Browsing Tag

appetizers

Appetizers/Starters, Savory Snacks

Goat Cheese, Grilled Aubergine and Ramp Chimichurri Crostini

The other day, I made this Ramp Chimichurri which is out of this world, and I mentioned that you can use it on a bunch of things besides just steak. Here is one of those things. The chimichurri moved this from “hey, I have a bunch of random ingredients that I need to use up before they go off” to “wow, this is one heck of a snack in just under 30 minutes of work (and would be much less except that you should salt the eggplant for a bit, lest they get soggy). Cheeky little snack in the middle of my Thursday.
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23. April 2015
Breakfast/Brunch, Dinner, Lunch

Asparagus, Spring Onion and Speck Quiche

Random Story: Back in the day, when I lived in Seattle, Ben had a colleague from Iran (via Canada). When he found out that I was German, the very first thing that he said was “Oh, she must make great quiche!” This confused the heck out of me at the time because apparently Germans are great quiche bakers and I didn’t even know it. Turns out that I have no idea where he got this perception, but nevertheless to this day, I think of him whenever I make a quiche.
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14. April 2015
Breakfast/Brunch, General Reference/Tutorial

How to Cook Bacon (my way)

Everyone has their own way of cooking bacon. In the pan, in the oven, even in the microwave. My method involves the oven, covering the pan with aluminum foil (for easier clean up), but also by placing the bacon on a wire rack placed on the prepared baking sheet. Why? Well, two reasons: 1. by raising the bacon away from the pan, there is better airflow, so the bacon crisps from the bottom as well, leaving the bacon nice and flat and 2. also because the bacon is raised from the pan, it causes less splatters (the reason bacon splatters is because the heated grease under the bacon doesn’t have any place to go with the bacon on top of it, so it eventually “pops” to have the air/grease escape, causing splatters. I don’t know that this is the “best” method, but it is the one that I use. Onwards:
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1. March 2015
Appetizers/Starters, Dinner, Lunch, Sides

Crazy Crispy Curly Fries,
with Duck Fat and Thyme

I preface this post that I am laughing at the absurdity of myself. And you should be laughing at me becuase I am silly. Fair deal?

A couple of hours ago, I had this craving for french fries. I had to walk over to the post office anyway, so I grabbed a couple of russett potatoes at the shop. So far, so good. Because a couple of my friends have recently started experimenting with those spiral cutters, I decided to pull mine out as well. I’d bought one on a whim 3 or 4 years ago, but it has only seen the light of day about a dozen times (there are only so many zoodles that one can make!). Anyhoo, I preheated the oven, spiralized (is that a word?) my taters and went to find a bit of oil. No olive oil. No veggie oil. Seriously? Need to be better about checking staple ingredients. But I do have rendered duck fat in the fridge (as only Kat would), and some bacon fat too. And butter, though that wouldn’t have been nearly as much fun.
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6. February 2015