beach blondies with corona and lime

Believe it or not, I actually made these Corona Blondies back in January for an Oscars party. I added lime zest and juice to the original recipe and called them Hawaiian Corona Blondies in honor of nominee The Descendants. It was a pretty tenuous link to the film, but Corona does like to market themselves as a beer to drink while lounging at the beach, so I figured it sort of fit together with the film's paradisaical setting. 

romantic dinner

I'm truly disappointed in how these photos came out, but this meal was just too special for me not to talk about it just because it was kind of a hot mess for the camera. This year, with Nathan back at school, we've kind of scaled back on our big special occasion dinners, and have made fancy meals at home rather than shelling out the big bucks at a restaurant. For Valentine's Day we made this duck breast with orange gastrique, aligot mashed potatoes, braised leeks and then a lightening-fast chocolate mousse for dessert.

french apple cake/super fast sauteed apples and ice cream

So remember when my friends and I went apple picking?




Cute right? Yeah I know. Not so cute? The utterly homely but totally delicious and gooey apple cake. It's kind of brown and ugly, and I could barely get it out of the pan, but damn if it wasn't really, really good.

red velvet beet cookie and cream cheese ice cream sandwiches

I don't really like beets all that much, which you may have picked up on, considering that every time my food co-op forces them upon me, I reluctantly come up with some sort of way to cook them for which I can muster only minimal enthusiasm. Yeah that's usually how it goes. Not a total clunker in the bunch, but nothing that made me jump up and say "YES! This is the beet I have been waiting for and now we are in LOVE," and I'm beginning to think it's just never gonna happen.




So basically, this is me giving up on making a "beet dish" that I would really enjoy and just hiding them in a big fat chocolatey cookie. Of course, you occasionally hear about people making "all natural" red velvet cake with beets instead of red food coloring (which is actually more traditional, believe it or not). I could have gone that route, with a delicious cream cheese frosting, but I really wanted to whip up David Lebowitz's cream cheese ice cream, which made me think of ice cream sandwiches, which led me to these red velvet beet cookies.

stone fruit salad with ginger, lime and mint

I don't think that I have anything else like this on the blog: peaches and nectarines with ginger lime syrup. How good does that sound?

I'm sorry that I didn't post this back when we all actually eat delicious summer peaches and nectarines. I have to work on updating this blog in a more timely fashion, but it's just so easy to fall behind. I'm sorry; I will try to be better.

strawberry sour cream pie

I made this for the 4th of July, if you couldn't guess based on the patriotic table cloth. For the second year running, I went up to my friend Kristina's house in Winthrop, Massachusetts. Her mother has amazing patriotic decorations, and this table cloth only scratches the surface.

caramelized bananas over oatmeal

I remember the first time I learned that you could utterly transform bananas into sweet, chewy, crisp, melty banana candy simply by slicing them and pan frying them with butter. I had helped my friend Kevin move, and as a thank you he made breakfast. It was either french toast or waffles, both of which I love and would have been more than satisfied with. Then he asked if I wanted bananas, and I was blown away.




Obviously, caramelized and fried bananas are hardly a culinary innovation. This is basically the same concept of Bananas Foster, without the theatrics of flambeing.

I don't add sugar when I caramelize my bananas, and they are still plenty sweet. If yours aren't particularly ripe, I suppose sugar would help, but I'd honestly advise waiting until the fruit sweetens up naturally in order to yield the best result.

There are two basic versions of this dish: thin sliced and thick sliced. Thick slices afford for the most variation in texture and flavor in each piece, as the center of a thick slice of banana will taste purely of banana. This is very good, but usually I like to slice my banana really thinly, which means that the inner banana gets very soft and almost melts away, while the exterior becomes a delicately crispy sugar shell. If you don't have enough butter in the pan, the fruit can easily stick and all the slices can quickly become a sticky caramelly mess. If that threatens to happen to you, do not fret. It's not as pretty, but it will still taste amazing.




So what can you do with these golden little beauties? They are a welcome addition to breakfasts, brunches and desserts. You could stuff them into crepes with mascarpone or ricotta, layer them with puff pastry and whipped cream, pile them atop a stack of pancakes or french toast, serve them over ice cream... The possibilities are endless.

Today, I chose oatmeal. It was an excellent way to enliven a somewhat dull breakfast food!

green pepper relish/apple crisp

spicy green pepper relish

Happy Friday everyone! I am currently drinking wine at my friend Lauren's apartment after Hill Country Fried Chicken and their awesome biscuits. I don't really want to be writing a blog post right now, but I am supposed to be doing this every day for the month. So yeah, here it goes. Needless to say, I am going to keep this short.


lots of apple crisp

Last month Lauren had a group of us over once again, and this is what I brought: green pepper relish, and apple crisp.

I made the green pepper relish because I had poblano peppers from the food co-op. I didn't know they were nearly as spicy as they are. In fact, I thought they were like, green bell peppers. Whoops. So instead of one tiny jalapeno and one much larger bell pepper, I had a one to one ratio of poblano to bell pepper. Whoops. My friend Mike loved the relish, but Lauren and I both found it oppressively spicy. I would have liked it if it maybe had about a quarter of the poblanos in it, which it probably should have if I just followed the recipe as written. Thanks food co-op, for not labeling your peppers.


a delicious fall treat with ice cream

Luckily, the apple crisp Laura and I threw together was way more successful. If I'm being honest, she actually made this on her own, but after she constructed it, I baked it, and I ate it, and I am perfectly qualified to tell you just how good it was: fucking delicious.

The oats, butter, flour and brown sugar topping was perfectly crisp and toasty, coating the spiced apples with tasty deliciousness. With vanilla ice cream, it's a perfect fall dessert. So thanks to Lauren for letting me use her laptop for this post, and for letting me bring this food to her house!

plum compote with vanilla ice cream and fresh whipped cream

plum compote

I don't know about you, but one of the things I miss most about summer is stone fruit. There's nothing better than sinking your teeth into a ripe, juicy peach, plum or nectarine. Of course, that makes a mushy or flavorless specimen all the more disappointing. I love a good plum, but since they are often fairly tart, it's harder to find a really delicious one.

Back in September, we got a bunch of slightly tart but nice little plums. They weren't quite sweet enough on their own for my taste, so I baked some of them into a cake. After a couple of days, the remaining plums started to get a little overripe an squishy. I couldn't let them go to the waste so this is what I came up with: a compote.


boozy plum compote with fresh whipped cream over vanilla ice cream

I think this is a compote, anyway. Basically, I just chopped up the plums and added a little sugar, a dash of cinnamon and a glug of my vanilla bean rum. Then I let it bubble away for 15 or so minutes until it got all stewed and syrupy delicious.

I may have made it a tad too sweet, but it was still incredibly delicious hot from the pot, served over vanilla ice cream with fresh whipped cream. I have to admit I ate this compote all by myself, but I bet it would make a pretty impressive and totally easy dessert for company. I know it'll be a while before plums are in season again, so maybe that's not the most helpful suggestion. Perhaps you could try apples? Maybe I'll test it out. Based on my track record you should expect a blog post in about two months.

pumpkin ice cream

creamy, boozy, pumpkin ice cream

I would like to start by apologizing for this utterly unappetizing photo. There is, however, a story behind it.

When I invited Hannah and Lauren over for dinner, the plan was to end our evening with some freshly churned pumpkin ice cream. Hannah had been diagnosed with chronic myelogenous leukemia in August, and after a month of heavy treatment she was feeling well enough to make it into the city for the weekend. I'd told her about my shiny new ice cream machine and promised to make her whatever flavor she wanted. I was excited when she chose pumpkin. Of course, that meant I had to buy canned pumpkin, which, believe it or not, was simply no where to be found in my two neighborhood grocery stores!

Therefore, our dinner went on as scheduled, but we sadly postponed pumpkin ice cream. Luckily, Hannah didn't have to wait too long– it debuted to great acclaim the following evening, when Grace threw a small party in Hannah's honor. Ms Spangler set out a big taco bar with all the fixins and your choice of chicken, pork carnitas and ground beef. She made all that from scratch plus Mexican corn with lime, mayo, cheese and chili powder. I wish I had taken pictures because it was such a sight to see. It was quite a feast, and I only wish my jaw had been in better working order at the time so as to more fully enjoy everything.

When looking for a pumpkin ice cream recipe, I turned first to The Perfect Scoop, aka the ice cream bible. Disappointingly, I came up empty-handed. One "pumpkin ice cream," google search later and it quickly became apparent that I was not the only one mourning its exclusion. The very first hit was from the author David Lebovitz's blog, where he thoughtfully provided this recipe.

Once I procured the necessary pumpkin, I proceeded to follow the recipe almost exactly as written. Unlike Rick Bayless's corn ice cream, which used a double boiler to make the custard, Lebovitz's instructions call for whisking the eggs in a bowl and then slowly adding the heated milk/cream/sugar/spice mixture to it. Then you pour all of that back into the pot and stir over a low flame until the custard thickens.

I don't know if maybe I just don't really understand what a thickened egg custard should look like or what, but just as I did with the corn ice cream, I had problems. This time, not only was it not thickening, but it actually kept curdling, the egg separating from the cream and turning all grainy and gross. However, I took a tip from my friend Megan, and popped in my immersion blender whenever that happened. This brought everything back together just fine, but after the third cycle of abortive thickening, accidentally curdling and scrambling to blend it back together, I gave up and moved on.

I added brown sugar and transferred the custard to an ice bath, adding the pumpkin puree. At the point the recipe called for a half teaspoon of vanilla extract and two teaspoons of rum or brandy. Instead, I used my vanilla bean infused rum, adding quite a bit more than the recipe called for. I figured it would make it extra creamy and delicious, since it would keep the ice cream from freezing as hard. I was right, but in this particular case this did cause some issues.

Once everyone had eaten their fill, I pulled out my carefully transported pumpkin ice cream from the freezer for dessert. It was lucky that this event took place on September 11th, rather than August 11th. As you can see, it got kind of soft and melty, on its trip downtown. It probably never froze all the way to begin with, and having it out on the train didn't help matters at all. Even an hour or so to recover in Grace's freezer made no noticeable difference. I can only imagine how soupy it would have been if I had attempted to travel with it in the middle of New York's oppressively hot summer of 2010.

Of course, even slightly melted ice cream can be delicious, and this one was no exception. I was shocked I had made something so rich, creamy and wonderful! This was a very, very good batch of ice cream. It wasn't too aggressively pumpkiny, but it was smooth and decadently delicious with a hint of fall spices. Hannah, you picked a winner!

I haven't broken out the ice cream maker since, and this will certainly be a tough act to follow. Hopefully, next time around I can conquer the custard!

dimply plum cake: homely but delicious

the famous dimply plum cake

Geeze. If you want a real idea of how infrequently I've been blogging lately, consider this: I baked this cake on September 3th. It is now November 1st, and New York has seen the temperatures dip into the thirties as the days begin to get shorter and shorter. September already seems like long ago, but try to remember to way back then: it was the Friday of Labor Day weekend. The East Coast was prepped for a massive hurricane set to put a major damper on the holiday. I had spent the afternoon at the hospital for my jaw's grand reopening. Though this was very exciting, it was also somewhat of a painful process. The wires had been drilled through my gums to hold the arch bars in place, so pulling them out required lots of novocain and left my gums inflamed and sore.

Even though they had replaced the wires clamping my teeth shut with more forgiving rubber bands a week and a half before, my jaw was still fragile and weak, which precluded me from eating all but the softest foods. Regardless, I was excited to be on the mend and free of the unslightly metal braces for the first time in over 5 weeks. I was looking forward to spending the weekend out on Long Island with Nathan's family and my own, and to putting my injury behind me.

I like to be a good house guest, so I spent that Friday night baking this dimply plum cake for Nathan's step-mom's friends Liz and Harry, who were kind enough to invite us to their home.


smooshed plum cake

I know that is one shockingly ugly cake. I foolishly wrapped it up in foil for easy transit before it cooled, so it steamed in the wrapper and the top turned into an unsightly sticky mess. Of course, we don't eat cake because it looks good– we eat cake because of the way it tastes. This cake, a recipe by Dorie Greenspan, is an internet sensation, so my expectations were high. The cake was less sweet than most, but pleasantly so, and was nice and moist from the large chunks of fruit. I was happy to use so many of my food co-op plums to make it, and I liked the hint of cinnamon flavor. It was a good dessert to usher in fall with the last of summer's stone fruit. Very seasonal, but not actually the most inspiring dessert you've ever eaten.

As luck would have it, the over-hyped Earl stayed off shore and the weather held up beautifully. We went swimming, took a motorboat out to Fire Island and foraged for beach plums on Saturday before heading north to Northport and spending Sunday sailing in the bay with my Dad. As for the food, I obviously missed out on all the grilled steak and corn on the cob at dinner, but Nathan's step-mom Patricia and step-sister Helen made sure there was plenty of soft and juicy salmon for me to enjoy.

Dessert was even easier, as cakes and pies can easily be mashed up into easily swallowed spoonfuls. With my wires gone, eating the same plate of dessert as everyone else, I was finally able to forget about my broken jaw and begin to enjoy food again. Based on taste alone, dimply plum cake may not have been the revelation I hoped for. I imagine that there are other plum based desserts that are just as good, if not better, even if their names aren't as cute. That being said, it was still delicious. Everyone else told me they liked it, but to me, at that point in time, dimply plum cake tasted like hope.

corn ice cream with sugared strawberries and balsamic vinegar

long over due corn ice cream

Oh man. I probably killed whatever minuscule readership I had by taking a little hiatus there. Whoops. Anyway, I am back. With more ice cream!

Back during the summer Laura and I were getting 6 ears of beautiful fresh summer corn a week. It was always incredibly delicious, but it was also a lot for two girls to handle. We made soups and salad, and ate it off the cob when my face wasn't sealed shut. These were definitely good, but it was all pretty standard savory fare and I wanted to try my hand at a corn dessert that would take let the corn's natural sweetness take center stage. I thought about making a corn budino pudding, but I didn't really know how to go about it. Then I remembered the corn custard they served last summer at the Shake Shack, which, despite my initial skepticism, I thought was pretty awesome. As you can probably imagine, I quickly decided it was time for my second batch of homemade ice cream!

Some quick googling for corn ice cream turned up a Rick Bayless recipe. Based on his Top Chef appearances, I think Rick is incredibly awesome, and while I haven't had the opportunity to eat at either of his restaurants, his picadillo recipe yields a rich melting pot of sweet and savory flavors that I could eat any night of the week. So, I was excited to try my hand at another one of his dishes.


corn ice cream over zesty strawberries with aged balsamic

I followed the recipe as written, save for swapping out the orange liqueur with some dark rum. It seemed like it would be fairly easy, for the most part. Of course, I anticipated difficulty with cooking the egg custard, and it did not disappoint. I stirred the egg, cream and corn mixture over a double boiler for like, fifty minutes and it never thickened! This was during the summer, so it was oppressively hot and even more so over the stove. Eventually I just gave up. I think my ice cream was thinner and less creamy as a result, but then again my vanilla ice cream was plenty creamy, and it wasn't thickened with a custard base. Perhaps I just need to get more comfortable in general with the ice cream making process.

Other than getting my custard to thicken, there's not much I would do differently. Of course, I made this just a week or so after I had my wires opened, so I was sick of straining all the little pieces out of my food. I knew I should, but I couldn't bare the thought of anymore of that time consuming nonsense, so I left in the smashed corn kernels. It tasted ok, but didn't do much for the ice cream's texture. If I made this again, I'd definitely go through the trouble of straining it all.


strawberries and ice cream in a fancy presentation by my standards

So I was pretty certain that the corn ice cream would be delicious by itself, but I was making a big vegetarian dinner for my boy, and I wanted a slightly more impressive presentation. Laura had bought a big carton of strawberries in China Town, and Nathan had brought back a tiny bottle of aged balsamic vinegar from Florence. I found a nice recipe for strawberries in a zesty balsamic syrup, so I decided that I would serve my ice cream atop that.

I quickly boiled sugar, water and lemon peel, and then let that sit in the fridge while Nathan and I ate dinner. To serve, I filled a ramekin with strawberries, added a scoop of the corn ice cream, and then drizzled on a few drops of the expensive balsamic. Even Nathan was impressed with how elegant and delicious it was! The corn ice cream was sweet and custardy, with a subtle corn flavor, and the strawberries were bright and delicious with a hint of citrus. I liked the what I could taste of the balsamic, but wish I had added it with a more generous hand. I think I was just afraid of wasting such an expensive ingredient, but using a little more really would have made the strawberries sing.

It was a great dessert to end a great meal. Man, I definitely need to get that ice cream machine churning again!

brown sugar and sour cream raspberry gratin

I went home for the weekend when they opened my jaw and replaced the wires sealing me shut with rubber bands. When I came back, there was a giant crate of raspberries in the fridge, which Laura encouraged me to help her finish. Twist my arm a bit, why don't you?


raspberry gratin with sour cream and brown sugar

So, one morning I made us breakfast by popping these super easy brown sugar and sour cream raspberry gratins under the broiler for a few minutes and then topping them with homemade vanilla ice cream. Part of a well balanced breakfast, obviously, and perfectly soft and swallowable for a broken jaw.


raspberries topped with sour cream, brown sugar, and broiled until crisp and melty

All you have to do in top a layer of raspberries with a layer of sour cream, a sprinkling of brown sugar, and then broil it until the brown sugar caramelizes and everything get warmed through. It takes like five minutes from start to finish, and its predictably delicious. Ooey gooey fresh fruit, creamy and with a touch of brown sugar, you'll absolutely inhale this dish.

I made mine in individual ramekins, which would be a great dinner party dessert, especially topped with ice cream or fresh whipped cream. I assembled mine the night before, which made a quick breakfast even more achievable, and such a technique would work beautifully if you were serving this to a large group.

I went a little light on the brown sugar, because I didn't want it to be too sweet, but if you want a more substantial crust, feel free to add more. Enjoy!

ice cream!

So I got the most awesome get well soon present after I broke my jaw. It was an ice cream machine, thoughtfully sent to me by Nathan's family. They knew that I was incredibly impressed by Tenli's homemade blackberry swirl ice cream, and they knew my post injury diet consisted of almost entirely milk shakes. Basically, this gift was the perfect fit— a big thank you to Tenli, Marie, Raisa and Weston!


my ice cream maker churning away on its first batch

They also thoughtfully included a copy of David Lebovitz's exhaustive ice cream cookbook, One Perfect Scoop. It has tons of amazing recipes for ice cream, gelato, frozen yogurt, sorbets and granitas, as well as delightful things to mix in or sprinkle on top of your cold confections. I of course read the whole book cover to cover and was able to learn quite a bit about frozen, churned desserts.

One thing that you may not already know is that many types of ice cream are made from a custard base. This is generally made by carefully cooking egg yolks with cream and sugar until the mixture thickens. I say carefully because egg yolks cooked over direct heat have a very strong tendency to scramble and harden, which doesn't make a very good ice cream base at all. If this sounds intimidating, you are not alone, which is why I chose an ice cream that did NOT have a custard base for my very first batch.


easy ice cream

To be specific, I made a Philadelphia style vanilla, and to be fair, I have always preferred that to French vanilla ice cream. Some thing about the crisp visual contrast between the white ice cream and the dark speckles of vanilla bean is way more appealing to me than the rich, eggy yellowness of French vanilla. I like both, but Philadelphia vanilla has long been my favorite of all ice cream flavors. It certainly didn't hurt that it was the easiest of all David's recipes, but there's a good chance that I would have gone with a classic vanilla as my first flavor regardless. I love it that much.

How easy is the recipe? Here, I'll give it to you.

Vanilla Ice Cream, Philadelphia Style
(from David Lebovitz's One Perfect Scoop, published 2007)
2 cups heavy cream
1 cup whole milk
¾ cup sugar
pinch of salt
1 vanilla bean, split in half lengthwise
¾ tsp vanilla extract

Pour one cup of the cream into a medium saucepan and add the sugar and salt. Scrape the seeds from the vanilla bean into the saucepan and add the pod to the pot. Warm over medium heat, stirring, until the sugar is dissolved.

Remove from the heat and add the remaining cup of cream, the cup of milk and the vanilla extract.

Chill the mixture thoroughly in the refrigerator. When ready to churn, remove the vanilla bean, rinsing and reserving it for another use, and then freeze the mixture in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer's instructions.


Philly vanilla with fresh whipped cream

Beautiful, easy and delicious. Wow. Tasted exactly like every other Philadelphia style vanilla I've ever had, which is to say AWESOME. I had some extra heavy cream, so I quickly made some whipped cream with my electric mixer. A classy, classic, all white combo.

This was actually the second thing I was able to eat after my wires were snipped and I went on the soft food diet. (Nathan made me some Gordon Ramsay scrambled eggs for lunch, but then I went home and made this.) Let me tell you, it quite hit the spot.

I know that an ice cream machine is a bit of an investment, both monetarily, and in terms of much coveted kitchen space, but I'm really enjoying mine. Being able to churn my own ice cream has opened a whole new world of culinary possibilities, I'd encourage you to get one yourself if this is something you'd like to do at home. Big thanks again to Tenli and Marie for the super amazing gift!

foraged beach plum and strawberry crisp

So this weekend was my first one without wires in over 5 weeks. I celebrated by heading out to Long Island with Nathan. There, we spent time with our respective families and enjoyed ourselves out on the water. In addition to sailing in Northport Harbor with my dad, we also got to take a motor boat out to Fire Island, which was surprisingly beautiful. It really felt like it was miles and miles from anything. Gorgeous.



Here we are out on the beach. The surf was incredibly rough courtesy of the otherwise utterly unimpressive Hurricane Earl, so we couldn't go swimming, but it was still awesome.



That first photo is just a small sample of the mind blowingly beautiful view. What you can't see is that the small, scrubby looking little bushes on either side of the walkway are actually laden with these tiny and tart beach plums. They look a little bit like overgrown blueberries, and are sweet with a tangy bitter aftertaste. Nathan and I had never seen them before, but we foraged a few handfuls, which we transported in my camera case, and took home to bake with.



Like the friendly Fire Island natives who assured us that these strange fruits were edible, my mom knew exactly what the beach plums were, and that they are most commonly made into jam. I like jam, but I don't use it all that often. Instead, I decided to make a nice beach plum crisp for dessert.



Here is the recipe, which either my mom or I clipped from Newsday years ago, although it says it was distributed by Los Angeles Times Syndicate. Anyway, I was only able to forage a small amount of beach plums, so I had to scale everything way down. We had only enough for four very small servings, so it must have been less than half the amount. I did not adjust the ratios in the written recipe, because I don't think I could accurately represent them. The great thing about crisps is that it's not a real topping, but just a crumbly topping that basically toasts on top of the fruit. It's very hard to mess up.



I also made a few substitutions with the ingredients, so I made those adjustments. The topping called for half butter and half oil, but my mom insisted on all butter, which worked perfectly. I also swapped out a couple of tablespoons of apple juice in the crust for maple syrup. The fruit filling was the most significant change. Originally, it included plums, blueberries and peaches or nectarines. I obviously used beach plums instead, and also strawberries, or else it would have been a little bitty baby crisp. Obviously, you can interchange whatever kind of fruits you have around. Also, I accidentally used regular sugar instead of the prescribed brown, with no ill effects. Finally, the serving suggestion was with vanilla frozen yogurt, but we went with Philadelphia style vanilla. Yum.



Without further ado:

Beach Plum-Berry Crisp
Topping:
¾ cup brown sugar, packed
¾ cup rolled oats
¾ cup flour
4 tbsp butter
2 tbsp maple syrup

Fruit Filling
2 pounds ripe beach plums, pitted and sliced
2 cups sliced strawberries
¼ cup maple syrup
3 tablespoons sugar
2 tbsp cornstarch
2 tbsp fresh lemon juice
¼ tsp ground nutmeg
dash ground ginger

1 qt vanilla ice cream, optional

1. Preheat oven to 400°. For topping, combine sugar, oats and flour in large bowl. Blend in butter until crumbly. Stir in maple syrup with fork until mixture is evenly moistened. Set aside.
2. For filling, combine beach plums, strawberries, maple syrup, sugar, cornstarch, lemon juice, nutmeg and ginger and toss gently to combine in a shallow 2-quart baking dish.
3. Sprinkle topping evenly over the fruit mixture. Bake for about 40 minutes, or until top is golden and filling is bubbling. Let cool about 10 minutes. Serve hot or warm, with vanilla ice cream. Makes 8 servings.



It was slightly tart because of the beach plums, but super delicious and easy. And I got to forage! So cool!

avocado chocolate pudding

So in the event that you break your jaw, you'll probably end up googling your condition. Before too long you'll find the number one food blog on the subject, Jaws Wired Shut. I have to admit, I didn't spend all that much time poking around there, mainly because finding a bunch of specialized recipes would mean accepting that this injury would be defining my diet for a significant amount of time. Even after the two weeks of wires turned into four, I was still in a bit of denial. Frankly, I wanted to avoid dwelling on my situation, and a lot of the suggestions were things I figured out on my own, like adding peanut butter and bananas to my milkshakes.

However, I did find a couple of ideas during my limited browsing. For one, I blended one of the cupcakes Laura and I bought for our friend Matt's birthday from Magnolia bakery into a delicious milk shake. The second meal I prepared is currently the most recently posted entry, a avocado chocolate pudding, playfully called "chocomole." It sounds pretty bizarre, I admit, but the picture looked just like a creamy, rich chocolate pudding should.


avocado chocolate pudding

See?

All you need is a food processor and a few simple ingredients, and you can transform an avocado into a very unlikely dessert. I substituted cocoa powder for the 3½ tablespoons raw cacao powder, but other than that I followed the recipe as written. One avocado, ½ teaspoon vanilla extract, ¼-½ cup water, ¼ teaspoon cinnamon, ⅓ cup maple syrup, and ¼ teaspoon salt simply blended together in the food processor = pudding! It sounds crazy, but it really does work.

It was good, but it had a rather oily texture that became rather unpleasant after awhile. I poured some half and half on top, which helped with the sliminess, but it was still a bit too cinnamonny. I think that this is a rather clever way to make a more healthy and nutritious chocolate pudding, but it was a little strange and probably wouldn't appeal to people who aren't on soft or liquid diets.


half and half makes everything better

This wasn't a failure by any means, but there was definitely something slightly off about it. Just not quite the pudding you're used to. Which I suppose shouldn't be surprising, since it's made from avocados.

many milkshakes

I know I promised you soups and such, but first I have a simple little post about what I'd mainly been subsisting on before I broke down and actually cooked something:

Milkshakes.



This one was peanut butter banana nutella. It was tasty once blended.

I've also been using a lot of strawberries, blueberries, raspberries and even some cantaloupe. In the beginning I mixed in sour cream and yogurt into these shakes, but lately it's been ice cream. I have vanilla, chocolate, peach, and orange sherbet/vanilla creamsickle.

As a liquid mixer, I was using Ensure, but I wasn't crazy about the taste, so when my supply ran out after two weeks, I opted not to buy any more, switching over to milk. I also have some Tropicana orange juice, and these delicious Naked juices my neighbor Leah was kind enough to bring by when she heard about my injury. The blueberry and mango blend well into fruit smoothies, but I kept the green machine flavor to drink on its own, mainly because it's a very dark green color and I thought the color wouldn't do my smoothies any favors.

My friends Marc, Salmaan, Dave, Grace and Lauren came over on Friday for a puree party, but we only ended up making milkshakes. (Except Nathan, who insisted on making something so disgusting that it will have to wait for another entry.) We didn't add any berries to our Friday night milkshakes, which was a nice change of pace since I didn't have to strain out the seeds or blueberry skins. Just nice smooth ice cream, bananas, milk and oreos.

As an added treat, Grace bought me a fun sundae glass and some pretty colored straws. They are awesome and cheer up any sad puree.



Look how nice my strawberry shake looks now!

peachy blueberry muffins

peachy blueberry muffins crusted with butter, sugar and chopped walnuts

This recipe comes from my mom's best friend Julie, who is also my brother's godmother. She's the closest type of family friend. For example, we spend every Christmas Eve at her house, enjoying all sorts of Italian fish dishes prepared by Julie, her husband Jimmy and their son James. Fried calamari, penne alla vodka and stuff clams... Great cooks all of them, and my mom has certainly adopted more than one of the Frangione family recipes into our kitchen over the years.

This peachy blueberry muffin recipe is one of them, and it is without doubt a treasure. Julie told me she adapted it from Coldwell Banker of all places, adding the blueberries among other changes. Coldwell is a realtor and I guess they used to put out monthly fliers with house selling tips, one of which was to make these muffins for a summer open house. I have to say, if anything could sell me a house, it might be these muffins. They're not too sweet, and the fruit pieces burst open in your mouth like candy. The butter sugar and walnuts combine to form an amazing crunchy sweet topping, and the sour cream moistened batter is soft and delicious. Best eaten fresh out of the oven, these can get a bit soggy the second day, so it's best to revive them in the toaster before you eat them again. They work really well as muffins, but you could also bake them in a pan and cut into bars. However you make these, please don't skip them. There isn't anything better you could make with sweet summer peaches and blueberries. I'd be hard pressed to name a baked good I love more.


the fruit studded interior of a peachy blueberry muffin

My mom hadn't made these in years, probably not since before high school, but they still loomed large in my memory. Earlier in the week Nathan's grandma gave us each a pint of blueberries, (they were on sale, three for $5), and then I got peaches from my food co-op. My mind immediately jumped to these muffins. I called up my brother and asked him to scan the recipe for me. Matt actually couldn't figure out how to scan on the printer, so he took four photos of the recipe which I had to paste together. It was pretty ghetto, but had absolutely no bearing on the final recipe. When I baked these up last Saturday morning, New York was still in the middle of the heat wave from hell, but cranking up the oven and overheating my apartment before noon was still well worth it. They were just as perfectly delicious as I remembered.

Peachy Blueberry Muffins
Muffin:
1¾ cup flour
¾ cup sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
2 eggs, slightly beaten
1 cup sour cream
¼ cup melted butter
1 tsp vanilla
1½ cup chopped peaches (this was three fairly small peaches for me cut into sixths that I then chopped into thirds)
1 cup blueberries
Topping:
½ cup chopped walnuts
½ cup sugar
¼ cup butter, soft

Combine flour, sugar, baking powder in bowl. Add mixture of eggs, sour cream, butter, vanilla, peach chunks and blueberries: mix till just moistened. Full 12 greased muffin cups three quarters full.Mix topping and sprinkle over muffins.

Bake at 400° for 25 minutes.

It actually took me at least 40 minutes to bake these, and there might have been a bit too much butter in the topping, but those are only the minorest of complaints when faced with a muffin this awesomely delicious.


the blueberries turned my tongue blue

I'll be happy when I can stick out my tongue like that again. This closed mouth thing is MISERABLE.

oreo cheesecake

roman style broccoli

This post is pretty much dinner for Paul Part III, (Part I being chicken parm and Part II being broccoli strascinati). For dessert that night, I made an Oreo cheesecake.

I love Oreos, so awhile back I bought one of those jumbo jumbo packs from BJ's that is designed to feed 30 third graders or whatever. Needless to say, it was more Oreos than I knew what to do with. Therefore, I was thrilled when I came across this recipe for cookies and cream cheesecake bars.

I ended up scaling down a little because I had some cream cheese, and bought some more, and then came home to discover that the stuff I had in my fridge had gone bad. Whoops. I wasn't about to go back out, so I simply regrouped and made do with 2 things of creamcheese instead of three, reducing the amount of other ingredients accordingly.

I ground up one roll of Oreos in the blender, and then mixed them with three tablespoons of melted butter. I pressed this mixture into the bottom of my tart pan. The recipe called for baking this crust, but I've made similar crumb and butter crusts in the past, and none of them required any baking. Therefore, I decided it was totally unnecessary and I skipped it.

Then I beat two bricks of room temperature cream cheese and half a cup sugar with my electric mixer. Once that was nice and blended, I added half a cup sour cream, ¾ teaspoon vanilla and mixed that all up. Then I added two large eggs, one at a time, and then made sure that everything was neatly combined. Then I took half of a roll of oreos and blended them really quickly, so they were still nice and chunky, and stirred that into the filling. Pour into the pan on top of your oreo crust, bake for 40 minutes at 325 degrees, refrigerate overnight and voila! You're done!

It was pretty tasty, but I think it needed more sugar, actually. It tasted more like cream cheese and less like cookies and cream or cheesecake. I wouldn't rule out that I ultimately used less than a half cup sugar, because I tend to cut back on sugar when baking. However, it definitely could have been sweeter. It was tasty enough, (I mean Oreos and cheesecake! come on!), but I think that there are probably better variations on this theme out there.

Thanks to Paul for the pictures! Have a good weekend everybody!

I scream, you scream, from California to the New York Islands

Note from Sarah: Today's entry is a guest blog by Nathan's mom, Tenli. She posted some absolutely mouthwatering photos of homemade ice cream on facebook earlier, and I was so impressed. Even though lots of food blogs frequently feature ice cream making, it still seems like an impossibly daunting proposition to me. I was so impressed with her blackberry ice cream that I insisted Tenli post a guest blog entry explaining the process. I hope you all enjoy it as much as I did!


Nathan's brother Weston, age 15, is an avid and creative cook, particularly skilled in the dessert area. He and I had been searching for a cooking class to take together since his birthday in October. Last weekend, we finally had our chance: Ice Cream 101 at Sur La Table in San Francisco. In the hands on class, we were introduced to the concept of "French style" ice creams, which are custard based. Weston and I participated enthusiastically in class, making four different kinds of ice cream, as well as chocolate and strawberry sauces, and of course eating them all. We came home to Oakland with the recipes from our class, a gorgeous red Cuisinart ice cream machine, and "The Perfect Scoop" by David Lebovitz. The next morning, as I stumbled around the house still logey from my ice cream hangover, it came to me: "Hair of the dog!" Off I went to get the ingredients for my first solo batch of Lemon Curd - Blackberry Swirl Ice Cream with Blackberry Sauce.

Our teacher, Sara Lodick, reminded us at the start that the best ice cream is made from the best and freshest ingredients, and, with that in mind, I splurged on Strauss Family Creamery organic dairy products from Marshall, California. The lemons and blackberries came from the local Sunday farmer's market. Pretty much everything else was already in my pantry, and I was good to go.


For the blackberry swirl part of the ice cream, I began by boiling the berries, sugar, lemon juice, and a small amount of light corn syrup in a small saucepan until they generated a fairly thick, deep purple sauce. I strained the liquid and set it to chill while I prepared the lemon ice cream. In a larger saucepan, I combined cream, milk, and sugar with some extra special vanilla extract from Mexico, and just barely scalded the mixture, turning off the heat when the merest hint of a skin formed on the surface of the liquid. In a metal bowl, I whisked together eight egg yolks with 3/4 cup of sugar, then added lemon juice and grated lemon peel. Finally, I combined the two mixtures together, slowly adding the liquid to the egg mixture with a ladle so as not to curdle the ggs. (I really missed Weston at this point -- ideally, this would be a two person operation.) Next, I put the metal bowl over a double boiler and stirred it over boiling water until it began to thicken. I fed the custard base through a strainer, and put the strained custard over a bowl of ice to chill quickly, then put it in the fridge to cool down further. The recipe said to cover and refrigerate overnight -- but in class, we did it in a couple of hours, so I knew it would be fine if I rushed things a bit!

While the custard was cooling its heels, I combined blackberries, more sugar, and more lemon juice in a bowl and let them stand for an hour or two, stirring every now and then. Over time, the lemon juice and sugar broke down the berries into a distillation of pure blackberry sweetness that would later be the sauce for our dessert.

Later that day, while eating a delicious grilled dinner out in the garden, the ice cream maker did all the work of turning my custard into fabulous lemony ice cream, which I then layered in a loaf pan with the blackberry swirl mixture, and returned to the freezer for another hour or so. Scooping into the layers produced a mouthwatering swirl of pale lemon and purple blackberry which was then drizzled with indigo sauce and a couple of ultra sweet blackberries. When we finally got to eat dessert, there were moans of pleasure all around.

- Guest entry by Tenli, Nathan's Mom. Thanks to Sarah for inviting me to share this experience.