Chocolate!

So we wanted to make mole sauce. And we remembered we had a recipe. So I said hey Chris, send me the list of ingredients because I am going to the magical supermarket so I can purchase anything that might be hard to find.

Here is the list of ingredients:

3 mulato chiles (or three aditional ancho chiles)
2 ancho chiles
4 pasilla chiles
canned fire roasted tomatoes
1 oz mexican chocolate
10 pepercorns a clove
whole allspice berries
sesame seeds
a cinnamon stick
the blood of an eggplant
coriander seeds
almonds
raisins
onion
2 thick slices of day old french bread, crusts removed properly torn into 1 inch by 1inch by 1 inch slices
8 mouse tears
chicken stock
1 slice unwaxed green bean pie
1 chicken
tortillas
double blended peice of flan

*some ingredients may have been added for comedic value

Luckily, said magical supermarket sells mole in a jar, just add chicken stock and you are all set.

There she is, our saving grace.

 We shredded up the chicken and wrapped it in tortillas with some rice and cheese.

 

Terribly unattractive, but terribly good.  Makes me wonder if making homemade mole sauce would have been worth it.

The next morning...time for more chocolate! We made pancakes with Starbucks mocha powder, very classy and tasty stuff.

Chris asks "mind if I make a peanut butter swirl to go in them?" Did I mind?! Did he mind if I married him and had all his babies right then and there? Chocolate peanut butter pancakes!! Clearly, I was on board.

These were a fantastic way to start the day. And also a delightful way to end my 3 day weekend.

Grilled Pizza

This weekend I checked off another item off my "Things I Want to Make Some Day" list: grilled pizza.

We divided each dough in half so the pies were more manageable to move around on the grill.

We stuck with simple, fresh toppings of tomatoes, basil, fresh mozzarella, and arugula.

 I cannot wait to make pizza like this again and highly recommend that you all give it a shot too, but do yourself a favor and don't put 4 pies on a time just because it fits, it can get a bit harried.

I hope everyone enjoyed how nicely these photos came out because I wasn't in my dim, dark kitchen : )

Happy Birthday Miss Alyss!

Granola bars? For a birthday? Come on KTC you can do better than that.  But! But! They have peanut butter, and toasted almonds, and chocolate chips! Annnd they are practical and who doesn't love practical?  That in a nutshell was my conversation with myself over what to make Miss Alyss for her birthday.

Giada lent me this recipe for peanut butter granola bars.  Yep, 2 Giada recipes in 1 weekend.  I am sorry to say I did not prepare either of her dishes with any sort of cleavage.  I think they still came out well though.

 

Check out the fantastic packaging : )

Happy birthday Alyssa! I hope the curse is officially broken for good!

Saturday Night Dinner

Saturday night rolls around each week and really all I want to do is cook.  Should I have a more interesting weekend? Maybe.  Do I want a more interesting weekend? Not really.  And you wouldn't want me to have any other hobby now would you, because then this blog would cease to exist.

Feast your eyes on this feast!

 Pear, arugula, craisins, toasted walnuts, and blue cheese.

Baked pasta and chicken courtesy of Giada. 

She called for 1 cup of pasta, 1 cup? Really? Who the hell is that going to feed? So we made it with a whole pound of pasta and doubled the other ingredients.  It was spectacular and I see why it is one of the most popular dishes on the Food Network website.

My plate, don't worry I had 2 more helpings.

Of course this fantastic Saturday night was topped of just right by a giant bowl of popcorn and an episode of 48 Hours.  If you have a better way to spend a Saturday night you let me know, but I'll be pretty skeptical about it.

Lazy Sunday Dinner

Fresh spinach fettuccine

Zucchini ribbons

Spinach

Gorgonzola cream sauce

Really, what more do you need to know?  Let's just look at some pictures okay?

I made the zucchini ribbons with a vegetable peeler and it was quite pretty.

I even converted a self-proclaimed Gorgonzola cheese hater.  Well, we never informed him that there was Gorgonzola in the sauce and my mother actually spit out her food laughing at how many helpings he had, but honestly how do you not even ask what you are sitting down to eat? Mwahahahaha.

Doughnut Crawl!

We set out on Saturday afternoon bright-eyed, eagerly awaiting our first doughnut.  The crawl started out at Doughnut Plant in the lower east side.  I got a peanut butter glazed blackberry jam doughnut.  Also consumed were a vanilla bean glazed doughnut and a mango cake donut.  I must say I was unbelievably pleased with my selection and this was my favorite doughnut of the day.

Next we traveled underwater to Dough in Clinton Hill.  We arrived after a small subway mishap about 45 minutes before the store was closing for the day.  We entered the shop and the only doughnuts on the shelf were 8 nutella doughnuts.  Our jaws dropped to the floor.  The only doughnuts left are the ones we are allergic to? What a terrible fate for the doughnut crawl! And then, the magical baker behind the counter informed us that we can have whatever doughnuts we wanted!

I chose a cheesecake doughnut with graham cracker crumbs, my companions got chocolate and earl grey and a passion fruit with cocoa nibs doughnuts.  These were warm and fresh and delicious.  Basically having a piece of cheesecake on top of my doughnut was a bit much, but it was crazy good so I'm not going to complain.

The final stop on our doughnut tour was Peter Pan Bakery in Greenpoint.  I wish I had gotten a picture of the inside of this place because it was really cute and had an old-timey feel to it.  This was a great last stop on the tour because it had classic flavors that wouldn't make us burst at the seams.  I had a chocolate coconut.  The other doughnuts pictured are a cinnamon stick and a blueberry jelly powdered doughnut.

The doughnut crawl was a HUGE success and as if that wasn't enough I made two more incredible stops this very night.  The first, Barcade where I had some microbrews and played some old school video games.  I got a high score on Q'Bert and was pretty proud of myself.

The last stop of the evening was Motorino!!! I have been reading about this place for ages now and was so excited to finally have their pizza.  It did not disappoint.

We ordered the ramps pie, stracciatella, and brussel sprouts.  I left about 2 bites on my plate and I am wishing that I had those 2 bites right about now.

What an amazing day of food!  Hope you all had as awesome of a weekend as I did!

Mother's Day Dinner

My Mother's Day menu consisted of:

1. Kebabs with chicken, sausage, steak, green and yellow squash, eggplant, pepper, red onion, and cherry tomatoes (yes it was a bit much, but so pretty!) all in a teriyaki marinade


2. Orzo salad (you know how I feel about pasta salads) with sun dried tomato vinaigrette, artichoke hearts, olives, scallions, and parsley


3. Fruit torte with peaches, mangoes, pineapple, and strawberries (lovely little frozen mix that I can't wait to make into a smoothie or sangria...hmmmmm.....)

Pre-baking

Fresh outta the oven

Topped with fresh whipped cream and black raspberry ice cream (oh! there ya go Amy, red raspberry as opposed to black raspberry. We can give Trader Joe's a break now.)

A beautiful day with a fantastic end to a food filled weekend.

Saturday Night Dinner

Saturday was a lovely evening and I just had to eat my dinner outside so we did some barbecuing of hot dogs and hamburgers. We made a corn salad with olives, sun dried tomatoes, cucumbers, and a little Italian dressing to go alongside.


And now for the really awesome part. I have been searching (and so has Chris) high and low at every food selling establishment for this product we saw a commercial for. While in the greatest supermarket I've ever visited I finally found it! The next 48 hours was a think-tank filled with ideas for what to put inside this sheet of mozzarella. The decision: prosciutto and pesto. The result: amazing. So good I even decided to top my burger with one of the slices.

What will I roll up next? What do you want to roll up in some mozzarella?

Cinco De Mayo

I always find it necessary to celebrate my Mexican heritage with a Cinco de Mayo feast especially since I just went to the greatest supermarket in the world which was filled with so many fun ethnic ingredients! This year I made chicken marinated in lime, cilantro, garlic oil, and cayanne pepper. I also made a cole slaw with similar ingredients to the chicken marinade and a saffron rice to go on the tacos. I picked up some guacamole and pico de gallo as well as some other taco fix-ens to go atop the tacos.

Here is one of my many tacos of the evening:

Veggie Stir-Fry

I cooked dinner tonight because frankly it's been a really long time and I need to start pulling my weight around this house. My Dad is a vegetarian so I am constantly leaning towards pasta dishes when I cook dinner for everyone. Tonight I embarked on a new adventure: tofu!

I marinated the tofu in rice wine vinegar, soy sauce, sesame oil, and red pepper flakes. The vegetables I used: broccoli, carrot, snap peas, bamboo shoots, water chestnuts.

I stir-fried the tofu and vegetables with soy sauce and sesame oil.

I made some white rice with scallions to go alongside the stir-fry. It was my first really successful batch of rice thanks to some important advice that for me is very hard to do: don't touch it (thanks Chris)!

Birthday Cupcakes

My birthday celebration continued this weekend and so did the eating!

I made these darling "popcorn" cupcakes for my friends. Since the "popcorn" was made out of marshmallows I decided to give the cupcakes a s'mores theme.


I used crushed up chocolate graham crackers to line the bottom of the cupcakes and mixed some larger pieces into the batter.

I made a marshmallow frosting with fluff, butter, confectioners sugar, and vanilla.

So cute!