Red Velvet Whoopie Pie

And here we have it.. another sandwich cookie. I was inspired to do a Whoopie Pie when I watched Bobby Flay take on a two woman team in a whoopie pie throwdown. The women were from Maine and I DON'T remember their names or their store, but their pies looked FANTASTIC. They had made pumpkin shaped and flavored cookies with a thick and fluffy white filling that had to have been at least 3/4 inch thick. I wanted to taste those cookies SO BADLY. But I couldn't, of course, because it was on TV and I was watching the showdown from my couch in NY. Oh well.

So what I decided to do was attempt a festive whoopie pie. I would have LOVED to do a pumpkin cookie, but that would have required a pumpkin puree, which I didn't have. So, red velvet is a nice flavor, and red is rather festive, so I based my recipe off of this blog post, which was festive for Valentine's Day (and maybe if I find my special someone I'll make them just like that... any takers? ;)). Here's my spin on the cookie:

Ingredients (for cookies)
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tbsp. cocoa powder
½ tsp. baking powder
¼ tsp. salt
1 tsp. nutmeg
1.5 tsp. cinnamon
1 Tbs. pure vanilla extract
1 Tbs. grounded coffee (I didn't use instant, but you probably can if you want to)
1/2 cup unsalted butter
1 cup light brown sugar
1 egg
1 tsp. vanilla extract
½ cup buttermilk, at room temperature - if you don't have buttermilk, do this: set aside just under 1/2 cup of milk and about a tablespoon of white vinegar, let sit for a few minutes, and then it's ready to use
red food coloring

Ingredients (for filling)
2 Tbs. pure vanilla extract
1 stick butter
1 8 oz. package of cream cheese
2.5 (or as much as you need) cups confectioner's sugar

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.
2. Prepare wet ingredients in a bowl: beat an egg and whisk in the pure vanilla extract, light brown sugar, buttermilk, butter (I melt it completely in the microwave before adding it), and red food coloring.

3. Prepare dry ingredients in a separate bowl: sift flour and add cocoa powder, baking powder, nutmeg, cinnamon, salt, and coffee. Whisk them all together.

4. Whisk the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients until you have an even consistency and all have been incorporated.

5. Prepare a cookie sheet for the oven. I like it with a piece of aluminum foil and cooking spray. Use ~2 Tbs. of the batter for each cookie. Make them round, not flat, but not spherical either. Use your thumb or something to even out the surface.

6. Leave in oven for 7-9 minutes. My cookies took exactly 8 each time.
7. Set aside the cookies to cool.
8. Prepare the filling. Cream together the butter, cream cheese, and pure vanilla extract. Once you've done that, sift in your confectioner's sugar, adding small amounts at a time, until the mixture is fluffy and yummy to the taste.
9. Let both mixtures cool for a while. Then, make your sandwiches! If I need to explain how to make a sandwich then please leave. There is only so much I can do.

Indian Samosas - a historical and instructional lesson

So, yesterday my mother and I made a trip to a really nice Italian supermarket called Meat Farms. To all me Lawn Guylanders out there, it's on 347 headed eastbound, probably in Smithtown. Anyhoo. I was so amazed by the selection of vegetables and fruits and also painfully reminded of my culinary shortcomings. There were far more unfamiliar than familiar vegetables, fruits, and meats and poultries, and I vowed to do a better job experimenting with and studying foods that are foreign to me. I think I'll start by researching the ingredients I already use.

Samosas are a popular snack in India, and are sort of like Jewish potato knishes. They usually make a great vegetarian appetizer, but really you can add whatever you feel like to it. They are a very customizable recipe. It generally consists of a fried or baked triangular, semi-lunar or tetrahedral pastry shell with a savory filling, which may include spiced potatoes, onions, peas, coriander, and lentils, or ground beef or chicken. The size and shape of a samosa as well as the consistency of the pastry used can vary considerably, although it is mostly triangular.

Ingredients you will find are the triumvirate of Indian spices: the garam masala powder, the coriander powder, and the red chili powder. Turmeric is used, but I don't use it in most of my Indian dishes so I won't categorize it as such. You will also see cumin seeds, and sometimes cumin powder is used as part of that "triumvirate," but the addition of a fourth spice to the triumvirate would have to make me find a new word, so I shall not. :)

Here are some quotes from Wikipedia about the spices (bc I don't feel like being original right now and typing them all out to make something that sounds cohesive and sensible):
The word garam refers to spice intensity, not heat; garam masala is pungent, but not "hot" in the same way as a chili pepper. Garam masala is actually a mixture of different spices that are added to many Indian dishes. Typically, garam masala includes cumin, coriander, cardamom, black pepper and cinnamon, but may also included nutmeg or bay leaves, depending on whether meat, fish or vegetables are being cooked.

Turmeric, a bright yellow-orange root, is ground into a powder and used in countless Indian dishes, both vegetarian and non-vegetarian varieties. Perhaps the most well-known use is for curry, as turmeric is what gives the dish its bright yellow color.




SAMOSAS!
Ingredients:
Egg roll wrappers
Potatoes
Turmeric
Red Chili powder
Coriander powder
Garam masala
Cashew nuts
Cilantro
Ginger
Garlic
Cumin seeds
Extra virgin olive oil

1. Boil those potatoes. Dice them and place them in a pot of boiling water with salt and olive oil. They have cooked when you can stick a fork through the potatoes and they break.

2. Once they've cooked, bring out a skillet. Heat up oil, then add minced ginger, minced garlic, and the cumin seeds. DO NOT LET THEM BURN.

3. Before the oil-flavoring ingredients can burn, add the cashew nuts and turmeric. Roast them a bit.

4. Add potatoes, garam masala, red chili powder, coriander powder, salt, and pepper. Stir fry a bit. Since your potatoes are diced, you'll want to mash them up somehow. I almost think it was a failure on my part: I probably should have used a ricer before I added the potatoes to the pan. But I didn't. Instead I kept adding water to help me mash up the potatoes in the skillet with my spatula. I ended up having a pretty lumpy and uneven consistency, with many traces of white potato that hadn't reached the spices. Use a ricer. I'll do that next time.
5. Last but not least, the cilantro. Add it once the potatoes have cooked.


6. Heat up canola oil in a saucepan. I don't use an oil thermometer, so I can't really tell you how hot it should be. Anyway. While you are doing that you should be preparing the egg roll wrappers. I recommend watching from 5:29-6:26 of Vahrehvah's samosa YouTube video (I also took his recipe to do this) to learn how.


7. Fry them up! Add the samosas to the hot oil until they turn a nice golden brown. Then eat 'em. Yummilicious.

No-yeast Naan(ish) Bread

This recipe makes about 6 decent size pieces of bread. Yummy. I took this recipe from somewhere and didn't like it. Then I changed it to my preferences and now it's delicious!

Ingredients
2.5 cups flour
2 tablespoons sugar
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1 egg
1 Tbs. pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup milk
1/2 cup yogurt
1 Tbs. EVOO
pinch of salt
sesame seeds (optional)


Prepare oven at 450 degrees for "broil." I actually don't know what that means.

Prepare ingredients. Wet and dry ingredients in two separate bowls. "Dry" ingredients include the flour, baking powder and soda, and the pinch of salt.


"Wet" ingredients include the egg (beat it), milk, yogurt, EVOO, pure vanilla extract and also add the sugar. Mix in two separate bowls.

Then, bring the wet ingredients into the dry. Knead everything together to make a ball of dough.


Chop out pieces of the dough, depending on your size preference, and using flour and a roller, make thin roundish pieces. Once you've flattened out your pieces, drizzle some sesame seeds and press them down slightly so you know they're secure.

In the oven they go! It really does not take a long time for these to cook. I like to let it brown on one side and then flip it for just a minute or so. They do, however, NEED to flip once. Honestly it takes like 5 minutes so you better watch the oven here.

^^^This is what happens when you do a crappy job rolling out your dough. Yummy and crunchy, but ugly.

^^^This is what happens when you do a good job rolling out your dough. Yummy, crunchy, and pretty. Do this.

EAT WITH BUTTER! AS PART OF AN INDIAN DISH! YAAAHHH

Vegan Rice Pudding

This recipe is vegan not because I'm vegan, but because the ingredients I chose to use were healthier and they just so happened to be non-dairy. Again, starting up with the guesstimates of ingredients:

Almond milk, a lot
1 can coconut milk
3 cups Basmati rice
~1/2 cup sugar
Pure vanilla extract

1. Prepare the rice by cooking it fully in your standard boiling water and pot.

2. Meanwhile, heat up the almond milk and coconut milk in a separate saucepan. Make sure the size of the pan you choose is enough for both the milks and the rice.

3. When the rice is done cooking, use a strainer to remove it from the pot and transfer it to the saucepan.

4. You have to wait a while here. Like really like 45 minutes. The pudding will thicken up and the consistency will feel less like a soup as you stir.


5. Once you've reached your desired consistency, either eat the pudding warm (I like to serve with plumped up raisins and cinnamon) or cold (after refrigeration). I really don't recommend a middle ground here: room temperature rice pudding is nastyyyyy.