Chocolate Scorcher

It is no secret that I love Cafe Verite and Cupcake Royale. The Ballard location is one of my favorite places to go and study--can you blame me? Amazing stumptown coffee, delicious cupcakes, friendly & cute baristas, good music, and art? What's not to like?!

This month's cupcake of the month (which I have sampled twice... no, three times, I think) is no exception to the deliciousness that they're rolling out on a regular basis.  The chocolate cupcake base is moist and tasty, but the real treat is the frosting, which is a chocolate cream cheese frosting that has a blend of spices including garam masala in it, topped with shavings of Theo's ghost chile chocolate. Ghost chile is the world's hottest chile, and hails from the Assam region of India. It provides the cupcake with about a 30 second burn of spiciness, in the best way, but isn't too much for my pansy ass to handle. 

downtown lunch

I am constantly trying to think of new ways to fill my belly when I am working downtown and through laziness, forgetfulness, or a combination of the two, have forgotten to bring anything for lunch. Today, I stumbled upon a gem.

I have been to DeLaurenti's many times to get sandwiches, cheese, cookies, wine, you name it. I have never tried their pizza, until today. I wandered in the door, peered over at the fresh-out-of-the-oven pizza, and saw a marvelous looking slice that practically danced in front of my eyes, so great was my hunger.

This slice of pizza, which I procured for about $3, was topped with gorgonzola, pear slices, arugula, golden raisins, and deliciousness. My coworkers watched jealously as I ate it, proclaiming its deliciousness after each bite. One coworker was moved to go out in search of this divine pizza, only to return empty-handed, as they had no more of this variety available when she got there.

My only regret? That I did not get a picture of the pizza in all its glory.

Roasted chicken, potato salad, and carrot cake--a sunday dinner

I haven't roasted a chicken in over a year. I was nervous that I would somehow fuck it up, that it would be overcooked, undercooked, unseasoned, too salty... you get the picture. Luckily, I am a pro when it comes to roasting chickens (thanks to lessons from Dad) and it turned out to be delicious, tender, and perfectly seasoned.

This is my general procedure for roasting a chicken, augmented occasionally by different herbs depending on season and accompanying dishes.

I first wash the bird and remove the "extras" packed inside. Next, I rub the bird down with olive oil, squeeze the juice from 1/2 of a lemon inside the bird, and rub some sea salt and freshly ground pepper inside the body cavity. Then, I cut a couple of slices of lemon and stuff those inside the bird, followed by several chopped garlic cloves (the more the m

errier, in my opinion). Before placing the bird in the oven, I sprinkle a little salt and garlic powder on top, then cook to perfection. Voila!

As for potato salad, I had to again defer to Dad this time, emailing him for his famous potato salad recipe. This is truly kick ass potato salad, so feel special that I am sharing the recipe. Directly quoted from his email is the recipe/instructions for the potato salad:

"Cook about 5 whole, medium potatoes slowly, yukon golds are nice and nutty. Refrigerate them, cooling completely prior to cutting. I chop up celery and onion in about equal amounts, each about 1/4th the volume of the diced potatoes or to your liking. You can always add, but not subtract. Slice about 5 red radishes. And dice up several smal

l sweet pickles. I add some of rhe liquid from the jar, as well. Celery seed is nice to add, salt and pepper to taste. Boil 5 eggs and refrigerate at the same time as the potatoes. Cut them up and add toward the last. Now turn in some mayonnaise. add till it approaches creamy, don't overdo it. Again, you can always add more. Refrigerate overnight for the best flavor infiltration."

The potato salad was, of course, delicious. It was weird, making it. I have never actually done it, that was always Dad's thing. Since he is in Japan, I had to make my own. It was quite popular, and at the end of the night I think everyone had eaten two help

ings, at least.

To finish off our sunday dinner, I made a carrot cake! It was my first time, and I hadn't stopped to think how labor intensive it is to make carrot cake. It is no easy task to grate 3 cups of carrots, but I managed it without developing carpal tunnel or sustaining any grating-related injuries. Success! The cake was moist and delicious. Such a great summer cake! I loved the pecans in the cake as well.

delicious.

Stirfry

Stirfry is one of my favorite things to cook and eat. I am always tweaking the sauce, trying different things, and generally attempting to create delicious concoctions involving plenty of fresh veggies. Lately I've been using fresh orange juice and zest, a lot of freshly grated ginger, minced garlic, fish sauce, and some sweet chili sauce all together to make a light but delicious sauce that makes for a zesty and delicious stirfry. Some of my favorite veggies for stirfry are broccoli, bok choi, red peppers, sugar snap peas, and carrots, but really, you can toss in anything that you like and it would be delicious. I also added some extra firm tofu to my stirfry and served it over jasmine rice. Delicious.

coconut milk ice cream

I own some kind of odd kitchen appliances, both because I sometimes splurge and buy things for special cooking projects, and because my dad, who also loves to cook, likes to buy me fun things like an ice cream maker. I recently tried some very tasty ice cream that was made with a coconut milk base, and I thought it would be interesting to try it out at home. I used the following recipe:

2 cans coconut milk
3/4 cup undutched cocoa powder
1/2 cup sugar (to taste, I didn't want it too sweet and this turned out well)
1 tsp vanilla extract

I whisked the cocoa powder in with a little bit of coconut milk, then mixed in the remaining ingredients in no particular order. I poured it all into my ice cream maker and watched as it turned to delicious ice cream before my eyes. The texture, upon coming out of the mixer, was perfect, like frozen yogurt. After being re-frozen, however, it was more difficult to scoop and crumbled a bit--but was still absolutely lovely. I want to experiment with other flavors, and see about maybe adding a little soy milk next time, to see if that makes it less crumbly for scooping.

Molly Moon!

I went out for ice cream with Anna and Spidermike last night in Wallingford. After a lovely walk from the U-district and an equally lovely dinner at Sea-Thai, we decided that it was perfect ice cream weather.

Molly Moon should be around the corner from my house. Or maybe it shouldn't be, because I would go all the time. I had strawberry balsamic ice cream and vivace coffee ice cream, and was pretty much in ice cream heaven. It was so delicious. I have had strawberries with balsamic vinegar together before as a wine pairing, and loved it then, so I knew I had to try this ice cream and it was so good. I wanted to buy a pint to take home, but had self-control. Luckily.

In addition to the scoops of ice cream I had, I got to try my friends' ice cream--honey lavendar (so delicious and refreshing), salted black licorice (very salty! not sure if I liked it as much, but I don't love licorice), and maple walnut (what I call an "old man" ice cream flavor). I tasted two of their sorbets--pomegranate curry and chocolate mandarin. The pomegranate curry was so interesting and zesty, though I don't think it was a flavor I'd really want a whole scoop of. The chocolate mandarin, however, almost made me change my order... it was that good.

I just have a whole lot of love for Molly Moon, right now.

bread, bread, and more bread.

This is the massive pile of bread my roommate and I brought home from the Essential Bakery bread dumpster. Faced with such a daunting load of carbohydrates, we decided that there was only one thing we could do--make bread pudding. Not just any bread pudding, but whole wheat bread pudding! This is something I have never done. Technically, it is two things I have never done, both the bread pudding making and also with whole wheat bread. I kind of wished I had some rum in the house, but as it was too late to go to a liquor store, we stuck with milk, eggs, butter, raisins, brown sugar, and some tasty spices--cinnamon and nutmeg.

The resulting product, while not being especially beautiful to look at because it is, after all, bread pudding, but was delicious, warm, and a wintry treat that kind of made me wish I had a hot toddy to go with it. Again, next time.

We still had a lot of bread, which we continued to consume in a variety of ways, including a favorite... dipped in olive oil and balsamic vinegar. The morning after the bread pudding experiment, we made french press with a most amazing Stumptown coffee, and I made french toast with a sourdough fremont loaf. French toast is something I don't make often, but every time I do, I wonder why it has been so long. I want to experiment with another french toast recipe in the near future that I found that had anise in it. This time, however, I made rather traditional french toast with a little vanilla and nutmeg in it.

Another important thing I learned over the couple of days that followed is what a difference it truly makes to have a good bread knife.