. But for today, since I happened to have spaghetti squash in the fridge, I went with the tried and true.

I'm always surprised when I hear people say they've never eaten spaghetti squash before, or only with spaghetti sauce on it. My parents grew it in their garden, so we ate it a lot. Unfortunately, I've never learned how to tell if it's good or not before I cook it. I've had bad luck with squash I buy at a regular grocery store, so if you're going to try this, go to a produce store or farmer's market. This was one of my unlucky times. I ended up cooking it about twice as long as Alton Brown suggests, and it still didn't get all the way soft. Still, it had a very good flavor. I added butter, salt, pepper, and parmesan cheese, as recommended. I hadn't try cheese before. I couldn't taste it at all, so I won't bother in the future.

And, since it's almost Halloween, I thought I'd include the most famous squash: pumpkin! We carved our jack-o-lantern today. My four-year-old designed the face herself.

I toasted the seeds with butter, sugar and cinnamon. I didn't bake them long enough for my taste, but my daughter and husband sure liked them!

Maren's Pot Roast

2010-10-24T11:57:00.000-07:00

I am inclined to agree with Danielle that pot roasts are invariably pot-roasty--however I think this one had a couple of ingredients that made it just a little different from ones I've made before: the pearl onions and the tomato juice/vinegar combination. The onions were a definitely a nice change (they seemed sweeter too) and the tomato juice helped add flavor and tenderness. Definitely go for frozen pearl onions, though. I just bought some dry from the produce section but you have to boil them to peel them so they seem to add a lot of extra work for something you want to just throw in the slow cooker.

I used my slow cooker as well (low for 8 hours). I didn't brown my meat first, I just chucked it in there with the veggies, but it was tender enough to just be served up with a spoon--no carving required.

My husband observed that perhaps what makes a pot roast nice is eating it infrequently, so it will probably be a while before I make it again, but when I do, I'll go back to this recipe.

This week

2010-10-24T10:42:00.000-07:00

I am under the weather and am supposed to post today. Is anyone ready that they can switch with me? Although I have a funeral the first weekend in Nov.

Sorry No one wants me to cook today and I don't really get to the rest of the week.

Jen

Catch up Week

2010-10-18T17:18:00.000-07:00

We are having another catch up week! Feel free to make anything from the past this week and post about it. We have adjusted the schedule so it now looks like this:
October 24: Jen
October 31: Catherine
November 7: Maren
November 14: Melanie W.

Please make sure you take note of your new day and are ready to post when it comes! We can't wait to see what you choose.

Danielle's Pot Roast

2010-10-16T18:35:00.000-07:00

Our dinner conversation the other night --

Danielle: "This roast is pretty good, but I can't say it's the best I've ever had."

Max: "Can you say any roast is the best you've ever had? Isn't every roast practically the same as every other roast you've had?"

Danielle: "No.. well... Ok maybe you've got a point."

As I thought about it, I couldn't distinguish between roasts I've had based on taste. Really, the only thing that has determined a good roast for me is how it's cooked (i.e. has it cooked long enough to be falling apart). In that respect, I only did an ok job with this roast. I cooked it for about 4 hours at 275 degrees, and I thought it needed more time.

I was going to use my crock pot like Cami did, but my crock pot wasn't big enough. My Vons didn't have a good selection of chuck roast, and the only thing I could get was a 3.5 lb boneless roast. So that plus all the veggies was too much for my slow cooker. So I put it in a large stainless steel pot and roasted it in the oven.

I would've liked to try the foil pouch method that Alton Brown uses, but I didn't have heavy duty foil and I had my hands pretty full as it was that day. I suppose my roast may have cooked more effectively with the foil pouch, but I don't know that I'll ever get around to trying it out.

The things we really liked about this roast recipe (and that set it apart from other roasts) were the pearl onions and the fresh thyme. I think the fresh thyme is what makes this recipe.

Danielle's Baked Sugar Cookies

2010-10-10T21:40:00.000-07:00

I would've make these cookies when the recipe came up originally but I had just made sugar cookies with a different recipe. I haven't made sugar cookies again until yesterday. Actually, Max made them, but I can review them.

I thought the cookies tassted pretty good, but I thought they were a little too soft. They tended to fall apart. Max and I also agreed that they needed more sugar. I know a lot of people don't like their cut-out cookies to be too sweet because you're just going to put frosting on them, but we say bring on the sweetness. I mean, they are sugar cookies. I think a sugar cookie should be sweet enough to eat on its own without the frosting.

The dough was a little difficult to work with the first time we tried. We chilled ours for somewhere between three and four hours, and it got too soft by the time we had the dough rolled out and cut. We had a hard time getting them on the cookie sheet. However, Max made another batch today after the dough had chilled overnight and he said they were a lot easier to work with.

As you can see in the picture, we didn't made the lemon glaze frosting. We like traditional, butter and powdered sugar frosting. To us, sugar cookies just aren't real sugar cookies without a big thick layer of thick sugary frosting.

This was a decent sugar cookie recipe, but I think I'll stick with my other recipe that is my current favorite.

Pot Roast

2010-10-10T17:59:00.001-07:00

The recipe this week comes from Episode 49, season 4 A Chuck for Chuck. You can find a recipe here but it is different from the one in the book. He explains in the book that he received lots of feedback that the original recipe was weird. It has raisins and olives. I stuck with the recipe in the book but next time I will probably add the raisins and cumin. I love cumin. I would love to know how it tastes with olives and raisins.

My husband loves pot roast. Me, not so much. I generally make it a few times a year because I know he loves it, it's easy and cheap. So, I thought this was a good choice. I loved the pearl onions and I think the tomato juice adds a nice flavor.

I made mine in a crock pot. So easy. The meat just fell apart and was very juicy. I must say it was the best pot roast I've ever made and probably the best one I've ever eaten. Oh and he thought it was great, of course.

Cami's Crepe Quiche Lorraine

2010-10-10T17:50:00.000-07:00

This was my first attempt at crepes. They always seemed so fancy and hard. They are not hard. In fact I was a little surprised by how easy they are. I made the savory ones using spinach, oregano, thyme and a little cumin. They were delicious alone but made so much better with bacon, eggs and cheese inside.

I forgot to put the cheese in the middle so I just sprinkled it on top. I think it tasted great. I had a lot more egg mixture than crepes. Next time I will probably double the crepes or half the eggs. Calder isn't a big fan of onions so I made his with bacon, cheese and eggs without the crepes. He loved them. I poured those right into the muffin tins. It was the perfect Sunday morning breakfast.

Crepe Expectations.

2010-10-03T11:58:00.000-07:00

I just love to use my blender. Love it.

When I see a recipe that calls for using it, my insides give a little "Wahoo!"

I have always heard of crepes. I've had them once at a friends. But it's one of those foods that I'm intimidated to make for some reason. This was a good opportunity for growth. Hope you enjoy them.

Episode 58: Crepe Expectations

I made Crepe Quiche Lorraine.

The other recipes are Crepes, Mushroom Crepe Cake, and Crepe Suzette.

The Lorraine was absolutely fantastic. You should make that one. So tasty, savory, and pure enjoyment. I'm not over selling it, I promise.

I followed the directions and it made 9 crepes. About 1/3 of the flour was wheat. I used 1/4 cup of batter for each crepe. The quiche batter was more than 6 crepes worth of filling. With the extra, I made little quiche cup cakes for my toddler. Their idea of how many servings the recipe makes is off.

I also had to add about 10-15 minutes on to my baking time. I have stoneware (boo) that makes life harder.

I will definitely makes these again.

Last Rotation Change

2010-10-02T20:10:00.000-07:00

I'm sure you've noticed but there wasn't a recipe this week. I hope you enjoyed the week off. We'll resume with the recipe selecting tomorrow with Lisa choosing a recipe. This means that everyone else will be pushed back a week. I know that works out better for a few of you anyway. Check the recipe rotation page if you have any questions.

Melanie's Angel Food Cake

2010-09-30T20:12:00.000-07:00

...or should I say Disaster Food Cake?

They said it's fool proof, but I proved them wrong! I honestly don't know what happened. I followed the recipe exactly! I even watched the online episode as I made it to make sure I did everything Alton did. I was just going to use a bundt pan but happened to find a regular tube pan at a thrift store. I even bought a sifter since I didn't have one. I let the egg whites warm up to room temperature. I carefully folded in the flour/sugar mixture. I let it cool upside down. The only thing I did different was use all-purpose flour instead of cake flour (and I subtracted 2 Tbsp. of the all-purpose because I read that was an appropriate substitution). I don't think that alone would cause my cake to fall and taste like an omelet. It was so dense and eggy! Maybe I didn't beat the egg whites long enough? After baking for 35 minutes and checking its doneness with a skewer I put the cake back in the oven for about 8 minutes longer because it was still gooey in the middle. Maybe poking a hole and putting it back in the oven let all the air out of the cake? Whatever happened, it was a big disappointment. This was meant to be for my husband's birthday. Looks like he'll have to settle for a Duncan Hines cake instead. I'd like to try this again, but I'm hesitant so I might just give up on making homemade angel food cake for now!

Catherine's Very Garlicky Greens

2010-09-26T17:46:00.000-07:00

I was excited about the garlic selection because I've been wanting to learn how to cook greens. I had some once a long time ago that I really liked, but haven't had them since. I bought collards because they looked better than the mustard or other greens.

Don't they look pretty? The recipe was really easy to make. I used 7 garlic gloves, which was too much, but it still had a really good flavor. The collard greens were rather bitter, though. Has anyone had other greens before that they would recommend? I would totally make this again if I could find something a little milder. I even think it would be good with spinach. I would recommend cutting the amount of garlic in half, though. Nobody in my family ate it (besides me), but I wasn't expecting them to.

Newer Rotation Updates

2010-09-25T18:37:00.001-07:00

I've made a few more changes to the recipe selecting rotation. Check it out here to see when you choose a recipe.

Cami's Angel Food Cake

2010-09-25T18:24:00.001-07:00

Even though I totally didn't follow the instructions my angel food cake still tasted good. I missed the step where you divide the sugar in half and mix only some with the flour. Then I missed the part about whipping the egg whites with just sugar until it made peaks. Well, I threw the whole flour mixture in with the egg whites and away we went. I never got peaks but I guess I shouldn't have expected to. I ended up with a more dense cake but since I used a bundt pan (I don't have an angel food cake pan) it worked out. Last time I made angel food cake it overfilled the bundt pan and made a mess of my oven. At least with this I didn't have to clean my oven. And oddly enough my husband said this is the best angel food cake he has ever had.

I'm going to try again.

Good Eats 2: The Middle Years

2010-09-23T21:25:00.000-07:00

For anyone who's interested, the next cookbook in the Good Eats series is out! I got my copy yesterday, and I'm so excited to look through it.

Strangely, Amazon still says it's on pre-order and that it's coming out on the 27th, but like I said, I already got mine. So hop on over to Amazon and get your copy!

Good Eats Recipe Rotation Round 2

2010-09-20T18:50:00.000-07:00

We've updated the recipe rotation for the next round. Check it out HERE. If that date doesn't work for you, please let us know and we can switch things around.

Cami's Poached Eggs

2010-09-20T17:52:00.000-07:00

I should really call this Jason's poached egg. He has used this recipe about 6 times since we started using the Good Eats cookbook. He loves this and I do too. Before this I was a scrambled eggs girl. I didn't really have much interest in anything else. I guess if something is good, why change it. I'm now excited to try a few other ways to prepare eggs. We've been wanting to try using salsa to poach the eggs and make huevos rancheros. Has anyone ever done that?

Danielle's Poached Eggs

2010-09-19T21:47:00.000-07:00

Inspired by Alton Brown's suggestion of eating poached eggs on BBQ pulled pork, we decided to eat ours on shredded BBQ chicken. It was delicious!

I was excited to see this episode in the rotation because I've been wanting to try poached eggs ever since I saw the Good Eats episode about eggs benedict. I wanted to try eggs benedict this week, but I haven't been to the store yet to get the ingredients. That will show up on my menu very soon though. Anyway, I thought poached eggs were supposed to be difficult to make, but these were very easy. Ours didn't all turn out very pretty, but they tasted good.

We made several eggs at a time, so we followed the wide saute pan method. I want to try the sauce pan/whirlpool method sometime. I'm interested to see how the eggs come out differently. Also, I'm not going to cook mine as long next time. I like my yolks a little more runny -- ours came out more like soft boiled eggs.

The Egg Files III: Let Them Eat Foam

2010-09-19T19:55:00.000-07:00

This week's episode only has one recipe -- angel food cake. We had a bunch of extra egg whites left over from something else we made, so this was the perfect choice. It's pg. 224 in the book, and you can find the recipe online here.

This recipe gets excellent reviews on the Food Network. A bunch of people said it was fool proof, and I'm inclined to agree. I did a few things differently than the recipe called for and mine turned out great.

Here are the things I did differently --

I didn't have cake flour, so I used all purpose flour and substituted 2 Tbsp of it with corn starch (got the idea from one of the comments on the recipe).
My eggs were straight from the fridge. Someone told me recently that she's never been able to tell the difference between whipping cold eggs vs. room temperature eggs. But to be safe, I put my egg whites in my mixing bowl and put it over a bowl of hot water to warm them a bit.
I used my stand mixer instead of a hand mixer, and it worked out fine.

I used vanilla extract in my cake. I ended up baking mine for a few minutes extra to make sure it was done in the middle. Also, I like it a little extra browned on top (that's the best part!). This cake was delicious. I love the texture and the flavor. And it was easy to make. I can't say it was super quick, but I wasn't very organized when I was making it. It wasn't too bad though. It didn't take me as long as most Baked recipes!

Anyway, if you like angel food cake, this is a good one. Yum!

Tasty Peanut Chicken.

2010-09-19T17:37:00.000-07:00

This chicken recipe was good. It was really good, but I don't know why I'm not interested in making it again. Too many steps maybe? I'm kind of in a cooking rut and all about the easy.

Every one liked it. The salsa was sweet and pretty.

Very visually appealing meal.

Flan is Good.

2010-09-19T17:27:00.000-07:00

It was so yum I want to go make more. My husband loved it. The kids too. All who touch this, love this.

I used too deep of cups to cook it in. Oh well. It didn't look as good as others, but it all gets chewed up anyways.

I will so make this again.

I made homemade butterscotch for the topping.

I highly recommend it.

Danielle's Big Squeeze Grilled Cheese

2010-09-17T10:25:00.000-07:00

No picture. I forgot.

I decided to give the clarified butter a shot so that someone could give an opinion on it. I figured that since I didn't have to stand there and watch it the whole time, I didn't mind how long it took to make. I'm not sure if I did it right because mine didn't come out totally clear (it was pretty muddy looking). I would've had to strain it through cheese cloth or something to get all the burnt butter particles out of it.

But that aside, it worked. Our bread browned nicely and didn't burn. I don't know that I can say it was worth it. I guess if I made grilled cheese often, I would keep some clarified butter in the fridge (but I don't).

One problem we had is that we only have one cast iron pan. For the other pan, we used a heavy bottom stainless steel pan. The pans didn't heat the same, so the top pan was hotter than the bottom pan and we had to turn the heat back on to get our cheese to melt all the way.

We used smoked gruyere and medium yellow cheddar on challah bread. I really liked the sweetness of the challah bread with the cheese. And I loved the addition of the mustard. It was a good sandwich. But like Maren said, I didn't feel so good a little while after eating it. I think that kind of cheese intake will be a pretty rare occurrence for us in the future.

Mission: Poachable

2010-09-12T19:46:00.000-07:00

Choosing to poach eggs was rather a spree in self-indulgence on my part, since no one in my house, besides me, would even think of eating one. I should be more sympathetic, since it's only in the last year or two that I came around to anything other than a solidly cooked yolk.

But eating eggs Benedict for brunch at a local restaurant has forever altered me, and I've been wanting to try poaching eggs on my own for a while.

The result was a serviceably poached and decently tasty egg, but I think I'll have to try a few more times (maybe try a deeper pan--I skimped too much on depth since I was poaching only one egg). I think part of the charm of a poached egg is how they look before you stab them with your fork, and mine was a little on the sad side.

Ideally I'd eat a poached egg over a spinach-and-crispy-potatoes salad, but this I time I made do with toast, and sprinkled some leftover Gouda and Gruyere from the cheese sandwiches over it.

Find this and the other poaching recipes here, or on page 187 of the book.

Maren's Grilled Cheese Sandwich

2010-09-12T19:23:00.000-07:00

Terribly unappetizing, I know! (I did attempt a photo of a more successful sandwich, but it was too washed out to use.)

Q: Who can ruin a cheese sandwich in 5 seconds flat?
A: Maren!

The making of these sandwiches didn't go very smoothly, as you will have guessed already. I decided to skip the butter clarification as well, but I really regretted not having at least melted it--so after the first disastrous sandwich, that's what I did.

Secondly, I forgot the 'kill the heat' part of the instructions. Oops. The pan was so hot that not only the bread scorched but the pan as well (and I'm not sure it will ever recover).

However, after a few minutes and feeling calmer, I tried again. It turned out that the cheese inside the burnt sandwich wasn't even melted much, so I peeled the ruined bread away and re-used the rest of the sandwich (which made me feel better).

In an effort to keep a long story from getting too much longer, I'll just say that the rest of the sandwiches were edible--tasty, even (if amazingly ugly)--and while I may not really know what to do next time, I definitely know several things NOT to do. My most successful sandwich was squashed with heavy pan and then flipped (per Catherine's method). The traditional method of no squashing over regular heat didn't melt all the cheese. And may I say that 3 oz. is a LOT of cheese for one sandwich? While I enjoyed the flavors of the two cheeses (smoked Gouda and Gruyere) immensely, I paid for it with a stomach-ache later.

Still, the taste of these is hard to resist, so I'll probably have to try again sometime.

Melanie's Grilled Cheese Sandwich

2010-09-10T17:40:00.000-07:00

I always love a grilled cheese sandwich. My usual choice of cheese is cheddar so it was fun to try new cheeses. I used the Gouda/Gruyere combo. I love both these cheeses so I thought it was really yummy, especially with the dijon mustard. The only thing is I don't often buy good cheese so I had a hard time paying the high price for just a few sandwiches.

I decided to try the double skillet cooking method but my bread also stuck to the bottom of the top pan. I wasn't using cast iron skillets so maybe the bread won't stick to cast iron? I decided to use my usual old-fashioned cooking method, keeping the pan on the heat and flipping with a spatula. They turned out fine to me.

Also, there was no way I was going to sit and cook butter for 30-40 minutes to clarify it just so I didn't have burnt brown spots on my bread, so I skipped that step. I know Alton says it's worth it, but to me it didn't seem worth it. I did find it interesting to learn about clarifying butter though because I had never heard of that before.

Overall, these sandwiches were really tasty and a nice treat from our usual grilled cheese, but I'll probably stick with my cheddar cheese in the future, mostly due to cost factor. I'll save the gouda and gruyere for more substantial meals!

Jen's Guacamole

2010-09-06T17:41:00.000-07:00

I tried Alton's guacamole recipe. It was good. I thought the cumin added a nice smoky note to the recipe but I have to say that I prefer Rick Bayless' recipe.

Here's the link to Rick's version in case you want to try. http://www.kalamazoogourmet.com/rbme160.php

I took the guacamole to a family party that took an hour so i just put in a big plastic bowl for transport...sorry its not too pretty ;)

Maren's Garlic Cloves + Chicken

2010-09-05T18:34:00.000-07:00

My husband extremely fond of roasted chicken but requested that I prepare it in the traditional style, so here's what I did different from the recipe:

left the chicken whole
no pre-cooking on the stove
poured about 2 Tbsp. of oil (I think 1/2 c. would've been way too much) in the bottom of the pan before popping the chicken in the oven, in addition to rubbing the bird itself down with oil as the recipe says to
cooked about 60 min. at 475°F, basting every 20 minutes or so

The chicken turned out very nicely! It was one of the better roasted chickens I've done--and I don't do it that often; it's a special occasion-type dish for us. Roasting garlic along with it is a great idea for today's supermarket chickens that are perhaps not as flavorful as their eaters would like. Maybe I'll try to work this recipe in a bit more during the winter--it is definitely a cozy dish, and very easy to do. (Plus I love to make chicken broth with bones and skin after the meat's all eaten up and have chicken noodle soup!)

For Whom the Cheese Melts I

2010-09-05T17:10:00.000-07:00

This week's episode is For Whom the Cheese Melts I (page 82 in the book). We're big fans of grilled cheese sandwiches here, so the promise of "1 simple, perfect sandwich" was very tempting. There were several differences in this recipe to the way I usually make them. First, Alton Brown suggests using two cheeses, one hard and one soft. I used smoked Gouda and Gruyere. Second, the recipe calls for Dijon mustard and black pepper. I'm not a big fan of either, so I was a little skeptical. Finally, you're supposed to heat up two skillets, then turn them off before putting the sandwich between them to be pressed flat and cooked from both sides at once.

As you can see, there were a few problems. My bread stuck to the bottom of the top skillet, so it fell apart as I was taking it out. Also, the bottom slice of bread was almost completely burned. So for the next two sandwiches I didn't bother preheating the skillets, and I only left the one on top on for a minute or two to flatten the sandwich, then just flipped it to cook the top. Those came out perfectly. I didn't get a picture because, hey, we were hungry, and who wants a cold grilled cheese sandwich?

Of course, the most important thing is how it tasted. I would say they were just about perfect. The smoky cheese flavors and the Dijon mustard were fantastic together (I couldn't taste the black pepper). I'll definitely be making these sandwiches again.

P.S. I didn't clarify the butter. I just can't bring myself to care that much about butter. Although I suppose if I had maybe the sandwich wouldn't have stuck.

Cami's 40 Cloves & A Chicken

2010-09-04T17:48:00.001-07:00

This was another hit at our house. It was easy, convenient and had very few ingredients. Although it takes a while to cook the hands on time is minimal. I also bought my chicken pre-divided. The cost seemed to be the same, so why not? I do have one little tip that you may all know already anyway. When peeling the garlic, lay the blade of a large knife horizontally to press down on the garlic until you hear a pop. That is the peel breaking. This makes it much easier to peel.

I never buy chicken with skin or bones. I was surprised how cheap it is when you buy it as a whole chicken. I probably won't switch my ways but I will make this recipe this way again. I did take the skin off one of the breasts because I don't eat the skin and thought it might be easier before I cooked it. This was a mistake. That piece was much drier than the other ones, so in the future I'll just leave the skin on to cook and then remove.

I really enjoyed taking the garlic and spreading it on french bread. I thought it tasted wonderful as did my husband. He ate this for dinner last night, lunch today and dinner again tonight, so I think he likes it.

I wasn't sure if my 12 inch pan could go in the oven. I want to get new pans sometime in the future so I figured if I ruined the pan that would be a good excuse to get a new one. Unfortunately/fortunately the pan did just fine.

Danielle's Flandango

2010-08-31T18:03:00.000-07:00

I LOVE flan. I was excited when Cami picked this episode. I've made and had flan a number of times before and this was as good as any I've had. The texture was perfect. And besides the caramel, it was super easy to make. The only deviation I made from the recipe was that instead of half & half, I used half whole milk and half heavy cream. Half & half is just milk and cream anyway right? I figured I didn't need to buy cream AND half & half.

I did all of mine with caramel. I'm interested in how it would turn out with chocolate in the bottom, but I didn't want to make chocolate sauce in addition to caramel. For the caramel, I used the brown sugar caramel sauce recipe in the Baked book. I messed up the consistency (I still haven't perfected my caramel making methods), but it worked out just fine for the flan. And it tasted great. This recipe is a keeper.

Cami's Salsa

2010-08-30T18:53:00.000-07:00

Like Maren I love fresh salsa but haven't ever made it myself. This was really good! I used the recipe in the book and was very happy with it. This makes a ton! I think we'll be eating it all week. I need to buy more chips.

We had baked potatoes for dinner tonight and this is how I always eat my baked potatoes: potato with cheese and salsa on top. Yummy! Sometimes I throw in some sour cream. You should all try it sometime.

Maren's Fresh Salsa

2010-08-29T20:08:00.001-07:00

This was my first time making salsa from all fresh ingredients. I think fresh salsa is always so pretty, and this one was no exception despite that it was made by me. :)

It tasted good too! I was anxious it might be quite spicy, but it isn't. (I love spice but my comfort threshold is quite below my husband's.) Melanie mentioned that the online recipe is different and I'd recommend using that one--that's what I'll do next time. The spice factor for this salsa is all in the dried chiles you use. I didn't have dried ancho chiles, only dried chipotles, so I used that and we really liked the flavor. I needed to do a bit of tinkering before the overall taste was right, but ended up using about 1 Tbsp. of chili powder too (I used Chile 3000 from penzeys.com, which I love (the chili powder and Penzey's!)).

We ate this salsa for dinner over slow-cooker chili and it was absolutely delicious. It tasted better that way than with just tortilla chips, although it's definitely good that way too.

My husband is pretty much Salsa Fiend Incarnate so the leftovers didn't last long. This is a great summer treat when tomatoes are in season, so I'll be making it again!

Jen's 40 Cloves and a Chicken

2010-08-29T17:07:00.000-07:00

The recipe is found on page 238 in the book. Here is the link to the recipe online, http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/alton-brown/40-cloves-and-a-chicken-recipe/index.html
I did make it as it was stated there only I did not cut up my own chicken, Sorry Alton. I did take the faster route and bought it that way from the store.

He says to use some of cooked garlic to spread on bread but it was a bit much for me. Although the chicken was moist and flavorable.

Out of the 6 of us eating only my nephew was slow to actually pick up his fork. But then again he is 4 ;).

Hope everyone likes this one.

"The Bulb of the Night" episode

2010-08-29T09:04:00.000-07:00

Later Today I'll be posting a recipe from "The Bulb of the Night" episode. I have chosen 40 cloves of garlic and 1 chicken recipe. I have made a version of this recipe when I was in High School and I remember it being a lot of work! This one doesn't seem as a complex but will see later today.