Cool Cucumbers
On Sunday we never made it to
Dim Sum. be's mom was making atole and wanted us to go for lunch. It's this super thick, bright yellow milky warm corn drink that i actually hate! - not because it's milky, but because it's sickeningly sweet and i don't like the texture. Luckily, we also had pupusas that his grandmother made.
Later that night, we hosted an impromptu dinner party with O, Miss N and Ishle. Items served: falafel, toasted pita, hummus, baba ganoush, tahini sauce, black olives, tomatoes, lettuce, feta cheese, tabouli and cucumber salad. The falafel and tabouli were from
Fantastic Foods mixes but we made the baba ganoush, hummus and cucumber salad* from scratch. Everything was pretty easy except deep frying the falafel; one batch came out nicely browned while the other ended up slightly burned. (In addition, one guest kept referring to himself in the 3rd person as "The Lazy Chef.")
For dessert, we served Samoa Girl Scout Cookie and Andes Candies
Edy's Ice Cream with chocolate syrup and chopped hazelnuts. The Samoa flavor was super yummy, although i wish it contained more cookie pieces. The Andes flavor wasn't as good as it could have been. It was basically mint chocolate chip with eh-quality chocolate. For post-dessert, we had some pieces from the
See's Candies Nuts & Chews box that Miss N brought us all the way from California! I'm a huge fan of See's because they don't skimp on nuts - it's a good & simple, down-to-earth candy company. Note you can order custom boxes from their website; i've done this twice and it's awesome getting only the pieces you love! My most favorite See's pieces: Almond Square, Dark Almonds, Milk Peanuts, P-Nut Crunch, Marzipan, California Brittle, Cocoanut and Datenut.
And on a final note, i picked up a jar of Strawberry
Fluff! Today i made a sandwich of Strawberry Fluff and natural peanut butter (i don't like that ultra-processed Jiff stuff) on cinnamon wheat bread. So yummy!
*The cucumber salad was a surprise hit. I just made it up using what sounded good together. It's refreshing and super easy!
be's Cool Cucumber Salad1 medium cucumber
1.5 T extra virgin olive oil
1.5 T fresh lemon juice
1 small handful fresh parsley
1 small handful fresh mint
salt to taste
Score or peel away the skin of the cucumber (optional) and chop into a small dice. Wash and dry both herbs well, and finely chop. Mix all the ingredients together; feel free to adjust the seasonings to your liking. Cover and let cool in the refrigerator until ready to serve. I didn't do this, but a little finely chopped onion would be good, too.
Roasting
We haven't been cooking as much as usual; spring is full of birthdays and events that keep us eating out constantly. The sink is perpetually full of dishes and we haven't set foot in a supermarket in weeks. The
box has been cancelled often in these past few months, but since we've barely eaten any greens we let the last two arrive.
We got 2 large Italian eggplants in the last box - and combined with a bag of pita bread leftover from be's birthday party we decided to make a Mediterranean/West Asian meal for dinner last night. be roasted an eggplant directly on the gas burner to make the baba ganoush recipe from
Arabian Cuisine, a free book we got from a box on the street! It came out a soft, smokey, roasty, lemony blenderful of goodness. He also toasted some pita brushed with olive oil and sprinkled with sea salt and a little pepper. Meanwhile, i fried up some falafel balls using mix from
Fantastic Foods, the best one we've tried. It totally brought me back to college; falafel was a favorite food to make in Mod 58! To complete the meal, i made some tahini sauce and be cleaned some lettuce leaves. We both enjoyed the meal immensely - so much that we want to make it again tonight!
It just dawned on me that a "continental breakfast" is one typically served on the
continent of Europe, as opposed to the
islands like England and Ireland. On the continent, breakfast is usually a sweet roll or bread with butter & jam and coffee, tea or hot chocolate, sometimes cheese and fruit too. On the islands it's bacon, ham, sausage, eggs, potatoes, toast, beans, tomatoes, black pudding, kippers and all that hearty stuff. Obviously, the American style of breakfast, most often found in diners, resembles the islands-of-Europe the most, BUT a "continental breakfast," most often found at hotel chains, has evolved here into donuts and muffins.
Superchomp
This
article on competitive eater
Sonya Thomas is very interesting! The
International Federation of Competitive Eating ranks her 2nd in the world, and she's the most likely person to beat Takeru Kobayashi at the famed Nathan's Hot Dog eating contest (who holds the world record at 50). A few years ago we considered going - but 20,000 people crammed in Coney Island on the 4th of July didn't sound like a good idea.
Her recent records include:
March 20, 2005 -- 46 dozen (552) oysters in 10 minutes.
Feb. 12, 2005 -- 25 grilled cheese sandwiches in 10 minutes.
Jan. 22, 2005 -- one 9-pound burger with cheese in 48 minutes, 10 seconds.
Nov. 27, 2004 -- 52 hard-boiled eggs in five minutes.
Sept. 29, 2004 -- 48 soft-shell chicken tacos in 11 minutes.
Sept. 5, 2004 -- 5.09 pounds of buffalo wings (162 wings) in 12 minutes
Aug. 21, 2004 -- 9.76 pounds of lobster meat (38 soft-shell lobsters) in 12 minutes.
July 4, 2004 -- 32 Nathan's hot dogs and buns in 12 minutes, a new women's world record (and American record)
Keep in mind Sonya is 99 pounds! Go Asian American women!
The Perfect Match
A recent lunchbreak contained a CVS stop, which reaped a bag of the new "Jolly Ranchers &
La Dulceria Thalia: The Perfect Match" candies. The "Frutas Enchiladas/Hot & Spicy Fruits" lollipops were tamarind, lime and mango with flecks of "chili flavor" throughout. First off, i didn't like the square shape of the lollipops; they were awkwardly shaped and hard to eat. What also sucked was that my bag was ALL lime lollipops, with only 1 mango and 2 tamarind ones. All the flavors were on the sour side, and as you ate the lollipop, multiple layers of "chile" flecks appeared and made the candy slightly hot - nothing you couldn't handle but Anjali did claim it made her sore throat feel better! I don't think the "chile" was real since the label didn't list anything but "natural & artificial flavors," plus the description was "...with a sassy bite of
chili flavor to keep things exciting." Nevertheless, it was an overall good lollipop. Mango was my favorite, while tamarind tasted a little too sour and lime isn't anything special when it comes to hard candy flavors. Hopefully they'll make more flavors!
As for other recent food notes:
At the last
Acentos poetry reading in the Bronx (in the new space!) we had slices of goodness that Maria baked: two dark chocolate iced cakes with Nina's poetry painted in gold leaf encircling the tops. The cakes were very striking; the contrast of the gold handwriting on the thick layer of smooth chocolate icing was beautiful, and the cake was so good too!
be and i tried
Go Wasabi on 30th Ave in Astoria for the first time. As usual, be was fiending for sushi and we wanted to check out a new place. It's a small restaurant with very modern decor and they have jazz nights. Both Korean and Japanese food are served, but we both got assorted maki rolls. The rice looked dense but was actually very light and soft - we both commented on this! Lastly, the back page of the menu is vegetarian; they offer many meatless options and brown rice upon request - rare things at your usual sushi place! We'll definitely be going back.
Before Ishle's rollerskating semi-derby (no actual fighting but enough falling), we had a birthday meal at
Pongsri on 2nd Ave and 18th St. I thought my pad Thai was too oily but everyone enjoyed the pad se ew and other dishes. We didn't get appetizers or desserts but the Thai iced tea was yummy. I'd go back to try the curries but probably wouldn't get the pad Thai again! I just always order it because i love it so much!
Fluff Love
When one is craving
Marshmallow Fluff, preparing foods that contain Fluff and even eating it straight out of the jar - alright, there might be a slight problem.
Over the past week and a half, i've made 5 panfuls of Rice Krispies Treats (but i've only eaten 3! 2 were for be's party!), had a Fluffernutter (peanut butter and Fluff) sandwich, plopped globs of it onto bowls of Uncle Louie G's Rocky Road Rage ice cream and scraped the remains of 1 jar and 1 container of Fluff clean.
I'm almost out of the 2nd 16 oz container; i was contemplating on which supermarket to go to - the one with Fluff glass jars or the big plastic containers? I'm afraid i'll soon have a giant empty Fluff jar/container collection.
Maybe it's because of all those years of no marshmallows. But wait! this theory doesn't hold since i never really even liked marshmallows. I think tonight it's time for s'mores!
PS: Kraft makes a "Marshmallow Creme" that contains a lot of preservatives and weird ingredients. Apparently, it doesn't compare to Durkee-Mower's Marshmallow Fluff at all.
.5 Red Velvet
At the Truth & Dare event tonight,
Ishle brought 2 dozen assorted cupcakes from the
Buttercup Bake Shop. In celebration of the triple Gemini birthdays, we all sang at the end of the event, followed by massive cupcake consumption. Luckily, Anjali and i shared a Red Velvet cupcake beforehand (i also snagged one for Anmol, the originator of RV love) and it was quite tasty! Buttercup does make a good solid cupcake; the icing is light and sugary, the cake part is moist and flavorful.
I thought Red Velvet cake was a Southern thing, but upon
researching most people conclude that it was invented in New York City's Waldorf-Astoria Hotel. However, there isn't a mention of it in their archives, only an
urban legend concerning angry wrongly-charged recipe seekers.
But whatever the true origins, it's an unusual cake - brilliant deep red, chocolate flavored goodness with a fluffy white icing. Now i regret not eating another!
Bad Gravy
Misc food notes:
I tried making "gelatin desserts" using tangerine
Kool Aid, canned tropical fruit and powdered agar agar (a seaweed thickening agent) - and they turned out terrible! They never fully set, so the consistency was like congealed gravy instead of Jell-o. Maybe it's something in the Kool-Aid that prevented setting? Next time, i'll try with plain fruit juice or use more agar agar. Or maybe i should just get more boxes of Hain Superfruits.
The only decent cup of auto-drip coffee from a chain in Midtown that i've had so far can be found at the
Chock Full O Nuts stand on 32nd and 5th Ave. I rarely buy coffee to go, but if i have a caffeine withdrawal headache i go there. Some people swear by
Dunkin Donuts coffee - those Coolattas sure are good - but after be's terrible cappuccino "made with real espresso" i cannot say nice things. The cappuccino was really grossly thick like cornstarch was added. People, just go to a real cafe.
I heard a rumor that the
Vitamin Water company supports republicans and their conservative issues. Does anyone have info on this? I've stopped the VW addiction long ago but i want to let everyone know if this is the case.
be made a real pan of macaroni & cheese tonight! Before his Star Wars date with Shaptowicz, he cooked up mac & cheese, roasted potatoes, sauteed beet tops and limeade. The macaroni in the mac & cheese had an excellent firm consistency, but the dish needed more salt. We only had unsalted butter and be didn't add enough to compensate. However, the panko crumbs he sprinkled on top were great, so it cancels out.
There Are Two Kinds of Coffee
This past Sunday we had lunch with be's family (minus his sleeping brother, plus his grandmother) in Astoria. His mom asked for a restaurant recommendation from our super, who suggested
Forno Italia on Ditmars. It was a celebratory lunch, covering a belated Mother's Day and be's birthday in one shot.
Although be's parents are pretty closed to trying new foods, they love Italian food - especially seafood dishes. His sister loves to cook and is really open to new things; his brother is a steak & taters kind of guy. The freaky thing is, this mirrors my family almost exactly. Amongst both families, a discussion/heated argument/fight usually breaks out during meals, but on Sunday everyone was in a good mood.
For starters, we got 2 baskets of brick oven bread aka plain pizza crust, with olive oil and basalmic vinegar dip. I think the bread was the best part of the meal = soft, salty, fluffy and with a hint of rosemary and other herbs. be and his family then shared large plates of fried shrimp, squid and baked clams, which they all seemed to enjoy. For entrees, most of us ordered various pasta dishes while J got a white pizza and be's grandmother got a veal dish.
My mushroom ravioli was quite good. The sauce was a creamy white wine with mushroom pieces, while the ravioli was filled with 3 different kinds of minced mushrooms. be's penne was served with a scoop of fresh ricotta cheese and the red sauce was very tasty. It was slightly sweet without any sour taste, very unlike your typical jarred tomato sauce. I thought the white pizza was good but not crispy enough. I would only get the pizza if it was baked charred and crisp on the outside. I didn't try any of the other dishes since they had meat in them, but everyone seemed to like them. Note that the specials cost over $20.00 a plate, though.
Afterwards, we checked out the bakery next door and picked up 2 boxes of assorted mini Italian pastries, all of which were yummy. I especially loved the flaky layered one that looks like a clam, filled with sweet cheese. The cannoli were a tad soggy but still good. (For the best cannoli, check out
De Robertis on 10th St and 1st Ave in the East Village!)
Armed with mini pastries, be and i served coffee back at our house. Surprisingly, be's grandmother asked for a glass of Hpnotiq (a bright blue fruity cognac) when she saw J with one! be had to drag out the auto-drip coffee maker that my mom got for $5.00 at Wal-Mart, and left at our house to make coffee when she visits. be's mom also likes a weaker cup of coffee, so be just made a giant pot of auto-drip with ground Kona beans. Maybe i'm a grand coffee snob since i just had to make a little pot of French press for myself, but auto-drip just tastes like bitter hot water these days. In my world, there are 2 kinds of brewed coffee: regular weak auto-drip and ultra flavorful French press.
be Day
Friday the 13thThe food we served for be's 30th birthday party:
Sour cream & chives potato chips, Cape Cod potato chips
1st Class Nuts
Tortilla chips, medium salsa and Costco guacamole
Mushroom pate (homemade) and parmesan toasts
Carrot sticks, celery sticks, grape tomatoes and black olives
Grape tomatoes, marinated artichoke hearts and black olives on toothpicks
Hummus (homemade) and warmed pita
Shrimp platter
Vegetarian Vietnamese fresh spring rolls (i wish we made these!)
4 kinds of cheese and crackers
Cheese fondue with toasted Parisi bread, fake sausages, petite dill pickles and Granny Smith apples
Pumpkin chili* with rolls (made by Shaptowicz!)
Brownie bites
Rice Krispies Treats (homemade)
Dark chocolate dipped strawberries (homemade)
The specialty drinks we made up (recipes to follow):
The Floating Yoda
Choco Chewbacca
Revenge of the Sith
Noteworthy food presents, besides the countless bottles of alcohol everyone brought:
Star Wars Wookie Cookie Cookbook** from Doey
Lindt chocolate basket from T
*Finally, we taste the infamous pumpkin chili from
Cristin &
Shappy! It was a delicious and hearty mix of kidney beans, mushrooms, onions, tofu and much more, held together with pumpkin! Since it's a savory dish topped with scallions, cilantro and shredded cheese, the pumpkin's taste blends in nicely - i've only had pumpkin served sweet with cinnamon, so this was a surprising and good change. It was extra yummy, too, because it was spicy hot!
**I especially liked the picture of squirting ketchup as weapon!
Each Day, I Eat 10
Here's the
Original Kellog's Rice Krispies Treats recipe. Note at the bottom it says you can use a 7 oz jar of marshmallow creme instead of 10 oz of real marshmallows.
Fluff is vegetarian and kosher; yay for gelatin-free Rice Krispies Treats! They have a recipe for
Marshmallow Fluff Treats on their site, which uses a higher proportion of marshmallow and butter, probably resulting in a chewier treat. Also check out the downloadable "Yummy Book" of Fluff recipes! be finally had some and has seen the light. He better not have finished the pan by the time i get home...
Fluff
While running errands today, i stopped by the
Dean & Deluca in Soho and picked up a pain au chocolate. The woman behind the counter recommended the brand that started with a "P," which i'm totally blanking on right now, since it was flakier than the City Bakery chocolate croissant. She was totally right; the pain au chocolate was ultra tender with buttery, flaky crisp corners, filled with a sweet melty dark chocolate. I liked it much better than the one i had at
Jacques Torres' place, and that one was already great. At $2.50 each, it was a fair price for something so choco-good!
The strawberries we got in our most recent
box were the 2nd best we've ever had. The gariguettes we had all over Paris are probably impossible to beat (they tasted like candy, i tell you!) but tonight's container of organic, dark red berries are probably the best you can find in the U.S. be was a little skeptical when i declared they were 2nd best ever, but after he ate a particularly sweet & juicy one, he seemed to be sure. I'm not a strawberry-lover, but these were so yummy i just might say i am.
After my cook-a-thon at 2AM, i decided to make a batch of rice krispie treats with marshmallow creme, aka
Fluff. It doesn't contain gelatin so they're vegetarian, although not vegan due to the egg whites. It was difficult scraping the creme out of the jar, but after you mix it with the melted butter it's just like using real marshmallows = a gooey, fluffy, ploppy white mass you mix with rice cereal. I had 4 treats when they semi-cooled; the Fluff ones are pretty much the same as regular ones, except they're less "stretchy" and a little "crisper." The treats tasted very buttery too, since i used 3 T of real organic butter as opposed to margarine.
Why I'm Scared of Aliens
I just realized that they're the culprit to my many nights laying awake in bed with the covers over my head. Thanks,
Sleestaks.
But on a food note, i spent most of yesterday at the
CAPA Asian American Heritage Festival in Union Square. Not only were Morgan Freeman and Jet Li there, but the giant plate of homemade Indian food from
YSS was delicious! For $7 i got an overflowing plate of rice, chickpeas, mutar paneer (peas and fresh cheese), raita (yogurt with cucumbers that Anmol made!) and 2 samosas. Q got another plate of food that contained green beans with sesame seeds and chiles (delicious) and the various drinks we all purchased included Thai iced tea and boba tea. It's always fun reconnecting with community members, but scary realizing how small the world is.
Fondue Fun
We had a late lunch/early dinner with
Ishle at
Vegetarian Palate off Flatbush in Brooklyn. be is constantly craving the Crispy Nuggets so he ordered that, while i got my usual Shanghai Spicy Noodles (complete with diced and pickled vegetables) and Ishle got Sesame Chicken. Those Crispy Nuggets are just amazing - definitely the best fake fried chicken anywhere!
After our grand meal, we all had a surprisingly difficult time setting up an Ikea bedframe, due to mistake-filled diagrams and misleading pictures!
Finally, Ishle took us to
The Chocolate Room on 5th Ave. Western Park Slope must be gentrification central. The neighborhood is absolutely nothing like it was even a few years ago; 90% of the people around are white! 5th Ave is totally just a trendier, less-diverse 7th Ave now. But back to the chocolate = we all split an order of chocolate fondue, which came with 4 pieces of pound cake, 3 strawberries, a few banana slices, 4 chunks of pineapple and 3 homemade marshmallows. The fondue was a 60% cacao with a velvety texture, very yums. The items to dip were good, but i thought the amount was too small. In order to ration out the chocolate to the dipping materials, we had to over-dunk. We didn't get any other desserts, but were tempted by the gift-boxed truffles and fancy chocolates. I would go back to try the hot chocolate and candies, but i didn't like the waiters nor the crowds. I still can't believe it's my old neighborhood!
Delocate
The
Delocator is a useful site to find independently-owned cafes and tea houses, as well as a list of chains like Starbucks (for comparison). I always gripe about Astor Place, where 4 Starbucks can be found within a few short blocks of each other: in the Barnes and Noble, near the K-Mart, across from Cooper Union and on 2nd Ave. My only suggestion is a pull-down menu for a distance radius; when i type in 10001 for midtown Manhattan, it calls up businesses as far as the Lower East Side. The site is built by readers adding their favorite places, so if yours is missing be sure to put it in.
A Food History
1) [circa 4] Using an old skool metal soda bottle cap, i'd cut circles out of Kraft singles and stack them up. Eventually, i ate the orange disks; they got floppier as time passed. My goal was to cut a circle out of the single with the wrapper still on, but that didn't happen.
2) [circa 4] I'd mix peanut butter with chocolate frosting and mash it into the said bottle cap, creating a "Barbie cake." It was always frustrating at this point since i intended to flip the cap upsidedown and lift it off the "cake," but that never happened. I usually then ate the peanut butter/chocolate frosting by digging it out.
3) [circa 5] I invented a great game where i'd put a green pea into one of my nostrils, and while holding the other closed, blow the pea out onto the table. My brother was amused by this game too, and we had fun blowing peas all over. My sister, who was probably 2 at the time, tried to play along but the pea ended up getting stuck in her nose. Of course, my mom was furious.
4) [circa 5] My brother, for some reason, unscrewed the cap to a French's mustard bottle, which was placed on the living room carpet. We spent a few minutes running around the room, making sure to jump over the bottle like a mini-hurdle. As my mom was about to use the yard stick on us, i accidentally stepped right on the bottle, squirting bright yellow mustard all over the new blue carpet. But she got me back in the end - using my Toys R Us watercolors, she covered up the yellow stain with an entire chunk of blue paint.
4) [circa 7] My brother and i decided to be mad scientists one afternoon. In a plastic Tupperware cup, we mixed an odd assortment of ingredients, some of which i recall were: heavy cream, sugar, orange juice and soy sauce. We tried to make my sister drink some - but it wasn't bad at all! I remember it surprisingly tasted like grape popsicles.
5) [circa 9] In order to punish our annoying neighbor, it was my brilliant idea to eat all the Nerds but save the box, filling it with gravel and gluing it shut. We put the fake Nerds into his mailbox, hoping he'd eat some, but his mean uncle threw it away first.
6) [circa 9] Because my mom hid the Halloween loot, my brother and i spent long afternoons combing over the house. We eventually found the pillowcase of joy, hidden under rags in an old metal garbage can in the garage. That was one of the best days ever. A few years later i netted a full 9 LBS of CANDY by ringing doorbells way after 9pm. That was awesome, too.
7) [circa 10] Another story about our annoying neighbor entailed "brownies" that were all over the back porch since "the oven wasn't hot enough to bake them." (I made up that rational explanation.) When our neighbor finally picked up a "brownie," my sister almost vomited while we all screamed that it was in fact, dog poop.
(In addition to playing with food, i loved to eat spoonfuls of things: mayonnaise, brown sugar, tartar sauce, peanut butter, frosting and honey.)
Big Updates
Happy belated birthdays to the four Taurii: Crack, Mama Sapp, Mama G and MacGuyver!
It's been a while. We've been busily domestic. I have 14 holes in my hands thanks to pins, but the place is looking nicer each day. Here's the big update:
Thursday 4/28: M wanted to watch "
Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind," an excellent movie but really not for first thing in the morning! We checked out a few sections of the
Metropolitan Museum of Art, had dinner at
Vegetarian Dim Sum House, dessert at
Sambuca's Cafe (be and M had some creamy strawberry dessert that they loved, while my tiramisu was okay but too blandly creamy) and ended the day at the
Bowery Poetry Club.
Friday 4/29: be woke up super, super early to drop M off at Penn Station. Afterwards, we both stopped in at work for a few hours. During my walk to the bank, i decided i had to have an Egg Florentine sandwich from
Pret a Manger. The branch near my job closed, so we've been longing for it ever since. I trudged many blocks out of my way to another branch, but sadly they were out of the EF so i got an avocado sandwich instead. Our evening was spent at a graduate-level film screening (yay Doey!) and dinner at
Pongsri on 23rd St. The portions were HUGE and the food was good - not the best and not the worst. In their Thai iced tea they used full cream, or something that made the drink taste slightly different.
Finally, we had dessert and drinks at
Veniero's in the East Village. I must first say that their strawberry cake is great (at least it was, like 7 years ago) but we had a terrible experience there on Friday. There was a long wait for a table, but after seeing dozens and dozens of groups get seated before us (all due to the fact we were a grand mob of 5 people), the only way we got seated was when we just sat down at a table for 4. We were ignored for a while before they insisted we move to table for 6, which "magically" opened up. We didn't get our menus until be flagged down the host. When we finally got our desserts, they weren't as good as i remembered and be's cappuccino was eh. To top everything off - as we were waiting for a table, i peered over the counter to watch the guys prepare hot drinks behind the bar. A few things i noticed: they use fuckin
NESQUIK to make hot chocolate, they squirt pre-made espresso from a thermos and their coffee is auto-drip brewed. This is certainly not right for any real cafe. Instead of Veniero's, get a real cannoli from
De Robertis or real coffee drinks from Panini, all around the corner from Veniero's, a totally overrated place.
Saturday 4/30: A good food day! be visited his parents before i even woke up, and he brought back 4 bags of
Elotitos (my crunchilicious love), 2 amazing fresh-not-frozen corn tamales and some Salvadorean cheese from be's mom's trip to El Salvador. For dinner i decided to make gougeres (cheese puffs) using this
recipe. I mainly followed the instructions with a few changes: i mixed in all the grated cheese instead of reserving some to sprinkle on the tops, i used freshly ground black pepper instead of white, i used sea salt ground in my new
awesome grinder, i opened the oven in between temperature changes to let steam escape and i pierced each gougere right out of the oven to release more steam. (The steam tips i learned from Alton Brown's choux pastry episode.) I was a little worried the gougeres would turn out like rocks or dough balls but they actually ended up AMAZING. Just like at
Artisanal, they were hollow and soft inside, crusty on the outside and full of salty cheesy flavor. be and i ate 24 in no time. The only thing i'd change for the next batch is make them smaller, piping out 1/2 T instead of 1 T mounds. Having each gougere as a single bite would be nicer than 2-3 bite ones. The bad news: i put the second pan in the freezer to bake at a later date and during an ice cream search, the pan (of course) slides out and spills 24 frozen puffs all over the kitchen floor. What is it with me and dropping baked goods? Finally, we had a nice dessert of orange Superfruits (vegetarian jell-o) with mandarin orange slices.
Sunday 5/1 - Tuesday 5/3: Mainly can be summed up as knitting, Hostess chocolate cupcakes, Vietnamese fresh spring rolls, mushroom pate, painting and cleaning (and back to work, bleh).
