So, what do you do when you roast 4 pumpkins and end up with several containers FULL of homemade pumpkin puree? AND you have a husband that "Isn’t really crazy about that whole pumpkin flavor"? Besides the Pumpkin Pie With Bourbon Whipped Cream I made, and the Pumpkin Cranberry Cookies, I made hummus. Hummus, cookies and pie that I had the sole responsibility of consuming, which also turned into a few extra, much needed, workouts and spin classes. Totally worth it.
This hummus also became the "dressing" on my salad for lunch, and the schemer for my ham sandwich at lunch the next day. So many yummy uses.
There has always been a problem with caramel apples. The ratio is off, backwards even. There just isn’t enough caramel and you’re left with, well, a half eaten apple on a stick.
Spooky Halloween treat. Looks like slimy, severed fingers, makes you hungry, right? That’s the best part about Halloween, you get to make crazy, gross, appetizers that are inspired by dismembered body parts and people love it.
Spooky Avocado Witches Fingers
4 Avocados
peeled, pitted and halved
1 tbs lemon or lime juice
2 ounces goat cheese
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon pepper
1 teaspoon chili powder
1 ounce prosciutto slices
Cut each avocado half into 4-6 slices. Place in medium bowl and gently toss in lemon juice.
Fill the center of each avocado slice with 1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon goat cheese mixture.
Sprinkle with salt, pepper and chili powder.
Wrap each avocado “finger” with 1/3 slice of prosciutto until the goat cheese is secured to the avocado. Make sure to leave the tip of the avocado exposed, to resemble a finger nail. Arrange the avocados in the shape of a hand on the plate to add extra spookiness. Serve and Enjoy!
POM Wonderful really is wonderful. I remember the days before POM, when I was a kid, and I had to get on my "dirty clothes" and sit in the bathtub just to eat a pomegranate. Seriously, actual fact. Now, you can buy all these great pomegranate related products, all the antioxidant and yumminess without the blood-like stains. Win, win.
I made these during Rosh Hashanah. I’m not Jewish, but I have recently had the honor of learning about all the beautiful food traditions the Jewish religion has. I had lunch with my friend Tori, of The Shiksa In The Kitchen, the other day and she told me all about eating pomegranets during the Jewish New Year to "to remind ourselves that our good deeds in the coming year should be plentiful." Now, who can’t get behind that? Wouldn’t the world just be a better place if we all took a second to remind ourselves to do more good deeds in the coming year?
Besides the beautiful symbolism of eating pomegranates during the High Holiday, these muffins were awesome. I was so happy with how they turned out.
Pomegranate Streusel Muffins
2/3 cup white sugar
1 cup brown sugar
2 cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/3 cup almonds, chopped (BTW: POM Wonderful ALSO has almonds! And, they’re great)
1 tsp cinnamon
1/3 cup chopped pecans
1/2 cup rolled oats
1 tsp salt
2 1/2 sticks butter, cold, cut into cubes
2 eggs
1/2 cup sour cream
1 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup POM Wonderful Pomegranate juice
1/2 cup POM Wonderful Pomegranate seeds
Preheat oven to 350.
In a bowl add the white sugar, brown sugar, flour, baking powder, almonds, cinnamon, pecans, oats and salt. Stir to combine. Add the butter cubes and using either your hands or a pastry cutter, rub the butter into the flour mixture until it is well combined and resembles crumbs. Measure three cups of the crumb mixture into the bowl of a stand mixer. Put the rest of the crumbs into the refrigerator to chill.
Add the eggs, sour cream, vanilla, and pomegranate juice to the mixer. Mix on medium/low speed until just combined. Don’t over mix. Add the pomegranate seeds and stir to combine.
Spray the wells of a muffin tin with butter flavored cooking spray. Add the batter to the wells until about 1/2 way full. Top with the chilled crumbs until the wells are filled to just below the top, about 1 or 2 tbs of crumbs.
Bake for 22-25 minutes, or until a tooth pick inserted into the center of the muffin comes out clean. Allow to cool before serving.
I’m going to push you one step further with your cake baking. You know that yummy cream that is inside doughnuts, the center of cream puffs and even the filling for that fantastic bakery fresh cakes? That’s pastry cream. And it’s easy to make. Even if you aren’t quite ready to give up the box cake mix, take the leap in dressing it up, super fancy, to make all those cake calories totally worth it. Pastry cream brings your cake way past the next level on to the "Did you really make this? Really? It’s amazing" level that you may have doubted you would ever reach. But you will. I believe in you.
Stop filling your cakes with frosting. Frosting is for the outside of the cake. Pastry cream is delicious and you should put this on your cake bakin' TO DO list. It’s easy, you’ll thank me with a big slice of yummy cake.
Vanilla Pastry Cream
1 1/2 cups heavy cream
1/2 cup sugar
2 large eggs, plus one extra yolk
2 tbs flour
2 tsp vanilla extract
Step One:
In a sauce pan over medium heat, bring the cream to a slight simmer, removing from heat when bubbles start to form around the edges. You don’t want to boil you cream, just heat it.
Step Two:
In a separate bowl, whisk the sugar, eggs and yolk, and flour until well combined and slightly frothy.
Step Three:
While continuing to whisk the egg mixture, add the cream about 1 tbs at a time. This is called tempering and basically, it’s a way to avoid turning your pastry cream into scrambled eggs. Once your have added about half the cream a tbs at a time, pour the rest in slowly and whisk until well combined.
Step Four:
Return the pastry cream to the stove and stir over medium heat until it comes to a low simmer. Continue to whisk until thickened, between 5 and 10 minutes. The cream should leave a track when you drag the whisk through it.
Step Five:
Remove from heat and stir in the vanilla. This needs to cool before putting into a piping bag, a cake or your mouth. Pour into a bowl and cover with plastic wrap, pressing it to the surface of the cream. This will avoid that gross skin that used to grow on top of the homemade pudding your grandma used to make when it sat in the fridge too long.
For the raspberries, I put the pastry cream into a piping bag and piped them into the middle of raspberries. As if I needed another reason to eat raspberries. Or pastry cream.
This makes 2 cups, enough to fill between two layers. The cake I made last week was three layers of white cake so I doubled the recipe.
I originally titled these: Chocolate Shortbread Cookies with Orange Cream and Chocolate Orange Ganache. Although that is much more descriptive, it was just too dang long. I wanted something to bring to the Los Angeles Food Bloggers Meeting, and this is how these things evolved in my brain:
I should try to make chocolate shortbread cookies, but I want to put something on top. I’ll make them like the Mini Lemon Meringue Tarts, but use orange. And Ganache instead of meringue. Orange ganache. Hope this works.
Chocolate Orange Creamsicle Cookies
For The Chocolate Shortbread:
1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
1 1/4 cups powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa
1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
For The Orange Cream:
2 tbs orange zest
5 egg yolks
1/2 cup white sugar
3/4 cup orange juice
5 tbs unsalted butter, cut into cubes
For The Orange Ganache:
1 cup dark chocolate chunks
2/3 cup heavy cream
2 tbs orange zest
1 tablespoon Cointreau or other orange-flavored liqueur
Preheat oven to 325.
Cream the butter and powdered sugar until well combined, about 3 minutes. Add the vanilla and beat until combined. In separate bowl, whisk the cocoa and flour together until well combined. With the mixer on low, gradually add the flour mixture.
Put about 2 tbs of the dough into each well of a muffin tin (spray with butter flavored cooking spray before hand), forming the dough up onto the side to make a cup with a large well in the center.
Chill the dough in the muffin tin for at least an hour.
Bake at 325 for 15 minutes. Allow to cool
Make the orange cream. I love this, it’s based on my lemon curd recipe but the orange is awesome.
Add the orange zest, orange juice, sugar and yolks to a bowl and mix well. Add the orange mixture to a pan over medium/low heat along with the butter.
Whisk until thickened, about 8 minutes. Once the mini tart shells are cooled, spoon in the orange cream.
Place the chocolate and the orange zest in a heat safe bowl. In a separate bowl, heat the cream and the orange-flavored liqueur until hot and steam, but not boiling (microwave is fine but you can also heat on the stove) and pour the hot cream over the chocolate. Stir for about 3 minutes or until well combined. If you have never made ganache or chocolate sauce, you may get a bit concerned about half way through. It is completely normal for your sauce to look like chunky chocolate milk for the first few minutes, just keep stirring and it’ll all work out.
Allow the ganche to cool a bit, then add it to the top of the cookies.
My friend Lindsay is pretty amazing. I mean, how many people can say they got pregnant twice in the same week? Thats pretty efficient if you ask me. She is due with her twin girls pretty soon and I was one of the lucky ladies (along with my friend Emily, who is gorgeous, and her house is so beautiful it made any type of decorations borderline unnecessary) who got to throw this amazing Mom a baby shower.
Two Peas in a Pod was a fun theme, however, it was pretty hard to find adorable embellishments to go along with the party so I had to rely on Etsy and my own craft prowess to get me through.
I ordered stickers from Autumnleah On Etsy that said, "Two Peas In A Pod, Lefler Twin Girls." Adorable. I used them on mini takeout boxes for the candy buffet,
I also used the stickers to make take away cupcake bags using mini pink lunch bags and ribbon.
Of course, the candy buffet was pink and green and a big hit.
I made a sign for the candy buffet that said:
Two Peas in A Pod
Life is good, the Leflers are blessed
With two little ladies, there will be no rest
Twice the dresses, twice the curls
Two beautiful, lovely, little girls
As we celebrate a gift so sweet,
Please enjoy a box of treats!
I made cupcake toppers with supplies from Paper Dozen on Etsy.
We also had people write down wishes and prayers for the Lefler family, easily my favorite activity of the day. I made the wish sign from chipboard letters, ribbon, brads, and scalloped circles from JCSkyline on Etsy. I heart Etsy and those crafting geniuses who sell their wares.
I also made my very first diaper cake. Tater picked out the frogs for the top, although I’m pretty sure she had no idea I would ask her to part with them. I did distract her with fresh strawberries and a juice box.
Now, no one really tells you this, but it turns out that photographing a 15 foot banner is actually harder than making a 15 foot banner. Here is my best attept. Although it’s hard to see, I was pretty dang proud of that banner. I use scrapbook paper, pink paper circle coaster from the Martha Stewart Crafts collection, sparkly chipboard letters, grosgrain ribbon and tiny little clothespins.
It says, "Welcome Sweet Peas." Anytime you have to actually explain what’s in a photo, it’s not a good photo. Sorry, Nikon, it wasn’t your fault.
I also made hanging paper lanterns, the green ones not the pink one. My crafting skills aren’t quite that good yet. I used the same techniques that I used in this hanging paper lantern tutorial. If you want to make super duper cheap lanterns for your own party, it is super duper easy.
We also had food. I know, we’re pretty crazy.
Mini quiches
Berry platter that was as much of a decoration as it was a food item, so beautiful.
I made two kinds of Salad Skewers, Goat cheese, Roasted Beet & Arugula as well as the ever popular Caprese Skewers.
We also had delicious mimosas, some made with real life champagne and others with pregnancy friendly sparkling cider.
And I made a cake! Shocking, I know. It was a white cake with a vanilla pastry cream filling and a brown sugar buttercream frosting. I used the same cake batter recipe I used for these cupcakes, the same frosting as with these cupcakes (the NON-beer version) and I decided to post a How To on making pastry cream because that dang cream was so good it was the true star of the cake. I made the peas in a pod out of fondant and doughnut holes, and brushed them with luster dust.
Oh yeah, there were people there too, and some super cute babies.
For the Lefler Family, My wish to you:
I Wish You Well, By Bill Withers
I wish you flowers sunshine and smiles
I wish your children that grow to make you proud
I wish you pretty things to wear
Sweet things to smell
I wish you well (oh I wish you well)
I wish you well (oh I wish you well)
I wish you well (oh I wish you well)
I wish you well (well)
I wish you good friends that always treat you fair
Wanna wish you ribbons to tie around your hair
I wish you, truckloads of cheer
and many happy years
I wish you well (oh I wish you well)
I wish you well (oh I wish you well)
I wish you well (oh I wish you well)
I wish you well (well)
I wish you freedom to do the things you love
Wanna wish you blessings and kindness from above
Wanna wish you sunlight through the clouds
I hope you laugh out loud
I wish you well (oh I wish you well)
I wish you well (oh I wish you well)
I wish you well (oh I wish you well)
I wish you well (well)
If you are a cupcake person, learning to stuff them is just an essential skill. Really, ESSENTIAL. Slight exaggerations aside, stuffing cupcakes brings them to the next level, adding another flavor, another texture and another dimension.
I’m going to highlight three common cupcake stuffin' techniques today, each one has advantages and it will largely depend on what you are stuffing with to decide which one to go with.
The first method is to stuff pre-cooking. This only works with a filling that can be baked. I use this a lot to stuff cupcakes with cheesecake. Yep, cheesecake stuffed cupcakes.
First, you will need your two components, the cupcake batter and the filling batter (like cheesecake, or cookie dough). These can be the same flavor of different flavors. For my Key LIme Pie cupcakes, I used a white cake batter and a key lime cheesecake batter.
First, fill your cupcakes only half way full
Using a spoon, make a well in the middle but pushing the batter up onto the sides of the cupcake papers.
Fill the well with about 1 tbs of the cream cheese mixture.
Bake until the cupcake batter is done, the cheesecake filling will cook at about the same rate. You want to make sure not to over cook your cupcake batter.
The second method is to bake the cupcakes and fill them later. Once your cupcakes have baked and cooled, you can create a hole in the middle in two ways.
The first way is to use a paring knife to remove a cone shaped section of the middle of the cupcake.
Don’t remove the bottom of the cupcake.
The second method of stuffing pre-cooked cupcakes if to smash a hole in the middle with the handle of a wooden spoon.
This does create a denseness at the bottom of the cupcake, but that can work to your advantage if you are using a particularly moist filling, like jam.
Use a piping bag to fill the hole that you have created in your cupcake. If you don’t have a piping bag, you should get one, but in the mean time use a Ziplock bag with a bit of the bottom corner cut off.
Then, just frost as usual. I used chocolate ganache to frost these, but this also makes for a great filling.
Enjoy!
Do you have a How To that you want to see? Email it tome at [email protected] or leave it on my Facebook wall at:
When you go about baking biscuits, beer is a great addition. Not only because beer is fantastic will every possible edible substance, but because the the carbonation is an amazing leavening agent that lends itself well to culinary beer usage.
For this recipe I used a Orange Wheat beer from Hangar 24, a Southern California based brewery. The beer was beautiful and the flavors where perfect for these biscuits. When I pick up a beer with fruit on the label, I am initially a touch apprehensive. I wait for the possibility of a Hard Cider like taste with the hesitation of a contused prostitute, before taking a sip. I am HAPPY to report that the natural orange was perfectly subtle and a well balanced citrus flavors, with a clean, crisp finish.
Even after cooking, the flavors stayed intact and complimented the white cheddar beautifully.
I also used Kerrygold cheese, although this has nothing to do with Oktoberfest, it’s just really great cheddar. The flavors are perfect for this recipe.
Cheddar Beer Biscuits
2 cups of flour
1/2 tsp sea salt
1 1/2 tsp black pepper
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp sugar
1 stick (8 tbs) butter, cut into small cubes
1/2 cup craft wheat beer (Orange Wheat from Hanger 24 preferred)
1/2 cup white cheddar (Kerrygold reserve preferred)
Preheat oven to 400.
Put the flour, salt, pepper, baking powder, baking soda and sugar in your food processor and pulse until combined. Add your butter cubes and process until the butter is evenly distributed, about 1-2 minutes.
Move to a bowl and add the cheese and beer and stir until combined.
Dump the dough onto a floured surface. Squish together with your hands to form a ball and then flatten into a rectangle about 6 inches wide and 10 inches long and 2 inches high. Use a sharp knife to cut the biscuits into squares.
You can make them as big or small as you want, but this recipe will make 6-8 average sized biscuits.
Place the biscuits on a baking sheet covered with parchment paper. Sprinkle the top with a bit of sea salt and pepper.
Bake for 12-14 minutes or until light golden brown.
I know that Oktoberfest started as the celebration of a royal wedding that would have put the recent William/Kate union to shame. I also know that it is not an actual proper Holiday.
But for those of us completly in love with all things Beer, it might as well be.
Oktoberfest, as in the one that takes place late September to Early October in Munich, is about LOCAL beer. I love all beer, but I have a special affinity for beer brewed close to home. Although this beer isn’t actual German beer, being that I am in California, it is in line with the locavore spirit of Oktoberfest and their rule for never serving any beer at the official Oktoberfest Festival that is not brewed in their own backyard. And that backyard would be the Munich City limits.
For this recipe, which I loved SO much, I used another incredible local craft beer, this one came from Bison Brewing. Honey Basil Beer. It’s local (to those of us in California), it’s organic and the flavors are amazing.
Beer Creme Brulee: Creme Beer-lee
3/4 cups heavy cream
3/4 cup Bison Honey Basil Beer (can sub German style wheat beer)
5 egg yolks
1/2 cup sugar, plus another 1/4 cup for the topping
Preheat the oven to 300.
Put the cream, and beer in a sauce pan over medium heat. Cook just until its bubbly around the edges but not boiling. Remove from heat, cover and allow to cool for about 15 minutes.
In a bowl, combine the egg yolks, and 1/2 cup of sugar. Whisk until frothy, about 3 minutes.
While continuing to whisk, slowly add the cooled cream mixture until well combined.
Put 8 ceramic ramekins in a baking dish, filling the baking dish with about 1 inch of water (don’t get any water in the ramekins).
Pour your custard through a mesh strainer into ramekins.
Cover the baking dish with aluminum foil and bake for 40-45 minutes or until the edges are set and the middle is still slightly wobbly.
Remove from oven and allow to cool, at room temp, in the water filled baking dish for 30 minutes. Transfer to a plate and allow to chill and set in the fridge for 4 hours. Right before serving, cover the top of your set custard with an even, thin layer of sugar (about 1/2-1 tsp). Then run a culinary torch over your sugar, slowly, until it melts and turns an amber color.
Notes
Cooking tip: Don’t brulee the sugar until you are ready to serve. After about an hour of sitting, the sugar will start to liquefy again.
Germany is goregous. I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to visit this amazing Country a few years ago. I even took a 7 hour train ride across the contry side on a beautiful day in September. And although tourist are flocking to Munich by the millions this month, and no offense to the Capitol City, my favorite place was Idar Oberstein. I like to travel off the beaten path, although the Festival in Munich does sound like a helluva good time.
For this recipe, which I loved SO much, I used another incredible local craft beer, this one came from Bison Brewing. Honey Basil Beer. It’s local (to those of us in California), it’s organic and the flavors are amazing.
Oktoberfest started this past Saturday, September 17th, marking the 201st anniversary of this high holiday devoted to beer. In honor of the German festivities, I am declaring this week "Beer Week" on Domestic Fits.
I have a love and a passion for really fantastic craft beer that started while working as a waitress at a micro brewery when I was in college. I was able to get a tour of the brewery and a crash course in beer making from two very excited, self proclaimed "Beer Geeks." Up until this point the idea of a "Beer Guy" conjured up images of frat boys playing beer pong, but the Geeks changed all that for me. They were excited about the beer, the flavors, the process of it and the difference between an Ale and a Lager (FYI: there are several differences but the main difference is a Lager is brewed longer). I was hooked and a world of flavors opened up. Lucky for me, the West Coast has a fantastic, seemingly endless, supply of craft beers. If you are ever so lucky to visit us, and you love the art of beer, take a tour of a microbrewery. Beer guys are the nicest breed.
Although the true Oktoberfest celebrations won’t allow any beer to be served at the festival that aren’t brewed within the Munich City limits, I decided against using German beer. I love German beer, its lovely, but the locavore spirit of using what is close by is what I wanted to capture. For this recipe I used a Orange Wheat beer from Hanger 24, a Southern California based brewery. The beer was beautiful and the flavors where fantastic for these biscuits
I also used Kerrygold cheese, although this has nothing to do with Oktoberfest, it’s just really great cheddar. The flavors are perfect for this recipe.
I figured out how to pronounce Galette. This was becoming an issue for me. How can I go about baking, and writing about, such an amazing food that I can’t even mention in conversation? So I googled it. I found this lovely little website that has a charming French man (just trust me on the charming part) who so beautifully pronounces the word Gal-Let. You’re gonna press play over and over just to make sure he really said Gal-Let and not Guh-Lay. Or maybe that’s just me.
Apple Brown Sugar (Gal-Let) Galettes
For the Crust:
1 1/2 cups flour
2 tbs sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 stick butter
1/4 cup ice cold water
For The FIlling:
4 cups granny smith apples, cored, peeled and sliced
2 tbs fresh squeezed lemon juice
1 cup brown sugar, packed
3 tbs melted butter.
Make the crust:
In a food processor, combine the flour, sugar and salt. Pulse to combine. Add the butter (ice cold and cut into cubes) and process until combined. Add the remaining flour and process until combined. Move dough to a bowl and add the water with a wooden spoon (don’t add the water with the food processor or your dough will turn into a cracker). If your dough is too dry, or two wet, add a bit of water or flour to achieve the right consistency.
Form the dough into a disk, cover with plastic wrap and chill for at least an hour.
Once your apples and peeled, cored and sliced, add to a bowl with the lemon juice and toss to combine. Add the brown sugar and butter and toss to combine. Let stand at room temp for 20 minutes.
Preheat oven to 400.
Once your dough is chilled, roll out to an even thickness. Cut out 6 inch circles. Use whatever you have that is round and six inches, I used a small plastic bowl. This recipe will make 6-8 mini Galettes.
Arrange the apples in tight circle in the middle of your dough, leaving a one inch boarder around the edges.
Fold the edges over the filling, leaving the center open.
Brush the remaining brown sugar/butter mixture that your apples were sitting in all over the Galettes and the exposed crust.
Bake at 400 for 28-35 minutes or until golden brown.
Sushi making is an art. A beautiful, delicious art. I’m not going to sit here and pretend that one little post will ever get anyone near the magic that happens behind a real sushi counter, but I WILL tell you that making a simple roll is easy enough to do at home. If you dare.
Make The Rice
Sushi rice isn’t like your every day rice and isn’t cooked the same way. The cooking method is different, and it is finished with a shot of sake (optional) and a vinegar dressing.
Put the rice in a large bowl and cover with cold tap water.
Swirl with your hands to remove any debris.
Drain the water off, using your hand to keep the rice in the bowl
Repeat two more times. By the third time, the water should be much less cloudy.
Put rice in a colander and allow to drain and dry, about 30 minutes.
Now here is where things get a little wierd. By all accounts, in my previous rice-cookin past, the ratio is 1 part rice to 2 parts water, right? Well, not in sushi land. Put your 3 cups of rice in a large sauce pan and cover with 3 cups of water. Yep, thats 1 part to 1 part. Don’t worry, it all works out.
Bring to a boil over high heat.
Cover and allow to boil over high heat (resist the urge to turn the heat down) for three minutes.
Then turn the heat to medium and cook for an an additional 5 minutes (I sure hope you have a kitchen timer).
Then turn the heat to low and cook for another 8 minutes.
There should be no visible water left. If you have a shot of Sake, drizzle it over the rice at this point. If you don’t have any Sake, don’t worry about. Remove from heat.
Cover with a towel or a cheese cloth, put the lid back on and allow to rest for ten minutes.
While your rice is cooking, make the dressing. Combine the vinegar, salt and sugar in a small bowl and microwave on high for 30 seconds. Stir until dissolved and allow to cool.
Once the rice has rested, transfer to a large, flat bottom bowl.
Pour the dressing over the rice.
Stir the rice with a wooden spoon to distribute the dressing evenly, while fanning with a fan to cool. If you don’t have a fan a piece of cardboard will work just fine.
Repeat until rice is at body temperature.
Make The Roll
First, lets talk about fish. For this post I made two kinds of sushi, a basic Ahi Tuna Roll and a Spicy Crab roll. You can fill your sushi with just about anything you want, including other types of meat and vegetables. If you want to use raw fish, buy the best stuff you can find, really, this is no place to bargain shop. Go to the best fish market in your town and asked what they have that is Sashimi grade and of that, what is the freshest and highest quality. Don’t go in with your heart set on a certain kind of fish, you may not get the best quality. If you really want Ahi, but they just had a beautiful Yellow Tail come in, get that. You don’t need a lot, I was able to make 5 rolls from less than a half a pound of Ahi.
Cut your fish into long thin strips, the width of about your pinky. If you don’t have a long enough piece of fish to cover the entire length of the roll, you can use segments.
You’ll will need sheets of Nori and a bamboo rolling mat. Most large chain grocery stores carry both of those in their Asian sections. You can also try your local Japanese markets.
For the smaller, basic Ahi roll, use one sheet of Nori, cut in half width-wise.
Place this on your bamboo rolling mat.
You will NEED a small bowl of cold water. This is so that the very sticky rice doesn’t stick to your fingers. Dip your fingers, as needed, into the water and transfer enough rice to make a thin layer of rice over the sheet of Nori while leaving a small blank margin along all sides.
Place your thin strips of fish in the center. I also placed a long thin strip of cucumber for a little crunch.
Roll away from you, using the mat as a guide. Apply firm pressure to shape the roll.
While the roll is still in the bamboo mat, form into a square with firm pressure.
For the Spicy Crab FIlling:
This is much more accessible and easier to find in most of the United States, regardless of how far you are from the ocean.
This is a basic spicy crab recipe, with sour cream as a substitute for the more commonly used mayonaise. If you want to use mayo, it will work just fine as well. I just have a very strong aversion to mayo in general, store bough being at the top of my hit list.
1 six ounce can of lump crab meat, or claw meat (please don’t use the fake stuff Krab just doesn’t taste the same)
2 tbs of sour cream
1 tsp Nanami Togarashi (Don’t be scared, most grocery stores have it in the Asian section)
Pinch of salt
Squeeze the crab meat to remove as much water as you can. This will help your filling to stay together and not become a soupy mess.
Add the sour cream, nanami and salt and stir to combine.
Use a full sheet of Nori for this roll, but use the same steps as with the Ahi roll.
I used a thin strip of cucumber for this roll as well. Just because I had it already cut and I wanted to add a little crunch.
Roll the same as before, but there is no need to make the larger rolls square.
Use a very sharp knife to cut the rolls, you may need to run the knife under hot water in between cuts.
Whats up with Wasabi?? There are two kinds that are pretty readily available at most grocery stores. The squeeze tube kind and the powder kind that you mix with water. I find the squeeze tube kind to have an odd, over powering taste. I very much prefer the powder kind.
You now know how to make sushi. Go impress your friends.
Do you have a How To that you want to see? Email it to [email protected] or leave it on my Facebook wall at:
I wrote another article for Honest Cooking. I wrote about this deep dish pie, because I love it so much. The crust is the best part, and making it deep dish adds more of the good stuff, oh, and the filling too. Also, deep dish pies are really impressive. They stand on their own, outside of a pie pan and look like a baked-goods force to be reckoned with. Next time you make a pie from scratch, forget the pie pan and reach for your spring form pan.
Once your pie dough is completed, chilled and ready to go, roll out one disk (about half of the total recipe) so that it will sit in your spring form pan with about a 1 inch overhang. Fold in half, then in half again to form a triangle. Gently move to the pan with the point of the triangle in the dead center.
Unfold and smooth any rips or tears with your fingers. Set in the fridge to chill until ready to use.
Preheat oven to 375.
In a separate bowl, add the flour, cornstarch, salt, and sugar, then whisk to combine.
Add the peaches and raspberries and toss to coat.
Add the fruit to the spring form pan that is now lined with pie dough. Roll out your remaining dough and place it on the top of the pie, using the same method to move as you did with your bottom dough layer. Using your fingers, squeeze the top and bottom layers of the crust together around the edge of the pan. Make a few slits in the top of the pie dough to release steam. If you want to cut out a shape, as shown below, do so prior to moving your dough.
Bake at 375 for 50-60 minutes or until the top is a golden brown.
Somehow, in the course of my very rushed Deep Dish photo shoot, my peach slices went missing.
I’m not entirely sure who’s belly they ended up in, but either way, a pretty healthy snack.
I couldn’t possible eat everything I make for this blog. As much as I love to bake, I love to give it away just as much. When I’m invited to someones house, I come bearing a tray of baked goods, requested or not. These cakes needed to leave my house as soon as I had the first bite. I had to find someone to take them off my hands and save me from eating a dozen Mango Rum Cakes with Lemon Butter cream. I made 6 in mini bundt cake pans and 8 in cupcake form. Dangerous.
This is how these cakes grew as an idea in my head:
I want to make a rum cake.
But, how do I make it different?
I have a gorgeous mango, I should use that.
And the frosting?
OOOOhhh…lemons!
Lemon buttercream. Mango, rum, lemon! It’ll be like a one of those umbrella drinks pool side at a resort.
OK, who do I give these to? I will eat them ALL if they stay in my house. The Movies and Bingo group.
I know a group of senior ladies that meet a few days a week to watch movies and play bingo. I dropped them off to them, as I did with the Caramel Cake I made a few weeks ago. Elena, at 68 years old is one of the younger, spunkier ladies. She took one look at these mini cakes and said, "Rum cake? Next time put my rum on the side and make it a double!"
Mini Mango Rum Cakes With Lemon Buttercream Frosting
For the Rum Cake:
1 stick of butter, softened
1 cup of sugar
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups of flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1 cup rum
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 cup of mango, diced
For the Lemon Buttercream:
2 sticks of butter, softened
1/4 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup of whole milk
2 1/2 cups of powdered sugar
Preheat oven to 350.
In the bowl of a stand mixer, cream the butter and sugar. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well between each addition. Add the vanilla and beat some more. In a sperate bowl, add the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon, mix well. In another bowl, add the rum and the oil. Starting and ending with the dry ingredients, add both the dry and wet ingredients to the stand mixer, a bit at a time, alternating between the two until all is combined in one bowl. Add the mango and stir until just combined.
Add your batter to either mini bundt cake pans (spray with butter flavored cooking spray), or muffin tins lined with cupcake papers. Fill 3/4 of the way full.
Bake for 18-25 minutes (depends on the size of your pan) or until top springs back when touched.
Allow to cool completely.
Combine all the ingredients for the lemon butter cream in a stand mixer. Mix on low speed until mostly combined, the raise to high speed and whip until light and fluffy.
I have a mild obsession with pie dough. Once I started to make (and modify) Cook’s Illustrated’s Foolproof Pie Dough in 2007, I realized that it is not only about a million times better than store bought crust, it takes about 8 minutes of active time. There is no downside. If you have never made pie dough, do it. Seriously, seriously, DO IT. If you are going to go through all of the trouble to make a pie, don’t even think about debasing it with a store bought crust.
I started writing for Honest Cooking this week. My first article is about the science behind pie dough. How the exact same ingredients can give you such different results and how I pledge my baking allegiance to Foolproof pie dough. For that article I wrote about the Cooks Illustrated version. For this post, I will give you my slight variation on that recipe.
3 cups of all purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt
3 tbs sugar
10 tbs butter (1 stick, plus 2 tbs), cut into cubes
1/2 cup shortening
1/4 cup vodka
1/4 cup cold water
Step one: Combine 2 cups of flour, salt, and sugar in a food processor, pulse a few times until its combined. Add the butter and the shortening and process until it forms a ball around the blade, about 2 minutes.
Step two: Add the remaining flour and process until well incorporated, about 1 minute.
Step Three: Move to a bowl and add the water and the vodka, combine with a spatula or wooden spoon.
Combining the liquid in the food process will destroy the effects of the vodka, and your hands may warm the fats too much. The dough will be very moist, but if it is too moist to stay together, add a little more flour.
Step Four: Split into two equal sized portions and form into disks. Wrap the disks in plastic wrap and chill until very firm, about two hours. Because this dough is so soft, it is very important for the pie dough to be very cold and very firm. Step five: On a very well floured surface, place one of the disks, add flour to the top of the disk as well.
Roll out into an even thickness. Marble rolling pins are very cold and don’t disrupt the fat inside the dough, making them an excellent choice for rolling pie dough. When you place your dough in the fridge to chill, add your marble rolling pin as well, allowing it to chill.
Step six: This recipe is very soft and will fall apart while being rolled. Although some people like to use the rolling pin to assist with moving the dough from rolling surface to pie pan, it tends to fall apart too easily with this method. The easiest way is to fold the dough circle in half, then in half again, forming a triangle.
Place the point of the triangle in the center of the pie plate and unfold the dough.
Trim the dough, leaving a half-inch overhang past the edge of the pie pan. Form a fluted edge around the top of the pie crust.
Baking: If you want to bake this before it’s filled, prick several holes in the bottom with a fork. Line the inside with parchment paper and fill with pie weights or dried beans. Bake at 375.
This crust can also be filled and baked immediately, whichever your recipe calls for.