F is for Foodie Faves

I  have a cookbook obsession. I tend to read them like normal people read real books. Like cover to cover in some cases. I also love food blogs, food & cooking magazines and Food Network. I have at least 10 food apps for my iPhone. To start my collection, my grandmother gave me cookbooks that I think she might have bought at a yard sale for my wedding. I still occasionally look at them but I've moved beyond the canned soup cookery:)

Right now my go to book is the Mark Bittman How to Cook Everything. I have the book and the app. Second would be Rachael Ray's 365 book. What I love about them both is they have a lot of base "technique" recipes and then variations on that base. It really gets you thinking about different combinations and for me at least inspires a bit of creativity.

So here are my top 10 favorite food related content sources (in no particular order)

How to Cook Everything (the App has EVERYTHING in the book and more for 4.99!)
Rachael Ray Everyday
Culinary Concoctions by Peabody
The Kitchn
Nourishing Traditions (this book brought me back to whole milk and full fat cheese)
365:No Repeats
Cooks Illustrated
Allrecipes Check out the ingredient search great for pantry clean-out days
Epicurious
The Bitten Word

What are your favorite foodie inspiration sources?

Here is my grandmother's wisdom about marriage, I've been married now for 17 years so I must be feeding him good :)

E is for Eating Local

A few years ago I read Animal, Vegetable, Miracle and it made a lasting impact on my thoughts about the importance of supporting local agriculture and buying local whenever possible. Lucky for me I live in central Texas where we have farmers markets year round thanks to not having that pesky thing the rest of you call Winter :) Last year I started subscribing to a CSA and I love it. For those who don't know a CSA is where local farms have people "subscribe" and pay in advance for a weekly share of the farm's produce. There are many variations; some you have to pay for a whole season, some are weekly, bi-weekly or monthly. Some even partner with local livestock farms to provide grass fed beef, poultry, eggs, and other items. 

It is a little more expensive than produce at the local grocery store but I've found it's actually cheaper than if I were to buy the same quantity in all organic produce at a place like Whole Foods. And it's worth it. The produce is fresher, it's organic (mine is- most are) and it's in season. And the money goes to my local farmer, not to some huge agribusiness company. Plus for me it's like a fun adventure, each week I get a box and I don't know what is going to be in it. My farm does post a blog each week telling what is likely to be in it but you don't know for sure until you pick it up. 

I have another blog where last year I was documenting what I got each week and then how I planned to use it all up. I've gotten lazy and did take a short break from the CSA over Christmas due to budget shortages :) Hopefully I'll get back to it as well, now that my blogging excitement has returned. Plus I eat better and don't let as much go to waste when I plan out how to use it all up. Take a look and let me know if any of you would like to see it resumed. 

A great source to find a CSA near you is LocalHarvest.org. 

Look at this bounty! 

D is for Dinner out!

Tonight we decided to go out and meet a friend for dinner. We're working on planning a charity fundraising event for a mutual friend who's experiencing some serious financial distress due to medical issues. We got to the place we really wanted to go, Chuy's and there was a 30 minute wait. The kids were famished so we headed across the road to another favorite Rudy's BBQ. We have so many fantastic restaurants in Austin you could eat out several times a week and never have to repeat. I forgot to snap pics:(
I love cooking at home but it sure is nice to not have to clean up. I try to order things out that I wouldn't take the time to make myself at home and I like to try new things but at each of our regular joints I of course have my regular favorites. When it's Rudy's I have to have extra moist brisket and creamed corn! 

C is for Culinary Concoctions by Peabody

It's Monday. I've been a bit under the weather the last few weeks and so was thinking that today's post was going to be C for Chicken Soup. Today at work I had one of those days that I wanted to just come home and do nothing, I really didn't want to cook. I wanted chocolate. When I got home and looked around the kitchen I found a bag of Robin's Eggs and remembered that I rushed out to get them this weekend because of a post written on one of my very favorite food blogs, Culinary Concoctions by Peabody. If you've never read her blog- go there now! If you are a fan you'll understand why I adore her. So tonight I decided to make my C post in her honor and whip up a batch of Robin's Eggs blondies she featured not long ago. They are in the oven as I write this. I love her blog not only for the recipes (I've bookmarked so many I'd have to bake every week for a year to try them all) but more for her sense of humor and pulling no punches writing. I like to think that if I knew her we would be friends. Peabody- if you read this and ever find yourself in Austin, the beers are on me :)

B is for Buttery Bacon Brittle

More to come when I can get to the computer!

Was racking my brain all day on what to do for B day. Butter was my first thought. Then I thought Brussels Sprouts and quickly forgot that one. Bacon. Butter. Hmmm what to do. I remembered seeing a few different bacon candy items so I did a little searching and found this from CHOW. Sounds good but - no butter! Mine HAS to have butter. Another search brought me to this basic buttery cashew brittle. Better. Tweaked it up a bit by adding in bacon and pan roasting the cashews in butter the Mark Bittman way. Also exchanged Lyle's golden syrup for the corn syrup it called for because it's just better!

Yum. These will be on the Christmas candy menu I think from now on. Took them to poker night and they were a hit.

Buttery Bacon Cashew Brittle
1 pkg bacon 
2- 3 tbsp brown sugar
3 cups cashews
3 tbsp butter
1 cup Lyle's golden syrup (or light karo if you can't get lyle's)
2 cups sugar
1/2 cup water
1 cup butter
1 1/2 tsp baking soda 


Heat oven to 400. Line a baking sheet with parchment and lay out the bacon. Sprinkle brown sugar on the bacon. Roast in oven until well done. Will be glazed and sticky from the sugar. 15-20 minutes. 


In the meantime melt 3 tbsp of butter in a large skillet. Add the cashews and stirring frequently over med low heat cook until golden brown. This will also take about 15 minutes. Spread out the nuts onto a backing sheet to cool.


In a large deep saucepan combine the syrup, sugar, water and butter. Stir continuously until it comes to a boil. Attach candy thermometer and cook, stirring often over med-high heat til it reaches 275, soft crack stage.  While it is heating chop the nuts and bacon into small pieces. When it reaches 275 add the nuts and bacon pieces. Continue to heat, stirring frequently until it reaches 295, hard crack. It will get foamy looking and rise up in the pan so make sure your pan is deep. Remove from heat at 295, quickly stir in the baking soda and combine well. This will cause it to foam up even more so be ready. Pour onto cookie sheets that have been well buttered. Once it's started to set up a bit after about 20 minutes or so score with a knife or pizza cutter into squares or diamonds to make for easier breaking and more uniform pieces later. 


Allow to cool completely. Enjoy! If any is left store it in an airtight container. Made two cookie sheets worth for me. 

Pics will be added later when I can get a decent internet connection. Too slow right now, the perils of living in the boonies.  Above is a montage made with one of my favorite apps, Diptic!

A is for Action

Ok so I've been neglecting this blog. Today I listened to a podcast about being inspired from Merlin Mann & Dan Benjamin. Then I saw a blog post in my Google reader from Cindy and it was my inspiration to take up the A- Z in April Challenge to try to get back to regular posts. The idea is simple, post every day in April except Sundays which will be 26 days. One for each letter of the alphabet. Not sure yet what mine will be, most of them will more likely than not include something food related. There will be pics as in the past few months I've become addicted to Instagram and photo editing apps on my iPhone.

A major part of that podcast is the idea that just thinking in your head about all the things you want to do is not going to get them done. You have to actually take Action!. One of my favorite quotes is from an unknown source, but a woman I used to work with would always say "Be A Verb". I try to live up to this in my work life and am working on it more in my personal life as well. Nike has been telling us for years to "Just Do It". Alright, Alright!! Thank you Cosmos for the wakeup call.

So here's to 26 days of fun filled alphabet inspired posts! Here is a pic of another A word:Animal!
Taken at a recent trip to the famous Chicago Shedd Aquarium using Hipstamatic.

Aloha!

Naked Wellingtons

I took a bit of a blogging break the last quarter of last year because frankly I was uninspired. Not sure why, possibly because my thyroid was out of whack. Also possibly because I was chronically broke of my own doing and so we were cooking and eating on the cheap which while tasty and relatively nourishing, was nothing to write home about. I mean do you really want to hear about my kraft dinner + tuna? I didn't think so.

Yesterday was my husband's birthday so I decided to cook something good for a change and get back into the swing of things. As I am prone to doing, I got overzealous. He asked for steak and lobster. I decided to kick the steak up a notch and try my hand at individual beef wellingtons. I had seen them on Rachael Ray recently and we had some awesome Omaha Steaks  in the freezer. Didn't look too hard. I googled a few recipes and found this one based on a version by Gordon Ramsey that used Parma ham instead of pate. Easy enough.

I had to work all day today and figured I'd pick up the ingredients on the way home. It of course took longer than anticipated and included a last minute stop in the liquor store for Sherry and Triple Sec because not only was I going to cook beef wellington and lobster and asparagus, I just had to make a claret cup cocktail I had read about in my NY Times cookbook. Not having wrote down the recipe I pulled one up on my trusty iphone and went to gathering stuff.

All is going along well, I've got the lobster water on to boil and have seared my beef just so, and am working on the mushroom mixture so I go to grab the puff pastry to pull it out and get it ready to assemble. It had been on the counter at least 25 minutes at this point but was still pretty much frozen. So I read the directions. Thaw for 40 MINUTES. Ugh oh. I had hungry people and was already feeling a bit overwhelmed. What to do? Scratch the wellington from the menu? Then what am I going to eat? I don't eat lobster so had only bought two, one for Jeremy and one for the girls to split.

So I decided to make some "gluten free" wellingtons. I called em Naked :) Slathered on the mushrooms, wrapped them in that gorgeous parma ham and slid em in the oven as if they had their pastry. In go the lobsters and the asparagus and about 12 minutes later all was again well in my world. They turned out great. I'm sure the pastry adds something but this variation suited us just fine. The ham was just smokey/salty goodness melded in with the mushrooms and beef. I had the deli slice it on .5 so it was super thin. Yum. We were too hungry to remember pics!

For dessert there was angel food cake with a mix of strawberries, blackberries and raspberries with whipped cream. Perfect. I did manage to snap a pic of that before devouring it.

Naked Wellington "gluten free"

4 beef tenderloin steaks

8oz crimini mushrooms

2 shallots

2 tbsp butter

Few glugs of Sherry

4 slices super thin Parma ham

Melt 1 Tbsp butter in a saute pan. Dry the steaks and season with salt/pepper. Sear on all sides- you're not cooking here, just sealing them up. Maybe 2 minutes on each side. If your steaks are thick make sure you sear all the edges.  Remove from pan and set aside.

Melt remaining tbsp butter and add the shallots finely chopped. While they are softening, pulse the mushrooms in food processor for a few minutes until finely chopped. Not completely paste but very small pieces. Add to the pan with the shallots. Lower the heat to med and stir occasionally while the mushrooms give off their liquid. Once almost dry add a few glugs of sherry. Stir well and continue to cook until the sherry is absorbed. Taste and season with salt/pepper.  

Remove the mushrooms and allow them to cool a few minutes while you assemble whatever else you're having on the side. Lay out a piece of parma on a cutting board and smear with the mushroom mixture. Top with a steak and wrap up the ham as tight as you can get it. Flip it over seam side down into a baking dish. Repeat with the other steaks.  Roast for 10-12 minutes in 400 degree oven until done to your liking. At 12 minutes ours were perfectly med rare. 

Enjoy. 

PS- the claret cup I just HAD to have? Yuck.