For the Love of Food

I am always on the look-out for a good chocolate chip cookie recipe. In the search for a crisp chocolate chip cookie, I came across this fantastic chewy cookie recipe on Cooking On the Side.

I tried these cookies out in all sizes: small, medium, and jumbo. And, jumbo cookies were definitely best over all because these cookies are breadier than what most people are used to and the larger they are the better the chocolate to cookie ratio is.

I made some ingredient substitutions to adjust for my dietary needs at the time. That’s also why my cookies look a bit different than the ones on Cooking On The Side. Different ingredients react differently when baked.

So, while I continue my search for a crisp chocolate chip cookie recipe, you can enjoy this one! Continue Reading »

I had my first scone in Ireland…I believer we were stopping for lunch somewhere on the northwest shore of Ireland. They were delicious – studded with little pieces of dried apricot and raisins.

So, for St. Patrick’s day, I want to share with you one of my favorite food-memories of my trip to Ireland a year and a half ago. Continue Reading »

While searching for a vanilla ice cream recipe for Christmas dinner, I came across the most fabulous and beautiful-looking recipe with the promise of being creamy and not freezing into a solid rock.

This is the first ice cream I have had all around success with – flavor and creaminess. Wow..it is fantastic. I can recommend it whole heartedly…and I don’t like vanilla ice cream. Now, I am really itching to get my hands on a copy of The Perfect Scoop (where the recipe is originally from).

Oh, and it went really well with the homemade apple pie I made. The apple pie was ok…you can find my recipe here.

I also got to try out my new macro rings that my husband got me for Christmas. I have been dreaming of my own pair of macro rings since I was in 7th grade when I first tried them out on my camera – borrowed from my best friend.

So, on to other news…

Remember that apartment we were buying?? Well, we bought it and renovations are taking longer…and we have to move into another apartment. So, starting Wednesday, I will be offline for about 6 weeks until we are in our new home. So, while I may have some time to blog, I will most likely not get the opportunity to go online until sometime after Easter. Big bummer…

Ironically, I haven’t been very stressed the last few days and I am home with two sick kids, a whole bunch of moving boxes, and am coming down with a cold myself…and I just feel relaxed.  Crazy, huh?

In the mean time, enjoy this delicious recipe!

Last Spring my son was accepted to one of the preschools in historic downtown.  We have a few friends from our garden who also send their children there.  One of theme was a regular at the preschools “workshop” where parents get together and can jellies and make jewelry to be sold at the local Christmas market to raise money for different activities the children do in preschool.

Now, i haven’t had a chance to be part of a club or group that does things for fun (like crafts) since I was in high school.  So, I jumped at the opportunity to join the workshop.  We meet once a month around 8pm, crack open a bottle of wine, bring some snacks, and work on different crafts and talk.  It’s really so much fun and a great way to meet other moms/women – especially when you don’t know many people.

So…when I heard about their need for jellies, I got really excited and ran home in search of a unique recipe.  I came across a recipe on MyRecipes.com for a watermelon jelly, tweaked it, and ended up with something everyone was talking about!

The mom who is in charge of the organization for the jelly/jam/preserves/chutney sales gave my jelly the name “Toskanischer Sommer” (Tuscan Summer – in German).  I went by the market everyday with my camera to get a picture of it with the other jellies, but it was never out.  Then, the only day I show up without a camera, they are selling it..so these are pictures I took with my cell phone.

Much to my delight, all of my jelly was sold out in 2 days!!! Continue Reading »

Way way back in the beginning of the summer, when sour cherries were in season, I canned 2 batches of maraschino cherries. It was actually pretty simple. The “hardest” part was waiting until the sour cherries were in season because it only happens for 3-4 weeks a year!

To pit them, I took a paper clip, stuck it through the top and scooped out the pit. There are plenty of examples on how to do this online.

The 2 batches of cherries I made were different. One was just preserved in maraschino liquor and the other had some fructose added to it for sweetness. They were both canned in a water bath.

After waiting a few weeks, I opened them up and did a taste test. And, they are nothing like their store-bought counter parts, but are a much more gourmet version to impress your friends with. I had a lot of fun with this and hope that you can too next year when sour cherries are back in season.

Ingredients:
pitted sour cherries
enough Maraschino Liquor to cover them in a canning jar
2 teaspoons of Sugar or Fructose per 1/2 cup of cherries to be canned
jars of canning in

Directions:
place cherries, maraschino liquor, and fructose in a sauce pan and bring to a boil. Boil for 3 minutes and pour into canning jar(s). Sea the jars and can in a water bath for 10 minutes. Remove from water carefully, set aside and leave undisturbed for 24 hours. Open after at least 1 week so flavors have time to set.

Enjoy in cakes, over ice cream, or in your favorite cocktails!

Now that my baby is sleeping through the night (yes – I have taught our 9 week old baby to sleep 12 hours through the night!!!), I am trying to use my “free” time now to blog more often now (it took me 3 days to finish writing this post!!).

On to the pie crust… Continue Reading »

Friday I posted about a copycat Tony Roma’s baby back ribs recipe that I tried out. Bellow is the recipe with the bbq sauce that they recommended making. I found it way way to tangy and vinegary. However, this may be because the homemade ketchup that I made this time around was also more tangy than usual…and the fact that I only had light corn syrup and not the dark corn syrup called for.

Either way..my husband loved it. I thought it was good, but it was so tangy that my mouth was burning!

The cooking method for these ribs is really fantastic and quite simple and created delicious succulent fall-off-the bone ribs. You will need 2 days to make this recipe, so prepare accordingly! Continue Reading »

Baby-back ribs are not very popular in Germany – ribs in general are considered a sort of waste product. So, they are cheap. I can get a kilogram of spare or baby-back ribs for €3,00 (about US$4.17). So, when we need a cost-effective meal that contains meat, ribs are the way to go for us.

The other day I came across a copycat recipe for Tony Roma’s baby-back ribs. The recipe included a sauce, which was good (see next week’s Monday post), but definitely did not taste anything like Tony Roma’s bbq sauce. I did however, split the rib recipe in half to try out my new sweet and smoky homemade bbq sauce, and, to my surprise, I had recreated Tony Roma’s bbq sauce!

The cooking method for these ribs is really fantastic and quite simple and created delicious succulent fall-off-the bone ribs. You will need 2 days to make this recipe, so prepare accordingly! Continue Reading »

May 21st was Father’s Day in Germany. The traditional German way to celebrate Father’s day (as a father) is to grab your favorite beer mug, get together with all your buddies, and drink a keg a beer while hiking. It’s on a holiday here in Bavaria (Jesus’ ascension) so this starts as early as 8 or 9am.

We decided to celebrate it a bit more traditionally by having a breakfast in our garden. So, I prepared everything ahead of time and packed our portable electric burner and we had french toast there!

Unfortunately, I can’t find the original recipe that I adapted this from online. Here is my version: Continue Reading »

At the end of last month I participated in Foodbuzz’s 24,24,24 event. Among many other dishes, we grilled a whole suckling pig. Having some meat left over, I was sent home with some leftovers. So, I took the opportunity to make some bbq pulled pork that my husband had been begging me to make for a while.

I didn’t follow a recipe, I just put in the ingredients that I felt would be right. Luckily, I measured everything out and wrote it all down so that I could share with you.

I also made a less traditional addition to the pulled pork by adding a can of some Heinz Baked Beans in tomato sauce that we had bought to try. They added some nice substance to the meat and next time I will double the amount of beans in the recipe. And, next time I will also just use navy beans instead of baked beans in tomato sauce. I found that the baked beans sauce didn’t add (or take away) from the recipe. So, since baked beans are more expensive than plain old navy beans, I will go with the cheaper alternative.

I served these over homemade buttermilk biscuits and with steamed corn. However, because bbq pulled pork is gooey and messy we ate it with a fork a nice and cut the biscuit into it as well. It was absolutely delicious! Continue Reading »