Our friends are bakers, too!

Here at Broccoli is for Lovers the thing we love second to showcasing our own kitchen creations, is showcasing those of our friends. For the second year in a row, Maureen has decorated an adorable Yo Gabba Gabba cake for her now two-year-old (holy cow, is he two already? I can't believe it!!) son Fitz. What a lucky kid, his mom makes the best birthday cakes around. Happy Birthday, Fitzo!

And over at quasify, Nanio has finally baked up some Gooseberry goodness. In his own words:

my gooseberry tart thing recipe (hashed out with help of my mom & internet strangers)

1) Mix a can of gooseberries, two thirds cup sugar and three tablespoons of flour together, bring a gentle boil. Let that cool. It will set up into a liquidy gel.
2) Make a top/bottom pie crust recipe. Instead of balling in two, make 8 to 12 smaller balls.
3) Mix an 8oz cream cheese (softened) w/ three tablespoons of sugar.
4) Flatten small balls (optionally, with your newly purchased and totally bitchin’ rolling pin), smush a tablespoon or two of cream cheese in the center and cover with a similar amount of the cooled gooseberries.
5) Crimp those bad boys shut and trim excess. We’ll have to pretend like I did this part of the recipe correctly.

6) Bake at 400 for 10-14 minutes.

My not-very-objective opinion is these tasted pretty decent but didn’t turn out to be terribly attractive. I think had I baked them in a mini-cupcake cooking sheet instead of on a flat pan it might have kept the three dimensionality I imagined when I started the project. Next time.

Looks delicious, Nanio!

YJPumpkin YJPie

I spent New Years' in Boston this year, and after ringing in the new decade in the most perfect way I could have imagined, I began a whole list (in my head) of things I wanted to accomplish in twenty-ten. Unbeknownst to me at the time, a mere two days later, I would have made my very first pumpkin pie. A fine accomplishment if you ask me!

Yep, I've never made a pumpkin pie.

I didn't grow up being a pumpkin lover, it wasn't until college that I was introduced to pumpkin bread (thanks to my boyfriends mom and her AMAZING recipe), which quickly became an all time favorite of mine. I've since enjoyed many pumpkin baked goods, muffins, pancakes, ice cream, the list goes on. Still - pumpkin pie is not my thing. It's the texture I think. I don't know. But I've never really loved it, and I've never made one. Until now.

It was a total last minute idea, and started about 45 minutes too late probably, but with the help of Nanio and his newly organized kitchen, we successfully threw together a pumpkin pie! We simply followed the recipe on the back of the Libby's Pumpkin Pie filling can, which included evaporated milk, some eggs, cinnamon, ginger, sugar, and probably a few other things. We used a graham cracker crust, because as I said we were extremely pressed for time.

I think I would have liked to have left it in the oven a little bit longer, but as it was we were leaving at the time we were supposed to be arriving at our friend's house for dinner - extra baking time was not an option.

All in all, I think the little guy turned out quite nicely. Everyone had a piece, and no one seemed to complain!

A new twist on an old favorite

I was searching for our many many, many posts on brie bites - is it possible we don't have any?! How has this tragedy happened, because I know they are made often.

Last night I reverted back to the complete baked brie - and not the bites. I was attending a "Scotch Night", that has become an end of semester tradition for the Cognitive Psychology PhD students at UT, and brie seemed like the perfect accompaniment to scotch. It's actually very simple. One wheel of brie. A few sheets of thawed phyllo dough. Some kind of jam/jelly. A little melted butter. Done. I'm partial to putting apricot preserves on the brie, I'm not sure why. I think apricot is a nice flavor with the cheese, it adds a little sweet, but can also be very savory. Last night when I opened the fridge to pull out the cheese and preserves I spied a package of fresh rosemary, and the wheels began turning. I chopped up some of that fresh rosemary, and mixed it into the preserves. And, this was maybe the best choice I've made all week! Delicious!

Slacker!

So let's see, it's already Thursday. First of all, how did that happen? I don't think Week 5 is happening this week unless it's on Sunday, which I consider to be the official start to Week 6 but maybe that's just me! My excuse? I've been busy and poor, waiting desperately for my paycheck! (I only wish my excuse were that I was busy training for and running in a half marathon, like some OTHER person that I'm so jealous of!) I'll try to make up for it with two new recipes next week, though I already know that neither of them will be for Thanksgiving. My family has requested an old recipe of mine for Pumpkin Cheesecake! I'll have some time on my hands though the rest of next weekend so I'm sure I'll get to a couple newbies for a lunch or dinner.

Week 4 (Mel): Pumpkin Muffins

This recipe comes to you courtesy of Betty Crocker. It's so easy and delicious that I made it once on Thursday and then twice on Sunday. I was going to a friend's house for brunch on Sunday and wanted to try this recipe out before-hand. That was why I made them on Thursday. After trying them, I decided what changes I wanted to make and made a fresh batch for my friends on Sunday morning. Well I left my friend with the extras of course so I had to make an additional batch on Sunday afternoon to have for myself this week! So here's the recipe, as written. I'll indicate my changes below it.

Pumpkin Muffins

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup sugar
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup canned pumpkin
1/4 cup butter, melted
1 egg
1/2 cup raisins

Heat oven to 400 degrees. Grease bottoms of 12 medium muffin cups. Mix all ingredients just until flour is moistened. Batter should be lumpy. Fill muffin cups 2/3 full. Sprinkle 1/4 teaspoon sugar over batter in each cup. Bake 18 to 20 minutes. Immediately remove from pan.

Mel's Variation: I used 1 cup all-purpose flour and 1/2 cup whole wheat flour. I didn't like the taste of the nutmeg and didn't think there should be equal amounts of nutmeg and cinnamon, so I kept the nutmeg amount the same and did more like 3/4 teaspoon of cinnamon. The first time I made these, they only made 11 muffins. I also thought the taste of the pumpkin could be stronger, so the second and third times, I used more pumpkin puree. . . maybe an extra tablespoon and a half. It was a rounded 1/2 cup anyway. Lastly, I think it was more like 1/8 teaspoon of sugar that I sprinkled on top of each muffin before baking. I looked at 1/4 teaspoon and it just looked like too much.

For the future, I'm thinking of experimenting more and maybe using half the amount of butter and adding 2 tablespoons of canola oil or applesauce.

Week 3 (Jenni): Veggie Burgers and Sweet Potato Fries

This week's new recipe comes from a book my mom bought for me as a house warming present. Well, and part came from Sandra Lee.

I used my roommates grater for the carrots and zucchini, it was super easy and lots of fun. I'm realizing how much easier a food processor would make things. The recipe indicates that the food processor would have done the job in ~25 seconds. It took me nearly 25 minutes to get everything through my make-shift processor. When I was done though, it looked so yummy. My mixture was a little sticky, I feared stacking the patties on the plate, so I wrapped them each individually. I'm likely going to freeze most of them, to eat later! I cooked up a burger, and topped it with some blue cheese, it was amazing! The sweet potato fries were quick and easy, and very tasty. I used my favorite season-all seasoning to flavor them, and just let them bake for about 30 minutes.

All in all, a totally delicious Sunday evening meal.

Veggie Burgers
4 Tbsp evoo
1 medium onion, finely chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
2 large carrots, grated
2 medium zucchini, grated
1 16-ounce can of garbanzo beans, drained
1 Tbsp crunchy natural peanut butter
1 1/2 cups whole-wheat bread crumbs
1 Tbsp chopped fresh parsley
1 tsp curry powder*
1 tsp mixed herbs*
1 egg, beaten


Heat 2 Tbsp of oil in a large skillet. Add the onion, garlic, carrot, and zucchini, and saute about 5 minutes, until softened. Take off heat, and set aside.

Place garbanzo beans, peanut butter, breadcrumbs, parsley, curry powder, mixed herbs, and egg in a food processor.*** Process for about 20 seconds, or until garbanzo beans are broken up and all ingredients combined. Add the onion mixture and process for another 5 seconds - do not overprocess.

Form 8 patties, and place them in the fridge for 30 minutes. To cook, heat 2 Tbsp of evoo in a skillet, and cook about 4 minutes on each side.


*I did not have curry powder, I used some mixture of creole seasoning instead.
**I did not have mixed herbs, persay, so I used a dash each of oregano, dill weed, rosemary, thyme
***I do not have a food processor, so I cycled everything through my immersion blender/chopped apparatus. It was tedious and long. A food processor would have been easier.

Week 3 (Mel): Roasted Tomato Caprese Salad

This is definitely a plan-ahead kind of meal. With a little olive oil, balsamic vinegar, garlic, salt, pepper, and sugar to caramelize, these tomatoes roasted up quite nicely! They did take two hours in the oven, but let me tell you, it was totally worth it. I'm eager to try this recipe again with maybe other vegetables too. Mmmmmm!!! I don't think I've ever tasted tomatoes like this before. It was just delicious!

So as you can see in the recipe, all you do after the tomatoes are done is let them cool, add the cheese and basil, drizzle with olive oil, shake on a little salt and pepper, and you're all set to dig in and enjoy! I had it for dinner with some left-over mashed potatoes with peas. Oh Ina, you almost never disappoint me! Yes, ALMOST never. . . I wasn't too impressed with her Roasted Potato Leek Soup but hey, no one's perfect. I've forgiven her.

Enjoy the salad! I sure did!