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Category: experiments

Death Bi Chocolate?

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.

Experimental risotto – Mushroom, bacon, and maple syrup

I think I’ll make mushroom risotto for dinner tonight – so the big question is whether I want to stick with what I know’ll be tasty or whether I want to try to add bacon and a tiny bit of maple syrup to change things up a bit.

I’m not usually a fan of maple syrup, but I think the bacon I usually use (for breakfast and stuff, I haven’t tried it in risotto yet) will taste… classier… with a bit of syrup drizzled about.

ETA: a drizzle of maple syrup worked even better than I expected.

Green papaya

I made an impulse purchase of a huge, beautiful green papaya, and now I am figuring out what to do with it.

Seriously, the thing is big enough for more than one meal.

I’m thinking 1/4 of it can go into soup.
This recipe is simple, but it’s the most promising one I’ve found so far.

Here is a Filipino recipe for Green Papaya Chicken (Tinolang Manok)

Here is an indian side dish. It says that I can make it without the dal and it’ll just end up looser, but if I make the rice drier, it should all balance out.

OOoooo… or I could make spring rolls! That’ll only happen if it lasts until the weekend and is vaguely ripe when I cut it open, but aside from the herbs and a cucumber, I have all the other ingredients.

I think I do not want to make a chutney or a cold salad-type dish.

But I am certainly open to other suggestions and links.

food front

It has been too hot to cook, so I made soup/stew at night over the weekend and have been making that last.

I had half a cabbage and (what I thought was) a spaghetti squash in my produce drawer, so I came up with a daring plan to try to make another soup/stew with the two of those, some ham, and chicken stock.

When I went to cut up the squash, however, it turned out to be a random asian melon.

It made a rather wonderful breakfast, but it was a surprise.

Tofu Shirataki

Food experiment: Tofu Shirataki

Yeah, so this was a total shot in the dark as to whether they would be edible, but they were both weird and on sale so they fit my standard requirements for a culinary adventure.

Shirataki noodles are made from a root (often translated on the packaging as yam) and – in this case – tofu. They are packaged wet, kind of like sauerkraut.

Because the packaging warned that they are often parboiled to get rid of the smell (other notes included “distinctive texture”), I drained the packaging liquid and set it to marinate in a spicy cooking sauce. Then, I fried it all up in a pan with eggplant and shredded cabbage.

Right after cooking – fairly tasty, but still not as sexy a texture as proper noodles… they ended up having an almost al dente texture. Maybe I should have parboiled, but I was more worried about the flavor.

After freezing – No. Just no. So the website has a warning not to freeze, but the packaging didn’t, and ew! It turned into thin strips of plastic, I swear! So I am picking those out and dropping them in my trash so I can eat the rest of the goody.