Summer is for Blackberries

After the chicken post, I was supposed to have two more recipes up within a matter of days. However, in my infinite winning, I left a bag of groceries at the store and didn't realize until the next day. Even better, this bag had some of the most important ingredients of the two recipes I just mentioned. Well, I finally managed to get my shit together enough to make the cake I was planning on. There is also a pasta recipe, but that has to wait because, yet again, I am an ingredient short. FML.

Blackberry Buttermilk Cake
Adapted from bon appetit.

3/4 cup butter (1.5 sticks) + more for greasing
2 1/3 cup cake flour + more for dusting
2 small packages of fresh blackberries
1/4 cup + 1 1/3 cups sugar
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda
3 large eggs
2 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 tsp orange zest
1 cup buttermilk
powdered sugar (for dusting)

Whenever you're baking, it's usually best to let your cold ingredients come to room temperature before you start working (a notable exception being butter in pie crust). Once you decide to make this, let the butter, eggs, and buttermilk sit out for a while before you start assembling anything.


Preheat oven to 350 F. Butter the bottom of a 9" or 10" springform pan. Cut a sheet of parchment paper to fit the bottom of the same pan and fix it on top of the butter. Butter this parchment paper and then dust with flour, tapping out excess.

Arrange blackberries on this buttered, floured surface, and sprinkle 1/4 cup sugar over them.

In a medium bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, salt, baking soda. In a larger bowl (or the bowl of a stand mixer) cream together the 1.5 sticks of a butter and the 1.33333 cups of sugar. Mix until this is pale and fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, mixing well after each addition. Beat in vanilla and zest.

Reduce mixer speed to low (if that's what you're using) and add the flour mixture and buttermilk, alternating between the two, until all has been added to the bowl of butter/sugar. It tends to work out best to start and end with flour, but do what works for you. Divide the flour into at least 3 additions and the buttermilk into at least 2, but if you want to go even slower than that it should be fine. Important here: don't over-mix. Stop mixing once the flour has been just incorporated.

Pour cake batter over blackberries and smooth out the top. Place in the oven and set the time for 45 minutes because you'll want to check it at this point (it probably won't be done, but it might be). The cake is done when it is golden brown and bounces back when pressed with a fingertip.

When cake comes out, let it stay in the pan and place the pan on a wire rack for 15 minutes. Run a knife along the edge of the cake and remove the sides of the pan. Remove the bottom from the pan and peel off parchment. Dust the top (blackberry side) generously with powdered sugar and let cool completely.

Notes

• I'm usually a brownie batter and cookie dough eater only - cake batter has never really done it for me. But holy god, this stuff was tasty. It will also be very light in terms of texture, almost like if whipped cream and cake batter had a baby. This is good, this is what you want.
• There was a ton of debate on the bonappetit.com reviews for this about the proper cooking time. The original recipe states that you need 1 hr and 25 min for a 9" pan, and 1 hr for a 10" pan. I'm using a 9" pan and my cake came out finished at 1 hr but I had to cover it with foil around the 45 minute mark or the bottom (non-blackberry side) would have burned. Just check it as you go to make sure things aren't burnt and don't be surprised if you end up cooking it for a little longer.
• I don't ever have the patience to wait for non-iced caked to cool so I ate a piece of this warm. It's delicious though I recommend adding a small scoop of vanilla ice cream.

Cost

• I got the blackberries on special at 2 packs/$5 and everything else is pretty much stuff you should have on hand so it's about a $5 cake.
• According to the source, this is a 10-serving cake at 410 calories per slice.

Stunning Men and A Home-Cooked Classic

You know what I found today? This. Needless to say, a good bit of my afternoon and evening went to trying to ask Jensen Ackles questions he would actually answer publicly. Out of the three I submitted, he answered one. Apparently most of my inquiries are just too personal/creepy/not okay to be acknowledged. I have no hard feelings though. It's very difficult to be upset with someone so beautiful. Emma laughed at my new-found stalking hobby but, not having ever seen Supernatural, questioned whether Jensen could really live up to the gorgeousness of Ian Somerhalder; I have no answer for this. I have no answer for anything right now, as I have spent the past 20 minutes looking through pictures of these two and have drifted off to a happier place where Jensen and Ian and I sit around sipping coffee and doing crosswords together. Mmmmm.

Oh

uh

food?

That's why we're here? Huh. Okay.

Roast Chicken with Lemon, Rosemary, and Honey
Adapted from bonappetit.com.

1 2-4 lb chicken
1/4 cup olive oil
1 tbsp honey
2 lemon
1/2 lb shallots, peeled
fresh rosemary sprigs (at least 1 large bunch)
salt
pepper

Preheat the oven to 375 F. Line your roasting/baking pan with rosemary sprigs. Set aside.

Whisk oil, honey, and most of the juice of 1 lemon in a small bowl.

Open/rinse/remove giblets/neck from your chicken. Now, beginning at the neck, use your fingers to go between the breast meat and the skin to loosen said skin. Pour about 1/2 of your oil mixture on the breast meat (in the space you just created) and try to spread it evenly around as best you can. Spread the rest of it evenly over the rest of the chicken. Set chicken on top of the bed of rosemary you've prepared.

Slice your second lemon in half. Place 1 of those halves and 1 whole, peeled shallot in the cavity of the chicken. Stuff the rest of the rosemary in there too. Season the chicken all over with salt and pepper.

Cut the other half of that lemon into slices and place those on top of the chicken. Place the rest of the shallots in the baking dish around the chicken.

Roast the chicken, basting as often as you reasonably can (maybe once every 10-15 minutes?), for 45 minutes. Increase over temp to 425 F and roast for another 10-ish minutes, until a thermometer stuck into the thickest part of the thigh reads 165 F and the skin looks delicious.

Remove from oven. Enjoy.

Notes

• This recipe was originally doubled (IE: for 2 chickens) so feel free to scale this up as needed. 
• If you don't know where you keep the meat thermometer, you can use the classic method of cutting a slit in the skin between the thigh and the body of the bird and making sure the juices run clear. Also, don't get salmonella. That shit is nasty.
• I couldn't find a baster in Emma's apartment so I just tried to spoon juice over the chicken as much as I could. This is tedious and ineffective, so if you have a baster, use it.
• Keep an eye on things while they are in the oven and cover the chicken in foil if it looks like things are getting too dark.
• The chicken came out moist with a slight hint of lemon in the meat. It was good, but I don't know that I tasted anything all that different than I've tasted in many roasted chickens of yore.
• The shallots are sweet and delicious.

Cost

• I bought a humanely-raised chicken cause I'm a sucker for that shit so that plus the rosemary plus the lemons came to $11. This should last me at least 3 meals so, not too bad.
• Calories are obviously less for the white meat, but on average, about 450 for 1/3 of the bird.

Bonus

Though I am loathe to admit it, someone close to me has done a very accurate and abbreviated version of this post that I will share:

[7:44:50 PM]: I'M POOR OH GOD I HAVE NO MONEY I SUBSTITUTED CHEAPER THINGS I HAVE NO KITCHEN EQUIPMENT I'M JEALOUS OF EMMA'S STAND MIXER CHICKEN CAME OUT OK I HAVE NO FREE TIME THE END

Tart Frozen Yogurt > Studying

Keeping the bowl of the ice cream making attachment of the KitchenAid mixer in the freezer is successfully encouraging Emma and me to make more ice cream and ice cream-analogs. She definitely spear-headed this recipe too, and I think it's brilliant.

Tart Frozen Yogurt
2 1/2 cups Trader Joe's 2% Greek Yogurt
1/2 cup agave nectar
1 tsp vanilla

Mix all ingredients in a bowl. Place mix in the bowl part of your ice cream maker. Hit Start. Wait 20-30 minutes. Enjoy your Pinkberry-style frozen treat.

Notes

• I'm sure brands other than Trader Joe's would work; my favorite greek yogurt tends to be Fage because I find it to be thickest. Similarly, I'm sure you could up the fat content of the yogurt for a creamier final product.
• If you don't have or don't want to use agave, replace the 1/2 with 3/4 sugar. This may also work with an artificial sweetener if you're trying to cut down on calories, but I haven't tried it so if it doesn't work out, not my B.
• As it was with the previous ice cream recipe, reserve any mix-ins you want for when the yogurt is done being churned. Ideas: granola, nuts, berries, chocolate chips, candies, dried fruits.
• Allowing your pet to clean out the greek yogurt container is entirely optional, though completely adorable.

Cost

• A half-cup of greek yogurt + a tbsp or so of agave + vanilla = at or under 180 calories. Pretty damn good for dessert.
• Greek yogurt can very greatly when it comes to price, usually from about $3 to $6. That means a batch of this will run probably between $6 - $12. Considering a single serving from a fancy yogurt place is often somewhere between $4-$7, this ain't bad.

How Many Doctoral Candidates Does It Take to Make Ice Cream?

I ask. Emma answers matter-of-fact-ly: Two. It seems she's right. In an unprecedented turn of events, I am blogging and photographing this adventure, but someone else (Emma!) is doing pretty much all of the work. She's also doing pretty much all of the singing. It is a humble tune, one I have dubbed "Churning," and it goes like this: churning-a-churning-churning-a-churning. It's cute.

My excitement is less lyrical but just as strong since I don't have a fancy stand-mixer (*sigh*) or its fancy ice cream-making attachment back home. Alas.

Chocolate Ice Cream

Adapted from Baked Bree.

1 cup cocoa powder

3/4 cup brown sugar

1 1/2 cups 2% milk

3 1/4 cups heavy cream

1 tbsp vanilla

6 handfuls of sea salt potato chips
2-3 cups of hot fudge

Put cocoa and brown sugar together in a bowl.

Add milk and cream and whisk until well combined.

Pour mix into your frozen ice-cream maker bowl and follow its instructions.

Voila! Ice cream!

Emma and I wanted fixin's (that apostrophe is substituting for the g, not a possessive marker - just to be clear) so we divided up the batch and mixed in chips and fudge during the ice cream's soft-serve phase. I wrote the amounts assuming you'd want to mix up the entire batch with chips and chocolate but use less if you're making less ice cream.

Notes

• I had a whole big, clever post written up and it went away. I don't know exactly where but now that it's gone I feel deflated and don't really want to re-write all of it. Le sigh.
• Feel free to use different things to mix in or no mix-ins at all. Chocolate chips, marshmellows, nuts, cookie pieces, cereal pieces, broccoli florets, whatever gets your boat to floating.
• It is crucial to use high-quality cocoa here. One of the main reasons Emma and I started experimenting with add-ins was because we used the Hershey's cocoa we had on hand and definitely tasted the low-quality bitterness. That said, the texture was great and it was incredibly easy so it's worth doing if you have the equipment.

Your Entire Shopping Cart in One Meal

Hello Friends! Emma has returned from her Boston/NYC extravaganza so we made a celebratory Costco run and ended up with some delicious chicken-apple sausage that we decided we had to start eating ~immediately. As some of you may recall from a trip I took to Philadelphia last year (two years ago? I honestly don't know anymore), lots of meat + veggies = frittata.


Also, special thanks to Emma, not just for letting me invade her apartment for the summer and for the use of her wonderful kitchen, but also for being this post's photographer. If you notice a difference in picture quality for the better, that's why.


Frittata (general)
meat
vegetables
cheese
eggs


Heat meat and vegetables until they are desired texture and doneness. Add eggs and cheese to veggies and meat (which should be in an oven-safe skillet). Cook until edges and top look like they're nearly done. Pop in the oven until the edges are done. Frittata!

Costco-Style Frittata


2 full-size sausage links
3 small potatoes
2 ears of corn
1 red pepper
1/2 green pepper
1/4 large yellow onion
3 cloves garlic
2/3 cup grape/cherry tomatoes
12 eggs
milk (for texture and volume)
salt
pepper
cheddar cheese (chunked or shredded)


Go ahead and get a large-ish pot of water boiling, place an oven rack in the top of the oven, and preheat the oven to 350 F. Peel the potatoes and cut them into bite-sized chunks. Add potato chunks and ears of corn (husked, if they didn't come that way) to boiling water and cook until potatoes are soft - approximately 9 minutes.


Cut sausage into bite-sized pieces. In an oven-proof skillet, heat oil and add your sausage (teehee). Ours came fully cooked so we just wanted to get the outside a little brown but if yours are raw you should probably take this opportunity to actually cook them. Remove from heat and place sausage on paper towels to drain.

At some point, cut the corn off the cobs and dice up all of your veggies.


Salt and pepper the potatoes to taste. Add more oil to the pan and turn up the heat. Fry the potatoes! (You're essentially making home-fries here, and yes, you're welcome.) Remove from heat and remove any blackened bits from the pan. Add more oil if needed cause you're about to saute up your veggies. Add garlic and onions first. Once they are caramelized, add peppers. When peppers are as cooked as you like, add the tomatoes, potatoes, corn, and sausage.

In a separate bowl, mix eggs with milk (volume ratio ~2:1, egg:milk but play around). Spread your skillet mix around evenly  in its skillet and then pour the egg-mix over it. Add cheese and stir it around a bit. Now - and this is the best part - don't do anything! Wait until the edges of the giant egg monster you've made are looking cooked and the top is mostly set (~20 minutes). Shove that bad-boy in the oven. Keep an eye on it, but you're just looking for it to brown around the edges and stop looking liquidy (~15-20 minutes for a 10-12 inch skillet).

Serving Suggestion: eat with ketchup, while watching The Bachelorette. These guys are hilariously self-important.

Notes

• This, as it was before and likely will be again, is a giant frittata. It is also incredibly full so if you want more egg in your egg dish, use less in the way of veggies.
• All of these ingredients (except the eggs) are optional. More veg/meat, less veg/meat, different veg/meat. Do it. Do it all.
• If you jiggle the frittata and it jiggles back, it's not ready for the oven.
• Feel free to sub in egg whites for whole eggs if you're trying to cut calories.

Cost

• This can be as cheap or expensive as you want, but a dozen eggs is generally about $3 and let's say you used some leftovers, some veg you already had, and bought $10 worth of new ingredients (+ eggs). You're going to get about 8 servings at around $1.63 each.
• Chopping and the frying and the whatnot can take a good bit of time, but if you're using leftovers (IE: broccoli from last night, chicken from the night before that, etc) it should go pretty quickly. About 30 minutes for the frittata to cook once it's assembled.

You Can Take The Girl Out of Texas ...

and she won't really mind, although she will miss the food. Okay, enough of the third-person douche-baggery. But I am making a "tex-mex" chicken soup, which is essentially tortilla soup minus the tortilla strips (though you should totally add those if that's your thing). Also, I'd like to give a special thanks to Emma for hosting me most-of-the-summer long, and her kitchen, which is way bigger and more beautiful than mine.

(I left this page open while I was cooking so I could write down anything that came to me and wouldn't forget it. This isn't relevant to anything, but Pandora just tried to play Creed on one of my stations. Who does that, Pandora?)

Tortilla(-less) Soup
Adapted from Cooking Light.

olive oil (enough to coat the giant pot you should be using)
1/4-1/2 of an onion, chopped
4 garlic cloves, minced
1 red pepper, chopped
1 jalapeno, minced*
1 tbsp chili powder
1 1/2 tsp crushed red pepper
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground cumin
1/2 tsp ground black pepper
shredded chicken**
1-2 bag(s) frozen kernel corn
4 cups chicken broth
2 large tomatoes, chopped
1 (15 oz) can black beans, drained (and rinsed if you care)
1/4 cup fresh cilantro, chopped
cheddar cheese
lime wedges

* If you like you're shit extra spicy, just mince. If you prefer it mild, make sure you seed these guys too.
** Use as much or as little as you like. The original recipe calls for 3 cups, but I just bought a package of raw chicken tenders, boiled them w/ the juice of half a lime, and called it a day. People like to get all butt-hurt over boiled chicken but truthfully, if you don't overcook it, it's one of the easiest ways to end up with moist, cooked chicken.

Coat your cooking vessel in olive oil and heat it up. Add onions, garlic, red pepper, and jalapeno. Let this saute for at least 3 minutes, or until you've gathered up all your spices.

Now, take those spices, throw them in the pot. Bam! (If you will.) Stir it up and let it sit for 30-ish seconds. Add chicken and everything else up until black beans (but add those too). Bring this to a boil and then reduce heat and allow your almost-soup to simmer for 6 or so minutes.

Add cheese and cilantro. Serve with a lime wedge.

Notes

• Because I tend to be as lazy as possible without truly fucking something up, I left about 1/2 of the jalapeno seeds in the jalapeno mince. Bad idea. If you end up making a similar mistake, add a dollop of greek yogurt or sour cream. It will temper the heat and make your soup edible again.
• Since this is cooking and not baking, all of the ingredients are pretty much optional and flexible. The only thing you probably have to have is the chicken broth (though if you're going the vegetarian route, you can use that ass-tasting vegetable broth stores sell). Speaking of which, chicken is optional. Veggies are interchangeable. Have fun. Go nuts.
• Upon investigation, I realized I say "go nuts" a lot. Deal with it.
• I don't know if I've written up enough recipes with corn in them for you to notice, but pretty much any recipe that involves corn ends up as the corn-version of that recipe. I used 2 whole bags of frozen corn in this soup, so it might be more appropriately labeled "Corn-and-Chicken Soup." You're fine with 1 bag unless you love corn as much as I do.
• Speaking of love: cheese. Original recipe says to use queso fresco but that's harder to get on the east coast than it is on the Juarez border so, you know, cheddar. As per usual, use whatever amount your fat-kid-little-heart desires (mine desires an entire block).

Cost

• I lost my receipt but I'm not apologizing this time. Why? Because I dug through the trash to try to find it. The old banana peel, dog fur-laden trash. For YOU. Yeah, now you're hungry.
• If you use 3 oz of cheese, and keep each serving size to 1 cup, you're looking at 186 calories. Not bad.

With Much Love and Apologies

Hello! I know it's been ages - close to a year - without a post. I can do nothing about that now except apologize and promise to try to make it somewhat up to you over the next two-ish months. I am on a sort-of break from medical school (they are rare and precious) and want to tell you about some wonderful things I've been cooking and think you should cook too.

If anyone still reads this - and I doubt that - know that you are appreciated. And will soon be rewarded with a low-cal chicken tortilla soup recipe. In the meantime, thank you for coming back. Apparently medical school really is as time-consuming as they say it is, and then some.

Love,
K.