DC's Challenge - Thai Tofu Satay

The January 2010 DC challenge was hosted by Cuppy of Cuppylicious and she chose a delicious Thai-inspired recipe for Pork Satay from the book 1000 Recipes by Martha Day.

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Obviously, I wasn't going to make this with piggy.

So, I used tofu.

(On a side note - this Jan. 2010 marks the 10th anniversary of my vegetarianism)

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I love Thai food - love, love and I've eaten a lot of it. On the west coast, on the east coast....in my house in the middle of nowhere.

I did not enjoy this recipe and the Ladies ate it.

(Anyone seeing a pattern with my Daring Baking/Cooking stuff being eaten by the Ladies???)

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I like tofu, but I have specific ways of preparing it.

Not coating it in onion and garlic. Uncooked onion and garlic!

I drank pots of mint tea to get the taste out of my mouth!

I pressed the tofu.

Then added the "flavoring" mixture.


And let in marinate overnight.

Then I baked it in the oven.

The tofu was still white inside! Yuck.

And it didn't have any flavor, besides onion/garlic.

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In my opinion: The mix needed much more liquid. Tofu is like a sponge and it will soak up whatever flavor you put it in. Much, much less onion and garlic. And cook the onion - caramelize it, before putting it with the tofu. Add more soy sauce, some rice vinegar, rice wine, a little chile pepper, ginger, ground pepper, maybe some smoked salt.

And cook it in a dish with the sauce, don't bother with the skewers.

DC's Challenge - Salmon en Croute

The 2009 Daring Cooks challenge was hosted by Simone of Junglefrog Cooking. Simone chose Salmon en Croute (or alternative recipes for Beef Wellington or Vegetable en Croute) from Good Food Online.

This was a fun recipe.

I enjoyed making and eating it.

It's also something I would make again.

Yay! Three out of three!

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So basically it is salmon with a cream/spinach sauce in a pastry crust.

Now....I'm going to share a secret family recipe.

For crust.

3 ingredients

1 cup of flour

1/2 cup of cold butter

1/4 cup - with one egg

and if their is room in the cup measure liquid of your choice

I used orange juice this time, but I've used wine, other juices and milk in the past.

Grind your flour and butter together. Mix your egg and liquid together.

Mix egg/liquid into flour/butter. Form into a ball and refrigerate for at least an hour.

Roll out the dough.

This dough is very nice to work with and can be rolled out paper thin, if you want.

Cutting out some shapes for the top of the salmon packages.

I made this in November, so leaves seemed appropriate.

$1 fillet of salmon topped with cream cheese, spinach, dill, a little onion, salt and pepper.

Egg washing pastry cut outs on to the salmon packages.

Pastry leaves.

More egg washing.

After baking.

Yummy!

Looks fancy.

Was cheap.

Tasted great!

A++

Daring Baker's November Challenge - Cannoli

The November 2009 Daring Bakers Challenge was chosen and hosted by Lisa Michele of Parsley, Sage, Desserts and Line Drives. She chose the Italian Pastry, Cannolo (Cannoli is plural)........

Ta da!

Ok, I'm a few (24) hours late posting this challenge, but it really wasn't my fault!

It was the sun's fault.

Yes, the sun. If you have ever been to the north in the Fall/Winter you may have noticed a lack of something. Sun. Yes people, we invented SAD. The sun went on vacation to Florida for a week and then another week and...yeah, you get the idea.

I refused to do the challenge until I had natural light to photograph my cannoli! It was a great excuse!

Yesterday the sun came out.

Entonces - aqui estan!

If you want the recipe, please go to Lisa Michele's site.

We start with a dough.

An amazing dough!

It went together like a dream and felt like a Granny's bingo wings.

Of course, if your Granny makes cannoli she probably doesn't have bingo wings, 'cause cannoil take some WWF upper body strength.

Good.

Work up an appetite for those cannoli.

P.S. I used a nice riesling wine in this.

Rolling the dough out.
Use those muscles!
I tried to use a pasta maker loaned to me by my parents.
Stupid machine ate half my dough before I gave up using it.
I found taking a small piece and rolling it out super, super thin and then wrapping the piece around the cannolo form worked the best.



My cannoli forms.
Long story.
My part of the country is better known for leftsa, than for cannoli, so it was impossible to find cannoli forms.
Except.....my Mom went to the local hardware store and found these lengths of pipe for me!
Yay! Copper!
Very heavy.
Are real cannoli forms heavy?




Rolling dough around form.




Dough ready for frying.



Dough fresh from the fryer.

Cannoli with ricotta/lemon filling and cinnamon Red Hot pear sauce.

I canned the pear sauce* myself.

Fancy tea party, anyone?

My entry for the Royal Foodie Joust.

Cannoli with ginger/fennel/cinnamon pear sauce.



So, what did I think of this challenge?

It was a good one.

It expanded my cooking horizons.

I tried cannoli in a Little Italy bakery 2 years ago, but I wasn't too impressed.

Homemade cannoli are much better.

And my pear sauce is awesome. ;)

*Red Hot Pear Sauce

Remember 3 months ago when I asked you all what I should do with a ton of pears?

And you suggested pear sauce?

Ta da!

3 months later.... Recipe here

I decided to try out a savory cannoli idea. I used a slice of locally made smoked cheddar, pickled herring and a dollop of my own pear chutney. It was good.

Daring Cook's November Challenge

The November 2009 Daring Cooks challenge was brought to you by Audax of Audax Artifex and Rose of The Bite Me Kitchen. They chose sushi as the challenge.

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I want to thank Audax and Rose for the challenge.

It truly was a challenge!

The recipe is really, really long.

I didn't post it, because I wanted more room for my pics, but go to Audax or Rose's blog to see the step by step directions.

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Before this, I had never tasted sushi (or wanted to taste it).
And now that I've tasted it-

I hate it.

Let's just get that out of the way.

The nori tastes and smells like a stagnant lake.

The rice is sticky and sweet. And not in a good way.

Although, you might remember I said here in my Pumpkin/Bulghur post
that I wasn't crazy about white rice.

It also seems like a lot of work and mess for pretty, but inedible food.

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First, the spiral sushi roll with baby corn, coconut black beans*, fried red and yellow pepper.

Ta da!



I like wasabi and peppers so I ate that.


See below for the fate of the sushi.
Bwahaha! (evil laughter)



The dragon roll.


So cute!


And so yucky!





I used fake crab sticks and fried peppers inside.


Avocado on top and red pepper for the flames.



Black beans for the eyes.




And the nigiri sushi.
I thought I might like these, because they don't have any nori.


But it's a huge chunk of rice with toppings.


I ate the tops.


Yum! Smoked cheddar cheese, rum/ginger/cinnamon syrup raisins and kiwi slices.










I ate some of the rice with coconut black beans and topped it with avocado.

It was tasty.


What did I do with all of that sushi?




My girls had a sushi party!

They didn't like the nori.

Or the rice.

Too sticky for chicken beaks.

They picked out the fillings.

Silly chickens!

They usually gobble up rice.

*Coconut Black Beans

1 cup dry black beans, rinsed

1 can coconut milk

1 small dried chile

1/2 tsp dried onion
1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp ginger powder

salt to taste

Rinse beans. Add beans and 6 cups water to med. saucepot. Bring to a boil and boil for 10 mins. Remove from burner, cover and let soak for 1 hour.

Drain beans and rinse (again).

Add rinsed beans, coconut milk and spices to the saucepot.

Simmer at med./low heat until the coconut milk volume has been reduced in half.

About 1 hour.

Beans should be tender by now, but still holding their shape.

Add salt to taste and serve.