Thanksgiving!

  I hope that you all had a happy Thanksgiving!  We had a blast.  Went to Memphis to visit some friends, eat turkey, and of course... cook!  I love cooking,  and there is nothing more fun than cooking with a friend.
  I made some homemade pecan pie using two local ingredients.  Local sugar cane syrup, and local pecans from my Best Friends backyard.  Super yummy!  I realized that I think the cane syrup may have been some form of molasses... I need to do some research on that.

This week I made three dishes from the "Vegetables Every Day" cookbook.  A sauteed beet recipe that was delicious!  A curried carrot soup that was horrible!  Seriously,  everytime this guy makes a blended veggie soup recipes,  it has leeks,  and I really do not like the taste of leeks.  
  Finally I made a brocolini and garlic recipe that I inhaled.  It was so good!







Linky Love!
1)   All about Brocolini.  I got mine at Target.  I so suggest that you run out right now, get some,  and cook it and eat it.  It is so worth it!
2)  The rolls I made.  They were so pretty,  but did not come out right.  So sad.  But now I feel inspired to make more things in those little jars...
3)  This one is for one of my dear friends of all ways comments on my blog posts!  My dear,  every time I see bacon... I think of you!

That's all for tonight folks! TTYL!

Friday Linky Love and more beets

So this week I decided to make some more beets.   I want to finish the chapter, in fact,  from now on I will be trying to complete chapters to finish the book sooner.  I made three recipes, one of which, I had to really change because I did not have any beet greens.  Which means,  I can share a recipe... but I cannot promise you will like it.

   The rough part of all the beets is,  I like them,  I need to still get used to them.  Beets roasted are so sweet,  not sweet like candy,  but sweet like a sweet potato.   I think it is all just a mental thing.  I grew up eating your standard veggies,  like carrots, celery, and potatoes.   Although, back in the day,  I think everyone liked beets.  Somehow when my generation came around,  beets seemed to take the backseat with brussel sprouts.




Linky Love!
1) A unique way to peel a beets.
2) Different ways to peel beets.
3) One Mama shares her experience on cooking beets.

Friday Linky Love and some Jicama

My little collection of homemade canned goods.

 Well, here's to another week.  I only made one dish out of the cookbook.  Now I really have to have a cooking marathon to make sure I get through this in a year!  Anyways.  First up,  my newest canning adventure.  We have some satsumas growing in our backyard.  I picked a whole bunch of them and made some satsuma marmalade.  My Beloved loves it! :D  I almost started crying after I made it because he loves orange marmalade,  and it just felt to good to harvest my own 'oranges' and then make (and can) by hand my own marmalade,  just for him!  Chef Turbo seems to love it too.

     I only made one dish out of Mr. Bishops book this week.  The star ingredient was a Jicama.  Very interesting,  and I can now proudly say I can use this vegetable if I were ever challenged to cook with it.   It tasted good,  but I wish that it did not have the scallions in it.  They seemed a little over powering.  Oh, BTW,  there were no oranges,  I just added that for extra decoration,  otherwise it would just look like a boring bowl of jicama and carrots.

Jicama and Carrot Salad pp. 183

   I also thought, for photography reasons,  that adding some sesame to it would look more interesting.  It did not add or subtract from the taste.   It just made it look more appealing.  

LINKY LOVE!

1) I read this article the same day I am going to cook a whole chicken!  What wonderful planning!

All about Brining
2) I love Alton Brown,  I also love to brine my turkeys.  Try it this year!  It's so good!
3)  I am going to try and use these this year with these bags I bought at the Williams Sonoma store.

More Plantains... and corn... and a link

So,  tonight I tried to count all the recipes I have made.  I think I got around 96.  Kinda depressing since there are 350 recipes left.  Sigh.  I need to really get cracking!

  This week I wanted to finish plantains (which I did) and I fell in love with that produce even more!  I also made one dish of corn.

  In the video, I start it off with rain.  Why? Because, it finally rained this week,  and we got tons of it.  I also got a new dishwasher.  The old one (which was possibly around 12 years old) was falling apart.  I love my new dishwasher!  I can fit so many more dishes and organize my silverware.  Yes,  I almost organize my dishes too.  It's to help put them away faster.



Linky Love.

I think I failed you all with love for linkys.  I did not do as much research this week.  But I have one link!
How to render chicken fat!  Almost for free!! :D
http://www.pennilessparenting.com/2010/10/rendering-chicken-fat.html#more

Marx Foods "Iron Foodie" Contest

                                   
(So sorry,  I am not sure why the badge is looking weird.)

These are some question I need to answer.  My dearest readers... let me just say... here is another side of me,  if you haven't caught this side yet...

Why do you want to compete in this challenge?
    I love to cook and I also love a good challenge for my culinary skills.  I love to cook so much,  that I have books in my cookbook shelf on the science of food and cooking.  Like Harold McGee's "On Food and Cooking" and Russ Parsons "How to Read a French Fry".  I am just crazy about food and inventing new and fun things for my family to eat!

Limitations of time/space notwithstanding, whose kitchen would you like to spend the day in & why? 
     I would love to cook with Alton Brown.  Again,  this comes back to not just food,  but the science of food. Mr. Brown also brings history into it all... which makes the normal everyday recipe more fun!  He is really my inspiration on why I love the science behind cooking!

What morsel are you most likely to swipe from family & friends’ plates when they aren’t looking?
      Chocolate.  It's my Achilles Heal.  Ask my husband.  Got chocolate cake?  I'll eat the whole thing before anyone notices...

Sum your childhood up in one meal.
     Chicken Catcha Tori... or that is what we called it.  I think we had the right to change the name,  because with how picky my siblings and I were,  my mom had to change a few of the ingredients (like no onions... see below).  Most of us asked for this dish for our birthdays and other special events.  Another tid-bit into the made up name,  we have a sister we call 'Toria'.  She hates spaghetti to this day.

The one mainstream food you can’t stand?
     I cannot stand onions.  Never have.  In fact I have memories of my mom forcing me to eat a McDonald's hamburger with the little dehydrated onions.  I gagged the whole time.  But, this year I made a commitment to learn to embrace the food I despise so much.  I can handle shallots now,  if it is boiled for a long time.  That's progress... right?

Plaintains and LINKY LOVE!

This week, I decided that we were going to learn how to cook plantains.   I have had them before in Jamaica (and enjoyed them),  but I have never eaten them successfully here in the States.  Mr. Bishop had some great recipes.  First we made the "sauteed plantains".  The kids and I could not put them down.  Then I made the "Baked Plantains",  but I was the only one who enjoyed them.  I am ok with that!
I still have two more yuca recipes to complete,  and I made the "Yuca Soup".  I did not care for it.  I am not a big vegetable soup lover.
  Other things made?  I made a the "Buttermilk Pancakes" from this gals e-book and loved them!  I also made fruit leather from this other gal's e-book,  and the kids loved them and gave them a new name... 'fruit skin'.  I invented a new recipe using the dough from my "Joy of Cooking" croissant recipe.  I browned some ground beef with garlic,  shredded some cheese, and put them in the dough and squished them together.  Next time I will shape them in nice shapes and cover them in butter so they will not look so weird.  Ok... now for the pictures...





<3<3 LINKY LOVE <3<3
Sadly,  no one has told me if they wrote a blog post about their favorite kitchen tools.  So,  I only have a small number of links to share with you today.  If you are interested in doing this challenge... let me know in the comments below!

1) COMFORT FOOD!
2) I just bought some apples to make these...
3) In Love!  I want some.  :D  I think I am going to get some of the 'asparagus' and fill it with the grains I use and display them in my cabinets. 

Yummy Yuca and Linky Love!

 This week I was trying to cook through the Yuca chapter.  It only had 4 recipes.  But life this week caught up with me,  and I only made two recipes.   They were both really good.  Chef Turbo really like the fritters,  and he got to help make them too.  I was terrified to make the Yuca because I heard that it was poisonous.  I am still not sure how it is bad,  but I followed the directions to a tee and did not waver.  All I do know is,  peel your Yuca, take the core out, and cook it.
  This week I tried to make some pita bread and I failed.  It turned into flat bread.  So sad!  I'll try again some other time.
  I made some "cow shaped" pasta.  Only because I was tired of spaghetti and the cow was the only cookie cutter I could find.
The pictures of the food I made this week....



<3 Linky Love! <3

Whole Foods for the Holidays going on at Keeper of the Home.  I love reading her blog and I am looking forward to all the posts that her blogging friends will be doing!  Join in on the fun!




I bought a new e-book (which is on sale you know...) it's a great way to take baby steps on eat real food.  It will change your life!  I already read through the book (I'm trying my first recipe tomorrow) and it was encouraging and helpful as I am a newbie on eating real food.

Cooking with my Kid is one of my favorite blogs to read,  they posted this recipe and I cannot wait to try it!

I'm also loving putting "food on my face" thanks to Crunch Betty!  Looking forward to trying this next..

That's it for today my dearest readers.  I'm thinking next week I would like to do something fun... what is your favorite tool(s) in the kitchen?  Take a picture of it and write about it.  Be prepared to share your link!  Better yet, email me { kstone (at) stonecafecreations } your link before Friday,  and I will include it in my Linky Love!  We'll have a "Favorite Tools Friday Linky Love Special!"