Snow Day

Sorry I've been lacking on the posts... We had a midterm today, so my life has revolved around med school and med school only.  Midterms are bittersweet... you study like crazy for a week but then you get a free afternoon when you finish the midterm!

Last Monday, Kansas City was graced with a beautiful snow! While the working adults and med students didn't get a day off, all of the schools in the area were closed (hmmph). Because of this, I'm calling it a snow day.  In leiu of posting an oh- so-yummy recipe (check back later this week!), I'm going to show you a few of my pictures from the snow day! 

Turns out, Wilson loves snow. 

Wilson is also terrified of bridges.  We have to carry him across the one in our neighborhood.

How crazy huge is this icicle??

Julia Child's Cinnamon Toast Flan

As sad as it is, this is the first recipe of Julia Child's that I've made. Being the true inspiration for this blog, one would think her recipes would be highlighted a bit more.  However, her recipes are somewhat.... difficult. She did "master the art of French cooking" after all...

This recipe is for a bread pudding.

How difficult could a bread pudding be?? When I first read the ingredients, I was delightfully surprised at the simplicity of them.  And then I read the instructions and was brought back down to reality.  Yup... her recipes are tough.  Who would have thought you had to whisk egg yolks to yield the perfect "yellow ribbon".  What exactly is a yellow ribbon of eggs supposed to look like??

I whisked them until I thought they looked right. That's usually not a good idea (unless you're Julia Child, of course).

Did you know you had to make a custard to add to the bread slices before you actually baked everything? I was always under the impression you could add all of the ingredients at once and watch the magic happen.  Apparently things don't work like that in France.

The one easy part was making cinnamon toast.  Yeah, I can do that.  Although, the recipe said to broil the cinnamon sugar topped bread.

I'm going to be honest for a second....Please don't judge.

I'm still a little lost on what exactly broiling is...

Okay, I said it.  Moving on.

Needless to say, I ignored that pesky word, "broil", and just put the toast on a cookie sheet.

In the end, cinnamon toast is cinnamon toast.  Regardless of the path it took.

Now, for someone who is extremely impatient and has never made a custard before, this was the frustrating part.  When do I need to stop whisking it? How thick does it need to be?? Why do I need a sieve?? Is a sieve the same thing as a strainer? Is this supposed to be so dang clumpy? Why is this so difficult?!

Let me tell you, this recipe was a challenge.  I highly recommend trying it though. It is Julia Child after all. I found it to be a bit too mushy for my taste, so next time I'm going to skip the hot water bath that the dish had to sit in.  The part of the dish that sat in the water during baking turned out a lot less thickened than the rest of it.  It still satisfies the sweet tooth and with a little tweaking (and improving of cooking skills), this recipe could be très bonne!

I'm sorry to do this to you, but I just can't resist....

I'm trying to show restraint with these Wilson pictures, but so far, not so good.

p.s... you can get the recipe here!

Pig Cake

When I told my friends and family that I would be making a Pig Cake in honor of the Razorbacks (for the aforementioned event), I, apparently, was deceiving them.  They were expecting a nicely baked cake in the shape of a pig.  While I would love to have the ability to make said cake, my current skills are only sufficient to make this kind of pig cake.  A lovely cake that has nothing to do with pigs. 

It has canned fruit in it.  Canned fruit reminds me of snack time and cafeteria food in elementary school. 

Moving on...

This cake is actually pretty fantastic.  I'm more of a chocolate girl myself, but I didn't mind this fruity cake one bit.  It's also very very simple.  Notice my attraction towards simplicity on this blog? I rarely enjoy a tough recipe, as most of them end in frustration and a trashcan full of food.

The batter is really just about mixing a box of cake mix and a can of mandarine oranges (as well as some eggs and a dash of oil here and there). Doesn't get much simpler than that.

I made this cake a day in advance and prepared the icing right before the party arrived.  While we watched the game and devoured the food, the icing was busy setting in the fridge.

Once the icing has hardened a bit (to about the consistency of whipped cream), slice it up and top it with a mandarine orange! Delicious! You can find the recipe here!

I bet if certain football players had eaten this before a certain game, we wouldn't still be in mourning.

p.s.... you might have noticed some changes around here.  Don't worry... it's a minor flaw of mine.  I just can't leave things well enough alone.  Don't be surprised if it changes again in a month!

Spinach Artichoke Dip

Well, I've found it.  The perfect go-to dip for any social occasion.  This past Tuesday, I decided to whip up this tasty treat for the Sugar Bowl (Arkansas vs. Ohio State) watch party at my apartment. Unfortunately, our Razorbacks didn't turn out quite as well as this dip did.  This dip is delicious and oh-so-easy to make.

Garlic is my #2 favorite ingredient to cook with. Did you know that?

You're probably wondering what #1 is. 

No, it's not artichoke hearts.

 It's chocolate.  I know I know... so cliche.

I apologize for these terrible pictures... they were taken at night and my wretched apartment creates a nasty, yellow hue on every picture I take.  No amount of picture editing can undo the yellow atrocity. Regardless, this dip is incredible and I do hope you make it soon.  You can find the recipe here.

(Thank you to my brother, Nick, for graciously offering to model the chip)

Notice Jane in the corner biting her nails... this was a rough game to watch.  Rough, indeed.

Last but not least, my boys watching the game...

Pumpkin Cookies

Okay this one's more like it.... It just might make my "must-make-all-the-time" list.  This cookie is so simple yet soooo delicious.  I've never made a cookie that's as fluffy as this, and I've never made one that stays fluffy as long as this one does. The inside is almost cake-like, while the chocolate chips remain soft and gooey.  I adapted the recipe from here... the original recipe called for butterscotch chips, but my spur of the moment trip to CVS turned up fruitless.   I just used chocolate chips instead, but I'm anxious to try these again with the butterscotch chips, as I think they would be divine.

All in all this recipe took me 20 minutes... It's your basic drop cookie recipe with simple ingredients. 

Oh p.s... this is my companion in the kitchen.
His name is Wilson.

Please make these cookies soon. So so simple. And then you can let me know how the butterscotch chips are!

Cinnamon Roll Muffins

Let me just start off by saying these are not at the top of my "must-make-all-the-time" list... you could possibly say this was a recipe fail.  There's nothing more frustrating than spending an hour an a half of your day on something that you end up throwing in the garbage in the end.  If I were truly a dedicated food blogger, I would clean off my hands and go at it again, trying to get that perfect recipe to show your readers.  Seeing as how I have about 5 readers, family included, I don't quite feel up to perfecting this thing.  I'm just going to chalk it up as a failure.  

Easy ingredients, easy recipe.  For those of you who have made cinnamon rolls from scratch... bravo to you.  I'd like to shake your hand.  As much as I love them, the idea of spending that many hours making them has always seemed daunting and thus, I have avoided doing it.  However, this recipe does not require the many hours of waiting for the bread to rise or rolling the dough to get the perfect cinnamon:bread ratio.  Prep time is actually about 20 minutes and cooking time is about 20.  Not too shabby. 

So far so good...

Now here's where we run into the problem.  The recipe called for a pretty large sized bowl of the cinnamon sugar mixture.  With a recipe providing such an immense amount, one thinks that entire amount must be used.  wrongo.

Notice the burned cinnamon sugar around the sides? There was, alas, a too little bread: cinnamon ratio. The sugar overflowed (even though I mixed a lot of the sugar into the dough... as I was told to) and burned the crap out of my pan.  And my cinnamon rolls.

The insides were delicious, but unfortunately, the outsides were just too burnt to continue.  I would suggest NOT trying to use all of the sugar mixture that was in the recipe... Just lightly dust it.  You will probably end up with a large bowl of sugar left but, hey, some pumpkin pancakes could use some!

You can find the recipe here! I really would suggest making these... they were super easy but dumbo over here used too much sugar. Easy problem to fix!

Pumpkin Pancakes

Well, I'm back.  I've decided to start the blog up again.  Maybe it's a New Year's resolution.  Maybe it's just boredom during my last week of break.  Regardless, I'm back... with some changes.  I'm hoping this blog will be a little bit more structured... more cooking focused, less rambling.  I received a new camera for Christmas that will allow me to take a lot better photos of the food I cook.  I'm so looking forward to learning more about it and hopefully improving my cooking skills along the way.  Unfortunately, the photos don't turn out as great on this blog as I had hoped they would but still better than the camera I was using before! My horrible kitchen doesn't really help either.... I'm stuck having to take photos in fluorescent light.  Ick. Hopefully, my next kitchen will provide me some natural light!

I adapted this recipe from the Good to the Grain cookbook.  Kim Boyce does a great job of incorporating very different flours (aside from the traditional white flour) into the recipes while maintaining simplicity.

The recipe called for Kamut flour but seeing as how I really don't even know how to pronounce that word, I traded it out for whole- wheat flour.

 I also halved the recipe... the original yielded 20 pancakes.  That's a bit much for a girl and her dog to eat.

The topping she suggested and included the recipe for was a spiced sugar blend.  Sounded delicious but I'm more of a syrup/ fruity kind of gal on my pancakes.   I added a little bit of apple butter to the pancakes and it turned out divine.  The apple butter complimented the pumpkin and cinnamon in the pancakes, making for an overall delicious (and healthy) breakfast!

Recipe:

Yields about 20 pancakes

Ingredients

Butter for the pan

Dry mix:

1 cup whole-wheat (she used Kamut flour) flour

1 cup all-purpose flour

2 tsp. baking powder

3/4 tsp. kosher salt

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/4 tsp cinnamon

1/8 tsp allspice

Wet mix:

3 Tbsp. unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly

1 1/4 cup whole milk

1 cup buttermilk

2/3 cup pumpkin puree

2 Tbsp. honey

1 egg

Spiced Sugar:

1/3 cup sugar

2 tsp. freshly grated nutmeg

3/4 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 tsp. allspice

Directions:

1. Sift dry ingredietns into large bowl. set aside.

2. In medium bowl, whisk wet ingredients until thoroughly combined.

3. Using spatula, mix wet ingredients into dry ingredients.  Gently fold batter together with spatula.  The batter should be the consistency of lightly whipped cream and have a subtle orange hue.

4. Mix together spiced sugar. Set aside. 

5. Heat a 10-inch cast- iron or griddle over medium heat until water sizzles when splashed on pan. Rub the pan generously with butter. 

6. Dollop 1/4-cup mounds of batter into the pan (2 or 3 at a time). Once bubbles from on top of pancake, flip over and cook until pancake is dark-golden brown.

7. Wipe pan with cloth before next batch.

8. Serve pancakes hot, with spiced sugar sprinkled on top.