Quick Appetizer

The other day I literally had 1 hour to whip some type of appetizer together.  So with 5 ingredients I made this happen. Baguette, goat cheese, fresh rosemary, honey, pine nuts (olive oil and salt) is that 7 ingredients now, do we count condiments?

Anyway, I sliced the baguette on an angle, drizzled them with olive oil and toasted them on a cookie sheet in a 425 degree oven, toast both sides. I like them slightly brown and crispy.  Pull them out of the oven and let them cool.

Mince the rosemary and toast the pine nuts. Smear goat cheese on each crostini (toasted bread), then drizzle the honey over each one. Finally sprinkle the rosemary and pine nuts over them all.  Serve on a simple platter and decorate with fresh rosemary sprigs.  All done.

I was complimented on this quite a few times, even the little ones like it.  It's a nice sweet and savory dish.  Enjoy! 

Chocolate Bark

I'm in the process of creating all kinds of treats and decor for an upcoming event. Most anything special involves chocolate for me. Once during the hottest day of summer I decided to make my own chocolate truffles, what a mess, they were delicious, but my white kitchen had chocolate in places I didn't think were possible.  The weather is still nice here in L.A. so I think I'm safe to try my hand at this chocolate creation.

A reader once asked me whether I tempered my chocolate while making one of my recipes. I never have done this and wasn't sure why I needed to. So I went to doing my research on why and how. The best explanation and easiest recipe was found here, David Lebovitz is the blogosphere master of chocolate in my humble opinion.

Follow his recipe and use a proper thermometer, David suggest this one at Amazon, Chocolate Tempering Thermometer, ​if only I had this, it would have been much easier. But I made due with the one I had and well eyeballed it and tasted along the way. So far the chocolate has held up.

Use dark chocolate bittersweet chips no more than 70% cacao is suggested.  I bought these at Surfas, in Culver City, California. But you can find decent chocolate in your local grocery store.

Melting and temperature checking. So hard not to take spoonfuls of this along the way. That is so not the right thermometer, try the one that David recommended on the link above.

​Here are the ingredients for my chocolate bark. I did a few batches of chocolate. One where I stirred in a tablespoon of instant espresso coffee and then added in the toasted almonds and a few dried cherries.  Of course I used my candied orange peels and pistachio for another version and finally added in apricots, cherries and almonds for a final version. Use whatever ingredients you like, pick your favorites I like to make sure to add some color so I tried to use a variety.

Here's where you get to smear the chocolate. I used a small 1/4 cooked sheet with parchment paper on the bottom. I smeared the chocolate out and started laying in my fixings, you need to work quickly before the chocolate starts to harden. Candied orange peels and pistachios for this batch.​

Let it cool in the refrigerator for about 15 minutes and then it's ready for breaking into pieces and eating right away, in my case i saved these for an event and will package them up the day before.

Voila, all done, delicious and beautiful. I can't wait to share these with my friends. Enjoy!

Apples

Where did last year go. It was a busy year for me and not a lot of posting going on. It's when I finally have time off I get a chance to reflect on why I started this blog. First of all it was a chance to pick up my camera more often and take pictures of the things I love. Food. Travel. And the wonderful things that make Life so great, partly more food and more travel. At least I'm honest.

This year I hope to post more often.  My friend at eatdrinknbemerry told me yesterday, you need to pick up your camera more.  He is so right.  I promise more pictures.

SB and I have a pending trip to London and Paris. I'm sure I'll have lots to share, maybe even get a picture of SB on this blog. One can always hope he'll give in, but if not, no worries, we'll have plenty to tell.

Last year was a good year, we finally reached a spiritual goal that we've been working towards for many years. We look forward to whatever the future holds for us. Our motto, "go thru the doors that are open and stop trying to push the ones that are closed." So we hope to continue to live by that thought.

What else have I been doing this past month. Quite a bit of baking and cooking, yay! Also with a few days off from regular life I had time to organize closets, shelves, books, and all kinds of stuff. I tossed out a few old cooking magazines and reminded myself of recipes I've longed too try. On visiting a friend she laid out a forty clove garlic chicken for herself to make and handed me Ina Garten's French Apple Tart to try. So I've made it 3 times since the last week of December.

Did you know that there are 7,500 varieties of apples ranging in color from red to gold, yellow to green, and being slightly larger than cherry and can be as big as a grapefruit. Approximately 2,500 are grown here in American. I found that amazing, I had no idea, as I've only touched probably only 6 - 8 different types of apples. I personally love apples with peanut butter, usually a gala apple. Really though, I like anything with peanut butter.

So here's a picture of my french apple tart (this is the 2nd time). I have to say the 3rd was the prettiest, and was taken to a pot-luck dinner at my bosses house. I forgot to take a picture as I was so worried about getting it transported there without making a mess.

If you want to make it, the recipe is found

here

.

Coconut Macaroons

For the sweet and savory party I was able to make one dessert to contribute to this feast. I had a craving for coconut. So I went through a few cookbooks till I found a recipe I hadn't tried yet. The always reliable Ina Garten provide the recipe that seemed the easiest and most tasty.

And who doesn't love chocolate right. Ultimately these macaroons ended up with chocolate. I melted semi-sweet chocolate in a double broiler and then tried to decide if I was going to dip the top of each one or brush the bottoms. Bottoms one over at a suggestion from SB. These I have to say turned out delicious.

We had plenty to give everyone and took a few home ourselves. Next day over a cup of coffee was the best breakfast.

Here's Ina's recipe from her

Barefoot Contessa Family Style

.

14 ounces sweetened shredded coconut

14 ounces sweetened condesed milk

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

2 extra-large egg whites, at room temperature

1/4 teaspoon kocher salt

Preheat the oven to 325 degrees.

Combine the coconut, condensed milk, and vanilla in a large bowl. Whip the egg whites and salt on high speed in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the whisk attachment until they make medium-firm peaks. Carefully fold the egg whites into the coconut mixture.

Drop the batter onto sheet pans lined with parchment paper (I tried to use my silapat cookie sheet liner on one sheet as I was short on parchment paper - this didn't work well as the sticky coconut stuck to it, even after cooling. So parchment paper is the way to go) using either a 1 1/4 inch diameter ice cream scoop, or two teaspoons. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, until golden brown. Cool and serve.

If you choose to put chocolate on them follow instructions below.

Put semi-sweet chocolate chips (or your chocolate of choice) in a bowl set over boiling water in a sauce pan. Don't let the water hit the bowl. Once chocolate is melted used a icing spatula to spread chocolate evenly over the bottoms of each macaroon. Put macaroons on a baking sheet upside down and refrigerate to harden the chocolate about 30 minutes. Plate and serve.

Enjoy.

Chocolate Mousse with Orange Mascarpone Whipped Cream

So last night was the Oscars. One of my favorite shows to watch since I was a little girl. Life though has been so busy and for various reasons I literally only saw one of the movies that had a nomination. But tradition is that I must watch this show. So we had two friends over, the kind of friends that you don't have to dress up for, that can cook in your kitchen and find your silverware drawer and eat your Pretzel Bites and your okay with that (well maybe, Pretzel Bites are almost sacred in our household). With that said I quickly took inventory of what I had at home and made a run to Trader Joes for all the fun foods, salami, sopresseta, provolone, goat and asiago cheese, shrimp, cocktail sauce, and smoked salmon.

As everything was pretty much just layout on a plate I decided to make one thing from scratch. So having just watched an episode of Giada's

Italian Kitchen

on the Food Network I thought I'd make this Bittersweet Chocolate Mousse with an Orange Mascarpone Whipped Cream. Truly this was a treat. The mousse was rich and decadent, super creamy, and the orange mascarpone whipped cream was cool and refreshing. Chocolate and Orange are a super combination, they always seem to enhance the flavor in each other. My friend literally said, "Wow," through every bite she took.

Here's the recipe I followed from

FoodTV.com

:

Mousse:

1/2 cup whole milk

3 tablespoons sugar

1/4 teaspoon instant espresso powder

1 cup bittersweet chocolate chips

3 large egg whites

Cream:

1/4 cup mascarpone cheese, room temperature

2 tablespoons fresh squeezed orange juice

1/2 cup whipping cream

2 tablespoons powdered sugar

1 teaspoon orange zest

For the Mousse: In a small saucepan over medium heat stir together the milk with the sugar and the espresso powder until the milk is hot, but not boiling, and the sugar is dissolved. Place the chocolate chips in a blender.

*Pour the hot milk over the chips. Run the blender on high until combined, a few seconds. Add the egg whites and run the blender on high until light, about 1 minute. Transfer the mousse to 4 small serving cups. Cover with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator until firm, about 3 hours.

For the Cream: In the bowl of an electric mixer, stir together the

mascarpone cheese and the orange juice until smooth. Add the cream,

powdered sugar, and orange zest. Whip until the cream has soft peaks, about 1 minute. Whip the cream just before serving the mousse or cover with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator until ready to serve.

* When blending hot liquids: Remove liquid from the heat and allow to cool for at least 5 minutes. Transfer liquid to a blender or food processor and fill it no more than halfway. If using a blender, release one corner of the lid. This prevents the vacuum effect that creates heat explosions. Place a towel over the top of the machine, pulse a few times then process on high speed until smooth.