Kitchen Boot camp– Baked Brie with Cranberries

It seems like forever since I participated in this challenge or maybe it just seems like a while.  For this month, our challenge was to make a Thanksgiving appetizer.  In my family, we normally don’t mess with appetizers and go straight to the main course but I wanted to add one just incase we had to wait for something to finish cooking (this time it was rice).  Unfortunately, I didn’t realize until it was too late that I didn’t seal the pastry dough well enough and the cheese leaked out a little.  It was still good even with the cheese oozing out.  I have seen many versions of this dish.  My favorite brie pairing is figs.  Unfortunately, I didn’t have any around so I decided to incorporate some of the cranberry sauce I had with the brie. 
Baked Brie and Cranberries
Puff pastry (homemade or store bought)
One Wheel of brie (what ever size you would like)
Cranberry chutney (look below for recipe)
Directions

1. Fold out the puff pastry and make sure it is large enough to cover the brie. 
2. Layer about 3-4 tablespoons of cranberry chutney in the center a puff pastry leaving about 2-3 inches from the edge.
3. Place the brie with the skin on top of the cranberries.
4. Fold over the edges, make sure it completely covers the brie.
5. Take an egg wash and seal the edges together (this step I forgot)
6. Bake at 350F for 20-30 minutes. 
7. Brush an egg wash about 10 minutes prior removing it from the oven.
8. Let it sit for 10-15 minutes and than serve.

Yeah it kinda looks funny, when I took this, it started to deflate.
Cranberry Chutney
1 package of fresh or frozen cranberries – about 12 oz.
1 Cup of Water
1 Cup of Raw Sugar
Juice of One Orange
2 Teaspoon of Grated Orange Peel
Directions

1. Put everything in a medium sauce pan.
2. Start heating up the pan at a medium-high heat and bring it to a boil.
3. Once it is boiling, reduce the heat to a medium-low heat and let it simmer for 30 minutes.
4. While it is cooking, you could help it out by breaking up the cranberries.
5. Once it thickens, remove it from the heat and let it sit for 10 minutes or until it is completely cool.

Check out My Kitchen Addiction for the other posts.

Food Coma….btw How was your Thanksgiving

 

 

I hope everybody had a great thanksgiving.  Mine was busy but great.  For the past three years, I have been hosting Thanksgiving for The Husband’s family.  Each year we have been deep frying the turkey.  I’m actually intimidated to roast an actually turkey so instead we deep fry it.  The Husband is in charge of that part of the meal while I prepare everything else.  This year I went simple.   I even timed everything right were all the food was done when everybody got to our house.  For once I’m not late with our food .  The Daughter was excited to see all the food.  I have been getting her psyched up for Thanksgiving for the last week.  So when she saw the turkey, she was already jumping up and down.  It was a rainy Thanksgiving so The Husband decided to cook the turkey by the garage.  I was a little worried about it but he seemed fine about it.  The best part is that it only took an hour to cook.  I wanted to pick at it as soon as he brought it to the kitchen. 

The other dishes I made was…..

A garden salad with Dried Cherries, pecans, and Fuji apples.  It was topped with an apple poppy seed dressing.

Chicken Gravy – This was the first time I made homemade gravy.  I’m so doing this again.  It came out better than regular gravy.

Garlic Mashed Potatoes – A staple in my house.  I roasted the garlic the night before and than made regular mashed potatoes with butter and milk. 

Homemade cranberry sauce (My husband keep insisting we get the canned stuff..humph)

Sweet Potatoes and Carrots in a Brown Sugar Glaze

Green Bean and Portabella mushroom Casserole (you could tell I was getting lazy at this point?)

Butter Glazed Dinner Rolls (It was a copy cat recipe of Golden Corral’s Bread recipe)

Plain Ensaymada – I had ube filled but The Husband ate all of them before Thanksgiving. 

Pumpkin pie

Baked Brie with cranberries.  I didn’t seal the bottom well enough so the cheese started to leak out.

Baked Mac and cheese (I don’t know what I was thinking with the chunks of cheese. )  I was going to top it with Parm Cheese but I actually ran out. 

We also invited our friends thank goodness, most of the food was actually gone .  Here is the damage we did.

 

So how was everybody’s Thanksgiving?

Kulinarya–Relleno, another Misadventure #11

I’m a little late with this post and actually I was debating if I was going to post this.  I wasn’t happy with the result but I figured why not.  This month was hosted by Anna from Second Helpings and  Dahlia from Energetic Chef.  I was excited when I heard the them and than it sank in to the actually task.  The only relleno I have known was bangus relleno.  Watching The Mother make that many times, I thought I could do that.  Than I realized that would require me to debone the fish.  That scares me.  I can’t even hold a whole fish.  So instead I made a eggplant relleno but I messed it up according to the Husband.  I did reference multiple recipes and I “thought” I knew the basics.  I was so wrong. 

Instead of using Japanese eggplant, I thought I could use regular egg plant.  Mistake one.

The second mistake, I didn’t cook the eggplant prior stuffing it. 

I used a ground beef mixture of ground beef, carrots, peas, potatoes, onions, and garlic (sound familiar).  I had to make empanadas this week so I just used the same filling. 

Mistake three, I made the layers too thick. 

So I stuffed it, dipped it in a egg wash, than cooked it on a skillet.  It took longer than  I thought to cook and when we finally did eat it, some parts of it was not cooked.  The egg plant was not cooked, the filling was already cooked.  Great huh? 

Mistake four  - I forgot salt and pepper. 

This is what happened when I don’t cook for a while.  Lets just say The Husband analyzed the dish and told me “what I should have done” .  So next time, he is making it. 

Here are some pitiful pictures

Btw the stuff on the bottom is egg..It turned into a omelet on the bottom. 

Kulinarya was started by a group of Filipino foodies living in Sydney, who are passionate about the Filipino culture & its colourful cuisine.
Each month we will showcase a new dish along with their family recipes. By sharing these recipes, we hope you find the same passion and love for Filipino Food as we do.
The current members are:

Kath - http://www.acupcakeortwo.com/
Trisha - http://sugarlace.com/
Trissa - http://trissalicious.com/
Olive - http://www.latestrecipes.net/
Caroline - http://whenadobometfeijoada.blogspot.com/
Ninette - http://bigboldbeautifulfood.blogspot.com/
Peach- http://www.thepeachkitchen.com/
Althea- http://www.busogsarap.com/
Asha - http://forkspoonnknife.blogspot.com/
Malou - http://www.impromptudiva.com/
Cherrie - http://sweetcherriepie.blogspot.com/
Acdee - http://acdee.blogspot.com/
Valerie - http://www.acanadianfoodie.com/
Sheryl - http://crispywaffle.com/
Divina - http://www.sense-serendipity.com/
Anna - http://www.anniesfoodjournal.blogspot.com/
Dahlia - http://www.energychef.blogspot.com/
Joy - http://joyjoycreativeoutlet.blogspot.com/
Maribel - http://www.foodgeek.webs.com/
Tressa
Jen - http://www.jen-at-work.blogspot.com/
Pia - http://bisayajudkaayo.blogspot.com/
Malaka - http://thegrandinternational.com.
Mimi - http://lapinchecocinera.blogspot.com
Erika - http://ivoryhut.com/
Kat - http://twitter.com/alanokat
Lala - http://thislittlepiggywenttothemarket.blogspot.com/
Selfie - http://eats.sefiebee.com/
Connie Veneracion frm http://homecookingrocks.com/
Oggi from http://oggi-icandothat.blogspot.com/
Katrina Kostik from http://lardonmyfrench.blogspot.com/
Rochelle Ryan from http://www.whydiss.blogspot.com/
Marica - http://cuppycreme.blogspot.com
Diona - http://titaflips.blogspot.com/
Rowena - http://saraplicious.blogspot.com

Oh I did it again :(

For a good month, I planned out the menu for The Daughters Birthday.  I love having parties just because I get to experiment with new recipes.  But guess what I forgot to do yet again, take pictures.  I hate when I do that.  Luckily one of my friends Vicky did take a few pictures.  I also was able to take some pictures after the party but by than, most of the food was gone.  Errrrrr.  I tried to go with a Halloween theme but I ran out of time for a few things I had planned. 

Menu

Longoniza Sliders (Chicken and Pork)
Chicken Wings (I attempted to make Max’s style)

Orzo Salad

Meat Ball Eyeballs (Chicken)

Pizza (ok Papa John’s Pizza)

Baked Salmon

Deviled Eggs

Sans Rival Macarons

Chocolate Suman

Espasol

Homemade Marshmallows

 

My lovely cousins also brought some brownies, caramel apple cookies, and taffy apples.  And my wonderful, loving friend Anna (she did me a huge favor) made some Apple Pie Caramel Apples.  We didn’t want to share them with the kids .  You have to check out her post, it was really good.  Unfortunately, we were running around so much, we also forgot to give the little giveaways for the kids.  The important part was that The Daughter had a ball.  She refused to sleep that night. 

Here are some pics from that day. 

Longoniza sliders on Pan De Sal

Strawberry Marshmallows  - some dipped in chocolate.

Me and the Munchkin

Cinnamon sugar chips

The Costume The Daughter was suppose to wear prior her ripping it.

 

I’ll be posting some of the recipes.  This week is going to be crazy again for thanksgiving.  What are your plans for thanksgiving?

Towat’t Baboy

First off, I don’t actually eat pork or I try not to.  I grew up not being allowed to eat it, it was against my religion.  I did slowly start eating pork and since The Daughter is allergic to almost everything we are kinda limited on what we could feed her.  For the party I was catering, I was requested to make Towat’t Baboy.  Lets just say, I had no idea what it was.  I did do some research and I got the main ingredients including piggy ears.  I had The Husband handle that part.  He was my taste tester as I cooked it and he loved it.  To me, it was kinda like beef steak but maybe that was just me.  This is a dish The Husband will probably ask me to make again but we will see

 

Towat’t Baboy

2 Lbs of Pork Butt

2 Lbs of Piggy Ears (You could adjust to your preference)

3 large packages of Tofu

1 Large Onion Sliced

Whole Peppercorns to taste

Sauce * These measurements are by ratio so adjust by the amount you would like

2 parts whole heads of garlic minced

1 part vinegar to 3/4 part soy sauce (so if you had 1 cup of vinegar it would be 3/4 cup of soy sauce)

1/8 part brown sugar (I liked it a little sweeter

 

Direction

1. First start boiling the pork butt and piggy ears until the pork butt is tender.  There should still be a little bit to the pork ears.
2. Once it is done cooking, let it cook and than slice in 1 inch cubes.
3. Take the tofu and dice in 1 inch cubes and than sauté them in a large wok.
4. Once they brown, add the onion slices.
5. While that is cooking, mix together the sauce.  Just mix together all the ingredients.
6. Once the onions are tender but not too soft, add the pork pieces and pour the sauce over the whole thing.
7. Mix well to make sure everything is coated.
8. Bring the heat down to a simmer and let it sit for about 10 minutes until the sauce because thicker.
9. Serve over Rice.

 

Almost Human Again

Like the title?  It is how I feel.  I more or less took a break from everything.  I had quite a few things go on in my life at the same time and my creative block, I forced myself to take a mental break.  For the last 2 months, all I have been doing is eating junk food, watching TV, and playing with the daughter.  No experiments, no school, hardly reading any blogs, and obviously hardly any posts.  I hit the one year mark and I wasn’t sure what direction I wanted to go in.  I realized I wasn’t baking as much.  Baking was the start of my love in the kitchen.  I had to find ways to get out of my slump.  Than I got a phone call about a party someone wanted me to cater.  I jumped at the chance.  It was to be a Halloween theme and I figured, it was a challenge to make some simple dishes with a Halloween twist.  I did feel a little frazzled because the day of the party was the day before The Daughters 2nd birthday.  I did plan ahead and prepped quite a bit to make sure I didn’t feel rush.  I also had the help of The Husband.  He even delivered and setup for me while I rested up.   This was a Filipino party so I was able to make some of the dishes with a Filipino twist. 

Here was the menu:
Eyeball meatballs - Embutido Style
Witch Finger Pan de Sal
Fried "Mummy" Vegetarian Egg Rolls
Tokwat't Baboy
Orzo salad
Guacamole
Espasol

It was fun going with a theme.  Since I was not able to take pictures of the final setup, I was able to take some pictures before The Husband left for the delivery.


Mummy Egg Rolls

Witches Finger Pan de Sal

Tokat’t Baboy

Orzo Salad

Embudito meatballs
Here is the Embudito Meatball recipe
(Makes about 20)
1 Lb. of ground meat (chicken, pork, beef)
2 Carrots
1 Onion
2 Tbs Chicken/Beef Bouillon
2 Hard Boiled Eggs cut in small pieces
1/4 Lb. of Velveeta Cheese Diced in 20 cubes
Green Olives sliced (You will probably need about 6-7 of them)
Directions

1. Take the ground meat and place in a bowl. 
2. Peel the carrots and used a cheese grater to shred the carrots directly into the bowl.
3. Do the same with the onion.
4. Add the bouillon and mix together until it is well incorporated
5. Start dividing the mixture into 20 portions (it equaled about 1 oz. of meat)
6. Make a ball out of the portioned out meat, than flatten into a pancake.
7. Place a cheese cube and a egg piece in the middle.  You could add other stuff like hot dog pieces if you like.
8. Bring up the edges to make a ball. 
9. Place a olive slice on the outside to resemble an pupil.
10. Once all the meat balls are assembled, cook the meat balls.
11. I steamed mine but you could also bake it. 
12. Once the meat is full cooked, I would use a meat thermometer, it is ready to serve. 

I made a set for The Daughters birthday and I served it with sweet and sour sauce. 

Need Sleep

I apologize now for not posting but I'm completely exhausted.  After coming back from California, having The Daughters birthday party, and other reasons -  I haven't slept.  Hopefully after this weekend, I will back to my normal self (to whatever that is :D).  I do have a few new recipes, I'm just waiting for some energy to actually put it down on paper.  Hopefully I won't forget :D.

Now I must go back to work and fight to stay awake.