Senior Review

First of all, you should all read this letter written to a food blogger from a 60 year old man in the UK who doesn't know the first thing about cooking and is trying to figure out where to start.

Now then. My Senior Review is on MONDAY. At 9AM. And it's supposed to be cold. I'll be spending 30 minutes presenting my work and another 20 getting feedback. Among the pieces showcased will be this one -- KitchenWar. I'll be spending a lot of time on this because it's a big project, and I think it would be impudent, bordering on rude, to talk so much about food without serving some to my panel.

I need suggestions for what to serve. I will not be able to cook anything there, though I will be able to plate it. I was originally thinking about Russian Creme with raspberries, but that's more summery than is appropriate for a 40 degree Monday morning. So now I'm thinking potato soup. Not really a breakfast food, but it's warm and hearty, and I can probably keep it warm on the way to campus. I was also tempted to do some skillet popcorn, though I don't know how well that will travel. Maybe home made muffins...? I think there's a microwave in my review room, so I suppose I could cook them the night before and warm them up.

Cookies!!

I made them, they are mine. All 5 dozen. 5 dozen. Let that be a lesson to you. Be really careful when you're cooking from a restaurant cookbook. Over at Frog, I'm convinced they make cookies by the gross. I don't actually need 5 dozen cookies. I don't need anywhere near that many. Life is hard.

In all seriousness, this recipe is very odd to make. Oatmeal chocolate chip cookies, normally with walnuts, but I used peanuts instead. You make a basic cookie batter, and then you add over a cup of oatmeal, 2 cups of chocolate chips, and 1.5 cups of peanuts. At then end of all this, you don't really have cookie batter anymore. You have oatmeal and peanuts and chocolate chips with a batter coating. They just barely hold together. This is a flat, crunchy cookie.

A Note To The Underprivileged...

When I was growing up, my parents had what I now know to be the rare habit of keeping bread in the oven. There wasn't any real reason for this beyond the fact that we had nowhere else to put it. I didn't usually think much of it, although it did elicit some comment from friends who came over.

It also created a very amusing trial-by-fire situation for our babysitters, whom my mom would inevitably forget to inform of the bread situation. It became a fairly common occurrence for my parents to return home from a night on the town to find the house smelling of burnt plastic and a sheepish babysitter with a small, sad little pile of ziplock bags painstakingly filled with the remains of the bread stash.

Interjection: One of my housemates has confirmed that his family used to do the bread-in-the-oven trick as well. So it wasn't just us.

Anyway, the point of all this is that it taught me a very important lesson, which that you always, always check the oven before you turn it on. Basic kitchen safety 101, in my book.

These memories all came back last week. We are not renewing the lease on our house and our landlord has started setting up showings. In preparation for one of these, I was cleaning up the kitchen and running out of time. I was confronted with a bunch of heavy, dirty dishes under the purview of one of my housemates, as well as the remains of an angel food cake. In a desperate attempt to get out of the house before the landlord showed up, I shoved everything dirty into the oven and left.

I didn't hear about this until this morning, when the guilty party mentioned that he had disposed of the rest of the angel food cake "because it got baked twice." He followed this up with a very proud and self-satisfied, "I don't check the oven before I preheat it." I can only conclude that he was deprived as a child, as his parents must not have booby trapped their kitchen when he was growing up. (This was also the day he left the stove on. Another big no-no. In our house, that would have meant a pile of mail going up in flames.)

If you are the victim of kitchen theatrics neglect, help is available. It may be too late to adopt the trademark cavalier attitude towards alternative storage methods so common among the privileged, but with dedication and practice, you too can learn the art of safely using an oven.

Truffle Update

I forgot to add that the extra 4 oz of chocolate made everything better. I confronted the ganache while the soup was simmering. This time it was plenty stiff enough to scoop. So stiff that it bent the melon baller and didn't want to ball.

I scooped out ball sized chunks, coated them with cocoa powder, and shaped them with my hands. They turned out fine.

Ingredients
15 oz dark chocolate
6 oz heavy cream
3 tbsp caramel syrup (Joy of Cooking)
1/4c very very strong coffee
cocoa powder, for coating

Finely chop the chocolate and put in a heat resistant mixing bowl. Add the coffee and caramel. Over low heat, bring the heavy cream to a simmer and pour over the chocolate. Stir until chocolate is fully melted. Refrigerate until firm.

Scoop 2 tsp of ganache and coat with cocoa. Roll between hands to shape into a ball. The cocoa should keep the chocolate from melting to your hands. Store at cool room temperature in an airtight container.

New Home

Here it is. My new home for the next couple months. I gave in to my inner foodie and now I'm doing semester long cooking projects for two of my art classes. This means approximately 20 hours of cooking and blogging every week.

Stay tuned.