When Jamie Oliver’s Food Revolution was on awhile back, I watched it and became very happy that my daughter takes a packed lunch to school every day. I then watched Food, Inc. and realized that even with Little J taking her lunch to school, we still needed to make some serious changes as a family. The movie did not make me want to stop eating meat, but it did make me realize we need to be more responsible about what we decide to eat as individuals and a society.
It was really driven home for me when we visited a dairy farmer as part of Agriculture Day at Leadership Frederick County. You can read the recap post here. What it all comes down to is knowing the source of your food and eating as local as possible. We need to keep our food purchases local to not only be healthier, but also to protect the food chain. If you want to know what I mean by protecting the food chain, read this.
I’m not trying to scare anyone or be a downer and become some activist, but I do think we need to not take what we purchase at grocery stores at face value. I have started to read food labels much more and am totally shocked by what I see. High fructose corn syrup in hot dog rolls?? Really? Yikes.
Of course, we can’t make everything at home, grow it ourselves, or buy everything local due to expense and accessibility, but it is something that I am committing my family to as much as possible. I have joined a CSA which quite frankly scares me more than just a little bit. There are a lot of vegetables that I have no idea what to do with, but am ready for the challenge. I plan on learning how to make more things on my own and preserve things for the winter months.
Also we will be exploring all the great resources we have locally for getting food from the farm to the plate as much as possible. So while I will still be blogging about all the goodies I like to cook and bake, I hope to provide information on local food as I explore all of our options. I hope that you will share with me hints and recipes to make this all a little easier ;-)
Tell me your favorite source for local meats, veggies, fruit, dairy, etc.?
Last month I took a truffle making class at The Kitchen Studio. First off, if you have never taken a class there you should. What’s better than learning to make chocolate truffles? Making them with friends. I was fortunate enough to share the evening with April and Cathy. I was late, of course, so I missed the discussion and tasting of the different kinds of chocolates, but Cathy was kind enough to get me caught up.
Class was on a Friday night and the week had been pretty tough on me, but ending the week by playing with chocolate
was just what the doctor ordered. Chefs Christine and Caroline did a lot of prep work for us during the day and had prepared the flavored ganaches for us. There was hazelnut, aztec (with a kick of cayenne), cappuccino, and chai tea. Chef Christine demonstrated how to make a salted caramel center. Yes, chocolate, caramel and salt. I was in Heaven.
I have read many truffle recipes and watched them made, but this was the first time I actually got to get my hands dirty. Believe me you will get dirty, but having chocolate everywhere doesn’t suck. To keep the chocolate from melting too much it is advisable to wear latex gloves when rolling the truffle centers. Cathy and I worked with the aztec filling. It was a little harder than I expected, but Cathy tackled it like a pro by scooping it out. My job was to roll them into balls, but some of mine resembled the truffles that the pigs forage, rather than pretty balls of chocolaty goodness. The good news is no matter what they looked like, they all tasted great!
Now it was time for coating the truffles and Chef Christine pulled out the chocolate temperer. This allowed us to put the perfect chocolate coating on the salted caramel truffles. This also marked the beginning of my next culinary adventure with chocolate. Because of this class, I have ordered a chocolate tempering machine that should be here in a week or so. Stay tuned for that.
The class was great and I now have enough confidence to move forward and try truffles on my own as well as many other chocolate concoctions.
My friend Jen’s blog post the other day about reconnecting with her passion for running inspired this post. What does flour, sugar and butter have to do with running? Absolutely NOTHING. I’m talking about the passion part. I have no explanation and I really don’t know when it started, but baking has been my go-to activity when I’m feeling stressed or just want to get my mind off work. There is just something about following a recipe and creating something yummy that brings me so much joy. I WISH running or any kind of exercising did that for me, but alas it doesn’t. Bathing suit season would sure be a lot more fun.
Last week I was preparing for my presentation about social media at the Frederick Chamber New Media and Technology Conference when I began to get really nervous about it. I have presented on many occasions, but for some reason this one was rattling my nerves. Common sense would probably tell me to prepare more, but frankly I knew the topic inside and out. So what did I do? Baked, of course.
Now I should provide a little back story first. During Twitter conversations before the conference I had mentioned that I would bring some cookies to conference to share, so it was something I talked about, but didn’t know if I would have the time. I really didn’t have the time, but the baking Siren was calling me. I went to my list of recipes I want to try. Yes, I have a baking to do list. I am always on the hunt for interesting sounding recipes to add to this list. If you have something I should try, leave a comment below with it please.
The recipe I decided to try that night was suggested to me by @kimthewriter for Homemade Oreos I mean, seriously, how can you go wrong with an Oreo? I checked the pantry and had all the ingredients, so it was time to get to work. As I started measuring ingredients, I could already feel my shoulders begin to relax and a relaxed smile come across my face. I was in the zone. I had Little J there helping me with adding ingredients and shaping the cookies while we listened to some music and laughed. Everything was right in the world. Sappy, I know. Bear with me, I’m having a moment.
By the time we finished, we had a delicious cookie that we both had to keep ourselves from devouring them all. I had relaxed and with one more review of my notes was ready for my presentation. I took the cookies with me to the conference, because next to the actual baking process the next best thing is sharing them with friends. I was happy to leave the conference feeling that my presentation had been a success and my cookie container almost empty. Both were a sign of a great day in my book.
Your turn, hit the comments and let me know where you find your zen. Also give me some things to add to my baking to do list.
It’s that time of year again. Valentine’s Day. I have never been a big fan of February 14th, probably because I spent most of them single until I met Hubby. Now that I’m married and have Little J, it’s really become more of a family celebration. Usually cards and small gifts for each of us finished up with something fun for dinner at home. I’m big on themes, so usually dinner has a theme to it. One year was Spanish tapas and one was all spicy food.
This year, we are thinking fondue. Little J has never experienced fondue and we figure she will think it is a lot of fun. Especially the chocolate kind. I still haven’t planned out the menu yet, so if you have any great fondue ideas, please let me know.
So keeping in mind that I’m running a pretty G-rated blog here, let me know what you have planned for Valentine’s Day.
It’s no secret that I love food and am trying to improve at my photography skills. My friend Jessica kindly has offered to help me out on the photography front. We met at Moxie a few weeks ago to have lunch and to practice taking pictures of food. The lunch was good, the company was great and actually my photos didn’t come out half bad.
I started with the bake potato soup:
Main course was a grilled cheese with bacon:
Dessert was chocolate cake with strawberry butter cream icing:
And after:
I learned about the Macro setting on my camera which I had used before, but had no idea what it was called or its purpose. You can see the entire set of my photos here.
As I sit here on a Friday afternoon the snow is beginning to fall pretty quickly as the beginning of a predicted major snowstorm is upon us. I still don’t know why, but when a snowstorm is predicted the first thing I think about is what am I going to cook while the flakes fall. We already had a dinner party planned which is still going on as planned since all the attendees can walk. On top of that it is Super Bowl Sunday. Even without the snow it was going to be foodapolooza weekend.
I thought I would share what I will be cooking up, in the hopes you would share your weekend cooking and/or baking plans.
Saturday
Breakfast and lunch are always a toss up and depend on our mood. I’m thinking I may have to try out the French Toast Scone mix I got from King Arthur Flour. If I’m lucky and hubby is in the mood to cook, I may score a breakfast burrito.
The menu has an India theme for the dinner party. We are hosting so we are in charge of entree and appetizer and the other two families are bringing dessert and drinks. Here is our contribution:
Appetizer: Indian-Spiced Roasted Chickpeas
Entree: Chicken Curry with Basmati Rice
Side: Homemade Naan and Cucumber-Mint Raita
I can’t wait to see what our friends are bringing for drinks and desserts.
Sunday
Breakfast will be something light since we will be eating early.
Early dinner will be Braciole with a veggie, to be determined. When the Super Bowl rolls around, we will pull out some chicken wings and other football appropriate goodies.
I’m not sure I will get any baking in, but I probably will end up whipping up a little something.
Now it is your turn. Tell me what you plan cooking or just eating this weekend.
I realize I sound like a Food Network nut based on my past few posts, but it really is my go-to channel, Web site and magazine when I’m looking for practical recipes and information. As my cooking skills and interests have evolved over the years, so has my liking for different shows/hosts. The one host that I seem to connect with the most now is Ina Garten. Quite simply, she rocks. I love her food philosophy of using simple, fresh and quality ingredients. I also love her entertaining style of being able to do as much prep work as possible so you can actually enjoy your own party. I bet she makes a mean cocktail.
The thing I like best about Ina is her recipes are rock solid. Every time I use one of her recipes, it is usually the best version I’ve ever made of that dish. I bring this up because I love shortbread cookies and have been searching for and trying different recipes over the years that I like, but have not fallen in love with. Let’s face it, if you are going to consume that much butter you better be in love with it. Sitting at Little J’s dance class the other day, I was searching for a cookie recipe to try that night. I didn’t want to be bothered to stop at the grocery store, so I needed to limit it to ingredients I already had. I did a search for cookies on the trusty (yet sometimes hard to navigate) Food Network site and decided to see what cookie recipes Ina had to offer. Score! Shortbread cookies and I had all of the ingredients.
Long story short, the recipe was simple and the cookies were delicious (hubby and I each ate 3 to just make sure they were edible. Yeah that’s the reason). This recipe is now my go-to for shortbread. Ina is also my source for the following recipes:
I’m sure there are more, but that’s all I could think of right now. Therefore I am declaring a new rule for myself: if I need a recipe for something specific I’m trying to make, my first stop is to see if Ina Garten has a recipe for it. If she does, I will search no further. End of story. This is why “In Ina I Trust”.
One of my favorite magazines is Food Network Magazine. My world pretty much comes to a complete stop when it arrives in my mailbox until I quickly page through it to see what recipes look good. In the latest issue, I found a recipe for Shrimp and Chicken Etouffee and decided that was the first thing I was going to try from the magazine. I had never made etouffee or even eaten it before. I always gravitate towards jambalaya instead when in the mood for NOLA food. As part of my New Year’s resolution, I was ready to try something new.
First problem, the recipe was labeled as Weekend Cooking and I decided to try it on a Wednesday. Take it from me, they label these recipes like that for a reason. It was much more time consuming than I had the time for, but didn’t realize it until I already had everything finally cut. Uh oh, this is not going to be good. I decided to cowgirl up and committed to finishing the dinner before Little J’s bedtime.
The recipe was pretty straight forward but there was one little part that I was not 100% sure of, the roux. I have some prior experience with making a roux for my alfredo sauce, but not a dark, nutty roux. As I follow the directions, I immediately start the questions in my mind:
Should it be more of a solid?
Or more of a liquid?
How dark brown?
What have I gotten myself into?
I took my best guess at the roux’s readiness and continue the recipe by adding the veggies. I’m almost at the end of the recipe and I’m noticing the color of my etouffee is no where near as dark as the one in the picture. Uh oh, this can’t be good. I make the rice and finish up the etouffee not knowing if I just wasted an hour and a half of my life making something we won’t want to eat.
I am happy to report that the meal was delicious and we were happy to pack up the leftovers to freeze and enjoy another day. Apparently roux is not a cruel mistress and just provides different depths of flavor (yes, I said depths of flavor). I will definitely be more patient with it next time to see how it changes the flavor. Are there any cooking techniques that trip you up?
I just got back from the announcement regarding Frederick’s First Restaurant Week. I already got to sample some yummy food. You can all the details at the site, but thought I would give you some highlights. Kudos to Jean Peterson Design and Orases on a great logo and Web site.
The event is scheduled for March 8 – 14 and at this time the following restaurants are participating:
Last night marked the end of a long, busy week and decided to put down the laptop and just veg. For me, vegging on a Friday night can only mean one thing is on my TV, Food Network. The show coming on was The Best Thing I Ever Ate. Have you seen this show? It’s the stars of Food Network talking about the best food they had ever eaten.
The first episode talked about the best salty things they had eaten and the second was a more general topic. Everything they ate sounded and looked really good. I’m definitely adding pork belly to the list of things I need to try.
The show got me thinking about the best food I had ever eaten and I was really disappointed that I could not think of anything off the top of my head. Hubby and I even discussed it and couldn’t think of many things we just absolutely crave. The one thing that stood out most to the both of us was the filet mignon that I make at home.
Does this mean that I’m picky about my food? Or I totally go to the wrong restaurants? Maybe I don’t pay attention to really think about it while I’m eating? I’m going with a combination of restaurant choice and paying attention. Due to Little J, every restaurant we go to has to have chicken nuggets on the menu and I’m usually pretty distracted getting her to eat. My goal moving forward is to be more in the moment when eating and be on a quest to find the best thing I ever ate.
Now I’m asking you, what and where did you get the best thing you ever ate?
MyPOV is my personal blog where I talk about things from My Point of View including owning a business, having a family, baking, cooking, photography and anything else that may be on my mind at the moment. Visit the About page to learn more about me.
I just got back from the announcement regarding Frederick’s First Restaurant Week. I already got to sample some yummy food. You can all the details at the 
