Hamantaschen Cookies

I've had a can of poppy seed filling lounging in my pantry for almost a year now. I bought it when the Winn-Dixie in Tifton went out of business because I'd never seen it before and it excited me. Inside the label, they have two nifty recipes using the filling. The second was for these little cookies. How do you pronounce them by the way? I'd read about them before- or the story behind them at least- and thought they'd be a nice change of pace. Since I'd decided to make them, I longed to have little tri-cornered cookies gracing my counters with poppy-goodness filling I could nibble on with tea. It was not to be.

I would like to state that this is not the recipes fault. At least, I don't think so. Rather, my rolling skills and the questionable taste of the filling. I've been making drop cookies for so long that I forgot I even had a rolling pin. Certainly, I've forgotten how to use it. The cookies weren't thin enough by far. The dough kept sticking to my pin no matter how much flour I used, thus were too heavy to be pinched into the traditional tri-corner hat look. Notice the weird indents on the bottom two cookies in this picture. Those were where they were folded for those few brief moments of brilliance only to fall down.

So I fudged and decided that poppy-seed thumb-print cookies were in order. After tasting the canned filling, I decided to be safe and use jam on most of them; the filling was just so... seedy and strange tasting that I couldn't imagine eating many of them. Luckily, the jam didn't bubble and overflow the wells while baking. I also only used about a fourth of the dough. The outcome was sort of mediocre. They tasted like jam and biscuits to me. That's all fine and good, but if I want jam and biscuits, I'll make them. I've contemplated using it to wrap cocktail sausages, but have yet to do it instead simply eating the dough. For now.

I'm adding the recipe, because it's not a bad one despite my dislike of the filling and inability to shape them. If you like this sort of thing, I'd say this is a good place to start. Personally, I'm going to use the rest of the can to try to other recipe suggested. I'll let you know how it goes.

Solo (brand) Hamantaschen Cookies

2 3/4 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 cup sugar

1 T baking powder

1 tsp grated orange peel

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup butter, softened

2 eggs, beaten

2 T milk

1 can Solo Ground Poppy Seed or Prune Plum (Lekvar) filling

1 egg yolk beaten with 1 T milk for brushing (I skipped this)

Stir flour, sugar, baking powder, orange peel, and salt in large bowl. Cut in butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs.

Side Note: I took this picture less because I thought you needed to know what coarse crumbs looked like and more to show that I finally got to whip out my pastry blender again- oh, how I love thee. Also, use a bigger bowl.

Add eggs and milk and mix until dough binds together. Knead dough in bowl 5 to 8 strokes or until smooth. Divide dough in half and wrap each pieces separately in waxed paper or plastic wrap. Refrigerate hour.

Preheat oven to 350 F. Grease baking sheets and set aside. Roll out 1 piece of dough on lightly floured surface to 1/4" thickness. Cut dough with floured 3" round plain cookie cutter. Spoon 1 tsp poppy seed filling into center of each circle. Bring 3 edges of circle together into middle of circle to form triangle. Pinch edges upwards to make slight ridge, leaving small hole in center. Place on prepared baking sheets about 1 1/2" apart and brush with beaten egg yolk mixture. Repeat with remaining dough and filling.

Bake 20 to 25 minutes or until golden brown. Remove from baking sheets and cool completely on wire racks.

Makes about 32 cookies.

Stuffed Tomatoes

Well, I was a little late on making my stuffed tomatoes. Life happens. But today was the DAY! I used Giada’s recipe from my Everyday Italian cookbook and boy did they hit the spot. I’ve made them before, but never this light. They just tasted bright and fresh and everything summery. I guess it also helped that I accidentally used cilantro instead of parsley. They look so similar! But what does parsley add taste-wise anyway? Cilantro added a nice vibrant touch that was especially nice, although I find it hard to chew because, you know, “finely chopped” is a nice idea and all but those of us without knife skills generally resort to chunk-style. Barring that, I would definitely make these again as a side. She uses rice as the main stuffing ingredient whereas I usually use bread crumbs and cheese for something more filling. These almost qualified as an aperitif because they whet my appetite something fierce, but I have to leave the rest of the tomatoes for the roommate. Wah.

These were incredibly easy and fast. The only time-consuming part might be the rice, because I always seem to do something stupid. That and waiting for the fire in your oven to put itself out. Whoops. They finished nicely in the toaster over, which will remain the main cooking appliance until I do some cleaning.

Stuffed Tomatoes
From Everyday Italian by Giada De Laurentiis.

Salt
2/3 cup Arborio rice or med-grain white rice
1 tsp plus 2 T olive oil
4 ripe but firm large tomatoes
4 T chopped fresh basil
3 T chopped fresh flat-leaf parsley (I still suggest cilantro)
1 garlic clove, minced
½ tsp freshly ground black pepper, plus more to taste
¼ c freshly grated Parmesan cheese

Cook rice until just done and rinse under cold water. Drain well and set aside.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease your baking dish with 1 tsp olive oil. Cut ½ inch-thick slices off the tops of each tomato and set aside. Scoop out the insides into a bowl. Arrange tomatoes in baking dish.

Add ¼ cup tomato pulp to the rice. Stir in the basil, parsley (cilantro), garlic, 2 T olive oil, salt and pepper to taste, and parmesan cheese. Adjust seasonings to taste. Spoon rice mixture into tomatoes. Replace reserved tops on tomatoes and bake until rice is heated through- about 20 minutes. Serve hot or room temperature.


I don’t have an after picture because I just made one, saving the rest for my roommate and one for me for later. More importantly, I made sweet, sweet love to it the second it popped out of the toaster oven. But don’t the rest look lovely?

Woe is Me and My Roomate

We all remember what it's like to be a kid. Lazing around all day daydreaming and subsisting on junk food. Those days where gaining weight is a non-issue and healthy living even less so.

Unfortunately, some of us are still living like we'll never make it to 30 and could care less if we don't. It's not because we feel invincible. It's not even because we don't care about our health. Mostly, if we're not busy we're lazy. And that's the rub.

For my room mate, she's busy all day long and too tired after she gets home. Well, that and I'm afraid of her cooking. I however am the opposite. I'm taking the summer off and instead of doing all the things I didn't have time for during school like I'd planned, I spend most days on the computer or staring at the ceiling. I have no motivation and no reason to have any. It's when I'm crazy-busy that I want to cook everyday, though whether I actually have time to do so is iffy. We eat junk all day because it's easy. Period, no other justification necessary.

But we WANT to change. It's not about even eating a truly healthy diet. It's about having ONE serving of vegetables a day. Depending on at least ONE round meal a week. Since I've stopped my Sunday dinners, we don't even have that anymore. I'm running out of my freezer rations of my favorite (chock full o veggies) soup, so it's time to restock and start cooking. Vegetables are a priority, but any real food counts.

Since we've decided to try, I've started craving vegetables like a fiend. I forget how much I like them when I'm not eating them. We're starting off with a simple recipe for stuffed tomatoes, and you have no idea how much I'm salivating at the thought. After that, who knows? Vegetable stir-fry? Vegetable kabobs? At least a salad? We'll just have to wait and see.

Homemade Oreos and How to Break Your Mixer

I've been so incredibly lazy this summer and I know it. Wah. I haven't really cooked anything since, but look! I'm making the effort to bring you the wonderful recipe I promised near a month ago. I said I was going out the next day to bake cookies, and by God I did!

I first found the recipe on the Smitten Kitchen blog (link at bottom) and found I had all the ingredients to make them. That's usually the deciding factor on whether I ever get around to making most recipes or not. Well, it was the cookies' lucky day. They were just as great as promised- sweet but not overly so and chocolaty good. It's uncanny how they taste exactly like real oreo's. I think I'll make the chocolate cookies again because I loved the almost savory quality to them, but I'll skip the filling. I forgot before I made them that I'm not an Oreo freak.

A few pointers and a how-to:

Make sure that your dough balls for the cookies are small- like really small- if you want them to be Oreo sized. Mine spread like crazy and turned out HUGE. Also, unless you like the double-stuffed Oreos, you might want to cut down on the filling amounts.

If you've ever daydreamed of new and inventive ways to break kitchen appliances, step right up. I chose the ziploc bag technique for filling. If you feel so inclined, make sure to insert beaters into filling bag and turn mixer on high. The cream filling will immediately cling to the insides of the bag and put up just enough resistance to rip the plastic casings right off your machine. Yay!

Don't be appliance stupid like me. Instead, be smart like me and try these cookies. While you're over there, make sure to surf around her blog; it's chock full of goodies.

Smitten Kitchen:
http://smittenkitchen.com/2007/05/my-kingdom-for-a-glass-of-milk

Why Tacos Make Me Happy

If you're like me, it seems that everything you cook from a recipe just turns out sub-par. I would love to blame it on the recipe. Sadly, I'm pretty sure I can't. I've got years and years ahead of me to improve my cooking skills. But it's those days that the simplest of meals turns sour that makes you wonder why you do it sometimes. There's some monster in me that screams when I've gone too long without cooking. To appease it doesn't take much. As long as I get off my ass long enough to trick out a frozen meal or something from a can, I know I'm on the long road to cooking recovery. That's why tonight is a good night. I'm making tacos.

Tacos are something you cannot- absolutely cannot- mess up. It's unthinkable. It's impossible. Thank god. You usually have most of the stuff on hand and prep is reduced to brown meat and heat shells, less if you're going vegetarian. They can be as dressed up or dressed down as you please. And the most incredible part for me: I will actually eat the leftovers. I'm a leftover girl; I love them. But is seems that I usually won't eat them if I've made them from a recipe- especially the Sunday Nighters. I'm going to eat the hell out of these suckers. And that makes me incredibly happy. So happy that I'm attempting homemade mei fun. Winn Dixie finally had the cellophane noodles in and I snatched them.

I found the 101 Way to Make Ramen Noodles Cookbook by Toni Patrick today at Books-a-Million. I have phases with Ramen noodles. I always love them, but I forget they exist sometimes. I feel another creative spurt concerning my crunchy friends coming on. Possibly tomorrow.

I also have reviews coming soon. I promised a Blue Bunny write-up a while ago that I haven't gotten around to yet and something on the Amy's brand of organic foods. Maybe some of my fallback Ramen masterpieces if you're lucky.

Chocolate Stout (Cake)

I seemed to have forgotten a promised cake review. Shame on me. I have plans tomorrow to make a batch of homemade oreo cookies yoinked from another food blog- which will also necessitate a review-and that reminded me of this. The link to the recipe will be provided at the bottom of the post, as always. Anyways, I happened upon this recipe at the perfect time. Earlier that day, I had opened one of my “special” bottles of beer. It was Young’s Double Chocolate Stout. It was dark and strong, but not overpowering. It was reminiscent of Guinness in that it had a bitter bite to it that almost completely dissipated once you swallowed. Not as clean as Guinness, but very good. The label informs you that it’s chocolate malt combined with real dark chocolate. Well, my palate isn’t really up to snuff on that front, so I couldn’t say one way or the other. If you like ‘em dark, pick this one up next time you see it.

Another thing to note about this is that it comes in pints. Now, I love my liquor, but unless I’m really trying, I don’t like to drink more than about a cup a day. So this left me with an abundance of beer that I couldn’t in good conscience just toss out. Enter beer cake. The picture on the website makes it look infinitely more appetizing than mine came out. I stumbled upon a million hurdles with this damn cake, and despite some unfortunate texture issues, it turned out delicious. I skipped the nuts because, well, why bother? More chocolate to fill in the space, I say.

I only made a half-recipe. When will I learn that this is bad when it comes to cakes and the like. Also, I resorted, again, to baking it in a bundt pan. I don’t have round cake pans and the other pans were occupied. I had issues with the frosting as well. Normally, I don’t make the “recommended” frosting with cakes because the cake itself is already sweet enough and a bunch of gooey frosting on top sort of makes my stomach flip. My tip: you must make this frosting. The cake is a lot like the beer it’s made with. It’s not sweet- it’s rich and flavorful and deeply nuanced, but it is not sweet enough when you expect cake. Yet, my frosting came out liquid and didn’t set right. Until of course, I put it in the fridge where it promptly solidified into a hard shell.

Nevermind all that. If you want something completely unlike the toothache cakes you’ve always had, try this. You get the sweet, chocolaty goodness that all cakes must have with something much more complex than an old slap of cover-up frosting can give you.

Now you can see how unfortunate mine was. But it tasted good! That's all that counts right?

To whip up your own cake, go here: http://www.deliaonline.com/recipes/chocolate-beer-cake,1858,RC.html

How Time Flies

Look! It's Monday already! And I have no Sunday dinner to report. I've had family in town on Friday and Saturday, and now without a job, my days all run together. I completely forgot about cooking yesterday. But! To make up for that, I've written up a review for all the chocoholics out there.

If you don’t have a World Market ‘round, get your credit cards ready. I discovered Ritter Sport chocolates about six months ago on an imported candy binge and never looked back. World Market is my most convenient place to stock up, regardless of the fact that the closest one is nearly three hours away. If I wasn’t going to get Ritter on the last trip, the assorted mini box would have convinced me anyway. To my delight I found six varieties stashed in the box, giving me four new ones to try. It is now official, Ritter Sport makes some of my favorite chocolate candies.

There were 2 cornflake chocolates, 1 nugat, 1 marzipan, 1 hazelnut, 1 butter biscuit, 1 solid milk chocolate, and 2 yogurt covered. I must admit upfront that I haven’t touched either of he yogurt. In fact, they will probably shoved off to my boyfriend. I bought a full size of this particular flavor months ago and didn’t care for it one bit. It tasted like sour milk dipped in chocolate- which I suppose it is. But no thank you.

However, don’t let my bad opinion of one flavor deter you. Everything else is delicious. The cornflake candies were ridiculously crunchy after eating the wimpy American alternatives. There are similar butter biscuit cookies out there that might be a match, but this one stands up to the rest of the brand well. I was particularly impressed with the hazelnut and the nugat. Their blend of hazelnut and creamy chocolate tasted almost like a Ferrer Roche, one of my favorites, and the nugat tasted exactly the same. Not sure where I was supposed to find in that nugat, but I didn’t care much given that it tasted so good. The solid milk chocolate is a fine example of the quality. Of course, none of this can beat the marzipan. This was my first love. Dense, nutty marizan is draped with milk chocolate that gives with a satisfying crack in every bite. It nearly tastes like dark chocolate, but I can’t be sure.

If you can’t pass up chocolate, I won’t need to convince you any farther. A good German brand at a reasonable price rarely needs convincing. Go forth.

Sunday: June 04

This is the second week in a row that I've been on time. Or as on time as I'll ever be because I'm usually busy too Sunday night to write up a post. This week was low key and high vege. My roomate brought me three absolutely beautiful green peppers and more watermelon than I can handle. She also brought be cucumbers not too long ago that was supposed to be thrown in with the watermelon recipe, but they are currently furry and taking a nap in the dumpster.

Three peppers, three for dinner. It's too good to pass up. So I didn't. I made some improve venison stuffed peppers. I finally got to use that damn ground venison! This is a really easy, rough recipe. Like bruschetta, I'm not sure you need someone to tell you what to do here, but here's a rough guide.

Ingredients:

1-2 pounds ground beef or venison (depending on how meaty you want it)

roughly 2 cups rice

1/2 cup tomato pasta sauce plus 2T for the topping

Assorted chopped vegetables or seasonings to taste (I would suggest some Parmesan)

Toppings of your choice

Preheat oven to 350. Brown meat and drain off liquid. Mix in the rest of the ingredients and heat. Core out peppers and stand on bottom in a baking dish. Stuff peppers nearly to the brim. Top with 2T of sauce on each pepper. Top with spices, cheese, or bread crumbs if desired. Bake for 1 hour.

Next came the watermelon. I ran into the same problem last year when my friend brought me about three watermelons. I made watermelon cake, drinks, and ate it raw until I could puke. This year, I have a boyfriend to pawn some of it off on. I also have a handy gazpacho recipe that turned out much better than I expected it to. I adapted it from an about.com recipe that will be added to the bottom of this post. I didn't add the jalapeno, but I think I will if I make it again. The flavors came through very nice and clear, but the spice would have helped to offset the sweetness a bit more. I also didn't use a full onion- like I ever do- so it was a little on the sweet side. But this is fresh, unexpected, and comes together in a snap.

Ingredients:

roughly 3 cups seeded watermelon, chunked

1 onion, chopped

1 red or yellow bell pepper, chopped

1T lemon juice

dash of olive oil

salt and pepper to taste

Prep all ingredients, then throw in a blender a little at a time. A blender will probably give you better results than a food processor unless you like chunks of raw onion in your meals. Chill for at least an hour before serving.

For more ideas or for the original recipe, go here: http://vegetarian.about.com/od/soupsstewsandchili/r/watermelongaz.htm