Food Follies - Daily Specials

Winey Words

2009-06-14T13:27:00.000-07:00

We picked up a California Chardonnay (blend) the other day because I realized that we hadn't tried one in a LONG time. So we chose one more or less at random at Trader Joes, just by reading the descriptions on the labels. (We like to live in the fast lane - LOL.) Here's a snip of the lucious text: "Opens with the intense, signature tropical fruit and citrus aromas typical of our terroir. Flavors of pineapple, fresh peach, lemon zest, and mango are augmented by good weight and perfect acidity." Yes, just because it's on the label doesn't mean it's TRUE - we know this - at least we didn't choose it because the logo was cool - ha! (Although it was rather nice.)

So... Well... the ACIDITY was good. But otherwise, despite our best efforts, we couldn't make out any distinct flavors. It just tasted like a basic "Chardonnay". No peach, or zest or this or that. Yes, it was a blend, but we've had blends before that were more "whole is greater than the sum of its parts" rather than a homogenous mix.

Oh, well - win some, lose some! And no, we're not mentioning any names. ;) We just wanted to discuss the disparity between the description and the actual taste, which we haven't actually experienced much of until now, which is, overall, a credit to the wine industry.
[Tags: white wine, chardonnay, california, wine, review]

Pound Cake with Raspberry Sauce

2009-06-09T14:03:00.000-07:00

I'd never actually made a pound cake from scratch before so I looked around online for a few likely recipe candidates - finally settling on a few from allrecipes.com, and adding my own little tweaks. This isn't a loaf pound cake, but a tube pan pound cake - MUCH bigger. And taller. And excellently dense, of course. I'm also glad I had the foresight to pull out our extra huge bowl to mix this in too - not surprising though, once you see the ingredients list! (Sorry - forgot to take an in-progress photo of the bowl of batter and beaters, etc.)

The batter was so thick that when I was putting the batter into the pan, it was much less of a 'pour' and more of a 'scoop and drop', but it worked out fine, as you can see:

The cake came out really tall too, although that's hard to see in the photo.

While the cake was cooling, I made an easy raspberry sauce - nicely raspberry-ish, but not overly sweet:

After the sauce was done I put it through a small strainer to take most of the seeds out so it was very smooth.

And the serving suggestion - slice a nice hunk of that cake and drizzle the raspberry sauce over it just before serving - yum! Would probably also be good with a dark chocolate drizzle or the like. Take a small slice unless you're REALLY hungry - as with most pound cakes, this is very dense and filling.

Click here for the full recipe.
[Tags: pound cake, raspberry sauce, recipe, food, food follies]

Pessagno Pinot Noir (California)

2009-05-26T11:17:00.000-07:00

After watching the movie Sideways I decided that I had to try a Pinot Noir and see what all the fuss was about. We picked one from Pessagno Wines because it came from a local winery and they actually differentiated between the various vineyards the grapes were grown in. Ours was from the Central Avenue Vineyard, vintage 2006.

We weren't disappointed. Now I understand why in the movie Sideways, Miles was so crazy about it. The wine was very rich with a complex taste that really challenged the tastebuds to define it. There was a subtle cherry flavor followed by a bit of pepper that left the tip of your tongue feeling slightly hot.

We had the wine with some smoked gouda and they paired very well together. At first I thought the smoky flavor of the cheese would overwhelm the wine's flavor, but they complemented each other nicely. We're definitely going to have to include Pinot Noirs in our regular wine rotation.
[Tags: wine review, pinot noir, sideways, red wine, california]

Wine Flu?

2009-05-04T10:23:00.000-07:00

First off, let me say that I think people are doing a good job of keeping the public informed about the spread of swine flu and steps to take care of yourself while it's flitting about. Secondly, and a however, I also think the media has taken advantage of the situation a little to enhance the drama a SMIDGE beyond what's necessary - heh. So this new Wine Flu t-shirt is just a funny joke about the media hysteria, not about the virus itself! Besides I can't resist a good play on words - you should all know that by now.

Wine Flu is available on all kinds of t-shirts and sweatshirts - click the image to browse!
[Tags: swine flu, wine flu, humor, funny, tshirt]

What Day is Today Anyway?

2009-04-01T12:38:00.000-07:00

I agree with the experts that say Rick-Rolling has been done to death, and wouldn't be funny as an April Fool's Joke anymore anyway. So I'm going in a different direction that works with the topic of this blog... but to find out, you have to click this link - do you dare? The little icon at the top of this post will give you a hint, if you're getting nervous. ;)
[Tags: april fools day, cake, funny]

Leave It To Cleaver - Not Just an Apron Anymore!

2009-03-24T13:21:00.000-07:00

We've had our "Leave it To Cleaver" apron available in our shop for a while now, as it's been a definite favorite. Recently it was brought to our attention that this design would do well offered on our other products as well - seeing the good sense in this, heh, we added them to the shop immediately! Click any of the sample images below to look at the entire selection - great for cooks and chefs, or people who just like to chop things with gusto!

[Tags: funny, humor, food, t-shirt, pun]

Tropicana Relents!

2009-02-23T11:59:00.000-08:00

Yay! Tropicana has decided to go back to their old packaging! When I first saw the new packaging, the word, "generic" came to mind immediately, even before I discovered that's what happened when MOST people saw the new packaging - LOL.

Perhaps the color of the orange juice just paled in comparison to the actual orange we were used to. Or maybe the font they chose just didn't stand out as special like the old one. Or maybe both! Click here for short article and side by side comparison.
[Tags: tropicana, orange+juice, packaging, generic]

Got Resveratrol?

2009-02-12T10:39:00.000-08:00

Okay, this is just a weird little design I made up after finding the word "resveratrol" (the stuff in red wine that makes it 'good' for you) not only very hard to say, but rather amusing. I mean, try saying it AFTER you've had a few glasses of red wine. Without accidentally swallowing your tongue, I mean.

Click any of the images below to browse our entire line of "got resveratrol" products....

A "got resveratrol?" (see, I can't even stop TYPING it) tee would be a great conversation starter at a wine tasting, or even a bar bet - LOL.
[Tags: funny, humor, tshirt, red wine, resveratrol]

Papa Murphy's Cinnamon Buns

2009-02-06T17:18:00.000-08:00

Our favorite pizza is Papa Murphy's Take-n-Bake Chicken Garlic Pizza. It's got their homemade white garlic sauce, white meat chicken, green onions, diced tomatoes, and lots of gooey cheese. And the last time we went to Papa Murphy's we had a coupon for a free tray of their cinnamon buns.

They came out looking terrific, as you can see in the delicious photo above. The cream cheese frosting was a bit thin and whipped, but tasted fine. But overall, the buns were a bit doughy, and just not as tasty as we'd hoped. A might flavorless, actually - could just be a slightly old batch or could be the norm. In any case, we probably won't be getting a tin of these next time we go back for the chicken garlic pizza, but we won't hold it against them.
[Tags: pizza, cinnamon rolls, food review, Papa Murphy's, food]

Homemade Girl Scout Cookies

2009-01-12T18:14:00.000-08:00

It's girl-scout cookie season soon (if not already?), and I ran across this interesting tidbit. It points out that the girl scout cookies still use hydrogenated oils, so they suggest making a donation to the girl scouts instead of buying cookies and making the cookies yourself! And here is the page with links to the homemade girl-scout cookie recipes. It's verrrrry tempting, isn't it!
[Tags: girl scout cookies, recipes, homemade, cookies]

Happy Birthday, John!

2008-12-21T08:45:00.000-08:00

Happy Birthday, John and Happy Solstice too! John requested a chocolate cake for his birthday this year (surprise!), so I thought I'd check out some new recipes online. I decided to try a Black Chocolate Cake Recipe since we're both fans of dark chocolate. The only change I made in that linked recipe was to use butter instead of shortening. The cake layers came out great - quite dense and didn't get all puffy/risen in the middle, so no leveling was needed.

For the frosting I used Caroline's Chocolate Fudge Frosting Recipe, although as many commenters suggested on that site, I used less milk than indicated.

And here it is!

I also shaved some dark chocolate over the top of it to add even more chocolateness, which I'm sure it needed. (Don't look at the plate around the bottom of the cake as I hadn't tidied up yet when I took the photo. I said DON'T look!)

Maybe next time I try this recipe I'll make a double batch of frosting and do some actual decorating around the edges and such.
[Tags: food, baking, birthday cake, chocolate cake, recipes]

Cherry Cookies

2008-12-10T15:07:00.000-08:00

It's holiday time, so I'm starting to pull out recipes I usually only make this time of year. (For no other reason except that it's nice to have some recipes for special occasions.) I started with Cherry Cookies, since I haven't made those in a LONG time, and they look so darn festive - covered in chopped walnuts with a cherry in the center!

See? Festive! And here is the recipe if you want to make them yourself. Have at!
[Tags: recipe, food, cookies, christmas, cherries]

Jam & Cheese Loaf

2008-12-01T19:33:00.000-08:00

For some reason I had a little extra time on the day before Thanksgiving, so I decided to make a Jam & Cheese Loaf for breakfast the next day. It's essentially a biscuit base, cream cheese filling, topped with the jam of your choice. Really easy and really tasty, and it looks pretty neat too, since you braid the dough over the filling:

I basically halfed this recipe since the full recipe makes a pretty large loaf. We finished it off in no time!
[Tags: dessert, recipe, cheese, biscuit, jam]

Homemade Hot Cocoa Mix

2008-11-08T20:47:00.000-08:00

I picked up the complimentary 'Something Extra' magazine from our local Nob Hill Foods supermarket the other day. While I was wandering through the pages, my attention caught on the recipe for homemade hot chocolate mix. I was excited because over the last year we'd been looking at the ingredients in all the standard single serving packets of hot chocolate on the market, and it seems that (excluding the more expensive or gourmet brands) there was a lot of unnecessary ingredients in them, including sucralose, which tends to give us both slight headaches. The one with the fewest ingredients was Swiss Miss (sans marshmallows), so we'd been using that.

Anyway, the recipe was pretty good, but we felt it needed a touch more sugar, so here's our tweaked version of their recipe:

Homemade Hot Cocoa Mix
3 cups instant dry milk
1 1/2 to 2 cups sugar (to taste)
1 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 tbsp. cornstarch
1 tbsp. cinnamon (optional, but recommended)

Just mix all of the ingredients together in a sealable plastic ziplock bag and store it in a container with a tight fitting lid. To make a cup of hot chocolate, add 1/3 cup of the mixture to a mug with 8 oz. steaming hot water and stir well. (Makes about 15 mugs.)

We're very happy with the way it came out! (And here is the full recipe in our archives - click there to find a printable version too.)
[Tags: food, recipe, hot chocolate, homemade, hot cocoa mix]

Spanish Sausages and Nun Cookies

2008-10-28T12:05:00.000-07:00

Some other exotic foods our previously mentioned globetrotting friend bestowed upon us involved specialties from Spain, including Spanish sausages, and breadsticks:

And these delicate square cookies made by nuns:

The sausage had a fantastic flavor and texture, the bread sticks were excellently crunchy, and the 'nun cookies' finished things off with a sort of fig-newtony type flair, but with a fruit that was lighter in color and taste. We ate them all like a snack, and washed them down with a bottle of fruity white wine, which complimented things well. All around it was a night of fantastic food tastery!
[Tags: food, Spain, sausage, cookies]

Sweet Potato Bisque with Tortellini

2008-10-22T16:40:00.000-07:00

As some of the regular readers might have realized, we've become enamored of the selection of soups and soup-bases at Trader Joe's. So on our last store trip (an hour each way, but still worth it) we picked up a container of their sweet potato bisque.

I emptied it into our small crock pot, thinned it with water a bit (it was still quite thick), added a few spices, and let it cook while I started making the homemade tortellini. I just wanted to make the noodles, no filling. (Sorry no 'in progress' photos - I was covered in flour and very focused - LOL!). I let the soup 'crock' for a number of hours. About two hours before we were going to eat, I tossed in the small tortellinis - it took them a while to cook, but they did fine. When we served it, we added a dollup (I've always wanted to use the word dollup) of sour cream in the middle, and a sprinkling of nutmeg.

It came out very tasty! And although the bisque has a lovely flavor, it IS rather mild - the sour cream sort of finished it out with a nice tang.
[Tags: food, soup, bisque, cooking, sweet potato]

Mini Apple Pies

2008-10-16T11:36:00.000-07:00

A long time ago we'd found these terrific little individual serving glass pyrex dishes at the Dollar Store of all places, and the other day I got to use them for the first time when making a couple of mini apple pies! (I would have made a regular pie, but we only had three apples in the fridge - besides - what a good ready-made excuse.)

I cut our apple pie recipe in half, and also cut our pie crust recipe in half. I also have to admit that this is the first time I've actually made a pie crust from scratch! John's made them from scratch, but I've grabbed the pre-made crusts in the past. But after doing this and seeing how easy it is, I'll probably hardly EVER use the pre-made crusts again.

The final pies came out really cute, and just like a regular apple pie, although the 'individual' portions were pretty big, but we got over it.

One more point: as you can see in the photo, I sealed the edges of the pie like normal, but tucked the edges back in a bit since I didn't want them to get dried out or burned. Wallah!
[Tags: food, dessert, apple pie recipe, thanksgiving, baking]

Baobab Fruit Spread

2008-10-10T11:00:00.000-07:00

A globetrotting friend of ours recently presented us with a jar of genuine baobab jam (I think it's jam - or fruit spread - either way) from Africa (Senegal, to be specific)! It's got a luscious taste - almost like a marmelade or honey, and we just dove into it and started eating it on crackers:

We ate half the jar in one sitting - I wonder if it's addictive? Just kidding! I don't think this is something you can readily get in the United States, if at all, so we were excited to be able to try something that seems to exotic.

Our friend also gave us some other exotic goodies, but you'll have to wait for another post for those.
[Tags: baobab fruit, Africa, jam, food, photos]

Grilled Turkey Reuben

2008-10-04T11:10:00.000-07:00

Every so often I remember that I love Grilled Turkey Reubens and that I haven't had one in a LONG time!

They're REALLY easy to make - sliced deli turkey, lots of good saurkraut (we used Hebrew National), and a Thousand Islands dressing on your choice of rye bread - we chose a Jewish Rye. (In our area of California, the only kind of ryes available are pre-packaged, made by Orowheat, but they work just fine!)

So assemble the sandwich as you like, butter the outsides of the bread, and then grill until golden brown!

That's not the most exciting picture, and you can see that it's browned a bit unevenly, but I was in more of a hurry to EAT the sandwich than to spend time on a pretty presentation - hah! It tasted even better than it looks here, if that helps. :D
[Tags: food, recipe, sandwich, reuben, food follies]

Spare Ribs with Country Bob Sauce

2008-09-05T12:56:00.000-07:00

We hit a great sale on pork spare ribs the other day and decided to do a little barbeque with Country Bob's Sauce.

It was a success! We could have actually used MORE of the sauce as it came out a bit more subtle than anticipated, but dipping is good too.

The interesting part of this is that when I was growing up, my mother never used BBQ sauce on her pork roasts or ribs - she only rubbed it with salt, pepper, onion, and garlic powder, which is delicious, but I've had to get more accustomed to BBQ sauce over the years. The best thing about using the Country Bobs is that it didn't overwhelm the flavor of the pork, which is always my biggest complaint about BBQ. It complimented it nicely with a subtle sweet flavor, which always does well on pork.
[Tags: food, pork, bbq, barbeque, cooking]

Blueberry Pie

2008-08-21T21:28:00.000-07:00

When I saw the 2.5 lb container of fresh blueberries for 5.99 I looked at it sort of lovingly and thought, "I could make a blueberry pie." I've never actually made a homemade pie. Kristen usually is in charge of pies, while I'm normally in charge of grilling and making omelettes. When I worked as a cook, our pies were made with canned fillings, so there was no help there.

I did go the easy route and went with the pre-made pie crust. I've actually made my own pie crust before, for Shepherd's Pie, but since I was starting this pie in the evening, I wanted to move things along.

It took all of thirty seconds for us to find some basic blueberry pie recipes on the web and tweak our own variation. Putting the ingredients together was a snap, and we have enough blueberries leftover for sprinkling on breakfast cereals, mixing in yogurts and possibly sharing with the local wildlife.

Kristen guided me through the proper method of sealing the two pie crust halves. When I made my Shepherd's Pie, the edge was a bit on the crusty side. The baking took longer than we expected, about an extra half hour, but the results were delicious. This is the first homemade blueberry pie I've ever had and it beat every store or restaurant pie I've had hands down.

Hopefully, we can catch the other berry families on sale and live on pie for the rest of the summer. Oh, and click here for the blueberry pie recipe we used.

[Tags: food, baking, blueberry, pie, dessert]

Country Bob's All Purpose Sauce

2008-08-17T21:09:00.000-07:00

When Al Malekovic from Country Bob's contacted us and offered us a free sample of Country Bob's All Purpose Sauce, I was dubious. I had pretty much given up on commercial barbecue sauces and marinades because they all contain MSG and/or High Fructose Corn Syrup. Al assured me that the sauce had neither of these ingredients, so I agreed to give it a try. I was pleased to see that the ingredients were very basic, Tomato puree, vinegar, molasses etc... there were no ingredients that I couldn't pronounce.

On first taste, I liked the sauce right away. It's somewhere between a barbecue sauce and a steak sauce, and as it's name implies it will work well for both. Of course, we decided to be more creative with our first outing, and used it as a marinade for some boneless pork chops along with a little crushed garlic. We coated the chops in flour, onion powder, salt and pepper, and naturally tossed them into a pan of hot vegetable oil.

The finished chops held the flavor of the sauce nicely. They added a bit of sweetness under the coating which really complimented the flavor of the pork chops nicely.

Not to be outdone though, the following week we were having chicken burritos. The salsa we had bought lacked zing, even though it was a medium. Kristen suggested we put some Country Bob's on them, which gave them a whole new flavor, more Tex than Mex I guess but they tasted great!

[Tags: food, sauce, pork chops, Country Bob's All Purpose Sauce, cooking]

Hot Weather Pasta Salad

2008-07-17T09:43:00.000-07:00

A little while ago the temperature was 110 degrees for many days in a row. When we actually had appetites, we had to come up with something else to eat besides cold sandwiches and fruit, so we put together a cold pasta salad!

We used a lot of stuff we had around the house - rotelli pasta (tri-color would have been nicer, but we only had regular), organic Tuscan Italian dressing, tuna fish, diced tomatoes, and parmesan cheese. And we sprinkled on some sliced, fresh mozzarella just before we ate it.

We have nothing against mayo-based salads, but even that can seem heavy when it's so hot outside, so the Italian dressing version worked nicely for us.
[Tags: food, pasta salad, recipe, tuna, italian dressing]

John's New Blackberry!

2008-07-14T11:37:00.000-07:00

Everyone's so busy talking about their new iPhones and all the cool things they can do with them, so I thought I'd post a photo of John's new Blackberry!

What - you were expecting something with batteries, buttons, and a screen? ;-)
[Tags: blackberry, blackberries, joke, funny, food]

Joey & Eddie's Italian Restaurant in San Francisco

2008-07-07T17:56:00.000-07:00

Recently, I was up in San Francisco for a day of meetings with a bunch of compadres and we had the pleasure of being treated to a night out in the private upstairs dining room at a fantastic Italian restaurant called "Joey & Eddie's".

(Pardon the photo - I forgot to take a picture until the very end when we were getting back on the bus that was rented for us - but you get the idea.)

It was one of those amazing multi-course, choice of wines type events. We had terrific bread with butter or olive oil, fantastic salad with all kinds of greens, crab bisque (or white bean soup), spaghetti topped with a cherry tomato concoction, white fish, chicken cacciatore, and then a big finish with a fabulous chocolate and hazelnut torte with pannecota served in these fancy dishes that looked like hubcaps - LOL! I wanted to eat so much more of each course, but knew I'd regret it later, so I managed to space out my samplings.

So if you're ever in San Francisco and have a hankering for some tasty tasty Italian, check out Joey and Eddie's. And as an additional bonus, on the way out we walked through the front room and saw Sammy Hagar sitting there at the bar enjoying a meal - he seemed to be with a tall blond, so no one bothered him - LOL.
[Tags: food, Italian, California, San Francisco, restaurant]