Food is Food

Titus and Dante wanted to make a cake. I had them make this classic quatre-quarts plus a little vanilla, but you can add whatever you'd like. For vanilla though, use vanilla extract or the scraped out seeds from a fresh vanilla pod if you have it - that's the best.

This is, literally, easy as cake. Easy enough for kids, for sure. And delicious! Leftovers? Well, this keeps well-wrapped in the fridge for several days. Or you can toast a slice or two, top with with berries and whipped cream perhaps?

Titus' Vanilla Cake

200 g eggs (3 or 4, depending on how large they are)

200 g sugar

200 g flour
1 tsp baking powder
200 g butter, melted

1 tsp vanilla

Beat eggs and sugar until pale and fluffy. Stir in flour and baking powder, and the melted butter and the vanilla. Pour into a well-lined cake pan and bake in a 200°C oven, for 30-35 minutes. Check to make sure it's baked through.

I was going to say that one of these days we’ll actually make a proper Peking duck recipe, but that’s probably not going to happen. That takes multiple steps, several days, and requires a place to hang the ducks to dry. Most modern homes don’t have a duck drying room.

However, using this relatively quick and simple technique, we can achieve something kind of similar, which many people would say, all things considered, is even better. Well, maybe not “many people,” but I would say that. These were really, really good.

Regarding the Chinese five-spice seen herein; mine contained cinnamon, anise seed, cloves, ginger, and fennel; but these ingredients can vary. Believe it or not, despite the name, many contain more than five spices, as things like pepper, nutmeg, orange peel, and cardamom, are also common additions. The good news is, for something like this, any combination of those will work.

If you’re not into lettuce cups for whatever reason, you can also use this technique for serving whole duck legs. The only difference is, don’t cut them up. Since this is something that can be made well ahead of time, it works nicely for large groups. Just simply reheat, and crisp up the skin before serving. I really hope you give these a try soon. Enjoy!

Ingredients:

6 whole duck legs

1 tbsp veg oil

1 tbsp kosher salt

1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

2 teaspoons Chinese 5-spice powder

3 green onions, cut into large pieces

5 garlic cloves, halved

For the sauce (everything here is to taste, so please adjust):

1/4 cup hoisin sauce

1 teaspoon sesame oil

1 teaspoon hot sauce

1/2 lemon juiced

Serve in lettuce cups, garnished with cucumber, green onions, and sesame seeds.

I am a zombie. Yesterday morning, Carson and I woke up, flew to LA, attended the Emmy's, and then flew home on a red-eye last night. Essentially, we spent 12 hours in Los Angeles and another 12 hours on a plane in a 24-hour timespan. I am a zombie. BUT, it was allll worth it because The Voice won an Emmy!!!! I was so proud of Carson and everyone that works so hard on the show, and it was very exciting to be there in person to cheer them on. Tonight starts a new season, so tune in!!

Moving on to this ridiculously delicious banana bread that I made on Saturday morning in guilty preparation for leaving my children. I think it worked, because they barely missed us and made us pretty cute "welcome home" signs. Go, banana bread, go! I tried out a couple of new techniques after seeing this recipe. First, I caramelized the bananas by roasting them in the oven with a little honey and cinnamon. Then, I browned the butter and let it cool slightly before adding it to the batter.

By doing these two things, the banana bread tasted sinful. Almost as if I had added rum or peanut butter. It has a caramely, slightly nutty flavor, and it's perfectly moist and plain old delicious. No need to bake this out of guilt, just bake this! And watch The Voice tonight! Ok, I'll take a nap now...

Brown Butter Caramelized Banana Bread

(Makes 1 loaf)

Printable Recipe

4 ripe bananas

Honey

Cinnamon

1 1/4 cup flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp ground nutmeg

6 T unsalted butter

1 tsp vanilla

1/4 cup sour cream

1 cup brown sugar

2 eggs

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Peel bananas, and place on a parchment-lined baking sheet. Drizzle with honey and sprinkle with cinnamon. Place in oven, and cook for 20 minutes, until bananas begin to caramelize. Remove, and set aside to let cool. Reduce oven heat to 350 degrees.

While bananas are roasting, melt butter in a small saucepan over medium-low heat, until it begins to brown and let off a nutty aroma. Remove from heat, and set aside to let cool.

In a small bowl, whisk together dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and nutmeg). In a larger bowl, add the bananas and mash. Stir in the butter, vanilla, sour cream, brown sugar and eggs, and combine until just smooth. Add the dry ingredients, and stir to combine. Pour batter into a greased bread pan, and bake for one hour.

They say Auguste Escoffier created this dish in honor of the opera, La Belle Helen, but we chefs know the real reason. How else are you going to use up bruised pears in such a delicious and beautiful way? Okay, so maybe that wasn’t his motivation, but as you’ll see in the video, it sure does work great.

The recipe is very straightforward, so instead we’ll go into your options for the chocolate sauce, as well as what to do with all that extra simple syrup. We have two chocolate preparations that will work for this (and have been linked). The first would be our easy hot fudge recipe; and the second, and more traditional choice, would be the classic chocolate ganache.

If you follow the link to the later, you’ll be taken to our Boston Cream Pie video, where you’ll see the technique for creating a classic ganache, but you’ll probably need to adjust the ratio of cream to chocolate. Generally it’s equal parts chocolate and cream, but if you want something more pourable, then 2 parts cream to 1 part chocolate (by weight) would work better.

As far as the extra vanilla poaching liquid goes; you’ll want to strain it, pour it into some cool looking bottles, and give it away as edible gifts. The taste is incredible. Better than the pears, if we’re being honest, and would make a fantastic holiday treat for the wannabe mixologists in your life. I really hope you give this a try soon. Enjoy!

Ingredients for 4 poached pears:

6 cups water

zest and juice of one lemon

4 bosc pears, cored and peeled (you can also use Anjou or Bartlett)

1 split vanilla bean, or a few teaspoons of vanilla extract

3 cups sugar

Simmer for about 20-25 minutes, depending on size and firmness

Because I used to develop recipes to pair with wines (for a now defunct online wine retailer) I have quite a collection of wine books. The book I probably use the most these days just to learn about wine is The Wine Bible, by Karen McNeil. I am eagerly anticipating the next edition, due out next month. However another book came across my desk recently that I am really enjoying. While by no means comprehensive, it does really get at the important stuff, especially when it comes to enjoying wine, not just geeking out on it.

Wine Folly, The Essential Guide to Wine is just that, a book that includes the fundamentals of wine—such as how wine is made, how to read a wine lablel, a glossary, how to taste, pair and serve wine, profiles of popular and under the radar wine varietals, regional maps and and more. It uses lots of infographics, data visualization, icons and imagery to help simplify the information. I particularly appreciate that is goes beyond the standard oft repeated information. For example in the pairing section there are pages on vegetable, herb and spice pairings not just the typical how to pair wines with meat or cheeeses.

Because the book focuses on the big picture, it does miss some details, particularly in terms of soils. For example the listing for Soave includes the flavor profile of the wine, dominant and possible flavors as well as the main grape type, common styles, where it grows, how to serve, store and pair it. However I was just at a seminar about Soave where I learned that the two main styles of Soave vary by the region and soil type—when produced in the South West the soil is limestone the wines are citrus, linear and floral. When produced in the Eastern and Central part of the region the soil is volcanic and the wines are richer and oilier in texture. Is that an important detail to know? It all depends on you.

In particular I find the tips on where to find value, terrific wine region maps and color icons of wine flavors really make this book a keeper and are guaranteed to deepen your appreciation and enjoyment of wine. Check out the popular blog from Wine Folly to get more of a sense of the style of the book.

Disclaimer: Wine Folly was provided to me for review purposes. I was not compensated monetarily for this or any other post. This post does include Amazon affiliate links.

I make a lot with cauliflower, because it's a vegetable that my children will actually eat, but chopping it up is one of my least favorite things to do. It's messy, tedious and time consuming. But yesterday I was at Target, and I came across these Cauliflower Crumbles (did you know if you're a mom and you find yourself with a few free hours you car will actually DRIVE YOU TO TARGET all by itself??? so weird). Yes, these crumbles are a major short cut BUT WHO CARES!? Short cuts at dinnertime make for a happy household. So last night, I made a version of these meatballs with cauliflower crumbles instead of the other vegetables it called for. They were so yummy!! They even went to the party, the party in our tummies, because sometimes we have to sing that song while we eat...

Thank you for the recipe, Audra!

Also, a Cauliflower Quesadilla and a Cauliflower Rice Bowl.

I never understand when people say they can’t cook. If you can follow a recipe, you can cook. Although not every recipe yields great results. One problem is accuracy. In creating recipes for clients I generally measure and weigh ingredients. Weighing is always more accurate. So it makes sense that when following recipes with weights, that readers should use weights too.

Of course not all recipes are written with weights, but that's changing. Some prominent cookbook authors, especially bakers, are using weights in their recipes and in particular the metric system. I talked to once such baker and cookbook author, Alice Medrich. She collects James Beard awards for practically every book she writes and approaches recipe testing much like a scientist. Her latest books are Flavor Flours and Seriously Bittersweet, Here’s what she had to say about using scales.

1. When did you start using grams in your recipes?

I got used to grams in Europe in the 1970's. I didn't switch from ounces to grams in my books until just a few years ago because I began to see that people were warming up to using scales and while they were at it, I thought, why not get them onto grams? I also saw that some of the celeb chefs were publishing in grams, so I though that would help too.

2. Why grams versus ounces?

If you want to increase or decrease a recipe by any percentage, the math is so much easier to do in grams.
If you make small changes in a recipe by increasing certain ingredients by small amounts, it's easier to capture that amount in grams than fractions of ounces.
Grams are universal around the world (except for in the US), so you can reach a wider audience and you can also use recipes from books around the world without worrying about the "translation."
Grams are such small units that you rarely need to use fractions which you do have to do with ounces. This means that grams look cleaner on the page.
With grams its easer to see relationships and ratios between amounts of ingredients.

3. What do you look for in a scale?

It should have a switch that goes from ounces to grams.

It should have a tare button (so you can reset to zero) to compensate for any kind of container.

It should be able to register amounts at least as small as 5 grams (though I like a scale that reads 1 or 2 grams) and at least as high a 2 kilos (though more is better).

I DO NOT LIKE any scale that proposes to translate from volume to weight (first because I don't trust the weights used for equivalences and second because I think we are grown ups and can learn to use a scale without training wheels) I often say that a decent scale can be had for less than the price of 10 lattes....so there is really no excuse not to have one, especially if you like to bake.

Thanks Alice!

I’ve reviewed various scales over the years. My current model? Smart Weigh.

Here are the features:

Sleek flat design, stores easily

A backlit LCD screen

A tare button

A capacity of 11 pounds/5 kg and registers as little as 5 grams

Uses 4 AAA batteries

Switches from ounces to grams, pounds to kilos

A wide and flat surface, which makes reading the screen very easy even when you are weighting something large

It looks a lot more expensive than it is--black or white models are $24.99

Disclaimer: I received the Smart Weigh for review purposes. This post includes Amazon affiliate links. I was not monetarily compensated for this review or any other post.

Do you know why I love Thanksgiving? Yes, because we gather family around and give thanks and blah blah blah, but what I love most is constructing the ideal bite on my fork. Flavors and textures that perfectly compliment each other, all at once. I think this is why I love bowls. Salad bowls, rice bowls, noodle bowls... you can eat a delicious bite with each spoonful (forkful, chopstick-ful?). Does anyone else think about their food this much? Should I seek help??

Anyway, my friend recently sent me the following recipe, and I shortened the title but it's really called "Crockpot Caramelized Pork Ramen Noodle Soup with Curry Roasted Acorn Squash" - a mouthful, right? A PERFECT MOUTHFUL. But before you click on the link and say... "wait, this takes 9 hours to make and calls for one thousand ingredients?!" let me calm you down right now. Your crock pot will do most of the work... just throw that pork butt in there with as many ingredients as you have (I omitted the red curry paste and the Chinese five-spice because I didn't want to go out and get them) and let it slooooowly cook. You don't HAVE to crisp up the pork at the end if you're low on time, but I would HIGHLY recommend it, as it really transforms the meat into something special. For the acorn squash, I only roasted it in olive oil, salt, pepper and a little brown sugar because, again, I didn't have any of the rest of the ingredients. But I still thought it was superb.