VartaMelon

Deep Frying Adventures

2011-01-24T17:53:00.004-05:00

Look at these hands.

Who, you may ask, could convince me to get them so goopy and gross?

The roomie! Ever since break I've heard about how amazing deep fried (I totally just typo'd fried as friend) pickles are and how we had to try them and make them and join the rest of the world in their deliciousness. So I made beer batter using Carib, since I am in the Carib after all, although technically, I'm in Wadadli country (let's see how many people understood that, haha). Dredged the pickle spears in flour then dipped in beer batter (which I seasoned with salt, pepper, garlic powder, and a little sugar). I then fried them, but also dipped a few in Italian bread crumbs too just to see how those would turn out, and I loved them like that. Layla like the regular ones, the bread crumb ones were a tad peppery for her liking, so fry accordingly.

Enjoy!

Revision of Sorts

2011-01-20T21:37:00.003-05:00

Remember this genius creation from way back when? Yea, me too. Rice crispie treats have never been the same since that memorable day.

Flash forward over a year later. I'm in med school on an island where serious junk food and the tools to deep fry them are harder to come by (and a bit pricey honestly for your average student). But fortunately, when there's a will, there's a way.

Lo and behold. The answer to the quick question revised:

1. Take a regular rice crispie treat, not the little ones, the bigger ones and cut them in half.

2. Hmmmmmm... Familiar smear of Nutella (actually, it wasn't real Nutella, it was an Antiguan version of Nutella, but hey, it worked).

3. CHOCOLATE ICE CREAM

4. Did I mentioned I joined a gym? I may actually even teach an abs class there.

5. Yup, I'm gonna be a doctor.

A Good Burger in Antigua

2010-11-17T08:53:00.005-05:00

Don't get me wrong, I like it here. Every day on my way to school I round a corner and am greeted by an amazing view of the ocean, on the flip side, in those few miles I go over NINE speed bumps. On Saturdays, a women named Harriet sets up a tent and a barbecue and sells the most amazing ribs I have ever had an my entire life, and there's a chicken shack that sells jerk chicken that the smell alone will make you drool from a mile away. One downside though, they're not big beef eaters here, and I'm a Persian Kabob that grew up in Burger Land America. I swear, I asked a cab driver once where he goes when he craves a good steak, and he actually said "ehhh, beef?". I was convinced Antigua and I were going to have some serious issues then, but they eat a lot of pork too, so we've come to an agreement.

Now I know every student has gotten themselves in the food funk here, because while there are good and nice places to eat, they are often tucked away. That has done nothing to damper with my mission to find a GOOD burger here. Hmmmmm, burger. And that my friends, brings me to The Tides Restaurant. It's located very close to school (AUA students will understand these directions). Imagine you are leaving school by making a left, after the sharp turn you make a left at the intersection and then a right on the first detour off that road. Another perk, it's on the water, so you get to hear the ocean while you eat along with getting a nice little ocean breeze. OH! And you can see Jumby Bay from The Tides when you sit outside, so if you do, the house on the right side of the island that you can see, is Oprah's. YUP. OPRAH.

I had been there for dinner before, I got the spring rolls as my appetizer and the lamb for my main. They were both absolutely delicious. But I wasn't paying attention and didn't take any pictures. This time I made sure to pay a little more attention. The lunch menu was quite different than the dinner menu when it came to the main courses. It included salads (cesar, nicoise, the reg's) and sandwiches as well as some pasta dishes and desserts. I got the spring rolls again for my app, because they are that good. They're not as doughy as most egg rolls and don't ooze oil when you bite them, they're actually quite light for being deep fried. For my main, I went for the burger. Hmmmmm, burger. And no frozen patty like they give us at school. They use Rib Eye!

Tastes like America.

And for $32 EC (that's a little under $12US), you get either fries or a salad. I would like to still be able to wear bikini's, so I went for the salad, I'm sorry if I disappointed you. I also had fruit for dessert. Back to the burger. I ordered it medium well, because I like to disappoint you all. But it was still super juicy. Even the bread was yummy. The cheese was nice and melted but not overly so where it gets crunchy. So next time you're craving a burger (in between classes, HA), I highly recommend The Tides, it's by far the best burger I've had in Antigua.

Ba-Nana Bread

2010-11-14T11:50:00.006-05:00

First off, I'm back!

Yes, after nearly a year, I am making a post, but in my defense, med school isn't a breeze and takes up a lot of time. So all of you thinking that since I'm on a Caribbean island, I'm living the life, you are so wrong. I'm not going to lie though, I've totally gone to class smelling like chlorine after jumping in the pool and laying out for a bit and I sip my coffee nearly every morning on my patio, all of which is pretty sweet considering it's NOVEMBER. On the flip side, the average medical student is weird. I have been lucky to meet some wonderful people though.

In the middle here, we have Nana, and on the right, Layla, my bestest buds on the island and the people I would lose my mind without. Together, we call ourselves the Reverse Oreo Cookie because we are awesome like that. Sadly, Nana is leaving us soon and Layla and I are both bummed. Especially because now we are no longer going to have someone say "banana" to us in a Ghanian accent.

Banana Bread

(Which is totally possible to make without baking soda, suck on that food network, I mean that nicely, I actually like food network a lot. Also, I don't have measuring cups or spoons which makes baking HARD. I used the smallest coffe cup we had, which looked like one cup and normal eating spoons, so teaspoon= small spoon. Oh, and I don't have a bread loaf, I used a cake pan. Now I know what to bring back when I go home for break.)

- 2 cups flour

- 1 teaspoon baking powder

- some shakes of cinnamon

- some shakes of salt

- 3/4 cup of brown sugar

- 2 eggs

- a blurb of vanilla

- 1/2 cup oil

- 1 cup of mashed super ripe bananas

1. Mash up the bananas, they are going to look gross.

Those are some ripe bananas.

2. Mix together, the eggs, sugar, vanilla, and the mashed bananas. It will look even more gross than the mashed bananas alone.

3. Mix in the flour, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt.

4. Pour into the pan and bake for about 45-50 minutes in a pre-heated 350 degree oven.

5. Eat while learning why mutations in human growth hormone cause the protein to be improperly transported and... back to the food:

Eating on the Island

2010-02-23T17:17:00.007-05:00

Ok. I know, it's been forever and what I'm about to post isn't even all gluttonous. But can I just say, it is NOT easy to cook here. First of all, the produce selection is just terrible and it's hard to find all the little things that a person wants, and then I didn't think this fully through and I'm missing some key kitchen appliances that I'm going to have to bring back with me when come back from break, but even that's not until the end of April.

The building I live in is called Mandalay, and as far as I'm concerned, it's the best AUA has to offer. 1) I'm across the street from the beach 2) The people here are AMAZING. Seriously, I have the best roommates and everything. I no longer have a roommate anymore, but I suppose the benefit to that is I don't have to close the door when I'm in the bathroom. It's the little things in life people, the little things.

As far as eating out goes, my Epic Portions buddies wouldn't survive. The only American chains here are Subway and KFC. Both of which are much more expensive and have much smaller menus. But then there are a million shawarma places to choose from. I tend to just cook and eat at home. I feed some of my neighbors sometimes and it turns out I make pretty good beef and broccoli. Want to see?

The way I do it is I cook the meat with some onions, then add the sauce which I make by adding: soy sauce, brown sugar, grated garlic, and lime juice. I then add the sauce, throw in my broccoli and grated grated (the second time I made it, I also added mushrooms). Give it a little stir to just slightly cook the broccoli so it doesn't get mushy, and yum! Tastes like PF Changs.

For dessert, I like to make the easiest cake known to those who bake from scratch. A laisy daisy cake.

There are about 800 million variations to this cake. I make the cake portion from scratch, but I have a friend who uses a boxed mix for the cake and just adds the topping after it bakes, which, let's face it, is the most important part. So bake whatever base cake you want. For the topping, get a bowl and mix enough coconut to cover the entire cake with a nice layer, a glug of milk, a nice good couple of spoons of brown sugar, and a couple of tablespoons of melted butter. Spread over the cake (it should be thick), and place under the broiler on low until golden and toasty. Invite all your neighbors over and become their favorite! hahahaha.

Oh, I miss deep frying an wrapping things in bacon. I just need TIME! But not all has been lost, I did manage to do this one night:

Bless.

Rawr.

2010-01-03T19:09:00.003-05:00

Ok, this time I think I have a pretty legit reason for slacking like crazy, I got into AUA so I can be a doctor and make money to dip all my bacon in really, really, really good chocolate. Let's hope the plan works. In the meantime, I will be back in Virginia at the end of April but I will make some posts from here once I get settled in!

BTW, my new roomie who is one of the sweetest people ever (no, seriously, she wrote me a greeting letter for when I got there with all these helpful tips on what to do and all, she's fabulous, everyone in the building LOVES her) and she's also quite the cook herself! No joke, people knocked on the door tonight because she made dinner. Loves it. She's already been given a heads up that pictures of her cooking may end up here.

One Big Can of Pureed Pumpkin

2009-11-16T20:07:00.007-05:00

I may be alone in doing this, but when seasons change, I start convincing myself I need things I don't really need. Fuzzy boots, intensive care lotion, two pairs of rain boots, a plaid jacket, hats with matching scarves and gloves, you get the idea. This list totally spread its way into my pantry and kitchen in the form of one super huge can of pureed pumpkin. I had been hoping to make pumpkin cookies, because a super awesome patient brought in pumpkin cookies to our office, but they were so good that I knew if mine didn't come out as amazing, I'd be kind of bummed. I totally need to get the recipe. Those cookie, you don't understand, they were heaven in bite size form. Anywhozers. I made pumpkin bread. I read several recipes and the general gist, most had a lot of white sugar, so mine is a little different than what you're probably used to seeing. I also think I used more pumpkin than most recipes. Either way, it came out super delicious and moist and I came home from work tonight and I made it yesterday and only about a quarter of it is left. I only got one good picture of it though, and it's not even a good picture, and that's because I totally pulled a Varta and found a way to deep fry pumpkin pie filling after I baked the bread. I'll go in order:

Pumpkin Bread, Cake, Whatever

20 ounces canned pumpkin

4 eggs

1 cup olive oil

1/3 cup milk

1/3 cup water

2 1/2 cups flour

1 1/2 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup white sugar

2 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

sprinkling of salt

teaspoon-ish cinnamon

1 teaspoon-ish nutmeg

1/2 teaspoon-ish cloves

*I say -ish, because honestly, whatever crinkles your socks

- Mix all the wet ingredients together

- Stir in the sugars until everything is smooth

- Add the spices

- Add the flour and mix until all even, stick your finger in a lick regularly to make sure it tastes as awesome as you want it to

- Pour in a cake pan, should be fairly big, it's a lot of batter

- bake at 350 degrees for 50-60 minutes, or until you can poke it with a knife and it doesn't come out with goop

If you bought a really big can of pumpkin like I did (which is like 30 ounces or so) you're going to have a very awkward amount of leftover pumpkin in the can.

Don't take it out, instead crack an egg into it, add some sugar, spices, and flour. Mix all that goodness until even.

Then, as per usual, take a won ton wrapper and plop and nice size helping of pumpkin pie filling on there. Only don't fold it into a won ton like usual, make a ravioli by just laying another won ton wrapper on top, sealing with water, deep fry like you (or I) would normally do.

Yea, these babies didn't last very long at allllll.

East Coast vs. West Coast

2009-10-27T12:16:00.007-04:00

I went to California this past weekend and got to see dear friends that I love and watch one get married. I've been to California a few times, but never paid too much attention to the food there, but I figured I better start. Since when it comes to big parties I don't believe in eating or breathing in my dresses before and during the festivities, I ordered a salad at Habit, which I found out was pretty much sacrilegious, and I apologize for that. I also ate salad at the wedding which I really got some heat for. They were chugging on the haterade, I swear. Anyways. After the wedding, my dear friend Payman and his amazing wife, Farah, were so sweet and took me to In-N-Out.

The Strawberry Shake. Not going to lie. That was amazing.

The burger (don't I look awesome?), while good, don't get me wrong, I'd eat it again, was not, in my opinion, as good as Five Guys. Let me explain. I ordered a double double animal style with animal fries, just to make sure I got the full In-N-Out experience. I was told that the fries weren't supposed to be as crunchy as they were, and I'll factor in the fact that it was around 1:30a.m. or so when we got the food. So ignore the fries, back to the burger.

Generally speaking, I like my burgers with lettuce, tomato, ketchup, and bacon. No random sauces. And the bread is super important. As big as my burger was, I thought it was a little too bread-y, and the sauce, I was expecting more than Thousand Island dressing.

As I said, being as that it was about to close, I'm taking that into consideration and I'll hold off on my final verdict for In-N-Out, but as it stands now. Five Guys is whopping its butt.

Dessert Nachos

2009-10-20T08:31:00.006-04:00

As many of you are aware, I've been going though a massive brain fart recently. Last night, I finally had a stroke of genius come to me and I feel reenergized to keep on going (in the little free time I have!) with the greasy concoctions.

First off, I cut some won ton wrappers diagonally, fried them, and laid them flat on wax paper to cool.

Then drizzled with melted milk chocolate.

Then I sprinkled them toasted coconut. I used regular grocery store sweetened coconut and just put them in the oven for 10-ish minutes on 350.

Then drizzled with melted white chocolate.

I then threw some more toasted coconut and some sliced almonds on. It looks like a super huge blob, I know. I let it cool overnight, but that's an overkill, I only gave it that much time because I started making kind of late and wanted to be in bed by midnight. I also hid them in the microwave since no one uses it. HA! I'm smart cookie.

In the morning I separated the "chips" and plated it to look like nachos which I learned, is very hard to photograph.

But super yummy!

Quick Question...

2009-10-14T21:12:00.004-04:00

Ever wonder what happiness tastes like?

I'll tell you. A rice crispie treat cut in half and smeared with Nutella. Oh baby, baby.

And while we're on the topic of questions, let me ask you all for some help, any requests for stuff to make? I'm running out of things to deep fry and wrap in bacon!!! Oh no!!!

Cinnabon Ice Cream Awesomeness

2009-10-04T22:56:00.005-04:00

Sooooooo, I'm going to California in a few weeks for a wedding and I totally need to get my body back in tip top shape which is only 4 pounds away but I keep doing things like this which really interfere with my mission.

Seriously, what kind of evil genius builds a Cinnabon and a Carvel Ice Cream together? It's like those Baskin Robbins/Dunkin Donuts and the KFC/Taco Bell hybrids. Some of us are really indecisive and will order from both. And when we're feeling creative, we'll ask if they can layer it on top of each other.

Who's a happy chunky monkey?

Vartamelon.

More S'mores

2009-09-30T21:15:00.003-04:00

Remember the super duper big Hershey bar? Well, I'm proud to announce I'm at the "R". That's a pretty big deal. Tonight, my little endeavor kind of failed on me, but was still delicious. I had a few egg roll wrappers left and figured since I finally had a little free time I better put them to use. I also had about 1/3 of a bag of miniature marshmallows left. Do you smell what he skinny fat girl is cooking? Both of my previous s'mores related posts were ice creamy. This is of the deep fried variety.

Putting it together.

How funny is that??? I totally forgot that marshmallows expand when hot.

Totally started oozing out. Unfortunately, this created a very airy egg roll. But fortunately, they tasted like awesome.

Still being lazy.

2009-09-27T19:04:00.005-04:00

So this weekend I went to the Frederick County Fair. A bit of a drive, but totally worth it. Where else will they charge you an extra 50 cents for lettuce and tomato but give you all the extra cheese you want for free? Plus, they deep fry things I never thought of. For example:

That's right you guys, deep fried FRUIT.

On the the top you have the deep fried strawberries, on the bottom, what you see is a deep fried pickle. Let's start with the strawberries. To be honest, I was disappointed. There was still gooey batter in the middle which when I first bit into it I thought was some sort of cream and got prematurely excited, but when I realized it was just the batter I got sad. So much potential. Now the pickle. That was awesome.

The candy apples were very impressive. But most impressive and deliciously awesome of them all, was the giant mozzarella stick. I walked by it at first thinking, hmmmm, that looks like a fancy corn dog. Then I asked what was the deal with the corn dog and the girl told me it was a cheese stick. It was seriously bigger than a corn dog. Check it out.

Pardon my blurry cell phone pics, I hadn't originally planned on going to the fair but I got a flat tire and my awesome sister in law picked me up and I tagged along.

Cheesy!

(Side note, I made the brownies again for an event at work, along with oatmeal cookies, and my yummies got finished before the store bought yummies)

Brownies

2009-09-14T11:04:00.008-04:00

So you know that five pound chocolate bar? Here it is compared to a normal sized Hershey bar. Massive, isn't it? Even storing it has been hard. It's been living in the microwave since we never use the microwave and it's one of the few places it will fit. Every so often I'll cut off a chunk and dip something in chocolate.

I've been going through a cooking brain fart recently, but I think I've finally gotten back in the groove. I've got a few baking ideas in my head, however, the greasy bacon/sausage/cheesy/fried part of my brain is still slightly lost. I'm open to requests to work with! Back to the baking (I totally typo'd that originally as bacon), what does one make with an nearly endless supply of chocolate? Brownies! I love brownies. The gooey kind, not the cakey kind, but not heavy, I don't like to feel gross after eating one. Not to toot my own horn here, but I think I think I came up with the most perfect brownie recipe. What differs from most others is that I used melted chocolate and good amount of olive oil instead of regular.

Awesome Brownies

- 1/2 stick plus a little bit more butter

- 1/2 cup olive oil

- 8 ounces chocolate

- 4 eggs

- 1 cup sugar

- 1 cup brown sugar

- 1 good glug of vanilla

- 1 flour

Melt the chocolate with the butter and olive oil using the double boiler method, stir a bit to make it all smooth and pretty.

Beat the eggs, sugar, brown sugar, and vanilla together with a fork until uniform.

When the chocolate is cooled off enough to not cook the eggs, mix the chocolate into the eggs and mix in the flour. Box mixes always say to make sure not to over-mix the batter, so I used that advice and you probably should too. Don't over-mix the batter.

How cool does that look?

I then baked it at 350 in a lined and greased 9 by 13 pan. I tend to like my brownies slightly undercooked. So depending on how you like them, the baking time could vary from 50 minutes (which is what I did) to an hour (I would assume). As long as a toothpick comes out clean when you poke it, I think you're in the clear. Allow to cool a little bit before cutting.

My dad wanted a piece before I got a picture.

I also took some with me went I went to see my brother and his boys yesterday, my nephew ate two and asked for more, and then my brother called me this morning and called them a 10. Made my day.

Now, if the Redskins win their next game. I will be an all around happy monkey.

Breakfast Egg Roll

2009-09-13T12:06:00.008-04:00

What is it with guys and breakfast burritos? Such a man food. I fend them to be too sloppy for my liking. The wrap usually gets soggy or is too limp. But since it's the outer portion I have an issue with and we all know I love breakfast food (even though I eat it at lunch or dinner), there has to be a way around this, right? Oh yes, there is.

There you have all the fixings of a yummy breakfast, minus the french toast. But don't worry, I have a carb in mind.

Look! My square buddy! Oh yes, another stuffed breakfast item. I think I have found my calling.

(two were already being fried)

Happy Sunday everyone! I am BACK. Now excuse me while I go squeeze in a workout before the Redskins beat the Giants. Oooooh snap.

Slacker

2009-09-10T12:42:00.003-04:00

I know I've been slow. I made normal shrimp egg rolls and I'll post that soon, but I want to get back to my greasy fatty roots. Honestly, it's the 5 pound chocolate bar. It taunts me. Mocking me for not knowing how to put a severe enough dent in its perfect rectangular shape. I need suggestions! I've got a few general ideas to get me started, but this is FIVE pounds. I need a whole list of things to do with it!!!

Persian Rice

2009-09-07T21:49:00.014-04:00

(Before I start I just need to mention that the final picture of the rice isn't from this weekend, it's from a friends party because while I remembered to take pictures of the steps, I forgot to take a picture of the final product)

When I turned 18, I got really sassy for a minute and told my dad that he couldn't tell me what to do anymore because I was now an adult. Without even looking up from what he was doing he told me "Persian girls don't become women until they learn how to make rice and make it well".

*Sigh*

The main difference between the Persian style of making rice and pretty much all other non-middle eastern countries is that our method is kind of a hassle. Although, I have to admit, tastes a million times better. We start off by rinsing basmati rice several times. Basically what you do is put however many cups of rice you want to make in a big bowl and pour water in it and drain until the water goes from opaque to as clear as you can make it. The you dump it gently into a big pot full of water and add salt. You'll want about one inch of water above the rice, cook until it boils gently.

You can't really go by times because it's all a matter of how much rice, how hot the water is, how much water, etc. That, and Persians are notorious for ambiguous answers. One time I asked how much salt to add and I was given the answer "yeh chosaki". Do you know what a "chosaki" is??? A little silent fart. Yes, ladies and gentleman, thousands of years of culture and we add a silent little fart's worth of salt. I don't what's funnier, that we do that or the fact that we have a separate word for silent farts as opposed to just calling them regular farts.

Back to the rice.

Good girl

Stir it VERY gently, occasionally. Once it rumbles a little bit and the rice tastes like it's almost cooked but still has a bit of a bite in the middle, it's time to drain it.

Rice that's ready to be drained

Drained rice

One of the best things about Persian rice is the "tah-deegh" which literally translates to "bottom of the pot". There are various kinds of this, rice, bread, rice and yogurt, or potato. It serves as a buffer I guess, to keep the rice from sticking/burning to the pot. Before putting the rice back into the pot to steam, you pour a nice layer of oil in the pot. Then add what you want to use for the tahdeegh. I used potato.

Tastes even better than a french fry

Then you GENTLY scoop the rice over the potatoes into a dome shape and let it steam on low heat until it's cooked all the way through.

Rice about to be covered and let to steam.

It's after this point I forgot to take pictures. My bad! But once the rice is cooked, what people generally do is take some ground saffron, dissolve it a small amount of water, then mix that with butter and add that to a small portion of rice to use on top of the final platter of rice. It makes it look very pretty and it tastes amazing.

That's actually from Thanksgiving because we Persians serve rice and stew along with our turkey.

Ice Cream S'mores Cake

2009-09-02T22:42:00.009-04:00

See my lovebug in the middle? She got married just over a month ago (infamous twice worn purple dress, sssshhh) and her wedding was absolutely gorgeous and an amazing time. Great food, good music, danced until 2 am, and met some wonderful new people. After dinner, when the dancing started up again before dessert, there were servers walking around with little ice cream cones that had to have been on freshly made cones because the smell took over the ballroom, and it was a huge ballroom.

Ever since that night I've been wanting to make something ice cream related and this week I finally got my chance. Bikini season is on its way out so I feel a little less guilty about this one. I had made ice cream s'mores in the past, but it was time to one up that little endeavor with an ice cream cake.

Ladies and gentleman what you are looking at (from bottom to top) is graham cracker cake, ice cream, brownie, more ice cream, another graham cracker cake, and toasted marshmallow fluff. That's quite a bit to take in, I know. It also took 2 days to complete. Let me break it down for you:

- On the first night I baked the graham cracker cakes. I'm sure there are real recipes out there for this, but this genius idea came to me at 11pm and I have to wake up at 7am, so modified Betty Crocker was called for. I used a normal box of yellow cake mix, only I scooped out one cup of the dry mix and added almost 2 cups of graham cracker crumbs for the flavor and a bit over a teaspoon of baking powder to lighten things up, everything else including the baking times I went according to the directions. I also baked the brownie layer this night. I used the same cake pan for all three of these parts to ensure equal size.

- On the second day (I woke up extra early to put it together) I spread ice cream over one of the graham cracker cake layers and the brownie layer and put them back in the freezer. I spread marshmallow fluff over the other graham cracker cake and placed it under the broiler to make it toasty. I then layered them, filled in any gaps with ice cream, smoothed the edges, and put it back in the freezer until nighttime.

It was perfect.

Stuffed Banana

2009-09-01T01:12:00.013-04:00

I'm still pretty bummed I can't buy one of these:

Gizmodo

Lord knows I love stuffing one food with another food. I'd go crazy if I had one of these things and it would be delicious. But I don't, so I improvise.

Yup, that's one ripe banana. I left the skin on while I made the tunnel so it wouldn't mush everywhere while I piped Nutella into it.

Of course I egg rolled it.

I am officially back in the groove.

Seriously, without me, it'd just be aweso.

Valomilk

2009-08-30T14:38:00.003-04:00

The past week, most of my cooking was recreating things I've made in the past for my cousins who were visiting. I promise, this week I'll return back to my crazy bacon and sausage obsession. I don't plan on reviewing foods too much here but I picked up a bunch of random candies in South Carolina that I can't get at home Virginia. A couple of years ago I read Candy Freak by Steve Almond. If you haven't read it, you should, it's awesome, the ultimate read for sugar junkies. A few things he mentioned in there have actually required some effort to find, so when I stumbled upon Valomilk at It's Sugar on Boardwalk at the Beach in South Carolina, I had to have it.

After scarfing down two ooey gooey cups of happiness and joy covered in love, I'm praying and hoping some candy store in my area sees this and starts selling them here!!!

Samoas Pie

2009-08-25T07:21:00.008-04:00

First of all, check out the chocolate bar my cousins brought me back from their quick trip to NYC with my brother.

How awesome is that? Five pounds of chocolate. I need to start coming up with some chocolatey ideas. My idea for the night just had a chocolate drizzle and it was before they came back, so I didn't get to open the big bar yet. Before vacation I had mentioned I had a pretty nifty idea for a pie and last night I finally got to make it. I had made the Thin Mint Pie, Tagalong Pie, next in line? Samoas! Unlike the previous two, there are no actual Samoas in this pie. I crushed shortbread cookies and mixed with melted butter for the crust and only baked it for a few minutes. Caramel pie must not be a very popular flavor because it was pretty hard finding multiple recipes to pick and choose from. Here's the caramel filling I ultimately used.

Caramel Coconut Pie Filling

1 and 1/4 cup brown sugar

1 cup of milk

1 cup cream

few spoons of flour

however much coconut you want, toasted

3 egg whites beaten stiff

Mix everything together minus the egg whites, fold egg whites into the mixture, pour into crust and bake at 300 for 45-55 minutes or until it stops jiggling when you move the pie pan.

I hadn't planned on being so sloppy with the chocolate drizzle. But I couldn't find the pastry bag thing with the nozzle so I used a plastic baggy and cut a hole in the corner and the chocolate was hot so I kept burning myself and then I tried to speed it up and squeeze harder but it oozed out the top. In hindsight, I think I also should have only put half the coconut in the pie and sprinkled the rest on top, then drizzle. Whatever. Lesson learned for next time. Important part, the pie was DELICIOUS!

Why is it so hard to take food pictures???

Egg in a Basket

2009-08-24T12:43:00.004-04:00

I am back! After a week at the beach I am fully browned and back in my own kitchen. My cousins are staying with us from Canada, so while I have my kitchen back, the menu isn't exactly in my control and the frying is still somewhat on hold. Do you want to hear the big shocker though? They don't eat bacon! Holy moly ravioli. How are we related? My brother took them to NYC for two days though, so I whipped out the bacon and made myself a breakfast for greasy champions. I took a little ramekin and lined a slice of bacon around the inside, then I placed three strips across to cover the bottom, trimming the side to make it as even as I could. Cracked an egg and popped in the oven and there I had it, an egg in a basket!

How cute is that? I would totally make this for a brunch, so simple and adorable! While the bacon was cooked, it wasn't as crispy as I tend to like my bacon to be. Next time I would give the bacon a 5 minute head start and then crack the egg into it.

South Carolina

2009-08-22T02:30:00.012-04:00

I totally should be sleeping right now since there is so much going on. We just got back from the beach last night and this afternoon my cousin and his son came to stay with us for a week from Canada. I feel like I've neglected the blog though, so here are the rest of the food pictures from my trip to Myrtle Beach. 7 days of all you can eat buffets for dinner (twice for breakfast as well), Shaggin Joe's for doughnuts, candy stores galore, foot long hot dogs, and ice cream around every corner. Most importantly, I got PRALINES.

Look at that cheese ball of a grin.

If you are ever in the South you NEED to go to River Street Sweets. The praline is eye rolling good. So good there are only two pieces left and I bought them on my last night there. They also like to dip things in chocolate, like marshmallows!

I got the Heath Bar chocolate covered marshmallow.

I have to say though, one of my favorite things was at Dairy King, oh yes, the Queen has a King and he lives in South Carolina. Home of the:

FUNNEL CAKE SUNDAE!!! Holy Bananas.

Genius.

People stared, but I think they were just jealous that they didn't order it themselves.

Original posts will return soon! Have a fabulous weekend! I'm going to a barbecue at my uncles tomorrow and the doughnut bread pudding was requested. Time permitting, I'll hopefully make something new as well!

Deep Fried Snickers

2009-08-16T22:55:00.007-04:00

I'm still on vacation, but I had something so ridiculously Vartamelon-y that I had to make a post about it as soon as I could and since I'm just unwinding in the room at the moment, what better time than now? There I was walking around the beach carnival when I saw one of those food stands and the sign for fried dough, hell to the yes, I wanted some fried dough. I got in line and started reading some of their other offerings: funnel cake (duh), elephant ears (turns out those are fried dough), and deep fried Twinkies. Next to the deep fried Twinkies was also a sign reading to ask what other things they deep fry, so I became the annoying girl in line asking them what else they deep fried. Turned out they deep fry Snickers, Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, and something else but I forgot. I chose the Snicker because peanuts have protein and that makes me feel less guilty.

There it is, swimming in the oil, batter oozing everywhere, it's beautiful. A couple of people were asking what it was and gave me funny looks when I told them which surprised me because I thought deep frying everything was totally normal in the South. They then let the excess oil drip off.

I think I've mentioned before that I make really ugly faces when I eat really delicious, fatty food. My brother captured this on camera.

I'm Out!

2009-08-10T19:19:00.001-04:00

I leave for the beach in two days, so I won't be posting for a while. Take care everyone and please let me know of good burgers and hot dogs if you know of any in Myrtle Beach!!!

More Dessert Egg Rolls

2009-08-09T21:00:00.009-04:00

I leave for South Carolina in a few days and I've already planned some things I can't wait to make when I get back. In the meantime, many of you are aware I've taken it upon myself to use up things in the fridge. I was originally going to post up what I made for dinner which, while delicious, wasn't anything special (sauted spinach with sausage, roasted eggplant with cheese and seasoned roasted onions). Then I remembered I still had some egg roll wrappers left and a Milky Way that I put in my fridge because it melted after I forgot to bring it inside.

Sssshhh, when I go to the movies I take my own snacks.

So, let's review, quick inventory: egg roll wrappers, bananas, Nutella, peanut butter, marshmallow fluff, and a refrigerated Milky Way. Oh, and some ice cream. This is a pretty familiar path.

Milky Way egg roll for me, banana and peanut butter egg roll for Bear, and a banana/marshmallow fluff/nutella egg roll for Sahar.

This was taken at a friends grad party last summer. She was my vacation buddy last year but sadly can't make it this year.

I took a picture of me eating these but my eyes kept rolling and it was really unattractive.

Elvis French Toast

2009-08-07T13:36:00.004-04:00

I have a few ideas for things to make but I'm saving them for when I get back from the beach (I leave on Thursday and I'll be gone for a week), because, well, I'm kind of vain and want to look good in my bathing suits, that's why. At the same time, I don't want to neglect the blog since I'm going to have to neglect it while I'm gone. See the dilemma?

I've "met" quite a few awesome people ever since I submitted the egg/sausage roll on Epic Portions, and I'm very grateful and thankful for all their help and support. I can always count on Bear for a post comment, so I had to go for his suggestion of finding a way to fry an Elvis Sandwich. I've never actually had an Elvis Sandwich before, but I was ready to switch it up this morning. Many are already aware I have a weird obsession with french toast. I love it. So there we go, as easy as that, I was going to french toast-ify the Elvis Sandwich.

What you are looking at, my friends, are two slices of bread with peanut butter, joining bacon and banana together, dunked it french toast batter. The most fun part about this was flipping it over, well, and eating it. It's so dense and hearty, it actually goes "thud" when you flip it. Definitely not for light eaters. I'm such a fat kid at heart, I peeled it open, drizzled syrup, put it back together and ate like a sandwich.

Tagalong Pie

2009-08-06T00:24:00.009-04:00

It was a rough day. The post I wanted to make turned out to be a super huge bust. I can't believe an attempt to deep fry something went awry. I feel so betrayed. Then, it was just a long day which I was not mentally prepped for because usually Wednesdays are easy breezy. And to add, I didn't make it to the gym. RAWR.

Deep breath. I'm ok. I have redeemed myself from yesterdays kitchen fail. The amazing thing about this is someone had mentioned a pie using Tagalongs today and guess what I found in the closet??? That's right! TAGALONGS (and a box of Lemon Cremes, hmmm)!!! Between the peanut butter filling and the chocolate coating, I forwent attempting to use the cookies as the crust. Have you ever tried crushing Tagalongs?

Totally looks like poop.

I'm also not too proud of the Sandra Lee I totally pulled with the filling. I made a traditional graham cracker crust, closest thing I had to the internal Tagalong cookie part, using however many graham crackers are in one of those bags in a box of graham crackers and 3/4 stick melted butter pressed into one of those pie pans that pop up. For the filling I used one box of vanilla pudding mix, a couple of hefty spoons of peanut butter, 9 crushed Tagalongs (it was originally 10, but I ate one), and 2 cups of milk. I used a mixer because I wanted the cookie to become as smooth as possible. It got the job done, no cookie chunks at all, just little bits of chocolate speckled throughout.

I then poured it into the crust and waited for an hour. Seriously, I waited. It was rough. But wise man said patience is a virtue. You know what I say? Modesty is a virtue God forgot to give me, so he made me better looking. That made no sense in there, but it's late and I'm tired and I still think that's a funny line. Moving on, the final product, Tagalong Pie!

Now, the artsy fartsy picture:

That cookbook it's sitting on was of NO use in this production aside from being used as a tray because someone is too lazy to get one out of the drawer.

Yummy.

Someone needs to back me up here, I can't be the only person that does that much damage in 5 minutes.

Cornbread and Chili (?)

2009-08-04T15:58:00.011-04:00

That's my dad. He stands like a military man because he is a military man. He was a Naval Captain for the Imperial Iranian Navy back in the good old days when the country was run by humans and not a monkey in an ill-fitting suit (no offense to all the monkeys out there). Anyways. My temper, skinny ankles, and appetite all came from him. So did my love for spicy food. If it makes my eyes water and mouth burn, even better. Since Persian food isn't exactly known for its kick, a spicy dinner wasn't going to sprout from the motherland.

Enter: Chili. I read a few recipes and came to the conclusion that chili is one of those meals that resulted from leftovers. I had just bought hot sausage and I originally wanted to use that as the meat for my chili, but my dad has high cholesterol and I wanted him to be able to enjoy it so I used ground turkey. Sorry, sausage. I had to make one fatty thing though, and since I'm the only cornbread fan in the house I used that as my opportunity. Standard cornbread with melted jalapeno butter.

Ok, so it's not really jalapeno butter (does that even exist?), but rather, butter melting with bacon grease and jalapenos. The goal was for all the pepper oils and juices to become incorporated into the butter so that I could strain it into the cornbread batter but keep the jalapeno flavor. Unfortunately, it wasn't as strong as I was hoping for so I just chopped up the peppers and threw them in too.

Not too shabby.

Chili time. As I mentioned before, I used ground turkey instead of the hot sausage (*sniffles*), chopped onions, chopped tomatoes, garlic, red kidney beans, and pinto beans. I seasoned it with salt, pepper, cumin, chili powder, cayenne pepper, more sliced jalapenos and another little green pepper that I don't know what it was, hot sauce, and a little something I picked up that I like to call, awesome:

How cool is that? Seriously? I really hope people aren't thinking "eewwwww, woman you're gross", because I seriously thought this was incredible. Cooked the beans, cooked the meat with the onion and garlic, mixed it all together, let it simmer, and kept adding more of the peppers and seasonings until my tongue went "holy smokes, that's bananas".

Didn't look at all what I thought it was going to look like (kind of funny looking if you ask me, but YUM), that's why I used the question mark, I don't know what qualifies as chili and what just spicy generic food.

Thin Mint Pie

2009-08-03T09:59:00.009-04:00

Most people buy normal quantities of Girl Scout Cookies, in my family, we buy enough to last until they start selling them again. No joke, about 30 boxes every year. That means there's a good chance when that Girl Scout comes knocking on the door I'll answer with a Samoa in my hand. There have been a lot of recipes for Samoa bars floating around on the internet but what about the other cookies? Don't they deserve some lovin' too? Tag-a-Longs are just as deserving, Thin Mints are no less delicious, and those lemon ones with the powdered sugar are for real addictive.

Friday night I bought a tart pan for reasons I won't get into now, but it played a big part in this, I was out and about all weekend and I finally came home at 10pm on Sunday, but that was as good of a time as any to make a pie. And my brilliant plan? Crushing up Thin Mints for the crust!

Same idea as a graham cracker crust, crushed up cookies (I used a sleeve and a half for a 9 inch pie pan, it made for a thick crust) and half a stick of melted butter. I then baked it at 350 degrees for oh, 15 minutes? I have no clue, I have terrible time perception and forgot to look at the clock, so maybe it was 20? It was enough for it to all firm up. Since the cookie crumbs have the chocolate coating, don't bother trying to press the crust up the sides. The chocolate will melt and all will come down anyways.

Years ago I found a chocolate mousse recipe in a magazine and saved it in my purple cooking notebook because I do dorky things like that. It's pretty basic, but it's light, delicious, and gets the job done. I chose that as my filling. Use whatever chocolate mousse rocks your socks.

I probably should have doubled the mousse for the pie (for reference, my mousse was based on 4 eggs and 4 ounces of chocolate, and I felt the mousse layer was a tad thin). Since by this point it was almost 11pm, I wasn't about to stay up for the final product, I let it chill in the fridge overnight and woke up to chocolate lovers dream.

Excuses, excuses

2009-08-02T15:37:00.009-04:00

Another weekend went by and the only things I made were for my nephews, none of which deserved any fanfare aside from my little choompa loompas gobbling it up and making me feel special. Come to think of it, that's the most important thing. I also took my bacon carnivore to a farm fair, and guess what they were selling?

Deep fried Oreo's. Of course, I made a beeline for it and sat down right in the grass to eat them. My nephew wasn't too impressed. He took a bite and asked for cotton candy.

I inhaled them as to not have the delicious taste tainted by the smell of goat as waited in line to milk them.

Have you ever seen a goat's teat? I don't even want to say what it looked like, but I will say I did not touch it and as excited as my nephew was to milk, his turn came and he turned to me and said "I don't want to touch it". On to the food little one, on to the food.

He also didn't care for the 10 inch corn dog and asked for fries. psh. Omnivore.

Veggie Patties

2009-07-31T12:21:00.007-04:00

My love of burgers is no joke. Grill them, fry them, fast food, gourmet, or homemade, I will cherish it and enjoy every bite. I'm still on my quest to use up everything in the fridge before we go to the beach and seriously trying to cut back on the fatty foods during this final week before heading south. Don't let the bacon fool you, I still enjoy my vegetables and I have nothing against veggie burgers except for the name, it's not a burger, it's a patty. Burger implies some form of ground meat, no? Back me up here, people. I digress, my main issue with most veggie patties you buy prepackaged is that they always really odd things mixed in (anyone care for some disodium guanylate or methyl cellulose?). I also really don't like it when they have rice, but that's a separate story. I decided to use up the last of the zucchini as the main component of my patties, the only rule I set for myself was that I wasn't allowed to open any new food items or packages, only use things taking up space, I think this proves that when it comes to foods like this, you can improvise any which way you please and anything goes.

Veggie Patties

- 2 finely grated zucchinis

- a handful of frozen spinach, thawed and squeezed dry

- a handful of frozen peas, thawed but not squeezed

- 5 mushroom sliced into thin sticks

- 3 eggs

- a handful (literally, hand in bag and grab) of shredded mozzarella cheese

- couple spoons of flour

I was really hoping to shred some carrots in there and throw in a handful of corn, but my dad pickled all the carrots and the only corn we had was an unopened frozen bag. I was also too lazy to cut any onions. I mixed all the ingredients together and seasoned with the following: salt, pepper, paprika, and cinnamon. I then fried them in a little bit of olive oil. Originally, I didn't put in any flour, but the first few wouldn't hold together so I mixed in a few spoons to thicken it up and they held together beautifully. I also cooked some bacon in the oven while I was doing this. I had to. Bacon makes me happy. I used a little bit of fat free sour cream instead of mayonnaise, added some sliced tomato and hot sauce, and made myself a fantastic sandwich.

Zucchini Bread

2009-07-30T12:52:00.005-04:00

Writing this post made me realize my cousins, brother, and I REALLY need to work on getting better at taking pictures together.

This is over a year old! We're terrible!

When we were younger, my cousins (one boy and one girl) used to spend weekends a lot at our house. We don't have a lot of family here in the states so our parents wanted to make sure we had a close relationship with the few we did. I was the baby, the boys in the middle, and my cousin Nanna (in the pic with me), was the oldest. Not huge gap though, just four years between the oldest and the youngest. I honestly don't remember what the boys would usually do, but play Nintendo is a pretty good bet. Nanna would often come with cookbooks from the library and we set about making a mess of the kitchen. For some reason, I remember making Snickerdoodles a lot with her. Anyways, it's safe to say that all those weekends baking with Nanna got me hooked and I've loved baking ever since.

I'm still trying to clean out the refrigerator, especially since the family vacation is coming up and I really don't want to have to throw a million things away before we go or come back home to stinky stuff. There are still a bunch of random vegetables I'm working through and the most abundant of all is zucchini. I was looking for something I could make and then freeze to take with us on the trip and that is also somewhat healthy, because let's face it, my control is nil and I can hear my bikinis cussing me out. So, helllloooooo zucchini bread!

Zucchini Bread

3 cups flour (I used 50/50 mix of whole wheat and all purpose, from what I've been reading, either/or of each is fine)

2 cups sugar (again, a 50/50 mix of brown sugar and white sugar)

2 teaspoons baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

cinnamon

ground cloves (next time I make this, I would definitely also add some nutmeg)

1 cup oil (my indecisiveness took the best of me, again, 50/50 of olive oil and canola oil)

3 cups finely grated zucchini

Mix mix mix. Bake at 350 for half an hour-ish until a toothpick comes out clean.

Bacon Cheeseburger Egg Rolls

2009-07-29T13:58:00.005-04:00

One time someone asked me what my favorite food is and without hesitation I replied "bacon cheeseburgers". Judging by their reaction, that's not a normal reply. But it's true. I really do love bacon cheeseburgers. I tend to order them everywhere when I go out to dinner. Don't get me wrong, I love trying new things, and I'll eat everything and anything at least once, but there's just something so comforting about beef and pork joined together by cheese. I know Tucker Max hopes they serve beer in hell, and since I'm a glutton, I hope it comes with a bacon cheeseburger.

Do you guys remember these? I had dreams about them, they looked so good. I love food that comes wrapped up or in transportable form. So convenient. I tweaked the idea just a tad and made something so delicious my eyes rolled. I'm trying to build suspense here, so I'm going to post the pictures in steps.

I've recently become obsessed with cooking bacon in the oven. Yes, I am pouring the bacon grease into a pot, it has flavor I don't want to waste.

All my components. I just cooked the beef with some onion in the bacon grease (get over it).

Oh, yes, I did.

BACON CHEESEBURGER EGG ROLLS

I only had 3 slices of bacon left and that was only enough for 4 egg rolls. So the remaining 2 were rolled up with extra cheese. Incredible. Perfect for an appetizer or movie night when you want a snack that doesn't require two hands or even looking at. Just pick up and eat!!! Now if you excuse me, I need to go throw away my bikinis and buy a muumuu.

White Chocolate Strawberry Egg Rolls

2009-07-29T10:19:00.004-04:00

This behavior really needs to stop. I'm going to the beach in two weeks and I don't plan on taking much more than sundresses and bikinis with me.

So the fact I'll fill egg roll wrappers (same basic story as the won ton wrapper) with white chocolate chips and strawberries and eat them with ice cream is creating a personal conflict of interest.

Strawberry Banana Cobbler

2009-07-28T12:39:00.004-04:00

On my quest to clean up the fridge I stumbled upon 2 eggs chilling in an 18 egg carton, 2 half sticks of butter, and some strawberries that no one was going to eat on their own anymore. Hmmm... glance over at fruit basket. Bananas. Strawberry Banana....??? Another awesome combination. I've also been wanting to make a cobbler for a while since I've never made one before and this blog is starting to become an excuse to make new things. I read a bunch of different recipes and came up with what I think is a pretty generic cobbler topping. I would say the only thing that stands out from mine is that I used more butter (go figure) than all those that I read and I added vanilla. I also forgot to measure stuff, I need to work on getting better at that.

Anyways, I now present to you: Strawberry Banana Cobbler

Fruit Layer

I shouldn't even bother writing this part out, but here it goes anyway: a bowls worth of slightly wrinkly strawberries and two bananas, all sliced and mixed together with a few spoons of sugar and a few spoons of flour to keep it from all getting super soggy

Cobbler Topping

1 cup flour (the one thing I remember to measure)

1 stick of butter, cut into little pieces

couple spoons of sugar

a teaspoon-ish of baking power

a blob of milk (I used skim, don't think it matters, my guess it was around a 1/4 cup)

one egg (ugh still have one lingering in the fridge!)

a plop of vanilla

Butter a baking dish really well and pour in the fruit mixture evenly. Mix all the cobbler topping ingredients together to make a dough, it will be very sticky. Place the dough in chunks over the fruit filling and bake at 350 until the golden, about 30 minutes.

Sooooooooooo yummy, just make sure to save some for your big brother so when he comes over he doesn't complain that he never gets to eat the stuff you're making and posting on your blog.

"Mexican Pizza"

2009-07-27T22:22:00.009-04:00

Do you ever get that accumulation of odds and ends in the refrigerator? The half can of something, the crumbly ends of that other thing, the open bag of cheese? Drives me bananas. I try to make what I eat so I can avoid that (except for the treats, I love treats, treats can linger all they want). Living with my parents, creates a smidge of a conflict with this. I drive my mom nuts because I'll throw stuff away to avoid leftovers or give them away when we have people over. Every so often I'll take some pity on those poor leftover tidbits and attempt to throw them together to make something for dinner. A while ago, John posted his recipe for Mexican lasagna on Epic Portions, and it made me drool. I've been wanting to make it for a long time, but I've just been putting it off. I still need to get my act together and make it for real. I had to mention it though, because that's where I got the idea for "Mexican pizza"

My leftover tidbits were some bacon, cheese, beans, jalapenos, beans, half a tomato, and half an onion.

Bottom layer: beans, corn, cheese, jalapenos, and bacon

Top layer: onions, tomatoes, cheese

I don't know what possessed me to cook it in the oven. It took longer than I was hoping for (I scarfed down leftover spaghetti while I waited) but it still came out delicious. I think next time I would put it in the toaster oven. Some sour cream and hot sauce, I was in heaven.

Nutella Strawberry Won Tons

2009-07-27T10:41:00.010-04:00

Oh, Monday. I can't complain though, I had an awesome weekend. Sadly, I had to miss the engagement party of a good and longtime friend because I went to the wedding of another super good friend, but I had the most amazing time. I was about to type out all the details, but the point is I didn't do any cooking this weekend, just a whole lot of eating.

Sssshhhh, I recycled the purple dress I wore to another friends wedding a few months ago.

Good thing I have pics of things I've made in the past to share! A while ago I decided I wanted to learn how to make won tons, so I bought a pack of won ton wrappers, made normal won tons, and called it a day. Did you know won ton wrappers come in packs of 60? That's a LOT. So there I was, with a bunch of won ton wrappers and no clue what to fill them with. Until the light bulb went off.

Recognize that little white jar? Nutella, oh baby.

Strawberries + Nutella = Crack.

Just spread some Nutella on the wrappers.

Add some cut strawberries.

Fold then fry. I don't own a deep fryer, so I just use a normal frying pan, and it works great. I imagine you could fill a saucepan or whatever with oil and deep fry, but then you have to pour it all out when you're done and blah blah blah. Just do what crinkles your socks.

Soooooooooooo good!!!

Bacon Bowl

2009-07-24T22:22:00.011-04:00

I have two nephews who are the loves of my life. My older nephew, Cyrous, is four (and a half). A while ago I made super huge pancakes with my super huge spatula and stacked it with eggs and bacon. I called it the breakfast monster, Cyrous called called it a really big pancake and said he wanted some. So I cut it in half and got him a fork.

He proceeded to eat all 5 slices of bacon inside and then said he was done.

My little bacon carnivore.

I wanted to come up with another bacon centered breakfast item. First thing that came to mind was the famous bacon cups, but I had to find a way to take it one step further. But let's work one step at a time. I wanted more of a bowl than a cup so I covered a mini-mixing bowl with foil and wrapped bacon around it.

Popped it in the oven at 375 degrees, I have no idea how long it was in there. Enough time for it to look like this:

*insert Seinfeld shrinking joke here*

And enough time to whip up this:

onion, potato, steak seasoning, sausage, and egg (this is a pre-egg pic)

Pile it all in, and you have got yourself one awesome breakfast bowl.

Raspberry Peach Bars

2009-07-24T15:52:00.009-04:00

The most common question I'm being asked is if I actually eat the things I make. The answer is, I do, and I love it. Then I'm usually asked how am I not huge, and the answer is simple, I work out and I don't eat like this ALL the time. For example, the day I made and ate the Tower of Love burger (also know as the Heart Attack Sandwich), I pretty much ate grapes and strawberries all day. You know, prep the body for what it was about to take in later. As for working out, I'm a monster in spandex at least 4 days a week, one of which is spent in Zumba. Don't know what Zumba is? The most fun you will ever have Latin dancing and booty popping with pelvic thrusts thrown in. Tower of Love was also eaten on Zumba day.

Ok, so that was taken at my friends birthday party, but you get the general Zumba idea.

As for how I eat regularly, I would say I'm a pretty healthy eater. My hardest habit to break is sugar. I have a massive sweet tooth, so I'm constantly trying to come up with ways to feed my sugar addiction (or curb it? hm...) without feeling too guilty about it. Fruit based treats are always a good place to start when trying to come up with something that won't make a person feel bad about eating it later, throw in some oats for some added fiber and you're good to go. I like the idea of fruit bars because they're such an easy way to use up fruit that may have been sitting in your fridge for too long. I had some raspberries and peaches that had both gotten pretty mushy and I used those as the fruit layer. The crust and topping are very basic, so this recipe is very flexible, use what you want/have and enjoy!

Raspberry Peach Bars

-2 cups flour

-1 cup brown sugar

-1/2 teaspoon baking soda

-2 sticks of butter (I started with a stick and worked my up to two, I suggest doing the same so that as you mix you get a feel for the consistency you want, just make sure it's cold)

-1 and 1/2 cups oats (I used the kind you can microwave, I don't think it makes a difference at all, I know some people are super anti-instant oatmeal, but dude, get over it)

-2 cups or more fruit, depending on how thin or thick you want the fruit layer to be (I used a mix of raspberries and peaches, feel free to switch it up and be creative!)

Line a 9 x 13 baking pan with wax paper, or butter the bejeepers out of it. In a bowl mix together, the flour, brown sugar, oats, and baking soda. Cut the butter into little chunks and mix into the dry ingredients with your hands to make a crumbly mixture, continue to add butter until the mixture sticks together but still crumbles. This is not a cookie dough by any means. Press about half or more of the mixture into the baking tray. I wanted a thicker crust and a thinner topping, so I would say I pressed about two thirds of the mix into the tray and reserved one third for topping.

Mix together you fruit filling. Mine was super juicy so I threw in a couple spoons of flour (I'm assuming cornstarch would do the same trick) to keep it from making everything soggy. Layer it evenly on top of the crust and cover with the remaining crust mixture. Bake in the oven at 350 degrees for about half an hour or until it starts to brown on the edges.

See, brown edges.

Let it cool before you start cutting it, it's very flimsy when hot but firms and really keeps together as it cools.

I'd love to hear what fruit combo's everyone comes up with!

Ice Cream S'mores

2009-07-23T20:53:00.005-04:00

I have several obsessions: my nephews, my gym, Nintendo, my frying pan, bacon cheeseburgers, Barbies, ice cream on skinny days, frozen yogurt on fat days, and S'mores. I'm sure there are more things but that last one I mentioned is the relevant one for this post. Ice cream and S'mores, awesome on their own, they have to be even more awesome together, right? YUP!

One of the greatest creations, I must say, are those silicone baking trays. I have a square one that I used to make a giant marshmallow once. I also have a silicone cupcake baking tray and I used it to make the chocolate cups for these ice cream s'mores. They popped right out. I used just plain chocolate chips melted on a double boiler. If you plan on making this, and have a not so steady hand like I do, and fear you can't make thin cups, add some heavy cream and have it be a ganache. That way when you bite into the cup, you'll actually be able to. I used just the plain melted chocolate but made the cups a tad too thick and they were, how do I put this nicely as to not insult myself? Hearty, let's go with that. They were hearty.

Once the cups were cooled, I layered broken up graham crackers, vanilla ice cream (clearly, a skinny day), more broken up graham crackers, and then a top layer of chocolate. Back to the freezer they went to firm up and not even an hour later, look at what I had! An awesome midnight snack.

Clafoutis

2009-07-23T10:54:00.009-04:00

I have a good friend, Chris, who in my opinion, has the most classic French story ever. A few years ago, Chris went to France and walked into a bakery asking for a chocolate croissant. After seeing it in the bakery window he asked, in French, for a chocolate croissant, only to have the Frenchman tell him that there is no such thing as a chocolate croissant. So Chris asked what he called that, pointing to the chocolate croissant, and the Frenchman told him,

"pain de chocolat"

Bread of chocolate. For real. Bread of chocolate.

AAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!

Anyways, that's what I think of every time I hear French or anything French related. So when I decided I was finally going to make a cherry clafoutis, even though I had never even had one before to know what it should come out like, I had to hold back giggles in my head. Bread of chocolate. Oh, France.

So a clafoutis is basically what happened a long, long, time ago when a French lady wanted to make a cake but didn't have enough flour. Then, she decided to make a custard but realized she didn't have enough eggs for that either, so she made a half cake/half custard. I totally made that up, but it sounds plausible.

Cherry Clafoutis

2 cups pitted and cut in half cherries (although any fruit would work)

3/4 cup flour

a teeny bit of salt

3 eggs

1/2 cup sugar

plop of vanilla

1 and 1/4 cup milk

a smidge of baking powder (this wasn't in any of the recipes I read that I used to put mine together, but I read a lot of people that had theirs come out very dense and I feel this helped keep it light)

Butter a baking dish and place the cherries evenly in the dish (don't worry about which side is up or down, it all will float when you pour the batter). Mix everything else together (it will be thinner than pancake batter, so don't be worried if it seems kind of runny) and pour on top of the cherries. Bake at 350 degrees for about 40 minutes (edit: my friend made this as well and hers was done after 20 minutes, so make sure to check on it frequently, when you move and it stops jiggling, it's done), it will poof a little in the oven and deflate ever so slightly as it cools. Served warm, it's amazing with ice cream. My nephews ate it plain and loved it.

Doughnut Bread Pudding.

2009-07-22T16:55:00.006-04:00

This was my last post on Epic Portions, and I like to think I went out with a bang. This dessert was dangerously easy to make and delicious.

Paula Dean and I are soul mates. She fries things, I fry things. She loves bacon, I buy it in bulk. She has a southern accent, I can fake a southern accent really well. However, when she introduced the world to Krispy Kreme bread pudding, she lost me a little. Why? One wrinkly little word: raisins. I hate them, can’t stand them, pick them out of muffins and carrot cake, truly can’t stand the little buggers. Her recipe also calls for canned fruit. Omg, what the fart monkey. Whatever, back to me. Safeway had doughnuts on sale, so what better time to make doughnut bread pudding? I followed my original bread pudding recipe, using cream, milk, eggs, coconut, vanilla, and white and dark chocolate. New to the mix were the doughnuts, replacing the usual challah bread, banana/chocolate cream, and sliced bananas. The beauty of bread pudding is that you can be so creative with it and it’s a great way to use up little things left over, for example the two half eaten bananas I had in my fridge. Such an an breezy dessert or snack. Just make sure to let the mixture soak up the liquid, otherwise you’ll end up with a crunchy, dry, crouton bread pudding.

Ingredients, minus the heavy cream and milk.

11 and a half doughnuts cut up. Yes, I ate some.

Mix all the wet ingredients together and pour on top of the doughnuts and add chocolate chips, but not too much chocolate, it's not the main focus of the dish. You also want to make sure you have enough liquid to soak all the doughnuts, don't be scared to add extra milk.

Bake until golden, it will still be kind of mushy but firm up slightly when it begins to cool.

Yummy!

Tower of Love

2009-07-22T11:31:00.008-04:00

I’ve always wanted to make the grilled cheese sandwich burger before and that’s pretty heavy, so I figured that was the perfect place to start. Bacon just feels natural to me, so of course that was going to be worked in. And more cheese, I love cheese. Normally I wouldn’t advocate the use of the plastic cheese, but it flows with the overall scheme. Still, something was missing. Then I remembered when I made the sausage stuffed french toast and someone suggested sausage gravy, I had never made sausage gravy before so I thought it’d be fun to give it a try. Super easy! Concerns me actually, if I can whip up sausage gravy in a few minutes now, what’s going to stop me from putting on everything. I digress. I’ll let the pictures do the talking from here…

Planning.

7 slices of bacon

First time making sausage gravy, so much easier than I thought! Just cook the sausage, place on a plate, heat milk and a little flour, season with salt and pepper, add sausage and cook until thick.

Frying the grilled cheese and burgers in bacon fat.

And so it begins.

Lay it on thick.

Hm. Pork.

Hm. Beef.

Calcium.

More hmmm.

Loving it.

Love it.

Original Post

My Original Claims to "Fame", Breakfast

2009-07-22T10:31:00.009-04:00

Here are a few pics and links to the Epic Portions pages of the first things that ever made it up.

First there was the Bacon Egg Sausage Roll with Cheese:

http://www.epicportions.com/2009/06/29/hard-boiled-egg-wrapped-in-bacon-cheese-sausage/

Then I became obsessed with french toast and the idea of stuffing it, first with sausage:

http://www.epicportions.com/2009/07/01/french-toast-stuffed-with-sausage/

And then I made a French Toast S'mores, complete with a graham cracker crust:

http://www.epicportions.com/2009/07/03/smore-toast/

Just a words before I begin...

2009-07-21T23:04:00.002-04:00

I've always loved to cook, I never thought I'd be posting the crazier things online, but the beauty of Facebook changed that. My photo albums soon became full of food and I eventually submitted the crazier things to various blogs to see where it would make the cut. For this, I am forever grateful to John (and Stephanie) from www.epicportions.com, for letting me send email after email of my culinary endeavors and for them being so kind as to posting them for me. EP is an amazing site and I think everyone should visit it all the time. I have it saved on my bookmarks tab.