Pumpkin Craisin Bread

For Halloween, I'd carved a pumpkin (but if my friend asks, I deny it since I left his mug on the pumpkin on his doorstep.) which of course resulted in leftover innards. Best not to let it go to waste. Pumpkin pie? Eh...Oh! I have an Alton Brown recipe for a pumpkin bread that uses fresh pumpkin. Hooray!

Aside from the extra step of raw pumpkin (versus out of a can), it wasn't difficult to make. Alas, I was not wowed by this pumpkin bread. It was just ok though nice and moist. Ok, I confess I found it downright boring. It could have been zucchini bread for all I knew. There was no taste of pumpkin just as there is no taste of zucchini in zucchini bread. Something go wrong? Well, it's possible that in using a carving pumpkin rather than a cooking pumpkin such as say a cinderella (I think?) or sugar pumkin resulted in subpar taste. Also, I didn't add the pumpkin seeds (in too much of a rush to toast them first) and added craisins instead for the hell of it. Though I doubt the omission/substitution played a significant role. Aside from the lack of pumpkin flavour, I found the spice content to underwhelming. Cinnamon was the only spice called for, but I could have gone for a more complex spice mixture for the oomph such as maybe throwing in some ginger for starters. Heck, gingerbread spicing would have been great but I go for that type of stuff.

Oh well. At least it looked nice with its split crest when it emerged from the oven. =)

Multinational Cookies

Ahh...these cookies sound like me. They've got two different citizenships. ;D

"American" Style choc chip cookies. AB's thin chip recipe, but with a touch of Brit but according to Brits, a touch of USA. =P If you've never been to UK, their version of milk chocolate is different from ours. Just eat a Hershey's milk choc, then a Cadbury's milk choc. Their's taste milky. I guess there's a reason Cadbury label's it as dairy milk with a pitcher of milk flowing in. ;) While at the Morrison's supermarket chain in London, I came across baggies of cookies. Never shop when you're hungry. Well, I was hungry. I checked out what sweet delights I could nosh on and I spied a bag labelled American Style Chocolate Chip Cookies. Well, I gotta see what that's considered! In the end, I'm not too sure what they meant because I never got around to getting the "normal" chocolate chip cookies to compare. But the immediate impression I got when I ate them was that it doesn't taste like cookies from home at all! Rather, Britified with the use of their version of milky chocolate chips. Hahaha!!! It's like...Americanized Chinese food or Britified Indian food. So I had Britified American cookies. They were enjoyable regardless. Something different.

Anyhow, I've been wanting to recreate these funny cookies (well, I did get a laugh from it) upon returning to the states but never got around to it. Also, not having Brit version of choc chips sorta makes it harder to do. ;P So I came up with the bright idea of using Cadbury bars in place of the chips. At least one year passed after I had that eureka moment. Finally one day, I wanted to make a dessert for my friend's birthday. She too stayed in London for an extended period of time so I decided to try these out on her!! Besides, I couldn't think of a good birthday cake to whip up for her. And so 2 bars of Cadbury went into AB's thin chips. The verdict? Not quite what I had. The milkyness gets lost either in the cookie dough or from the oven heat. It's there, but really subtle whereas the Morrison's cookies really whacked my tongue with dairy. She enjoyed the cookies though for their rich flavor (all the butter that got crammed in). Hooray! Plus, it brought back childhood memories of the type of cookies she used to love, but only had on special occassions. I understood where she was coming from. I always thought of these types of cookies as the ones you must wash your hands after consuming. She understood where I was coming from. Hahaha!! Thus, she has chosen to restrict her intake of these cookies as it seems this concoction is out to give her a coronary in celebration of her life. Go figure. =P

Artery Cloggers

After much chatter, I've finally started a food blog of what I cook, and what I stumble across while out! What better timing than during the scarfing of the holidays. I've made much food in the past few days but have only photographed half of them. Stomach first, photos second. Crumbs don't make for interesting imagery unfortunately. Nevertheless, I hope this blog proves useful in seeing what dishes come out of the chaos of the kitchen (when I'm in there that is). Yes, my poor poor victimized family members. That's how much I love my family. I'm making them stronger through mild poisoning!

So what dishes have I whipped up to torture the family? For lunch, I made beurek which are "savory cheese-filled pastries" out of the Sundays at Moosewood book which is great. Though I had been gathering the ingredients to make them (it's been on my list of things to cook), by the time I had the chance, the parsley had died and the mozzarella was nearly gone. This required substitutions. I added extra muenster for the loss of mozzarella (this made it too salty) and used dried parsley instead. I also used Parmesan-Reggiano instead of the feta called for, however it is a recommended substitution. I thought it would be like a calzone, and it is yet it isn't. The dough is light and airy rather than chewy like the pizza dough in calzones. This made all the difference for me because come leftover time, I will enjoy this much more than trying to gnaw through hardened pizza dough. My mom was the opposite. She likes the crispness of calzones more than the soft texture of these. The ingredients also included garlic and basil which is a great combination with the cheeses. This was easy to make especially with the Kitchen Aid mixer and its dough hook attachment. I love my kitchen appliances. Sigh. Rating: =9 =9 =9 Here are the puffs of joy:


For dinner, I made fish tacos. Mmmm...tacooooossss...I enjoy eating the fish tacos at Badlands Tacos particularly for the white sauce smothered all over the cabbage. A quickie search for fish taco recipes turned up Baja Fish Tacos from Fisherman's Market and Grill in FL. I used AB's fish and chips recipe for the battered fish (which is tasty especially with Bass Ale) because I was really after the white sauce. Having made AB's fish before (using Michelob...bleh), I was content with this decision. The verdict? It was ok. The folks liked it but my search for a similar white sauce is still on as it was quite mayo-ey in flavor. I must say, squeezing lots of lime juice on really made the white sauce taste much better with the shredded cabbage and battered fish (yes, I assaulted some fish). Other substitutions included using catfish instead of endangered cod, as well as flour tortillas instead of corn. What?!? I did what?? I don't think I get corn tortillas at the restaurant though they are soft tacos 'shells'. I only see the regular corn tortillas at the market so I used flour ones instead that I threw on the stove for a bit (this dish is so violent!). As for the catfish, I don't think it made much of a difference tastewise. Rating =9 =9 =9 Here is a slapdash photo of the assembly:


And so at the end of the meal, I was horribly filled with fat from the cheese at lunch, the oil from fried fish and the mayo in the white sauce. I had my second cup of tuocha (the first was after lunch) to help get the grease out and then polished the meal off with some citrus. Oh, those clementines never tasted more refreshing.