Growing up, Passover was one of 2.5 Jewish holidays my family would celebrate.

My uncle, while he was alive, was a strong presence leading the seder with charisma and a mischievous delight in tradition. After his death, my aunt was more thoughtful and pursued discussion and commentary. Passover was the time of year I spoke most openly about Judaism at my public school, taking in butter, matzoh, and salt, and sharing with my classmates. In college I learned even more about it during that one year I was dating someone more observant than I (and she has since gone on to become a rabbi). The first time I got drunk was at Passover, and I’ll still argue passionately in favor of the richness of the cheap, sweet, syrupy Passover wines of my youth (and have so argued on this blog).

It’s a holiday that has a strong emphasis on food. On problematic food. On being rushed and hurried and fleeing servitude so that bread could not rise. It’s a holiday of learning rules through food and exploring the Jewish way of reasoning from text to law through centuries of debate and logic. It’s about learning logical discourse and boolean algebra through food. And unlike my approach to gluten free cooking (bread? Whatever - let’s eat rice! And all sorts of things are fun without wheat!), this holiday requires that you deal with the matzoh. It’s not enough to eat leavened bread, but it is also required encouraged that you partake of the food that is problematic. And that leads to creativity and weirdness and often some rather dry and tasteless food.

But you know me, and creativity and weirdness are favorites of mine. I love this holiday, but I’ve never cooked for it before. I love this holiday, but I’ve never hosted it before. But now I have a house.

And I had a friend who pinged me and mentioned that she really, really liked matzoh and could there be acquiring of it? And I took that question and replied, “Well, I guess I could host Passover.”

So I invited some friends…

And had 21 RSVPs. Including my parents, jews and non-jews, the proudly child free and three children, people who keep kosher and people who only vaguely know that ham and cheese sandwiches are problematic, vegetarians and people who refuse to eat vegetables, and also the neighbor who has taken to asking for food from me (and her boyfriend).

From them, there were the following contributions: My mother made her signature chopped liver and brought a fruit bowl; Lulu brought coconut macaroons; Redwizz brought his secret family recipe charoset; another friend offered stuffed mushrooms and spinach kugel (but they ended up canceling); and my boss kindly dropped off her leftovers from the first night’s seder she hosted. All the rest was up to me. I did end up at the last minute get some amazing help from Geeksdoitbetter and Carrie, and the seder would not have gone nearly as well without their (especially Geeksdoitbetter’s) help.

Appetizers
mystery dip
So my boss’s husband makes a vegan mushroom/artichoke mousse mold thing to offer vegetarians instead of gefilte fish. I plan to get his recipe. But also included with their leftovers were little matzoh sticks, so I knew there had to be dip! This was my mother’s job. It was rapidly determined that either cream cheese or sour cream would be likely to overwhelm the delicate flavor of the mousse, so it was thinned with mayonnaise. Then, because it was dip, the flavor needed to be boosted a bit, so she added oregano, hot pepper, black pepper, and salt. The result was pretty tasty but not perfect.

chopped liver with little matzoh crackers

(not included were the pitted dates I split up the side and stuffed walnut quarters into. I was going to toss them in the over with honey, salt, and pepper, according to an ancient roman recipe, until just warm enough to be soft and pliable. Instead, a few were nibbled just stuffed.)

Seder
Charoset Okay, so my family’s recipe is hand cut apples with crumbled walnuts, cinnamon, and red wine. Redwizz’s family recipe is apples, dates, orange juice, almonds, and cinnamon, mixed in a food processor until it looks like mortar. Oddly, they don’t taste all that different, and his is easier to eat on matzoh (as well as being acceptable to those who do not imbibe).

First Course
I gave the diners a choice among potatoes (roasted leftovers from my boss - and surprisingly tasty), hard boiled eggs (using these directions from Coconut and Lime with great results), and gefilte fish from a can.

Second Course
Chicken Soup with Matzoh Balls and/or Noodles - I make stock all the time. I make flavorful stock! And I had a bag of vegetable ends in desperate need of a round of stock making. What is more, when I was out in the Italian Market questing for chicken fat (which can not be found there!), I happened to be in line behind someone buying a quantity of chicken wings and asking for the tips to be thrown away, so I managed to acquire them for free. But I was using a larger pot than I’m used to, and even though I increased the amount of vegetables and spices accordingly, it still tasted like water after hours of cooking. Like water! So I ended up getting a (small) whole chicken just for the stock. And then it had flavor! But that was surprisingly stressful.

The matzoh balls were also a little scary. I was sure I could do it, but I kept being sure I could do it later and procrastinating it farther and farther off. Until Carrie showed up and offered to help, and I managed to talk her into making them even though she’d never seen nor tasted them before. I gave her all of the directions I’d accumulated from my grandmother (who made amazing ones) - use the recipe on the matzoh meal box and don’t handle them much) and set her to it. And they turned out a little dense, but they floated and were tasty

The noodles were storebought and standard. I’m glad I didn’t make them too far ahead because by the time the meal was over and we went to clean the pot they had turned into a gelatinous mess.

Main Course
I decided to go with both dairy and meat options (just nothing mixed) and let people choose their own adventures. I had also planned several parve/vegan dishes, but those (accidentally, I swear) ended up being the ones cut from the menu once it was clear there was plenty food.

Meat

Mark Bittman’s Braised Lamb with Horseradish and Parsley
I love that this dish incorporates food mentioned as historically relevant in the service, and I love that it’s braised - eliminating the holiday’s tendency toward dry meats. The lamb shoulder was sourced from Esposito’s, and they were willing to remove the bone and package it separately for me. They also had special seder plate lamb bone sections, but since I was already buying a lamb bone, I just went with the shoulder piece. I bought three shoulders - two in the 3 pound range and 1 in the 5 pound range. And there was a lot of painstaking trimming of fat from that cut that I’m not sure was necessary, but the end product was succulent and beautiful.

Right, so the first step was taking all of the bones, roasting them, and them adding them to a pot with some vegetables to make stock (and then cleaning them and roasting the three prettiest for the seder plate).

Then I took the huge dutch oven my mother bought me as a housewarming present (my first one of my own! At the time I wasn’t sure I’d use one that big, but I’ve already used it a lot) and browned the lamb cubes in batches, sprinkling with salt and pepper. Even with the olive oil, the lamb still stuck a bit - and I suspect it might have released if I’d waited for a proper sear, but I could not resist stirring the meat a good bit.

When I was on the last batch for browning and it was looking just about done, I added the slivered garlic and let that cook for a bit together. Then in went a glug of manischewitz concord grape (the recipe allows for white wine, but I love cooking with the manischewitz too much) and the lamb stock. And then the rest of the meat… which possibly should have gone in sooner because I had to be very careful not to splash.

And I simmered the lamb for several hours and then didn’t add the peeled fresh horseradish (because I was scared and it was incredibly tasty without) until the last half hour of cooking, overnight, and the reheating on the day, but it didn’t end up changing the flavor much at all.

I almost forgot the parsley sauce, and few people used it - but I made it thick, with just a minimal amount of oil and vinegar (done by sight, so I have no measurements for you). It was delicious, and I’ve enjoyed using it up at leftovers - stirred into sour cream dip for chips and mixed in with egg salad)

Lemon Thyme Chicken
I feel a bit bad about this one. It has been so long since I’ve paid money for meat, that I’d planned to only spend money on ethical meat. And there I was at the farmers market staring at the $14/pound meat when this was already the most expensive meal I’d ever made and I’d been buying tables and chairs and a sink! And I walked away (after buying 4 dozen eggs) and bought cheap meat at the grocery store, where I bought enough thighs and breast meat to feed everyone for about $14. Next year I’ll do better.

Right, so step one was to peel and thickly slice an onion or two and to lay them in the bottom of the casserole dish (this adds moisture and keeps the meat from cooking to the dish, making cleanup easier).

Then I took a jar of pre-peeled garlic and shook enough into the dish to give more even coverage for the bottom - it doesn’t have to be perfect. And I tossed in about 10 oil-cured black olives to round out the flavor.

I arranged the chicken so that the thighs (with skin and fat) were around the outside and the breasts (skinless and cut into thigh-sized pieces, so three pieces per half) were filling in the center.

On top of that came freshly cut thyme (on the stem) and roughly-cut chunks of lemon. I usually make this dish with rosemary, so I used too little thyme to affect the chicken as much as I wanted, so in future I’d recommend really piling the stems on or/and also dusting with powdered thyme.

If you have more of the breast meat, you can also add a swig of wine and start the cooking process with aluminum foil over to keep it from drying. There were enough thighs (roughly half the meat) in this batch that no additional liquid was needed and it was fine uncovered. It went into the 350F over right before we started reading, so let’s say it cooked for an hour and a half. I have, however, accidentally overcooked this dish by as much as an hour and had no ill effects or drying of the meat.

Dairy

Kale and Feta Matzoh Pie
This recipe was inspired by Gourmet’s Spinach and Matzoh Pie, but I was already supposed to have someone bringing spinach kugel and I love the more bitter greens. Really, this recipe was begging for some kale!

I bought three spring tops of curly kale from Landisdale Farm at the farmers market. The day before, I shredded the kale and cooked it down with a pinch of salt (so that I’d have more room in my refrigerator).

The next day, I assembled the lasagnas.

I mixed up a pound of fresh farmers cheese (from mexico, featured in my local supermarket… tasted like try, crumbly sour cream with a bit more culturing), 2 cups whole milk, 3 eggs, freshly ground nutmeg, and some salt and pepper, in a bowl with a fork. It was fine, even without the blender.

And I ended up with two casserole dishes almost exactly the size of a piece of matzoh, so I used one to soak the pieces in the 2 cups of the mixture while assembling in the other… and then just laid the rest of the pieces on top to assemble the second one. There didn’t seem to be any difference between the dish that had been oiled and the one that hadn’t when it came time to serve.

Then I finely diced an onion and reheated the cooked kale, squeezing out the moisture as I went. I also minced and threw in about a quarter cup of fresh dill.

Once the moisture was mostly evaporated, I stirred the kale into the remaining egg/dairy mixture and crumbled in a good half of the pound of feta I’d bought from my local halal.

Then I assembled: matzoh, filling, matzoh, filling, matzoh - matzoh, filling, matzoh, filling, matzoh. And I had just enough filling left to put a very thin layer on the top of both - perfection. And I crumbled almost all of the rest of the feta on top (let’s say 3 ounces per dish).

This was baked ahead and served only slightly warmed. It was delicious! I love the body of the kale in this, and I can’t image spinach being nearly as good.

It even freezes and reheats well! I love this dish! Such a success.

Greens and Quinoa Pie
This was my very first time tackling quinoa. I know that’s delinquent of me, but still. The grains were smaller than I expected, and there was no way they were going to be cooperative in a strainer for rinsing and draining - so I soaked them. Only then the toasting process was unfortunate, and I had to give up on that step. Perhaps toasting them dry and then soaking them next time.

So I cooked 3/4 of a cup of quinoa (because I’d eyeballed the amount and had no use for a quarter of a cup, so I went ahead and cooked it all) and set it aside until I was ready to deal with making the dish.

In my largest skillet, I cooked the romaine and some other lettuce-y head that was pale and spiky (but not frissee) and bitter enough to be related to chicory. Then I tossed them into a strainer in the sink and squeezed them occasionally as guests started trickling in and milling about the kitchen.

The last thing I did before settling people into the dining room to start the seder was to assemble the skillet of cooked onions, green onions, dill, cooked quinoa, and squeezed cut up lettuces.

Once we started taking turns reading the story of Passover, I sneaked back a couple times into the kitchen (and hid the afikomen) to get it cooked, the three eggs beaten and added, and the cheese - the remaining 2 ounces of feta and the last of the stichelton from my cheese tasting. And then I popped it into the 350F oven (in the skillet, not juggling the whole transfer to a pie plate) to finish cooking evenly.

It turned out pretty tasty, froze well, and received praise from the one guest who claimed to love quinoa. While filling and sturdy, I’m not sure it was exceptional enough to make next year.

Golden Gratin - Yam & Apricot Casserole (could have been vegan)
There is no good reason why this dish isn’t parve and vegan! No good reason! But for some reason the recipe is made for it to be meat, and there’s a tendency among the commenters to make it dairy, too. Having made it, I say that it would lose nothing from being vegan.

So you peel your orange-fleshed sweet potatoes or yams and cut them into chunks.

Then you make a base syrup out of apricot nectar (I was planning up substitute orange juice, but my coop just happened to have a bottle of apricot nectar across from the check out - and I just used the one bottle, which was less than 4 cups, but whatever)… and then the recipe calls for a cup of chicken broth. Why, recipe? Why? I happened to have a quart jar of oolong tea hanging out, so that was a perfect substitution. Other substitution options would be orange juice, white grape juice, water, or vegetable stock.

The recipe then called for 6 tablespoons (3/4 stick) unsalted pareve margarine. I used 3 Tablespoons of butter. Honestly? I could have skipped the butter entirely.

Then 1/2 cup chopped dried apricots. I had bought Turkish Apricots from nuttyguys.com on a Groupon without a purpose a while back, and they went into this. Gooksdoitbetter cut them into quarters (and she peeled the yams and washed the kale and did all kinds of things to make this dinner go).

So the apricots cook with the nectar and tea with some cinnamon and black pepper and then you add the yams and cover and cook until the yams are fork tender. At this point, I put them up until the next day.

I was careful to maintain the yam chunks for that day, and they were delicious.

On the next round, when I served the leftovers a few days later, I mashed them into a smooth yamy puree and topped them with a crumble topping of 1/4 cup rolled oats (not kosher for passover), 1/4 cup matzoh meal, 1/8 cup matzoh flour, 1/4 cup brown sugar, and as much olive oil and neccessary to get it the right amount of crumbly. Baked for 40 minutes, and it was de-light-ful. Well, it was a (potentially vegan, and it would have been fine) sweet potato casserole with a crumble topping - what’s not to love?

Parve / Vegan dishes

Asparagus
The Soup Vixen helped me acquire half a flat of asparagus from the Italian Market. I was going to roast them right before serving… and that didn’t happen. So now I have a pickling and canning project. Woo!

Dandelion Greens
Come on - what says bitter greens and spring time so much as dandelions? These were (again last minute, so didn’t happen) going to be quick sauteed with olive oil and vast quantities of garlic.

Carrot Casserole
These were going to be cut into coins in the food processor and baked with a little liquid (probably vegetable stock) and some za’atar seasoning. This was the first recipe to be abandoned because I found the golden gratin, but I still bought the carrots

Savory Red Pepper and Onion Matzo Brei (not vegan)
Also would have been tasty, but was a dish that sounded best made last minute.

Dessert

Coconut Macaroons
My friend has a quest to find the perfect coconut macaroon recipe, so I made doe eyes at her for many of them for Passover. And it worked - she made 4 batches.

Only there was an error in the handing down of the familial coconut macaroon recipe, and this try called for 2 egg whites per package of coconut (instead of the 1 called for by the condensed milk people)… and that made the recipe harder for her than it should have been. Apparently the extra egg pools out into eggy feet around the base of each macaroon, and she had to tear them off individually. (also, her dishwasher broke mid macaroon making)

That said, the macaroons were soft and sinfully delicious and way better that the dusty, dry ones from the boss’s Passover leftovers. I brought the leftover macaroons to work, and there was so much praise!

My friend, however, is still looking for an even more perfect recipe. The condensed milk flavor was more noticeable than she wanted and there was the egg issue, but the ease of the recipe was a big plus.

Walnut-Date Torte
Whooo! So my stand mixer is also new so me, so this was my first time whipping egg whites. It was amazing. It was a miracle that I didn’t eat the sugar/whipped egg white mixture with a spoon. I can see meringues in my future. Pavlovas with summer fruit.

Right, so the walnut stuffed date appetizers (which didn’t happen) and the dates for this cake were prepped at the same time. I just took my measuring cup and every time the date was dry or not pretty or didn’t split easily, it was cut into bits (quarters the long way, and then 4-5 slices down the length). I ended up with slightly over a cup and a half from that method, which was exactly what the recipe called for. Then I added the half a cup of boiling water and let it sit to hydrate.

For the walnuts, I just learned that the way that entry is written explicitly means you measure the 1 1/2 cups of walnuts, then toast them, and then chop them. Done!

And then I got out the food processor my sister got me (which I absolutely did not steal from KitchenMage) as a housewarming to chop the walnuts with 1/4 cup light brown sugar until finely ground. Then the recipe calls for 2/3 cup matzoh meal, but I’d misread the recipe before shopping and also bought matzoh flour for just this recipe, so I was determined to use it! So in went 1/3 cup matzoh meal and 1/3 cup matzoh flour, 1/2 teaspoon ground cardamom, and a pinch of salt.

Instead of orange zest, I just happened to have some orange peel soaking in water in my fridge awaiting accumulating enough to candy… so I minced up an eighth of a cup of blanched, soaking (so much milder than fresh) orange peel and added it to the dates. I really liked this change.

I beat the egg whites until the looked like they were thinking about peaks, and then I started slowly adding the remaining 1/2 cup white sugar. And the volume didn’t increase as much as I was expecting, so I might have beat slightly longer than requested, but they were holding stiff, glossy peaks and looking lovely when I did stop. They made that lovely crinkly sound when you fold into them.

But first - the 4 yolks get mixed into the dates and orange peel. First the dates were added to the egg whites and folded in, and then the nuts and flour were folded in. This was seriously one of the most delicious cake batters ever! (And I’m a devoted batter eater. I find the batter is almost always significantly tastier than the end product, and this was no exception).

I had enough batter for two medium (8″?) pie plates. It baked at 350F for 40 minutes until a toothpick came out clean (I didn’t notice the springing away from the edge of the pan phenomenon), and I served it in the pan.

It was okay and definitely decent on the first day.

By the second day, however, it was nice! You should definitely make this 1-3 days ahead. You know what was also nice? Drizzling it with cointreau! It’s in the good fruitcake family, and it does well being treated that way.

I have started baking!

Now I’ve tried baking before, and I have ruined cookies. I have ruined more than one box mix of bread made in a bread machine. I just don’t get dough.

And now, all of a sudden, I’m baking. Bread. Without a bread machine.

Okay, so the without a bread machine part was entirely accidental, but I’d already added water to flour when I found out the motor on my bread machine had given up, and it would have been more difficult to clean up at that stage than to keep going and give it a try completely by hand.

I’m trying to keep myself to eating no more than a loaf of bread a week, so there hasn’t been an explosion of bread products. But it’s the second week of fearless breadmaking, and the second loaf of tasty bread… so I’m ready to confess to it.

Premise: Michael Ruhlman wrote a book, Ratio. And after talking it up with my friends, it was a yule gift to me (thanks!). I thought it was a book about baking, but it’s really more a book about all kinds of cooking - at a very high level. It pretty much says, “All of those techniques you know that come with complicated recipes? Well the recipes are secretly rather simple, and here are the magic formulae behind them all - in graph form, no less.”

Okay, well, I have a scale and I’m feeling a lot more comfortable with bread being able to be reduced to a framework with some flexibility.

But I’m also not an expert, so I can tell right away that the scant ten pages on bread will not be sufficient, so I also pull out the book of bread machine recipes and my Joy of Cooking.

Experiment 1:
I look at the lean dough recipe (Ratio, p.10):

20 ounces bread flour (about 2 cups)
12 ounces water
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon active or instant yeast

And I compare it with the recipes for 2 lb loaves in the bread machine cookbooks. Those tend to call for about 3 cups of flour, so I scale down the recipe to:

15 ounces flour
9 ounces water
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
yeast

Yeah, so I didn’t measure the yeast. The store only had packets, so I just went with a whole packet and figured that should be a loaf of bread worth.

So I pulled out my measuring cup (because it’s microwave safe) and poured in 9 ounces of water. And then I chucked in the random egg yolk I had in my freezer (thawed first) and 2 teaspoons of butter (because every recipe in the bread machine cookbook had about that quantity of lipids). And then I carefully microwaved it up to about 90F and poured some over the active dry yeast to soften it.

Into another container (a quart yogurt container was the perfect size), I started measuring out my flours. And of course I didn’t go the easy route, but I went for whole wheat flour right away. I added about 5 ounces of whole wheat, maybe another 3 ounces of rye flour, and then I was just careful adding the white bread flour to get it to exactly 15 ounces.

Then I added the liquid to the bread machine, added the flour, and topped it with the wet yeast. Plugged it in and nothing happened. Nothing! Whah!

After much despairing, I pulled out the bowl part and twirled the paddle for a bit by hand - and it came together pretty quickly and painlessly into a ball. So I dumped the ball into a large, heavy bowl to mix a little more. And here was the real moment of brilliance that will keep my coming back to bread making - I realized that I didn’t have to get a whole table messy/floury to make bread - I could knead it right there in the bowl!!! Not only was my table not getting dirty, but I was also amazed to discover that my hand didn’t end up all that messy, either. I love bread dough!

I kneaded it in the bowl for a bit, but it fairly quickly became apparent that there wasn’t enough liquid in the dough and it just felt grainy. So I slowly added water in batches as I was kneading. And then I was reading more in Joy of Cooking as I was kneading, and I saw that it said you must have sugars in the dough, too, in order to feed the yeast. So the next time the dough felt dry, I grabbed the honey bottle and squeezed in some honey. I think I ended up adding slightly less than al 1/4 cup of water and maybe an eighth of a cup of honey.

And then I had to let it rise… except my kitchen isn’t hot enough. I live in a tiny studio apartment, and I’ve come up with a solution where I heat my bedroom just a little and the kitchen not at all and this winter (thanks to the help of friends) I have the place insulated enough that it’s enough for me to be comfortable… but the kitchen’s around 40F on most days. So I (oiled the bowl, rounded the dough, turned it in the oil) dampened a kitchen towel and microwaved it until it was warm and steamy. Then I put the bowl on a cutting board and wrapped the top in the warm towel and tucked it all up close to the baseboard heater in my bedroom.

By morning it had doubled in size. Punched it down, kneaded it a little, had some errands to run, so I re-wet and microwaved the towel and put it up for a second rise. Came home and heated up the oven and baked it. (400F for 10 minutes, 350F for 25-30 more minutes - from Joy of Cooking)

Results of experiment #1: So I fully expected this loaf to fail. From no recipe to the equipment failure, from starting off trying a whole wheat loaf to the random inexplicable tinkering - this recipe was doomed to fail. Only it didn’t! It was delicious! It was bread! Okay, so it was a bit solid and tough and more suited to toasting that gobbling up straight, but it was still hard not to gobble it all up right away. I even took some to my mother that night, and she agreed it was tasty bread! Success!

Experiment #2:But I can do better.

This time I only went up to 3.5 ounces of 15 to be whole wheat flour. And I mixed some whole milk with the water (still a total weight of 9 ounces).

And I kneaded it for longer in hopes of making it chewier. Oh, and I figured that since I can keep kneading the flour in a bowl and my hand isn’t getting too dirty that the whole project is portable! So I tucked back into the warm bedroom and kneaded the flour for a whole episode of Earth 2.

The dough still needed more liquid (about the same amount more) and I still added honey (2 Tablespoons-ish). And I accidentally - because I didn’t check back with the book - only included 3/4 teaspoon salt.

And even with the long kneading time, it never reached the stage Ruhlman describes where, “To know if you’ve kneaded the bread dough enough, cut a small piece and stretch it gently. If it reaches the point of translucency before it breaks, the dough is ready.” (Ratio, p.8) But I figure that’s a feature of using the whole wheat flour. And I was starting to worry after 50 minutes of desultory kneading whether I might not be doing too much. I kept adding liquid until the dough was just slightly tacky/sticky after a thorough kneading.

Since the initial mixing had been done in this bowl, too, there was a fine crust of floury bits around the rim, so I did have to wash and dry the bowl before oiling it and putting the dough back in it to rise. But I used the same set up as last week. Only one rise, though.

Results of experiment #2: OMG BREAD! No, really - bread! Just the right amount of gumminess. It could use a bit deeper flavor, but it was exactly what bread should be! Without a recipe and done by feel! I can not express how happy this makes me! It wasn’t just beginners’ luck, either! Wooo! I can not wait until next week when I’ll let myself have another go, but I have no idea how this loaf will last through the night without getting completely devoured.

Plan for experiment #3 So I’m going to need to buy more yeast for next week, so I was perusing the King Arthur Flour website, and I stopped by to look at their recipes - some of which convert back and forth between volume and weight. I’ve noticed that they tend to go with a 16oz flour : 10 oz liquid ratio. That would be a little more wet, and I think I’ll try that next.

I am eating the weirdest cookies that I bought at Death Bi Chocolate - I think they have white chocolate chips, raisins, dried cherries, and powdered candy canes…. They are addictively good, and I have no idea how.

I do not have a baking talent… or really much of any talent for desserts.

So, dear friendslist, is it a plausible goal to produce something chocolatey and tasty (but not necessarily gourmet) for the Death Bi Chocolate people by Monday noon?

Especially considering that I recently re-injured my knee with the grotty cartilage?

Ingredients should cost no more than $15 and be light enough to be hopped across the street. Preparation should be able to mostly take place sitting down.

Are there any recipes that fit these requirements? (even if I don’t make something for the event, it’ll still be great to know if such recipes exist)

I know this isn’t the best year to try my hand at participating, but it has come to my attention that this year it will be held somewhere more local than it used to be, so I’d love to see the event do well.

Plus - chocolate!

Wisdom from the comments: Epicurious Chocolate Cake, Chocolate Orgasms, Whacky Cake, French Chocolate Candy, and these fancy shaped brownies:

Fancy shaped brownies are very easy. You will need:

brownie ingredients
a sheet of parchment paper
a half sheet pan
a spatula
cookie cutters

Line the half sheet pan with the parchment paper.
Spread the brownie batter over the parchment-lined pan. Bake till set. Let cool.

Cut in shapes with the cookie cutters. Place on a serving plate. Eat the scraps.

If desired, microwave butterscotch chips or white chocolate till they melt and drizzle over the cutouts. Lick the drips off your fingers.

Read books
Element of Fire by Martha Wells

I really liked this book, but I spent the entire time I was reading it wishing it were Science Fiction instead of Fantasy. See, one of the things I like most about some of this author’s other writing is that she writes science fiction that is believably otherworldly where I am neither pointing the the earth culture some author blatantly ripped off nor am I wincing at the implausible technobabble. Her stuff is the closest to good hard sci fi that I have read in a while. So I went into this book looking for that itch to be scratched, and I got fantasy.

Still, there’s wonderful political intrigue, and an amazingly understated and limiting system of magic that feels wonderfully plausible. Every single character has dimensions and motivations and regrets. I ended up wanting to spend a good deal more time in this world.

The Wizard Hunters by Martha Wells

Luckily, I already had another book set in the same world as Element of Fire. Only this one - is set in the future of the other book - possibly a steampunk future. So there’s that rich texture of fantasy, but the magic has faded a bit in the way of technology and there are whizzing gadgets and whamframits and legacies of wizards and the ways different cultures have been shaped by developing in a world with magic. It’s almost an anthropological study, but it’s also swashbuckling and quirkiness. There are so many elements in this world, but they are all clearly defined and interesting and I need to go buy the next two books in the trilogy right away.

Watched movies
Stardust

There were times when I was grinning uncontrollably, thinking, “Awwww… Neil Gaiman, your message is showing.” Geek boy makes good! People love you, even if you’re different! Overconfidence will do you in every time. N’awww!

But aside from that, totally aside from Neil Gaiman’s input, this was an awesome movie. The visuals were stunning! The acting was wonderful - there was just the right balance of scenery chewing and subtlety. And I have never seen costuming and special effects work together so well before - with the way they did the witch’s magic, her incredibly awkward dress totally worked because it matched the smokey magic effect and made it looks like she was trailing off into vapours at the edges - and both were enhanced by the other. I loved that the pretty pretty princess looked like a real person, and beautiful. I loved that one of the essential parts of becoming a hero was acquiring Keanu Reeve’s hair - I had never understood before. Robert De Niro was great, but I really wanted to squish his first mate’s cheeks - who was he? OH! - well, this movie really suited him.

Kiss of the Spider Woman

This movie has been available for me to watch ever since it was released and we had a copy on Beta. Finally got around to it.

First off. I hate William Hurt. Far too many times, I have gone into a movie really excited that it will have John Hurt in it, only to be tricked into having to watch William Hurt, instead. Not a fair substitution, I tell you! I think he managed to single-handedly ruin the last third of History of Violence, which would have been one of my favorite movies, if only they had cast someone other than William Hurt. I don’t like his voice, his mannerisms, the way he manages to be smugly modest, and he has stupid hair. Or I might just be projecting that all because I am bitter that he isn’t John Hurt.

And the movie starts off with William Hurt’s voice talking painfully slowly he’s really savouring his own nasal tone, and I almost turned it off right there. But my mother has been trying to get me to watch this movie for years, so I kept going.

I sure was glad that my closest neighbors have moved because I was a bit embarrassed at times to have, “Faggot,” shouted out through my windows so frequently - not a polite movie.

But it was a good movie. I liked how the characters developed and didn’t compromise. I liked how the story was built up in layers that seemed superficial but weren’t.

I have an urge to rewrite bits of it. On the other hand, I like that I have to fight the text at that point.

Baked… badly
Saga of the whole wheat banana peanut butter chocolate chip cookies

It all started with overripe bananas. And I was going to make banana bread, but I always make banana bread. So I looked through my cookbooks for something new to bake with bananas.

I have checked out from the library a cookbook for Clueless Bakers, and it had a recipe for whole wheat banana peanut butter cookies. What could go wrong?

So I started off following the recipe exactly, and the recipe said that throwing in chocolate chips would cause nothing but good things, so I did that.

The result? Lumpy, grainy, yucky cookies of blech!

I thought back to the best peanut butter cookies I have ever had, and they had been made from a fairly thin batter with melted chocolate drops on top. So I went to the store to buy Hershey’s Kisses, and I set out to thin the batter.

I looked in my fridge and decided that the small cup of vanilla yogurt would be the perfect choice, after all I was planning to put yogurt (plain) in the banana bread, if I made it, and a bit of vanilla would do wonders for the taste. I also decided that a teaspoon of powdered ginger would also do wonders for the taste, so I added that.

The batter was thin and spread out just the way I wanted, but it didn’t get crispy at all. The outside was cooked, but the inside was still mushy - and they were thin now!

Apparently, yogurt was the wrong choice. When I called my mother to whine about my cookies, she said that I should have used an egg but that a dairy product would trap too much moisture.

The Hershey’s Kisses were also not as charming as the chocolate drops made special for the other recipe because they didn’t melt - the just got a bit droopy around the edges but maintained their shape perfectly even after baking. Creepy. Possibly, I should have been tipped off by the paper tags under the foil that said, “Oops,” and, “I hate Mondays!”

At least the dough was tasty. If it weren’t for cultural indoctrination against salmonella, I’d prefer to eat most cookies as dough.

Nevermind, I packed up the entire lot of them and left them in the staff room for people to try.

I’m good at savoury food, but for some reason I am bizarrely incompetent at baked goods.

ETA: The free cookies at work were not tempting enough at all - at the end of the day, I ended up throwing out half of them.

PIE vs Harry Potter.

Made from scratch key lime pie in which we tested out two different recipes… versus the new Harry Potter book.

Pie made with some absolutely lovely people who are wonderful people… versus the new Harry Potter book

Pie with people who live in the city versus my pre-paid Harry Potter book out in the suburbs at least 40 minutes away.

what do you think happened?

I totally managed to do both!

There was socializing and talking and baking - with an extra trip to round up enough ingredients for the *two* batches instead of the single one originally planned. We found that the Nigella Lawson one was bizarrely fluffy and that we probably liked the simple recipe printed on the bag of key limes best, but we are reserving final judgment until the pies have had a chance to cool and set in the refrigerator.

Because we ate the pies warm!

Pies came out of the oven about 11:20ish.

There was tasty sampling that was reasonably leisurely so as to fully judge the pies’ merits.

And then there was freakishly fast driving. And I did not get a speeding ticket even though I totally deserved one.

Got to the bookstore at 12:10 to a bunch of people leaving - but there were still a bunch of people buying. My pre-paid receipt was not in the special box, so manager-type person was called over and a list was checked - and I walked out with a copy at 12:20.

And now I need to calm down a bit before getting into the serious business of reading.

I have an old standard recipe for never-fail banana nut bread that comes from the red-checkered version of the Better Homes and Gardens cookbook, so when I got my apartment I got a copy of the cookbook to take with me so that I could have this specific recipe.

Only they went and changed it on me! I ended up with some crazy recipe that had streusel nut topping. Not on, cookbook. [ETA: streusel-laden recipe warning - pop-ups and other annoying advertising]

So I sent home to my mother for a copy of the correct recipe to put into the cookbook:

Banana Nut Bread
350F

1/2 c. shortening butter (5 1/3 Tbsps.)
1/2 c. sugar
2 eggs

1 3/4 c. sifted all purpose flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt

1 c. mashed ripe bananas (I use 3 bananas, if I have them. Otherwise, 2)
1/2 c. chopped nuts (pecans, in my land)

Cream together butter and sugar; add eggs and beat well.

Sift together dry ingredients; add to creamed mixture alternately with banana, blending well after each addition.

Stir in nuts.

Pour into well greased 9.5″x5″x3″ loaf pan.

Bake at 350F for 40-45 minutes or until done. Remove from pan, and cool on a rack.

Now once I started making this in my apartment, I was living in a land with no dishwasher. So instead of mashing the bananas in one bowl, chopping the nuts into another, creaming the butter and sugar in yet another, and then having the large bowl with the dry ingredients and then everything else - I tried to minimize the dishes I would have to do. So I broke apart the nuts into the measuring cups after they’d been used, and I put the bananas straight into the dough and mashed as I mixed it in. This ended up making the dough too dry. So now there is about another 1/2 cup of sour cream in my standard recipe. Basically, I make it the usual way and then I add sour cream until the dough is wet enough.

This recipe makes amazing bread.

This morning, while I was waiting for the bread to cook, I decided to see whether my new cookbook, The Best Recipe by the Cook’s Illustrated people, had any opinions on the perfect technique for making banana bread. And they do:

• Sour Cream added richness, but it also made for a heavy texture and an unattractive, pebbly crust.
• they mix the nuts with the dry ingredients and the bananas with the wet, and they add yogurt in with the wet, too.

It’s the end of the season, and I have an abundance of food.

food I have
Not frozen meat
8 or so assorted pieces of Kentucky Fried Chicken
leftover filet mignon (with sauteed peppers and mushrooms on the side)
bacon (this usually is just assumed, but I thought I’d throw it on the list today)

Frozen Meat *means should be used soonish
ground beef
hamburger patties
meatballs
taco seasoned ground beef
london broil marinated for stir fry*
chicken breast
diced roast pork* (only 1 meal’s worth)
chicken backs for stock

sorely tempting meat on sale this week
ground beef $1.69/lb
skinless boneless chicken breast $1.99/lb

bread
tortillas
I have a bread machine!!!
1/2 pound of bread leftover from a loaf

Produce
10 peaches of dubious virtue (these are the least ripe ones from the $5 of peach seconds I got at the farmers’ market and put up and sugared and put in the back of the fridge to ferment. Now my container is full, and I need to think up something different for these last few)
10 pounds of potatoes
5 bell peppers
2 zucchinis
3 long skinny eggplants
carrots
jalepeno peppers
2 apples
garlic (whole and peeled)

Dairy
sour cream
cheddar cheese
2% milk
heavy cream
and end of a blue cheese that should be finished soonish
cream cheese

OMG food!
I looked through all my cookbooks for stuff for peaches and potatoes (separately)

One of my favorite cookbooks, Lidia’s Italian-American Kitchen, had a recipe for a frittata that not only included potatoes, but also bell peppers and day old bread! Score. I had that last night, but I put all the stuff on the list, anyway, just so I could brag about finding the perfect recipe. I wonder how well the potato frittata will reheat? I’ll find out eventually, I guess.

Cooking With the Seasons had an exceptionally tasty-looking peach dessert, but I’ll need people over to try that. Hint. Hint.
ETA: I lied. The recipe is in Winterthur’s Cullinary Collection, which also has an interesting recipe for a pie with dates and sesame seeds that I might like to have help trying to create some moot.

Otherwise, it looks like I’ll make a coriander and peach chutney/salsa thing and find a good meat to put it with… my choice would be lamb, but it’s looking like chicken is the available option.

I have separated the chicken into meat, crunchy bits, and refuse. I can’t quite bring myself to toss the crunchy bits. They are so tasty - there must be a way to use them without the hideous gluttony of a meal of chicken skin. Crumb topping for casserole?

I’d been planning to put the filet mignon with peppers and mushrooms either in tortillas or over rice all mexican-y with maybe the zucchini and perhaps a can of beans. I think the starch shall, instead, be diced potatoes. Lots of diced potatoes. And I could probably grill down at least one additional bell pepper. I might be able to put away five or six lunches from that dinner.

Ummmm… eggplant. That could go with potatoes in a curry. With jarred tomatoes (from [redacted]’s mother!). And… ummm… lots of jalepenos. Yeah.

So what else is urgent? I should have a bell pepper left, unless it self destructs before I get to it. More potatoes. Some pork for a small dish. Beef for a stir fry. Wherewithal to make hella tasty mashed potatoes to feed a large army. Bother - peaches still, I can’t imagine the chicken using up more than half what I have. Oh, and cooked chicken. Right.

So I need salad greens. I think a chicken, peach, grilled onion salad with stilton would be kinda tasty. Maybe some toasted almonds in that. But way too early to buy the greens yet.

roasted pork with potatoes and carrots and gravy. *yawn* Boring, but it’ll still be tasty.

And then I thaw the meat for stir fry again and make it right quick. Probably by this time I will need to buy more bell peppers. There can be potatoes in stir fry. Totally.

Ooh, and the Better Homes and Gardens has a recipe for bread machine potato bread that starts from a real potato.

Yeah. That should feed me into next month. And I think I’lll still need brilliant ideas to eat everything.

And I have a hankering to make lots of bread… only no room to eat it.

ARGH! I forgot about the three pounds of dates I bought to stuff for an SCA event and never got around to doing anything with… and the container of feta cheese and the bag of walnuts. Is anyone throwing a party any time soon who wants to join me in making a tasty little finger desserts?

Meanwhile, I am feeling both antisocial and lonely… and not quite sure what to do with that.

Okay - so the plan for the July 4th moot, is to have [Host] write fic. Lots of fic.

Therefore, we have planned a coup.

I will be organizing. Anyone interested in producing food, let me know.

(Also, it will be [Hosts]‘ anniversary)

Meanwhile, here are some of my ideas:

Friday: Thai Food
theme beverage: thai iced tea

Yeah, I totally have to look up the recipes before I have any idea what we’ll make. Let me know what are your favorite dishes (and be guaranteed that it’ll be an amateur version) - and let me know if there is anything you can not tolerate.

Saturday: Southern Food
theme beverage: Mint Julep

Breakfast
- Biscuits and gravy (made by [redacted])
- Bacon (made by [redacted])
- Eggs to order (made by Livia)

Appetizers/Lunch
- caramellized bell peppers (made by [redacted]) on cornbread (made ahead by [host])
- crab dip (made by [redacted])
- pimento cheese (made by Livia) on something (made by [host])
- shrimp remoulade (made by Livia or bought from Trader Joes)
- hush puppies (made by Molly) very last appetizer, so we can eat them with the dinner, too

First Course
Pecan-crusted pan-fried fish (made by [redacted])
Rosemary potatoes (made by [redacted])
Chicken Creole over rice (made by Livia)
Collard greens w/ bacon (made by [redacted])
Green beans (made by [redacted])

Salad Course
Salad
either balsamic or blue cheese dressing

Long-term noshing
Mac’n'cheese (made by [redacted])
Green bean salad (made by [redacted])
Red beans & rice (made by Livia)
Jambalya shrimp (made by Livia)

Dessert
Rum pears & rum apples (made by [redacted])
Chess Pie (made by Livia or someone with more baking affinity) with crust (made by Molly)

Sunday: Pig & Dairy day
theme beverage: beer

breakfast
Bacon (made by [redacted])
Eggs to order (made by Livia)
Eggs benedict (made by [redacted] plus others?)
English muffins (made by any ole person)

Appetizers/lunch
angels on horseback

Dinner
Pork medallions & cream sauce (made by [redacted])

Dessert
Custard? Zabaglione?

Monday: Mexican
theme beverage: tequila / Coors

Breakfast
yeah, whatever - feel free to volunteer to wrangle this

Appetizer/Lunch
Guacamole

Dinner
Saucy meats, condiments, and tortillas
Rice

Dessert
gluten-free churros?
fried ice cream (made by [redacted])

So who else wants to add to this?

A shopping list and further planning will come later.

Recipes for possible reference - (note: these recipes were here to use this weekend, but I don’t think I have every gotten around to trying any of them. Sources were not recorded)

Coconut Shortbread Cookies
1 c butter, softened
1.4 c granulated sugar
1 tsp vanilla
2 c all-purpose (gluten-free) flour
1/4 tsp salt
2 c flaked coconut
about 1 c powdered sugar

In a large bowl or electric mixer, beat butter until creamy; add granulated sugar and beat until smooth. Mix in vanilla. In another bowl, stir together flour and salt; gradually add to butter mixture, blending thoroughly. Add coconut and mix well until combined. Shape dough into a roll about 1 1/2 inches in diameter; wrap in wax paper and refrigerate until firm (2 hours MIN! to 3 days).

Unwrap dough. Using a sharp knife, cut into 1/4-inch-thick slices; place slices slightly apart on ungreased baking sheets. Bake in a 300 degree oven for 20 minutes or until cookies are firm to the touch and lightly browned on bottoms. Transfer to racks and let cool for 5 minutes. Sift hald the powdered sugar onto wax paper and transfer cookies to it in a single layer; sift additional powdered sugar on to to cover cookies lightly. Let cookies cool completely. Store airtight.

Cheese Straws (makes 5 1/2 dozen)
1/2 pound grated sharp cheddar cheese, grated at room temp
8 T (1 stick) butter, softened
1 3/4 c sifted flour
1/2 t salt
1/4 t cayenne pepper
1/2 t tabasco sauce

In a bowl, beat together the cheese and butter until well blended.

Sift the flour along with the salt, cayenne pepper directly into the cheese-butter mixture, add the Tabasco sauce, then mix until thoroughly blended. Form the dough into two large patties, cover, and refrigerate one hour.

Preheat the oven to 425F

One at a time, roll out the two portions of dough until they are about 1/4″ thick. Cut the dough into 5″x1/2″ strips and carefully place the strips on [lined] cookie sheets.

Bake cheese straws for 8 minutes. Then remove them from the oven and let them cool. (Also good served fresh and hot)

Andean Tamales
5 c water
1 c regular (not instant) hominy grits
1 t salt
1/4 pound mild pork sausage
1/2 pound lean pork
2 large cloves garlic, crushed
1/4 t whole aniseed
1 onion, about 2″ in diameter, finely chopped
one 4″ long fresh chili pepper, stemmed, seeded, and cut into thin strips
1-2 hard cooked eggs, cut into lengthwise strips
about 30 peanuts, roasted, shelled, and skinned

In a heavy, 2-quart saucepan, bring the water to a boil and slowly stir in the grits. Lower the heat, add the salt, cover and cook slowly for 25-20 minutes, stirring occasionally to prevent sticking.

Meanwhile, put the sausage, either whole or cut in half, into a colf frying pan, set it over medium heat, and cook until it begins to render a little fat.

Add the pork, either whole or cut into several pieces of equal thickness, and cook, turning occasionally, until the juices no longer run pink

Add the garlic, aniseed, onion, and pepper strips, stirring to brown and flavor the meat.

Turn off the heat; remove the meat from the pan with a slotted spoon and cut both the sausage and the lean pork into 1/4″x3″ strips. Set them aside on a plate together wih the egg strips and peanuts.

With a wooden spoon, mix the pan drippings and fat into the cooked grits

Cut lightweight aluminum foil into ten 10″x12″ strips

Divide the grits into equal portions. Pat half of each portion into the shape of a long, narrow rectangle down the middle of each foil strip. Run a strip of pork and one of sausage down the center of the grits, leaving room at both ends. Top with 3 peanuts and 1 or 2 strips of egg

Pat a half portion of grits over each strip of filling to completely cover it. Then seal the foil package by wrapping it like a present.

When you are ready to cook the tamales, place them in a skillet large enough to hold them in a single layer, cover them with boiling water and cook gently for 2 to 2-1/2 hours

Remove the tamales from the water with a slotted spoon, cool to room temperature, and serve right in foil packets

Delicate Eggplant Balls
1 medium eggplant, whole
1 egg, beaten
1/2 c grates Swiss cheese
4 T bread crumbs
1/2 t cumin
1/2 t garlic powder
1/2 t lemon juice
1/2 t salt
1/4 t pepper

Cook eggplant in boiling water until tender (20-25 minutes). Peel, and mash pulp with fork. Add remaining ingredients. Mix well. If mixture is too thin, add more breadcrumbs. Shape into small balls and refrigerate 1 hour. Roll balls in flour and deep fry until crisp. Serve hot.

Huevos Rancheros (makes 4)
4 tortillas
3 eggs
*2 c canned tomatoes
*1/4 c ketchup
*1/4 c barbecue sauce
*1/4 onion diced
*hot chile peppers to taste
*salt to taste

simmer all the starred ingredients for 10 minutes, breaking tomatoes into fine pieces. Heat sauce to boiling. In a generous amount of hot oil in a frying pan, fry tortillas lightly on each side. Set aside to drain. Fry eggs in the same pan, sunny-side up or over easy. Add salt to taste. Place one egg on each tortilla and pour a quarter of the sauce over all.