Meal planning has been a bit weird with the play going on, so I haven’t been experimenting with new recipes lately. We were lucky enough to be gifted some duck and chicken eggs a few weeks ago and I’ve been hoarding them. I’ll start with what we’ve been using them for.
I made this batch of chocolate pb ice cream with two of the duck eggs. Pinch of Salt ice cream base (search cinnamon ice cream on the blog for the link,) with cocoa powder and melted pb. Next time, I will add more chocolate and more pb. And I will not melt the pb, as it kind of disappeared. It tasted good though.
I also made rhubarb ice cream from a different ice cream recipe.
This one had no eggs! In fact, none of the ice cream recipes seem to have eggs in them! It is still delicious and creamy! I definitely want to try some more of them.
It is a little more pink than I wanted, the gel dye was a bit more pronounced than I expected. The recipe started with making a syrup with the rhubarb pieces, sugar, and water. Then you added that the to cream mix and let it chill overnight before churning it. I actually left it about a day and a half, as I forgot it was in the fridge! I think it made it thicker though. I would make this again. Maybe with chunkier rhubarb pieces though.
I also made these Chocolate Chip Muffins with two of the duck eggs, as I wanted to try them in baking. I realized that the Chinese market that we go to has duck eggs, so I will have to get some more. Although, my friends’ eggs will always be better! :). These are from Baking Unplugged by Nicole Rees. The muffins are extra rich with sour cream and the duck eggs. Mmmm…
I’ve made a few breakfast items lately. I’ve been finding myself getting bored with my usual yogurt. I tried a scone recipe from Bernard Clayton’s Small Breads. The Husband and I were not terribly happy with it. It had no sugar, so was more bready or biscuity than usual. It was also pretty bland. I added dried cherries to the batter too and those were probably the best part. Please ignore the dog tongue that I couldn’t edit out in the upper left. Someone really wanted to sample my breakfast and I didn’t notice until after I had already eaten them.
I don’t think I would make this again.
I did make these pancakes again, in fact, I have made them twice this month! They are Coconut Cream Pancakes from The Spruce Eats.
These are delicious! Plus, I don’t have to share them, as the Husband doesn’t like coconut. I added mini chocolate chips to some of them, but the didn’t really need it. I had this batch with chicken sage sausages. Both batches were made for dinner on nights the Husband had play things happening. Fancy shared my apples as they were honey crisp.
My Mom was visiting for a few days back when I was super sick and we made Matzo ball soup aka Jewish Penicillin. đ It did seem to help, as I could sort of talk the next day. It was an interesting and delicious experience. I consulted some recipes, but I ended up using the recipe on the box. Sort of.
I did use a mix for the matzo balls. I thought trying to actually make the mixture might be too much for my poor, sick self. Mom helped too and it turned into a delicious soup. I did make my own broth, with Penzey’s Mural of Flavor spice mix and some extra garlic. I would make this again. Both Mom and the Husband liked it as well.
I would probably make a smaller amount of this again. It was pretty quick to put together. Maybe the Husband will even try it next time.
I made chicken breasts last night with some Knorr noodles for a side. Today, I meant to make beef tacos, but left the meat out on the counter and completely forgot to put it away before going to work. So… We had chicken tacos with the left over chicken, homemade salsa, and enchilada sauce. They were messy, but good.
Now I have to find something else to make for Thursday, as enchiladas were my plan for Thursday… Oops.
I also made Fancy some treats, but haven’t had a chance to take a picture of them yet. She gets super excited about them. They have ginger, pumpkin, molasses, oats, and flour in them. I thought the ginger might be good for her stomach. A friend also sent me a biscuit book and a list of egg subs, so I’m excited to try some of those too. You know, in my copious amounts of free time. Ha! Sometimes I crack myself up.
Well, I’m headed off to bed to dream of deliciousness. Have a great night!
I thought it might be time for another cookbook review. I have used this book for five different recipes, but I really want to use a bunch more. There’s a bar dessert recipe that makes me drool just looking at the picture.
We found this book at the weird discount store by us. I don’t go there alone because I’m pretty sure I might get lost and end up in Narnia. Which might not be the worst thing ever, but I just don’t have time to deal with eternal winter right now. I just got warm again!
Anyway, I picked it up on a whim and it has really surprised me. A lot of the recipes call for things made from scratch. For example, these cheeseburger swirl rolls.
The dough was a potato bread made from scratch! They grew very large because apparently I have a magic hand with dough. Or maybe let it rise for too long. These were pretty good, but I might use more meat next time. We left off the ketchup and pickles. I would make these again, just halve the dough.
I made these apple rolls as well, which also had a scratch dough.
These were a request from the Husband. They are huge and need more apple, but tasted yummy. I would definitely make these again. The Husband requested more apples, but did like how they tasted.
The book has several sections, not just bready things. It has mix an match one pan meals with a bunch of different protein and veggie options. We tried the greek seasoning mix on some chicken one night and it was delicious.
We had Stovetop stuffing with it. The Husband loves stuffing, but I do not and have trouble finding a good recipe for it. He was very happy. đ I love the one pan options. They are super easy for me to set up and the Husband to cook when he gets home.
I tried the Dutch Oven Pancake from the breakfast section and discovered that I do not, in any way like it. It was crusty and chewy at the same time and not very good. It was also very bland.
I will stick to Pannukakku, thank you. Even the homemade jam didn’t really help it.
My most favorite thing I have made so far from the book is this recipe for brownies topped with a bittersweet ganache.
I made these for my boss’ birthday. Everyone liked them. They were super dense and fudgy and rich. The ganache was the finishing touch. The Husband liked them a little warm, with a scoop of ice cream. It was lovely.
My overall impressions of the book were that it was extremely well written. The pictures of the foods are lovely. Some of the recipes use short cut things, like pre-cooked meat or pre-made doughs, but most of them are from scratch.
It has a lot of information about different cooking materials for the pan, how to reduce it, and how to increase it. A lot of the recipes have instructions for how to make them ahead and freeze them, if possible.
Other than the Dutch Oven Pancake, the recipes have all been very tasty. If you can find the book, I would definitely recommend it.
Now, I need to go cuddle a sad puppers who was left alone this evening. Have a good night!
I keep making food and then forgetting to post it! The Bad Birthday Fairy brought me a “wicked bad cold” – according to the hipster PA I saw at urgent care. I haven’t been cooking this week much, other than the chicken sausage pasta dish yesterday. Tomorrow it will be crockpot chicken soup.
I did make fresh bao last week. They were big dinner sized buns this time. The Husband was quite impressed. I had Brussels sprouts on the side. They had olive oil and “Sandwich Sprinkle” on them.
This was Fancy’s reaction to not getting to eat the Chicken Bao.
Poor thing… So neglected!
I tried Giada’s House Soup from Food Network, which was pretty good. Not our favorite, but we would eat it again.
With the soup, we had Cheese Twists from “Small Breads.” They tasted okay and were fun to make, but there were too many and the Husband didn’t like them.
We had Antelope Meatballs Stroganoff. It was weird and we’re not sure we like antelope. We’ll probably not eat more antelope. It had a strange aftertaste.
Another miss was this Crockpot Chicken Curry, also from Food Network. The Husband has decided he likes curry spice, but not by itself. It was too much for me to eat by myself. The Husband didn’t really comment on the coconut milk in it, so I think it wasn’t a strong enough taste. I wouldn’t make this again.
We had Ricotta Cheesecake with a Warm Berry Sauce from “The Home Cook” by Alex Guarnachelli. The Husband didn’t like it at all, he thought there were too many textures. There was a not sweet cookie crust. There was candied citron in it and it freaked him right out. My work people loved it though, so it didn’t go to waste.
I think it was too soft, but the flavor was delicious. I like the firmer cheesecakes though, so I don’t know that I would make this again.
We had Nancy Fuller’s Stovetop Mac and Cheese, which had cream cheese in it to make it extra creamy. It was pretty good, not too rich. Quick recipe too. I would use this again.
I attempted to have a Girl’s Night when the Husband was going to be gone, but ended up with a nasty migraine and a ridiculous amount of mini cupcakes with no one to eat them.
They were from the Cupcakes and Cocktails cookbook that I found in a secondhand book store. It has recipes for both and I used three of the cupcake recipes.
Margarita Cupcakes with Lime Buttercream (not the meringue frosting in the book,) Pomegranate Orange Cupcakes, and Chocolate Chili Cupcakes. The Pomegranate ones originally had green tea powder, but I have thrown it out apparently, so I used orange instead.
All three of them were tasty. The chocolate ones were never frosted and the Pomegranate ones had a glaze and were sprinkled with edible glitter. I would definitely make all of them again, but especially the lime buttercream.
I have been trying out some new ideas and will have another cookbook review coming up soon. I want to try one or two more recipes to get a good overall review first. My garden sprouts are coming along well, so I’ll share my gardening plans. For now though, I’m going to go nurse my throat and hope I can actually talk tomorrow. Otherwise, I may be holding sessions via whiteboard!
I’m such a dork. In other news, we’ve been using a lot of spice mixes lately and I thought you might be interested in hearing more about them. Most of them have been from Penzey’s. They have excellent spices and had a super good sale and now my spice cupboard is full of Penzey’s.
I’m using them though and it’s helped me get over my food funk. This isn’t a sponsored post, by the way. I’m just discovering new things to try and cook.
A couple of them have been good enough that the Husband has requested them “on everything.” đ The Galena Street rub was one of them. We had that on the chicken drumsticks. The chili powder was in the veggie chili that I made while the Husband was gone.
We had Mural of Flavor on the turkey pot pie for Pi Day. It had a stuffing crust on the bottom and top.
I knew it was a winner when the Husband said, when I walked in the door “We have a problem. You have to stop making such delicious food.”
We also had Cookies and Cream Pie for Pi Day from Icebox Pies by Lauren Chattman.
It was kind of a cheater pie. I mixed vanilla ice cream with crushed Oreos and used a store bought Oreo crust! But it was still delicious!
The Husband suggested this steak seasoning over the weekend. He had tried some as a sample at Costco and it was very good. I didn’t ruin the steak! It was actually very tender and juicy.
There were also roasted potatoes with paprika, garlic, seasoned salt, and pepper and a roasted carrot recipe from the Guarnaschelli book. (Pretty sure you could play a nice drinking game with how much I’ve been referencing that cookbook…) I was surprised the Husband liked the carrots. They had honey, cumin, coriander, and s+p on them. They were pretty good, although I forgot the finish of red wine vinegar, which would have cut through the sweetness nicely.
Fancy was mad that she couldn’t have the steak or the carrots. She drooled on my foot the whole time.
I made some things for our game night too, but of course, forgot to take pictures. We had chocolate covered strawberries, almond flour brownies, and chocolate chip cookies for sweets. Savory things included crab stuffed mushrooms, cheeses and sausage, and Firebreather salsa.
We’ve decided we’re done with winter, so last night had panko crusted shrimp with cilantro rice and homemade peach salsa. I also had a Moscow Mule and some tropical fruit.
I made lemon strawberry muffins (with lemon peel from Penzey’s) this morning too, since I was still craving spring.
I have been doing some sewing too, but not necessarily things I can post. I finally tried a bra pattern, but am quite sure my Dad doesn’t want to see it. đ So I’ll figure out a way to update the sewing posts soon.
The latest issue of Food Network included 100 Recipes for Butter Lovers and I got all starry eyed with a pitted patter heartbeat. Possibly from the thought of ingesting all the butter recipes! I can feel it calling my name too, so am going to go pick out some recipes.
Fancy is quite content at the moment, being adorable in her blanket. Any time she gets up, it gets stuck on her tail and she walks it all over the house.
We discovered tonight that she lives up to her name. She will not eat regular oranges or apples, but happily accepts blood oranges and Honeycrisp. Fancy, indeed!
Well, bad jokes aside, I hope this post gave you some ideas to spice up your cooking!
I have a Cookbook Review for you and a Recipe Roundup tonight. Hopefully my pictures are right side up. I uploaded them from my phone (through the air, Mom!) and they seem to adjust themselves automatically. If not, pretend I meant to put them that way. It’s way too cold and my hip doesn’t like stairs at the moment.
The Husband was gone on a business trip for a couple of days, so I had a vegetarian feast week planned. It didn’t go quite as well as I hoped, as I ended up with no time to shop for the couple of things I couldn’t find. I did use the cookbook enough to be able to review it though, since I have used it before as well, for mac and cheese. I also had so many leftovers that I had to eat up, that I didn’t end up needing to cook as much as I thought I would.
The cookbook I used is called Vegetables! It’s by Pippa Cuthbert & Lindsay Cameron Wilson. It has some extremely fancy recipes in it, some of which are a little intimidating. It’s a very colorful book. Everything has fancy names and some of them are all about the 15 ingredients that you’ll only use once.
This recipe had baked chicken breasts on the side, as the Husband was still home at the beginning of the week and apparently likes regular meals. đ It was Linguine with Swiss Chard and Sweet Onions.
The sweet onion part is misleading, because you just caramelize them, not actually use sweeter onions. I was a little disappointed in that, as I think it would have gone well using them. I used rainbow chard for extra happiness and chicken broth instead of wine. I also added baked chicken on the side. I was a rebel!
I also made Black Bean And Vegetable Chili. I didn’t bother with the cilantro-lime creme fraiche (see what I mean about the fancy names?) as I knew I wouldn’t actually like it. I had this as a three course meal after work, with frozen popcorn shrimp, and arugula salad.
Mmmm! I love arugula! The Husband does not, so I don’t have to share! This also means I need to eat the entire container of it myself. Hmm.. I should probably have a rather large salad tomorrow.
The chili has chipotle chilis in adobo sauce in it and it makes it have the most delicious and smoky taste. I brought container of it to work and a co-worker tracked me down to find out what the delicious smell was! I would make this again, but was glad I made just half the batch. The Husband is not a fan of chili.
I’m in two minds whether to keep this book or not. I think there are some very good looking recipes in it, but I have had it for quite a few years and have made exactly three things out of it. The Husband’s dislike for vegetables makes it unlikely that I could make many more of them for both of us. It’s too much work to make separate dishes! But if I keep it, I could supervise the Husband’s pork cookery and make these for myself. Decisions, decisions… (Also, there are two book sales on the horizon and the Husband and I may have come home from shopping with three new cookbooks…)
For our other meals, we have had a variety of things.
I had the urge to make a chocolate cake a few weekends ago from the Alex Guarnaschelli book, so I did just that. (I know! But I can’t stop! Too many good recipes!) What the Husband doesn’t know is that it was the Mayonnaise Chocolate Cake recipe. Don’t tell him, or he won’t ever eat it again! I didn’t use the vanilla frosting though. It involved corn syrup. We don’t get along. I made a chocolate cream cheese frosting from the Better Homes book instead.
This was hands down the best chocolate cake I have made. It was super moist, even after a few days and very lovely and rich. It soothed my soul!
My only complaint was my frosting job wasn’t even, but I have not had a lot of practice with actual layer cakes. I will definitely make this again.
This banana bread was also from A.G’s cookbook. It was a spectacular failure in that I accidentally froze the butter while mixing it, by using partially frozen bananas. I had to put the metal mixer bowl in the preheating oven and it was a mess. Tasted delicious, but was sooooooo dense and wet at the same time.
There was a small mishap when I tried to turn the first loaf over. Half of it came off, so I had to eat it. I ended up throwing it away though. It was not good after a day or two. I may try it again with ripe bananas, not frozen, and halve the recipe.
Another failure this week was on Sunday, when I attempted to make quesadillas and had four fall apart on me for unknown reasons. I was mystified, as I make these all the time with leftover taco meat!
These were the “good” ones. I cooked up hamburger and added green chilis, onions, and some of our Fire-Breather salsa. Then I added it to the tortillas and that’s when it all fell apart. I was a little mortified, but we ate the evidence, so no one needs to know.
Something that did work out well, was the drumsticks.
I used another Penzey’s spice mix, the Galena Street Rub. I swear they didn’t sponsor this post, but they probably should have. Sometime soon, I might write a post about my spice cabinet contents, as it has grown exponentially and deliciously. I also had canned peaches with mine. The Husband has requested this spice rub on everything. đ
We also had venison and beef Christmas/Swedish meatballs and noodles at the beginning of the week last week. They were delicious as usual. Fancy was extra excited as she got a tiny bit of the raw venison. No pictures, as we ate them too fast.
Last, but not least, I made Pannukakku, or Finnish pancake this morning and had lingonberry jam on it. Sadly, my thimbleberry dealer is slacking and I am out of it again. đ
It made my little Finnish heart all warm and cozy this morning. If the dog weren’t pinning me to the couch, I would post the recipe. Although I may have posted it before.
So that’s what we’ve eaten lately. With the exception of the two missteps, which both still tasted delicious, I think it was a pretty good couple of weeks. Now to pick the next cookbook to focus on! And find room for the new cookbooks…
I’ve got something up my sleeve for Monday or Tuesday (heh, heh, sewing pun) but wanted to get back on track with my reviews. It helps me keep accountable and on track with my goals. February has been kind of a slower month. I have had a bit of trouble with some motivation and some of the ever present scheduling concerns. Also, sudden dental issues, which always complicate things. Fancy hasn’t been helping either. She’s been very snuggly.
Overall, I have been pretty good at trying to really think through my sewing projects. I have put a 6 month fabric buying ban on myself until June. Gifts obviously don’t count. đ The other caveat is that if I need a specific fabric to finish a specific project, I can buy the fabric for that project. Otherwise some things would just pile up more until June.
My organization adventures for the month have made me aware of just how much fabric I have. Most of it has a plan for it, but there is no reason I need that much! It was quite a sobering thing. I’ve been re-evaluating my wardrobe too and have decided to repurpose or remake some of the things that really don’t fit quite how I want them to. I have already taken apart a couple of skirts that don’t fit well and added the fabric back to my stash. I have also started a list of all the things in my project box, with notes about what is needed to finish them.
So far for sewing this month, I have mended a long sleeved sweater and added buttons to a bag and a 3/4 sleeved sweater. All of these have been in my UFO or mending box for quite some time. I also learned that my sewing machine will gather fabric for my if my bobbin and top thread are at different tensions. This made sewing some gathered doll clothes a bit easier.
There have been a lot of doll clothes made in the last two months, but as I have recently acquired two more dolls from a friend’s daughter, I will need to make some more.
Can’t have naked dolls sitting around my office! Speaking of my office, I switched offices with a colleague into a bit of a bigger office and it was amazing how much stuff I had ended up squeezing in my littler one. It took me about 4-5 hours to reorganize and I need a couple of small things, like a game storage unit and a little table for next to my chair. It will be fun to see the kid client reactions to it. The adults will take it in stride, I’m sure. So the next time I take a picture of doll wardrobe at work, it will be on a different chair. đ
I have made some more leggings for myself this month, because you can never have enough comfy pants! One of them, the polar bears didn’t quite work, due to the stretch, but I can fix the waistband and it should be fine.
I don’t remember if I mentioned this amazing cutting mat that the Husband got me for Christmas, but it’s making cutting things out so much easier when I’m upstairs. I love it!
I have also made a pair of black pants, but apparently this month, have a tendency to want to write about the pants I currently have on! These ones are soft, black, French Terry, and will pass for work pants, even though I feel like I’m wearing pjs. Instead, how about a picture of my bright pink joggers? I was wearing them the last time I wanted to write about them. They are quite obnoxious, but I love them. The Husband won’t give me his opinion, as he is a smart man.
They are made from my beloved Linen Lounger pattern for Patterns for Pirates and are cotton blend french terry from Girl Charlee. I’m not really enthused about trying new pants patterns, when I like the fit of this one so well. Since my blue jean leggings need to be mended though, I have plans to make a skinnier, actual pant pattern to replace them if needed. I also do need a couple of different pairs of nicer work type pants.
One other thing I needed was a couple of nicer sweaters to wear with my pants and pretty skirts. I went through my sweaters and gave a bunch away, but now needed replacements. I like to dress up a little for intakes and not wear the dino leggings until a couple sessions in. đ Enter this pattern; the Fall In Love Sweater by Ellie and Mac.
I quite enjoy it and it makes me feel super pretty and polished. For future versions, I may size up about a half, as it occasionally feels a little tight. It doesn’t accentuate all my bumps and lumps too much though, so I may not if the fabric is stretchy.
I made this second version as a short sleeved version. It needs bands, as the fabric likes to misbehave and the bottom hem is a little short, but it looks lovely on me. At least I think it does. This pattern fits me better than my normal go to short sleeve pattern, so I will definitely be making more. It has set in sleeves, not raglan or baseball style, so it looks a little more professional.
I’ve also made a very long and cozy fleece sweater to work in the basement in, but it’s come in very handy for our recent cold snap. I think my sewing was more intentional this month. I tried to focus on the gaps in my wardrobe. My drawer is still very full, so I need to do another clear out soon. I have a horror of giving away the “perfect” shirt, but there are a bunch that I just don’t wear!
My Sewing goals for this month include a neutral grey Cocoon Cardigan to fill that gap and to try the fancier pants pattern. I also want to continue to organize and purge my stash, as well as work on some quilts and UFO’s. I have a pattern for a “Fairy Sweater” which is a cascade type sweater that I have a lighter watercolor print to try to use up, but that may wait until closer to summer.
Now to switch gears to food. We had a lot of new food this month, due to the party. I think that I missed a bunch of pictures of meals that were not party food. We did have a lot of Chinese food this month, so you may not see it for a little while. Not that we don’t like it, but there’s only so much stir fry type things I can eat. Here were some of our favorites:
They were so good! I didn’t make a dipping sauce for them. We never have Nutella in the house and I have both spoons and no will power.
The Husband had the play auditions and production meetings this week, so we had leftovers from last week, including a new recipe from The Wooden Spoon cookbook. It was not our favorite. Basically hamburger, tomato sauce, and taco seasoning with shell noodles. The Husband added a lot of cheese, but I still think it was a little bland.
One thing we did like this week was Nancy Fuller’s Creamy Stovetop Mac and Cheese from this month’s Food Network. I was hungry after work on Thursday and ended up making it at 10 pm. It was good late night snacking food though. I used a little of the dragon pepper hot sauce in it. Mmmm!
Misses for the month were the fried pork ribs and the clementine cakes. The ribs were just super annoying to fry and frustrating as I couldn’t taste them to adjust any seasoning. The cakes were a little dense for me, even remembering they were supposed to be a pound cake recipe. I need to practice cupcakes more. I’m sure no one will object to trying them. đ
Food goals this month are to use my spiralizer attachment and the Instant Pot at least once. Also, be more creative with lunches and get the Husband more involved in planning. His choices were very good ones this month.
Mental health related, I also want to get back to reading before bed this month. I’m having a lot of trouble shutting my brain down to sleep and I know that will help. I went through a rough patch of not wanting to actually do anything and I am working on not getting to that point again.
Of course, taking Fancy to interesting places is another goal. We went to an informational meeting on therapy dog training today and the information is good, but she definitely needs more training first. I’m sure she won’t mind.
These goals should be pretty manageable, I think. Hopefully once the play starts getting going, we can get somewhat of a schedule going. Wish us luck!
I think it was pretty glorious at least. You can let me know what you think after the post. Not surprisingly, we ate a lot of Chinese food after the party.
The Husband happily ate the shao mai the next day. We also had a fried rice dish that was an experiment and actually worked out! The Husband ate pork slices too.
This one is a meatball dish called Lion’s Head Meatballs from The Food of China. These were very good! They were browned and then braised for an hour and a half. Deliciously tender meatballs were the result. They get their name from the bok choy that they are cooked with that looks like a lion’s man. We did sub chicken for pork.
Another Chinese dish was West Lake Beef Soup from The Joy of Chinese Cooking by Lo Mei Hing. We have a similar dish when we go out for fancy Chinese food at Christmas with the Husband’s family and I was excited to find a recipe for it.
One interesting thing about this cookbook, which we found at a booksale last year, is that every single recipe, except desserts, calls for MSG. We omitted that, for obvious reasons, but it tells you how old it is.
After the soup, we got a little tired of Chinese food, so we had a creamy pasta and mushroom dish and a creamy shrimp dish. I only have a picture of the mushroom pasta dish because we were too hungry and devoured the shrimp dish.
The Husband also requested Chicken Marsala and it turned out delicious! We enjoyed it a lot. We had it with a salad and fruit.
I posted a naked pizza picture on Instagram because it was just too pretty to not document. đ
The crust is the Pioneer Woman recipe, which I believe is linked here already. It makes a very nice friendly dough. You can also freeze it, but I have not had good luck with that.
Here’s a picture of the finished pizza. We used diced ham, mushrooms, and onions. It had homemade roasted garlic pizza sauce on it too and mozzarella cheese too.
I tried to give Fancy some cheese while making the pizza, but she moved and it all ended up on her back instead of her mouth. Silly girl! Don’t worry, she found it all and snarfed it all up.
I’ve also made waffles and muffins for breakfast and we had grilled cheese and canned soup tonight.
I’m still debating the next book. I kind of went through Food of China by Deh-Ta Hiusing and Nina Simmonds, pretty quickly, but have used a lot of it in before as well. I will do a little bit of a review for it here.
First off, the pictures are gorgeous! It’s a huge book, more of a coffee table book rather than a regular cookbook. The instructions are pretty clear. They requesting using light soy sauce a lot, which tastes horrible, so I generally just reduce the amount and add broth or water instead.
It’s a pretty extensive book, covering everything from appetizers, dim sum, main dishes, and desserts. We’ve used a lot of the recipes from it and they’ve turned out well. If you can find the book, I would get it. It’s definitely worth it. We got it as a gift, so I don’t know where it came from.
Fancy’s latest culinary adventure involved getting her Wobble open to cheat and eat the treats faster. Apparently sweet potatoes are a high value treat option.
She’s a smart dog, but we think it might have been by accident. Hopefully. We need her to not know how to do this regularly, thank you!
This week, I hope to pick a new cookbook to focus on for meals. We had a busy week coming up, so it may be a little interesting schedule wise. The Husband has another play starting soon. Auditions are next week. If anyone wants to come snuggle Fancy, I’m sure she’d be more than happy to accept any and all belly rubs. đ
I always have trouble knowing how to end my blog posts, so I guess I’ll just say “have a good night!”
I had good intentions to write this post for the last couple days and then had very bad news at work and a couple of migraines. I’m feeling better today, luckily.
Our Lunar New Year Party was lots of fun! We had planned to watch Crazy Rich Asians, but I went a little large on the guest list and we just don’t have comfy seating for 13 people! So we’ll have to watch it another time.
We had a Dim Sum theme this year and didn’t have a big main dish, just a bunch of smaller ones. But there was still lots of food. I went to the Asian market and got huge bags of produce, which we are now eating in everything to use up. I foisted some off on my in-laws today though, so hopefully we can finish off the rest of it.
We did have some store bought things this year. I’ve given up trying to make egg rolls or spring rolls. They just aren’t worth the work for me and never seem to come out right. We bought veggie spring rolls from Costco this time.
I also used these rice packet things from the Asian market. We get these for Dim Sum, but I can’t eat them because of the pork sausage that is in them. These ones just had dried shrimp, so I picked them up. They have some lovely spices too and were nice for lunch. They are wrapped in tea leaves, so you only eat the inside.
Another Dim Sum favorite of mine is the steamed Chinese Broccoli, or Gai Lan. It’s very much like broccoli in taste, but has leaves instead of the the florets. I’m sure I was the only one to eat it, but it made my heart happy. đ
I did make two kinds of bao, although these are just the pork ones. I had 5 spice chicken bao as well, but they got eaten up quick. These were both made up recipes, although I did use a recipe for the Bao dough from The Food of China. I think I posted the recipe last year in the party post, but can repost it if you’d like it.
I roasted a whole pork loin in thinned out char sai sauce (Chinese bbq sauce) and chopped that for the pork filling. The chicken filling was ground chicken, sauces, bamboo shoots, garlic, and scallions in them.
We had pork shao mai, which was from the Husband’s family recipe book! According to the Husband, his mom and dad may have collected the recipes from his paternal grandma. Most of them are typed, but there are a couple that are handwritten. The shao mai were eaten before I started taking pictures.
The crab stuffed mushrooms were also from the book and were delicious! They called for a “creamy white sauce” so I made one to go in it. Fake crab was used. We’ve discovered that we don’t always need real crab. It was exciting to use it and there will certainly be some dinners from there as well.
The lettuce wraps look a little sad in this picture, as we had eaten most of them. These were made with ground turkey. These were my own recipe, meaning I threw a bunch of sauces and sauce ingredients at them until the filling tasted good. đ
A new recipe, that I may not make again, was fried pork ribs. I texted the Husband from the Asian Market and he was very enthusiastic. I was, of course, thinking I didn’t have enough pork and would need one more dish. I was told they were good, but only fried half of them. They spit at me a lot and burned me.
The Husband baked the rest of them for dinner during the week and said that worked too. They marinated for a long time in a 5 spice based marinade and were then battered and fried, or baked. These were from the Food of China.
I highly recommend this website, as it has so many recipes and information on it for all your Asian culinary dreams. Someday I’ll get brave enough to make the coconut buns!
Back to the cakes though. I used blood oranges. The clementines were hard to find and I didn’t want to use them. I also didn’t glaze them and intended to make a frosting, but they didn’t get frosted. I did use super cute silicone cupcake molds though that had fortunes on the bottom!
Traditional almond cookies were also served. I used the recipe from my Food of China book and didn’t have blanched almonds and just left them off the tops. These didn’t brown, except on the bottoms, so be aware of that if you make them.
I think that was all the food! We didn’t manage a picture of the whole table, but I do have a picture of a table to share!
I found this Lego version of a Lunar New Year Dinner on Amazon really randomly while looking for the lucky coins we gave as favors this year. It was only available in Malaysia, but was somehow being sold by a toy company in New Jersey. I had no idea of any of this, the Husband found out after I gave it to him. đ One of his superpowers is research. It was perfect for us though! It even has the Chinese broccoli!!
Here’s a close up of the table.
We also have started collecting the Lego zodiac sets, so here’s last year’s dog and this year’s pig.
I’ll leave you with some other pretty pictures of our decor. I nerded out a little and made the bookshelf display Firefly themed. I couldn’t help myself!
It was very fun and next year we’ll have to do some experimenting with how we want to run it. I made all of the fillings ahead of time, which helped, but I still need to rethink how we do this party. I end up making everyone feel awkward, I think, while I’m racing around trying to finish things. When I suggested a potluck idea to the Husband, he said “I’m surprised you can even say those words!” Ha.. Ha.. Ha..
I’ll let you know how it turns out. đ Have a great weekend!
As a recap, one of the new things I wanted to do with food on the blog was to focus on one or two cookbooks for a couple of weeks, to give both myself, and you a bigger picture of them. Iâm still working out what this will look like. It may involve a lot of weekend cooking, as some of them are not quick recipes. This past week it was Alex Guarnaschelliâs The Home Cook.Â
Grand plans were made while lookong through this cookbook! Sadly, grand planning didnât include fully researching the recipe, leading me to end up making some recipe substitutions. I may have to do one more week of this book, just to try more things out!
The book itself is very easy to read and extremely approachable for home cooks. I would say this would be a good cookbook for anyone, regardless of cooking level. The recipes are clearly marked, broken down into clear steps, and have the cooking terms explained, not just said. It also describes what the results should look like.
I have made several recipes from it already and have some more planned as well. I thought I should give you an update on it, so you knew I was still cooking. đ So far I have made several pasta recipes, three baked recipes, and a soup recipe. They have all been delicious! I have several more planned, but might take a break for a minute. (Ummm, probably not, I may have some planned for this weekend.)
I forgot to take a picture of the Gnocchi Mac and Cheese, but although delicious, it was not photogenic. It was a bit rich and I maybe sort of followed the recipe… I couldnât find Gueyre and used Havarti and Gouda, as well as some chedder jack. It was good, but I wouldnât make it again. I have decided that I like my gnocchi crispy. The Husband agrees.
I made Weeknight Marinara and it took a bit longer than expected, but was worth the wait. We enjoyed the little bite from the red pepper flakes.
Very similar to the Marinara was Bolognese with Rigatoni. I was worried the sauce might be too thin, but it seemed to have worked out. I used so much salt in this dish, that I was concerned, but it actually turned out absolutely delicious. The Husband said it was âthe perfect dish.â Apparently when you actually measure out the salt and follow the recipe, it turns out good! Who knew?! Seriously though, the salt was all over in the recipe, including making the pasta water taste like sea water.
We both liked this Beef Meatball Soup with Couscous and Paprika. It was delicious. Not terribly complicated to make and the only thing I just changed was to use regular paprika instead of hot paprika, as I only had the regular.
I would definitely make this again. We had it with Parker House Rolls and they were a bit heavy for my taste, but I think it was just that the dough wasnât warm enough while rising. My house is draftier than I think it is and I should have protected the bowl a little more. They tasted good though, especially after toasting them on the second day with butter to have with the marinara. The recipe made a lot, so we froze the rest. They are the featured picture on the post.
I tried two other baked recipes, the Dark Chocolate Brownies and the Double Dark Chocolate Muffins. (I see a theme emerging…)
The brownies were delicious, definitely gooey in the middle, but not under-baked. We used them to make brownie sundaes.
The Husband liked these as much as the Ghiradelli mix ones and they were pretty quick. The batter was kind of funny though, it baked with a really high sheen and so it looked like it wasnât done at all, but it actually was. I had to use an ounce of bittersweet with the other unsweetened chocolate, as I had run out.
The Husband didnât try the chocolate muffins. I may have forgotten to tell him which tin they were in. They were good and held up well. Not as sweet as chocolate muffins normally are, which was nice. I did follow this recipe. I would make them again, but maybe halve the recipe.
So over all, itâs been a pretty good experience with this cookbook. I do have lots more recipes to try, but will mostly be trying them on weekends. They arenât exactly quick recipes for when I come home late.
Weâve had some other recipes mixed in, of course, including Chicken Pot Pie, Chicken Sausage Pasta, Chicken Noodle Soup, and an Asian beef Stew from The New Pressure Cooker Cookbook by Ellen Brown. The chicken was from a really good roast chicken that refused to cook. It was apparently still a little frozen even though it didnât feel that way when I baked it. I threw a lot of the spice cupboard on it and it was yummy after it finally cooked.
Here’s the soup! I threw more of the spice cupboard in it and I actually liked it. Normally it’s a little under seasoned for me, no matter who makes it.
The Husband was my sous chef for the chicken sausage pasta dish. Look at this mise en place!
Impressive knife cuts!
The Asian Beef Stew was interesting. I was afraid the Husband wouldnât like it, but he ended up thinking it was delicious. It had Chinese 5 Spice and orange in it. I used blood orange. Mmm…
 It’s good to have a whole cookbook of pressure cooker recipes to try. I get nervous trying to find recipes and this one popped up and looked good. Some of the recipes are a bit fancy maybe, but most look good.
We ended up having chicken pot pie on the same night as my parents and the night before K and J had it. Apparently great minds think alike on cold, snowy days especially! I’m sure the other two potpies were delicious as well, both my Mom and K make excellent ones.
A Fiestaware mini cast iron!
Fancy is prepping for the upcoming polar vortex tomorrow by eating everything she can get her paws on and then stealing all the blankets. I don’t blame her. It’s already super cold!
She was super mad when we made all the chicken dishes and she couldn’t have any. She kept drooling on my foot as I was working and sighing heavy, guilt laden sighs in hopes I would have pity on her poor starving self.
I’m going to go join her and steal back my quilt now, but I hope you’ve enjoyed hearing about the recipes and are looking forward to more to come!
Iâm slowly adjusting to regular life again and I may at some point write up a food and craft review for 2018, but itâs much more fun to talk about parties! Although I did completed an astonishing 145 sewing/craft projects! I will probably write about those for sure.
We had our annual Epiphany party on January 5 and it was our most successful one yet! We had about 20- 25 people come and it was lovely to see all of them. There was a mini craft night takeover, when I think four or five of the craft night people were here. I half expected them to break out into boughts of knitting! đ The party is always an interesting mix of people since we tend to invite pretty much everyone we know who is local, and itâs fun to watch and see how much people have in common or what they end up talking about. My favorite time, of course, is when I donât have to guide any of the conversations; they all just happen naturally! The tablecloth gained many signatures this year and it made my heart full and happy. This year there were several children in attendance and Fancy was super happy. At one point there were children on all sides and she was soaking it all in. She was, of course, exhausted that night and the rest of the next day. Silly girl.
But enough of the guest talk, Iâm sure you really are much more interested in the food!
I promised a friend I would share the rulle recipe and was able to get permission from my Dad, although he seemed a bit reluctant… I sweet talked him into it though. đ
Ideally, you want a better swirl than this, but I was impatient and scaring the dog while trying to get the flank steak thinner.
So hereâs the Arten Family Rulle Recipe- from Great Grandma Asta. Hopefully if I get it too wrong, one of my parents will let me know. đ
Ingrediants:
1 flank steak, trimmed and pounded thin, 1-2 pork chops chopped finely, 1 medium onion, chopped finely, salt, pepper, âtoo much allspice.â Maybe start with a half tablespoon of allspice. I normally make a layer of allspice thick enough that the meat looks dark. Obviously, when I make it, I donât use pork. My parents used veal this year and it was pretty good, but I think you can safely just use the flank steak and it will be fine.
Method:
Cut a long piece of kitchen twine. (Longer than you think youâll need, because you really donât want to be messing around trying to cut kitchen twine covered in steak germs and allspice. Ask me how I know that one. ) After pounding out the flank steak, lay flat and add the pork chops, onions, salt, pepper, and allspice. Starting with the long side, roll the flank steak as tightly as you can around the other ingrediants, attempting to keep as much in as possible. Tie the twine as tightly as possible around the meat tying off the ends. It will shrink while cooking, so you want it extra tight.
Put the meat roll into a large pot of salted water and bring to a boil, then simmer for 2-3 hours until it smells delicous and you really want to eat it all right then. Let it cool and then put it into a bowl of saltwater brine. I figure out the brine ratio by adding salt to my bowl until it is cloudy and wonât absorb more salt. While in the beinw, the meat needs to be completely submerged, so take a jar or something with a cap, fill it with water, and put it on top of a plate or bowl that can compress it underwater. Leave it in the brine for 3-7 days.
There was some debate on this question this year and I made the rulle on New Yearâs Day and it was perfect, so around 4 days. The family recipe doesnât specify brining time, much to our suprise. The day you want to serve it, drain the meat roll and cut off the twine. Using a serrated knife, cut thin slices. Cooks get to âtestâ all the bits that come off while cutting and you can hoard them from other people if you want. đ Put the rulle on thin sliced, buttered bread. My parents use rye, but I donât enjoy the little cocktail rye bread, so prefer to use french bread. Let me know if you make it!
We had crab dip and the family meatballs, as well as a cheese and meat tray. I didnât get to eat the Christmas Eve meatballs at my parentsâ house this year and was surprised by how much I missed them. There wasnât time to make a porkless batch before my parentsâ party. Their table looked like this:
Just in case you were wondering where I get my crazy ideas of appropriate amounts of party food from. Thatâs the family tablecloth, which has been in our family since the 60âs. There was moose on the table, thanks to my younger brotherâs girlfriend and her dad. Apparently this moose was trying to stomp on his sled dogs, so he had some extra meat for the winter.
So Scadinavian tradition says you should have 7 different kinds of cookies and a filled cake, but I was short on the cake part. I did have 8 kinds of cookies though, so I figured it worked. A lot of the cookies on our table this year were not the traditional ones from my childhood. We decided that on the years we go up to visit for Christmas, I maybe donât need to make as many. This year, there were three cookie recipes that were repeated and the rest were new.
Chewy Chocolate Chip, Chocolate Peppermint Cookies, and Apple Pie Tassies
The Husband enjoys chewy chocolate chip cookies the most, so these have been the best recipe we have found so far. Itâs from a Food Network instert book of 50 Chocolate Chip Cookies. I have no idea which edition it came from.
The Chocolate Peppermint Cookies were awful. Dry as a dessert, not enough mint flavor and I ended up throwing probably half the dough away. Far too many unladylike words were coming out of my mouth. The directions were confusing too and the dough would not roll out evenly no matter what I did. I actually think you need an industrial asphalt roller to make it work. They were from this yearâs Christmas Cookie Edition of Food Network- December 2018.
The Apple Pie Tassies were from December 2017. They were definitely a hit. I accidentally used the whole block of cream cheese, instead of just 6 oz, but I think it made it better. The dough starts with cream cheese and two sticks of butter, so hard to mess up. I would make these again, but make the shells smaller, so that the filling to shell ratio was more even.
Brownie Cookies, Maple Snickerdoodles
These were both from December 2018 FN too. The maple snickerdoodles were from a gift idea page in the front. I was a bit disappointed in the lack of aple flavor. It called for maple sugar and I probably should have used the maple syrup substitution instead. We have the delicious syrup from our friendsâ Sugarbush that I would like to try. They tasted good though, just not enough maple.
The Brownie cookies are fantastic! I made a different recipe in the UP and that one was not as fudgy and delicious. This one tastes pretty much like the middle of a brownie, which is my very favorite part. The Husband might like these almost as much as the chocolate chip ones, so they will definitely go on my rotation. It makes a smaller batch too, so less chance of leftovers. Not that youâll have leftovers.
We had to have PB balls, of course. They were one of the traditional things on the table and I think have ruined me for Reeseâs! I mean, these arenât that complicated and are sooooo much better!
One of our friends brought us a Japanese cheesecake to try and it was really good. I was especially excited to try it, as I had wanted to make one for the cheesecake battle. It was a bit more like cake in texture than cheesecake, but was still delicious. There is a possibility that I ate it for breakfast.
We had a pickle tray with many homemade pickles on it, including some of the squash pickles that made my Dad eat zucchini. Apparently besides using it as a bazooka, pickles are the only way to eat that particular squash. đ My Mom graciously gave me a bigger pickle tray this year, so we used that and it made them look even prettier.
Storebought gherkins, Garlic Hot Pickles, and Squash pickles. The hot ones made my Dad hiccup and surpised quite a few other people as well.
These lemon cookies were dairy and gluten free and were suprisingly good. Iâve not had a lot of luck with gluten free cookies that arenât grainy, but these were fluffy and light. They are from this website: https://www.noshtastic.com/easy-lemon-cookies-gluten-dairy-free/
Everyone enjoyed them, especially the people with some dietary restrictions. Made with margarine, they end up being vegan too, I believe.
We had so many people at the party that when our close friends came later in the party, I cornered K and reported that I was almost out of cheese and there were only three brownie cookies left. She talked me down and we enjoyed the rest of the party, but letâs assume I had some pretty crazy eyes going on there.
In exciting, non-party culinary adventures, we had friends over for pjs, Pixar movies, and fancy foods on New Yearâs eve. I made Scallops, but they were not pretty, so no pictures. We had lobster Mac and Cheese from the October 2018 FN, I think. Itâs a Pioneer Woman recipe, if you want to look it up on the FN website. We enjoyed it and used lobster tails so I wouldnât freak out as much about cooking a whole lobster.
Itâs hard to see, but itâs Christmas pas
K brought a Pioneer Woman Twice Baked Potato that was divine! She also brought veggies and a cheese and cracker selection. You know, because the four of us became an army overnight and needed additional foodstuffs… Thatâs probably a big reason weâre such good friends.
For New Yearâs Day breakfast, we had homemade Sour Cream Doughnuts from Voracious by Cara Nicoletti. They were delicious and mostly had hearts in the middle. We made cinnamon sugar and glazed doughnuts. The glaze in the book was a terrible one and just soaked into the doughnuts and made them soggy. We ended up just making our own with milk and powdered sugar. We had eggs and chicken apple sausages too to counteract the sugar.
But even before our exciting New Year foods, we did something even crazier. I made a molten lava cake in the Instant Pot to go along with a very nicely grilled steak. It was all the Husbandâs fault because he looked so shocked that you could make a lava cake in the Instant Pot. I would use a bittersweet chocolate next time. The semi sweet was not decadent enough.
Look at those grill marks!
I think I finally decided what to do with the food portion of the blog this year. The Husband got me Alex Guarnaschelliâs The Home Cook for Christmas and there are so many good recipes that it made me think I should take some time and really focus individually on my cookbooks. I made it through most of them, but there are still a bunch of recipes in each I would like to try. So for the next little while, I will be taking a closer look at each book. Iâm still not sure how my posts will be structured, but hopefully it will be interesting.
Not surprisingly, the first one will be the Guarnaschelli cookbook. I have several dishes from it planned for this week, along with some old favorites too.
For now though, I should probably go to bed, before the thought of all those recipes makes me hungry again! Have a good night!
