Yes please.

I thought it was going to be a close poll last week, but a dip of some sort won by a landslide!

I’m big believer in the general philosophy that almost any appetizer can be made into a dip of some sort. It’s really just simple physics. If it tastes good on it’s own, it’ll probably taste good processed down, baked, and put on a piece of bread or chip.

Sometimes, the dip is even easier to make then the original appetizer which is an added bonus.

That’s definitely true for this recipe.

There are two ways to make jalapeno poppers that I know of, both of which are delicious but a bit of work. This recipe pushes both of those methods aside and just mashes a metric ton of jalapenos with cheese.

How could it not be delicious?!

Jalapeno Popper Dip

Yield: Serves 6-8.

Prep Time: 15 minutes

Total Time: 50 minutes

Ingredients:

1 pound cream cheese
1 cup mayonnaise
1 cup cheddar cheese, grated
5-6 jalapeno peppers, minced
1 poblano pepper, minced (opt.)
1 Tablespoon olive oil
1 cup Panko bread crumbs
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
1/4 cup butter, melted
Tortilla chips, for serving

Directions:

1) Mince jalapenos and poblano. Leave the seeds in.

2) Add olive oil to a skillet and saute peppers over medium heat for about 4 minutes until they soften.

3) In a large bowl, mix together sauteed peppers with cream cheese, grated cheddar, and mayo. Stir well to combine.

4) In a small bowl, mix together Panko, butter, and parmesan cheese.

5) In a 1 1/2-2 quart buttered baking dish, scoop in the dip and spread it evenly in the dish. Top with panko topping.

6) Bake for 30 minutes at 350 degrees until cheese is melted and topping is browned.

7) Serve immediately with tortilla cheese or toasted bread.

Adapted from a Tablespoon recipe.

Pepper Overload

I know. This recipe has a lot of jalapenos in it. In fact, I’d bet that the only recipe you would ever make that has more jalapenos is if you were to make actual jalapeno poppers.

The truth though is that there is so much creamy stuff in this dip that the heat of the jalapenos is really reduced. If you only did one or two, you wouldn’t get any heat at all from them.

And don’t worry about seeding the things. Just wash them and dice them up. I like to quarter mine into segments and then dice them.

Leave the seeds.

I threw in a poblano in my batch just for fun, but I’m not really sure it gave the final dip much flavor. You can leave it out without too much worry I think.

Once you have all your peppers diced, saute them in a skillet with a drizzle of olive oil over medium heat for a few minutes. You just want them to soften a bit and cook off some of the liquid.

Just a few minutes will do the trick.

Trust me on this.

Mixing the Dip

There’s a lot of creamy stuff in this dip. No doubt about that.

I just did the full fat version because, hey… this is for the Super Bowl!

If you wanted to make this somewhat healthier though you could:

1) Cut the mayo amount in half.
2) Substitute the mayo entirely for Greek yogurt.
3) Sub out a quarter to half of the cream cheese for whipped silken tofu.

The third one might change the texture slightly, but I doubt it would be very noticeable. It’s a substitution that I frequently use in dips like this.

The creamy business.

But like I said… this is for the Super Bowl so why not just do it all the way?!

Once your peppers are done cooking, just stir everything together. Pretty straightforward!

This will even smell spicy.

The Topping

Probably the most common type of jalapeno popper is the fried ones with a golden crust. To get the same effect in dip form, just mix together some Panko bread crumbs, Parmesan cheese, and melted butter in a bowl.

If you don’t have Panko, you can definitely use normal bread crumbs.

Butter is important.

Baking the Dish

In a medium-sized casserole dish, scoop in your dip mixture and top it with your bread crumb topping.

I’d recommend buttering the dish before adding the dip just to make sure it doesn’t stick badly. It would be horrible to lose some dip!

Don't forget to butter the dish!

Bake this whole thing for about 25-30 minutes at 350 degrees.

It’s done with the cheese is all melted and the topping is nice and browned.

Really nicely browned.

Serve this sucker as soon as possible with lots of tortilla chips or toasted bread.

The chip to dip.

This is about as easy as a dip gets. It’s definitely way easier than making actual jalapeno poppers, but the flavor is really very similar.

If you happen to have leftovers, let me tell you a little secret. Put a few spoonfuls of it in a rice and bean burrito. Amazingness.

Well, this worked!

One of my favorite breakfasts or brunches to make on a lazy weekend day is crepes.

I like them because the batter is very easy to make and once you get the hang of them, I actually think they are easier to make than pancakes!

Plus you can fill them with all kinds of delicious stuff.

The problem I’ve encountered with crepes is that it’s hard to feed a crowd with them. You can only make one at a time and people usually want 2-3 for a meal so if you’re feeding four people, that’s 10-12 crepes!

Then one day the idea of a crepe pie smacked me over the head and I had to try it immediately.

It worked better than I ever thought it would.

Savory Crepe Pie

Yield: Serves 4-6.

Prep Time: 40 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour

Ingredients:

Basic Crepe Batter:
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon sugar
2 large eggs
1.5 cups milk
2 tablespoons melted butter (plus some for the pan)

Filling:
8 ounces crimini mushrooms, sliced
1 yellow pepper, diced
1 poblano pepper, diced
1/2 onion, minced
1 clove garlic, minced
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme
6-8 ounces cheddar cheese, grated
Salt and pepper
Butter, for the pie pan

Helpful Equipment:
Large nonstick skillet or crepe pan

Directions:

1) Make your crepe batter by mixing the dry ingredients together in a bowl and the wet ingredients (except butter) in a separate bowl. Stir wet ingredients into dry ingredients. Whisk in melted butter. Batter should be pretty runny. Let batter sit while you prep the filling.

2) Slice mushrooms, dice peppers, onions, and garlic. Add mushrooms to a large skillet with a drizzle of olive oil and saute over medium-high heat until the mushrooms release their liquid and soften, about 5-6 minutes.

3) Add other filling ingredients (except cheese) to the skillet and cook for another 4-5 minutes until peppers soften. Season filling with salt and pepper, red pepper flakes, and a pinch of dried thyme. Set filling aside.

4) Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

5) Using a large nonstick skillet, or crepe pan, add a small amount of butter over medium-high heat. Pour in about 1/2 cup of crepe batter and swirl it around the pan so it flattens out. Cook for 30-45 seconds on the first side until it firms up, then carefully flip the crepe and cook for another 15-20 seconds. Repeat until you have 4 large crepes. The batter will make 5-6 crepes so you can mess up one without worry.

6) Butter a pie pan and lay a crepe in the bottom of the pan. Add half of the mushroom filling and 1/3 of the grated cheese.

7) Top with a second crepe and 1/3 of the cheese.

8) Top with a third crepe. So the middle layer is just cheese basically.

9) Add rest of filling and cheese to top of the pie and top with the fourth crepe. Kind of crimp the edges of the crepe around the edges of the pie so it is mostly sealed.

10) Bake at 400 degrees for 20 minutes.

11) Let cool briefly and then slice and serve!

The Filling

Over the years, I’ve put together dozens of different crepe fillings. Sweet, savory, fruity, cheesy… you name it, you can probably stuff it in a crepe.

So I don’t want you to get the impression that this filling is the only filling that you can use for this recipe. This is just the one I used and it worked really well.

Good winter veggies.

Rinse and slice up the mushrooms and dice up your veggies. It’s okay to keep them in pretty big chunks. You don’t want the veggies to disappear in the dish.

Great flavors.

Then just add a few tablespoons of olive oil to a large skillet and toss in the mushrooms. Cook them over medium high heat until they start to soften and release their water. Then you can add in all the other veggies and continue to cook until they are soft.

Total cooking time for this will probably be in the 10 minute range. There’s actually a lot of wiggle room in how much you cook the veggies. It is important to saute them though so you can cook off some of the water in the veggies. Otherwise the filling would be very watery in your final dish.

When the veggies are cooked, season the filling with salt and pepper, red pepper flakes, and dried thyme.

Very important.

The Crepes

This is my basic crepe batter recipe. It’s never failed me really. Don’t fix it if it ain’t broken right?

Whisk together the dry ingredients in a bowl and stir the wet ingredients together in a separate bowl (minus the melted butter). Then stir the wet into the dry and finally stir in the butter.

Ideally, let this batter sit for a few minutes before making the crepes.

I like to make the batter, then make the filling, and by the time the filling is done the batter is rested and ready to go.

Pretty easy batter.

Like I said, I find cooking crepes easier than pancakes honestly. That said, you might mess up one or two. Don’t worry about it if you do. Since these are going in a layered dish, they don’t have to be perfect.

When you’re ready to cook a crepe, just add a small amount of butter to a large nonstick pan or a crepe pan and then pour in about 1/3-1/2 cup of crepe batter. Swirl it around in the pan so it flows out and forms an even, very thin crepe.

Cook the crepe for about 45 seconds on the first side and then give it a flip. Flipping is always the part that people mess up but just do your best. Like I said, they don’t have to be perfect.

Takes maybe a minute!

You need four crepes to make this dish so just go ahead and make four and stack them up on a plate or something.

Making the Pie

You can use almost any kind of pie dish that you have. Is it important to have something round though so the crepes fit snuggly in there.

To make sure the crepes don’t stick to your pan, butter the thing really well.

Butter is important.

Then lay in one crepe and make sure to push it down so it’s snug against all the walls of the pie pan. Then add about 1/2 of your mushroom filling and 1/3 of your grated cheese.

Bottom layer.

Then toss on the second crepe. For the middle layer, I just did an all cheese layer. So add another 1/3 of the cheese to this layer.

Speaking of cheese, be sure to use a good flavorful cheese for this. You don’t want to use a lot of cheese, but make sure to use good stuff! I used a nice sharp white cheddar.

Just cheese on this layer!

Add on the third crepe and then the rest of your filling stuff.

It should all stack up very nicely.

More of the same.

Put the top crepe on and kind of press the edges down around the sides of the pie pan. Again, don’t freak out if it isn’t perfect.

Stick this whole thing in a 400 degree oven for about 20 minutes.

The great part about baking this is that the top and bottom crepes actually get a bit crispy which is nice and then the center is just this awesome savory party.

So good!

I was worried that this would just fall apart when I sliced it, but if you let it cool for just a minute or two when you pull it out of the oven, it actually slices really nicely.

You can even make out all the layers.

One of my favorite brunches.

If this is all your serving, assume about 1/4 of the pie per person. If you’re serving this with some other stuff then you could cut it into sixths and be fine.

The good news is that you can make these in advance and then just toss them in the oven if you’re having people over.

This is the right way to do crepes for a group!

The space in sweet bread is important.

A space has never been so important in a food name. Sweet bread is vastly different than sweetbread.

Sweetbread, of course, being the thymus gland of an animal (delicious in Po Boys) and sweet bread being an actual loaf of bread that happens to be sweet.

It can be confusing in writing, but it’s much more confusing in speech.

A recent conversation I had with Betsy:

Bets: What are you cooking today?

Nick: Sweet bread.

Bets: Awesome! My favorite. I can’t wait to try it!

Many hours later…

Bets: I thought you said you were make sweetbreads?!

Nick: Sorry. I should’ve been more specific. I was making sweet space bread.

It turns out though that sweet bread is also a wonderfully delicious thing and one that I’d never made before it won the poll last week. I was really happy with how it turned out!

Portuguese Sweet Bread

Yield: 2 loaves

Prep Time: 30 minutes

Total Time: 6 hours

Ingredients:

Starter:
1/2 Cup bread flour
1 Tablespoon sugar
2.25 Teaspoons instant yeast
1/2 Cup water

Dough:
6 Tablespoons sugar
1 Teaspoon salt
1/4 Cup powdered milk
4 Tablespoons unsalted butter
2 Large eggs
1 Teaspoon lemon (or almond) extract
1 Teaspoon orange extract
1 Teaspoon vanilla extract
3 Cups bread flour
6 Tablespoons water, room temperature

Egg Wash:
1 Egg, whisked with 1 Teaspoon water

Helpful Equipment:
Stand Mixer

Directions:

1) Start sponge by mixing starter ingredients in a medium bowl. Stir until it makes a smooth batter. Cover and let sit at room temperature for 60-90 minutes, until the sponge is very foamy.

2) To make dough, combine sugar, salt, powdered milk, and butter in large bowl or with a paddle attachment in a stand mixer. Combine until smooth.

3) Mix in eggs, one at a time, and extracts.

4) Mix in the sponge and flour and switch to the dough hook. Mix on medium with the dough hook until the dough is very supple and soft. If it is at all wet or sticky add more flour by the spoonful. Alternatively, you can knead by hand on a floured surface until the desired consistency is reached. This will take 10-12 minutes with a mixer or 15-16 minutes by hand.

5) Add dough ball to a lightly greased bowl, cover and let ferment until it doubles in size, about 2 hours.

6) Remove dough from bowl and divide into two pieces. Form each piece into a tight round ball (a boule). Lightly oil two 9-inch pie pans and place one boule in each pan, seam side down. Cover loosely and let rise for another 2-3 hours, until the dough doubles in size.

7) Brush loaves with egg wash.

8) Bake loaves at 350 degrees for 50-60 minutes until they are a deep brown and sound slightly hollow when thumped.

9) Remove from the oven and let cool on wire racks. Let cool for at least 45 minutes before slicing.

Adapted from The Bread Baker's Apprentice.

Making the Starter

Like a lot of real bread recipes, this loaf involves a starter. Don’t worry, this particular starter is really easy and doesn’t take days to make. You just need a few ingredients.

The basics.

Mix these all together with some water and let it ferment for 60-90 minutes until it gets nice and foamy. This also has the added benefit of making sure your yeast is nice and lively.

After the rise time, it should be really foamy and on the verge of collapse.

It's alive!

Making the Dough

If there is one book for which I’m very afraid to alter the recipes, it’s The Bread Baker’s Apprentice. The recipes are so specific that I just always feel like I’m committing some sort of cardinal sin if I change them.

So I feel obligated to disclose two changes that I made to this recipe. One I made on purpose and one I made on accident. Neither change made for a bad loaf.

First, I used 4 tablespoons of butter in my recipe while the original recipe called for 2 tablespoons of butter and 2 tablespoons of vegetable shortening. I made this change on purpose because I didn’t have any vegetable shortening!

Second, the original recipe called for lemon extract but I used almond extract in my version. The only reason I made this change is because I apparently cannot read.

Regardless, the one ingredient in this recipe that Mr. Reinhart says you 100% cannot substitute is powdered milk. I get that. It gives the final loaf a very specific flavor and texture. It’s not really negotiable.

Powdered milk is apparently important.

To start the dough, add the butter (or butter and shortening if you’re using both) to a bowl with the salt, sugar, and powdered milk and kind of work them together with a large spoon.

You could also add them to a stand mixer and beat them with a paddle attachment. You basically want to cream them together and I did kind of a piss poor job of it. Ideally, it would be one creamy texture.

Not my best job...

Anyway, then add your eggs one at a time, and the extracts and continue to mix.

Once all that is mixed together, add your starter that has been foaming away along with your bread flour and water.

That starter is cool stuff.

While you can definitely make this recipe with a stand mixer, I went ahead and made it by hand just to be different.

If you do use a mixer, switch to the dough hook after you get your ingredients together and stir it on medium for 10-12 minutes until the dough ball is a nice, soft texture.

If you’re doing it by hand, stir everything together until you get a rough ball. Something kind of like this…

Dough?

Scoop this out onto a lightly floured counter and start kneading! Here’s the bad news… this will take 15-16 minutes depending on your kneading skills. If the dough gets sticky at any point, knead in another spoonful of flour.

The resulting dough ball should be very smooth and soft and easy to work with.

Once you get it there, add it to a lightly oiled bowl so it can rise!

Dough!

The First Rising

Let the dough rise until it about doubles in size. This should take about two hours. This dough is incredibly soft and easy to work with. It actually reminded me of doughnut dough…

Doubling is about right.

A Strange Step

I was a bit confused about the next step. Actually, I’m still confused by it so I shoudln’t use past tense. The recipe calls to divide the dough into two even pieces and form loaves of dough. Makes sense, but then it says to add those boules to lightly greased pie pans.

I’m completely at a loss as to why you have to bake these in pie pans, but here it goes.

No idea why pie pans are needed.

The Second Rising

Once you’ve put your dough balls into the pie pans (seriously you can just use sheet pans as far as I can tell), cover them loosely and let them rise a second time.

Again, they should double in size which will take another 2 hours or so.

Then brush each loaf with a light coat of the egg wash.

For a nice brown crust...

Baking and Cooling

Bake these guys at 350 degrees for about 50-60 minutes.

After about 30 minutes they will start to get very browned. Have no fear. They won’t burn. Just let them keep cooking until the full 50-60 minutes is up. They should sound slightly hollow when thumped when they are done. If you’re in doubt, let them bake for another 5 minutes.

When you pull them out, let them cool on a wire rack. These are really pretty!

Pretty things!

I loved the crust on these loaves. After you let them cool for about 45 minutes, you can slice into them to reveal a nice crust and a very soft crumb which is awesome.

Makes great toast!

As you might guess, the dough is slightly sweet but also has great flavor from all the different extracts.

This bread is great on its own with some butter but is also good as toast with a dab of Nutella.

I hadn’t made a good loaf of bread in awhile so I was really happy with how these turned out!

Hello beautiful.

Administrative Announcement: This is my official 1,000th post on Macheesmo. That’s insane and that’s all I’ll say on that.

Onto polenta which was the winner of last week’s poll. I’ve made polenta a few different ways over the years and always love it. I’m starting to feel very comfortable serving polenta instead of pasta for some meals.

For example, I brought this beautiful dish to a dinner party last weekend and the hosts made a delicious venison stew. Normally, I might serve that with egg noodles or just on its own, but man was it good with this polenta. They were made to be together!

What I liked about how this dish turned out is that even though it looks like an incredibly rich dish, the polenta is really very light and airy. After being slow cooked and baked, they turn into these little clouds of corn goodness.

How could clouds of corn be bad?

Polenta Gratin

Yield: Serves 8 as a side.

Prep Time: 1 hour

Total Time: 3 hours

Ingredients:

1 cup coarse ground polenta
5 cups water
1 large sweet onion, diced
12 leaves sage, minced
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, 4 for onions 2 for polenta
Salt and pepper
2-3 ounces Gruyere or Fontina cheese

Directions:

1) Dice and mince onions and sage. In a large skillet saute veggies in butter over medium heat until they soften. Season with a pinch of salt and cook for about 6-8 minutes. You don't want them browned at all, just softened. Remove from heat and set aside when done.

2) Bring 5 cups of water to a simmer and whisk in polenta in a steady, slow stream. Bring to a simmer and stir until the mixture thickens slightly.

3) Turn heat down to very low and cook the polenta for 45-60 minutes, stirring occasionally to make sure it isn't sticking to the pan. The polenta should be over very low heat so it just bubbles every few seconds.

4) Once polenta is thick, stir in onions and sage and a knob of butter. Season with salt and pepper.

5) Line a sheet pan with plastic wrap and pour polenta onto sheet pan. Spread it evenly over the pan.

6) Refrigerate polenta for about an hour until it's firmly set.

7) Butter or grease a 9x13 baking dish and preheat oven to 350 degrees.

8) Break polenta into 1x1 inch chunks and stack them in the baking dish. Overlap some pieces and stagger them so they are uneven. There should be lots of gaps in between polenta pieces.

9) Add grated cheese to top of polenta.

10) Bake for 30 minutes at 350, then broil on low until the tops of the gratin are slightly browned, about 5-10 more minutes.

11) Let cool briefly and then serve warm.

Adapted from The Zuni Cafe Cookbook.

Making the Polenta

I’ve seen a huge range of theories on the correct way to prepare polenta. Some are incredibly fast while some require a bit more time.

The preparation that Judy Rogers recommends in The Zuni Cookbook is on the far end of the spectrum. If you followed her recipe step by step it would require many hours to make this dish.

Well, to be completely accurate, it would require many additional hours.

So I took half of her advice, but not all of it, and I ended up with a very delicious product.

I’m getting a bit ahead of myself. To start, you really just need a few simple ingredients.

Pretty basic stuff.

I wanted to get my onions and sage out of the way. These are actually optional. You could make the gratin with just the polenta, but I thought these gave it some really good complexity.

Just dice them up pretty evenly.

Nice and even dice.

In a large skillet, cook the onions and sage in some butter over medium heat. You want to cook them slowly so they don’t brown but just turn translucent and soft.

It’ll take 6-8 minutes to get to the right texture. Just don’t rush them. Once they are soft, you can remove them from the heat until you need them.

Not browned, just soft.

The big change in this recipe from the other polenta recipes I’ve seen is the polenta to water ratio. Normally, it’s three cups water to each cup of polenta. I’ve even seen 4-to-1.

Judy recommends an amazing 5-to-1 ratio though. The idea is to cook it very low for a long time with lots of moisture and the corn grains will swell and soften and turn into this almost creamy texture.

It takes a bit longer than cooking them quickly, but the results are different and better in my opinion.

One cup makes a lot.

Bring your water to a simmer and then whisk in the polenta in a steady, slow stream. It’s important to whisk the water as you stir in the corn or the grains will stick together immediately.

One cup of polenta will look like nothing in five cups of water, but don’t worry. It’ll all get absorbed.

Five to one ratio!

The Stirring Myth

Much like risotto, there’s a myth that you need to be constantly stirring polenta while it cooks. That’s true if you’re cooking it quickly over high or even medium heat. The way that Judy recommends though, you only need to stir it occasionally.

First, bring your polenta mixture to a slow simmer and then reduce the heat down to very low. The heat should be so low that the polenta only bubbles every few seconds.

Since it’s cooking so slowly, you only need to check on it and give it a good stir every 5-10 minutes just to make sure it isn’t sticking to the pan. The mixture should always be slightly liquid and never firm.

Believe it or not, you may have to actually add more water to the pan if it gets too thick.

Cook this at this low temperature for about an hour until it’s creamy, soft, and smooth.

Then add in a knob of butter and season it well with salt and pepper.

A generous buttering.

This is where I departed from Judy. She recommends holding the polenta at a low temperature over a water bath for another few hours which will improve the consistency.

That might be true and fairly easy to do in a restaurant kitchen, but I didn’t want to spend a whole day making polenta so I just moved ahead with the recipe. It seemed to work out fine.

The next step is to stir in those sauteed onions and sage. I love the smell of this.

Lots of flavor here.

The Gratin

It’s worth noting that you can stop here. The polenta with onions and sage is delicious as-is. Serve it with some grilled chicken or something and it’s a wonderful meal.

But if you want to take it to the next step, line a sheet pan with plastic wrap and then pour the polenta into the sheet pan. Spread it out so it’s nice and even over the pan.

Chill out.

Let this cool for a few minutes at room temperature and then stick it in your fridge for 45-60 minutes until it’s nice and firm.

Once it’s firm, start breaking the polenta into chunks!

Random chunks is better than perfect squares.

This gratin shouldn’t look like a potato gratin which are so uniform and perfect.

This gratin should be craggy and have different shaped pieces. So don’t worry about breaking up the pieces into the same size and don’t cut them into even squares or anything. Just rip them up and throw them in a dish.

Speaking of the dish, make sure you butter it well.

We call this the rustic look.

Butter that dish!

Cover this with just a light coating of cheese and it’s ready to go. You won’t hear me say this often, but don’t over-do it on the cheese. It should be a very light layer.

Don't over-do it.

Bake the gratin at 350 degrees for about 30 minutes and then stick it in the broiler (low is best) to brown a bit on top for about 5 minutes.

Bake and broil.

What I love about this gratin is that you have some peaks from the polenta that get a bit more browned than other parts so some parts are really crunchy and some pieces are nice and smooth.

This is about as good as a winter side dish can get in my opinion.

This stuff absolutely disappeared when I made it.

I was barely able to get thirds before it was gone.

See what I did there?

Sometimes indecision can lead to greatness.

For example, I love John Stewart’s Indecision election coverage. He always makes it very clear how much of a hot mess politics can be on both sides of the old aisle.

I’m not so indecisive about politics though.

I’m more indecisive about sandwiches.

On this occasion I was torn between making a grilled cheese sandwich or a club sandwich. My indecisiveness led me to just smack them together and call it good. And trust me, it was really good.

Grilled Cheese Club

Yield: 1 sandwich

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Total Time: 20 minutes

Ingredients:

3 pieces of bread
2-3 ounces Monterey Jack cheese, grated or sliced
1 chipotle pepper, diced
1 tablespoon salsa
1/2 avocado, sliced
2 slices bacon, crispy
Cilantro
Butter

Directions:

1) Butter two pieces of bread. Slice or grate the cheese and dice up the chipotle. Cook bacon either in a pan until crispy or on a wire rack in a 350 degree oven until crispy, about 15 minutes.

2) In a small skillet, add one piece of buttered bread, butter side down. Top with cheese, pepper and salsa. Top with other piece of buttered bread, butter side up.

3) Cook grilled cheese over medium heat for about 6-8 minutes, flipping occasionally until bread is browned and cheese is well-melted.

4) Toast other piece of bread. Top with bacon, sliced avocado, and cilantro.

5) When grilled cheese is done, add entire sandwich to the top of the open-faced part of the sandwich.

6) Slice and serve immediately!

A Tex-Mex Flair

When slapping together a grilled cheese sandwich and a club sandwich, almost any toppings will work. This is more a post about a simple idea rather than an exact recipe.

I decided to go with a tex-mex version though with chipotle peppers, cilantro, avocado, and salsa. Feel free to adapt to your tastes.

Some of my personal favorite flavors.

The Grilled Cheese

You might ask why I wouldn’t just shove all the ingredients into one grilled cheese sandwich.

The answer is two-fold. First, I don’t think they would all easily fit. Second, things are just better when they are stacked. Take my word for it.

The grilled cheese sandwich itself is pretty basic. I always recommend buttering the bread for a grilled cheese, but you don’t necessarily have to go as heavy on the butter as I do. I have a heavy butter hand – no question.

Butta that bread.

Add one slice of bread, butter side down, into a small skillet and then top with cheese, diced chipotle pepper and salsa. If you want to not have it be super-spicy, leave out the chipotle and just use some salsa.

Also, your cheese will melt easier if it’s grated. I didn’t grate mine on this occasion because I just plain forgot.

Some spicy stuff.

Cover this with the other piece of bread (butter side up) and cook it over medium heat until the cheese is melted and the bread is nice and brown. It’ll probably take about 8 minutes.

The key with cooking a grilled cheese is not to cook it over high heat. If you do, the bread will brown before the heat has time to transfer through to the cheese and you’ll end up with a burned sandwich.

Just keep it over medium heat and flip it every few minutes and you should be good to go.

The Club Section

I just couldn’t make a club sandwich without bacon. It’s not to say that you couldn’t, but I couldn’t.

I like to bake my bacon in the oven on a wire rack at 350 degrees so it gets nice and crispy.

The only way to do bacon.

Toast your third piece of bread and then add your bacon to the bread.

You’ll also need to slice up some avocado and grab a few cilantro leaves. I went heavy on the cilantro because I wanted a lot of herb flavor, but use it to your tastes which for some people is not at all.

Sandwich building 101.

Stack the avocado slices and cilantro right on top of the bacon. Notice that I didn’t put down any mayo or anything. You don’t really need it for this sandwich because the avocado has a creamy texture to it and there’s lots of cheese in the grilled cheese half.

Half of a sandwich.

Putting it all together

This isn’t rocket science, but I was pretty giddy while making it.

When your grilled cheese is done, it’s as simple as plopping it right on top of your club sandwich half.

Stacked up!

Slice it up so it’s easier to eat and you’re good to go.

I just love the layers in this bad boy. It was really good.

This worked.

This might be a bit more complicated than a normal grilled cheese, but it’s also more filling and has some really complex flavors which I liked.

The thing that takes the most time for the recipe is actually cooking the bacon. If you’re rushed you could leave it out or sub it with deli meat or something.

While indecision created this lovely thing, you should be decisive about making it as soon as possible.

Millions of cinnamon rolls!

You know you’re a food blogger when…

1) You are used to eating meals at room temperature because you had to spend 10 minutes photographing the darn thing.

2) You have the grocery store aisles memorized.

3) You bring baked goods to bars during happy hour just so you can get them out of the house.

Number three is exactly what happened with this delicious thing. I made it, photographed it, ate more of it than I should have and then rushed out the door to catch a beer with some friends.

I was about to leave when I decided… what the heck… let’s bring it to the bar! This was a good idea. People loved it because the tiny little rolls are bite-sized. Even our server snuck a few pieces!

While I was going to write that this recipe is really great for brunches, it also happens to be perfect for bars.

Chocolate Chip Monkey Bread

Yield: Serves 10.

Prep Time: 30 minutes + rise time

Total Time: 4 hours

Ingredients:

Dough:
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
1 cup milk, warm
1/3 cup water, warm
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 tablespoon instant yeast
3.25 cups all-purpose flour, plus extra for rolling
2 teaspoons salt
3 ounces semi-sweet chocolate chips (opt.)

1-2 tablespoons butter, soft for bundt pan.
1 teaspoon vegetable oil, for rising

Brown Sugar Coating:
1 cup brown sugar
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
8 tablespoons unsalted butter , melted

Glaze:
1 cup powdered sugar
2 tablespoons milk

Helpful Equipment:
Bundt Pan

Directions:

1) Butter pan with 2 tablespoons softened butter and set aside for later.

2) In a large bowl, mix together milk, water, melted butter, sugar and yeast. Meanwhile, mix flour and salt in standing mixer fitted with dough hook. Turn machine to low and slowly add milk mixture. After dough comes together, increase speed to medium and mix until dough is shiny and smooth, 6 to 7 minutes. If at any point dough is very sticky, add more flour by the tablespoon.

If you don't have a mixer, just mix the ingredients in a bowl with a wooden spoon until the dough forms a rough ball. Then turn out onto a floured surface and knead the dough until it forms a smooth ball, about 5-6 minutes.

3)Turn dough onto lightly floured counter and knead briefly to form smooth, round ball. Coat large bowl with vegetable oil or nonstick spray. Place dough in bowl and coat surface of dough. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and let rise until dough doubles in size, about an hour.

4) For the sugar mixture, mix brown sugar and cinnamon together in a bowl. Place melted butter in second bowl.

5) To finish bread, remove the dough from the bowl, and pat into a rough 10-inch square. Sprinkle chocolate chips on half of the dough and fold it over. Then roll out again to a square. Using a bench scraper or knife, cut dough into tiny 1/4-1/2 inch pieces.

6) Roll each piece into a rough ball and dip into the melted butter, allowing excess butter to drip back into the bowl. Roll in the brown sugar mixture, then layer balls in the Bundt pan. Try to stagger the balls so they form a single thing.

7) Cover the Bundt pan tightly with plastic wrap and let rise for another hour until the balls are about 2 inches from the top of the pan.

8) Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Unwrap the pan and bake until the top is deep brown, about 35-40 minutes. Cool in the pan for 5 minutes, then turn out onto a late and allow to cool slightly, about 10 minutes.

9) While the bread cools, whisk the confectioners’ sugar and milk in a small bowl until the lumps are gone. Using a spoon, drizzle the glaze over the monkey bread. Serve warm.

Adapted from a Brown Eyed Baker recipe.

The Dough

This dough is basically a cinnamon roll dough. It’s pretty much the easiest kind of dough to work with in my opinion. It’s really easy to mix and knead. It’s very soft and stretchy. It’s really easy to roll out and shape!

Start it by mixing all the dough ingredients except the salt and flour in a small bowl. Stir them together and let them sit for a minute or two to make sure the yeast is dissolved and active. It should start foaming a bit.

In a mixing bowl, combine your salt and flour and add in the liquid stuff. If you have a stand mixer, just mix this all together with the dough hook on low-medium speed until it comes together in a soft ball, about 5 minutes.

This is a really easy dough to make without a mixer though. Just stir the ingredients together with a wooden spoon and once they are all together, knead the dough on a floured surface until it’s a nice smooth and soft ball.

Mixer or no mixer, if the dough ever gets sticky, add more flour.

Pretty straightforward

Once your dough ball is formed, add it to a bowl that’s been lightly oiled. I just used some vegetable oil and coated the inside of the bowl. Turn the dough ball over in the bowl so it gets nice and coated and then cover the dough and let it rise for about an hour. It should double in size.

This was my finished dough ball.

After a short rise.

Making the Balls

Now for the fun part. Scoop the dough out onto a lightly floured surface and roll it out into a large square. Then sprinkle your chocolate chips on half of the square.

The chocolate is optional, but I thought it worked perfectly in the recipe. You can use almost any chocolate chip. I just used some semi-sweet chips that I had in my pantry.

You only need a few ounces to get some nice chocolate flavor.

No need to go crazy with chocolate.

Fold the dough over and pack it down so the chocolate chips are more or less enclosed in dough.

Folded and lightly rolled.

Then use a knife or a dough scraper to chop up the dough into bite-sized pieces. You should shoot for 60-70 little pieces. About 1/2 inch squares is a good goal.

It’s actually good to have different sizes though so don’t worry about them all being totally even.

Approximately a million.

Filling the Pan

In a small bowl, mix together the brown sugar and cinnamon. Also use a separate small bowl and gently melt some butter in the microwave.

Working with a few pieces of dough at a time, roll them into rough balls and dunk them in the melted butter.

No substitutions here...

Then toss them in the sugar and cinnamon mixture and roll them around. A light coating is all you need.

Like an inside out cinnamon roll

Then toss the finished balls in a bundt pan that has been pretty heavily buttered.

Keep going until you use all your dough. If you have a normal sized pan you’ll probably about half fill the pan which is perfect.

About half full is good.

If you don’t have a bundt pan, I don’t see why you couldn’t make this in a normal baking dish. It might not be quite as attractive, but it would still be delicious.

Regardless of the pan you choose, after you finish stacking all the balls of dough, cover the pan and let them rise a second time. About another hour should give you a great puffy dough.

While it might not look like these have risen much, keep in mind that they are also expanding to fill a bunch of little cracks that are in between all the dough balls. This second rise is really important.

A longer second rise.

Baking and Glazing

Once your dough has risen a second time, bake them at 350 degrees for about 35-40 minutes. They should be a nice golden brown and you might also notice some brown sugar bubbling up around the edges. That means it’s done!

This was my finished bread and it not only looked great, it smelled amazing!

Hello beautiful.

Let this cool in the pan for a few minutes and then invert it on a plate or platter.

Meanwhile, just stir together the powdered sugar and milk to make a very simple glaze.

Once the bread has cooled for 10 minutes or so, go ahead and drizzle the glaze all over it.

A simple glaze.

You could slice this, but I actually preferred serving it with toothpicks so people can just pick off the bread piece that they want.

Some people prefer the outer ones that get kind of crispy. Some like the inside ones that are soft.

So good!

For the delicious and show-stopping dessert that is produced, this thing really isn’t that hard to make. The dough is really easy to bring together and then it’s just a matter of rolling it, dunking it in butter and sugar and baking it.

In other words, you make do this. Anyone can make this.

And everyone should.

Wow good.

I was pretty scared when vegetable tart won the poll last week. The last time I tried a free-form tart on Macheesmo, it didn’t go well.

I had high hopes for this attempt though. For starters, I was using a Cook’s Illustrated recipe. That’s normally a really good start to a successful meal.

Second, and maybe more important, I didn’t get cocky. I read the recipe like 10 times (Cook’s Illustrated isn’t known for being succinct). I promised myself that I wouldn’t change the recipe at all.

I then immediately changed the recipe. Luckily, not in any devastating way.

Mushroom and Leek Galette

Yield: Serves 4.

Prep Time: 45 minutes + dough resting time

Total Time: 1 hour 30 minutes

Ingredients:

Dough:
1 1/4 cups (6.25 ounces) all-purpose flour
1/2 cup (2.75 ounces) whole wheat flour
1 tablespoon sugar
1 teaspoon kosher salt
10 tablespoons unsalted butter, cold and cubed
7 tablespoons ice water
1 teaspoon white vinegar

Filling:
1/2 pound shiitake mushrooms
3/4 pound crimini mushrooms
2 large leeks, sliced thin
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 teaspoon fresh thyme
2 tablespoons sour cream
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
3-4 ounces Gorgonzola cheese, crumbled
Salt and pepper
1 large egg, for egg wash

Helpful Equipment:
Pastry Brush
Dough Scraper

Directions:

1) To start dough, mix together flours with sugar and salt. Cut in cold, cubed butter using your fingers or pulse in a food processor until the butter is in pea-sized pieces.

2) Stir in water and vinegar and mix until the dough is saggy. It's okay if it doesn't come together completely at this point. Don't overmix it.

3) Scoop dough out onto plastic wrap. Form dough into a rough rectangle (again, it will still be crumbly). Wrap very tightly in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least an hour.

4) Remove dough and roll into a long rectangle, about 8x14 on a well-floured surface. Fold the left 1/3 of the dough into the center, then fold the right 1/3 over it. Rotate the dough 90 degrees, roll it out again, and repeat the fold. Do this one more time. If your dough sticks to the counter, use a dough scraper to scrape it up and use more flour. Then fold the dough (which should be much easier to work with now) into a square and wrap it in plastic wrap again. Refrigerate for another hour.

5) For filling, wash mushrooms and add to a microwave safe bowl. Cover with plastic wrap and microwave on high for 4-5 minutes until soft. Drain mushrooms in a colander. When cool, slice thinly.

6) Slice leeks thinly using just the white and light green sections. Add sliced leeks to a large skillet with a drizzle of olive oil. Cook over medium heat until the leeks are soft, about 4 minutes. Add fresh thyme and sliced mushrooms and continue to cook for another minute or two until the mixture is fairly dry.

7) Remove filling from heat and let cool. Then season with a pinch of salt and pepper and stir in sour cream and mustard.

8) When ready to make galette, preheat oven to 400 degrees. Remove dough from fridge 10-15 minutes before making the galette. Roll the dough out into a large 14 inch diameter circle. Use a knife to cut off any edges. Try to make it as round as you can, but it's okay to eyeball it.

9) Transfer the dough to a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. Brush the center of the dough with olive oil.

10) Add half of the filling to the center of the dough, leaving about 2 inches around the edge. Add 1/2 of the gorgonzola cheese. Top with the rest of the filling and then the rest of the cheese. Drizzle with olive oil.

11) Fold one end of the circle in toward the center, then work around the galette, making folds every few inches.

12) Brush galette with egg wash and transfer to oven. When galette is in oven, turn heat down to 375 and bake for 35-40 minutes until the crust is golden brown.

13) Let cool briefly and serve immediately!

Adapted from Cook's Illustrated Feb. 2012.

Making the Dough

Tart doughs are tricky. I’ll be the first to admit that I’ve struggled with them. Frankly, if you haven’t struggled with them you are either a baking prodigy or a liar.

The trick to this dough is not to overwork it in the beginning and let it rest twice in the fridge. Also, the recipe calls for laminating the dough a bit which means folding it over itself a few times so you develop layers of dough which results in super-flakey crust.

I was worried about this step because it’s the step that proves to be my downfall for things like croissants. But this is a beginner’s laminated dough. I didn’t have any issues with it at all. You won’t either.

Start the dough by mixing together your dry ingredients in a large bowl and then mix in the cubed butter with your fingers. You could use a food processor for this, but I like using my hands. Just get the butter into pea-sized pieces and then add your liquid (top right).

Once your liquid is added, stir it together, but don’t over-work it. There’s no need to bring the dough completely together at this point. The word CI used to describe the dough is “saggy”. I prefer the term “crumbly” (bottom left).

Scoop this crumbly dough out onto some plastic wrap, wrap it very tightly and refrigerate it for about an hour.

Saggy dough is good.

Lamination Domination

I was almost positive that I was going to botch this step, but it was pretty easy actually. Once your dough has rested for an hour in the fridge the flour will be better hydrated and it’ll be closer to one full piece when you unwrap it.

Roll it out on a well-floured board to form a long rectangle. It should be about 8×14 if you want to get specific, but I just eyeballed it (top left). Then fold the bottom 1/3 of the dough up to the center (top right). Then fold the top 1/3 down (bottom left). This basically creates three layers of dough.

Rotate the dough 90 degrees and do the whole rolling and folding process again. For those that aren’t math inclined, the second time you do this, you’ll have 9 layers of dough (3×3). The third and last time you do this, you’ll have 27 layers of dough.

This makes the final dough very flakey and awesome and is worth the 10 minutes or so it takes to do it. Your final dough will be really easy to work with. Before you roll it out though, wrap it in plastic again and stick in the fridge for another hour so it firms up (bottom right).

Like pastry, but actually doable.

Ok. The dough is the hardest part of this guy by a long shot. The filling is straightforward.

Leeky Shrooms

I’m not a huge fan of microwaves, but Cook’s Illustrated suggested using one to soften up the mushrooms for this recipe. I’m not really sure why. You could just slice them and saute them normally, but I figured I would try the microwave thing.

The shrooms!

I just rinsed off my shrooms and added them to a microwave safe bowl. Then covered them with plastic wrap and zapped them for about 4-5 minutes on high.

Seemed to work okay. Notice that I didn’t slice them yet.

Microwave at work.

Drain the mushrooms in a colander. They will release a lot of liquid in the microwave which is the goal. Then slice them thinly.

For the leeks, slice the white and light green parts thinly and add them to a skillet or medium pot with a drizzle of olive oil. Cook the leeks over medium heat until they are soft (about 4-5 minutes), then toss in your sliced mushrooms and fresh thyme.

Pretty colors.

Cook this for another few minutes just to combine the flavors. Then kill the heat and let the filling cool slightly.

You’ll need a few other items to finish off the filling. The original recipe called for créme fraîche, but I just used sour cream. Seemed like a fine substitution.

Flavor town.

Mix in the sour cream and mustard into your filling and maybe hit it with a pinch of salt and pepper.

Filling is done!

Really tasty.

Making the Galette

Once you’re ready to actually make this bad boy, preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Take your dough out of the fridge a few minutes before you want to roll it out. Then roll it into a large circle. Ideally, it would be about a 14 inch circle, but you can just eyeball it. I do recommend taking a knife and actually cutting a round shape out of the dough if you have any ends that are sticking out because it will make the folding easier.

Transfer the dough to a baking sheet lined with parchment paper and brush the center with some olive oil. Then pile on half of your filling!

NOTE: I made another change to the recipe at this point. Cook’s Illustrated said to cut tiny holes in the BOTTOM of your galette crust before adding the filling. Five holes to be exact. For the life of me, I couldn’t imagine why you would want to do that and it wasn’t explained at any point in the recipe so I just didn’t do it. No harm done.

Really easy dough to work with.

Crumble on half of your cheese, then the rest of the filling, then the final bit of cheese.

Now it’s time to fold it! Start at one end and just fold the dough to the center.

The first fold.

Rotate the dough and every few inches, just fold the dough toward the center.

Easy enough right?

Get it?

Eventually, you’ll have this wonderful little galette. Once you get it folded all the way around, brush the edges of the dough with egg wash (just an egg scrambled with 1 tablespoon water).

This guy is finally ready for the oven!

Don't forget egg wash.

Oven your galette is in the oven, turn the heat down to 375. Then let it bake for 35-40 minutes.

This guy turned out fantastic.

Nailed it.

The filling for this guy is good, but the crust is amazing. It’s really flakey and flavorful since it has some whole wheat flour in it.

It’s a bit of work, no doubt, but the results are worth it in my opinion.

Good luck. Good eats!

I’m not really much of a superstitious person. Maybe it’s my philosophy background, but I tend to think that things happen randomly and we impose meaning on them.

That said, there are still a few traditions that I do without fail.

One of those is eating black-eyed peas on New Years. It’s something my mom always served to me and she still calls me every year to make sure that I eat some.

I figure that in this case it doesn’t really hurt. Black-eyed peas aren’t a strange food. They aren’t impossible to find or taste gross. They are cheap and delicious. So I figure why not?!

Normally, I just make some sort of hearty soup like this one, but this year I decided to class it up a bit. As it happens, black-eyed peas and bacon make for a really good eggs benedict.

As a reader recently said on my Facebook page: “I don’t believe in good luck. But I do believe in good food!”

Black Eyed Pea Benedicts

Yield: Serves 2.

Prep Time: 20 minutes + cooking beans

Total Time: 45 minutes

Ingredients:

2 cups cooked black-eyed peas
3-4 slices thick bacon, chopped
3 scallions, chopped
1 large leaf of kale, minced
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 pinch of salt
4 large eggs
1/2 cup white vinegar (for poaching)
2 english muffins
Sriracha sauce (opt.)

Hollandaise Sauce:
1 large egg yolk
1 cup butter, melted preferably clarified
1 teaspoon water
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1 pinch salt
1 pinch cayenne peppe (opt.)

Directions:

1) Cook black-eyed peas according to package. Canned would work fine for this recipe also.

2) Dice bacon and scallions. For kale, slice out the center rib from one large leaf and mince the kale finely.

3) In a skillet, add a drizzle of olive oil over medium heat. Cook bacon until it's well-browned and most of the fat has rendered out.

4) Add scallions and kale and continue to cook for another few minutes until they soften.

5) Stir in black-eyed peas and season mixture with salt and pepper. Keep on low heat until needed and stir occasionally.

6) For hollandaise, whisk yolk together with water, lemon, and a pinch of cayenne and salt.

7) Melt butter. Clarified butter will work best, but I've used just normal melted unsalted butter with success before.

8) Over a double boiler, heat yolk mixture and whisk until it's steaming and frothy.

9) Slowly start to drizzle in butter and whisk. Add the butter slowly until the sauce comes together. You may not need the entire cup of butter to get a smooth sauce. Once the sauce is formed, set it aside until needed. Don't keep it over the heat. If it gets too thick, whisk in a teaspoon of hot water to thin it out.

10) To poach eggs, add 1/2 cup of vinegar to a large pot of water (2 quarts). Bring the water to a simmer (not a boil) and swirl the water with a spoon.

11) Crack eggs into a bowl and then carefully drop them into the swirling water. Cook for about 2 minutes.

12) Remove eggs with a slotted spoon and let them drain briefly on a paper towel.

13) Toast muffins and spoon black-eyed pea mixture over muffins. Top with eggs and sauce. Optionally, drizzle on some sriracha or hot sauce. Serve immediately.

The Peas

I used dried black-eyed peas for this post, but there’s really no reason for it. Feel free to use canned.

If you do use dried, be sure to sort them before cooking them. Of all the dried legumes I’ve ever used, black-eyed peas have more pebbles than any other in my experience. No idea why this is, but I always find a pebble or two in my black-eyed peas.

Chipping a tooth on a rock is not a great way to start the new year!

You could use canned...

The Topping

Besides the black-eyed peas, there’s just a few things that I wanted to put in my filling. All of these are pretty standard flavors that go really well with black-eyed peas. Traditionally, a ham hock is used to cook them, but I just sliced up a few pieces of bacon.

Instead of collard greens which need need to cook for awhile, I just minced up a kale leaf which will saute much better.

Good flavors!

To start the filling, add a drizzle of oil to a skillet and add all your bacon over medium heat.

Cook it until most of the fat has rendered out and the bacon starts to crispy up, about 8 minutes. Then add the sliced scallions and kale.

Cook this mixture until the veggies start to soften, just another minute or two. This will already smell great.

Already delicious!

Then just toss in your cooked black-eyed peas and season with some salt and pepper.

Solid stuff

Keep this mixture warm over low heat until you need it later. Give it a stir occasionally just to make sure it isn’t burning.

The Hollandaise

I really do think that when it comes to classic sauces, hollandaise is the easiest to make. I find it to be a very forgiving sauce which is why I’m always baffled at how restaurants screw it up.

It’s really just two things: Eggs and butter.

Not a hard sauce.

If you are making a really professional hollandaise sauce, you want to make sure and clarify your butter before using it in the sauce. This basically just insures that you don’t get any butter solids in the sauce and that you have consistent results.

But you know what? Clarifying butter is kind of a pain in the buttocks. I’ve just melted butter in the microwave before and used it with okay (but not perfect) results. Just try not to add the butter solids (which will be at the bottom of your bowl) to the sauce if you can help it.

Also, if your sauce doesn’t work because you took this shortcut… don’t blame me!

To make the sauce, whisk together a yolk with a teaspoon of water and lemon juice in a mixing bowl. Add in a pinch of salt and cayenne pepper (optional).

Set this bowl over a pan of simmering water (double boiler) and continue to whisk it until the yolk mixture turns frothy. It should be steaming slightly and will start foaming like crazy. This is your cue to start adding the butter.

Just like any time you are making an emulsified sauce, start by drizzling in a small amount of the butter. Whisk whisk whisk. Drizzle in a bit more. Whisk more.

If your sauce starts to curdle at all, it might be getting to hot, so take it off the heat and whisk like crazy.

At the end of the day you should be able to whisk in almost an entire cup of melted butter into the yolk. This was my finished sauce and it was darn near perfect in my opinion!

I could eat this with a spoon.

Once your sauce is made, don’t put it back on the heat. It’ll break down completely if it gets too hot. It’ll be fine at room temperature for 5 minutes while you finish the rest of meal. If it comes time to use it and it’s really thick or congealed, just whisk in a teaspoon of hot water and it’ll loosen up immediately.

Poaching the Eggs

They make fancy contraptions to poach eggs, but I think those things tend to overcook the eggs. If you don’t feel like poaching the eggs, you can also just fry a few eggs over-easy and use those.

To poach eggs the right way though, just bring a large pot of water to a simmer and then add in a good amount of plain distilled vinegar.

Crack your eggs one at a time into a separate bowl. Give the water a swirl with a spoon and gently slide the egg into the water. It should immediately clench up and start cooking in a nice little package.

Depending on the size of your pot, you should be able to do 2-4 eggs at a time in one pot.

Two minutes of cooking time will leave you with perfect poached eggs.

When they are done, scoop them out of the water with a slotted spoon and let them drain on a paper towel.

You could fry them also...

Assembling the Benedicts

All the hard work is done. Now for the fun part.

Toast a few English muffins and pile on the black-eyed pea mixture.

High and deep!

Top each half with an egg and a good dollop of sauce.

You could stop right here if you wanted.

Pretty straightforward

I like a bit of hot sauce with my black-eyed peas though so I drizzled on some Sriracha. It totally made the dish in my opinion.

When you cut into one of these benedicts, it’s a thing of beauty.

Best brunch I've made in awhile.

Like I said, I’m not sure that I believe in good luck.

But I’ll use any reason I can find though for an excuse to make these delicious things.

HAPPY NEW YEARS EVERYONE!

BAM.

My Mom wanted to do something slightly different for the holidays this year. Instead of a huge hunk of meat like a roast or ham or something for Christmas Eve dinner, she wanted to do a bunch of smaller plates in courses.

I’m almost positive that my loving mother chose this style of meal because it forces people to sit around the table and actually talk for a longer period of time.

Luckily, I like talking and eating and cooking, so I was happy to help her plan the feast.

We settled on Italian food because it’s pretty normal for that to be served in courses. Most of the courses were very straightforward and pretty simple to make, but I was particularly proud of the pasta course. I made some delicious homemade squash ravioli that turned out better than I was expecting.

I’m far from a ravioli expert and only a quarter Italian, but after making these I feel at least a third Italian.

Winter Squash Ravioli

Yield: Serves 4 as a meal.

Prep Time: 1 hour

Total Time: 2 hours

Ingredients:

Homemade Pasta:
3 cups all-purpose flour
2 large eggs
3 large egg yolks
A pinch of salt

Filling:
1 butternut squash, roasted (~4 cups of squash)
2 shallots (about 1/3 of a cup), diced
2 tablespoons olive oil
1/3 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup Parmesan cheese, grated
Pinch of nutmeg
Pinch of salt and pepper

Sage Butter Sauce:
6 tablespoons unsalted butter
2 tablespoons fresh sage (about 5 leaves), minced
1 teaspoon red pepper flakes
2 tablespoons pasta water

Helpful Equipment:
Pasta Maker (or KitchenAid attachment)
Ravioli cutter

Directions:

To make Pasta:
1) Mix salt and flour and make a well on a clean counter.

2) Whisk together eggs and yolks and add them to the well.

3) Use a fork to slowly incorporate the flour with the eggs. The goal is to add just enough flour to pull the dough together. Ideally, you'll end up with a ball of dough in the middle of a well of flour as you won't need all the flour to finish the dough.

4) Knead the dough gently for a few minutes, adding more flour if it's sticky or loose. Then let the dough rest for 10 minutes.

5) Continue kneading the dough for a another 5 minutes or so, incorporating more flour as needed.

6) Wrap the dough tightly in plastic and let it rest for an hour.

To Make Filling:

1) Roast squash in a 350 degree oven for about an hour until they are fork tender.

2) In a large pan, add olive oil and cook diced shallots over medium heat. When shallots are soft, add in squash flesh. It should be very soft.

3) Cook the filling for a few minutes, mashing the squash together with the shallots.

4) Add cream, cheese, and nutmeg. Season with salt and pepper.

5) Let filling cool before filling ravioli.

Making Ravioli:
1) Cut pasta dough into quarters and work with one quarter at a time. Pass dough through pasta maker a few times on widest setting, making sure to flour it well.

2) Crank down pasta roller and keep passing through dough until it's on the second to thinnest setting (normally 7).

3) If you have a long counter, spread the pasta sheet out and flour it heavily on the bottom so it doesn't stick to the counter. I cut my sheet in half to make it easier to work with.

4) Add a large teaspoon of squash filling spaced about an inch a part on the lower 1/3 of the pasta sheet. You should get 12-14 for a full sheet of pasta.

5) Use a roller cutter to cut up the ravioli into individual pieces.

6) Working with one ravioli at a time, dip your finger in water and run it around the edges of the ravioli filling. Then fold the dough over and press out all the air. Press down to seal the edges. Repeat with all the raviolis.

7) Use a decorative ravioli cutter to cut around the edges of each ravioli. This will help seal them completely and also make them pretty.

8) Toss ravioli on a baking sheet with some flour. Repeat with all the pasta dough.

9) Before cooking ravioli, freeze them for a few minutes so they firm up.

10) Cook ravioli in salted, boiling water for about 3-4 minutes. When they all float, they are done.

For Butter Sauce:
1) When you put your ravioli in to cook, start sauce. Add butter and herbs to a small saucepan. Melt over medium heat.

2) When butter is just starting to brown slightly, add a few spoonfuls of pasta water which will thicken the sauce a bit. Swirl it around to mix the water and butter.

3) Drain raviolis and add to plate.

4) Drizzle butter sauce over ravioli and serve with extra cheese.

Making the Filling

I kept this filling pretty simple and while I used butternut squash for it, I think you could use almost any winter squash. You want about 4 cups of roasted squash so that might mean you need to roast more than one squash if you’re using a smaller one.

One large butternut squash is plenty though.

Pretty straightforward

Roast this bad boy for about an hour at 350 degrees until it’s very tender.

In a medium pot, add the olive oil and shallots and cook for a minute or two over medium heat. Then add in the roasted squash flesh and mash everything together. It’s okay if there are some lumps.

Stir in the cream, cheese, nutmeg, and salt and pepper and your filling is done!

Be sure to let this cool completely before filling your ravioli.

A bit chunky is fine.

Making The Pasta

My pasta making has come a long way. If you go way back to my first attempt at making pasta, you’ll notice that I had no freakin’ idea what I was doing.

I still only have a vague idea as to what I’m doing, but it seems to work for me these days so I’m just letting it happen.

Basically, I just mix together my flour and salt and then make a big well on the counter. Then I pour in my eggs which I’ve lightly beaten (upper right).

Next, I use a fork to just slowly incorporate flour into the egg mixture. After a few minutes of this, the eggs will form a loose dough. Then you can start gently kneading it (bottom left).

As you knead it, the dough will get sticky and you’ll want to work in more flour which is convenient because you will be kneading the dough in a big pile of flour.

After maybe 8 minutes of kneading, you’ll have a nice firm ball of dough and probably plenty of flour left over, which is fine (bottom right).

Once your dough is made, wrap it tightly in plastic wrap and let it rest for about an hour (conveniently the time it takes to make the filling).

Now you can make some pasta!

Making pasta is pretty straightforward assuming you have a decent pasta roller. Work with a quarter of your dough at a time just to make it easier.

Feed it through the pasta roller a few times on the widest setting and then start cranking it down until it gets to the second-to-smallest setting (normally 7).

The key to making pasta that I’ve found is to really flour it up. It’s pretty hard to use too much flour because extra flour will just fall off.

This is some pretty perfect looking pasta if you ask me.

Artsy pasta shot.

Making the Ravioli

Assuming you have a long counter, you can just stretch the finished pasta sheet out in one long piece. I cut my pasta sheet in half though just to make it easier to work with.

Again, use a lot of flour on the bottom of the sheet so it doesn’t stick as you make the ravioli.

Then just dollop out large teaspoon sized lumps of filling on the pasta sheet. Make sure that you leave about an inch between the ravioli and also put the filling in the bottom third of the ravioli since we are going to fold them over.

A good teaspoon will help.

At this point, use a ravioli cutter to slice up the ravioli into individual pieces. It’s actually important to slice them before you seal them I’ve found because it lets you get a better seal on each ravioli.

Then, work with one ravioli at a time. Dip your fingers in some water and wet around the filling. Then fold the pasta over and seal it up! Try to press out as much air from the filling as possible.

These are looking really good.

Lookin' good.

Then take your ravioli cutter and run it around the edge of each ravioli. This will make the ravioli pretty, but will also make it really sealed well.

This is an optional step, but I think it helps.

The Important Part

The important part about making ravioli (I think) is to not freak out about them. Unless you’re working in a professional kitchen and people are paying $20 to eat 6 of your ravioli, they don’t need to be perfect.

They won’t be perfect. As long as they are sealed though, they will cook fine and still be delicious.

I graded myself on my first batch of ravioli. Even my “F” ravioli tasted delicious.

By the way, it is important to toss them in flour as you finish them just to make sure they don’t stick.

 A Quick Salad

A quick interlude on the ravioli thing. I just wanted to show you guys this delicious spinach salad that we served before the ravioli. Super simple ingredients: spinach, goat cheese, pomegranate seeds, and toasted walnuts. I also whisked together a quick apple cider vinaigrette that we served with this that was just out of this world.

No big deal.

Back to Ravioli

Once your ravioli are made, you can either cook them now or freeze them for later. Even if you are cooking them now, I recommend freezing them for a few minutes just to firm them up a bit.

When you are ready to cook the ravioli, just toss them in salted boiling water for about 3-4 minutes. When all the ravioli are floating, they are done.

Meanwhile you can work on the sauce which is just a few ingredients: butter, sage, red pepper flakes.

Hard to go wrong here...

As the ravioli cook, melt the butter down over medium heat and swirl all these ingredients together. I like to add in a few spoonfuls of the pasta water also which thickens the sauce a bit.

Drain the ravioli well, put a few on a plate, and drizzle the butter sauce over the top.

This is about as good as it gets if you ask me.

CHOMP!

People are intimidated by ravioli and I get that. They seem complicated. You have to make the dough, fill each individual thing, seal them up, and worry about presentation.

It’s a lot, but the key thing to remember is that they don’t have to be perfect. Once your guests try that first bite, they won’t care what they look like.

They will be delicious.

The other nice thing about ravioli is that you can make them way in advance. In fact, when I made these for our Christmas Eve feast, I made them the day before and just froze them until I needed them.

Are you a homemade ravioli fan? Have you ever made it yourself? Leave a comment!

The crumb is awesome.

If I were to tell you that size matters, you would probably think I was telling an inappropriate joke.

On any other day, you would be correct.

But on this day, I’m talking about coffee cake. And size definitely matters when it comes to coffee cake.

Not the size of the cake actually, but the size of crumb.

Let’s face it, the best part of any coffee cake is the brown sugar laced, slightly crunchy crumb that tops the cake. That’s why coffee cake exists. So why not go big on it? Why not pile on heaps of the stuff?

Why not indeed. And that’s what this coffee cake includes: A big thick layer of nothing but crumb.

Blackberry Big Crumb Coffee Cake

Yield: Serves 6-8.

Prep Time: 20 minutes

Total Time: 1 hour 30 minutes

Ingredients:

For Filling:
1 pint blackberries, washed and halved
1/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoon corn starch

For the Big Crumbs:
1/3 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon crystallized ginger, mashed
1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted
1 3/4 cups cake flour
A pinch of salt

Cake:
1/3 cup sour cream
1 large egg
1 large egg yolk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 cup cake flour
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons butter, cut into pieces and softened

Helpful Equipment:
Stand Mixer or Hand Mixer

Directions:

1) Preheat oven to 325 degrees

2) Butter an 8-inch-square baking pan.

3) For filling, slice blackberries in half and toss with sugar and cornstarch. Set aside.

4) To make crumbs, in a large bowl, whisk together sugars, spices, salt and butter until smooth. Stir in flour with a spatula. It will be a solid dough.

5) To prepare cake, in a small bowl, stir together the sour cream, egg, egg yolk and vanilla.

6) In a separate mixing bowl, stir together flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Add butter and a spoonful of sour cream mixture and mix on medium speed with a hand mixer or stand mixer until flour is moistened. Increase speed and beat for 30 seconds. Add remaining sour cream mixture in two batches, beating for 20 seconds after each addition, and scraping down the sides of bowl with a spatula.

7) Scoop out about 1/2 cup batter and set aside.

8) Scrape remaining batter into prepared pan. Spoon blackberries over batter. Dollop set-aside batter over blackberries; no need for it to be even.

9) Using your fingers, break topping mixture into big crumbs, about 1/2 inch to 3/4 inch in size. They do not have to be uniform, but make sure most are around that size. Sprinkle over cake.

10) Bake cake until a toothpick inserted into center comes out clean of batter (it might be moist from blackberries), about an hour to an hour and 15 minutes. Cool before serving.

Adapted from a NY Times recipe.

Berry Berry Good

There’s a fair amount of ingredients in this bad boy, but there are lots of duplicates so it isn’t too bad really. There’s three basic parts to the cake and we’ll make them all separately and then pile them all together: The cake, the berry filling, and the big crumb topping.

Let’s start with the filling. I went with blackberries, but you could use any berry I think.

Pretty things.

Assuming you do you blackberries, I recommend chopping them in half just because they can be a bit large.

Then just mix them in a bowl with the other filling ingredients. Filling is done!

I worried that the filling would be too watery, but it turned out fine.

I was worried about this, but it worked great.

Crumb Time

This is a great recipe for crumb. It’s nice and thick and produces big chunks of crunchy and sweet topping. It’s a keeper for sure.

The one ingredient that you may not have used before is crystallized ginger. It gives the crumb a really light ginger flavor which is amazing. If you can’t find it though, don’t worry about it. It’s not essential to the recipe.

One of my favorite ingredients.

If you use the crystallized ginger, be sure to chop it up really finely. The stuff is pretty strong and you wouldn’t want someone to bite into a big nugget of it.

Combine that with all the other crumb ingredients (except the flour) in a large bowl. Once everything is combined well, stir in the cake flour with a spatula or large spoon. And yes. You must use cake flour. No substitutions.

The finished crumb will a really thick dough that will kind of crumble if you pick it up. That’s what you want.

What's up crumb?!

The Cake

The cake part of this recipe is pretty straightforward. Mix together all the wet ingredients in a small bowl (eggs, yolks, sour cream, and vanilla). Then in a large bowl, add the dry ingredients, the softened butter, and just a spoonful of the sour cream mixture.

Beat this together with a hand mixer or stand mixer until the butter and flour and sugar are mixed in together well.

Starting that cake.

Once that’s all beaten together a bit, go ahead and add in all the liquid ingredients and continue to mix until the batter is smooth. It will be a pretty thick batter, but try not to over-mix it. Basically, stop mixing when you can’t see any flour.

This was my finished batter.

This is an odd batter, but it works.

Finishing the Coffee Cake

In a lightly buttered 8×8 baking dish, scrape in almost all of the cake batter. Leave about 1/2 cup of the batter for later.

Then add on all of your blackberry filling followed by the rest of your cake batter. It’s okay if it’s not perfectly spaced out. Just kind of get it all in there.

Batter, blackberries, batter.

Next, take all your crumb mixture and break it up into large pieces. Add those pieces to the cake!

The crumb will pretty much completely cover the entire cake which is awesome.

So crumby.

Because there’s a lot of moisture in the berries, you’ll need to bake this cake for a bit longer than you would without them.

Bake it at a low 325 for 60-75 minutes. A toothpick should come out of the center cleanly.

The finished version will be a thing of beauty.

A bit rustic looking...

Let this guy cool completely and then you can chop it up and serve it up.

Check out the cross-section on this cake. It’s like half crumb which is perfect.

A peek inside.

I made a few different coffee cakes over the years here on Macheesmo, but this is definitely my favorite to-date.

It would be a great thing to have around for the holidays for people to snack on with their morning coffee!