EatingIsImportant
  • Home
  • About
  • Contact
  • Walking Is Important

Feb. 5 food diary-- slaving away in the kitchen all day

2/25/2016

0 Comments

 
 Breakfast (somewhat later than usual, after driving my daughter to school because her bus mysteriously didn't show up this morning): leftover red lentils, ambasha bread with butter, crystallized ginger.

After breakfast I start the dough for Jennifer Reese's homemade "Oreos."  It is not actually as hard as she makes it sound, although I'm glad she warned that the batter, at first, "will look like a mistake-- a tacky, fudgy brown mess.  Don't worry.  Let it rest for 20 minutes at room temperature to firm up."  It did look like a mistake (how could I possibly roll this loose glop into a log?), and it did firm up.  Another amazing thing: the dough actually tastes like Oreos.
Picture
Picture
PictureOops.
Lunch: unsalted cashews mixed with dried cranberries, crystallized ginger.

Second stage Oreos: the baking.  Unfortunately, I took the recipe at its word and crowded the cookies together on the sheet, reassured that they would not expand.  This was incorrect.  The cookies swelled into one continuous chocolate sheet, with barely identifiable delineations.  I cut them apart into rectangular-ish shapes.  They also got a little bit scorched, even at 325 degrees.  Reese mentioned that it was optional to line the baking sheets with parchment paper, but I think the paper would have prevented over-browning.



Picture
Making the filling and icing the cookies together proved easy enough.  We immediately taste-tested them.  I have to say they are not my favorite.  Not inedible, certainly, but I wouldn't make them again.  The cream is a little too squishy, the cookies a little too crisp and buttery-- they don't seem as though they go together, and it feels like a chore to get through a whole cookie-- they're not two-bite-sized like an Oreo.  My daughter opined that she liked them, but she preferred the chocolate cookies without the cream.   ... but stay tuned for the updated opinion!  Because these cookies get substantially better with the passage of time, like a good stew!

Dinner: Smitten Kitchen's Avocado Cup Salads with Black Bean Confetti, Madhur Jaffrey's Stir-Fried Beet Greens with Ginger and Green Chiles.  I didn't really have sufficient beet greens for the latter recipe, and what I had cooked down so much that we only had a few oily and salty bites apiece.  Not a success, but my own fault.  The avocado cups salads were fine, not terribly exciting.   We had two each as an entree, but I might prefer just one avocado half as a side salad or appetizer.  I think a heavier hand with the lime juice and salt would have improved these.

Picture
Picture
Also, check out the new frying pan my husband bought me!
Snacks: 4 cups of coffee, 2 regular, 2 decaf, with half and half.  Some cookie tasting.  Glass of Madeira in the evening.  2 cookies for dessert while watching Fargo.  They have gotten much, much better.  The wafers don't slide around on the squishy filling anymore, and everything has settled together into its true self, which is both crispy and creamy at the same time, and delicious.
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    Whodunit

    The author is a waitress, home cook, and foodie who has trouble sticking to a subject.  She currently resides and works in the Maryland suburbs of D.C..

    Archives

    June 2018
    March 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016
    October 2016
    September 2016
    August 2016
    July 2016
    June 2016
    May 2016
    April 2016
    March 2016
    February 2016
    January 2016
    December 2015
    November 2015
    July 2014
    June 2014

    Categories

    All
    Bon Appetit
    Food Diary
    Guts
    Jennifer Reese
    Kitchen Practices
    Madhur Jaffrey
    Miscellany
    Mridula Baljekar
    Nonpienary
    Pie Of The Month
    Politics
    Rants
    Recipes
    Recommended Reading
    Restaurant Reviews
    Smitten Kitchen
    The Cat
    Things That Have Nothing To Do With Food



    Other people who eat, walk, and/or have to live in this effin' country:
    The Tipsy Baker
    Smitten Kitchen
    ​Orangette
    ​Cooking Without a Net
    ​My Name is Yeh
    ​
    A Sweet Spoonful
    ​
    Jack Monroe
    Lottie + Doof
    Two Red Bowls
    ​VSB




Proudly powered by Weebly
Photos used under Creative Commons from 4MamaMagazine, jdavis, Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com, Andy Hay, Andy Hay, Jerk Alert Productions, machaq, vere+photo, AlishaV, oonhs, wuestenigel, NIHClinicalCenter, JeepersMedia, Ly Thien Hoang (Lee), James St. John, N@ncyN@nce, fourpointgo, WeTravel.com, vagueonthehow, paraflyer, Tac6 Media, my little red suitcase, BarnImages.com, Kirinohana, Tony Webster, Lorie Shaull, roger4336, jules:stonesoup, torbakhopper, 2KoP, Mike Licht, NotionsCapital.com, entouriste, Laura Northrup, Sam Howzit, toniv90, espinr, leostrakosch, ell brown, Calgary Reviews, entouriste, Hey Paul Studios, Nrbelex, Gerry Dincher, kelvinf19, Natalia Volna itravelNZ@ travel app, perpetualplum, NCinDC, AlishaV, m01229, LifeSupercharger, NathanReed, madelinewright, mikecogh, regan76, JeepersMedia, Steiner Studios, spratt504, Matthew Paul Argall, melanie.lebel94, stu_spivack, Calgary Reviews, Kristoffer Trolle, Tambako the Jaguar, Mr.Sai, JeepersMedia, emleung, televisione, Ruth and Dave, Upupa4me, b-j-oe-r-n, Franco Folini, Green Mountain Girls Farm, Roberto Verzo, MAURO CATEB, pacomexico, takomabibelot