Baked pudding

I made this recipe awhile back from Barefoot Contessa's Back to Basics cookbook. It's between a brownie and a pudding. It's like an ode to chocolate. So good with a couple scoops of vanilla ice cream.

It was quite rich. When I served it, I was thinking like it was a brownie, but we really could only eat about half of the serving because it was pretty rich. With vanilla ice cream on top of the still-warm brownie pudding, it's almost like a hot fudge next to the ice cream. Next time, I will probably half the recipe.

Brownie Pudding
From Back to the Basics from Barefoot Contessa
Serves 6-8

Ingredients
1/2 pound (2 sticks) unsalted butter, plus extra for buttering the dish
4 extra-large eggs, at room temperature
2 cups sugar
3/4 cup good cocoa powder
1/2 cup all-purpose flour
Seeds scraped from 1 vanilla bean
1 tablespoon framboise liqueur, optional
Vanilla ice cream, for serving
Directions
Preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Lightly butter a 2-quart (9 by 12 by 2-inch) oval baking dish. Melt the 1/2 pound of butter and set aside to cool.


In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the eggs and sugar on medium-high speed for 5 to 10 minutes, until very thick and light yellow. Meanwhile, sift the cocoa powder and flour together and set aside.


When the egg and sugar mixture is ready, reduce the speed to low and add the vanilla seeds, framboise, if using, and the cocoa powder and flour mixture. Mix only until combined. With mixer still on low, slowly pour in the cooled butter and mix again just until combined.


Pour the brownie mixture into the prepared dish and place it in a larger baking pan. Add enough of the hottest tap water to the pan to come halfway up the side of the dish and bake for exactly 1 hour. A cake tester inserted 2 inches from the side will come out 3/4 clean. The center will appear very under-baked; this dessert is between a brownie and a pudding.


Allow to cool and serve with vanilla ice cream.

French dip sandwiches

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Just thought I'd share with you another one of our quick meals. This is so easy, probably as easy as a frozen pizza, depending on how you make it. I like warm sandwiches better than cold cuts. Always have, always will. Especially when the cheese is melting onto the sides and the bread is nicely toasted.

With the French dip sandwiches we usually make, I just buy a loaf of Italian or French bread, deli roast beef, sliced provolone, a can of au jus (or beef broth), and an onion (optional). Toast the bread, then add a think layer of roast beef and provolone cheese, toast again open-faced. Heat up the au jus. If using onions, slice and saute the onions until tender. Top them on your sandwich, dip, and enjoy.



You can also use swiss or mozzarella, hamburger buns, rolls, regular bread. You can make it a panini. You could also go fancy and do a beef roast and have slow cooked, shredded beef instead of deli roast beef. This recipe looks really good. I may have to try it that way. But you would also need more prep time for that. One of the first lines in that recipe is, "These aren’t your standard deli-sliced roast beef French dip sandwiches"...so there ya go!

Not your typical pizza

I LOVE goat cheese. In fact, I just love cheese.

One of the easy meals we do on a regular basis is "homemade" pizza. When I have extra time, I'll make the crust, but when I don't (which is common), I buy the refrigerated dough in a tube. We usually do toppings like pepperoni, mushrooms, red peppers, green peppers, ham, pineapple, corn (if we want to feel like we're back in Venezuela), and of course, cheese. The toppings are all based on what's available in the kitchen.

In October, we went to San Diego for the weekend to visit Brad and welcome him home to the USA (from Afghanistan). We went to his friend's house and discovered she was practically a gourmet chef. We had delicious gourmet food, including pizzas on the grill! (I definitely want to try this.) One of the pizzas was fig, prosciutto, and goat cheese, among other things like a grilled rack of lamb with spicy brown mustard sauce, wine, and Italian sausage on rolls with sauteed veggies.

So, I recreated this pizza a couple months ago when Amy visited, adding baby arugula, and again enjoyed the mix of flavors--sweet, salty, and peppery.

There's really not much of a recipe. For the crust, I used the refrigerated dough. I flattened it out on wax paper, let it sit for a few minutes. Then, I put some corn meal on a Pampered Chef stone, and put it in the oven to cook for a couple minutes. I took it out before it started browning and brushed it with olive oil. Then I added the toppings: dried figs quartered, prosciutto sliced, and chunks of goat cheese. I threw it in the oven for about 15 minutes. When I took it out, I threw on some baby arugula and enjoyed it!

Back to cheese...because I'm a nerd who loves the dairy section of the food pyramid, I have read about it on the web. I can't believe how MANY types of cheese there are. I want to try to make my own cheese. I heard ricotta is not hard to make. Maybe yogurt too. ...This summer?

Asian noodle salad

I made a very tasty Asian Noodle Salad the other night. It was fairly quick, healthy, and refreshing. Chopping up the veggies was really the only time consuming part.

I made it almost exactly as the recipe shows, except I used cole slaw mix instead of the cabbages (since I had it on hand). I also added celery and used whole wheat spaghetti noodles.

*Tip: Go easy on the dressing! We put too much on the first time we ate it, and decided that less is more, since there are so many flavors in there!

It's that time of year!

Looooove Girl Scout Cookies. These are our absolute favorites.

Baked Brie

This is an easy, tasty, and attractive appetizer that I've made to bring to holiday parties or when people have come over.

Baked Brie
Ingredients:
8 oz round of brie
1 can of crescent rolls
about 1/2 cup of cherry preserves (could use other kinds if desired)
about 1/4 cup chopped pecans
1 egg, beaten (to use for brushing the dough and giving it a shiny, crispy finish)

Unwrap the brie out of the package. The white rind on the outside of the cheese is typically eaten, and doesn't taste like much. (FYI "It is pale in color with a slight greyish tinge under a rind of white mold" -Wikipedia) Gross to think it's actually mold, but it's delicious. The cheese, that is.



Leave the rind on. Yes.

Then wrap the cheese round in crescent rolls. I used wax paper to unravel the crescent rolls, pinched together the individually cut rolls, and then had a sheet of crescent roll dough. Chop pecans and put in center of dough. Scoop the preserves and put on top of pecans. Place cheese round on top of preserves. Wrap dough around the cheese. Place the wrapped round seam side down on a sheet pan (I also used parchment paper for less clean up on the pan.)

I had extra dough, so I used cute pie cutters that I have to make leaves and place them on top. You could probably cut out any shapes you want with the extra dough.

Make an egg wash (egg whisked with a pinch of water) and use a brush to brush the dough all over.

Bake for 30 minutes at 350 degrees (or until golden brown and heated through).

Perfect Roast Chicken

I have made this recipe a handful of times, and love it every time. It's great for making when you have guests, because it's seems impressive, but it's actually pretty easy. It's also great for this time of year. At first, it was very intimidating to roast a whole chicken, but I eventually got used to man-handling the raw chicken. I actually don't mind raw meat too much. Some people can't stand touching it.

Perfect Roast Chicken
Recipe from Barefoot Contessa

Ingredients
1 (5 to 6 pound) roasting chicken
Kosher salt
Freshly ground black pepper
1 large bunch fresh thyme, plus 20 sprigs
1 lemon, halved
1 head garlic, cut in half crosswise (I use 4-6 tsp already minced garlic)
2 tablespoons (1/4 stick) butter, melted
1 large yellow onion, thickly sliced
4 carrots cut into 2-inch chunks (can use more if you love carrots)
1 bulb of fennel (of decent size), tops removed, and cut into wedges
Olive oil

Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.

Remove the chicken giblets. Rinse the chicken inside and out. Remove any excess fat and leftover pin feathers and pat the outside dry. Liberally salt and pepper the inside of the chicken. Stuff the cavity with the bunch of thyme, both halves of lemon, and all the garlic. Brush the outside of the chicken with the butter and sprinkle again with salt and pepper. Tie the legs together with kitchen string and tuck the wing tips under the body of the chicken.

Place the onions, carrots, and fennel in a roasting pan. Toss with salt, pepper, 20 sprigs of thyme, and olive oil. Spread around the bottom of the roasting pan and place the chicken on top.

Roast the chicken for 1 1/2 hours, or until the juices run clear when you cut between a leg and thigh. Remove the chicken and vegetables to a platter and cover with aluminum foil for about 20 minutes. Slice the chicken onto a platter and serve it with the vegetables

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There's also a video of her making it on YouTube: