all hallows eve

If you have not made your pepitas yet then you are way behind the 8 ball, if you dont know what pepitas are then you shouldnt even be in the game. Pepitas are pumpkin seeds that have been salted and slow roasted, they are a big part of making mole with an accent on the e. They are half the reason I like pumpkin. The other half is carving it and the other half is figuring out what to make with the pulp. Wait thats three halves. I could be John McCains running mate with math like that, dang hold on I could be John McCain - confusing and pleasing where it seems like every one gets some as long as they work for it, and those that work harder get more and as a result get to be more fat, kind of math. Fat seems to be the new thin and dumb seems to be the new smart. Anyway I dont live in a 'swing' state I live in NYC and you all know how we 'swing' we ARE the media elite. You know what that means right? We think we are smarter than everyone else - at least thats how we have been branded, and brands are worse than tatoos and I dont have a single tatoo! I am arrogant like that. Tatoos are for....well I'll let you decide, but I have been branded regularly. (just blabbing again)



So the smarty pants that we are makes me make my own marshmallows. These are my first attempt and I am hoping for a tasty lime marshmallow with these striking blue streaks.




Happy Halloween.

update:



The marshmallows look good and taste good but they are a little on the gooey side - I think next time I will not use corn syrup.




I made a little pumpkin soup with wild rice and asparagus from some of the pumpkin I scraped out of our jack-0-lantern, and I think I am going to try and make a pumpkin/chevre cheesecake. Stay tuned.

Second update:



Better marshmallows, pineapple flavor.

fig leaf chevre

Goat cheese wrapped with fig leaf then grilled and served with grilled tomatoes, olive oil, pepper and fresh crusty bread.




I washed some fresh fig leafs and placed a large piece of goat cheese in the center.



I folded it into a nice neat little package and oiled the outside.



I grilled it until the cheese started to ooze.




I drizzled a little olive oil and and added some grilled little tomatoes and devoured it with some crusty bread. The cheese was warm and tangy, the olive oil balanced it all out and the fig leaf gave a unique and distinctive 'green' flavor - I would definitely do this again and again and again.

buffalo booty

Not that kind of booty, pirate kind of booty but this came from a pirate buffalo. I went to my PO box yesterday and inside my tiny little box was a yellow card and that only means one thing - warrants for my arrest that are too large to fit - no it means I have a package. Usually these packages are things I dont want like - more gevalia coffee I didnt want to begin with, bundles of magazine subscriptions I didnt ask for or some other nonsense that makes the 15 minute wait all the more bothersome. Not yesterday. Yesterday there was no line waiting for packages so I didnt care what it was. I get the patriotically printed box that says priority mail and I see right away its from Buffaloville, home of Buffalodick and this sucker has some weight to it. I get it home tear it open and inside is a steaming hot bowl of his award winning chili, two pounds of smoked brisket and 3 smoked game hens - my jaw dropped. "How did the chili stay warm" was my first thought followed quickly by "how do I hide this meat so the pup and banana wont know I scored some loot."



Just kidding~!

I did get a world famous t-shirt and a damn nice mushroom book. I have quite a few mushroom books but this one is so good because of how the pictures are layed out, there are multiple shots of each mushroom as well as cross sections to make identifying a lot easier, Plus I can hardly wait to start wiping my greasy hands all overt this shirt while I eat and cook with it everyday until it falls off. - I guess the chili and the smoked meats are coming in a different box.



It says "Buffalo Dick Makes Good Chili" Thanks a ton Buffalodick.

banana meal

Worn out and bored. What is a cook to do?




Rice and Salad.

Tasty gravlax salmon in a mock risotto and cactus juice surrounded by grilled shrimp and cilantro -served with a fish cake and a side of goat cheese salad.

cactus fruit

Prickly pears or Tuna in spanish, these fruits are sweet, tart and delicious. I make a puree out of them and mix them into a vinaigrette. They have a lot of pectin so they would make a great jelly and I bet they would even ferment into a nice wine. Scoop out the pulp discard the seeds and attack with an immersion bender. They are also good eaten as they are.

Lunchtime Edit




Fish cake salad with cactus fruit balsamic reduction and tiny tomatoes. The fish cakes are made with fish a little cornmeal and a little crushed cracker bound with an egg and shaped, then fried in vegetable oil. The reduction is made by simmering some cactus fruit puree with a splash of balsamic vinegar until it thickens.

pasta madness

lots of fluff

A lot of bloggers take on monthly challenges and those are not easy to do but I took on an annual challenge and thats even harder to do. Oh people make little themes so that its easy like monday madness and wednesday nakedness but thats cheating, come up with content on your own. I wanted to do a post a day. Believe me its easy to fill your blog with all kinds of crap and I have done it, all you have to do is search 'jokes', or 'poems' and you will see where I tried to fill some space. The deal here is that I tried with whatever success to post a 'relevent' post every day and relevency in this case was of a culinary sort. I think I did OK. Next year I am going to post like a mofo(for my foreign readers 'mofo' means I will do things with no purpose) so 2008 has its own little place in history, it was a year with 'purpose'.

By now you might have figured out that I will over do just about anything, from jokes to puns to you name it, I even try and be pathetic but none of it works like my love for food. You might remember how worked up I get over chile, well I get the same way over pasta. I know, I know I profess this funny little obsession with french cooking but the only thing french about me is the abundant use of butter, cream and cheese, that's french isnt it and pasta is italian, OK so maybe it is things latin. My french friends refuse to believe or even accept that they are latin. Latin is spanish and food from spain is ick to me, I am spanish but I am spanish from the southwest so my food isnt ick...thus my dilemna. Whats my point? Pasta....ah blah blah blah....



This pasta is a spinach ravioli with a chorizo-chicharron filling and queso de oaxaca served with a creamy goat cheese sauce and chile sprinkles. Try it, its that good.

easy breezy waffles

Keeping it super simple, no fruit, no whipped cream, nothing fancy just straight waffles. Well not that straight, these waffles have a strawberry and banana puree mixed into the batter, I guess I can only take 'simple' so far. This is for you Anette, ekte håndlagde vafler.

Then to make it even less simple, these are heart shaped waffles, hey gimme a break my square waffle iron is inconsistent in its output (translates to; they stick and dont come out nice) This waffler is cast iron and it holds the heat well, my other one is some kind of aluminum alloy type thing and it is very fickle, I did manage to get a nice one out of it today as a test but the shape of these is so much nicer.


I smashed up the fruit and then made the batter, pouring in a small ladle full and then crossing my fingers.

Sometimes a little rabbits foot luck pays off.


After making about ten of these it was time for a little butter and syrup, we didnt eat all ten, these go into the fridge or freezer and get popped in the toaster oven for school day breakfasts.

65 till the end of the year

Thats not 65 days its 65 posts till I reach my goal of 365, or is it 366 because of Leap Year...no matter.

16 beans, and boy do they look good but if you dont like blackeyed peas then this isnt for you since blackeyed peas take over the flavor, the pup loves beans, the pup did not love these beans.

I'll tell you what is good though; goat cheese raviolis with a roasted red pepper couli and pesto.

These little pasta cushions are so tasty and the tang from the couli mixed with the goat cheese, then balanced out by the olive oil in the pesto makes you just want to streak.

number one & 300

I have reached nirvana, I am in the number one slot of New York foodies. I am "buzzed". I dont know how significant it really is but I like it!


I was number three for a long while and then number two, so I did have to matriculate. If you havent visited you should and if you want to join be sure and mention me.

A little video snippet:

electrolux

Another foodbuzz event and this time it was a meet and greet at Relais & Chateuax in Midtown to hear about Electrolux appliances and eat some tasty treats brought to us by the River Cafe. This was fun and it was like a little gallery opening except we had name tags, which actually make things so-much-easier. I hate that I cant remember names, like tonights chef for example, but I remember everyone who had a name tag. The appliances are pretty cool and I will post a youtube later about that but for now here is the food.



The theme was holiday since we are moving into the season and our bouches were amused with this little spoonfull of braised pork, squash and a toasted marshmallow.



Tasty indeed and I have to say my bouche was amused, various other tasty bits were passed about and the food bloggers went crazy, this was a tapenade with goat cheese and pimento.



We talked turkey and how to cook it, when we all learned how we were given a sandwich.



Dont let me forget that we had risotto, oh yeah, real good risotto with a few of my favorite mushrooms, this, my friends, made the whole journey worth it. This risotto was - and I hate to say things like this - sublime. It was. It was everything about the rice that you want, it was all about the mushroom that you desire and it just screamed cheese in the softest most cheesiest way, it was creamy and chewy and risotto-y as it should have been.




The coupe de torchon had to be the pumpkin creme brule. I wont even say too much about this little masterpiece. I am making this bad boy for my next whatever. I had a great time and I was happy and fortunate to be invited.