I have never made pancakes so fluffy and light before!

This is a pancake recipe from my Betty Crocker New Cookbook. The recipe is a simple one but this time, I tried the buttermilk variation and was surprised at the results. I don’t keep buttermilk in my fridge so I used a substitute of whole milk with a tablespoon of vinegar and it seemed to work very well.

This was served with Olivio margarine, a drizzling of maple syrup and thawed, frozen raspberries.

Here’s the recipe:

1 egg

1 c. buttermilk (whole milk with a tablespoon of vinegar for a substitute)

1 c. all-purpose flour

1?tbsp. brown sugar

3 tsps. baking powder

1/4 tsp. salt

2 tbsps. vegetable oil

Beat egg in medium bowl with a hand beater until very fluffy.  Beat in remaining ingredients just until smooth.  Heat griddle or skillet over medium heat and brush with margarine. For each pancake, pour less than 1/4 c. batter from cup or pitcher onto hot griddle.  Cook pancake until puffed and dry around the edges.  Turn and cook other side until light brown.

Stack on a plate in threes.  Top with butter or margarine, pour maple syrup over the top and serve with fresh or thawed frozen fruits.

This was my first time to cook Cannelloni.  My first taste of this was when my cousin had just come back from studies in the US and prepared it for one family gathering during our teens.  My cousin is really a gifted man in the kitchen.  It’s a trait he got from his godmother I was told…umm… by  his godmother…. who happens to be my Mom.

Back then, everyone swooned over how good this was since most of us hadn’t tasted it before.  I’ve had it a few times since then, but never thought of making it myself because I was intimidated.  Cannelloni sounds like a lot of work but isn’t really. There’s a lot of steps in the preparation, but they’re not at all delicate or difficult in anyway.  Besides, the results are worth it.

The combination of the ricotta with the spinach, tomato sauce with basil and rosemary and fontina cheese was excellent.  There’s a delicate sweetness to this dish I only tasted once before in a stuffed pasta shell dish of one restaurant.

It’s a home-style Italian restaurant in Cheyenne, Wyoming called Avanti Ristorante Italiano. They serve excellent Italian food, never touted as authentic, just home-style.  If you find yourself passing through the Cowboy State in the future, make a stop at Avanti. I guarantee, it will be worth it.

For planning purposes, I made one full recipe and have another dish sitting in my refrigerator for another day.  It should keep about 5 days.  Freezing is not recommended because the Bechamel Sauce will separate.

Spinach Cannelloni with Fontina Tomato Sauce:

1 tsp. olive oil

2 tbsps. minced shallots

1 can (28 or 32 oz.) whole italian tomatoes

2/3 c. water

1/2 tsp. chopped parsley

1/2 tsp. dried rosemarya few basil leaves, torn

1/4 tsp. salt

Heat the oil in a medium saucepan over medium high heat.  Add the shallots and cook 1 minute.  Add remaining ingredients and bring to a boil.  Simmer for 25-30minutes.  Set aside.

Crepes:

3/4 c. water

3/4 c. milk

3 large eggs

1/4 tsp. salt

1/8 tsp. ground nutmeg

1 1/2 c. all purpose flour

1 tsp. vegetable oil for brushing pan

Process all crepe ingredients except the flour and vegetable oil, at low speed in a blender.  Add the flour and process until smooth.  Lightly coat a 6-inch nonstick skillet with oil, over medium high heat 1 minute.  Pour 2 tbsps. batter into skillet, tilting to coat bottom. Cook 1 minute or until crepe sets on top and begins to brown on the bottom.  Invert onto a plate.  Repeat, stacking crepes.  Cover and set aside.

Bechamel Sauce:

2 tbsps. butter or margarine

3 tbsps. minced shallots

3 tbsps. all purpose flour

1/2 c. heavy cream or whipping cream

1 c. milk

1/4 tsp. salt

2 ounces fontina cheese, cut up

Melt butter in small saucepan over medium-high heat.? Add the shallots and cook 1 minute.  Stir in the flour, cook another minute.  Stirring constantly (a wire whisk is best for this), add the milk, cream and salt  gradually as you whisk.  TIP:  Put the liquids and salt in measuring cup with a lip to make pouring easier.  Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer 1 minute.  Stir in cheese until melted.  Cover and set aside.

Filling:

2 bags fresh spinach, steamed, chopped and strained rained

1 tsps. garlic

1 32 oz. container ricotta cheese

1 large egg yolk

1/2 c. freshly grated parmesan cheese

1/2 tsp. salt.

1/4 tsp. freshly ground pepper

Heat 1 oil and saute garlic over medium  heat.  Add garlic and cook 2 minutes.  Add spinach and saute 3 minutes.  Combine this with rest of ingredients in a large bowl.

Assembly:

Heat oven to 375F.  Cover bottom of shallow 4-quart baking dish with 1 cup of tomato sauce.  Spoon 1/3 c. of filling along center of each crepe, roll up and transfer to baking dish, arranging it so you have 2 4-crepe rows. 

Spoon 1 more cup of tomato sauce over crepes.  Cover with bechamel sauce and bake 25-30 minutes. Cool at least 10 minutes before serving. 

Don’t you just admire those people who can decorate cakes like it was the easiest thing in the world to do?  Magic, blessed hands….

Unfortunately, I’m not one of them.  Here’s my latest sorry attempt at cake decorating.  I can bake it and it tastes great, but does it look that way?  Never mind…

Looking at the photo now, I think about all the things I could have done better.  Piped some whipped cream at the bottom, laid the top layer straighter so the cake doesn’t look so lopsided…a dozen things really.

Oh well, the cake tasted great…the sweet and slightly tart raspberry cream went so well with the bitter chocolate filling.  The raspberry syrup added great depth to an otherwise ordinary chocolate sponge cake.

The base cake is what you call a genoise, a European sponge cake tracing its roots to Genoa, hence the name.  It doesn’t use any shortening or leavening and is perfect for high altitude baking.

A wonderful, wonderful recipe I found at the Godiva Chocolate website that I hope to make for my family back home really soon…

Here’s the recipe:

Chocolate Genoise:

1/3 c. cake flour

1/3 c. cornstarch

1/4 c. cocoa powder

3 large eggs plus 3 large eggyolks, at room temperature

3/4 c. sugar

pinch of salt

Raspberry Syrup:

1/4 c. sugar

1/3 c. water

1/4 c. raspberry liqueur (I used a substitute that worked well for me, rhum and a blue raspberry drink mix)

Chocolate Filling:

1/2 c. heavy cream

4.5 ounces dark chocolate, coarsely chopped ( I used unsweetened just because)

2 tbsps. butter

Raspberry Bavarian:

2-12 ounce bags frozen raspberries

3.4 c. sugar

1/3 c. raspberry liqueur

1 1/2 envelopes unflavored gelatin

2 c. heavy cream

Assembly:

1 c. heavy cream

dark chocolate shavings

1/2 pint fresh raspberries

confectioner’s sugar

Make the Genoise:

Preheat oven to 350F.  Butter bottom and side of 9-inch spring form pan.  Line bottom with parchment paper.

Sift together all dry ingredients.  Beat together rest of ingredients using a heatproof bowl. Use a handheld mixer at medium speed.  Place bowl over pan of simmering water and continue beating until the mixture is lukewarm.   Remove from heat.  Increase speed to high and beat until mixture is cooled and increased in volume, about 3 to 4 minutes. The mixture should turn a very light yellow.

Sift dry ingredients over egg mixture in three additions, gently folding with a rubber spatula.

Spread batter in prepared pan and bake for 30 minutes.  Allow to cool 10 minutes before removing from pan and invert onto a rack.  Cool completely.

Make the Syrup:  Combine sugar and water in saucepan over medium heat, boil.  Remove from heat.  Cool and add liqueur.

Make the Chocolate Filling:  Heat cream in saucepan to boil over medium heat.  Remove from heat and add chocolate, let stand 30 minutes.  Whisk in butter until smooth.

Make the Raspberry Bavarian:  Combine raspberries in a saucepan.  Heat to a boil and simmer for 10 minutes.  Strain mixture through a fine-meshed siever into bowl.  Cool to room temperature.  Combine  liqueur and gelatin in heatproof bowl and let stand 5 minutes.  Place in a saucepan with simmering water and heat until gelatin is dissolved. Whisk into raspberry puree.  Beat cream until stiff peaks form.  Fold into raspberry mix.

Assembly:  Cut genoise horizontally into two equal layers.  Place one layer in bottom of spring form pan, cut side up.  Brush with half of raspberry syrup.  Spread half of chocolate filling over cake.  Top with a third of the raspberry Bavarian cream.  Top with other half of cake, cut side down.  Brush cake with remaining syrup and layer the chocolate filling on top.  Refrigerate about an hour before proceeding with decorating.  Refrigerate the raspberry cream as well.

Spread remaining raspberry cream on the top and sides.  Spread whipped cream on the sides.  Decorate top with fresh raspberries and chocolate shavings.  Sprinkle confectioner’s sugar over the center raspberries.  Refrigerate at least two hours before serving.

Cake Decorating for the First Time?

Do you have those regular burger cravings that won’t be satisfied by a quick trip to McDonald’s or Carl’s Jr.?  I do.  Before I got married, those cravings were easily satisfied by a quick trip to McDonald’s, Jollibee and even Tropical Hut.  Then Spouse had to introduce me to homemade American burgers that I once regarded as bland,  uninspired  ground beef slabs of dubious origins.  

For the record, this is not a gourmet burger  made with freshly-ground sirloin or angus beef.  It’s a housewife’s version made for maximum convenience and flavor. I do not ground my own burger meat, yet.  I do prefer a mix of 81% and 96% lean ground beef. The 93% lean ground is just too dry.  I also prefer the meat to be unfrozen.  In a pinch, no one will stop you from making burgers out of ground beef from your freezer of course, and I have done that.  But burger meat that’s been frozen is drier somehow.

I’ve made my burgers more interesting by spicing it up.  I first tried Emeril’s Original Essence with salt and freshly-ground pepper.  I later switched to Luzianne Cajun Seasoning and found it better.

Then, to borrow a phrase from Emeril, I “kick it up a notch” and bury some crumbled blue cheese or feta in the middle of the burger patty before grilling stovetop.  The cheese will melt into the meat and flavor the whole patty. It’s delicious both ways.

Now comes the question of how to cook your burger.  Do you prefer flame grilled or propane-grilled?  Stepson says nothing but flame-grilled will do.  Hank Hill of the cartoon, King of the Hill, will say propane-grilled for sure. I prefer mine grilled stovetop.  

I know, I know…it isn’t an American burger anymore if it isn’t grilled on a barbecue!  But this is a Filipino making the burger and I guarantee, it will come out just as good – even better – after I’m done with it.

Bobby Flay’s Boy Gets Grill

For grilling stovetop, start with a thick stovetop grill or cat iron skillet, brushed with a little cooking oil. Cook your burgers just a couple or more minutes (depending on patty thickness) on both sides to get it medium-cooked.  I cannot take rare burgers.  Pink and a little bloody is fine, but oozing raw is not for me.

I then cook some sliced onions on the grill and top the burger with tomatoes and the sauteed onion, maybe some lettuce and more of the feta or blue cheese.  Serve it with some polish dill pickles and more tomatoes and some french fries on the side.

If your burger is good, there’s no need for ketchup, mayo or mustard.  This particular one was good enough that it didn’t need all the extras.

St. Patrick’s Day will be here in a few days.  But I couldn’t wait wait to have Corned Beef with Cabbage before it came, so here it is.

This dish reminded me of Nilagang Baka and I always cooked it the Filipino-way, boiling it with onion and black peppercorn till it was falling apart.  Then adding in the potatoes and cabbage.

When it came time to eating, I grimaced when Spouse slathered the meat with brown mustard.  I persisted in having some steamed rice to go with my corned beef and cabbage and Spouse even tried that.  Although, he did insist on saving a few slices for a Reuben.

Old habits are hard to break, but when it comes to food, I’ve been known to try almost everything.  After a few years of cooking this dish, I’ve conceded and now cook and eat it the American way.

Corned Beef with Cabbage and Potatoes:

1-1.5 lbs. corned beef brisket

1 large baking potato

4 carrots, peeled and cut in 1 in. slices

1 yellow onion, rough-diced

3 c. water

Place the corned beef in a heavy stock pot and add enough water to cover it about an inch.  Bring to a boil and allow to simmer on low for 2.5 to 3.5  hours.  Don’t touch the meat while it’s simmering to avoid breaking it up. Add potato and carrots.  Cook till almost done, 15-20 minutes.

Add onions and cabbage and simmer until done, about 8 minutes. Transfer vegetables on a serving dish.  Move the beef to a cutting board and allow to cool about 5 minutes.  Slice thinly and transfer to your dish.  Serve with Dijon mustard.

This is not your usual chili.  For one, it’s served “on top of spaghetti, all covered with cheese”.  This one in the photo is known as a five-way.  

It’s served with the chili or meat sauce, beans, cheese (I used provolone so you can hardly see it in the photo) and chopped raw onions over spaghetti noodles.  It’s a fantastic combination.

Another thing that makes this chili different are the spices for flavoring, including:  cinnamon, allspice and even cocoa powder….not your usual chili, like I said.

I found this recipe in Jeff Smith’s “The Frugal Gourmet Cooks American” years ago and have made it several times.  Like most of my regular recipes, it’s evolved from the original with the changes I’ve introduced.

My cooking skills were unexpectedly put to the test when I cooked this for an office get-together, not realizing one of my co-workers was originally from Cincinnati.  He recognized the smells as I was getting it ready for serving.  I knew he was skeptical at first, but I also saw his eyes light up on his first bite. And then all he said was my chili was “not bad” which, according to him, was an observation that was “not bad at all”.

Apparently, he’d tried several chilis puporting to be Cincinnati-style, which totally unimpressed him.  He even said some of the others he’s tried were downright bad and not at all like the original.  To make me feel better, he said this was not an easy dish to do if you were NOT from Cincinnati and mine was the closest one to the original he’s had – outside of Cincinnati, of course.

A couple of weeks later, he generously brings me a can of Skyline Chili, which his father ships him regularly. “So you know what the REAL Cincinnati Chili is supposed to taste,” he tells me. 

My officemate worked at the original Skyline when he was a kid and let me in on some secrets on how to cook this famous chili.  Before you know it, he was telling me about another Cincy favorite, goetta, which he said I should try cooking next time. I have yet to do that.

The closest I’ve come to Cincinnati, Ohio was to cross the Ohio River somewhere in Indiana when Spouse and I missed our turn on the way from Colorado to Orlando, Florida.  I hope to make it to Cincinnati someday and try the real thing.  For now, this will do for me…

Cincinnati Chili

2 tbsps. vegetable oil

1 lb. ground pork

1 lb. ground beef

4 onions, chopped

6 cloves garlic, minced

1 tbsp. whole cumin seeds (A MUST)

4 -6 tbsps. hot chili powder

3 whole bay leaves

2 tsps. cinnamon

2 tsps. allspice

2 tsps. Tabasco

4 tbsps. cocoa powder

2 tbsps. Worcestershire sauce

4 tbsps. white vinegar

1 28-oz. can pureed tomatoes

2 tbsps. tomato paste

1 tbsp. oregano

2 lbs. kidney beans, soaked and cooked

salt to taste

Heat a large heavy stockpot and add the oil.  Saute the meats, onion, garlic, cumin seeds, chili powder adn bay leaves until the meat is browned.  Drain the fat and discard.  Add the remaining ingredients, including the beans and bring to a simmer.

Cook, covered for 1-1/2 hours.  Make sure you have enough water in the pot.

TIP:  What you’re looking for is a meat sauce that’s been cooked down to a fine consistency, not an overly thick sauce.  The color should be more red than brown, and the cumin will give it a very Southwest flavor.

To serve, pile spaghetti noodles on a plate, top with the meat sauce, then the beans, cheddar cheese (or any cheese of your choice) and some chopped raw onions.Very good with beer, preferably the Colorado brew, Fat Tire Amber Ale.