French Onion Soup; Two Ways
Posted: November 23, 2011 Filed under: Uncategorized Comments Off
French Onion Soup
A while back I had this minor obsession with French Onion Soup. I just needed to make it. The first time I did, I used Smitten Kitchen’s recipe, which was delicious.
That was the outcome. Mine turned out a whole lot darker for some strange reason.
Then Ruhlman wrote about it here and he doesn’t use stock, just water. I was keen to try that, too.
You have no idea how much I teared chopping those onions up.
Sweating it out
I think I actually prefer Ruhlman’s recipe. The cheese is meant to be a lot more brown but I got impatient (I was hungry!) so I popped it out of the oven pretty early.
I froze it so I actually still have a little small portion of it left in the freezer. I also currently have a loaf of baguette sitting on my counter. Coincidence? Nay, fate.
Sweet Sticky Sin
Posted: November 22, 2011 Filed under: baking, bread 1 Comment »
Ultimate Sticky Buns
The last time I made Cinnamon Buns, my friend Karen pointed out sticky buns to me. Apparently it was exactly like cinnamon buns, but on speed. Or a sugar high. I read about how it had a sticky caramel glaze with pecans and I pretty much salivated all over my keyboard. True story.
If you want, the recipe is right here. I didn’t bother hunting down dark corn syrup (I used glucose instead) and I reduced the sugar a fair bit because I really don’t like overly sweet things. Even then, I still found the buns really sweet.
I went a bit crazy with the pecans, as you can see. And that’s the sticky caramel glaze. It smelled AMAZING. I used a springform caketin for this and my only advice if you’re doing the same is to double foil the base of the tin and put it on a deeper tray because that glaze is going to find a way to seep out and if you hate cleaning your oven as much as I do, you’d heed my advice.
Fresh out of the oven and it smelled divine. I was dying to pick away at it.
Flipped over with all the glazed goodness oozing everywhere. It was seriously one of those silent foodgasm moments when I had a fresh out of the oven piece. Yes it was really sweet but oh goodness was it ever sticky and the pecans added the crunch I so loved. And the scent of cinnamon that lingered in my apartment for the next 24 hours? Major perk.
Pistou Pizzazz
Posted: November 21, 2011 Filed under: cooking, dinner, fish Comments Off
Salmon with Pepper and Beans and Almond Pistou
In a recent effort to eat healthier and cleaner, I made this for dinner. I resorted to my favourite recipe search engine, Epicurious, and found this recipe.
As usual, I made a few augmentations due to what I lacked in the pantry. I omitted the dill and sugar snap peas and went for chives and green beans instead. I can’t recommend this dish enough. It was so delicious and so healthy!
The pistou was what did it for me. It was crazy how fresh and addictive it was. I ended up using the leftovers for wraps that I would make for lunch or even just snacking on it by the spoonful. I know, it’s bizarre but gosh darn it, it was good.
Actually, I have a feeling I’ll be making the pistou again. It just goes with everything and it’s so flexible that I could just mix and match the ingredients as I pleased. I could use pine nuts or pecans, I could swap the herbs for thyme or parsley, I could put shallots and garlic in there as well. The possibilities are endless!
(Yes, I’ll be posting more now! I have so many backlogged entries!)
