Apple Pie....Round Two

Around Thanksgiving I tried my hand at making apple pie. The pie turned out well, the filling was wonderful but the crust left something to be desired. I added apple pie back to my list to give another go round which I had the opportunity to do Saturday.

The recipe I tried this weekend is from Baking Illustrated. The crust is made with butter and shortening which I think made a big difference, the crust was great. Had a butter flavor and flaky texture.

The filling I think is where this recipe falls short. The recipe warns that they sacrifice appearance for taste, so this I expected. However the filling had way too much liquid, I believe this is due to not macerating the fruit as the recipe suggests. Also, the choice of Macintosh & Granny Smith apples in the recipe made the filling a bit bitter.

I would really like to become good at making pies so I have decided to make them my next challenge. I think I have found a great crust recipe in this go round, but still need to work on the filling. I will also try other flavors as well, any suggestions?

Peter makes Carrot Cupcakes....And I Helped! :-)

Since I broke my right arm at work last weekend.....who knew the office could be so dangerous.... cooking has been a bit of challenge. I do have a removable brace so I can do somethings, but too much stirring and chopping doesn't work so well. Anyhoo, my dear husband (who is probably afraid of starvation) has been helping out a lot.

On Monday night we made Carrot Cupcakes from Everyday Food. This is a go to recipe for me, it is quick and easy and is one of Peter's favorites.

http://www.marthastewart.com/portal/site/mslo/menuitem.fc77a0dbc44dd1611e3bf410b5900aa0/?vgnextoid=ae20d3deb6a0f010VgnVCM1000003d370a0aRCRD&autonomy_kw=carrot%20cupcakes&rsc=header_3

They tasted awesome! He did over fill the the papers so they "grew" together but that was OK, it gave them character.

A note about this silicone muffin tin......it sucks!!! Way too flimsy and if you don't put a paper in them you can't get the muffins out. So we chucked it in the trash.

Here is Peter making the frosting for the cupcakes. He didn't want to take my advice about putting more frosting on the cupcake than you really need to make it easier to frost, but what do I know......

He still had a ton of fun.

I think we should make cooking together a regular thing.

Foodie BlogRoll

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Birthday Dinner

Last night we went over to my In-Laws to celebrate my Mother in Law, Cristina's Birthday. We got to try out my new camera and spend time with the entire family. Everyone had a wonderful time.

On the menu (delicious meal cooked by Steve) was Roasted Pork, Red Cabbage, Mashed Potatoes, and Homemade Bread. We also snacked on cheese and grapes before the big meal.

Caesar Pasta Salad

The Gilbertson's came over last night for dinner. We had grilled pork chops and Caesar Pasta Salad from epicurious.com, http://www.epicurious.com/recipes/food/views/109526.

We thought it turned out pretty well. The crunch from the romaine lettuce in with the pasta was very nice. I did read the reviews for this recipe before making it and took the suggestion of adding Worcestershire Sauce to the dressing. I do think it made a flavor difference.

I will keep this one as a light summer dish. I think it would also be wonderful with some grilled chicken.

Best Buttermilk Pancakes

From The Martha Stewart Living~ Original Classics Cookbook.

So here we are again with the breakfast dilemma....pancakes have never been my thing, mostly because you are suppose to eat them with maple syrup which I really dislike. None the less, I had a small carton of buttermilk in the fridge that needed to be used so I thought I would give these a shot also considering that Peter LOVES pancakes.

The dough gets very fluffy and light and the pancakes cook up nicely in a cast iron skillet brushed with a bit of the left over bacon grease. A yummy start to the weekend!

Dinner on the Deck

We had our first dinner of the season out on the deck tonight. The weather was beautiful, I am really hoping that spring is here to stay!

On the menu

Grilled Pork Tenderloin- marinaded all day in just a mixture of dried herbs with some water and olive oil.

Small Golden Potatoes- quickly "smashed" with a small amount of butter, parsley, salt & pepper

Broccolini- sauteed in bit of olive oil, shallots, and white wine. (Peter REALLY did not like the broccolini, but I did)

Tea Please

I have recently been thinking about the amount of caffeine I consume in the morning. During the week I drink a large to go mug of coffee on the way to work, not so bad I guess, but on the weekends while I am wondering the house I drink at least a half a pot....or more! This coupled with creamer is not so good.

Peter drinks a lot of green tea, which I like but do not love, I have to add honey, which is not one of my favorites either. However, I had a hot cup of white tea the other day at brunch that had a melon twist that I really enjoyed and it did not need a thing. I went looking for it at the grocery store but couldn't find it. Instead I chose this one with an Asian plum twist and I think it is very good as well.

So, I have decided to cut out the coffee on the way to work and replace it with the tea. I think I will still have my coffee on the weekends......I really do love the stuff.......and will try very hard to limit myself to two cups. Wish me luck!

Monday Morning Breakfast

I am not feeling so good today, so I am very grateful to be working from home. This is such a great perk to working for my company.

Since I wasn't battling traffic this morning I had time to make an egg white omelet with mushrooms, peas, canadian bacon and mozzarella cheese. Also found a plum in our fruit basket that was so ripe and delicious that I ate all of it and only half of the omelet!

Note the beautiful plate given to me by my father in law and his wife Cristina who brought it back from Mexico.

Brownies

This weekend I tried my hand at the Chewy, Fudgey, Triple Chocolate Brownies in Baking Illustrated. There were two reasons I chose this particular recipe. First today is our friend Mandy's birthday, she loves brownies so I wanted to make them for her. Second my Aunt Cathy sent me this awesome brownie pan for my birthday that I just had to try out. It is called the Bakers Edge Brownie Pan and it gives each and every brownie at least two crispy/chewy edges which I love.






The recipe calls for three types of chocolate, unsweetened, semisweet, and cocoa powder. You melt the chocolate with one stick of butter before adding to the eggs, sugar, vanilla and only one cup of flour. Due to the minimal amount of flour I expected the brownies to be very fudgey (which is how I like them) but they turned out somewhere in the middle of fudgey and cakey leaning more towards cakey. They were very tasty but I was not happy with the texture. I am wondering if they may have baked too long. The instructions for the pan warns that the brownies will bake much faster than those baked in traditional brownie pans. I think I will try this recipe again with the new pan and with a traditional pan to see if that makes a difference.


The pan did make a cool design which is photo worthy. I really like the pan a lot, just need to do some experimenting and adjust the cooking time. Cathy also sent me a peanut butter brownie recipe that she created that I will make for Peter sometime soon.

Thank you Aunt Cathy for such a cool gift!

Lazy Sunday Afternoon

This past Sunday was so beautiful, the weather was perfect! My parents and brother came over to celebrate my birthday. They brought me my favorite flowers, tulips, which made me so happy.




I grilled out for the first time this season and and we all enjoyed a Sunday Afternoon beer on the porch, Lucy included! I am so looking forward to spring!

Saturday Evening with Great Friends

Last evening Peter and I had several friends over to spend some time with Jun, a friend who now lives in NYC. Everyone had a great time and the kids (OK, and the adults) were up way past their bed time.

The food was excellent as always, we do have some great cooks in this group. Unfortunately I did not take photos of everything.....I need to get better about that. But we had beef and cheese roll ups, spinach & artichoke dip, white pizza dip, mac & cheese, and ham & cheese tarts. Delicious!

For this gathering I tested out two recipe's out of my new cookbook Baking Illustrated.

Classic Oatmeal raisin.

Personally I am not a big fan of Oatmeal Raisin (especially the raisin part) however these looked great and the recipe was thorough and easy to follow. They were gobbled up pretty fast and the boys even got into the secret stash with extras that I had in the pantry.

Thick & Chewy Double Chocolate Cookies

Now this one is more up my ally. These cookies are boarder line sinful!! Moist and chewy they are almost brownie like. Also, the chocolate flavor is spot on. This recipe was again very thorough and I am really enjoying the notes before every recipe in this book, it helps to ensure the recipe turns out well every time. This one was a bit more difficult to put together, several steps are involved and then the dough has to rest for 30 minutes before baking.

I also put together an antipasto platter with all sorts of treats. Prosciutto, Salami, Olives, etc. The cheese was an Irish Cheddar with Porter and was surprisingly tasty, although not as appealing to the eye. I also made an herbed goat cheese from the Dinner Party's magazine I picked up last weekend which also turned out well.