A FRIDGE FULL OF FOOD...

Disney Chef Helps Celebrate The Royal Wedding

 

Disney Swan & Dolphin Resort just posted this photo of Princess Diana's tiara (top) along with the edible version Chef Branlard made entirely from pulled sugar (bottom).

Gorgeous! That is just incredible.  I keep staring at it, so impressed with his talent and the beauty that can be food.

Here's a link to their facebook page:  http://www.facebook.com/swananddolphin

How many folks here in the U.S. are planning to get up at crack of dawn's hiney to watch?  That's 0500 here in the midwest.  Yes. I will either get up or stay up and watch.  I can't help it. There is still something glamorous that speaks to my little girl heart about the pretty and seemingly nice girl who walks in the church a commoner and leaves as a princess.

A Spring Classic: Broccoli and Cheddar Soup

 

I've lost a little over 20 lbs since I've been following the "Glenna's No Crap" Diet, which is a combination of all the best nutrition information I know and no, you guessed it, crap.  Basically, I'm cooking from scratch and looking at every label. If I don't know what an ingredient is I set it aside.  For convenience sake this leaves me eating a lot of cottage cheese or natural peanut butter and homemade bread if I'm not in the mood to cook but, luckily, I'm usually in the mood to cook from scratch. This week, my craving has been for broccoli soup.  I love broccoli soup when I'm out at a restaurant but there's something about that too bright orange color that hints at some not very natural ingredients...so I made my own.

One of the simple tricks to this soup is something I learned from Auntie Miranda:  if you want a cheddar flavor in something, the sharper, more flavorful the cheese you use the less it takes to give you the medium cheddar flavor you're looking for. Good advice, Auntie.

 

Easter (or Anytime): Apple Crostata

 

After the Easter egg bread fiasco, I still wanted to make a dessert for Gene's and my Easter dinner so I decided to make something so easy, so uncomplicated that surely I couldn't screw it up.  At least that's what I kept praying. 

This apple crostata fit the bill perfectly.  Simple and quick, it was the perfect ending for the richness of our roasted duck.  You can use a sprinkling of cinnamon, cardamon, or allspice if you like, but as I've said a few times here on the blog my personal preference for fruit desserts is to keep the spicing simple so the clear flavor of the fruit shines through. This recipe only contains three ingredients besides the apple and the pie crust:  lemon juice, butter, and sugar. It doesn't get much more simple than that.

Life as a Failed Easter Dessert

 

After hours, over half the day actually, of planning, mixing, kneading, chilling, boiling, dyeing, more rolling, more chilling, resting, mixing, rolling, filling, spreading, moving, shaping, pre-heating, cutting out decorations, egg washing, and sugar sprinkling, I slipped my multi-pound  humongo Easter masterpiece into the oven for it's hour-long bake and slumped down into my chair to watch TV and knit for my little Littles a bit while anticipating every sweet decadent pastry bite following Easter dinner.

And that's exactly how it would have ended in a movie, with a perfectly made up, but with just enough dusting of flour on one perfectly blushed cheekbone to let us know how HARD Julia Roberts worked in creating that amazing pastry using no experience and only the drive of personal willpower all the while squeezed into a niney minute framework as she pulled out the glorious, perfectly browned orgasmic dessert from her fake movie set oven.

Well kids...I ain't Julia Roberts. Nor am I Martha Stewart.  The reality in my life turned out to be that fifteen minutes after turning over my baby to that monster freak called my oven, I physically followed a slightly acrid and puzzling scent into my real working kitchen to see black smoking pouring out of the oven vent and opened the door to see my creation melting and dripping everywhere like the Wicked Witch of the West after a shower.

Pissed off? You betcha.  All that work and money for ingredients wasted, but the more than that, my hope was mocked. That's what hurt the most.  I was hugely disappointed but--evenutally--after releasing my annoyance with a good slam of the oven door, stomping out of the kitchen, and crying like a big baby in my bedroom for fifteen minutes,I could also see that as many things that do go well for me in the kitchen even when attempting dishes I've never prepared before, the Vegas odds are there's going to be a few failures along the way as well. When I had a chance to stop and think about it objectively, I realized that the bigger truth in this is that through this kitchen disaster I've learned more unforgettable baking lessons in one afternoon than I've learned in the last year from my successes.  That is the definition of experience. 

Knitting for the NICU: Easter 2011

 

I am so excited for our NICU babies.  A bunch of wonderful gals have volunteered to knit with me for our babies so instead of just me and my little silliness we have a whole room full of talented knitters creating gorgeous hats for our little Littles this year.  Starting with Easter bunnies, chicks, and eggs, thank you so much for my partners in crime:  Shelly Grant, Kathy Grimes, Yung Bishop, Suzanne Anderson, Jordan McAdams, Sydney McAdams, and Nicole Kirk.  Shelly, Kathy, Yung, and Nicole are all RT's with our hospital, Suzanne is my sister, and Jordan and Sydney are my teenaged nieces. I could say they're my sister's daughters but that would imply that they belong to her but they don't. They're mine and I just allow Suzanne to raise them.  :-)

 

I'll be bringing in two big bags of hats today:  one marked Easter and one marked Spring/Summer as we get new babies after Easter.

 

 

We've designated Kathy as our resident animal maker--how cute are these? I can't decide which are my favorite, they're all so adorable!

 

Yung has become happily obsessed with making flowers and butterflies--aren't they beautiful? 

    Happy Easter everyone!

 

Easter: More Than One Way to Eat a Peep

 

Where most people roast marshmallows, my niece Jordan and I love to roast Peeps.We love that extra crunch the outside layer of sugar of the Easter peep provides along with the perverse spectacle. So why not combine two of our favorite things:  Roasted Peeps and sweet potato casserole? Mmmm...

Hy-Vee Grocery Contest: Duct Tape Creations

 

Check this out:  http://www.hy-vee.com/promotions/think-spring.aspx?vc=true

Grocery store Hy-Vee is having a spring contest of making something, anything, out of duct tape. There are several entries, including a couple of cutel little kids that are in the lead in clothing much more simple than the work these two had to have gone to.  Don't know what the winners will receive, of course, vote for what YOU think is the coolest, but for me, I think these two not only had a really clever and original idea: not just a shirt or simple skirt, but a very complicated PROM Dress and and 3-piece Tux that they themselves (not their parents) executed flawlessly and without being campy.  That dress is gorgeous and very classy. I can't imagine how many hours they put into designing and making that themselves. Wow.  A huge round of applause to you two!

(Note: You don't have to register or leave an email addy to vote, just click the "button" and you're allowed to vote once a day until the contest ends on April 26th.)

Martini for Bourbon Lovers: Song of the South

 

I created my own martini recipe last night especially for Kentucky bourbon lovers like me, naming it Song of the South. It's a simple mix of the harder-edged sweetness of sorghum mixed with the smoky taste of the Jim Beam that creates a slightly sweeter, lighter "adult beverage" in the whiskey family but served as a cold but ice cube-less martini. 

As a little tutorial on the difference between sorghum and molasses...I've grown up eating both and have both in my pantry.  They are both made from sugar cane but the short answer is that sorghum is sweeter and less processed.  Sorghum is boiled down from the sugar cane stalks into a syrup. That's it.  Molasses is actually a biproduct of sugar making. Once the sugar cane has been boiled and starts to crystalize, the crystals are removed and that's sugar.  What's left is reboiled along with a milk and an alkaline solution. That's moleasses, which is darker and less sweet than sorghum.

Spring is Here! Five Ingredient Stuffed Peppers

 

Nothing says spring and summer to me like stuffed sweet peppers. Sure, you can get them in the grocery all year long but the spring ones seem fresher and perkier, the harbingers of all the garden goodies to come. 

Feijoida is Good by itself but Better with a Friend

 

Invited to lunch yesterday by my friend Teril, I was served a Portuguese treat I'd never had or made before:  Feijoida, a thick multi-meat stew that her husband, Stan, had brought back a love for from his LDS mission to Brazil. Americanizing it slightly, Teril's version is very close to what he ate in Brazil. Originally, Feijoida was a stew created by the African slaves brought to Portugal and all of its colonies, including Brazil.  The stew primarily consisted of black, white, or pinto beans (depending on the country and region), simmered in large clay pots along with a mix of cast off meats available to the slaves:  beef tongue and pig ears, tails, and feet. Thankfully, the stew Teril fed me was made from beef chuck roast, smoked sausage, and bacon.  I hope. More modernly, the stew is served over rice and may be accompanied by additional smoked sausages, kale or collard greens, hot sauce, and sometimes deep fried bananas.