Poached Chicken and Couscous in a Coffee Maker? 

I think my mom would get mad at me if I tried to do this with her coffee maker, lol.

The Daring Bakers' February, 2012 Challenge: Quick! Gimme a Flavor!

Beer Cheese Bread

The Daring Bakers’ February 2012 host was – Lis! Lisa stepped in last minute and challenged us to create a quick bread we could call our own. She supplied us with a base recipe and shared some recipes she loves from various websites and encouraged us to build upon them and create new flavor profiles.

Check out the post HERE

I decided to go with a Beer Bread recipe because ever since I've heard of beer bread, I've been obsessed with making some and never really had a valid excuse to whip some up until now.

Pulled Pork

BBQ Pulled Pork Sandwich

I had President's Day off. What better way to spend a day off than slow roasting a whole pork shoulder for hours and hours?

I absolutely love pulled pork because it's so cheap and easy to make! I got a 5.5 lb pork shoulder from my local grocery store for about $6!

You can't get any easier than seasoning a shoulder and then literally placing it into a low oven and walking away.

I decided to go a little more complicated with my seasoning though. I made my own rub using salt, sugar and various spices such as paprika, cumin and garlic powder.

Experimental Tart Dough

My very first try at making a tart!

 So I picked up these mini tart pans at Bed Bath and Beyond the other day. I don't normally make tarts. In fact, I've never made a tart!. It was an impulse buy.

What am I going to do with these mini tart pans?

Make a tart, of course.

I was fully planning on whipping up a small amount of standard pie crust dough to line one of the pans with, but while looking through various food blogs, I noticed a recipe on David Lebovitz's food blog for something he called French Tart Dough.

His French Tart Dough looked a lot like Cream Puff Dough (Pâte à Choux if you wanna be fancy) without the eggs!

His recipe calls for combining your fat, water, sugar and salt and slowly heating it in an oven for 15 minutes. This is done to slowly brown the butter and create a layer of flavor that way.

I decided to skip that and treat the recipe as if I was making a batch of Cream Puff Dough (minus adding the egg, of course). I quartered the recipe so it could fit one mini tart pan.

Small Batch Cream Puffs

Cream Puff with Vanilla Ice Cream and Strawberry Sauce

I love desserts. Then again, who doesn't? I'm serious though. Put any kind of dessert in front of me and I go right it, and have a hard time stopping.

No self control. It's such a shame.

If only I could make a small amount of my favorite treats without making a full batch and potentially eat it all.

Well, after messing around with ratios, I discovered I could in fact make a small batch of cream puffs.

Onion Bacon Marmalade

 Onion Bacon Marmalade. Sweet. Salty. Smokey.

The first time I came across the concept of a onion and bacon spread, it was in the form of an ice cream sandwich my boyfriend got at an ice cream shop. It consisted of two chocolate cookies, chocolate soft serve and a layer of caramelized bacon and onions.

Yeah, the thought of bacon, onions and ice cream didn't phase us in the slightest. We were quite excited, in fact.

The ice cream sandwich in question was just ok. There were too many flaws going on with it. The cookies were too hard...the ice cream too soft...the bacon too chunky and way too salty.

While the sandwich to me was a "meh," I still couldn't get over the bacon onion spread they used. While it wasn't perfect, I knew it had potential. Maybe if I could recreate it and go easier on the bacon and heavier on the onions.

Hense, Onion Bacon Marmalade was born.

A come back! (Hopefully)

So my friend, Michelle, decided to start a food blog (visit her at Science Cooks!). After reading her first post, I remembered I too had this food blog, but sadly never had the time to update. It's such a shame too because I love taking pictures of the food I make and showing it off.

Well, no more! Thanks to Michelle, I've decided to make the time and update this long neglected blog at least once a week.

See you soon!