Monthly Archives

April 2020

Dinner, Lunch

Chicken Curry Pot Pie

Bake-a-Long “Savory Bakes” contribution #1: Chicken Curry Pot Pie. This one isn’t much of a looker, I will admit. I rolled the pastry too thin and it started breaking from the edge of the skillet. That said, what it doesn’t have in looks, it definitely has in taste!

My mom has an expression that roughly translates as “sideways through the refrigerator”; what it means is take all your leftovers and smaller ingredients and make a meal out of it. Well, these days, I have all sorts of random bits and bobs in the fridge — a few carrots, a potato and onions, a package of boneless chicken thighs in the freezer and some pantry staples. I ended up making a yummy chicken curry last night and turned it into a pot pie for lunch (and dinner) today. It’s very yummy, even if it isn’t pretty.
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15. April 2020
Appetizers/Starters, Breakfast/Brunch, Dinner, Lunch, Salads, Savory Snacks, Sides

Smoked Salmon and Chives Deviled Eggs

You might be an overly poshy food blogger when, whilst making deviled eggs during a global pandemic, you think “oooh, I may have stashed smoked salmon in the freezer for an emergency!”

For the record, there is no such thing as a smoked salmon emergency. Ever. No matter how delish it is.

But, the deviled eggs are yummy. And my chives survived the winter.
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13. April 2020
Breakfast/Brunch, Sweet Snacks

Apricot Almond Hot Cross Buns

I know that most people eat Hot Cross Buns on Good Friday and thus I am a day early, but I had time this morning, and won’t tomorrow, so there you have it. Also, in case someone was inspired to make their own and needed a recipe. Every year I make a new variation, but the base recipe stays the same (it’s usually the things that I add — raisins or cranberries or currants or chocolate chips — or this year, apricots) that I swap out. They are actually one of my favorite things and I have to be careful that I don’t snack this whole batch. As you can see, it makes a lot of buns!
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9. April 2020
Breads, Breakfast/Brunch, Sweet Snacks

Browned Butter Bourbon Walnut Banana Bread
(aka Squirrel Bread)

So, a couple of different anecdotes to add today. The first one is: in German, a colloquial way of saying “hoarding” is “hamstering” (as in “I am hamstering toilet paper”). Kind of makes sense, right? Hamsters filling their cheeks with reserves (although that is when the whole TP analogy falls apart, because that would be a little gross to have TP in the mouth). I’ve always thought it a cute and funny expression.

The other story is this (and trust me, I’ll get to a point here in a minute): a few weeks ago, a friend of mine had a chocolate squirrel fall out of her freezer (sort of like chocolate bunnies, one of the companies in Germany makes chocolate squirrels around this time of year — wow, hamsters and squirrels and bunnies, all in one post) so she decided to add the now-broken squirrel into banana bread. For some reason, this struck me as funny, so this morning, as I made this Browned Butter Bourbon Walnut Banana Bread, I decided that I was just going to call it Squirrel Bread.

So there you have it, I am hamstering Squirrel Bread.
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8. April 2020
Candy, Sweet Snacks

Easter Fudge Combo: Dark Chocolate Walnut Fudge and Triple Coconut White Chocolate Fudge

I have a tendency to make chocolates or fudge around holidays. It’s often completely impromptu — like I didn’t plan on making these two types until this morning, and had I not had the ingredients in the pantry, I wouldn’t have made them at all. I am very pleased that I did have the ingredients though, especially for the white chocolate coconut fudge as it is incredibly decadent!
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6. April 2020