we're not in kansas anymore.

welcome to the new and improved version of the culinary meandering of a university student! 

a new school year approaches and i will soon find myself back in ottawa. *simultaneous sorrow and excitement*

so in the spirit of that change, i have decided to make a few adjustments to our friendly neighbourhood blog. 

in addition to the fancy new layout, you'll now be able to comment on posts (backed by popular demand) and follow the blog. direct your attention to the top left "Follow" button or right side of the page to sign up for that!

also, i've imported all of the old fav posts from tumblr, so feel free take a stroll down culinary memory lane and share some love. or some hate. preferably the former. those who post the latter will be thrown off a ladder.

so enjoy the lovely new scenery and the most recent post featuring cake pops below!

thanks for reading :)

my cake pops is cool, my cake pops is poppin'.

once upon a last thursday, while packing for a weekend of cottaging, i found myself in text message correspondence with biz “barbra” sanford: cottage host. we were discussing supplies for the weekend getaway and i, being the saint that i am, offered to contribute. here’s how it went:

nice spelling, btw, barb. 

now, with my offer, i was suggesting something more along the lines of a couple bags of chips, hot dog buns or some beers. clearly, biz saw a goldensnitch opportunity and lunged for it.

since she is one of my dearest caucasian friends - i, of course, complied with her demands. the fact that i was also “double dared” to provide these baked goods (so b.a.) may have also played a significant role in this. i was not about to risk being called a chicken. that would ruin me!

so, in order to to preserve my grade-school reputation and to win friend-of-the-year, i arrived at the cottage bearing these:

cake pops.

perhaps you have seen these spherical masterpieces in starbucks and remarked on their cuteness. perhaps you encountered them many moons ago on bakerella.com, like me. or perhaps you have never heard of them before - if this is the case, you’re welcome. 

whatever your experience with cake pops, i think i’m safe in betting that you have never realized the immense effort that is involved in their creation. at least, i know i hadn’t.

cut to a naive me starting this baking project at 7pm and expecting to be able to catch jersey shore at 10pm. i assure you this did not come to pass. instead, i found myself in the kitchen until 1am, physically maimed and tackling the most time-consuming blog food to date. but we’ll get to that later.

let’s start with the recipe. 

the first thing i did was bake 3 boxed cake mixes - chocolate, vanilla and red velvet. and then set them aside to cool. 

once they were cooled, i put them each in a separate bowl and crumbled them. of course, by that i mean crush them into dust. *bicep flex* 

pick out any burnt or hard pieces along the way. you’ll want the end product to be pretty fine and look something like this:

damn! cake, you fine ;) 

next up, you add icing to the crumbled cake. yes. to the crumbled cake. and mix. the best method for this is handio mixius. 

handio mixius: (n) a terribly complex method of food preparation that requires the vigorous use of the phalanges in order to successfully combine the components of a mixture. known to be the mortal enemy of women with freshly manicured nails and wimps alike. often utilized in the manufacturing of homemade meatballs, hamburgers, doughs and pastas.

the amount of icing you’ll need depends on the thickness of the icing itself. i used store-bought icing for the chocolate and vanilla cakes, but homemade cream cheese icing for the red velvet and the ratios were completely different. your goal is to be able to roll the cake into balls that’ll keep their shape if you set them down or squeeze them a bit with your fingers. that might be vague, but trust me, you’ll know when they’re right. 

side note: don’t panic if they get too wet, you can always add some flour to dry them up a bit. there’s so much flavour in the icing that it won’t make a difference. unless your version of “too wet” is a cake soup. in which case, get out of the kitchen - you’re too far gone. 

alright! next, roll the cake mixture into balls about the size of a walnut. like so:

okay, here’s where the trouble started. after rolling 3 cakes worth of balls, my trusty assistant (x-tina) and i were rather tired and just wanted to get these over with. so we stuck some lollipop sticks in them and threw them in the freezer. mistake. 

an hour later when we took them out, expecting them to be ready and tried to dip them, they slid down the stick like beads on an abacus or slipped off the end with a chocolatey thud. the result was hideous.

attempt two: freeze them first and put the sticks in them after? absolutely not. they were too hard to get the sticks in them. another hour down the drain. 

at this point, we had a slight decline in morale and sanity which led us to thinking these would be acceptable substitutes:

you know how the saying goes: if at first you don’t succeed, curse biz sanford and write your name in chocolate. or try again. which we did, and after hours of trial and error, we finally figured out the secret of the sticks: you dip them in chocolate first, stick them in the cake and freeze them. 

while these are beautiful just plain like this, the perfectionist in me could not stop there. for added taste and physical appeal, i decided to dip them in an array of melted chips. 

chocolate, white chocolate, butterscotch and peanut butter. 

the trick to dipping anything in melted chocolate (or other chip varieties) is to add oil to the mixture before melting. this way, it’ll stay runny longer and it adds a nice shine to whatever you’re dipping. 

after the whole stick debacle, i thought i was in the homestretch when i had reached the dipping process. and it was all going great. until the accident.

as i’ve mentioned, this had been a very long process and by the time i got to the melting chocolate step of this recipe, my parents had long since gone to bed. now, if you’ve ever been to my house, you will have noticed the high ceilings. and while these are very nice to look at, in the night, they carry echoes that could rival the grand canyon. 

trying to be as quiet as possible so as not to disturb my parents, i gently placed the containers of chips in the microwave. i then made to, ever so quietly, close the microwave door using only the tips of my fingers. cue a blinding pain in my finger from being squeezed in the door and me looking down, expecting a blood blister. and instead seeing this:

after numerous “are you kidding me?!”s, a few “son of a bitch”s and one exceptionally high pain-induced karate kick (don’t ask, i have no idea what the purpose of it was), i cut off my finger and soldiered on. or, did i put on a dora the explorer bandaid and cry for a bit? i forget. 

please note: no blood made its way into the cake pops as my finger was heavily bandaged and saran wrapped. the only bodily fluids, including but not limited to blood, sweat and/or tears, involved in this recipe were purely metaphorical. 

hoping that the accident wouldn’t leave me needing an amputation and spell the end of my cooking career, i dried my tears and proceeded to dip several dozen cake pops in the various melted coatings and set them in the freezer to harden overnight. i’m not gonna call myself a hero, but if the spandex suit fits…

anyways, this is what they looked like when they came out. 

the next day and a five hour drive later, the cake pops were warmly welcomed to the cottage. 

review: i hate hate hate the word moist. next to ointment, it is the word i loathe most in the english language. but in regard to the cake pops, there is no better adjective. adding icing to them at that stage of the recipe makes it impossible for them to dry out like a normal cake would. they were frozen, sat in the sun in a black car, frozen and unfrozen again, put in the fridge and left on a counter to defrost and they tasted as fresh as when they were first made. you could freeze them and have them on hand forever.

when i was making them, i was really concerned about which coating should go with which cake. in the end, it didn’t matter - they were all fantastic and delish, no matter the combination.

the biggest hit was the red velvet cake, but my personal fav was the chocolate cake/peanut butter coating. 

all in all, i think it’s safe to say that the world of cottage-appropriate food has been expanded. who knows, s’mores and hot dogs might just have to move over for cake pops. okay, i take that back - that’s blasphemy. but they were definitely a hit. 

now that i’ve worked out the kinks in this recipe and wouldn’t have to dedicate half a day to them - i’d definitely make cake pops again without having to be double dared. if i ever recover from the accident, that is. 

thanks for reading :) 

somewhere over the cupcake.

(originally from august 2nd 2011.)

good day, hungry readers. a thousand apologies for my lengthy absence. should you require an outlet for the anger caused by my lack of blogging, please direct them towards pizza pizza or the law school admissions test. between the logic games and the large-3-toppings, recreational cooking time has been hard to come by. but alas, (earwax) i am back in action and i give you: 

rainbow cupcakes.

but before i get to the recipe, in true LSAT form, i present you with the following logical dilemma:

• i hate icing. 
• i hate cake.
• i love cupcakes. 

yeah, i don’t really understand it either. but calm down, take your jaw off the floor, i don’t mean all cake. i mean pre-made store-bought cake like the kind you get from grocery stores. to anyone who has served me this cake in my life and watched me soldier through it, i’m sorry to tell you that i hated every second and only complied so as not to hurt your feelings. 

please note: mccain cakes, this does not apply to you. keep up the good work! see you next time i have an emotional breakdown. 

so the reason behind this fervent dislike of grocery store cake is their icing. while i’m not a fan of icing at all, there are some kinds that i can stomach with minimal gagging. this variety of icing is not among them. usually, it is so hideously thick that even if the cake itself was satisfactory, you’d never know. no offense or disrespect intended towards the fine grocery store bakers of the world but COME ON! who comes up with these cake-to-icing ratios, a council of obese american children?!

alright, rant over. in summary, i do not eat cake unless it has been prepared at home and even then, it must have no icing. cut to a young me at every birthday party i have ever attended enjoying a rice krispie square while the children around me shovel mounds of that trash into their gobs. 

in contrast to all of the above, i love cupcakes. homemade ones, mind you. i love making them, i love looking at them, i love eating them (after i scrape off most of the icing), in short, i can’t live if living is without them, mariah. 

out of all the cupcake recipes in my arsenal and the ones i have copied from my frequent viewings of cupcake wars, rainbow cupcakes are my favourite and the most visually impressive. so this weekend for the cesareo family picnic, they were the perfect choice for my potluck contribution. when there are a hundred hungry italians to please, you don’t bring your B game. unless you want to be strangled with piano wire or gunned down at a toll-booth. 

so here’s the procedure: 

because the post-batter-making process is so lengthy (and even though it physically hurts me to give this instruction) i’ll give you the short version of this recipe which includes venturing to your favourite grocer and buying a box of white cake mix instead of making your own batter from scratch. don’t judge me, i decided to make these at about 10pm the night before the picnic and a homemade batter was not in the scopa cards. 

the cake mix MUST BE WHITE. not yellow, not off-white. WHITE. got it? lovely. onward!

you begin by preparing the cake mix as per its instructions on the box. then you divide it evenly between 6 bowls. next, you add a different colour of food colouring to each bowl. 

i used purple, blue, green, yellow, orange and red. you’re going to need a lot of food colouring to make the batter bright enough so that it doesn’t fade during baking. my rule of thumb is to add food colouring until you think you’re on a psychedelic trip. groovy. 

so by this point, unless you’re using a paste food colouring - you’ll notice that the mixture is a bit runny for layering. to rectify this SERIOUS problem, add a tablespoon of flour to each bowl. now, since the flavouring in the recipe won’t be equipped to handle the extra flour, you’ll also want to add a half teaspoon of vanilla (or lemon, whichever flavour you have) extract. 

next, you spoon the batter into muffin tins one colour at a time as they would appear in a rainbow.

since you’ve added flour to the recipe, these cupcakes shouldn’t rise too much, so feel free to fill them over the recommended 3/4 full.

this is a very lengthy process, especially if you’re working with six colours, as i was. here are some tips for maximizing your time: 

• use a piping bag or ziploc bag to dispense your batter
• do one colour at a time. meaning, do the bottom layer of purple through the whole muffin tin and then move onto the next. otherwise you’ll end up with leftover batter and cupcake batter in the garbage is something i will not stand for.
• secure the help of a few trusty servants. if you do not have servants, feel free to use your family. have them follow behind with the next colour as you add the previous one or lay palm leaves at your feet as you make your way about the kitchen.

then you stick these in the oven at whatever temperature the box says and wait. 

don’t be alarmed if some of the lower colours bubble to the surface, through trial and error, i have found this unavoidable and learned to move on with my life. with the help of extensive therapy.  

they’re ready to come out of the oven when you can stick a toothpick in them and have it come out with no batter on it. 

scoop ‘em out and let them cool. 

side note: my dad thought it’d be cool to make one of the cupcakes tie-dye by stirring the batter pre-oven. he was wrong. it was hideous. 

it reminded me of that kid in kindergarten who would mix all the different paints together. as a self-diagnosed perfectionist, this made me cringe and had to be immediately thrown away. down my throat. 

after the cupcakes were cooled, i piped some whipped icing onto them (obviously leaving several uniced for myself) and topped them with sprinkles. 

here’s how they turned out:

the minis on the inside

and the large ones on the outside

*sigh* i have traveled the world and seen its many wonders, but never before have i encountered such beauty. 

and on top of that, they’re delicious! mind you, this may be a cognitive deception caused by the vibrant colours. but hey - whatever works! 

the reviews:

my nonna - “mamma mia! i neva see sometin so byataful. i gotta make-a dis for my friend at homa deep next tersday! oh my guy - i lova them” 

to translate: wow! i have never seen something so beautiful. i’ve got to make this for my friends at home depot next thursday. oh my god, i love them!

okay, she never said any of that. but she and everyone else who helped these cupcakes disappear so quickly seemed to enjoy them about as much as we italians enjoy yelling at soccer games on tv. 

in summary, these are great cupcakes and they’re not too difficult to make if you use a premade mix. kids especially seem to like them because of the bright colours. make them for your next special occaision: birthdays, bar mitzvahs, graduations, gay pride, a tuesday, whatever! 

i don’t know if i’ll ever develop a love towards pre-made cakes from the grocery store, but making these cupcakes from a store-bought mix is definitely a step in the right direction. is an eventual co-existence possible? maybe. all i know is that there’s a long, delicious, rainbow brick road on the way to finding out.

thanks for reading :)

in queso emergency, make enchiladas!

(originally from june 21st 2011.)

enchiladas and mexican rice.

i have olive skin. well, not exactly olive since i am neither green nor black - i’m more the shade of a well-mixed cafe latte. in any case, my skin colour is a very obvious attribute of mine. what i have learned is not as obvious is my ethnicity.

while some people are able to guess that i’m italian, there are many who mistake my skin to be the result of very different heritages. i’ve heard it all - spanish, greek, turkish, saudi arabian, and most commonly: mexican. i get that one a lot.

i don’t know why, esé.

while i am not in fact mexican, that does not stop me from enjoying mexican cuisine. and wearing a sombrero. and answering to the name alejandro.

until a few months ago, my experience with mexican food consisted of taco bell and the americanized version of mexican food from resorts in acapulco and cozumel. in other words, food that was about as mexican as bangers and mash, mate.

however, when i went to chicago to visit oprah my sister in february, i was exposed to authentic mexican food at a restaurant called dos diablos. it was like i had died and gone to mexican heaven (i assume mexicans have their own)! the salsa they serve with their complimentary chips was so good they could have poured it over ice and served it as a cocktail. which is exactly what i did. except that i did not do that at all.

now, once you’ve tasted perfection, any attempt at recreation is blasphemy and a one-way ticket to disappointment. ALL ABOARD! so rather than embarrass myself by attempting the salsa recipe, i decided to recreate the main dish i had at dos diablo’s: enchiladas and rice.

according to the powers that be in mexican cooking (aka aaron sanchez from the food network), the most important component of an enchilada recipe is not the tortilla or even the filling, but the sauce or mole. pronounced mo-lay. not as in the thing enrique inglesias had removed from his face. bailamoooooooos.

so that’s where our story begins, with the mole. OLE!

you start by frying up a clove of garlic and 1/4 an onion in olive oil on medium high. once the onions have softened, add 1 tablespoon each of chile powder, cumin and paprika. then add 1/2 can of crushed tomatoes, 1/2 cup of your favourite salsa (i used que pasa), 1/2 cup of chicken broth, 2 tablespoons of brown sugar and some salt and pepper. let simmer - it should look something like this.

now, if you’ve been following my meandering, you know that i can’t just read a recipe and follow it. according to my therapist, i should try harder to follow instructions, but i don’t think i’ll listen to him. anyways, the above is the base recipe - if you want to spice things up and get craaaaazay, you can do what i did: add a tablespoon of chipotle seasoning and 2 tablespoons of cocoa powder.

now, before you judge me, judy - the chocolate/chile pepper combination is very common in mexican cooking. even traditional mexican hot chocolate recipes include chile powder. SO YEAH, i used it :)

while you’re letting this simmer, get started on the filling for the enchiladas.

here are the things you’ll need: shredded chicken. either 4 breasts or a whole rotisserie chicken - i used the latter because it was easier to shred and it came prepared. my laziness is another hot topic in therapy.

please note: i am not actually in therapy, the voices in my head have told me i don’t need it.

okay, so chicken, a can of drained black beans, a can of drained corn niblets, two chopped bell peppers - whichever colours you like, 1/4 of an onion or green onions, the juice of a lime, a teaspoon each of chile powder and chipotle seasoning.

no cooking required here, lazy susan, just toss all of those in a big bowl.

next, grab a bag of tortillas - corn ones if you can find them, unfortunately wal-mart failed me and i had to make due with flour - and fill them. like so:

then you roll them up tightly and set them seam side down in a pan.

after you’ve finished rolling all your joints, snoop dogg, top them with the mole sauce and some shredded queso.

beautiful isn’t it? well, i think so. but then again, i have been known to recite shakespearean sonnets to things i top with cheese. that’s normal, right?

anywaaaaaaaaaaays, stick these cylindrical masterpieces in the oven for 30 minutes at 375.

while you’re waiting for those to cook, enjoy a margarita with your friend tanner.

if you do not have a friend tanner or have some sick, twisted aversion to margaritas kill yourself get started on the rice.

i just used standard long-grain white rice i had left over from chinese night, but anything works really. cook the rice as the package dictates and then transfer it into a mixing bowl.

meanwhile, fry up some ground beef with a package of taco seasoning. make sure you drain the grease before you add the seasoning, otherwise you’ll end up with rice that tastes like the fryer at mcdonald’s. that’s gross, hombre.

when the rice is done, add the beef to it along with some salsa. you don’t want it to be soupy, so add a little bit of salsa at a time and mix.

by this time, your enchiladas should be finished. if they’re not, feel free to pass the time by dancing to some carlos santana, googling selma hayek or watching harry potter and the prisoner of azkaban. (and yes, hp3 is relevant - the director is alfonso cuaron, a mexican.)

please note: do not feel obligated to pair harry potter movies solely with mexican food. they are an excellent accompaniment to any meal and have my highest recommendation - not that they need it, eh pottah?

finally, plate, garnish with cilantro and serve!

reviews:

lizard - “it was delicious, holmes. i really liked the sauce. the combination of chicken, corn, beans and peppers was very authentic. that’s all i’ve got - i don’t remember anything else after the margaritas”

papino - “excellent tasting” - he’s a man of few words, but the fact that he ate 6 in one sitting and that he had them again for lunch today is a positive sign!

katie kaboom (amanda) - “BOOM!” this is not a good thing. if you’ve been following along or have had the displeasure of meeting my sister, you know that mistakes concerning her meals can be fatal. also, she is very picky. so when she asked to have her enchiladas served in taco shells instead of tortillas and i burnt the shells, you can imagine her wrath. to put it into perspective, there was less suffering in the first 10 minutes of saving private ryan than there was at my kitchen table last night. she did eat the enchiladas, but begrudgingly. her consumption of them, despite not liking tortillas indicates that they were to her liking.

tanner - “ay caramba, they were fantastic! everything was very authentic mexican. and i should know. it was like being back in the old country, muchacha.”

me - the enchiladas were really good and definitely comparable to dos diablos’. having rotisserie chicken inside enhanced the flavour of the filling, i recommend you use that if you’re going to make this recipe.

the mole had so much flavour (LOL, never thought i’d type that in my life), the combination of sweetness from the tomatoes, brown sugar and cocoa with the heat from all the spices - a real winner. i’ll definitely make this again. maybe i’ll use it on chicken or in tacos, i don’t know, i just know i haven’t had enough of it yet, which cause for concern since i have an addictive personality :|

the rice was great too - it was something i thought up, so you might need to tinker with it to suit your own taste. i ended up adding some of the mole sauce to it at the table. i encourage you to do the same.

all in all, a muy bien recreation of the dos diablos original! when i go back to chicago (this thursday!) and eat there again, i’ll hold my sombrero-clad head high, knowing that i too can create mexican magnificence.

and if in the future, the colour of my skin fools someone into thinking i’m mexican, i won’t take it as an insulting suggestion that i should become a gardener or a maid, but as a compliment to my (incorrectly assumed) heritage’s delicious food.

thanks for reading :)