Cheese and Crackers- All Grown Up!

Some nights you want to stay in and relax- watch tv, read, be with your sweet, or have a girls night in. That doesn't mean you should have to eat something boring and in fact, throwing together a beautiful and tasty plate of snacks is one of the easier things you can do. It was rainy this weekend and I planned ahead by picking up just a few special things - a little charcuterie, a little cheese, and some olives paired well with what I had laying around the house. Open a bottle of wine or your favorite beer (my fave) and you really can't go wrong. My husband indulged in March Madness and I spent some time with my pal, Katniss, reading Mockingjay. This is exactly what I needed for a relaxing Saturday night!

For this plate- I served picholine olives, serrano ham, Cypress Grove Purple Haze cheese (their cheeses are my favorite!), duck rillete, whole grain mustard, dates, crackers, cornichons, and some mini rye toasts.

What do you fancy on a snack plate? Totinos Pizza Rolls, Cheese, Charcutterie, Pop Tarts, lunchables- whatever it is, we want to know!

Something fishy is going on

I mentioned awhile ago that R and I were given a Food Saver for the holidays and we are still in the early stages of exploring it's potential. We picked up some fish recently and wanted to marinade it in a vacuum sealed bag with some aromatics. I added lemon, thyme, and fennel, along with a drizzle of olive oil. We let it sit over night and then grilled it on a cedar plank. This was such an easy weeknight meal, especially since we prepared everything in advance. It came out great and really could not have been simpler.

Start with the basics

Put the fish in the bag

Add your aromatics

Vacuum seal and refrigerate overnight

On the board ready for grilling

Dinner's ready!

Fish, grilled fennel, grilled zucchini

See, super easy! You could use a regular zip lock instead of a vacuum sealer and you will still end up with a yummy dinner. What are your go to recipes for fish?

Hipcooks West- Tapas Class

One of the more creative gifts we got for our wedding was a gift certificate to Hipcooks from 2 of our groomsmen. The Hipcooks West studio is only about a mile from our apartment and offers a variety of classes each month. We wanted to chose a class that was focused around something we don't make very often at home with the hopes of getting a few new skills and a new menu to throw into our routine. We settled on a Spanish tapas class. The menu featured garlic shrimp, tortilla espanola, sweet and spicy nuts, marinated olives, a simple salad, empanadas, and lastly, flan!

Beginning of class and flan prep.

Caramelized sugar art to adorn the flan

Pouring flan into ramekins before baking

Husband tossing nuts with brown sugar, butter, and rosemary

le nuts

Sangria- cheers!

Manchego and membrillo

Finished nuts with a sprinkle of tobasco and marinated olives

Preparing our tortilla espanola with potato, chorizo, and onions

Empanada filling with ground beef, currants, raisins,and olives

Stuffing and filling the empanadas

Beautiful finished tortilla

Garlic shrimp

Golden empanadas fresh from the oven

Fresh made hummus with a splash of sesame oil

Dinner time!

Beautiful flan with orange and vanilla bean

We left well fed, learned some new tricks, and feel more comfortable with a genre we hadn't experimented with much. R left craving more flan, what else is new?! 

Have you taken any cooking classes? What did you learn? If you're looking to try one, I'd recommend giving Hipcooks a try, it was absolutely a lot of fun and we enjoyed the company of our fellow students.

Did someone say burrata?

Burrata...the penultimate cheese- creamy on the center, soft skin on the outside. It's my absolute favorite of the cheese family. So good I could eat it like an apple, but I won't, because that's not ok, and I'd really prefer to eat it carefully to savour it. If you've never had burrata, I beg of you to please do your best to find some and prepare yourself something wonderful and indulge.

Mozza makes a pretty noteworthy caprese salad with roasted tomatoes and burrata. If you've had it, you know just how good it is. If you haven't had it, you should. Can't make it to Mozza, not to worry. The Mozza Cookbook has the recipe and if you can get your hands on good burrata, this is exactly what you should do with it.

My take on the Mozza caprese

Do you love burrata? What's your favorite cheese and your favorite way to eat it? Maybe you should schedule some burrata time this weekend and then come back and tell me all about it post cheese consumption!

Beets+Oranges= BFF

Beets and oranges go together like Bert and Ernie. This week we roasted up some beets and made a few different beet salads and this is the one I liked best.

All you need are a few roasted beets (or the packaged roasted beets from Trader Joes), oranges, salt, pepper, goat cheese, and balsamic glaze or vinegar (I got mine at Whole Foods).  No fancy recipe needed, just toss together and drizzle with the balsamic.

Happy Friday everyone and try something new this weekend!

Getting messy in the kitchen with my girls!

Watching the Bachelor has been a long standing tradition for my friends and I. Nothing is more fun than a night with the girls to watch these women throw themselves at whatever average joe is up for grabs. When deciding what to do for dinner beforehand, 2 of my girlfriends asked that I lead a little cooking class so they could pick up a new kitchen skill. Nothing fancy here, just an old fashioned, home made pizza party. I picked up all the ingredients from Trader Joes to make a few pizzas, brussel sprouts with bacon and a sherry shallot vinaigrette (modified recipe from Mozza cookbook), and bacon wrapped dates stuffed with blue cheese. Of course we had wine a plenty and something sweet for dessert. We had so much fun in the kitchen together and the girls made a delicious dinner!

The makings for bacon wrapped dates stuffed with blue cheese

E working on the dates

Blue cheese going into the middle of the date

Quartered brussel sprouts

Crisped bacon

Pizza dough

Roasted tomatoes with olive oil, salt, pepper, and shallots

M stirring the onions while the carmelize

Mid-caramelization

Sauteed criminis with thyme

Sous Chef, Breaker

The complete dishes:

Dates ready for snacking

Brussel sprouts with bacon and shallot vinaigrette

Pizza with mozzarella, artichokes, caramelized onions, roasted tomatoes, and salami

Pizza with mushrooms, carmelized onions, and goat cheese

Dinner time!

Macarons to finish off the evening

And then it was time to watch Bachelor Ben and the most dramatic episode ever!

Do you have a favorite dish to make with girlfriends? Are you watching the Bachelor? What are your thoughts, spill them all!!

Like a Virgin: Sous Vide for the Very First Time

A few years ago R and I took a free class at Williams-Sonoma on Sous Vide. We were fascinated and knew that we'd get a sous vide at some point. We're still waiting for that someday to come along. Sous Vide cooking basically is cooking food in a warm water bath set at the temperature in which the food should be done cooking at for several hours. We received a Food Saver from my parents for the holidays and were finally able to put it to good use. After reading about using a slow cooker as a make shift sous vide, we knew we had to check it out. While I was at work, Rich seasoned some chicken thighs and sealed them in the Food Saver and got it started in the "sous vide." Some more information for cooking chicken with this method can be found here and here.  It took a few hours to cook and then we seared it in a pan for just a little crust (which didn't actually give any crust, we'll have to work on that!) and it came out great! The chicken was very tender and juicy. We will definitely have to experiment with this some more to get it down perfectly, but we were pleased with our first attempt. We also through an egg in to test it out and that wasn't half bad either!

It all starts with the Food Saver

It's cooking!

Fresh out of the bath

And into the pan with a little oil

Finished product

Cooked all the way through

Time for the egg

60 degree egg

Get your yoke on!

 Do you cook sous vide? I'd love to hear about your experiences!