Salted Caramel Whoopie Pies and Homemade Indian Food

Heather, Jasmine and I like to read all of the same cooking/food blogs-- Serious Eats (www.seriouseats.com), The Pioneer Woman Cooks (www.thepioneerwomancooks.com) and The Girl Who Ate Everything (www.thegirlwhoateeverything). We like to alert each other whenever we see good recipes and fun projects on these blogs, so when Jasmine and I saw a recipe for salted caramel whoopie pies on Serious Eats (http://www.seriouseats.com/2009/02/blogwatch-whoopie-pies-with-salted-caramel-bu.html) we knew it was going to be our next project when I was in San Francisco. Soft chocolate cookies + salted caramel buttercream = heavenly bliss!

The recipe wasn't hard-- make the soft cake-like cookies, then fill with buttercream. Ella was very excited to help us out. When she saw us getting everything ready, the first words out of her mouth here "I want to help"! Ella is already a very adventurous eater, so maybe these projects will spark a lifetime interest in cooking as well.

As you can see, Ella was a very good helper. She carefully helped Jasmine stir the cookie batter and helped me beat the caramel into the buttercream. Ella was always very careful to do exactly what Jasmine and I asked her to do, and followed directions very well. Hmmm... maybe I see an EZ-Bake oven in someone's future?! She loved tasting the buttercream after we were done making it.



Below is a picture of our finished product. We learned a very important lesson-- make sure the cookies are FULLY cooled before filling with buttercream! Otherwise, the butter will melt all over and make a mess, and you will be sad.


And here's Ella enjoying the fruits of her labor-- she looks like a satisfied cook:


Indian food is one of my favorite cuisines. However, my attempts to make it haven't been very successful. It always tastes not quite right, like something is missing. Jasmine also loves Indian food and has been raving about these spice mixes from Sukhi's (www.sukhis.com) that she buys at their farmers market. I was extremely skeptical because I am skeptical about all mixes in general. How can they be any good? They're prepackaged and often cheaply made.

Sukhi's blew away all of my skepticism. We went to the farmer's market and picked up a couple of different packets and made them for dinner my last night in San Francisco. We made a vegetable curry and two types of chicken curry. Wow! It tasted exactly like it came from one of my local Indian restaurants and were extremely easy to make. I liked how I was able to use fresh vegetables and meat to make a fast and healthy dinner.

Jasmine and John brought a bunch of these mixes when they were visiting me in New York. Thanks Jaz and John! Dalmau and I will now be enjoying delicious Indian dinners all Fall and Winter long.

A San Francisco Wing Ding

I loooove buffalo wings! Ever since Amy, my freshman year roomate at the University of Rochester (which is very close to Buffalo), first introduced me to the wonders of these savory, tangy and spicy morsels, they've been one of my favorite foods. In Rochester, a side of wings is always ordered with pizza, and a frequent weekend indulgence. Buffalo wings (and another favorite food, salt & vinegar potato chips, which Amy also introduced me to) were directly responsible for me gaining the freshman 15 lbs! However, that still hasn't stopped me from indulging from time to time.

After reading about a Super Bowl wing wrap up on Serious Eats (www.seriouseats.com), John, Jasmine and I held our own taste test during my visit. We put 3 brands to the test: KFC (buffalo and plain crispy); Extreme Pizza; and Original Buffalo Wings. Extreme Pizza and Original Buffalo Wings are local neighborhood spots. The local KFC was very sketchy. Each place we ordered 3 types of wings: plain, buffalo and barbeque.

The KFC barbeque didn't disappoint. It was crispy, sweet and smoky, just like we had remembered it. I also liked the slightly thicker breading (which is a no-no for buffalo wings, but perfectly acceptable for barbeque wings!). At the end of the night it placed second overall.

The plain category had a very weak showing. We didn't particularly care for any of the plain wings-- they were either too plain, or flabby and wimpy, or just too "blah".

The overall winner was the Original Buffalo Wings. Their buffalo wings were just right-- the correct balance of vinegar, spice and butter, on a crispy wing with very light breading. A special bonus are the homemade potato chips which are categorically delicious! The second place buffalo wing winner was KFC, and the loser was Extreme Pizza-- just not good at all.

SF Weekend Day 1: At the museum with YSL, Mootisse and Pigasso

I went to San Francisco for my annual spring visit with Ella and Tyler. I love San Francisco, and I was especially looking forward to showing Ella more of the city now that she's getting older and can easily walk around. I arrived late on Thursday night and woke up early Friday morning (no need for an alarm clock with Ella around). We had decided that Tyler would go to daycare and Ella and I would have a special day to ourselves.

Ella and I started our adventure with breakfast at Cafe Murano across the street. Ella learned a new word to go along with a delicious start-- a "croi-ssanT" as Ella said very clearly enunciated. We then hopped into a taxi for Ella's first cab ride, which she enjoyed immensely. She loved looking through the window and seeing all the cars go by, and engaged our cabbie in conversation, asking him if this was his car.

After waving goodbye to the cab driver, we picked up our tickets at the De Young museum to see the Yves Saint Laurent exhibit, which ends in early April. I was looking forward to seeing the exhibition, as San Francisco was the only American stop of the tour. Ella and I looked at all of the beautiful clothes, and Ella was especially enthralled with the videos of the fashion shows. The funniest part was when Ella asked if we could go downstairs to see "Mootisse and Pigasso." Last year I gave Ella a book I found at MoMA titled "When Mootisse met Pigasso." It is a cute introduction to the world of modern art, and tells a somewhat fictional tale of the rivalry and eventual close friendship between Matisse and Picasso. I was especially happy to hear that the book and its topic had stuck with Ella.

So, at Ella's request, we went downstairs to look at the art, and then went outside to enjoy the sunshine and look at the sculptures surrounding the museum. Ella loved a sculpture of a boy playing the flute. She likes to imitate him by wiggling her fingers in front of her and pretending to blow into a flute.

We then took a cab back to Filmore street and the MMJ store. Ella showed off her very fashion-forward look by mixing and matching the stripes on her pants to her striped coat. Ella likes to touch all of the clothes and then twirl in front of the ceiling to floor mirrors. She then made me laugh again with her very direct and clear request: "I want to eat and then go home." So Ella and I had a great lunch together at Osaka, where Ella impressed me by eating tons of vegetables. We started off with sharing a salad, and then Ella ate some of my rice and teriyaki salmon, and about half of my vegetable tempura with eggplant, sweet potato, carrot and zucchini.

We both needed a nap after our busy morning!