Intro from Baking Challenge: This week's challenge is...avocado! This creamy delicious fruit (yes, it is technically a fruit) is often used fresh in guacamole, and is a fantastic addition to many sandwiches. But, how to incorporate it into a baked good? Did you know that, as a healthier alternative, you can actually substitute avocado for some of the butter in a recipe? There are a lot of other surprising ways that you can use avocado in baking. Some lovely savory options include baked eggs in avocado (yes, please!) and avocado crostini. If you're feeling like something sweet, avocado's creaminess lends itself well as an addition to icing , or even an avocado pie. Happy baking!
Oh man, were these delicious! I made them on a Saturday morning for a weekend breakfast treat. I used the recipe here for the eggs, using little crescents of tin foil to help hold the avocado halves level. When they were just about done, I fried up some bacon and then fried the diced chorizo in the leftover bacon fat (which was AMAZING). I will absolutely be making these again.
Intro from Cooking Challenge: Contrasting flavors are an important part of any cook’s bag of tricks. Think of how much a pot of tomato sauce can really shine with a little sugar added, or a dish like sweet and sour pork has those layers of different flavors that stack on top of each other to create something greater than the sum of its parts. We can apply the same ideas to temperature contrast, and that’s exactly what we’re here to do for hot and cold week. This doesn’t necessarily have to be high-concept – a favorite meal of mine is barbecued pulled pork sandwiches with coleslaw, where you have not only the hot/cold contrast but also the smoky barbecue/piquant coleslaw flavor contrast. Many top chefs use hot and cold contrast to create unique dishes – Heston Blumenthal, for example is famous for creating drinks that are hot on one side, and cold on the other (and here’s how to do it). Hot and cold contrasts can also be used in desserts. The two most famous examples of this are baked Alaska and bananas foster.
As soon as I saw this week's challenge, I knew I wanted to make black been soup. The combination of hot bean soup with a dollop of cool sour cream turns the whole thing into a silky bowl of delicious.
I made the soup from scratch following this recipe and then garnished with a generous blob of sour cream and a shredded blend of Mexican cheese.
Intro from Cooking Challenge: Pickles! Whether they're stacked on your favorite sandwich from the deli, or in the gross jar sitting on the counter at the gas station, everybody is familiar with pickles in some form. Pickling is the method of preservation that relies on controlled fermentation of foods in brine or vinegar, resulting in a salty or sour product. This method can be applied to pretty much any food that you want to preserve, whether it's fruit, vegetables, or even meat and fish! You can go for the classics, like Straight Up Kosher Dill Pickles or go for something way out there like Kool-Aid Pickles! Portland knows all about pickles, and here's a bit of musical inspiration!
Oh man, Will was so excited when this week's challenge came up. He's been begging me to make pickles for the past year. So I figured I'd make up for the delay by going completely overboard. I made four different kinds of quick pickles (at the rate Will eats pickles, there's no need to worry about longevity). The base for all four was essentially the same - two cups water, two cups white (or cider) vinegar, two tablespoons salt.
The mustard pickles have some light pickling spices added, plus a lot of mustard seeds, some mustard powder, a dash of turmeric, and a little bit of dill.
The regular dills have a liberal amount of pickling spices and a bunch of fresh dill, plus a smashed garlic clove. Classic.
The garlic & onion pickles have...you guessed it, lots of onion and smashed garlic. Unlike the two above, these and the next were pickled in cider vinegar, instead of regular white vinegar.
Last but definitely not least, here are the jalapeno pickles. Two chopped jalos are in here, along with some peppercorn and a dash of cayenne pepper (because why not make it hotter?), all pickled in cider vinegar.
Intro from Baking Challenge: This week's challenge is...flowers! You could incorporate flowers decoratively into a desert. If your piping and fondant/gumpaste skills aren't advanced, these royal icing flowers are simple and adorable. You could also incorporate actual flowers into a recipe - if you can get your hands on it hibiscus is delicious. Lavender is also a popular addition to many deserts. Feeling like something savory? Squash blossoms are a great option.
My attempt at the Wilton Rose! Considering I took a Wilton flower decorating class, I probably should be a little better at these...But I think they came out alright! The frosting is regular buttercream.
Intro from Cooking Challenge: It's week 34 already and this week we're taking it to the opposite side of your world! This doesn't mean you have to cook something from the literal opposite side of the world, but this week we're letting you pick the far away cuisine that you would like to try to cook. The general opposite of North America is Australia, but since we already had Australian week, a lot of us may want to try something from another far away place instead. For example, if you live in Canada, try something from South America or something all the way in South Africa. The basic idea is to try something new from somewhere pretty far away. And for those of you that are curious, you can use this as a guide to find the exact opposite from where you live.
As the Intro pointed out, North America is on the opposite side of the world from Australia, and we've already done Australian cuisine for a prior week's challenge. So instead, I decided to go with the opposite side of the ocean! If you were to travel straight across the Atlantic from New York City, you would find yourself in Portugal, so I chose to make a Portuguese dish.
Salt cod is a very popular item in Portuguese cooking, and Bacalhau à Gomes de Sã seemed like a good recipe to try. For those who don't know (like me), you can typically find salt cod in a wooden box in your local supermarket. If you're lucky to have a specialty store near you, you can get a whole salt cod!
Unfortunately, I have to say this was not my favorite dish. Salt cod just isn't my jam. I found it to be overwhelmingly fishy. However, the combination of potato, onion, fish, egg, and olive was actually really intriguing, both from a taste and texture perspective. While I didn't end up liking the dish, it was definitely a fun foray into cooking with a new ingredient and I'm glad I tried it!
Intro from Baking Challenge: Hello bakers! This week's challenge is savory. Breads, casseroles (baked jalapeno mac and cheese is my favorite), lasagna, chicken parmigiana - these are just some of many tasty baked dishes that you might conjure up this week. Happy baking!
When I think of savory baking, I immediately think of puff pastry - so for this week's challenge I made a salmon and spinach stuffed puff pastry based on this recipe. I simplified it (and brought down the price) quite a bit by using frozen spinach, which I defrosted in a small pot of boiling water (about 1 cup) and then sauteed with olive oil, minced garlic, and salt & pepper. I removed the skin from the salmon and rubbed it down with some dijon mustard before placing it on the puff pastry sheet, covering with spinach, and folding up. My spinach is on the bottom (compared to the pictures in the original recipe) because I flipped the bundle over so the seam was on the bottom, to prevent the pastry from opening up while baking.
Intro from Cooking Challenge: This week is all about melons, the fruits of the family Cucurbitaceae. In addition to the common watermelon, honeydew, and cantaloupe, there's also a bunch of weird stuff. Horned melon, bitter melon, Korean melon, and some other things no one eats. Most melons are usually eaten raw, sliced, and boring. If you want to do something cool, there's a surprisingly large amount of things you can do. Watermelon lends itself surprisingly well to being cooked, fried, grilled or otherwise. I'm pretty sure no one actually eats bitter melon, but you can find it at most Asian markets, and there's an entire website devoted to making it taste less like the sadness of a thousand orphans. In conclusion, I leave you with the answer to the question "Hey, is it Lemon Week?" "No Lemons, no! Melon!"
The only thing better than how delicious these are is how easy they are to make. Each skewer has a hunk of either cantaloupe or honey dew, a slice of prosciutto, a basil leaf, and a mini mozzarella ball.
