It's been one of those days where I wish I could have just ended the day earlier, gone to sleep and hope for a fresh, new start tomorrow. The anxiety was high and the hair pulling has nearly left me bald.
It's one of those days where even the most beautiful looking fruits and darkest chocolate taste foul. Yeah.
Sigh.
Spring break is here and the kids are off of school. This has added to my day. Oh joy, oh joy, oh joy. Plus, I caught the kids cold. Stay-home moms don't get sick days, unfortunately.
So, this is the perfect recipe to add to the pain of it all.
I made it a couple of weeks ago. I debated whether I should even bother posting it. Sure, it looks pretty enough but it was a lot of work and it wasn't worth the lot of work. It wouldn't have been worth even a small bit of work. It was disappointing. Fine Cooking let me down or I must have really missed something.
The flavors weren't exciting, the meat wasn't crispy and the dressing for the asian slaw was, well, blah.
Just so you know, I will not be posting the recipe. Not like I'll be making this again nor do I want to spend my time typing a recipe out that stinks. I think I'm going to have a
glass bottle of wine instead right now.
Here's to tomorrow. May it be a better day.
Cheers!
I offer you some more pretty food p0rn. I'm just too busy, busy to post anything else at the moment!
I took the picture about a month or so ago. It's one of the squash harvested from our garden that's been stored in our basement. The squash started developing "freckles".
How cute :)
Have a super duper weekend. I just hope I don't get "squashed" by the uber busy weekend I have!
I've heard of the term "yorkshire pudding". I never understood why they call it a pudding when it's a baked good. But according to wiki,
pudding is
rich, fairly homogenous starch or dairy based desserts. I'm not sure how blood pudding fits into that description but I think I'll have to ask my English friend to decipher this mystery for me. The name "popovers" came later, when special muffin-like tins were used and the breads would "pop over".
I have never tasted a popover before but have wondered what they are like. I watched an Alton Brown episode (did I mention I love Alton Brown-perfect blend of geeky scientist who loves food!) and thought to myself that I should try them out. I didn't have a popover tin so I figured I'd just use a muffin tin. Then I forgot about it.
Fast forward. I'm shopping and see a popover tin on clearance. Suh-weet! Time to bake! (Tip: You don't need a popover tin. My friend said her mother used to make it in a square baking pan instead.)
One thing that is great about popovers is that they are SUPER easy to make. I mean, stupidly super easy. Throw the basic ingredients in a blender, whirl and pour into the popover cups. If you can't breath and chew gum at the same time, then it might not be that easy for you. I'm just saying.
Secondly, they POP over the tins by a lot and stay tall! The structure is amazing to me, that they stand up so high! And, some of them have weird shapes to them. They are like foreign looking bread from outer space and the inside is HOLLOW! I'm just amazed by it all. I mean, there is no baking powder or soda in the ingredients list!
Thirdly, they are tasty. I'll definitely be making these again!
...
Popovers
makes 6
1 tbsp unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1 cup (4 3/4 ounces) all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp kosher salt
2 large eggs, room temperature
1 cup whole milk, room temperature
Spray a 6-cup popover pan with non-stick oil. Set the oven to 400F.
Put the ingredients into a blender and process for 30 seconds. Pour the batter evenly, filling approximately 1/2 full.
Bake on the middle rack for 40 minutes and do not open the oven door to check.
Remove the popovers to a cooling rack. Poke the tops with a knife to allow steam to release. Serve warm.
Recipe from: Basic Popovers, Alton Brown on Foodnetwork.com
I used to would avoid cutting onions whenever I could. I love onions but the stinging and crying was just unbearable for me. I don't know if my eyes were just more sensitive to it but I just hated it. Hated it. Wouldn't you avoid the feeling of little daggers in your eye?
I've spent many years trying all the tips and techniques and I call bullshit on them. Pardon my "french" but most of those techniques just don't work. Lets run through a list, shall we?
- Use a sharp knife to prevent slicing as many of the cells within the onion that cause the stinging reaction. - Uh, what?!? Onions cells are about 75 micrometers or 0.075 mm. That is small. A sharper knife will reduce how many cells from being broken? Not enough for me. I had new sharp knives to test try and it did nada in helping ease the crying and screaming (from me, not the onion). If this was the case, you might as well just forgo dicing or mincing your onions, which is how I need them most of the time. The more cuts, the more pain! Better just throw the thing in whole in your recipe - maybe that's a better tip.
- Cut your onions under running water. Oh sure, why don't I just hunch over the sink and try not to cut off a finger while the water is running. Maybe I'll dream of waterfalls while I give my onion a bath and lose a diced onion or two down the drain along with a fingertip, but maybe I'll cry less. Don't think it's worth it. Not very practical.
- Cut the onions fast - No kidding? Well, what do you think I'm doing? After the second cut, I start feeling the stinging setting in. After dicing a whole onion, it has taken me a good 20 minutes to recover, if not more. I'm literally blind because I can't open my eyes from the pain and I have once run into a wall running away from the devilishly laughing onion.
- Wear goggles or eye protection. -Why don't you also take out your swimsuit and flippers while you're at it? Pina Colada anyone? I'm sure I'd cut off a fingertip due to lost peripheral vision of my goggles. Does anyone really do this? Anyone??? Maybe I should look into patenting some onion goggles.
- Chew gum - Whoever came up with this idea must have an IQ of an ass or works for Wrigley's or Trident. Just you wait, commercials will be coming our way with 9 out of 10 chef's recommending chewing said gum while chopping onions.
So what tip or technique do I have for you today? It's super simple.
Put the onion to cool in the refrigerator.
Yes, that's all.
A cool onion never makes my eyes hurt or water. It's divine. I always have one or two in my vegetable drawer of my fridge and now I never have tears in the kitchen, except for tears of joy.
You'll thank me if you don't already know this tip.
You are welcome.
Power to the people.
(Picture taken by Marianne with my camera, processed by me) The other day, I took my kids to the nearby McDonald's. With no seating in the play place area I sat just outside of it, with a big group of teenagers behind me, while I watched my kids. While sitting there, I overheard the teenagers keep trying to show off with stories of grandeur and swearing to constantly try to "one-up" each other. This was what the night with David Adjey was like, except, he was the only teenager and he kept trying to "one-up" himself.
A few of us local bloggers got the chance to have
Dinner and Q&A Date with David Adjey at NAIT as he is this year's
NAIT Chef in Residence. We were able to ask him questions while we enjoyed dishes from David's book
Deconstructing the Dish. A youtube video of the evening will be released later for viewing on
NAIT’s TechLife channel.
I was not expecting such a large tasting of food and Champagne was served too. We bloggers were very spoiled. Though, I found the food not to be very hot, which disappointed me a bit. But it was overall pretty good. I'm not a fan of seafood but I didn't shy away from it. However, I noticed my stomach bloating and feeling queasy and by the time I got home, the back of my throat and tongue swelled a bit. I was obviously allergic to something, though, I'm not sure what it was, since there were numerous things I've never eaten before.
I had a preconceived notion of who David Adjey was before I met him and as I told him at the end of the night, he came across exactly who I thought he was. Pompous is the word that comes to mind. But he makes no apologies for it and I respect that. For him to get to where he's at in his career, he needs to have done something right and be hard working.
Chris and I came to conclude that "You can take the kid out of Scarborough but you can't take Scarborough out of the kid". (You'll need to watch the beginning of the
video to get that.)
I enjoyed myself and am thankful to
Diane, NAIT and David Adjey for having the event. Here are my fellow bloggers take on the evening. I will update the list as they post entries.
