Great Bowls of Fire

We had a little chili cook off here in RaChaCha.

I think I went for the bowl.

My husbands bowl.

Some really different chilis.  Some with cumin as the star, some vegetable ones.  Chipotle ones.  So varied.

Some of the volunteers dishing out chili.

Getting to the bottom of the barrel.  This one was my husbands favorite (#7).

We had a really great time taste testing chilis from 12 of Rochester's restaurants.   The event was hosted by Genesee Center for the Arts.  They have many classes there for pottery, printing and other fine arts as well as a community dark room- (which I used back in the day - pre- kids)

It is official now- here are the winners!
Best Veg: Owl House
Best Met: Sticky Lips
Spiciest: India House
Most Unique: Owl House
Overall: Sticky Lips

The Key:

1 = India House, 2 = O'Callaghan's, 3 = Aladdins, 4 = Sol Burrito, 5 = DogTown, 6= Jines, 7 = Nathan's, 8 = Jeremiah's, 9 = Sticky Lips, 10 = Stock Exchange, 11 = Stock Exchange, 12 = Owl House.

What I would really like to do now is go to Texas for some chili cook off.  That would be awesome.  But you know I would have to have the recipes and I don't think they would give them out.

Whopper in Progress

I saw this recipe for a cookie called a whopper. The original recipe began here. I put it all together and was excited about a healthy cookie that was also gluten free. I could share it with others if it was a good one. But alas, it was tastey, but extremely crumbly. In the end I think I figured out why.

Here's the progression.

First batch of cookies were crumbly so I added 1 cup of flour to the remaining dough.

They had better texture but still were crumbly.

Then it dawned on me that the melted butter may have had something to do with it. (If you are gluten free you may want to make this recipe without the flour because I think the butter was the true culprit.)

This time they came out WAY better. Tastey, pretty healthy, and most importantly- cohesive. ahhhh.

Whopper (adjusted)

1 cup butter
1 1/4 cup brown sugar
3/4 white sugar
3 eggs, room temp
2 teaspoons vanilla
2 cups of Jif peanut butter
4 cups Old Fashioned Oats
2 cups oat bran
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/2 cups raisins
1 (12 oz) package chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350F. Cream butter and sugars together. Add peanut butter, mix well. Add eggs one at a time. Combine dry ingredients in a bowl and add to creamed mixture. Finally add raisins and chocolate chips. Place on greased baking sheet in large balls, flatten a little. Bake for fifteen minutes.

I am sending these yummy whopper of a cookie over to Click for their event. Click Cookies. Click on the announcement below to join in.

A CRAFT and A COOKIE

Many moons ago, when I met my husband, he took me home for the Holidays. That was my real inclination that he was serious about me. We had met in October and he took me home to meet his folks in December. Mind you, they lived eight hours away, so we had to stay there. My goodness, talk about nerves. I really had nothing to fear. My DH's, mother was an angel. The moment I came through the door I was kissed 100 times as if I was a long lost relative. His sister kept talking to me in English, while everyone was talking in Italian. Thank God for her helping me through that (thanks M : )). I had brought a ton of biscotti with me as an offering. A good gesture. It went over pretty well. I decided to make biscotti today and thought of that day and my lovely Mother-in-law. She passed away a couple of years ago. We miss her.

These are very low fat. The only fat comes from the walnuts and the eggs. You can omit the walnuts and use egg replacements, or whites, if you must. But if you can use them, they are good for you. It's a nice recipe with some wholesome goodness. Enjoy these biscotti with Chai tea for an ultimate spice experience!

I am sending these in for a Vegetarian Round Up at Fun and Food Cafe.


Here is one of the crafts I have been working on...

from left to right: "Toot", "Sparkle" and "Pom Pom"

Aren't they cute cupcakes. Found the idea here. Have no idea where the original link came from, sorry, but hey you have the pattern now, sew away!

MAPLE WALNUT PUMPKIN BISCOTTI
Lori's Lipsmacking Goodness Original

2 cups whole wheat pastry flour
3 cups all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 1/2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice*
1 1/4 cup brown sugar
3 eggs
1 - 15oz can puree pumpkin or 1 3/4 cups homemade pumpkin puree
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup maple syrup
1 cup walnuts, chopped and toasted

Preheat oven to 375 F. Combine dry ingredients, salt, baking powder, flours, spice and sugar. Combine wet ingredients, pumpkin, eggs, vanilla, maple syrup. Stir together. Mix in walnuts.

Spoon onto cookie sheet, down the edge of the long side of the pan, do the same on the other side. So you have two logs, horizontally extending into the pan about 4 inches or so. You may have a little left over, depending on how big your pans are. If so put in a small loaf pan.

After baking about twenty minutes, cut them using a serrated knife. Do so while hot so it does not crumble on you. Place them back in the oven laying flat for ten minutes. Remove from oven, flip and bake another ten minutes. You can stand them up for twenty instead but be careful that the bottom doesn't burn.

Store in an air tight tin or freezer. They will keep several weeks. Even until Christmas if there is limited humidity.


Notes:
The one thing I would have added if I had some is maple extract.
* pumpkin pie spice can be made by combining 2 tablespoons ginger, 1 tablespoon nutmeg, 1/4 cup cinnamon and 1 tablespoon cloves.

PIE EATING CONTEST with GRAPE PIE

Just kidding. My husband thought it was though. Kidding again. Check out the pie event. What perfect timing for my Grape Pie!



About forty five minutes from where I live is the Finger Lakes. Some amazing wines come from this picturesque area. There are so many vineyards and so many wineries. The lakes are just beautiful!

In Naples, they have a Grape Festival every year. You can get some amazing grape pies there. They will cost you a little. Or you can make your own. I found a recipe and after a couple tries and some tweaking, I am very satisfied with the results. The pastry can be found here at Simply Recipes. Its an amazing dough. Very flaky and crisp! Tasty too!

Just to let you know the tapioca had to be upped because it was too runny. After experimentation the following recipe is what works for me.

Concord Grape Pie
based on this recipe
Lori's Lipsmacking Goodness

2 1/4 cups grapes, skinned
1 cup sugar
2 heaping tablespoons tapioca flour

Seperate the grapes from the skins. Cook them in a heavy bottom sauce pan until they have fallen apart. Strain through a sieve over the skins. Let the skins and hot juice sit for two hours until completely cooled. The original recipe says five hours.  I did it both ways and am satisfied with the results.

Preheat oven to 400 F. Add sugar and tapioca. Stir. Roll out your pie crust. Pour grape mixture into (uncooked) prepared pie crust. Bake at 400 F for fifteen minutes. Reduce oven temperature to 350 F for about 20 more minutes. Let cool completely to set.

Cilantro Pesto with Tofu

Yeah, that's right, a creamy, dreamy, low fat pesto made with tofu! How could you go wrong?
It may not be the most traditional of recipes but it sure tastes great. My husband thought it was regular pesto. The fact that he thought that left me with two conclusions, either his taste buds do not know any subtle or major differences in taste or the pesto is so good that it tastes just as divine as the real mccoy. I want to believe the latter of these two statements. I'll leave it up to you to decide for yourself.


This is my entry for Equal Opportunity Kitchen's blogging event called, TRIED, TESTED and TRUE TWO. What a great idea for an event!

CILANTRO PESTO with TOFU

1 12oz package soft or silken tofu
2 cups cilantro
2 cloves garlic
1/4 cup peccorino romano
juice of one lime
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper

Spin all ingredients in food processor or a blender. The taste is best when left for at least an hour to marry. A day before is even better. Serve with grated cheese sprinkled on top and a few pine nuts. Bon Appetito!

SUGAR HIGH FRIDAY and Sunday, Monday, Tuesday...

Here I am baking again. I just cant help myself. When I saw Tartelette's Sugar High Friday I just had to join in on the fun. I love these events! If you have not had the pleasure of seeing Tartelette's site you must view it. You will salivate outragously. She has paired up with The Domestic Goddess to bring us all Sugar High Friday.

I wanted to use my fresh strawberries for my dessert but did not have enough lemons on hand to make a proper lemon cake. I decided to go with oranges as they are taking over my fridge. I also decided to go a little healthy as I have been making way too many desserts lately. I need more Zumba and less sugar.

ORANGE CAKE
adapted from King Arthur's Whole Grain Baking

Batter:
2 1/2 cups whole wheat pastry flour
1 cup unbleached all purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 3/4 cups sugar
4 large eggs
1 cup milk
1 tablespoon orange zest (I zested the whole orange)
2 teaspoons vanilla

Glaze (I did not do this)

1/2 cup orange juice
2 teaspoons orange zest
1/4 cup sugar

Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease and flour a 9" or 10" bundt pan. I used mini tart pans and mini muffin cups.

I am going to paraphrase here:
Cream butter and sugar in mixer. Add zest and eggs one at a time. Mix in vanilla. Mix dry ingredients in a seperate bowl. Add to the butter mixture alternately with the milk. Pour batter into desired size pan. If you are doing a bundt, the baking time will be about 55 minutes.

STRAWBERRIES MACERATED in CURACAO

1/4 cup Curacao (Orange Liquor)
2 tablespoon sugar
4 pints strawberries, sliced

Combine Curacao and sugar. Pour over sliced strawberries and refrrigerate.
Spoon strawberries over orange cake and add a dollop of whipped cream!
(BTW... no my kids got the nonalcoholic version).

PUTTIN' UP STRAPPLE SAUCE

I heard about Pixie's, You Say Tomahto, I Say Tomayto and Rosie's, Rosie Bakes a ‘Peace’ of Cake blogging event. It's called Putting Up. How cute is that? What a perfect time to make my Strapple Sauce.







This has to be one of my all time favorite homemade canned goods. It is a combination of apple and stawberry sauce. There are no hard and fast rules to make it, just a few canning concepts need to be applied.

Here you can see the spot easily where you need to press.



Here in New York there are lots of great apples, before all you people in Washington say that you have the best, I will just say that in the North East, I think NY rules. The particular variety that I use here is Empire. We buy a lot of apples so I usually have plenty on hand. My husband eats five a day. That is his breakfast and lunch. Crazy, but hey he lost 40 pounds that way. OK back to that sauce. These particular Empires were getting sandy and yucky as we had them in the garage and the weather has become too warm for them. So you can use older apples but fresh is always better.

First core and peel all your apples. I quarter them to cook them down faster. Put your apples on a low heat with about a 1/4 cup of water to get them started. As they begin to heat you can put the heat up to a medium to medium high. Check and stir occassionally as the can stick to the bottom especially in the beginning. Once they melt you can put in your strawberries (Note: rasberries, mango and other fruits work as well). I had some strawberries in the freezer but you can use fresh of course. Depending on the tartness of the apples you chose, you can use sugar or not. I used none and they were perfectly sweet. Just make sure that you cook till the sugar is melted.


Blend in a food processor or blender. You can either have it kind of chunky or pureed smooth, your choice. My children don't like chunks. Spoon into jars, pints or quarts. Fill to 1/4 inch from top. Wipe away any sauce on jar rim, place lid and then screw top on jar. Place jars in large pot, cover with water, bring to a boil and process for 15-20 minutes. "Process" in canning terms means boil. Remove jars from water, there is a special tool you can use for this. I place them on a cutting board and cover with a towel. I highly recommend the Ball Canning book for all the specifics on home canning. Although I am always open to suggestions for Canning and Preserving Books.

After some time, even over night, check the seals on your jars. Just press the top, if it has some give it is not properly canned. Refrigerate and use. If the lid does not have any give then you have a canned good, yeah! In the picture above you see where you need to press on the lid.

Don't be afraid of canning, it is so easy, really. You will be rewarded with a product with less sugar and salt than anything you can get on the market. Plus you are totally in control of the ingredients. The easiest and safest things to can are things with acid. The acid acts as a natural preservative. So things like, tomatoes, apples, vinegar or pickled goods, all of these are easy and relatively safe.

LIVESTRONG EVENT

I found out about the Livestrong event on Tartlette's site. I jumped at the chance to participate. I recently lost my Aunt to cancer. About three years ago I also lost my Mother In Law to cancer. Both of these women were so sweet and beautiful. They are so missed. I think of them often. Unfortunately so many of us have been touched by cancer in our lives. I did this to honor my loved ones and all of those who have fought cancer!


MINI PASSION FRUIT CHEESECAKE WITH PASSIONFRUIT CURD
recipe adapted from epicurean

8oz. cream cheese, room temperature
1 egg
1/4 cup passionfruit puree
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/4 cup sour cream
1/2 cup sugar

Cream the cheese with the sugar. Combine thoroughly. Add egg. Combine thoroughly. Periodically scrape bowl to make sure all of the ingredients are in the mix. Add vanilla and sour cream. Swirl in passion fruit. Bake at 300 F for about 45 minutes.

Crust for Cheesecake:

Combine 1/2 cup crushed vanilla wafer cookies and 1 tablespoon butter. Press in cheesecake pan on bottome and 1/2 inch up the sides.

Passion Fruit Curd

3 egg yolks
3 whole eggs
1 3/4 cup sugar
2/3 cup passion fruit puree
1 1/2 sticks butter, unsalted

Combine eggs and yolks, sugar and passionfruit in a double boiler. Whisk over boiling water for about ten minutes. Once it is thickened remove double boiler from heat and stir in butter one tablespoon at a time. Cover and refrigerate.

HOW TO ENJOY A CUPCAKE

Check out the cupcake spectacular!


Cupcakes Spectacular 2008




Just ask my two year old and five year old.

I am so excited. This is the first recipe for a sweet treat that I made up by myself. AND I had success.

I have always liked recipes with sour cream in them. They always seemed to come out very moist. So...

COCONUT VANILLA CUPCAKES

1 stick unsalted butter, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 teaspoons coconut oil
1/4 cup milk
2 eggs
1 cup sour cream
1 cup sugar
2 cups cake flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 375 F. Cream butter and sugar. Mix until light and fluffy. Add coconut and vanilla. Add eggs one at a time. Combine dry ingredients: flour, salt and baking powder. Mix into wet batter alternately with milk and sour cream. Fill greased mini muffin tins 2/3 full. Bake for about 12 minutes. Makes about 48 little minis.