just in time!

This is a little late notice but it was brought to my attention that I hadn't posted the recipe yet for the mint brownies I made for my friend Mal's going away party.

The recipe for the brownie portion is...

1/3 c brown sugar
1/3 c white sugar
1/3 c butter, melted
1 T water
1 egg
1 t vanilla
1/3 c unsweetened cocoa
3/4 c flour
1/4 t baking powder
1/8 t salt

Mix together the sugar and butter.  Beat in egg, water, and vanilla.  Gradually stir in cocoa.  Lightly mix in flour, baking powder, and salt.
Bake in a greased 8x8 pan at 350 degrees for about 15-20 minutes, a toothpick should come out clean.

Once the brownies are completely cool you can start layering.

1 c confectioners sugar
1/4 c butter, softened
2 t peppermint extract
1 t vanilla extract

Mix ingredients until smooth.  Spread over brownies and chill in fridge until set hard.

3 T butter
1/2 c chocolate chips
1/3 c crushed candy canes

In double boiler, melt chocolate chips and butter until smooth.  Allow to cool slightly and carefully pour over brownie mint layer.  Sprinkle with crushed candy canes.
Cover and chill for at least 1 hour. 

These are really festive and delicious!

Merry Christmas!

Welcome to the holiday season....

Hope everyone had a great thanksgiving!  We had quite a feast over here, I made....

Scones for breakfast
Ciabatta bread
Warm brie with pepper jelly
Candied walnuts
Parker House rolls
Noodle kugel-family recipe
Mashed potatoes
Vegetable pot pie -- I pretty much just eyeball this when I make it, but here is a general recipe
Turkey
Pumpkin pie

On top of that, our guests also brought a couple dishes--it was awesome! 

I just started a new retail job which has been crazy.  It was ambitious of me to decide to host thanksgiving, but on top of that I decided to make everything from scratch.  I don't know what I was thinking!  Looking back it would have been a lot less stressful to just buy a loaf of bread and some rolls at the store... oh well!

We also had a small, but exciting fire when I tried to brown my meringue for the pumpkin pie

Haha!  The best part is that after scraping off the charred part, the pie was amazing so my only advice is to use a culinary torch and nothing else ;)

I also wanted to post that before Thanksgiving, Dano and I made a roasted cauliflower soup that was delicious!  Neither of us even really like cauliflower so I decided to make this soup to use a bunch up from our CSA and we licked our bowls clean!

I used vegetable broth instead of chicken broth and didn't measure the nutmeg, just grated the seed over the cauliflower until it looked well covered.  And I don't buy garlic powder, just chopped some garlic up and added it to the cauliflower when there was only like 10 minutes left for it to roast.

where did the month of October go?!

Now that I am back in the world of modern conveniences, I am hoping to update much more often! 

Fall just might be my favorite season to bake--it's nice to have the oven warming up our apartment and I love baking with pumpkin and apples!  I like to bake with actual pumpkins and I'll do a post on that later but this week was a canned pumpkin kind of week...

I was anxious to get baking once I moved back into our apartment and one of my favorite fall recipes are these pumpkin cookies.  I used half brown sugar and half white sugar and I have been buying whole nutmeg seeds lately and grating them myself.  It adds much more flavor!  With all glaze recipes, be sure to check the consistency of the frosting--it's hard to measure confectioner's sugar accurately so take a spoon and make sure it will adhere and not just drip off.  I added cinnamon to the glaze and made it pretty thick so I could use a cake decorating bag to ice the cookies.

Yum!

food heaven...

Last night I thought I had died and went to food heaven. 

Here's how it all began...

Dano and I's neighbor/friend Mike went to visit a friend at a local farm and brought us back some amazing produce--most notably tomatoes and peppers!  Its hard to get those items here on the coast because it just doesn't get warm enough for them to ripen.  Luckily this farm was pretty far inland with much warmer weather.  As I was flipping through my Martha Stewart magazine I saw this recipe for salsa and got inspired!  I didn't quite follow this recipe, just used what we had which ended up being this-

After roasting...

I let them cool, then peeled the skins off the veggies and whipped them up in the food processor.  I added salt, cumin, chili powder, lime juice (2 limes), and a bunch of chopped cilantro.  After letting it sit in the fridge overnight it was amazing!

The best part is yet to come though! 

The other night I was pondering what to do with an overripe tomato I had up at the cabin and thought of the goat cheese bruschetta Dano's mom introduced me to.  So cut up the tomato with some fresh chopped garlic and let that sit on the counter while I toasted some artisan rolls.  I then slathered the rolls in goat cheese, topped them with the tomato & garlic mixture, then topped that with some of the fresh salsa.... it was so beautiful and delicious!

I've made this bruschetta many times with just store bought pico de gallo but this was so much better! 

The other food-highlight of my week has been the discovery of this pancake mix...

(Yes, I do make pancakes for myself before work...) and it is really easy & tastes great!  It was sort of an impulse buy because it was on sale but now I'm hooked!   It has 8 grams of protein and only 3 grams of sugar (more reason to add chocolate chips ;)

Hope you are having a food-heaven type of week too!

a great food week...

This week I stopped in at Grocery Outlet (for non-west coasters, it's a great way to get super cheap food) and saw a big bag of poblano peppers... probably 5 or 6 in the bag for a $1.99!

I made stuffed peppers by first charring the peppers on the broiler.  Then I used some quinoa already cooked in the fridge, sauteed some veggies (red pepper, onion, zucchini), and a half can of pinto beans.  I mixed up the filling in the saute pan and added chili powder and salt.  Then slit open the peppers (careful, they will be hot!) and fill!  I topped the filled peppers with some slices of garlic chili cheddar cheese and cooked them (the oven was still hot from the broiler).

Also this week I decided to finally attempt to make Challah bread.  I've made many bread types before but this one has always been floating in the back of my mind since I was told it makes the BEST french toast (I love carbs for breakfast ;) ).  Bread is tricky.... I always get nervous before trying a new bread recipe!  I don't recommend attempting it without a food thermometer.  I used this recipe and it turned out great....

And yes, the french toast Wednesday morning was the best!

phew!

Sorry it's been so long since I updated this!

It's been a really hectic month because I've been trying to look and apply for jobs as much as possible since the summer is starting to wind down.

The other night I didn't get back to the cabin until 9pm but I had a plan to make eggplant parmesan and nothing was going to stop me!

I started by salting the eggplant and laying it on pans lined with paper towel.  This pulls out the bitterness of the eggplant.  After about twenty minutes I rinsed it off, dried it, and breaded it.  Then baked it in the oven on a sheet pan until browned and crispy (flipping once).  Then, in a lasagna pan I layered the eggplant with spaghetti sauce, cheese, herbs, and some sliced cherry tomatoes and baked until bubbly! 

It was amazing! 

I took it for lunch on multiple days with a roll and made eggplant sandwiches warmed in the microwave at work.

It takes a little time to make (I think I finally ate at about 10pm....) but it's not difficult and definitely worth the wait!

cheating this week...

This morning I started work at 6:30 am to conduct a tide pooling program... it was fun, but it's been a long day.  So this week I am going to cheat a little bit and just send you off to another blog that I found my bookclub recipe this month on :)  This chocolate-berry ice cream cake is an easy, perfect summer treat--sweet & chilled with chocolate and fresh fruit!  Enjoy!