Cream colored ponies and crisp apple streudels
Doorbells and sleigh bells and schnitzel with noodles
Wild geese that fly with the moon on their wings
These are a few of my favorite things

I am, or should be, studying… we’ll catch up soon!

So apparently Coolio is a food aficionado as well as rap star and has released a cook book entitled Cookin’ With Coolio. Check out his interview and be amused.

I’m not a huge fan of the term “meat substitute.” Whenever I hear it, images of tofurkey and tofu burgers pop into my head; as if that is the embodiment of vegetarian cuisine (for the record I have never had tofurkey nor a tofu burger and I am in no rush to change this). I associate those images with a desire to mimic dishes in a vegetarian way, inherently placing the original dish as the benchmark; the brass ring to aspire to.

Vegetables. Are awesome (yeah, I said it). Fruit. Is awesome. Pasta, bread, beans… you get the idea. And they’re all awesome for their own unique qualities. There. Rant done.

I really enjoyed the tostada I had while on my southwest trip. I’d never heard even heard of them before but I knew I wanted more. This sucker had a “meat substitute,” but I have no idea what it was (some restaurants have gotten really good at that stuff), so I figured screw it. Let’s do it anyway. I’m really happy with how this turned out.

These refried beans are not fried, but just cooked for a really long time. Sorry, I’m not frying beans in lard. You can find fried tortillas at any mega mart.

Two good friends have opened up a cookie shop, Palmetto Pastries, featuring iced sugar cookies for the holidays! Click here to find out more!

These are thick and delicate sugar cookies that are iced with our almond flavored icing. We only use royal icing to pipe phrases and special designs on the cookies, ensuring that you won’t bite into a hard layer of icing over a soft delicious cookie.

Don’t miss out! They are accepting orders now through December 18th to ensure quality and efficient delivery.

Please tell them to send me some free cookies as well so that I can really give a stellar review 🙂

The cold season means root vegetables; something that isn’t particularly appreciated by most. You’ve got your “cool kids” available year round; the carrots, the potatoes; and then you’ve got the red-headed step children; turnips, rutabagas, parsnips, etc. They only get to leave their room when things get cold (maybe) and even then they’re not appreciated by many. Poor turnips….

A big reason for this “lack of cool” is that fall/winter root vegetables tend to be more bitter than their more ubiquitous cousins. While it can be argued that this provides the opportunity for a more complex flavor, this assumes the cook knows how to draw out this complexity. Otherwise, all you’ve got is a really bitter tasting dinner and an overwhelming desire to give Pizza Hut a call.

I tend to consider roasting as my first course of action with a vegetable I’m not comfortable with. Really, is there a vegetable that doesn’t have the potential to roast well? Carrots caramelize when roasted, releasing their sugars for a natural sweetening. This seemed to be an excellent pairing with turnips.