30 Jan
Super Peel Pizza Peel Winner
Posted by Michelle as Giveaways | 5 Comments
Congratulations to the winner of the Super Peel Pizza Peel
Commenter #89, Monica, of ABCs of My Life. She shared her worst pizza disaster:
“This looks wonderful. We eat pizza often and I usually make it because of my son’s allergies. My one pizza disaster was during a birthday party. I made my son a pizza on a pre-cooked crust and put it under the boiler to melt the cheese. I forgot to check it and it came out of the oven on fire. Luckily I had another crust on hand.”
I have to say, I feel such a kinship with you all after reading about syour pizza disasters. I feel I have experienced it all – ingredients burned to the bottom of the oven, a misshapen pizza plopped onto a stone, pizza folding in on itself, a stone cracking mid-bake. One thing is for certain – no one is alone in their baking miseries, and we’re all in this kitchen adventure together!
Thanks for entering, everyone! Stay tuned for more great giveaways!
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29 Jan
French Onion Soup
Posted by Michelle as Soups, Stews and Chili | 27 Comments
French Onion Soup is something that I always thoroughly enjoy when given the opportunity to order it at a restaurant. A stunningly white crock full of aromatic, brothy onion soup topped with a chunk of baguette and smothered in bubbly, browned Gruyere cheese that is dripping over the top and down the sides. I love to savor that cheesy baguette, and take only a little bit off with each spoonful. I can never make it last for the entire bowl of soup, but pulling a soup spoon out of a crock of French onion soup with cheese stretching itself thin is just about the most wonderful site in the culinary world.
I have been aching to make French Onion Soup at home for some time now, as it was on my original Top 100 list, and I am so thankful that I finally got around to doing it. I’m pretty sure I still smell like onions, but wow, this recipe rivals some of the best French onion soup I have had at great restaurants. It’s that good. Perhaps even better.
28 Jan
How to Stock and Organize Your Freezer
Posted by Michelle as How-To | 37 Comments
Does your freezer look like this?
Do you wish it looked like this?
(Images above courtesy of Google Images; neither are my freezer, that is coming up!)
I think we’ve all had a moment when we’ve unearthed something from the depths of our freezer only to wonder not only when it was put there, but what in the world it was! As I was cleaning out my own freezer and ridding it of remnants of last summer’s ice cream bounty, I thought that perhaps it was time to talk about freezer organization here on Brown Eyed Baker. (I also thought it was time that I whip up a fresh batch of vanilla bean ice cream.) A freezer can be a lot like a vacant spare bedroom that usually meets one of two fates: (1) A nicely organized space that allows you to store things that you don’t use everyday but want to keep for when you need them; or (2) A space so disorganized and messy that you don’t want to open the door for fear of what may fall on your head (or toe), and if you can get the door open safely you probably can’t get very far into the mess to even figure out what’s in there.
The first part of this post will be dedicated to organizing your freezer – figuring out what you have in there and going over some food safety guidelines for proper food storage and how long different types of food can last safely in a freezer.
The second part of this post will help you re-stock your freezer with food that you can prepare and have ready to heat up at a moment’s notice. These will be particularly useful on nights when you get in late but don’t want to pick up fast food. Also, if you know someone who is expecting, a nice gesture may be to prepare one or two dishes that are ready to freeze so once the baby arrives the new mom can pull it out of the freezer, pop it in the oven, and have a warm, homemade dinner with no effort.
27 Jan
Mushroom-Herb Macaroni & Cheese
Posted by Michelle as Pasta, Noodles and Dumplings | 29 Comments
Macaroni and cheese is a perennial favorite among kids and a safe fall back for parents with picky eaters. However, most adults will tell you that they still consider the ooey, gooey dish to be one of the ultimate comfort foods. One of the best things I could have ever done was learn how to make homemade macaroni and cheese from scratch. No more blue box mac n’ cheese for this girl! I have made quite a few different variations (a basic recipe, along with a “grown up” version that includes bacon) and I have to say that this one is by far my favorite. This mushroom-herb version was born out of a fondue dish that my Chief Culinary Consultant and I enjoyed during a snowy weekend last January while watching some playoff football. The fondue dish included brie with a couple of other cheeses and a mushroom-herb paste mixed in; I took this idea and turned it into an insanely delicious baked macaroni and cheese recipe.
26 Jan
Quiche Lorraine Scones
Posted by Michelle as Scones | 52 Comments
Quiche Lorraine is a quintessential brunch favorite. After all, what’s not to love about eggs, Swiss cheese, bacon and green onions in a flaky, buttery crust? I personally can devour anything involving bacon and cheese in seconds flat. It can be anything – quiches, sandwiches, burgers – you name it, and if it has bacon and cheese, I’ll eat it. So it should come as no surprise that when I caught wind of these scones I hurdled a chair and narrowly missed the corner of my kitchen island to start throwing them together. (I’m dangerous in the kitchen – my hips have suffered countless bruises due to that wretched corner!) These are every bit as good as you’d imagine them to be. Using butter as the main fat component gives them a light, buttery and biscuit-like texture. Throw in holes of melted Swiss cheese, salty bacon and the bite of green onions, and you have the perfect breakfast, lunch, brunch or snack food.
25 Jan
Giveaway: Super Peel Pizza Peel
Posted by Michelle as Giveaways | 382 Comments
Raise your hand if you love (or even like) pizza. No doubt many of us share a love for a great big slice of pizza full of favorite toppings. Sometimes there is nothing better than kicking back on a Friday night and waiting for the doorbell to ring and seeing dinner appear before your eyes. Sometimes, though, there is nothing more satisfying that pulling a homemade pizza out of your own oven and feasting on it. A perfect crust that you can top with the exact amount of sauce and cheese that you prefer and your favorite toppings. While I am a big fan of the classic pepperoni pizza, gourmet-style pizzas have become all the rage lately.
No matter your pizza preference, you are sure to love this Super Peel Pizza Peel
Gary, the inventor of the Super Peel, contacted me after the holidays to find out if I received one and when I said I hadn’t he offered to ship me one and if I liked it, to provide another for a giveaway. Well, let me tell you – it totally rocks and my pizza making is a million times better! If you’ve ever tried to “toss” a pizza onto a hot stone, you are all too familiar with the troubles that can ensue. And of course shaping one on a cold stone and putting it in the oven totally defeats the purpose of the stone. So, the long and short of it is, the Super Peel is nothing short of awesome and you need one. Therefore, I have taken Gary up on his offer and am giving one away to a lucky reader chosen at random!
Deadline: Thursday, January 28, 2010 11:59pm EST
Required: Your email address. You must fill out the email address portion of the comment form (it will not be published) or I will not be able to contact you should you win.
How to Enter: It’s simple! Leave a comment on this post and answer the following question:
Have you had a pizza disaster? Tell me about it! If not, share your most wretched baking disaster.
For Extra Entries: Tweet about this giveaway (@browneyedbaker), post about it on your blog, or post about it on Facebook. Then come back and leave a separate comment with a link to your Tweet, blog post, or Facebook post for a possible 3 extra comments & entries.
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15 Jan
Dog Birthday Cake
Posted by Michelle as Dog Treats | 60 Comments
Happy 3rd Birthday to my Golden Retriever, Einstein!
Since I find an excuse to bake for just about every other occasion I couldn’t let my dog’s birthday pass without letting him enjoy a special cake. I went looking online to find a dog-suitable recipe for a cake and can you believe there are whole bakeries out there dedicated to dog treats and cakes? I was astonished! Probably a very nice niche to be in, actually. In the end, I used some of the same ingredients that went into the homemade dog treats I made a couple of years ago. Throw in some shredded carrots and a few other things, and the cake was ready to go! It can be baked in a round pan or a loaf pan; I did it in a loaf pan and then carved it into a bone and used peanut butter for a little “icing”. I also read that you could puree cottage cheese for white icing as well.
14 Jan
Chocolate-Chocolate Chunk Muffins
Posted by Michelle as Muffins | 55 Comments
These muffins reignited an as-yet unresolved internal debate I have about chocolate muffins. I mean, are they really muffins? I tend to believe they are more on the order of chocolate cupcakes sans the icing. I think perhaps the benefit of calling treats of this nature muffins is to ensure that they can be eaten for breakfast without the full-fledged guilt that would accompany eating a chocolate cupcake for breakfast. But let’s be honest – if you are going to eat this chocolate muffin for breakfast, would you have really felt guilty for eating a chocolate cupcake for breakfast? Me neither! But then again, I tend to like leftover cheesecake for breakfast as a special treat, so I’m probably the wrong person to ask.
Whether you consider them muffins or cupcakes, suitable for breakfast or dessert, they are certainly one thing: Delicious.
13 Jan
How to Plan a Dinner Party (Or Any Party!)
Posted by Michelle as How-To | 23 Comments
Over the holidays, I helped my mom host a Christmas celebration with my dad’s side of the family the weekend before Christmas. I eagerly offered to do all of the menu planning, which included the grocery shopping, food prep and planning out the oven schedule for the day of the party. It was my first time handling the logistics of a holiday and while it took some work, it was unbelievably fun and I loved putting together a large meal.
While the holiday season has already passed, I thought the start of the new year would be a great time to do a walk-through of how I planned the meal and got myself organized, as well to share some guidelines and checklists that you can use when planning a large-ish food event at your home. After all, the year is full of reasons to throw parties – birthdays, anniversaries, graduations, holidays like Valentine’s Day, 4th of July, and countless other occasions!
12 Jan
Maple-Oatmeal Scones
Posted by Michelle as Scones | 31 Comments
This is somewhat of an embarrassing confession. I have never eaten a scone that hasn’t originated from my kitchen. I don’t do the Starbucks thing and I don’t really frequent bakeries all that often, and when I do I’m typically more drawn to the sugary-sweet and chocolate confections, rather than breakfast-type treats. So all I know of scones I have learned from reading about them and baking them myself. Although this may seem like a narrow glipse into the world of scone goodness, I have tasted and experimented with many different types of scones – those made with cream, with butter, with buttermilk. Those that are sweet, some that are savory, some great for breakfast and some you could easily enjoy for dessert. I hadn’t made scones in a little while and after catching a glimpse of the description of Saturday’s “Barefoot Contessa” episode in my DVR and seeing Maple-Oatmeal Scones listed, I didn’t even watch the episode – I hurriedly Googled the recipe, printed it and prepared to bake!
