Key Lime Pie

In American Regional, we hit the Caribbean and Florida. So naturally we made Key Lime Pie. It was great. At least I thought it was. We had to use key lime juice because we could not get fresh limes in here in Utah. It still turned out good. Even my husband who dislikes the pie, tasted it and said it was good.
I used a little too much condensed milk, because I went by cups instead of weight, so there is a little sweeter taste to the pie. Overall, it was a success.

Key Lime Pie- all this is done by weight, if your doing it by cups, add a little more lime juice and zest.

1cup + 1tbsp          Graham Cracker Crumbs
1/4 cup      2oz        Granulated Sugar
1/4cup       2oz        Butter, melted
2cups        15oz       Sweetened Condensed Milk
6                              Egg Yolks
3/4 cup       6oz       Key Lime Juice
1tbsp         1/3 oz    Key Lime Zest
1cup           8oz       Heavy Cream
1/2 cup                    Confectioner's Sugar (powdered Sugar)

1. Pre heat oven to 350 degrees
2.Combine the graham cracker crumb and sugar.
3. Add the melted butter and combine until the mixture resembles wet sand, press mixture into 9 in pie pan.
4. Whisk the condensed milk with egg yolks and blend in the lime juice and zest. Pour the mixture into the pan with the pie crust.
5. Bake for about 15-20 minutes. Until the filling is set. Let pie cool at room temperature for 1 hour. Be careful to not over bake.
6. Prepare the topping by whipping the cream with the sugar, be careful not to over mix. It will break down if it is over mixed.
7 Garnish pie with whipped cream

**Tip: have a chilled bowl when whipping the cream it helps to make it fluffy and the cold will help it whip up faster than a warm bowl.

Fruit Tarts

Last week in Class we worked on making those pretty tarts you see in bakeries. I though it would be incredibly difficult. The only hard thing was deciding how to place my fruit on the tart to make it look pretty.
It would be nice if I could make and sell them out of my house. That whole ideas has kinda fallen by the wayside. Turns out people in Utah, aren't as friendly and helpful as they first seemed.  Keeping this about the food. I have posted some pictures below of my tart, and another groups. We all used what fresh fruit that we had. What gives it the shiny look is a glaze that is put on top. It seals in everything so that it does not go bad as fast. Really cool when your looking at them. I just need to get better at making pretty designs. The recipe is really basic. Its a sweet dough for the tart, a basic pastry cream recipe for the filling and fresh fruit.

Happy Eating.

Baking, Baking and more baking

With midterms quickly approaching, I am spreading thin and trying to catch up with every thing. Baking and pastry has been great. I am getting much better at what I have already been doing. Learning to make a few new things too.
Definitely have had a lot a practice time in to the point I cramp my hands when they have to knead dough. But its all worth it. I would not change a thing or go back to riding the ambulance. I have found my calling and it is to feed people, and make them fat and happy. Some of the pictures below are Soft yeast dinner rolls, shaped two different ways, pretzels,  spritz cookies, and oat meal cookies. There are two pictures of the oatmeal. What it should look like and what NOT to do. If you do not add enough flour you get the second picture. A heap of gooey mess attached to parchment. Lesson learned by a classmate at my table.  Whats coming this week you ask, pies and custards. Because I am busy these next few nights, I will post the recipes for some of the creations later on as I catch up.

Happy Eating

Soft yeast dinner rolls.

Forgot to mention we did Biscotti this week too.

Gingerbread cookie

Pretzels

Oatmeal cookies

What NOT to do

Catching up

Its been a crazy couple weeks trying to catch up with typing up recipe cards and taking pictures, notes, and making sure everyone is up to date. So last week in American Regional, we stepped into part of the Old South covering some great dishes. When I think south I think Louisiana. This covered pre civil war, so it went back to some of the older dishes and that most of the deep frying came from the African Slaves. The history of food is actually quite interesting. Carolina Pulled Pork was on our menu along with Potato salad, cobbler and Shrimp Perloo. Here are what they look like. If you want the recipe just leave a comment and I will post them up as soon as I can. There are some recipes that we didn't make that are good too. As soon as I get some time I will put them up here.

Spicy Crab Soup

Another recipe from American Regional. Exploring the East Coast this week. Spicy Crab Soup. Using crab pieces. I would recommend that you add the potato closer to when you add the crab, rather than when the directions state. We paired this with Crab puffs.

Spicy Crab Soup
2 tbsp unsalted butter
1/2 cup Onion 1/2 in dice
1/2 cup Celery 1/2 in dice
1 cup  potato 1/4 in dice
2 cup tomatoes peeled and seeded 1/4 dice
1/2 cup corn kernels
2 cups chicken stock
1 tsp Old Bay seafood seasoning , or Cajun seasoning
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 black pepper
1 cup crab meat
1/2 cup green peas
1 tsp lemon juice

Heat the butter over medium heat and cook onion for 4 min.
Add the celery and cook for 3 minutes
Add potato, tomato, corn, and chicken stock
Add seasoning and cook for 25 minutes
Add crab meat and peas the simmer for 10 min
Correct the seasoning with salt, pepper and lemon juice .

Serve warm with crab puffs

I will post the puff recipe at a later date. Hope you all enjoy eating ..

Mock GInger Pound Cake

This was a recipe we made yesterday in American Regional classes. This recipe comes from the Mid Atlantic states. I would recommend putting a little extra orange juice in with the cake batter to bring out the ginger.  We served it with warm cranberries and whipped cream.

Ginger Pound Cake
2 cup All purpose flour
1/2 tsp Baking Powder
1/4 tsp Salt
1 cup unsalted butter, room temp
1/2 tsp orange zest
1 1/4 cup granulated sugar
3 eggs room temperature
2tbsp ground ginger
1/2 cup milk

Pre heat the oven to 350. Butter and lightly flour a loaf pan or line it with parchment paper.
Sift together flour, baking power, salt. Set aside
Cream the butter adding the zest. Cream until its light and fuffy. about 5 min
Gradually add the sugar and beat until mixture is fuffly again.
Add the eggs one at a time being sure they are well incorporated before adding the next egg.
Mix in the ginger
Add the flour mixture alternating wih the milk begining and ending with flour.
Pour the batter into the pan and bake for about 1 hour or until a skewer inserted comes out clean.

Happy Eating

Jalapeño corn muffins

This was one of the items we made this week in class. It is a jalapeño corn muffin. We used what is called the muffin method. That means you stir the mix til it's just incorporated. Otherwise you can have too much gluten and the muffins will be tough and hard. We used triple the amount of jalapeños that the recipe called for. We also tossed them on a grill to give them a better flavor. Will post recipe later this weekend.

Happy Easter

Sorry all for the lack of posting. I have been trying to catch up in my work at school. Hopefully soon I will have some interesting food items to post for you all. The first week of school we did do biscuts and blueberry muffins. I had some issues with being there the whole week so, its not worth the posting. I will have something for you all next week. I hope everyone has a nice holiday.

Happy Eating.

Hunger Games food

I found a cook book that has recipes from the Hunger Games. Some of the recipes have worked out great as you will see and others are way off the mark. I think the author confused baking powder and baking soda in some of the recipes. The ones that did turn out we're the Dist.12 ugly biscuits and the brown sugar short bread. Wild dog stew from the Hob is still brewing so that will be posted later. If you want any of the recipes just ask me. Picture to be posted later.