Revamp!

Just wanted to my friends and family know that I recently revamped an old post for Taco Soup.  Dave and I have made this recipe MANY times since I originally posted it.   We usually make it more like a chili- thick and spicy- and less like a traditional "soup."  Click HERE to check it out!! :)

Chocolate Cookies with Salted Cinnamon Caramel

 They might not be the prettiest cookies on the block, but they definitely tasted awesome!  I know, because I brought them to work and they disappeared within an hour in the teachers' room.  (well, I guess it's possible that everyone tried them, but didn't like them.  I wasn't there to see reactions, but I assume they were positive! haha)

Lessons for next time:

1. Get a small scoop so that they could be a uniform size.  The only cookie scoop I had was too big, so I had to eyeball it
2. Get a round-ended spoon to make the indentations.  All I had was a squarish one, so I went with square cookies.  Circles would have looked a lot better
3. Roll the dough in your hands a bit to minimize the crackling. I thought they would even out while baking, but they looked exactly the same coming out as they did going in.
4. Make extra caramel- that stuff is amazing!!

For about 2 dozen cookies....

Ingredients:
1 ¼ cup all purpose flour
¼ cup Dutch processed cocoa powder, sifted
½ tsp kosher salt
1 stick (8 tbsp; 113g) unsalted butter, at room temperature
½ cup dark brown sugar, packed
1 tsp pure vanilla extract (I used vanilla bean paste)
2 tbsp milk, at room temperature
4 oz soft caramel (I used the Werther's brand soft caramels)
2 tbsp whipping cream
Cinnamon, to taste (I'm not sure how much I used, but I used a lot! I love cinnamon)
Salt (I used Maldon Sea Salt Flakes)

Directions:

1. Center an oven rack and preheat the oven to 325F.  Line cookie sheets with parchment paper or silicone mats. 
2. In a small bowl, whisk together the all-purpose flour, cocoa, and salt to combine. Set aside. 
3. In a medium bowl, using an electric mixer, beat the butter until fluffy. Gradually beat in the sugar and continue mixing until light and well combined. 
4. Add the vanilla, then milk. 
5. Add the dry ingredients and mix on the low speed just until the dough forms.
6. Roll the dough into 1-inch balls. Place them onto the prepared baking sheet and flatten very slightly with your hand. Using a handle of a wooden spoon, make an indentation in the center of each cookie; make it quite deep and about a penny in diameter. 
7. Chill the formed cookies for 20 minutes in the refrigerator, covered with parchment or plastic, before baking. 
8. Bake the cookies for 15 minutes, until the cookies appear set. Transfer the cookies on the sheet on a cooling rack and, using the same spoon handle, deepen the indentations made earlier; don’t poke through though, be gentle. You do want this extra space for a delicious filling. Let them cool completely
9. Put the caramel and the cream into a small microwave-safe bowl. Microwave on “medium” for about a minute, pausing the microwave and stirring a couple of times, until the caramel is melted and mixture is smooth. 
10. Transfer into a small plastic bag, seal to close. Snip a corner of the bag and fill the cookies. 
11. Top with salt. The cookies can be stored for up to a week in an airtight container.

 

Recipe adapted from Baking Obsession

Homemade Ricotta Cheese

I have learned that this is not an official ricotta because of the way it is prepared, but it is similar and tastes incredible.  It was so easy, that I can't wait to make it again, with a slight adjustment (see below)

Ingredients (for one large cup of ricotta):
3 cups whole milk
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 teaspoon coarse sea salt
3 tablespoons freshly squeezed lemon juice (**or 1 1/2 tbs lemon juice + 1 1/2 tbs white vinegar, see note)

Directions:

1. Pour the milk, cream and salt into a 3-quart nonreactive saucepan, and attach a candy or deep-fry thermometer. 
2. Heat the milk to 190°F, stirring it occasionally to keep it from scorching on the bottom. 
3. Remove from heat and add the lemon juice, then stir it once or twice, gently and slowly. 
4. Let the pot sit undisturbed for 5 minutes.  While you wait, line a colander with a few layers of cheesecloth and place it over a large bowl (to catch the whey). I did not have cheesecloth, so I lined the colander with a coffee filter. 
5. Pour the curds and whey into the colander and let the curds strain for at least an hour. I let mine strain for about 3 hours. (It will firm as it cools, so do not judge its final texture by what you have in your cheesecloth.)  You can discard the whey, or use it for something else.
6. Place ricotta in an airtight container, and refrigerate until ready to use.

**Note: Using pure lemon juice as my only acid did impart a fresh hint of lemony flavor.  I did some research and found that cutting back some of the lemon and replacing it with vinegar will give you a more neutral flavor. I think I'll try that one next time, then report back! The lemon tasted delicious in the ricotta, but you might not always want that flavor, ya know?

I put some ricotta on a cracker with freshly cracked black pepper and a dollop of olive oil.  I also just ate it by itself with a spoon :)  In addition, you can spread it onto a crostini and drizzle on a bit of honey.  OR if you are really cool, make some cannoli crepes. Dude, the possibilities are endless.

Recipe from Smitten Kitchen

Spaghetti Squash with Tomato Sauce

This was a meal I whipped together the other night, and it was so delicious! I know that my recipe for the sauce in no way even comes close to competing with the tomato sauce that mom/grandma/Matt makes. Buuuut it was quick and easy.  I like that!

Since this was thrown together on the fly, I'll do my best to write down the ingredient amounts...

Ingredients:
1 spaghetti squash
28 oz can Whole San Marzano Tomatoes
3-4 cloves garlic
1 onion (I used a red onion, because that's what we had)
Basil (fresh would of course be better, but all I had was dried)
a bit of olive oil, salt and pepper

Directions:

1.  Roast the spaghetti squash. I cut mine in half, placed it in a shallow dish with about a half inch of water, and cooked it for about 35-40 minutes in a 450 degree oven.  That did the trick!  Scrape the spaghetti squash with a fork and use tongs to remove and put into a separate bowl.
2. While the squash is roasting, chop the onion and garlic.  I was crying profusely from the onion (usually I make Dave deal with onions, but he wasn't home) so I only had about 4/5 of it chopped.  
3. Heat a pot with some oil (I used our Le Crueset) and saute the garlic and onions until soft. 
4. Add the entire contents of the tomato can to the pot, and use a spoon to break up some of the tomatoes. Throw in some basil, and season with salt and pepper.
5. Reduce heat to medium, put on the lid, and cook for about 20 minutes.
6. Once the sauce has finished cooking, taste to see if it needs anything else, then lightly puree with an immersion blender. Make sure to leave big chunks!  Those are awesome :)
7. Serve the sauce over the cooked spaghetti squash.

This made 3 good sized servings. Since I tagged it as "healthy," I figured I should share the nutrition info per serving:

Calories: 178
Fat: 8g (from the olive oil used to saute)
Sodium: 90mg
Carbs: 23g
Protien: 3g
Sugars: 8g (mostly from the squash)

Savory Pumpkin Beer Bread

This recipe is supposed to be savory pumpkin beer bread, but instead we ended up with savory pumpkin beer bread.  (basically we used regular beer instead of pumpkin beer)

Ingredients:

3 cups unbleached, self-rising flour

3 tbsp light brown sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp ginger

1/4 tsp freshly grated nutmeg (I only used a pinch, then added a bit extra cinnamon)

1/8 tsp allspice

1 cup pumpkin

12 ounces room temperature pumpkin beer (we ended up using Sam Adams Octoberfest)

butter

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350, and grease a 9x 5" loaf pan with shortening.
2. Whisk together the flour, sugar and spices.
3. Add the pumpkin and the beer and stir until combined.
4. Spoon into prepared loaf pan, and bake about 1 hour.  
5. Let cool in the pan 5 minutes, then remove from pan and place on a cooling rack.
6. Pour melted butter on top of the bread, letting it drip down the sides. 

  Enjoy while still warm, toasted with butter, or sprinkle with cinnamon sugar for a sweet treat.

recipe from Bake at 350

Brown Sugar & Cinnamon Cookies

I have been wanting to try at least one new recipe a week, so on a whim this past Thursday I whipped up a batch of cookies.  It's a good thing the recipe only calls for one egg- that's all I had!

These came out with a slight crispy outside, but a delightfully chewy inside.  I wish I had a picture of it, but when I make cookies and have some dough left over (yet not enough for a whole new pan), I make a "super cookie" for Dave and I to split.  Basically I put all of the dough together, flatten it out on the pan, and load it up with toppings.  For this one, I added mini chocolate chips and some flaked sea salt- it was an amazing variation on the recipe!

Ingredients:
2 cups plain (all-purpose) flour
2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 tsp ground cinnamon
170 g (1 1/2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature (I only had salted, so I used that and reduced the amount of salt in the recipe to only a small pinch)
1 1/4 cups dark brown sugar
1 large egg, at room temperature

Directions:

1. Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F, and line baking sheets with parchment paper. 
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, salt, baking soda, and cinnamon. Set aside. 
3. Beat butter and sugar until smooth and creamy. Add the egg and beat well. 
4. Add flour mixture and beat until well incorporated, scraping sides of bowl as you go. 
5. Use a cookie scoop to drop large tablespoonfuls of dough onto prepared baking sheets, about 2 inches apart. 
6. Bake for about 8-10 minutes until edges are browned. Cook on wire rack.

Recipe from A Spoonful of Sugar

Corn & Coconut Curry Chowder with Pale Ale

 Hooray - a new post!  This evening I made a yummy soup for dinner...very flavorful!

Ingredients:
6 large ears sweet corn, or 2 bags frozen corn (rinsed in cold water to thaw)
4 tbs olive oil
1 yellow onion, chopped
6 cloves garlic, chopped
1 1/3 cup pale ale (we used Sierra Nevada)
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
4 cups vegetable broth (chicken will work as well)
2 cans (13.5 ounces each) coconut milk (we used light)
4 tsp red curry paste, or more to taste (we used about 1/2 tsp more)
large pinch cayenne, or more to taste
10 large leaves basil, thinly sliced
2 large red peppers, roasted and chopped (we used jarred)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 400 if using fresh corn, 450 if using frozen.
2. Place on a baking sheet, roast for 20 minutes. If using fresh corn, remove from oven and allow to cool enough to handle. Cut the kernels off the corn, set aside.
3. In a sauce pan over medium high heat, sauté the onions in olive oil until soft, about 5-10 minutes. 
4. Add the garlic and cook for 30 seconds. Add the beer, salt, pepper, vegetable broth, coconut milk, curry paste, corn kernels, and cayenne. 
5. Bring to a simmer and cook for 5 minutes.
6. Using an immersion blender, puree until smooth.  Stir in the basil and the red pepper.

Recipe adapted from The Beeroness

Apple Cake (made with freshly picked apples!)...and apple picking

This past Saturday, Dave and I headed over to Parlee Farms for some apple picking.  Typically we go apple picking at the end of the season, and we always miss the early varieties.  I'm so happy that we remembered to go in September this year!  I made an amazing apple cake with some of the Ginger Gold apples we picked (we also grabbed some Jonomacs and MacIntosh.  (1/3 of the cake is missing in the photo above, because Dave and I were too impatient to wait for me to take a pic!  We scarfed a few pieces down when it was hot out of the oven)

Fist a few pics of our outing, followed by the recipe:

On the hayride

 

The fresh cider donuts- absolutely incredible, although they're no Lakeside donut :)

Above you'll see about half of the apples we picked- we only picked one peck (about 10 lbs).  I've been eating apples all week, but we still have a bunch left over- I hope to make some cinnamon apple ice cream this weekend!

note: Sorry there's a mix of US and metric measurements- I adapted an existing recipe, and have not gone back yet to figure everything out. I'm hoping that I can get everything in grams, because I much prefer to weigh than measure!

Ingredients
Cake:
140 grams unsalted butter, softened
150 grams firmly packed soft dark brown sugar
2 eggs
225 grams self-raising flour (or make your own- 1 ¾ c flour, 2 ⅓ tsp baking powder, ⅝ tsp salt, then measure 225g)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon
2 tablespoon milk
500 grams apples (about 2-3 apples), peeled, cored, diced.

Streusel Topping:
½ cup all-purpose flour
¼ cup brown sugar, packed
½ stick unsalted butter
½ tsp ground cinnamon

Directions

1. Heat oven to 320 degrees, and line a 8 in square cake pan with parchment paper.
2. Beat the butter and sugar with an electric mixer until light and fluffy, then gradually add the eggs, one at a time, continuing to beat until fully combined.
3. Sift in the flour, baking powder and cinnamon. 
4. Add the milk and apples, then fold everything together. The batter will be very thick!!
5. Spoon the mixture into the prepared pan and smooth surface. 
6. Place the topping ingredients in a food processor and pulse until crumbly.  Sprinkle the topping evenly over the batter. 
7. Bake for 1 hr 10 mins, until a skewer inserted into center comes out clean. Cool in the tin for 10 mins, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Oh my....super moist, not to sweet, and totally delicious.  I will be making it again soon!

Recipe adapted from Cakelets and Doilies

Food Crawl - 30th Birthday in Boston

Yep...I'm 30!  It was my birthday yesterday, so the friends took me out for high tea downtown!  It was a fancy afternoon :)

Before we met up with the gals, I tried to pose real cool in my bday dress.  I'm sure you can imagine how that turned out...

 

posing

falling

Yea. Real cool (see Dave's successful attempt at coolness at the bottom of this post).

After a quick trip to Hotel Chocolat for my favorite salted caramels, we popped over to L'Espalier. 

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Totally fancy-schmancy, with a cool elevator guy.  I was with Theresa, and when we got upstairs, we were greeted by the hostess- she then directed us to the salon to wait for Leah (she got trapped near the Commons because of the Jimmy Fund walk!).

The first tea that we received upon arriving at our table was this hand-tied little ball of tea/flowers:

You plop it into hot water (although I doubt "plop" is the technical term)...

 

...and wait for it to bloom:

Below is the menu for the rest of the teas- they were all included, so we could try each one!

We chose the "Little Red Riding Hood" fantasy tea, which came with a delightful assortment of tea sandwiches and petit fours.

Lobster with herbed cream on a breakfast radish, Roasted guinea hen profiterole with garlic aïoli,

Jonah crab salad with gribiche and American caviar on a deviled egg (the best one!),

Smoked salmon on wheat with yuzu kosho crème, and English cucumber with candied lemon and sorrel creamcheese on citrus bread .

Theresa and Leah being all fancy (pinkies are up, if you can't tell)

When the dessert plate came out, mine had a special birthday treat!

Here is the Pâte à choux swan with espresso Chantilly cream:

...and here are the Almond apricot scone and chocolate cinnamon scone (hanging out with a delectable mango trifle!)

Not pictured is the Greek yogurt panna cotta- which was just heavenly!  It was an unassuming little patty of creamy, rich goodness.  Trust me.

We also got a few amazing accoutrements:

which we ate by the spoonful :)

Here's the view of Boylston street from our table:

I asked the hostess to snap a photo of us on our way out, but I think she didn't understand what I was saying when I explained how to focus on my camera (I think she MUCH preferred the girls who handed her an iPhone to take their picture!)

After we ate, we went out for pedicures. I told you...this was a fancy outing!

Can you tell which color is mine? I'm sure you can, and I'm sure you're not surprised

Post nails, we shopped at a few boutiques on Newbury street, where I picked up a clearance skirt and necklace, Leah got a cute shirt, and Theresa purchased 2 shirts! Success!

It was time to meet up with the boys, and when I was asked what I wanted to do for dinner, I had a hankering for hot dogs.  Ha!  Not as classy as the rest of the day, but boy did they hit the spot!!

Of course, we went to Spikes.


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Matt, Theresa, and Adam

Chili Cheese dog:

Junkyard dog:

And mine, the 57 T Bird (no, that's not grease...the oogy stuff is honey mustard, covering the melted cheese!!)

The boys apparently had a food crawl of their own while we were doing girly stuff- including Tasty Burger, Marliave, Thinking Cup, and a trip to Chinatown for pork buns.

At the beginning of the post I promised you Dave's attempt at cool-ness.  WAY better than mine! (but maybe that's because I captured the radical lens flare! hehe)

The drive home over the Mass Ave bridge

Thanks for making my bday so fun!