Thai Peanut Sauce

I'm going to give you this recipe for Thai peanut sauce because I love you. I think you're wonderful and you're a hard worker and you deserve something delicious in your life. I've made a few different recipes in the past and all of them have been unsatisfactory. Too peanuty or too spicy or too sweet or too thick or not thick enough. So when I came across this one through Pinterest (on this site) I was skeptical but willing. You guys, it's so good that when I took my first taste I jumped up and down for joy. And then I dipped a cucumber in it and passed out. And then I made chicken tacos with this slathered all over it and I licked the plate clean of any that dripped out.

Here.  Enjoy.

• One 13.5-ounce can of full-fat coconut milk (I used the light coconut milk because they were mysteriously out of full-fat. It turned out great.)
• 1/4 cup Thai red curry paste
• ¾ cup unsweetened (natural) creamy peanut butter (if you have to use regular peanut butter cut back on the sugar)
• ½ tablespoon salt
• ¾ cup sugar
• 2 tablespoons of apple cider vinegar or white vinegar
• ½ cup water

Throw everything into a pot. Bring it to a boil then lower to a simmer. Simmer for 3-5 minutes and then let cool. Pour it on everything. Brush your teeth with it. Just stick a straw in a big vat of it and go to town.  (While you're shopping for these ingredients you should also get some shredded carrots, shredded cabbage, scallions, cilantro, and cucumbers as you will need these to go with anything that you're putting it on.

 

Last night at book club I had some out with a bunch of sliced cucumbers and near the end I just took the whole tray and put it on my lap and finished them off. It makes a lot so I just keep it the fridge in glass jars and supposedly it will keep for weeks but I promise you I will not find that out. Tonight I'm going to make Thai pizza with it. Tomorrow it will probably be Thai noodles. I think it would be great on a salad.

Special Occasion Orange French Toast

Recipe: Special Occasion Orange French Toast
Like/Don't Like: Yum.


I make something called Special Occasion French Toast. I call it that because you should only make it if you have something spectacular to celebrate or you're about to run a marathon. It's a bit on the decadent side. It involves layering slices of french bread and a cream cheese mixture and then pouring eggs and heavy cream all over it and then letting it sit over night and then before baking the whole thing you dump butter and brown sugar and nuts over the top. Better make that two marathons.

But it was a special occasion on Saturday and I needed something to feed a lot of people so I decided to make it. Only I wanted to do it a little differently so I found a recipe and behold: Special Occasion Orange French Toast.

It was divine. And it actually baked up nicer than the original Special Occasion French Toast. I made a few changes to the recipe though. They are:

1.) I only put in half the sugar it asked for in the egg mixture. I thought 1 cup sounded excessive.
2.) Instead of the mandarin oranges I used the zest and juice of two oranges because chunks of baked oranges sounded gross.
3.) It says to mix equal parts of the orange butter sauce with maple syrup to serve on top but that just sounded like a diabetic coma waiting to happen. I served both on the side and some people mixed and others didn't. I didn't and I thought the sauce alone was heavenly. Those who did mix said it was great too.
4.) I added a dash of salt with the dash of nutmeg.

Changes I'm planning on making:

1.) I'm going to try it with one less egg in both the egg mixture and the filling. It didn't taste eggy but the texture was a little too custardy for my taste.
2.) It was a subtle orange flavor and I want it to be a little more pronounced so I may throw in some marmalade to the filling.

I hope you like jogging because you're going to need to after you eat this.

Pumpkin Soup

It was Pumpkin Party time last Saturday, which gave me a good reason to try out a new recipe. And it was a winner. The pumpkin party originated with Wendy's pumpkin soup but since Wendy left we haven't had soup at the party and I missed it. But I didn't want to make Wendy's soup because I didn't want to have to deal with an actual pumpkin. Soup should be easy and pumpkins are not anything like easy. This one has pumpkin puree and, bonus, tastes a little like pumpkin pie. I don't know about you but when I eat anything with pumpkin my mouth always enjoys it but my brain is confused if it tastes more like a gourd then a pie. It's not really sweet but it has all the same spices as pumpkin pie. It was extremely easy and warm and delicious. I can't remember where I got it from but I found a few variations on it and I changed it up a bit so why don't we just say it's the Yummy Pumpkin Soup Recipe:

1 (30 oz.) can pumpkin puree
1 quart chicken stock (low sodium)
1 cup half and half
1 shallot minced
3 Tbsp butter
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp cayenne pepper
1 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp clove
1/2 tsp all spice
1/2 ginger
1 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp brown sugar
2 Tbsp molasses
6-8 strips of bacon cooked and chopped
blue cheese crumbled

Melt 1 Tbsp butter in large pot and cook shallots for about 2 minutes. Add stock, pumpkin, half and half, remaining 2 Tbsp of butter and all the spices and sugar and molasses. Combine and simmer on low for 10 minutes. While it's simmering you can cook your bacon. I added more spice as needed but it's mostly to your taste. Top with bacon and blue cheese. Bacon is an obvious topper, all things are better with bacon. But you may question the blue cheese. Don't. It totally works here. Even Katie, who doesn't like blue cheese, said it made the soup. I agree.

Chicken & Dumplings

Recipe: Chicken & Dumplings
Like/Don't Like: Mmmm. Warm & tasty. Like.

So it's really cold here. Let me amend that, it's really cold here in California. Which means that it's about 55 during the day and about 40 at night. Brrrr. And it's rainy. Cold and cloudy and rainy. Anyone feel sorry for me now? I didn't think so. But that does not change the fact that for the last week I've been very chilled. So I was in need of comfort food last night. Warm comfort food with dumplings. Because nothing says, "Let me hug your tummy" more than dumplings, right? It was too late to think about stew, which is my go-to vehicle for dumplings. So I wracked my brain and remembered the one time I had chicken and dumplings. It was heavenly. This may have something to do with the fact that Courtney made it. Anyone who knows Courtney knows what I'm talking about. In heaven, all of our meals will taste like Courtney made them. I digress...I remember it being warm and creamy and delicious. And last night as I drove home from work in the cold, cold rain all I could think about was how perfect chicken and dumplings would be.

And it was. Warm and delicious. I got the recipe off of allrecipes.com but I changed it so much that it doesn't really even resemble it so here's what I did, including the changes that I will make the next time I make it, which may be tonight since it is still cold and rainy and I'm still a wimp.

1 - 2 chicken breasts cut into bite size pieces
some celery chopped
some carrots chopped
some onion finely chopped
maybe some minced garlic if you want it
whatever other vegetables you want to add, maybe potatoes or peas or corn
some Italian seasoning
salt and pepper
whatever other seasonings you feel like, this is your soup, go for it.
1 box of low sodium chicken broth
1 cup milk
2 Tbsp. flour

In a big pot heat up about a teaspoon of olive oil and throw in everything but the broth. Cook it until the chicken no longer is pink on the outside and the onions are translucent. Pour in the broth, bring to a boil, then reduce to a simmer. Cover and cook for about 10 minutes, or until the chicken is completely cooked and the veggies are soft. Mix together milk and flour until smooth and pour into soup. Return to a medium boil.

Dumplings:

1 cup flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp white sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 Tbsp margarine
1/2 cup milk

Stir together flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt in medium size bowl. Cut in butter until crumbly. Stir in milk to make a soft dough. Drop large spoonfuls into the boiling soup. Cover and simmer for 15 minutes without lifting the lid. DON'T LIFT THE LID! Ha. I said that just to scare you. I don't actually know what will happen if you lift the lid but maybe we don't want to find out. Insert a toothpick into a dumpling and if it comes out clean then your gold. Last night I didn't have any flour so I used corn starch to thicken it and refrigerated biscuits for the dumplings. They worked alright but I'm still craving the real deal.

I have no idea how much this will make. The dumplings soaked up a lot of the liquid and it was enough for me and Katie with just enough for leftovers for my lunch. So I've upped the liquid ingredients here. Probably about 4.

Pumpkin Ravioli

Recipe: Pumpkin Shallot Ravioli with Sage Butter

Like/Don't Like: Like

Note: This recipe makes me sound like I actually cook fancy food all the time. Don't believe it. Although I like to cook and try out recipes I usually have toast for dinner.

My dear friend Wendy started a tradition many years ago of a pumpkin party. She would make her pumpkin soup and we'd all bring something pumpkiny to share. And because she's Wendy, there would usually be fun pumpkin games for us to play. Wendy and her cute family has since moved to Texas and the pumpkin party kind of died down. But Laura revived it this year (Hooray Laura!) and coupled it with the Little House on the Prairie - Best of Almanzo Marathon (Hooray Almanzo!) - both completely in the Spirit of Wendy.

Because pumpkin parties of yore have usually consisted of Wendy's soup and Katie's Yummy Pumpkin Stuff (Hooray YPS!) and about 10 other sweet pumpkin desserts I decided I would branch out and do something savory instead. You want to know how many savory pumpkin recipes are out there? Five. And three of them were for pumpkin ravioli. So that's what I did.

It turned out better than I expected. Mostly because it was easy. I mean, really easy. And kind of fun to make. It made me want to wear a chef's hat and speak Italian. I'm a believer in trying out new recipes on people (just ask my book club) and sometimes they don't always turn out as I would hope. But aside from one completely disintegrating in the water, they worked out nicely and tasted pretty good. And did I mention how easy they were to make. Do not be afraid to try this recipe. I had a ton of pumpkin left over so I just tripled the recipe and made a bunch and shoved them in the freezer, where they will probably sit for months and months and months. Amanda and I had this conversation just the other day. Our freezers aren't so much freezers but curio cases for ancient relics of dinners past. It makes for a fun guessing game.

Some tips on the recipe:

1.) These are large ravioli so don't over-stuff them because they will explode. I tried quartering the wanton wrappers and they made for really adorable wee ravioli but I aged about 34 years making them. Much less time consuming doing the full size.

2.) They're not kidding when they say save some of the boiling water. They're slippery when they come out of the pot but they get sticky fast. Actually, why don't you just skip the whole serving dish thing and plate everything instead. They're kind of delicate and will rip easily and I thought it was easier to just put it straight from the pot to the plate and pour a little sauce over it.

3.) And I do mean a little sauce. Butter is terrific but it's better with just a drizzle.

4.) I actually liked more sage in the filling the second time I made them. About 2 tsp.

5.) You can very easily make this a meaty dish but putting some Italian sausage in it. Yum.

6.) I think they would taste better with real pasta so if you have a pasta maker and you're crazy go ahead and make it. And while you're at it, why don't you grow an herb garden because I actually had to buy an herb garden just to have fresh sage.