– You guys and gals seem to commisserate with Alex’s five stages of a bad meal. Lora:
Totally cracking up over this. I have a similar post (still unposted!) about the incredibly frustrating process of making French Macaroons. Great minds think alike
Yes! Let us know when that’s up, Lora. Have we started a new food meme? Five Stages of…
– Thanks everyone for EVEN MORE suggestions on America’s best new sandwiches. Heather:
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It’s okay, you can laugh at my semi-vegetarianism. Everyone does. I eat meat one day a week at the most. But when I do, it must be high quality; I’m not a fan of hormones or antibiotics or animals crammed into warehouses. Please respect your food.
After coming out of my food coma, I thought I would share this recipe for Pot Roast Bolognese Pappardelle with my fellow ESers because I know you all enjoy a good food coma. However, you must know, there are a few essentials to this recipe where corners cannot be cut:
That’s it. If you don’t cut corners, this will be delicious. And yes, even semi-vegetarians will like it.
Pot Roast Bolognese Pappardelle
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Ed. Note: While I sat all morning and ran cards through the ATM, Julia worked her ass off selling Richfield Farms’ fabulous produce at the Mt. Pleasant Farmers’ Market all summer. I sat; she fielded questions about zucchini. I sat; she made change in her head. I sat; she hulled boxes back on the truck. Of course, she loved every minute of it and has now turned her attention to canning. Here’s her dabble in marmalading.
Despite the ridicule from my friends—all of them Southern with canning-loving grandmothers—dropping mostly not-so-veiled references to me being an 80-year-old Southern grandmother, and my boyfriend just saying I was nuts, I decided to become a canner. Over the summer months I put up dozens of jars of preserves, whole fruit and tomato sauce. Then November hit, the market ended, and I got bored.
Several weeks ago, after a canning lull, I began to feel the itch. Trader Joe’s had organic meyer lemons – bingo. Now normally I’m not a big freak about organic foods, but with citrus, it’s different. The toxins from any sprayed pesticides are stored in the peel, and so for something like marmalade, which uses the peel, it’s important to start with a non-tainted fruit. Who needs pesticides on top of the always present botulism threat?
Not wanting to squander my precious finds, I did quite a bit of pre-marmalading research on my favorite canning blogs (One Green Generation and Food in Jars) and ended up creating my own recipe based off a few I found. Normally with canning I stick to a specific recipe—again the threat of botulism is scary—but lemons are super acidic, and there’s a lot of sugar, so I felt pretty safe taking a few liberties.
My first marmalade attempt turned out more like a syrup and the taste is fabulous: sweet, tart and acidic with the chewy zest providing a good counter point to the runny liquid. Next time I’ll trust my instinct and let it cook longer. But I’m loving the new things I can do because of the more liquid texture: a salad dressing with red wine vinegar and a little olive oil; with mustard to marinate chicken; topping for vanilla ice cream; glaze for a cake; and of course, a way to dress up plain yogurt.
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How beautiful is Soma‘s cabbage and chickpea roulade? Full recipe here. More drool-worthy images after the j.
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Apparently Photoshopping never gets old. And never stops being funny. Tom Hanks‘ head pops up on beavers, elephants and camels and now it’s Paula Deen’s turn. Her fat ass is flying around on ham (above), Charlie Sheen and of course, a stick of butter.
Enjoy the meme.
(Photo: Paula Deen Riding Things)
More Attack of the Meme
You really shouldn’t be surprised that I have another breakfast dessert. After all breakfast is the meal of champions right? Following that logic I’ve whipped up a sweet hand-to-mouth breakfast exercise that will build your biceps and get your day started right with some sweet goodness.
But let’s clear something up first — that’s no muffin. That, my culinary enthusiast, is an Apple Walnut French Toast served in a cupcake liner with a walnut and graham cracker streusel.
My idea was to make French toast for a large group without running two or three pans and trying to time it so everyone is served in unison. Now of course you can opt for a large French toast casserole, but the problem I have with those is the center is always soggy — and well, that’s no good. So I decided to scale things down for more even baking.
Result: Loveliness between the pleats. (I know — it’s a recurring theme for me). No soggy mess and pretty much no leftovers.
Small note – Almost any bread will do for this recipe. You can use a plain loaf like an Italian or French bread type or a flavored one like I did. For this recipe I used an Apple Walnut bread from one of my favorite local bakeries. Alternatively, if you use plain bread, a quick flavor adjustment can be made by using a flavored dairy creamer instead of regular milk or cream.
Apple Walnut French Toast
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