Snake Bite

For some reason this year I'm really into Halloween Food. I became a bit obsessed with some Jello last week that I hope to make and then someone posted a drink recipe that sounds fun, and then I came across Snake Bite Calzone. A recipe I made once before for a Halloween party at work, I remembered it being very good.

And boy was it easy!  30 minutes and on the table--plus no real dishes!

Ingredients
1 tube refrigerated pizza dough (we used Artisan whole wheat)
1 package pepperoni (about 30 pieces needed)
3/4 C mozzarella cheese (we used the new kraft one that has cream cheese in it, melty)
1/2 C ricotta cheese
Yellow & Blue food coloring
1 egg white
cooking spray
pizza or marinara sauce for serving

Directions
PREHEAT THE OVEN TO 350
1. Unroll the pizza dough and roll it out a little bit more so it is big
2. Lay pepperoni in rows along the dough leaving a 1 inch border
3. Mix together cheese and place dollops over the pepperoni
4. Roll lengthwise into a snake, pinch the ends
5. Spray a baking sheet and place the snake so it looks like he's slithering across the tray
6. Cut a piece of pepperoni for the forked tongue and eyes
7. Put one drop of yellow food coloring in the egg white, paint the snake. Add 1 drop of blue coloring and stir. Paint the snake green. Be sure to attach the eyes and tongue if you haven't already.
8. Bake for about 30 minutes until golden brown
9. Warm pizza sauce and serve with the snake

This is enough for 4 with a salad or some other vegetable/fruit side

Variations: We liked this with no changes but it would be good with a little garlic inside or maybe some spices if you want to add some variety.

Sausage and Bean Soup

A few weeks ago I went on a bit of a sausage kick, I bought a few kinds of sausages on sale. I bought one kind for a recipe and the other cause I'd always wanted to try it and there was that sale. Then I went home and made the recipe and later we had the other sausages and we found we didn't love them. I was now stuck with a variety of extra sausages.  Being "Autumn" I decided to make a nice soup with the sausages and some beans. I searched recipes, I found one, I went to the store and got the rest of the ingredients.

And then it was 106 degrees.  For the whole week...

But finally this weekend the weather was a little more reasonable, so I made some soup.  I loosely followed this recipe. It was actually a really hearty soup and pretty delicious. And guess what? Joey ate Kale!


My adaptation:

Ingredients
2 15oz cans white beans, drained and rinsed
4 C chicken broth (low sodium)
1 onion
3 large carrots
2 cloves garlic
4 sausages, (I used 2 pork-wine from Guy Ferrari and 2 Italian Chicken)
1/2 bunch kale
1/2 t salt
10 grinds pepper
1/2 t Italian spices
1/4 t oregano
1/4 t thyme
2 bay leaves
1 T olive oil

Directions
1. Dice the onions and slice the carrots into half moons. Mince the garlic
2. Heat a heavy pot over medium high and add oil once hot
3. Saute the onions and carrots until onions are soft and brown, about 4 minutes
4. Slice the sausages into half moons, prepare the spices
5. Add the garlic to the pot and cook about 30 seconds, then add the sausages
6. Cook for 8 minutes and then add the beans, spices and chicken broth--keep track of those bay leaves.
7. Bring to a boil then reduce heat and simmer 10 minutes.
8. Remove 2 cups of the soup and blend with an immersion blender, add it back to the soup and cook another few minutes.
9. Remove kale leaves from stems and cut into pieces, rinse
10. Remove soup from heat and add kale to let it wilt, serve

A play on Monkey Bread

Tonight I made some buttermilk biscuits but I used the smaller biscuit cutter and made way too many. In order to make a slightly less amount of too many biscuits for two, I decided to mix some sauteed cinnamon apples with the scraps and bake it in the oven.

This is not unlike Monkey Bread. This is a lot like a certain recipe I remember seeing on Tastespotting early last week.  But I didn't follow any recipe, I just put it together.  It took 8 minute to bake and maybe it could've gone a bit longer.  I think this is a fantastic "Welcome Fall" dessert.  If you are living anywhere besides Southern CA you might actual have met Autumn on September 22nd. But if you live here in Los Angeles, you are planning to put some shorts on tomorrow and zip from the car to the ice cold office to avoid 102 degrees on OCTOBER first...

This is a quick dessert if you already have the apples and biscuit dough made. This is a slightly less quick dessert if you don't.  This made enough for two.

Apple Biscuit "Cobbler"

Ingredients:

1/2 C sauteed cinnamon apples (recipe below)
1/2 C leftover biscuit pieces or 3 canned biscuits
cinnamon
nutmeg
baking spice
3 T sugar
1 T butter

Directions:

1. In a small bowl mix sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and baking spice. If you sliced the apples, cut them into smaller bits
2. Layer biscuits and apples in a small ramekin, ending with more biscuit than apples
3. Melt butter and pour over the ramekin
4. Bake at 450 degrees for 9 minutes
5. Let cool at least 10 minutes before digging in!


Sauteed Cinnamon Apples

Ingredients:
4 medium apples, two red, two green, peeled and thinly sliced or cubed
cinnamon
1/4 C brown sugar
1 T butter

Directions:
1. In a small frying pan, melt butter over medium heat
2. Toss apples with cinnamon and sugar (I actually used a ton more sugar but I highly dissuade you from doing this because it was too much sugar)
3. Saute apples for about 8 minutes until tender and a little syrup forms, serve as a side or a dessert

Buttermilk Marinated Pork Chops

Do you ever need buttermilk for a recipe and then wonder what to do with the rest of it? Why do they sell whipping cream in 1 C cartons but buttermilk only in the quart size? Do they expect me to have a glass with dinner? The worst thing is that you probably bought the buttermilk to make some kind of dessert/bread and do you really want to make another dessert/bread? So today I decided to use the buttermilk to marinate some pork chops we had.

This is a quick recipe and pretty tasty I think. Joey thought they were a little plain. You could definitely make some kind of sauce to go with this, or maybe put it in a salad.  It is very moist. Feel free to mix up the spices anyway.

I got the idea from this blog and basically followed the marinade instructions but not the cooking instructions since I used the really thin pork chops.

Ingredients:
1 1/2 C buttermilk
4 thin boneless pork chops
2 cloves garlic, crushed
salt & pepper
1 t dried thyme

1 t olive oil

Directions:
1. Place all ingredients in a ziplock bag and marinade in the refrigerator for a couple of hours, I did 6 hrs.
2. Heat the olive oil in a skillet over medium high
3. Shake off excess buttermilk and cook chops about 3-5 minutes per side or until cooked through

Super Moist Chocolate Cake

 Making cake from scratch is something I have only ever done one other time. Cake mixes are just so convenient! And once, my mom told me that cake from a mix is the same taste as cake from scratch. So I stuck with the basics.

However, Joey always says "it's just from a box, we can't serve it to people" so this time, in honor of Gavin's birthday I decided to bake from scratch.  I browsed the interwebs for weeks, then my browser restarted and I lost all my saved recipes.  So, I decided to make Smitten Kitchen's chocolate cake with caramel filling and vanilla frosting.

This cake is the moistest thing I have ever made. It calls for buttermilk, eggs, coffee and oil - how's that for lots of liquid to make a moist cake?
This makes a lot of cake. It really only makes two 10-inch rounds but who has 10-inch cake pans? I sure don't. I have two 9-inch cake pans, so I made those and also made a little pan of cake for two. This was a great idea because then Joey and I had the opportunity to taste the cake since when you make a cake round you can't taste it!


This cake is SUPER moist. It fills up your mixer so when she says large bowl really take her advice on that one!  As  you can see, while the cakes came out in rounds, the stack wasn't so successful...the cake demolished itself on the top layer and it took some pretty creative frosting to get it back together in one piece.  I also wasn't able to do that crumb cover frosting layer.  It turns out I'm not that good at frosting. But I think it turned out pretty well all things considering.

Ingredients:

For the Cake:

Head over to Smitten Kitchen to read the ingredients and instructions for the cake part. This makes the moistest cake ever.

For the caramel filling:

I made a half recipe of the frosting/filling for the Domestic Fits blog for the cake I made last time - I didn't actually read the instructions as well as I thought but it was still fine, except that it solidified FAST. This filling turns into a crunch almost toffee like filling. It wasn't what I was looking for but everyone really liked the added crunch. I wish it had been creamy and caramely--like in a milky way bar.

For the frosting:

I made the frosting sans sprinkles from Sweetopia's blog. This frosting spread super easily and it also piped alright from a ziploc bag.

This cake was pretty sweet, I thought the crunchy layer was a bit weird but it was well received by the diners.  The actual cake itself was amazing!  i really loved the moistness of it and honestly, I think I could eat it plain. Normally I don't see the point of plain cake, but this time I think I'd be into it!

Chocolate Dulce de Leche Bars

Several years ago, one of my coworkers brought in Chocolate Dulce de Leche bars for her birthday. I had one and have remembered the rich and delicious flavor ever since.  This past weekend, I had reason to make dessert and decided to make the bars I'd been thinking about for years.  After mixing up the dough I realized  that there was not enough to share with upwards of 30 people so I quickly made moves to double the recipe. I didn't really double it per-se, because I didn't exactly have the topping ingredients for doubling--just the crust. I made enough fro a 9x13 pan + a smaller pan--I used a 9x9 cake pan but the amount of crust I had left was not enough, so maybe a smaller pan would work better.

I forgot to take pictures, but they were well liked at the party and all eaten over the rest of the weekend.  I think they may have benefited from a light sprinkling of finishing salt on the top. But I didn't think of that until I was at the party.

These bars actually traveled quite well and lasted out of the refrigerator for a couple of hours before serving. They may be even more delicious chilled but I didn't feel the need to cram them in the hostess' fridge.

This is the measurements I used, adapted from Epicurious:

Ingredients:

For shortbread crust:

• 2 stick unsalted butter, softened
• 2/3 cup packed light brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 2 cup all-purpose flour

For chocolate dulce de leche:

• 1 cup heavy cream
• 2/3 cup whole milk
• 14 oz dulce de leche (this is the size of the can)
• 7 large egg yolks
• 8 ounces 60%-cacao bittersweet chocolate, I used chocolate chips

Directions:

Make shortbread crust: 
Preheat oven to 375°F with rack in middle. Butter a shallow 9- to 9 1/2-inch square baking pan (1 to 1 1/2 inches deep). Line bottom and 2 sides with parchment paper, leaving an overhang. Butter parchment.

Blend together butter, brown sugar, vanilla, and salt in a bowl with a fork. Sift in flour and blend with fork until a soft dough forms.

Spread dough evenly in baking pan using an offset spatula or back of a spoon, then prick all over with fork.

Bake until golden, 15 to 20 minutes, then cool completely in pan on a rack, about 30 minutes.

Make chocolate dulce de leche: 
Bring cream and dulce de leche to a simmer in a small heavy saucepan, stirring with a wooden spoon until dulce de leche has dissolved.

Whisk together yolks in a bowl, then slowly whisk in hot cream mixture. Return to pan and cook over medium heat, stirring constantly, until pan is visible in tracks of spoon and mixture registers 170°F on an instant-read thermometer. Remove from heat and whisk in chocolate until melted.

Make bars:
Pour chocolate mixture over cooled shortbread and chill, uncovered, until cold and set, about 2 hours.

Run a small knife around edges to loosen, then transfer to a cutting board using parchment. Cut with a hot clean knife (dip in hot water and wipe clean between cuts) into 24 bars. Chill until ready to serve. (these were hard to cut)

A Dinner Party - Strawberry Caprese

Pre-dinner party, I had the ladies over only for movie watching and book chatting. I decided to offer snacks during this time which, in retrospect may have slightly overshadowed the early dinner.  However, this particular appetizer was so delicious I am glad I made it. It has all the same flavors you love about tomato caprese with a twist!

I made this in the morning and let it sit about 30 minutes before serving. Make this for your next party!

I followed this recipe exactly and served it over baguette slices that I toasted in the oven for about 4 minutes at 350.


Strawberry Caprese Salad
makes 4-6 servings
2 Tablespoons white balsamic vinegar
1 Tablespoon freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 Tablespoon light brown sugar
1 Tablespoon honey
1 small garlic clove, finely minced
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
3 Tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1/3 cup torn fresh basil, plus more for garnish
8 ounces small mozzarella pearls/balls
1 pound fresh strawberries, halved or quartered if large

In a large bowl whisk together the vinegar, lemon juice, brown sugar, honey, garlic, salt and pepper, until the
brown sugar is dissolved. In a slow and steady stream, whisk in the oil until emulsified. Add the basil and
mozzarella, tossing to coat. Cover and chillfor 2 hours. Add the strawberries and let stand at room temperature for 30 minutes; stirring occasionally. Serve over toasted baguette slices.

Printed from thegalleygourmet.net