Ravioli! Finally!

umm...why have I never made brown butter before?!

And the pasta journey with Janet continues...
 

I have wanted to make ravioli for some time but never could convince myself to bother with rolling the dough out super thin.

But, with Janet and the pasta roller making thin sheets of dough takes about 3 minutes.

Butternut squash is a favorite of Charlie's so I decided to make my first few batches of ravioli with a butternut squash and nutmeg filling. 

Then, with each batch I experimented with different shapes and sauces.

One of the biggest lessons I learned was that I consistently under-filled the ravioli because I was worried about it bursting open during cooking.

Therefore, the next time I make ravioli I'll be more aggressive with the filling.

My first attempt resulted in square or rectangle ravioli and a Brown Butter and Sage sauce.

I took what I learned from attempt #1 and make my ravioli bigger. 

I also tried making triangles (much easier) and topped them with a Sage Alfredo sauce. 

Sage and butternut squash just go together y'all.

Oh, and I garnished attempt #2 with bacon. Bacon makes everything better!

Biscuits and Gravy Done Yum

 After learning the "biscuit method" in class Charlie requested I make some scones for him.

I can't believe he actually likes scones and if you've read my post on them you know how I feel.

We compromised on biscuits and gravy for a weekend treat.

I have very specific requirements when it comes to homemade biscuits and gravy. Not only am I from the South but I had a grandmother who never popped a can of biscuits in her life.

If you've ever had the real thing you know why I never order biscuits and gravy at a restaurant.

To make my gravy I mixed a ton of fresh sage and red pepper flakes in with some sausage. Then, I got a nice sear on the meat in a stainless steel pan. Then, I crumbled it.

Oh, the flavor.

I used a very basic biscuit recipe in my baking textbook to give it a try. Nothing special about the recipe and it produced sufficient biscuits that were slightly too salty for my taste.

I don't know how, but I managed to hit the off button on the stove while adjusting one of the burners.

The heat fluctuation affected the rise. These biscuits were on their way to being towers of goodness.

While the biscuits were trying to bake I whipped up a gravy. I used the leftover grease from the sausage and about a 2 to 1 ration of flour to butter. Then I added a mix of warm cream and mix to the roux and whisked until it had thickened to a nice, lump free texture.

Finally, I seasoned the gravy with salt and pepper and then added the sausage.

After allowing to biscuits to cool briefly I plated the dish and we got to eat. Yum!

I'm Bringing Sexy Back ...

making 3 types of crust seemed like a good idea at the time

...to pies.

Yep.

I'm bringing sexy back.
All those other bakers don't know how to act.
I think my pies are special for the cheap ingredients that they lack.
If you turn around, their taste will bring you back.

Hurry babe,
You see these lattices?
Butter, baby I'm your slave.
I'll let you cut me if I misbehave!
You see no other pies make my taste buds feel this way.

Go ahead and roll your eyes. I couldn't help myself.

After creating a not so great first pie in class I was on a mission to step my game up.

Let me preface this by saying none of these pies were perfect but I did learn a lot making them.

Therefore, I bring you the following trinity of pies:

1. Strawberry Lime Pie with a Savory Butter Crust Lined with White Chocolate

note to self: don't use a red plate with a red dish

2. Basil Ginger Blackberry and Apple Pie with a Brown Butter Crust
















3. Chai Poached Pear Pie with a Sweet Butter Crust

obviously the decoration on this one was a fail

In retrospect, maybe I should have stuck with simple recipes for practice but I just couldn't help myself.

Crust
With the first two pies I baked, I rolled my crust out too thin. Even when it wasn't over baked, it was still crispy.

And, I'll likely never blind bake a crust again without lots of additional practice-I just couldn't get it to work. The strawberry pie had the most successful crust.

I can't believe I'm saying this but in adjusting the recipes I may not have adjusted the fat properly. I think I put too much butter in and it dramatically affected the way the crust baked.

p.s. Lining a pie crust with chocolate is kind of awesome.

Filling
If you add more liquid, make sure you adjust the thickening agent. My strawberry pie turned out a bit wobbly because I added additional lime juice and didn't adjust the cornstarch.

Fresh herbs can really take flavor in a pie up a notch.

The pear filling was the most successful. It came together nicely and had the most perfect consistency.

I'm going to keep working on this but not for a few weeks. These pies wore me out :)

Great Grains!

this bowl is two servings

Grains were the focus in my Nutrition class last week.

I was very excited about this class since we were able to create our own grain salads based on a list of available grains and ingredients.

Usually we follow a recipe so I was very excited about the chance to be creative in a kitchen with nearly every imaginable ingredient.

The night before class I went through the list and referenced my Flavor Bible to see what I could put together.

If you are interested in cooking at all and don't own a copy of the Flavor Bible, here's a link to its page on Amazon.

Buy it. You'll thank me. I use it several times a week.

I've always love grain salads but never knew how to go about creating them in an adventurous way.

Luckily, Chef put together and easy to follow how to in our lab that I'm summarizing below.

Grain Salad Cheat Sheet

Step 1: Pick a grain. Cook it. Cool it.

Step 2: Choose 3-4 Fruit or Veg. Think about textures and colors. Par cook veg if necessary.

Step 3: Chose 1-3 ingredients from the following categories: Nut/Seed, Dried Fruits, Beans, Cheese, Other.

Step 4: Choose 1-3 Fresh Herbs.

Step 5: Use a Vinegar or Citrus Juice (lemon, lime, or grapefruit) to make a vinaigrette.

Prep your non-grain ingredients. Once grain is cool mix in non-grain ingredients and toss with vinaigrette.

Super simple right?

I made an Apricot Barley Grain Salad with a Ginger Lime Vinaigrette.

Since it is nutrition class, we do a nutritional analysis on each recipe with some amazing software.

 Here is my complete recipe and nutritional analysis.

Ginger Lime Vinaigrette
140g    Veg Oil
70 g     Lime Juice and Zest (about 2 limes)
3/4      TBS Ginger
2TSP   Honey
2 TBS  Cilantro
0.2g     Salt

Apricot Barley Salad with 3TBS of Vinaigrette
1C  Barley
25g Dried Apricot
15g Red Onion
10g Toasted Almond
23g Avocado (1/2 a small avocado)
10g Arugula

most of the fat comes from the vinaigrette

Immunity Soup

Yum!

On Monday I woke up with what I knew was the start of a terrible sinus infection.

Sinus infections and I have a close personal relationship after living in Memphis-aka pollenpalozza-so I took myself to the doctor and got a prescription for a Z-Pak.

With all the crazy fluctuations in the weather recently I thought I'd cover all my bases and make a giant pot of what I call "Immunity Soup" since I didn't want to catch a cold too.

Probably could have used more garlic

I really believe in the healing power of food and this soup is chock full of my favorite immunity booster: GARLIC!

Other healthful ingredients:

Lemon
Spinach
Turmeric
Carrots

I know that looks like a lot of garlic. Charlie peeled it for me and it totaled nearly 3 entire heads. He was convinced it would be too much to eat. No faith. (shaking my head)

I simmered the garlic in chicken broth for about an hour while I made the pasta and prepped the rest of the ingredients which made the garlic fall apart tender. 

I made farfalle!

At this point, I tossed the garlic/broth mixture in the blender to puree the garlic. I then added the turmeric and returned it to the stove to simmer.

I hate soggy noodles and veg in soup. Therefore, I don't cook all of the ingredients together. 

I baked the chicken coated in herbs. Then I cut all the veggies. I tossed the carrots in the garlic and chicken broth to simmer while I brought the pasta water to boil and cooked the pasta. 

Finally, I brought it all together by adding the lemon juice to the broth and plating it. I tossed the spinach in each bowl and added the noddles. I let it all sit for the time it took me to slice and add the chicken breasts.

I also like doing things separate because it lets you add other ingredients to the leftover broth over the course of the week.

And, it makes it easy to adjust the flavors if you have a citrus phobic member of the family (ahem...Charlie).

This soup is incredibly easy to make but is a bit time consuming since I made the pasta from scratch. 

Now that I have Janet I am going to set one day aside soon and make a ton of fresh pasta to freeze so I have it on hand when I decide to make recipes like this on the fly.

Meet Janet

gonna need to mortgage something

I have dreamed about owning a Kitchenaid for years but refused to spend the money.

The final cost of the Kitchenaid and the pasta attachments that I dreamed of come in right at $700 on the Kitchenaid website

There are less expensive models.

However, I wanted the Professional 6 Quart mixer because it is the biggest and baddest one out there. I also wanted the three main pasta attachments.

I just couldn't see spending that kind of money; I also couldn't reconcile myself to one of the less expensive models.

looks about right

Recently, I was in the process of testing recipes for two different mousses I broke the whisk on my hand mixer..

After spending roughly three hours hand whipping eggs and cream, enough was enough. My arm was sore for two days.
(Side Bar: Katie-remember my frustration at the cupcakes? double that.)

Enter Charlie.

With his amazing shopping prowess he found the exact mixer I'd been wanting with the pasta attachments and a rebate for the ice cream mixer attached for right at 50% of retail!

oh the places we'll go

Which brings us to Janet.


Say hello.


Isn't she gorgeous?


Wait, you do know I'm talking about the mixer and not the lady above right? :)



Side Note

Janet is also the first name of the main baking and pastry instructor at Metro.

I joked that I should name the mixer Janet since she and I (both the instructor and mixer) will be spending a lot of time together over the next year or so.

The name stuck.

I have nothing but respect for my instructor. She has a wonderful sense of humor and vast and impressive knowledge of baking skills and technique.

And, did I mention her background is in molecular biology? Awesome.

Lucky Charm

I <3 this garnish!

One of the first things that I learned at the bakery is that shaped mousse desserts used in the entremet are called bombe glacée or simply a bombe in French.

I've loved the name ever since because a good dessert should be explosive! :)

A few days ago the idea of doing a St. Patrick's Day dessert came up.

With the "bombe" floating in the back of my mind I finally landed on doing a play on the Irish Car Bomb drink.

And since I got so excited about the idea below we decided this would be my original recipe and dessert production for my Stage time at the bakery.

inside only, no caramel or garnish

Here is the dessert that followed from top to bottom:

1. Gold Brushed Dark Chocolate Garnish
2. Jameson Whiskey Caramel
3. Dark Chocolate Spray
4.Green Coffee "Devils Food" Cake
5. Bailey's Creme Anglaise Inlay


I'm posting this before the holiday in case anyone needs some inspiration.

And, as always, I'm happy to share my recipe if anyone wants it.

The pastry chef I've been working with is beyond amazing and I'm so happy he liked my idea.

And, trust me, I am so excited to have something I designed with his help in the case. It makes me remember why I'm working so hard in culinary school.

Actually, 90% of the time it doesn't feel like work. Except for the math I'm having a blast!

Oh, and they posted a pic of my dessert on their Facebook page. You can check out the official photo here! (You might have to scroll down a few pics. It is in the album "Our Creations")

in the case!!

The "Barnes and Noble" Scone

The topic of my first official baking class was "Quick Breads."

Quick breads are basically breads that do not use yeast for rise: Banana Bread, Muffins, Pancakes, yes, pancakes (this one surprised me!)

I signed up to make Morning Glory Muffins because it was the only muffin on the list I didn't recognize and Chocolate Cranberry Cherry Scones.

I was nice enough to bring Charlie a sample

 I. Hate. Scones.

They are dry, useless bricks. If given one I would use it as a doorstop or weapon before I would eat it.

If I were a skunk I would have defensively sprayed the room at the thought of making scones.

However, I hoped the irritation of making this thing that I hate would be lessened by using chocolate.

To make the muffins we used the Muffin Method. That's a shock, huh?

Muffin Method in a Nutshell:
You add all the wet ingredients together in one bowl. You sift all the dry ingredients together in another bowl. Then add the wet to the dry and fold together until just combined.

If you mix until everything is incorporated, you've over mixed your batter.

Then get them in the muffin pan and in to a preheated oven lighting fast. If you let this batter rest they won't rise because the reaction you want from the baking soda will happen on the counter instead of in the oven.

Let's just say now that if I had to get up and make these Morning Glory muffins for breakfast my morning wouldn't be so glorious.

this is what a muffin top should look like...still laughing

I had to shred carrots and apples.  And measure out raisins, shredded coconut, and walnuts. Time consuming.

Simple method? Yes. Simple muffin? Hell to the No!

Oh, and I learned all you lovers of giant muffin tops (ha ha...anybody?) are eating crappy muffins. Proper muffins don't have domes. They should have a fairly flat uneven surface.

On to the scones and the Biscuit Method...

Biscuit Method in a Nutshell:
Add and sift all dry ingredients in one bowl. Mix all wet ingredients in another bowl. Cut butter in to dry ingredients. Add wet ingredients until just combined. Turn out on counter and "fold knead" no more than 5 times. Shape and cut. Freeze for 20 minutes. Then bake until G.B.D. and done in the center.

one-eyed scone monster

I followed the recipe except I used dried cherries because I couldn't find the dried cranberries. Whatevs.

And, after all that work, according to Chef  I made a "Barnes and Noble Scone" because mine rose tall and had more of a muffin-like consistency inside instead of the sawdust consistency I know and hate.

The dry scone is referred to as the British Scone.

While I might have liked the scone I made a little, not even the addition of chocolate could change my mind.

However, a classmate did make a Cream Scone that I really did like. Hmmm....

Bronco's Review

One of the side effects of being in culinary school is the desire to constantly try different restaurants in Omaha.

So, last weekend Charlie and I were looking for a place to have lunch. After some searching we decided on a small cafe in a  part of Omaha we hadn't yet explored.

beacon of hope

However, when we arrived we realized the restaurant was closed. Disaster!

But, wait, when we got out of the car we were overwhelmed by the amazing smell of onion rings. Ten feet from the cafe we found the smell coming from Bronco's.

Crisis averted! We would not starve! Brunch would would be had!

But, wait a minute. Let's just say from the moment we walked in the door I felt like I'd been here before.

Why?

 old school pac man !

Because it turns out that Bronco's is Omaha's 50-year-old dive version of a McDonald's crossed with a KFC, Burger King (only due to the onion rings) and an arcade.

Yes, an arcade.

After asking several questions about the menu I realized the signature Bronco burger was literally a Big Mac.

The young man working the register tolerated my barrage of questions very well.

I will say the place was really busy for 2pm on a Saturday and the fried chicken did look pretty good.

cheeseburger with onion rings

I ordered the Hickory Burger Combo with fries and Charlie had the Double Cheeseburger Combo with onion rings.

His double cheeseburgers were a replica of Mickey D's except for the lack of ketchup and my Hickory Burger really had no flavor.

Sadness.

Hickory burger

But the fries and onion rings were great.

I can't say we'd go back but I'm glad I know a place like this exists in Omaha.

I do wonder if it is still operated by the original owners. It would be nice if that were the case.

these guys were guarding the bathrooms...random

Side  Note
I've discovered that if I'm going to get a fast food burger in Omaha I want to go to Runza.

They have great burgers, amazing fries, and the most fascinating signature item that is like a burger inside an amazing roll with cabbage. I was skeptical at first but I love them!

If we ever leave Omaha, I'll certainly miss Runza. I can't say I'll ever think
about Bronco's again.

Mini Jalapeno Cheddar Loaves

I did an awkward happy dance when I cut in to these!

Bread is something I have wanted to learn to make for a very long time.

Yes, I've dabbled in rolls and even attempted a pumpkin loaf but making artisan bread or sandwich loaves has always been more of the goal.

All the ingredients, mixed and kneaded

After spending some time looking through my baking textbook for this quarter I decided to give bread a go.

Also, Charlie wanted me to make mini loaves to use for sandwiches now that we are back focused on healthy eating.

After fermenting for  90 min dough is portioned and shaped.

One mini loaf is about the right portion size. And, of course, if I make the bread I can control the quality of the ingredients. Also, it is preservative free.

Before proofing for 45 min

I'm happy to pass this recipe along to anyone that wants to give it a go.


I would say it was just about as easy as making yeast rolls but it does have a few extra steps.

After proofing-dough expanded about 70%

Also, it calls for instant yeast instead of active dry yeast, which I've found much easier to working with at home.

Therefore, since I don't have a proofing box and it is super cold here I had to get pretty creative to create an environment that was the right temperature for fermentation and proofing.

These sandwiches couldn't be any cuter!

And, that was the boring stuff.

I found it really fun to add cheese and jalapenos to a dough.








I made a quick salad with a cranberry vinaigrette, and that's lunch!

EEEclairSSS

often referred to as a paste instead of a dough

Pâte à Choux is a must learn dough for anyone interested in French pastries.

It is very versatile and is used for many recipes including, but not limited to, eclairs, cream puffs, beignets, crullers, and even churros.

Recently, during some stage hours I was tasked with making a batch. And, for the bakery I'm staging at a batch is about enough for 100 eclairs.

The pastry chef that I'm working with had walked me through the process a few days prior and I understood the ingredient list. I went in to the process feel fairly confident that I could make the dough and pipe the eclairs on my own.

don't open the oven during the first 15 minutes or they won't puff up

I proceeded to precisely measure out the ingredients and go through the method as I'd observed but instead of a slightly sticky combined dough I ended up with something that resembled porridge

After talking through the steps again with the pastry chef and having to scrape all that useless dough in to the trash, I still have no idea what I did wrong. I felt terrible about my mistake.

I've decided I love silpat!

However, screw ups like that only push me to learn more and work harder.

Two days later I decided to try the Pâte à Choux again at home. 
Of course, I scaled the recipe down considerably.

Everything miraculously came together on the first try!

I then also proceeded to make pastry cream and a dark chocolate ganache to fill and top the eclairs.

pastry cream chillin in the fridge

While I'm beyond happy they turned out  I certainly need to practice piping the dough. The eclairs were a bit skinny and some ended up with weird knobs. But, they all tasted great!


 I should also probably practice cutting them. I knew the bread knife was SHARP but geesh! Serious blood loss for 30 min. For real! Lesson learned!

6 cuts from 1 angry knife!

 



After some research I have discovered eclairs are much more than this basic version that is widely recognized in America. In bakeries all across France they are really pushing the eclair concept with different fillings, toppings, and dough additions.

I can't wait to try some of these fancier version but decided, as always, the  first attempt should be the pastry in its most basic form.

absolutely worth all the trouble!

Charlie and I had a few to celebrate the success and then I took the remaining batch to the office where I worked from August to February. I really liked all of my co-workers and figured it would be a nice treat.

Besides, Charlie and I are back to focusing on super healthy eating and serious gym time. I knew if they stayed here, we'd eat ALL of them!





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