Trends - - Page 24

by ES Guest

Christmas in August: Pickled Watermelon Rind

Ed Note: Our friend Julia, canning lover and far mar worker, is back to rant about a newly acquired, and blogger-inspired, cookbook. Julia’s previously written about roasted rhubarb and Meyer lemon syrup.

Discovering my inner Southern grandmother has opened up my cookbook addiction in a whole new direction: canning and preserving texts now fill my shelves. Apparently many, many others have also become a part of this “canvolution” (not my word – I swear) and so a whole crop of canning books are popping up. As such, it seems that all sorts of canning bloggers are scrambling to write books to cash in on the craze.

For those of us who love cookbooks, but hate to follow recipes, canning presents a unique challenge in that, not following a recipe or procedure to a “t” can result in some really nasty things. Like death. From botulism. Not a pretty way to go.

As a result, every canning book that I have come across lately has – rightly – dedicated a good amount of space to describing the process of canning safety measures and the history of various methods.

The most recent canning book to my collection, WE SURE CAN! How Jams and Pickles Are Reviving the Lure and Lore of Local Food (courtesy of Arsenal Pulp Press) does not break from that format. In fact, author Sarah B. Hood spends 60ish pages writing about the history of canning…Then the resurgence of canning…Then the people responsible for the resurgence of canning…. Then the way to can…

And then (YAY!) we get two recipes.

Plate It or Hate It

Recent food world discoveries the ES crew is loving and hating…

Plate It: Grapesicles

Frozen grapes on a stick. The most perfectly simple summer cooler ever. Bonus points for the bed of frozen melon balls. (Little Ladies Who Lunch, via fuck yeah my health).

Hate It: Cake Pops

We’re all about cute, but there’s just no need. Why would anyone take a tender cake and turn it into a round mass of gumminess? Then take that disgusting bit and dip it in candy melts? Candy melts are about as tasty as candle wax. Please, just let us eat cake. (Photo: Mimsen)

Plate It: Food Duels

Cocktail O’Clock: Tequila + Balsamic

Who says tequila is made for margaritas only? This sweet and savory summer cocktail mixes the hard stuff with fresh strawberries, basil, lime juice and — for an extra foodie touch — balsamic vinegar. We approve.

Corzo Italian Sipper

1 ¼ oz. Corzo Silver
2 strawberries
1 sprigs of fresh basil
4 drops of balsamic
1 oz. Fresh lime juice
2 oz. distilled water
2 packets of Splenda or similar or 1 oz Agave Nectar

Serve over the rocks in an 8 oz. glass

Method: In a mixing glass muddle fresh strawberries and basil, add the rest of the ingredients with ice, shake 20 times and serve in a rocks glass with fresh ice. Garnish with a fresh spring of basil.

Find more summer-y cocktail ideas in Endless Cocktails.

in Drinks / Endless Cocktails / Recipe / Trends 0 comments

by BS

Milkshakes Gone Wild

Chocolate or vanilla? Are you kidding me? Milkshakes are the latest classic comfort fare to get a foodie-fied makeover, and we’re liking what we see. From bacon and bourbon to sweet potatoes and cereal, these creative innovations from chefs and bloggers around the country would make your grandmother’s milkshakes blush.

1. Cereal Milk Milkshake

Blogger Savory Notes took everyone’s favorite end-of-bowl treat — cereal-steeped milk — and turned it into cereal-flavored milkshakes.

Recipe: cereal milk milkshakes

2. Sweet Potato Cashew Milkshake

At Baltimore’s B&O American Brasserie, chef Thomas Dunklin whips up sweet potato ice cream and blends it with candied cashews and bourbon.

Recipe: sweet potato cashew milkshake

3. Dulce de Bacon Milkshake

Does life get any better than dulce de leche and bacon up in your milkshake? We don’t think so. Kudos to Adventures in Cooking for dreaming this up.

Recipe: dulce de bacon milkshake

Artsy Photo Of The Day

That there, ladies and gents, is solid olive oil.

in Photos / Trends 5 comments

by gansie

On Trend: Popcorn

The Fancy Food Show took place in Washington earlier this month and just like any other food event, influencers gathered to sniff out the top trends. Japanese and booze-inspired fare came out as favorites, as well as cherries and DIY kits. My favorite yield, however, is popcorn.

Manufacturers dress up popcorn in cheese, truffles and as a double-trend, bourbon, to turn this homely snack into a celebrity. But as high as popcorn climbs on the social ladder, it will always remain an innocent treat found on stove tops and in between movie seat cushions.

Happy Hour Kettle Corn, popping at the Cleveland State University Market, makes sure the good ole fashion snack continues to find happy mouths. Here’s a quick video of the making of kettle corn: 8 pounds of corn popped and seasoned in less than 3 minutes.

in Trends / Veggie 1 comments

by gansie

Rock that Lobster, On E-Stationery, That Is

Don’t get me wrong. I totally hated those people that would entrench weird backgrounds into their Outlook emails and with every subsequent exchange the weird faux notebook or fluttering butterfly would never go away.

Well, for those that secretly like electronic stationery (and that might secretly include me) I’ve got some pretty cutesy food themed samples. While I don’t suggest everyday embedding, I do think that if you’re sending a recipe via email this could be a fun way to jazz it up. Plus, it could up the ante on those chain letters.

The stationery can be customized with monograms, images and up to three lines of text at $4.99 per theme.

A few favorites from MeebleMail: Rock Lobster (above), Cupcakes (50% of the purchase price to National Foundation for Celiac Awareness), Kitchen, and Strawberry. (And this LBD.)

in Trends 0 comments