When baked potatoes reach their true potential – Hasselback Potatoes

Posted on September 2, 2011 by petitedecadence

Imagine if we were all an ingredient; wouldn’t reaching our potential be so much easier?? I guess it would depend on which chef’s hands you found yourself in though… But all modesty apart, I think I helped these slightly old potatoes sitting in my vegetable drawer along their way to stardom. And I know, nothing, absolutely nothing, beats some good old gratin dauphinois, especially my mother’s on christmas eve, (because there really is nothing in the world that can compare to cream, cheese and soft warm potatoes all together next to a tender slice of turkey) but this kind of baked potatoes, which are originally known as hasselback potatoes and are of swedish origin, are really high up there in the ladder of potatoes reaching for the stars. And that’s not only because they’re insanely delicious, crispy on the outside and soft on the inside, but because they’re also healthy (as far as healthy and potatoes can go together) and quick to make. The original version has breadcrumbs, tons of butter, and if I’m not mistaken, paprika. This version, however, is far simpler; thyme, teeny tiny bits of butter and garlic. That’s all you need. Really. Oh, and a sharp knife.

On to the recipe? Yes, of course you want to eat this! Keep reading ->

Continue reading →

Baking Frenzy Part II – Nutella Banana Muffins

Posted on August 31, 2011 by petitedecadence

So for baking frenzy part II, which I know, I’ve taken waaaaay too long to post, I’ll share with you one of my must recipes. I make these pretty often, not because they’re easy, not because I love nutella, not because I love banana muffins, but because they are the perfect combination of all that I’ve just said. I even know the recipe by heart now! The original recipe comes from Delicious Days, one of my favorite food blogs, with a few modifications of my own.

The Recipe:

Nutella-Banana Muffins
(adapted from Delicious Days)
Yield: 30 small muffins

2 eggs
125 g soft butter
100 g brown sugar
2 large ripe bananas
150 g Nutella
100 ml milk
250 g flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350ºF.

Cream together in a large bowl the eggs, butter and sugar, then fold in squashed banana and whisk.

In a separate bowl, combine milk and baking soda and blend well. Also separately, mix the flour with the baking powder. Now alternately blend in a part of the milk mixture, then a part of the flour mix, part of the milk, … until everything is combined. Add the nutella and with a rubber spatula swirl it into the batter, taking care not to mix it too much, leaving whole streaks of it unblended.

Now pour batter into prepared muffin tins (I used silicon) and bake in the preheated oven until golden brown, or a when tested with a wooden skewer it comes out clean.

Serve warm, the nutella truly kicks in then.

Baking frenzy Part 1 – Cinnamon pull-apart bread

Posted on August 24, 2011 by petitedecadence

Last week I had a baking frenzy – not out of sheer boredom, of course (because I’m never bored…..~~yeah right~~) but because we were throwing a bachelorette weekend party for a friend who for certain health reasons, can’t drink, and consequently couldn’t spend her weekend time jumping around like a monkey on steroids as drunken 20-something girls do on bachelorette parties. Hence, with the options of drinking, jumping around, or any other form of physical exertion out the window, we were left with only one activity left; eating. Not that any of us were complaining. You try sticking 12 girls, most of them single, in a house with sun, a pool, and great food for a whole weekend and you’ll see for yourself that no one will be missing the booze. (You might, though, need a pair of earmuffs. Girls are LOUD. Specially when stuck together in large groups without boys.) Anyway, since I’m the cook-baker of the group, it was my task to provide all the pastries for the brunch, dinner and teatime. I baked everything on friday, because I wanted it as fresh as possible for saturday, and that is the reason of my baking frenzy; I spent the whole day in the kitchen. Tiring, but happy! Part 1, is Joy the baker’s recipe for cinnamon sugar pull-apart bread, which I must confess, is every bit as good as described in her post. Mine turned out to be rather uncooked in the middle (because my oven does seem to be permanently on steroids) but that turned out to be a good thing; everyone wanted more of the “sneaky cinnamon dough”. Part 2 and 3, which will be coming soon, are banana nutella muffins and blueberry scones. Pictures here, and you can find the recipe at Joy’s really cool site.

A truly delicious bread. I only added a bit more cinnamon, and next time I’ll be cooking it in a slightly less hot oven, but you absolutely can’t stop eating it.

Nervous dinner – seared tuna, skewered everything else

Posted on August 15, 2011 by petitedecadence

So friday night I faced the task of putting together a whole dinner after having something of a mini-nervous-attack, which was not in the slightest related to my kitchen, cooking, or anything similar, but to other more troublesome situations of life, but which nonetheless left me with a bad case of shaking hands at around 6 pm; dinner was supposed to be served at 8:30 and I had in front of me a huge pile of vegetables to slice, raw tuna to turn into cubes and a bunch of sauces to prepare. After a well chilled glass of Martin Codax albariño though, my hands found half of their steadiness and so off I set preparing sauces. Due to the lack of time, I did not make recipes out of any of these (Because who has time to measure, photograph, slice, dice, skewer, write down *and* be calm and collected?) but I’ll share with you the menu and a few of the shots I did manage to take. If you’re interested in any of the dishes let me know and I’ll gladly explain how to make it!

The tuna chalupitas (which are a sort of mini toasted tortilla) with a spicy and sweet soy sauce dressing:
(Excuse my picture, it was taken after most of them were gone. Oh, and I must add thanks to my previous photography helper friend @danmijares)

The baked potatoes, which were served with a cream-cheese, chives and heavy cream sauce:

And the skewered and grilled chicken, meat, eggplants, mushrooms, asparagus, and baby onions, served with a sweet and sour asian-y sauce:

Cashew Brittle – Vanilla ice cream

Posted on August 6, 2011 by petitedecadence

So lately I’ve had floating around my head gazillions of ideas for ice cream (probably because I stuck my ice cream maker in the freezer about 9 days ago and hadn’t yet brought myself to the actual task of putting something in it.) Amongst those ideas have been a mamey one, which is probably coming next, a strawberry crumble one, a nutella-banana one, and a rosemary one. But, even though I rarely repeat recipes, I thought I’d start this ice-cream frenzy my mind is on with something tried and true – and oh so very true! I made this recipe before for a friend who’s crazy about nuts (heh, crazy about nuts -insert childish giggle-) in any form, but particularly mixed with anything sweet, namely caramel. The cashews in this ice cream are slightly salted, roasted, and then turned into brittle, all by a very simple process. They are then incorporated into an adaptation of The perfect scoop’s vanilla ice cream recipe. I made extra brittle for serving, and also just because it’s delicious by itself, you can serve it with tea or ~~just munch on it while you blog about it~~ give it to said friend as an extra present. Keep reading for the recipe.