Pondering the world

What happens if I say "bacon?"

I was stunned the other day when I went into my blog stats and found that 1,286 people had looked at my blog, up from my normal 33 or so. What caused that? Probably my post on "Starbucks amateurs." I figure Starbucks--and other marketing companies--probably has a large number of marketing people whose job it is to use Google alerts and check up on what people are saying about Starbucks. My post was most likely not very important in the grand scheme of things. I hope they at least enjoyed the story. But what happens if I say "bacon?"

Did you know that "bacon" is the most-searched phrase on the internet? Why is that? I know people love bacon, Americans in particular, in spite of the fact that it's on all of the "bad" lists--cholesterol, fat, obesity, religious restrictions, etc.

Just so you won't be disappointed that I baited you with "bacon" and then didn't give you anything, here's a link to Bacon, Lettuce and Tomato Salad.

I just wanted to see if my stats jump as much for "bacon" as they did for "Starbucks."

 

Starbucks amateurs

You can always tell the "amateurs" at Starbucks. Believe it or not, there are still people out there who have never been to Starbucks before or hardly ever have coffee other than Folgers at home or at church. They can most often be seen standing about eight feet away from the barista, craning their necks up at the menu board and asking questions like, "What's a latte?  What's an Americano? Does that come with whipped cream?" It takes them forever to decide what they want.

Then there are us Starbucks "professionals." Not only do we always know what we want before we even walk in the door, if we go to the same Starbucks all the time, chances are the barista knows us by name and starts making our drinks before we even order.

We bought two of those nice steel personal cups when they first came out, and they're older than some of the baristas who wait on us.

 

pink Peeps margarita for Easter

Yesterday we enjoyed an Easter dinner at Santacafe in Santa Fe.  Imagine my delight to see a "pink Peeps margarita" on their special Easter menu. Of course I had to order it. I thought that meant the Peeps would be pink, but it was just the drink. Here's what it looked like. 

The margarita was apparently made with pink grapefruit juice, and perhaps it's more colorful with the yellow chick Peeps. And yes, a Peeps dunked in a pink grapefruit margarita is awesome!

Our daughter suggested that we should sink the chick to the bottom of the glass and then take a photo, but I had already eaten most of it by then.

Boston Cream Pie epiphany

I recently made a Boston Cream Pie from Cooks Illustrated.  It was awesome.  The best part is that Boston Cream Pie is my favorite cake and has been my requested birthday cake for as long as I can remember (except the year my sister made me a cherry-flavored birthday cake, parts of which she flung all over the kitchen--but that's another story).

A couple of days before I made the cake, I was running errands and ended up at a grocery store with a craving for a chocolate-frosted Bavarian cream donut, which has always been my favorite. As I took the first bite, I realized it's very nearly a Boston Cream Pie in miniature.  

The difference is that, even after sharing the cake with some friends, I still have half a cake left.

Samoas Cookie Bars--a tasty disaster

Wow. It's been a while since I've had a cooking disaster this bad. I've been cooking for long enough that, most of the time, at least, I can look at a recipe and tell if it looks reasonable. Alternatively, sometimes my response is, "Eew. That won't work. What were they thinking?"

I've had this recipe for Samoas Cookie Bars in my to-be-tested file for a while and I pulled it out today. It's a baked cookie base, then spread with a mixture of melted caramels and toasted coconut, and topped with melted chocolate. Let all of that cool and solidify and cut into bars--sounds reasonable, right?

Everything was fine until I tried to cut them into bars. The cookie base was so crumbly, it fell apart immediately, and the caramel layer was so stiff that it separated right off the cookie base. The melted chocolate chip topping didn't really get firm again, so when I was desperately trying to cut these things and hold them together, I just ended up with sticky mess of chocolate and caramel on my fingers and crumbs all over. The flavor was pretty good, but not good enough to try to re-work the recipe. I licked the gooey stuff off my fingers and tossed the whole mess.

Life is too short to eat bad food--or to try to fix a bad recipe.

Is it sacrilege to change one of Julia Child's recipes?

The other day, I made Julia Child's Orange Bavarian Cream from Mastering the Art of French Cooking. Am I starting to sound like a broken record when I say it was so.... good... creamy and light, like an orange creamsicle mousse. And yet, I changed the recipe slightly. Instead of putting it into a mold and then turning it out after it was set, I spooned it into a dozen individual custard dishes. Also, at the very end, she called for topping it with orange slices that have been dipped in sugar. However, I remembered that I had made some candied orange peel and put it in the freezer. I chopped the orange peel and put it in my spice grinder with a little extra sugar until it was very finely minced, then sprinkled about 1/2 teaspoon on each serving in the custard cups. It was still delicious.

Oh... I changed two things in her recipe. Is that an offense punishable by jail time? I'm sure there are Julia Child purists out there.

P.S. I am NOT going to do the entire cookbook in one year. That is the true path to insanity. Besides which, she has recipes for things I don't eat, like organ meats, artichokes, aspics and cucumbers (to which I am allergic). No amount of money can entice me to cook some of those things.  Ick.

Italian Meatballs with Pasta

Several months ago, Costco was sampling some frozen meatballs, which were quite good, and I bought a bag. I used the sauce from a recipe I already had and created these Italian Meatballs with Pasta. It makes a quick dinner and it turned out delicious. For a printer-friendly version, click here.

Italian meatballs with pasta 

3 T. vegetable oil
1 c. chopped onion
1 T. parsley flakes
1 1/2 tsp. oregano
1 tsp. basil
1 tsp. salt
1 clove garlic, minced
1/4 tsp. pepper
2-lb. can Italian tomatoes or diced tomatoes
1/4 c. water
20 meatballs
8 oz. shell macaroni, fusilli or penne pasta 

Heat oil in a Dutch oven.  Add onion and saute until nearly translucent. Add parsley, oregano, basil, salt, garlic, pepper, tomatoes and water.  Heat to boiling and cover.  Reduce heat and simmer, turning meat several times, for 30 minutes.  

While the meatballs simmer, cook the pasta in boiling salted water; drain.  Spoon the pasta onto a plate and top with meatballs and sauce.

 

keep your biscuits close

I just have to capture those funny things I see that take my imagination on a wild ride.  This was at a hotel buffet line, and the cover swiveled to close it and keep the biscuits fresh.  Obviously, people liked them because there weren't any left.

We just finished a trip through the South.  If there's anything that says "breakfast" there, it's biscuits and ham, biscuits and eggs, biscuits and gravy...

Biscuits are close to my heart, and I intend to keep them there.

These ARE my mother's chicken and dumplings (Delaware "chicken and slicks")

Today I made my mother's chicken and dumplings.  You may recall that I had tried a recipe from somewhere else and wasn't happy with it.  My mother makes the best chicken and dumplings in the world.

I'm posting the recipe on our Bottger Mansion of Old Town Bed & Breakfast blog so our guests will be able to find it.  For the whole story and the recipe for Authentic Delaware Chicken and Dumplings, click here.

Bon appetit!

it wasn't my mother's chicken and dumplings

Cooks Illustrated recently had a recipe for Chicken and Dumplings.  They weren't anything like my mother's chicken and dumplings.  What was I thinking??  Of course they weren't.  Cooks Illustrated is out of Vermont, and I grew up in Delaware, where the dumplings are made from dough that you roll out very thin and flat, cut into squares and then gently lower into the simmering broth so they don't stick together.  That's the Delmarva method of cooking chicken and dumplings, and they're called "slicks."

Everywhere else in the country, they put scoops of biscuit dough on top of the broth, cover with a lid, and then steam them.  And when I finished making them, that's exactly what they tasted like--dough balls simmered in chicken broth and steamed.  The stew itself was excellent, rich and full of flavor, so once I removed the offending dough balls, we enjoyed a delicious chicken stew.

I even went searching on the web for Delmarva-style "chicken and slicks."  To my horror, I found that some people have posted recipes claiming to be that style, but topping the chicken stew with Bisquick biscuits or even canned biscuits.  They missed the point completely!

I found mentions of restaurants in Delmarva that serve chicken and slicks (and sell out of them quickly), grange hall and Veterans association dinners and church suppers, but perhaps they either think that everyone knows how to make them and therefore don't post a recipe anywhere, or their recipe is a closely-guarded secret.

So today, after I finish the painting on my remodel project (click here to see what that's all about), I will call my mother and have her walk me through her fabulous chicken and slicks "recipe" that's been in her head all these years.  I didn't really learn it because I left home when I was 18 and haven't lived in Delaware since.  

If it's not a secret recipe and she gives me permission, I'll post the recipe here.  Stay tuned for Delaware Chicken and Slicks.