cupcakes - a really old endever.

First things first: i made these the week before thanksgiving. i shoulda posted then but i was embarassed that i hadnt figured out anything clever to do for ben's MSB challenge so i sat on this post until, oh, about now. sorry ben.

I really wish that i had a "before" picture of these cupcakes - it was pretty cool to see how easy it is to disguise a special treat for kids! if you can see, the icing is just plain white, the decorations are snow caps (white on dark chocolate) and the wrapper is silver. which meant that they looked like plain ole boring ole stupid ole cupcakes. TRICK!

this one kid took one bite and said "OMG OMG OMG OMGOMGOMG!!!!! RAINBOWS!!!"
and then he asked me what they were made of and i said "magic!" but matt told me i should have told him 'clown blood'. DARN. i totally missed that opportunity.





they're really easy to make, just make white cake (from a box is fine - the point of this recipe is to look good, kids dont care if it's boxed cake or a gourmet recipe) . divide the icing into 6 bowls and dye the crap out of each bowl with food dye. the colors will get less brilliant during baking, so really just go wild. then transfer the contents of each of the six bowls into one ziplock baggie for each color. line the cupcake tins and tilt the whole shebang by setting one end of the cupcake tray on a thick cookbook (this will make layering the colors easier) and start piping in a solid line of each color. try to not fill the cupcakes more than 1/2-way full, or you may get overflow and overflow toasts a brown color and then you've just used a bunch of food coloring for nothing because it turned brown in the end.

anyway, yum. go cupcakes!

Improvised kitchen tools

Ben saw in America's test kitchen that you can use the top of an onion as a steamer for vegetables. Naturally, Ben extended this to eggs. Benedicts to be exact. These are their stories:

First, the onion layers were sized and buttered.

Egg One (the first one was much better than the second, much like with siblings):


Ben thought it would be a good idea to see what a beaten egg would do. Egg two was not as delicious. We ended up having to add some water around the onion to get it to cook evenly.


WHOOOAAAA MONTAGE EGG BENDER!


Here's what I made. Poached style. I am less adventurous.

The end.

recipe minimalism

I made my own tomato sauce. I hate tomatoes. I respect tomato sauce conceptually, but have only met one or two versions that didn't make me gag or at least where I could hold off picking around for the first few bites. As I've gotten older, I've grown out of my childhood preference for perfectly smooth sauces that are basically watered down tomato paste, which don't cut it texture-wise, though they do have the advantage of not having any offensive tomato pieces or skins.
I decided now that I don't have 20398542 things to do every second of every day, I could try to tackle this thing in a responsible way. Basically, I made my own sauce and it was pretty great. The end.

Part of the reason for this sauce story is that when I was puttering around the house running this entry in my head, it occurred to me that, much is the style here generally, transmitting a recipe on a blog for people who already know how to cook doesn't require much more than a list of ingredients and cooking method. Variation is inevitable whether ther is a proper recipe or not, but personally, I end up changing it anyway (unless it's dessert/baking). Sooooo, I was flipping through this guy recently:

The recipes are paragraphs outlining what's in the dish and anything notable about the process. For people who are into cooking and reading about cooking in this way, check out this and everything else that Mark Bittman ever does. I remember reading in one of his "101" recipes collections a "recipe" that was something like "take x and wrap it in bacon."

shepherd's pie doesn't photograph well

Also, this is a little blurry, I think because the glass of wine pictured was not my first of the evening. This was the night before an exam, after a snowstorm, and the only overlap of free time that Kerensa and I had pretty much for the whole break.

So! Veggie Shepherd's Pie! This is an adaptation of another Klein Kid Non-Recipe. The things that we generally throw in here are lentils, carrots, pearl onions, and other usual suspects, with a red wine sauce. I also added butternut squash and shallots, seasoned with cinnamon, cumin, salt/pepper, and coriander. No mushrooms this time, but I like to do a mushroomy version sometimes. Leeks or fennel are also a nice addition. Also, we don't keep milk in the house, but Kerensa had made some red velvet the night before, so we put some of the leftover buttermilk in the pototatoes. OMG. To round things out, I did a combination collard and beet green sautee on the side.

I'm Still Here (Sunday Dinner)

Taking a break from paper world, I finally took a minute to cook up the stuff I got at the AMAZING Inwood farmer's market (more on that later). I like to do a Sunday night dinner that is a little awesome since the rest of the week is so insane. Here we go:
-roasted fingerling potatoes
-sauteed collards
-roasted spaghetti squash with vars spices
-baked soy-mustard crusted tofu

P.S. HAZ! (thx Ben!)

Eating Appreciation Day

Thanksgiving is not just my favorite holiday, it's the only holiday I like. At all. Turkey + stuffing + gravy = heaven. For me, it's the perfect meal. So much starch. Butter in EVERYTHING. I wish it was more complicated than that. But it's not.

Ever since the first time I had a less than satisfactory Thanksgiving meal I've wanted to make my own. The first time I did it was two years ago when, through a series of misunderstandings, Sara and I were left with nowhere to go on Thanksgiving. So, I made the whole meal for just the two of us, while we sat at home in sweat pants and listened to old episodes of This American Life on line. That was perhaps the best Thanksgiving I've ever had.

This year I went to my aunt's house and made all of the sides, plus two pumpkin pies. I didn't think to take pictures beforehand, but here are a few phone shots of the aftermath:

Sweet potatoes with marshmallows:

I really wish I'd taken a picture of this before all of the marshmallows melted. The marshmallows were all perfectly browned. It was ridiculous. Like in a goddamn magazine. It was disgusting how awesome it looked. I'm not even a big fan of sweet potatoes and I just kind of winged this. Boiled them and then mashed them with some butter (of course), cinnamon, brown sugar, and evaporated milk (mostly b/c we only had fat free milk and I had it left over from making pumpkin pie). I think you can do just about anything to sweet potatoes and everyone who likes them will love them.

Stuffing:

I love stuffing. It's probably my favorite part. This is a really basic stuffing that I made with veggie stock instead of chicken stock so that my vegetarian sister could get a little joy out of this bird-eater's holiday.

Cranberry Sauce:

Again, as simple as it gets. Cranberries, sugar, water. I don't know why anyone would ever buy this already made. It's even fun to make. A monkey could do this.

And finally, Pumpkin Pie:

I never liked pumpkin pie until one year when my mom made it from a cheese pumpkin. I think she only did this once, but it was so memorable that I always wanted to try it myself. I started doing it in like '03 or '04 and have done it every year since. I've had people say it was the best they've ever tasted. You'd think that would be the ultimate compliment, but it sounds so made up. Still, this pie RULES.

yo ben: this guy. oh man, this guy. you're going to have a conniption.

i think thisi is the guy who really drank your milkshake.

oh man.

Challenge Entry: The Cucone

Meet the cucone.

Based on the bacone.


Here's me holding it.

Here's that guy with his.


The bacone is a cone make of cooked bacon filled with scrambled eggs, cheese, country gravy, and topped with a biscuit. The cucone is a cone made of peeled cucumber, filled with poached egg whites, goat cheese, and topped with a piece of smoked salmon.

I'd say this guy speaks entirely for himself, but... Boo-Yah!!!

I'm going to hell

for eating female crabs. but by god were they tasty!


(sexing crabs)

happy halloween, SHARK STYLE

this year, i carved a shark. you cant see it, but he has some fearsome teeth and a terrifying looking tail! but greg and matt said he looks like a dolphin. eff that. dolphins suck. "vanessa!?!" you might cry, "dolphins are intelligent and friendly!" to which i would reply (to quote cartmen) "yeah, intelligent and friendly on rye bread with some mayo"

stupid dolphins.
matt's pumpkin was much more fierce. not in a 'project runway' kind of fierce (go christian!) but in a IM GOING TO EAT YOU AND SUCK THE MARROW FROM YOUR BONES kind of fierce. it's SHARK X.

shark x comes from a long-standing tradition which was started by jon soto. while i may not approve of his lack of a flat-top hair cut, the man knows how to start a bad-ass tradition.



For dinner we ate shitake mushrooms sauted with olive oil AND butter, salt and pepper. After about 5-10 minutes of that, i threw in about 3/4 cup of white cooking wine. once that bubbled down a bit, i added some salad greens that were hanging out in the fridge and about to turn into salad-green-soda (gross).

all of that over noodles. i loved it. it was delicate. YUM. matt wished there was some sort of sauce. maybe next time i will take the stems from the mushrooms (which you dont want to really put in the dish because they're pretty tough) and make a broth-y sauce with them. cook em with some water and more butter and some seasonings. but that's all for next time.

and o man you guys. we made pumpkin seeds by soaking them in buffalo wing sauce and then baking them. it was brilliant. wait until we fine-tune the recipe and then BOOM WE'LL BE DRANKIN ALL THE MILKSHAKES OUT THERE.

Pesto is the answer

I am revealing to you my trump card for every potluck or backyard bbq. Roasted russet potatoes and haricots verts with pesto. Usually I would put this over watercress. Sometimes I add capers but the pesto was a little salty this time. Why I am making it in the middle of the week on a school night when I have 42309324 pages of reading to do for tomorrow I am not sure except that it is difficult to concentrate with basil aging in the vegetable bin.

¡Chili con huevos!

Vegetarian chili topped with spinach, cheddar cheese, and a poached egg. Kind of like The Soup but it's chili instead of soup. I'm tempted to say that my chili recipe is TOP SECRET but I already gave it to Laura and it's here for anyone to see. I make it with NO TOMATOES BECAUSE I HATE THEM. Also, I can not stress enough how much of a difference bulgur wheat makes to a vegetarian chili. Much meatier. Or you could just put in meat.

Fortune

I got this fortune cookie at the sushi place yesterday:

Milkshake Busters Challenge #4

The next (I believe 4th) Milkshake Busters Challenge has been announced! We will each have one month to prepare...

FATBLOG DEFATIFYING CHALLENGE!!!

Yes! It's finally come! Each contestant must select one item from the infamous thisiswhyyourefat.com and healthy that son of a bitch up! Now keep in mind, some of these recipes, in order to remain as their original post, will have fattening elements. It is your job, however, to take something from the fatblog and turn it into an everydayish meal. Points go to healthiness, creativity, difficulty level, and closeness to the original.

Go forth and make their milkshakes healthy... then drink the shit out of them! Your time beings... NOW!



Keep in mind, all those who abstain from participation may be subject to loss of posting privileges.

FISH > YUENGLING

Look at that fish. look at his beady little eyes. i ate him. yes i did! i ate him right up.
him and his brothers. the red snappa' brothers. i ate all of them. like the gangsta i am, i first laid them on a bed of salt (that i added some whipped egg whites too). also i stuffed those mothah fuckahs with some lemon and onion and garlic, because THAT IS HOW I ROLL.
look at them all snug in their beds made of salt! so cute. that's like 5 pounds of salt there. and like 6 whipped egg whites. that's a lot of salt.
here they go -- into the oven at 425 for 30 minutes. there's no real way to tell when they're done, so just know that a 1.5 lb fish wrapped in about an inch or more of salt will take 25 minutes to cook. TRUST THE TIMING. i added a few more minutes because i cooked two fish to the pan. i mean bed. bed of salt.
then... then i cracked that salt right off. and threw it in the GARBAGE. fucking salt. it also got everywhere. but not inside my fishies! awesome. they have dead eyes now. right when they came out of the oven, the eyes were all swelled up because the liquid inside boiled, but then after a few minutes they caved in. animal eyes are cool.
yeah, this is me de-skinning those delicious fishys. you take that skin right off and the meat inside is delicous and moist. and surprisingly not salty at all! omg. i'm going to have to tell you guys about going to the fish market in trenton. oh man. matt just threw me off track for a second. where was i?
oh fuck yeah. that's such a good combination. dale's pale ale (the best beer in existence in a can) (also Matt says it's damned delicious and he's got a pretty good repoire when it comes to beer tasting) (also it's just a fact) and some red snapper. oh yeah, i was going to tell you guys about this place - ok, so. FISH AS FAR AS THE EYE CAN SEE. seriously. like 30 varieties of fish, all ready to be de-scaled and de boned and gutted and everythign by my helpful mexican de-fisherizer. he was amazing. there were also tanks of live fish in case i wanted to take home my own tilapia for a pet. also, there was a WALL of SHRIMP. i almost lost my boyfriend to grocery section! and whole rock crabs and blue crabs (but only the females which is just tragic because they take em out of the waters and then who will be there to make the next generation of little crabbies for me to eat?)lauren got really grossed out by the eyeballs. and the spine. personally, i like looking at all the parts of something i'm eating... i mean, hell. it's going inside you, you might as well get a good look, eh? am i right?

oh the remains. the best parts were the fishmeats on teh bottom of the fishies because the juices soaked through all the lemons and garlics and got just a touch salty and it was amazing. that's my fork right there, i was picking the remains. YUM.
greg says "THIS FISH IS BETTER THAN YUENGLING" and then got in a philosophical discussion with matt about how yuengling is just adequate and then john terry piped in with how yuengling is to beer what dante's peak is to movies. but everyone agreed that the fish was better than both of those things.
and that's what's left. not too shabby for less than 10 bucks a head! (including salad and greenbeans as a side dish) (also there was a tart that i made from almost overripe fruit that was pretty bangin but is an entry all its own) (BEN WHAT? TOP THAT WITH YOUR MINI EGGS. I DARE YA, and matt just fucked your milkshake)

butternut squash fries

I whipped these together as a treat to prevent myself from crying over my math homework. Peeled and seeded butternut squash, cut into sticks, kosher salt, olive oil, bake, eat. I had them with some aioli on the side.

breakfast like WHOA

OK SO: ben, quit bitching. here's some picturesque deliciousness which even features EGGS and JOHN TERRY!!!! Woooooh!

we made somethign amazing. this is the pancake batter. it includes sour cream, beaten egg whites, RICOTTA!! lemon juice, and yes... you're seeing those yellow flakes! that's lemon zest. i fucking LOVE lemons. this is going to get even more delicous. you cant wait.

Here... here we have the pancakes cooking. they're like an inch thick and so awesome. FLUFFY GALORE.


Ok so, on the side we got some molasses. Grandma's molasses. the ORIGINAL kind. we dont fuck around with the molasses.


You ready for this? we cooked the EGG in the MOLASSES.
THAT JUST BLEW YOUR MIND.


And this is how it turned out. dripping, luscious. full of the sweet stuff. (kind of wierd)

Final plate:
we took some powdered sugar and put a teaspoon of fresh lemon juice in it and smushed it around and put THAT on the pancakes! amazing!


Even JT said "yeah, ok. these pancakes are ok! awesome."
and that's the end of that chapter.

Marinated Pork

Marinated pork and veggies over a bed of sushi rice and wakame. I used a mixture of honey, mirin, miso, sesame oil, and garlic and let it sit over night. Turned out excellent. Very tender. The extra pork fat and drippings were great for the veggies. Sushi rice turned out really well too. No I didn't rinse it. I like the extra starch. At the last minute i threw in the wakame so it soaked up a little of the water and was just finished at the same time as the rice. Good stuff. Still waiting on someone else to post.

Lamb

Weeknight dinner collaboration. Lamb, mashed sweet potatoes, and steamed asparagus. Comes with excellent gravy.

Who's Your Frydaddy?

Because I've been called out, I will tell you all about the time I was woken up to a wonderful text message. Being that it was my day off, the time was 8pm. As per the message, it was time to deep fry something. I had recently acquired an electric deep fryer via the internets and my housemates decided to christen it. Here are their stories.Above, Blake batters some chicken. These babies were amazing. Below is the chicken strips sitting on a rack draining. They were first floured, then egged, then floured, then egged, then floured. Wonderful crispiness.Those bitches look gooooood, right? Well they were. I also wasn't satisfied with just christening on chicken so I pulled some other stuff out of the kitchen to fry. It didn't all make it in. Below are the oreos and pickles prefry.The oreos didn't make it, what did hit the cut were the pickles and some fries. Below are the fried pickles, french fries, and the final table layout before dinner.As you can see we baked up some biscuits and threw down some excellent beers. By the end nobody was sure whom would have the first coronary. Excellent bathroom time was had. The fryer is still holding the extra oil for later use when we can finally throw down on those oreos. All are invited.