Daring Bakers’ Challenge: Marquise on Meringue!

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almonds, baking, caramel, cayenne, chipotle, chocolate, cinnamon, Daring Bakers, fancy, gluten-free, meringue, nibs, pepper, recipes, spicy, tequila

The May 2011 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Emma of CookCraftGrow and Jenny of Purple House Dirt.  They chose to challenge everyone to make a Chocolate Marquise.  The inspiration for this recipe comes from a dessert they prepared at a restaurant in Seattle.

Are you guys wearing your fancypants??  You’re going to need them for this dessert.  It’s famous, so you don’t want to be under-dressed.  That would be rude. What do your fancypants look like?  If I could design the pair in my mind, they would be purple, sparkly, and with a ruffly butt.  Totally class, right?  For some reason stirrups keep wanting to bombard my vision, but I think I’m going to pass on those.

Right.  So this dessert has kind of a lot of components, each requiring its own set of steps.  It was way overwhelming at first, but after reading over things a few times along with all the questions others were asking/answering in the DB forum, I realized that it wouldn’t be difficult, just time-consuming.  Definitely an exercise in planning, which isn’t really my forte.  But I did it!

I’m guessing the $1,000,000 question right now is: What the #$%^ is a marquise?!  It’s kind of like a chocolate mousse, but a little richer.  After making the base for it, you freeze it which allows you to cut it, coat it in cocoa powder, and place it on the meringue.  When you finally eat it, it’s so dreamy soft….mmmmm.  It’s not overly sweet, especially with the kick from the spices, and you know how I love me some spicy chocolate!

And when there’s also torched meringue, boozy caramel, and spiced nuts, how can it be anything but amazing??  (Answer: it can’t.) 

Wordless Wednesday: Quack

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boerne, ducks, Wordless Wednesday

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Breakfast Chalupas!

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avocado, breakfast, brunch, chalupas, cheese, cooking, corn tortillas, easy, Eggland's Best, eggs, green chiles, healthy, migas, onion, recipes, red pepper, salsa, Tex-Mex, tomato

It seems like all sorts of foods are on a constant rollercoaster between good and evil.  Coconut oil is good for you now, but agave syrup is bad news bears?  It’s hard to know who or what to believe, but I feel like if it Mama Nature made it, it’s most likely okay.  And let’s just get this out of the way: please don’t ever tell me that the fat content in avocados is bad.  Hello, GOOD FAT.  (For the record, I am by no means a nutritionist…feel free to dismiss my opinions if they’re not to your liking.)

After many years of being viewed as cholesterol-laden baddies, eggs are now packed with Vitamin D and lower in cholesterol, at least compared to an earlier study.  If you read that article, it’s unknown why, but thought to be related to the hens’ diets.  Speaking of hen diets, I was lucky to score a coupon for Eggland’s Best eggs (as a member of the Foodbuzz Tastemaker Program), which are the eggs I’ve been buying for the last few months anyway!  They boast having vegetarian-fed hens (wait, do other eggs come from carnivorous hens?!) which produce healthier eggs.  Being a vegetarian myself, I’m down with that.  They taste good, too. 

What I usually eat…

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coconut oil, cooking, mushrooms, onions, sweet potatoes, vegetables

I typically don’t go all out when I cook because most of the time, I’m just feeding myself.  On top of that, I like to make enough for a few days of leftovers, but not too much that I’ll get sick of it.  In other words, I’m a slacker at heart and a lot of what I eat isn’t blog-worthy.

But here I am, blogging about the boring (yet tasty) dinner I made last night.  Cuh-razy!

Often I’ll saute some veggies and call it a meal.  What you see here is onion, sweet potato, and mushrooms cooked in coconut oil.  (I’d read that coconut oil + sweet potatoes = a good idea.  It is.  Try it!)  Usually there’s a green thing in the mix, but I was craving bagels and chocolate during a post-pilates grocery store pit stop, so it’s enough of a feat that I made it to the produce section.  (and yes, I did buy bagels and chocolate.  mmm…)

Wordless Wednesday: Oh Deer…

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deer, Lake LBJ, Texas, Wordless Wednesday

For more WW, click here.

Key Lime Raspberry Thumbprint Cookies

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baking, cookies, desserts, key lime, preserves, raspberries, recipes, soft cookies

One of the things I’ve learned in life is that you can’t tell my mom anything.  I think this is just a personality quirk that my family has learned to accept, and it can be pretty amusing at times.

My parents have a quasi-retirement house up at Lake LBJ which they tend to go to on the weekends.  It’s in a neighborhood, but there are lots of wild animals around, most notably deer.  Now, to give you an idea of my mom’s compassion for animals, pretty much every pet we ever had was a stray that she rescued.  Naturally, with all the deer traipsing through the yard at the lakehouse, my mom has resorted to feeding them.  This is a big nono in that area and last year she was caught and fined a hefty fee.   Most people would learn their lesson from this situation and stop feeding the deer.

Well…I was up there this past weekend, and guess what?  My mom didn’t listen and has resumed her devious/compassionate behavior.  It’s really obvious too because there will be up to 30 deer in the yard!  There’s a pregnant one that will even eat out of her hand.  After the couple of times I saw her feed them, she said, “You guys are making me look bad!  Go on, get outta here!” and then proceeded to feed them some more.  haha, oh my… 

Daring Cooks’ Challenge: Gumbo!

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beans, cajun, collard greens, cooking, Daring Cooks, greens, gumbo, healthy, kale, Louisiana, mustard greens, New Orleans, okra, recipes, rice, roux, vegan, vegetarian

What’s this?  Another New Orleans recipe in one week?  This one comes in the form of a Daring Cooks’ Challenge!

Our May hostess, Denise, of There’s a Newf in My Soup!, challenged The Daring Cooks to make Gumbo!  She provided us with all the recipes we’d need, from creole spices, homemade stock, and Louisiana white rice, to Drew’s Chicken & Smoked Sausage Gumbo and Seafood Gumbo from My New Orleans: The Cookbook, by John Besh. 

Gumbo!  Growing up in Texas, I think it’s hard not to try gumbo at some point, but maybe that’s more the case if your dad is a gumbo fanatic.  I always thought it was pretty good, but had never mustered up enough ambition to make it.  But then in true Daring Kitchen form, a recipe just like gumbo (ambitious?) is perfect for a challenge!

Hello, Rhubarb, my new friend…

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baking, cardamom, crumble, desserts, easy, quick, recipes, rhubarb

(…I’d like to bake with you again?)

Guess what??  I have just become acquainted with rhubarb!  Yep, that red celery-ish stuff had never graced my grocery basket or even tastebuds with its presence, but this nonsense is officially over.

My friend Jill invited a couple other friends and me over for dinner a few days ago to help her tackle the yummy grilled vegetable terrine that she had made.  Who can say no to that?  Seeing this as a golden opportunity to bake something, it seemed like the perfect situation to try out that totally foreign fruigetable.  (The more you know: It’s technically a vegetable, but was deemed a fruit in the US in 1947.)

Wordless Wednesday: Van Garden

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vegetable garden, Wordless Wednesday

For more WW, click here.

Cold-Brewed Iced Coffee, New Orleans Style

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Blue Bottle, chicory, coffee, easy, how to, New Orleans, recipes

How does one go to New Orleans, yet not experience the city or even the food?

Answer: with the sole purpose of taking an orchestra audition.

Whenever I think about New Orleans, I always forget that I’ve actually been there, but really, it shouldn’t count.  It was four years ago that I auditioned for the orchestra there, and all of my time was spent in my hotel, a church (audition location), an airport shuttle, and an airport.  Good times!

As for the food…  Oh, how I would love to tell you about the blissful beignet that I consumed with a perfect cup of coffee, or even a po-boy or a simple bowl of gumbo, but alas; I try to keep the truthiness levels of my blog high.  I’ll spare you the details of my boxed granola bars and subpar hotel burger.

Instead, let’s talk about New Orleans style iced coffee.  What makes it different from the regular stuff?  It’s brewed with chicory!  Yeah, I didn’t know much about chicory either, but it’s the root of endive, AKA that lettuce that I’ve somehow never bought.  It can be roasted and brewed with coffee!  Apparently it gives the coffee a deeper and less bitter flavor.  In fact, back in times when coffee was not easy to come by, folks would brew pure chicory.  Maybe it tastes similar coffee (or does it?), but I want to know how they then got their caffeine fix!