Disgruntled Julie: A Ph.D. in Progress

Boston Recommendations

2009-11-05T08:49:00.001-05:00

Later this month, I will be heading up to Boston for the AACR Molecular Targets & Cancer Therapeutics meeting. It’s been quite a while since I’ve been to Boston – the last time was the summer between graduating high school and starting college! I’ll be in the Back Bay area, so if anyone has any suggestions for things to do in the evening (or during less interesting sessions!) or places I should eat, let me know!

Also, if anyone else is either attending the conference or a permanent resident of Boston, send me an email if you are interested in perhaps trying to meet up while I am there!

French Macarons (Daring Bakers’ Challenge)

2009-10-27T22:28:00.002-05:00

The 2009 October Daring Bakers’ challenge was brought to us by Ami S. She chose macarons from Claudia Fleming’s The Last Course: The Desserts of Gramercy Tavern as the challenge recipe.

So, here’s the thing. I don’t really get the macaron craze. Cute little bakeries and pastry shops all over D.C. seem to sell them for an arm and a leg, much like the cupcake craze, and, much like cupcakes, I have no desire to pay an exorbitant price for them. And also much like cupcakes, I don’t even particularly like macarons. But the recipe sounded like a challenge, so I was in.

This was the very first thing I tackled after 3 weeks sick on the couch with swine flu and pneumonia. In retrospect, it probably wasn’t such a good plan; I was still feeling sick and had zero patience. To say I half-assed this recipe would be generous; really, at best, I quarter-assed this. All month, the Daring Bakers’ forum has been full of failed attempts… apparently, macarons are quite the tricky little beasts. And there I was, still not yet fully recovered, throwing my hands in the air and saying.. what the hell? Let’s give this a try.

All sorts of tips and tricks were shared in the forums in order to get this recipe to work. In my illness-induced annoyance state, I ignored all of them. Age your egg whites on the counter for three days, they said! I let mine sit at room temperature for 30 minutes before whipping them up. Be sure to sift your almond flour and sugar together three times so it is smooth! In my matchbox-sized kitchen, there is no room for non-essentials like sifters or mesh sieves, so not only did I not sift mine three times… I didn’t sift mine at all! Oh yes, there were LUMPS. And I narrowed my eyes and glared and told my macarons to suck it up and deal.

And deal they did. Much to my surprise, after reading about failure after failure, mine worked just fine. On the first try. With not-yet room temperature egg whites, non-sifted almond flour, and an oven that is notoriously off by quite a bit (but I don’t own an over thermometer, so I don’t know what that ‘bit’ is). MY biggest problem? Piping them out. I don’t own actual pastry bags (see reference to non-essential items for matchbox-sized kitchen) so I went with the good old snip off a corner of a ziploc bag. Nevermind that I even had circles drawn out underneath my parchment paper, I absolutely, positively, could not get that batter out in a circle… let alone in a same sized oval. Of course, this didn’t affect the quality of the cookie itself, but made sandwiching them up a bit difficult. Knowing my stomach was not yet up to par, I made these with my Husband’s tastes in mind – a simple dark chocolate ganache filling. I was thrilled that they turned out well; he was thrilled to eat them. All in all, a win-win situation!

See that ruffley edge along the base? Those are called macaron “feet” and are the defining characteristic of a macaron. Yeah, I didn’t know that either.

French Macarons

Ingredients:

2 1/4 cups confectioners’ sugar
2 cups almond flour
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
5 egg whites, room temperature (-ish)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 200F.
Combine the confectioners’ sugar and almond flour in a medium bowl.
Beat the egg whites using a stand mixer until they hold soft peaks. Slowly add the granulated sugar and beat until the mixture holds stiff peaks.
Sift (HA. suckers!) a third of the almond flour into the meringue and fold gently to combine. Sift in the remaining almond flour in two batches. Do not overfold, but fully incorporate your ingredients.
Spoon the mixture into a pastry bag fitted with a plain half-inch tip (or, for the truly frustrating experience, snip the end off a ziplog bag). Pipe one-inch sized mounds of batter onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper.
Bake the macarons for 5 minutes. Remove the pan from the oven and raise the temperature to 375F. Once the oven is up to temperature, put the pans back in the oven and back for an additional 7 to 8 minutes, or lightly colored.
Cool on a rack before filling.

Quarantined

2009-10-04T14:50:00.001-05:00

My extended absence can be summed up with two words: swine flu. Those of you who follow me on Twitter caught the real-time play-by-play of my past two weeks: the 104+ fever, the aches, the chills followed by sweating like a pig (very appropriate for the swine flu), the coughing, the vomiting, the vomiting, the even more vomiting, and finally, the very slow road to recovery which started on Friday.I have spent the past two weeks stuck on the couch (aside from two Tuesday’s ago, when I had to go into lab, and this past Monday, when I spent Yom Kippur not in synagogue, but at the doctor’s office discovering that my flu turned into secondary pneumonia), too tired, worn out, and miserable to do anything aside from follow Twitter from my iPhone. I am totally behind on e-mails, all but my very favorite blogs, the 2043 papers my PI sent to me telling me to read immediately to discuss upon my return (sorry Boss, but I have not looked at a single one), and apparently the drastic change in seasons – before I fell ill, it was warm and summery; rumor has it that it is now in the 60s and the leaves are already starting to change color.

I will be making my triumphant return to society this week (I am only feeling about 50% right now, but I am pretty sure if I don’t show up in lab meeting first thing Monday morning, my PI will drag me off the couch kicking and screaming) and slowly returning to the blogiverse. Don’t worry, I’ll wash my hands well before leaving comments on any of your blogs.

Blackberry Buttermilk Cake

2009-09-16T22:12:00.002-05:00

When I first saw this in Gourmet as a raspberry buttermilk cake, I made it. And it was good, but nothing that totally knocked my socks off. Quick, easy, and a perfect everyday cake. By this point, my blackberries were a week old, I was getting tired of baking with them (something I never thought would be possible), and I didn’t want anything heavy or extravagant, because I would not be bringing the resulting recipe into the lab after the previous whining over not baking enough. I decided to try the buttermilk cake again, replacing the raspberries with blackberries, for something a little lighter to have around for a weekend when Husband was visiting. And you know what? It was so much tastier. When it comes to just eating, raspberries are my favorite, hands down. But when it comes to baking, I think the verdict is in – blackberries make EVERYHING better! This cake is ridiculously simple to make, so give it a whirl! (Interesting tidbit of note: unlike the raspberries, my blackberries were so fat, they all sank straight to the bottom of the cake!). This wraps up Blackberry Extravaganza week - I hope you enjoyed it and found a recipe or two to add to your collections!

Blackberry Buttermilk Cake
adapted from Gourmet June 2009

Ingredients:

1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 stick unsalted butter, softened
2/3 cup plus 1 1/2 tablespoons sugar, divided
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 egg
1/2 cup buttermilk
1 cup fresh blackberries

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400F. Butter and flour a 9-inch round cake pan.
Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Beat together butter and 2/3 cup sugar at medium-high speed until pale and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Beat in vanilla and egg.
At low speed, mix in flour and buttermilk until just combined. Spoon batter into cake pan, smoothing top. Scatter blackberries over top and sprinkle with remaining 1 1/2 tablespoons sugar.
Bake until cake is golden and a wooden toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes. Cool in pan 10 minutes, then turn out onto a rack and cool an additional 10 to 15 minutes more.

all the blackberries hiding on the bottom of the cake

Blackberry Peach Galette

2009-09-16T22:00:00.002-05:00

If there is one thing you make from my Blackberry Extravaganza week, make this. Really. Make this. Now. It was amazing. A-MA-ZING. It was so amazing, in fact, that it apparently turned one particular labmate into a greedy monster who stormed up to me and verbally berated me for not bringing in more, droning on and on about how it was so unfair that I didn’t consider the number of people in the lab and that some people took larger slices and not everyone would get a “big enough” slice and it just wasn’t fair next time, could I just get my act together and bring in MORE? I just sort of sat there with my jaw hanging open, because after I brought in blackberry pie bars, berry oatmeal crumble bars, blackberry scones, and then a blackberry peach galette, I get yelled at for not baking ENOUGH? Sorry, but my Ph.D. stipend is very small, and it does not pay for me to provide your breakfast buffet! I suspect it will be a very long time before I bake for the lab again – isn’t it a shame when one rotten apple spoils everything for the whole bunch?

I really love galettes so much more than pies – I’m not sure why, but the whole rustic look really appeals to me. Plus, I love that they are filled with fruit slices rather than a soupy fruit filling and the crust tends to be thicker, so galettes can be picked up and eaten with your hands, rather than requiring a fork and a plate (perfect for consumption during lab meetings). I went with blackberry and peach because I picked both at the farm, and the flavors complimented each other together perfectly. Obviously, you can use any fruit in a galette, but I loved these together so much I would be hesitant to change it up next time; personally, I can’t imagine another combination that I would personally enjoy more!

Blackberry Peach Galette
adapted from Our Best Bites

Ingredients:

2 cups flour
11 tablespoons butter
1/4 teaspoon salt
4 tablespoons ice water
3 large, ripe peaches, pitted and sliced
1 cup blackberries
1/4 cup sugar
3 tablespoons flour
1 1/2 tablespoons butter

Directions:

Preheat oven to 375F.
Add flour and salt to a medium bowl. Cut cold butter into small chunks and throw on top of flour. Cut the butter into the flour using a pastry blender under mixture resembles small crumbs the size of peas. Add ice water one tablespoon at a time while stirring the dough mixture with a fork. Bring dough together and put into a ball. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate.
Sprinkle flour and sugar over fruit. Stir.
Roll out pastry dough on a floured surface to at least 12” in diameter. There will be enough dough for one large and one small galette. Transfer dough to baking sheet.
Dump fruit mixture in the middle of dough and dot with 1 –2 tablespoons butter.
Pull up edges of dough and pleat. Dip fingers in water and moisten between the pleats to seal. Brush dough with melted butter and sprinkle with sugar.
Bake for 50-60 minutes. When done, the fruit will be bubbling and the crust will be golden brown in color. Remove from the oven and cool for 10-15 minutes on a wire rack. Eat all for yourself and do not share because it is just too delicious.

Blackberry Scones

2009-09-16T21:38:00.002-05:00

Next up in the blackberry baking adventures came some blackberry scones. I wasn’t quite sure how these would turn out, since there aren’t a plethora of blackberry scone recipes out there, the way there are for say, cranberry scones. I thought that perhaps there is a reason for that – maybe the blackberries are just too juicy to work in a scone. When I mixed the dough, it came out SO thick and SO heavy that I realized there was just no possible way that I was ever going to be able to stretch the dough out and cut it into circles. I’m not sure what exactly went wrong – maybe the blackberries were just too much – but boy oh boy was it dense. Rather than just give up, I decided to just squash all the dough into my springform pan and pop it in the oven and see what happened. Lo and behold, after baking for quite a while – scones! These were especially tasty with the blackberry jam that already happened to be be leftover in the lab from a previous scone smorgasbord brought in by our PI!

Blackberry Scones
adapted from America’s Test Kitchen

Ingredients:

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
3 tablespoons sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
5 tablespoons chilled, unsalted butter, cut into 1/4 inch cubes
3/4 cups blackberries
1 cup heavy cream

Directions:

Preheat oven to 425F.
Add flour, baking powder, sugar, and salt in the bowl of a food processor. Pulse six times. Distribute butter over dry ingredients. Cover and pulse 12 times, each pulse lasting 1 second. Add blackberries and pulse one more time.
Transfer dough to a large bowl and stir in cream with a rubber spatula until dough begins to form, about 30 seconds.
Transfer dough to countertop and knead by hand until it just comes together in a rough, sticky ball.
Press dough into a 9-inch springform pan, scoring the dough into 8 wedges with a knife.
Bake dough in springform pan until tops are light brown and dough is cooked through, 20 to 25 minutes. Cut through immediately before cooling, then cool on wire rack for at least 10 minutes before serving.

Berry Oatmeal Crumble Bars

2009-09-16T21:18:00.002-05:00

After making the blackberry pie bars, I decided to tackle the remaining pile of freshly picked blackberries with my personal favorite berry recipe, berry crumble bars. I’ve tried these with all sorts of berries – blackberries, blueberries, raspberries, strawberries, and combinations of all of the above – and they have all turned out delicious. The crunchy oatmeal topping, the sweet jam-like filling… these are the perfect summery treat! (And I think my lab agreed.) Of course, between the blackberry pie bars and these blackberry crumble bars, I still had roughly 2/3 of my initial blackberry pile remaining in my refrigerator…

Berry Oatmeal Crumble Bars

Ingredients:

3 cups fresh berries of choices
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/2 cup sugar
2 tablespoons cornstarch
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 cups rolled oats
1 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup butter, softened and cut into large chunks
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions:

To prepare filling, stir together berries and lemon juice in a medium saucepan. Cook over medium heat until fruit is tender, about 15 minutes.
In a small bowl, whisk together sugar and cornstarch. Stir into fruit mixture. Continue cooking until mixture comes to a boil. Boil for 1-2 minutes until thick. Remove from heat.
Preheat oven to 350F and lightly grease a 9”x13” baking pan.
In a large mixing bowl, combine flour, oats, brown sugar, butter, baking soda, salt, and vanilla extract. Cut ingredients together with pastry blender or two knives until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Set aside 1 1/2 cups of mixture in a medium bowl.
Pour remaining crumb mixture into the bottom of the dish, spread evenly, and pat down. Place filling in dollops over crust and carefully spread to cover entire surface.
Squeeze reserved crumb mixture into large clumps with fingers and sprinkle evenly over the top of the fruit filling.
Bake until golden brown, about 30 to 35 minutes. Cool completely before slicing.

Blackberry Pie Bars

2009-09-15T21:36:00.001-05:00

The blackberry picking adventure confirmed the fact that I am absolutely useless at estimating anything with the U.S. measurement system. Want to eyeball 50mL? No problem. Need to weigh out approximately 180g of guanidine hydrochloride? I’m your girl. Looking for three cups of blackberries? <chirping crickets> I just kept picking and picking while we were there to try to ensure that I would have enough to bake a recipe or two, but I just wasn’t sure that I had enough.

When I returned home, I looked through my collection of recipes in Evernote. Since I was bringing this in to the lab, I wanted to avoid any kind of pies and cakes – anything which involves forks and plates. Food to share in lab is far easier if it can be picked up with the hands on the way out the door to a seminar or to drop by and ask the PIs a question. When I stumbled across the concept of putting blackberry pies into a bar form, I was sold. The only potential problem? The recipe calls for six cups of blackberries, which seemed like a LOT… and I wasn’t sure that I had enough from my day of berry picking. Before I started mixing together any other ingredients, I pulled out my measuring cups and started doling out blackberries, one cup at a time. However, the six cups required for the blackberry pie bars barely made a dent in the box of blackberries I bought home. I never intended to be baking for a full week… it was just a U.S. volumetric estimation FAIL. But a very, very yummy fail at that, since I couldn’t let all those blackberries go to waste, could I? These were a fantastic hit, but very rich, so cut the bars small! Stay tuned the rest of the week for what I made with the massive heap of leftover blackberries…

Blackberry Pie Bars
adapted from Joy the Baker

Ingredients:

3 cups all-purpose flour (crust)
1 1/2 cups sugar (crust)
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 cups chilled unsalted butter, cut into cubes
4 eggs
2 cups sugar (filling)
1 cup sour cream
3/4 cup all-purpose flour (filling)
2 tablespoons lemon juice
pinch salt
6 cups fresh blackberries

Directions;

Preheat the oven to 350F. Grease a 9 x 13-inch baking dish with cooking spray and set aside.
To make the crust, combine the sugar, flour, salt, and butter in an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Beat the ingredients on medium speed until the mixture looks dry and crumbly.
Reserve 1 1/2 cups of the crust mixture to use as a topping. Press the remaining mixture into the bottom of the pan with fingertips. Bake the crust for 12 – 15 minutes until golden brown.
While crust is cooling, prepare the filling. Whisk the eggs in a large bowl and add the sugar, sour cream, flour, lemon juice, and salt. Fold in the blackberries.
Spread the mixture over the crust. Sprinkle the crust mixture over the filling.
Bake for 45 to 55 minutes, until the top is lightly browned. Cool for 1 hour before slicing and serving.

Berrypicking!

2009-09-14T22:22:00.001-05:00

Last weekend, I was home visiting my family in Harrisburg for Labor Day, and my mother had picked up some delightful blackberries from her local farmer’s market. This reminded me that I never posted about my own berrypicking trip – and the several recipes that resulted. Since blackberry season is rapidly diminishing, but there are still some floating around out there, I thought I’d dedicate this week as Blackberry Week, and get all my berry-related posts resulting from the berry picking trip out all at once. Kind of like one last tribute to summer (weather appropriate, seeing as how it snuck back up to 86 degrees today), before all the berries disappear off the shelves for another 10 months!

Every year, our lab piles up in a car or two and drives out to a pick-your-own farm in Maryland where we pick the fruit of the season. In the past, I was never able to go, because I always had to babysit the old, crappy, protein-eating AKTAprime. This year, however, courtesy of a far more cooperative AKTAexplorer, I am able to leave my purifications unattended, and was able to participate for the first time. And I had a blast! The general routine is eat one, pick two, eat one pick two, until you are so stuffed full of berries that you can barely move…. and then you roll yourself down the orchard to the peach trees and eat/pick peaches. And the prices are unbelievable – I came home with 5.5 pounds of blackberries, 8 humongous peaches, 4 tomatoes the size of my head, and a dozen hand-cut zinnias for under $20. Yes, please!

If you are interested in more pictures from the berrypicking adventure, you can check them out here <cue segue into new blog>. I always have good intentions for posting pictures, and never get around to it. I always feel like I need to explain things on here because personally, I don’t dig personal blogs that post without pictures or that whole ‘Wordless Wednesday’ thing. There are photography blogs I love for the photography… and then blogs I enjoy because I like the person writing. I will confess to being disappointed when I click over to one of my favorite blogs and just find a picture or two. So now, some of my favorite photographs have a home – drop on by and visit some of my favorite events (my honeymoon, the Inauguration – all the things I meant to write about and never actually did).

Thinking about how I like order in my life and separate divisions in my Google Reader also made me wonder what everyone else prefers. I know this started with a large group of fellow graduate students and scientists – would you prefer if I had the recipes on a separate blog so you didn’t have to sift through them? Likewise, I know many food bloggers now drop in on a regular basis; are you entirely disinterested in my battles with imidazole and would rather have somewhere to go to see only the chemistry that goes on in my kitchen? Would I be better off turning this into two separate blogs, or do you like dropping by for the general mishmash variety show? Comments and (constructive) criticism welcome… and stay turned tomorrow for the berry extravaganza!

Are you ready for some FOOTBALL?!

2009-09-13T21:53:00.002-05:00

As you all know, I bleed black and gold.

So, I am sure it comes as absolutely no surprise whatsoever that I was ridiculously excited for Thursday’s NFL season opener between the Steelers and the Titans.

As it turns out, a particular PI whom I have befriended on Twitter happens to be a Titans fan, which resulted in quite a lot of trash talking throughout the entire day and evening. During the game, this appeared in my Twitter feed:

And, of course, the Steelers always prevail. Which means that, for the next week, the following is located on the laboratory homepage of one particular losing Principal Investigator.

Bow down, BethAnn, bow down… because the Steelers rule the field. (Okay, so maybe ‘ruled the field’ is a bit of an exaggeration. but at least Jeff Reed has a golden toe, which is obviously more than can be said about Rob Bironas on Thursday…)

And, my offer still stands… I’ll let you borrow my Terrible Towel if you need somewhere to dry your Titan-sized tears. I’ll even throw in some homemade baked goods to make up for all the food that PreppyChemist Twittered about that you didn’t get to eat.

Also, is anyone else extremely excited that it is FOOTBALL SEASON?? Thursday night I had a group of friends over to watch the Steelers game, I spent all day Saturday watching college football with PreppyChemist, went to Capitals practice (don't worry, still hate the Capitals and love the Peguins, but hockey is hockey) with PreppyChemist on Sunday morning, and then spent the entire rest of the day Sunday (and still am) sitting on the couch watching NFL games. Fall is here and I couldn't be happier!

Harumph

2009-09-03T22:33:00.003-05:00

I have things I’ve been meaning to post about, but instead, in light of my current situation, I leave you with this:

Do you see the giant cavernous slump in 5th year? That is exactly where I am right now. And right at the very lowest point, it should say “All experiments that were working have suddenly inexplicitly stopped despite weeks worth of troubleshooting”.

I have fallen into the Fifth Year Pit of Despair.

Even one of the PIs of the lab recognized the Pit of Despair, acknowledged that no one could possibly be motivated in this situation, and told me to take the rest of the day off and eat ice cream. And who I would I be to argue? (Okay, well, instead of ice cream I had non-dairy, fruit-sweetened Soy Delicious, which is possibly my Favorite Thing Ever, but same idea.)

Anyone have some rope to start dragging me up the giant peak of motivation to lead towards my defense?

***UPDATE***

One of my favorite Twitter followers, @bam294, who always provides a hilarious PI-point of view of situations, sent me this SNL clip to describe my current situation. Indeed, there was a light at the end of the tunnel… but… alas…. it’s broken. I guess I just need to “fix it”. (Fast forward to ~2:05.)

Aromatic Noodles with Lime-Peanut Sauce

2009-08-23T08:49:00.001-05:00

This is the 8th and final week of Whip It Up. The end to the “challenge” won’t change things around here – after all, I’ve been posting a recipe per week since November – it just means that I can go back to posting from my archived recipes and pictures, rather than having to cook something new each week. This week’s theme is “Make Your Own Take Out”, and I knew immediately what I would be making. I may have actually drooled on my keyboard when I saw this posted over at Amy’s last month, containing my favorite Thai-inspired flavors (peanut and lime) with a mix of some of my favorite vegetables (broccoli, sugar snap peas, snow peas). It did not disappoint – it was every bit as good as I was imagining, plus super easy and came together very quickly (in other words, a perfect weeknight meal). It did, however, make quite a lot – eight Julie-sized portions, to be exact. I was definitely tired of it by the end of the week after eating it every day for lunch and dinner, proving that you can, indeed, have WAY too much of a good thing. I suspect it will be quite a while before I make it again… or I’ll just have to have friends over for dinner so they can save me from the leftovers.

Aromatic Noodles with Lime-Peanut Sauce
Adapted from The Food You Crave by Ellie Krieger

Ingredients:

12 ounces whole wheat linguine
2 cups broccoli florets
2 cups sugar snap peas
2 cups snow peas
1/2 cup peanuts
1/2 cup peanut butter
1/4 cup low-sodium soy sauce
1/4 cup water
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
1/2 tablespoon lime zest
juice from one lime
1 scallion, chopped
3/4-inch piece fresh ginger, peeled and grated
2 tablespoons firmly packed brown sugar
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes

Directions:

Toast the peanuts in a dry skillet over medium-high heat until fragrant, approximately 5 minutes, stirring frequently. Set aside to cool.
Cook pasta according to package directions. Drain and rinse under cold running water, set aside.
Steam broccoli, snow peas, and sugar snap peas in the microwave until bright green and crisp-tender.
Puree the peanut butter, soy sauce, water, vinegar, lime juice, lime zest, scallion, ginger, brown sugar, and red pepper flakes in a food processor blender until smooth. Coarsely chop the cooled peanuts.
Immediately before serving, toss the pasta with the peanut sauce. Divide into bowls and top each serving with vegetables and a sprinkle of chopped peanuts,

Reusable Bags

2009-08-22T12:14:00.001-05:00

I’ve been meaning to invest in a good set of reusable bags for quite some time now. Since I often wind up going a month or more between when my husband is able to come down to D.C., I really have to stock up on a lot of groceries all at once (have I mentioned how difficult it is planning out a grocery list for 4-5 weeks at a time?) since I don’t have a car. This often means that I wind up coming up with upwards of 12-15 plastic grocery bags, so I’m looking to do some heavy duty grocery schlepping. I’d like a set that folds up easily so I can keep most of them right in Husband’s car so that we don’t forget them, something which is easy to carry (since he no longer lives here, he does not keep the parking spot across the street, so we often wind up walking several blocks with all our groceries), and something which does not complicate the bagging process.

So far, it seems like the most popular reusable bags include:

Baggu ($22 for 3 bags in a pouch)

RueMe ($29.85 for 3 bags which roll up)

Envirosax ($37.50 for 5 bags in a pouch)

Flip and Tumble ($9 per bag which rolls into a ball)

Does anyone have any suggestions? Things you particularly like or dislike about any of these, or any other brand of bags?

Three Steps Forward, Two Steps Back

2009-08-20T12:08:00.004-05:00

Fourth grade was a pretty crappy year for me. My teacher was simultaneously going through a bitter divorce when she learned that her teenage daughter was pregnant. She chose to take out her frustrations on us, yelling, screaming, and teaching us that no matter what went wrong in life, it was all our fault. Not caring enough to take any responsibility for her students, her answer for the somewhat disruptive class clown was to sit him next to me, and tell me I had to control him… and if he misbehaved, it was a bad refection on me. Practically every day, he would lean back on his two chair legs, the teacher would yell at him, and eventually take away his chair and force him to stand for the rest of class. Inevitably, he would wait until I was concentrated hard on reading, walk up behind me, yank the chair out from under me, and dump me on the floor to steal my chair. And, everyday, the teacher would tell me it was my fault for not doing a good job of controlling him, so my punishment was that I had to stand while he had to sit.

The one bright spot in the year was my gifted education. Unlike many places, like my husband’s school district, we did not have one completely separate class for gifted. Instead, those in the gifted program just left their regular classrooms for an hour per day. There were three of us from my classroom in the gifted program, and we were all having an equally miserable year. In an effort to drag out the time until returning back to our regular class, we used to walk down the hallway taking three steps forward, two steps backward, essentially progressing forward one step for every five steps taken.

Three steps forward, two steps back seems like the best description of my research right now. Remember the impossible purification I wrote about a few weeks ago? Well… it turned out to not me so impossible after all. One night, lying in bed unable to sleep, I had an idea… a hunch that I thought just might work. The next morning, I told my PI of my plan, to which he replied, “It won’t work. Don’t bother trying.” This statement came from the same individual who just a week before went on and on at my committee meeting about how I was a better biochemist now and had surpassed his knowledge of purification, so surely I could find a way to purify this protein. Rather than get (too) disgruntled and annoyed, I went with my gut and attempted it anyway, and two days later, smugly shoved a coomassie under his nose showing a dirty start lane and two perfectly purified bands in two separate fractions. Three celebratory steps forward!

After showing that Protein Y had properly refolded (the purification involved denaturing the protein and refolding it on the column) and still bound to Protein X, PI said the worst possible statement. “Next,” he said excitedly, “all you have to do is crosslink the lysines and that will be easy!” You see, it’s like sports. The second an announcer makes some comment like “[Quarterback] has not thrown an interception in 612 passes!” it automatically, no-fail, means that the next pass is going to be intercepted. Always. And this rule applies to PIs as well. The second he opened his mouth and described this step as “easy”, I knew I had it coming.

As it so turns out, the family of crosslinkers that will connect these proteins in the way that we need them to be connected works through linking the primary amines in the side chain of lysines. What this means is that you cannot have any amines in the buffers, because it will wind up crosslinking the buffer component rather than the proteins. And do you know what imidazole contains? Secondary amines. Harumph. So, I called up tech support at Pierce and the conversation went a little something like this.

Disgruntled Julie: Do secondary amines affect the crosslinking?
Tech Support: Yes, you can have tertiary amines, but not primary or secondary.
DJ: Is there anything I can do to get around imiazole in the buffer?
TS: Dialyze out the imidazole!
DJ: I’ve spent three years already trying to do that. Not going to happen.
TS: Have you tried doing it in steps?
DJ: 4 step, 6 step, and 8 step. Protein precipitates.
TS: How about overnight?
DJ: Precipitation.
TS: With glycerol?
DJ: With and without.
TS: How much glycerol?
DJ: 10%, 20%, 30%
TS: Spin column?
DJ: Precipitates.
TS: Desalting column?
DJ: Precipitates.
TS: Well, shit.

Indeed. My sentiments exactly. I finally have both proteins purified, and I cannot crosslink them because I absolutely, positively have not been able to dialyze the imidazole out of the protein.

O n e. T w o. Two giant steps backward.

Rice with Mushrooms, Cuttlefish, and Artichokes (Daring Cooks)

2009-08-15T13:24:00.001-05:00

There are very few things in life that I find as satisfactory as the ability to ‘kill two birds with one stone.’ Regardless of what it is, I love the feeling of getting double the results from my effort. I still remember the exact feeling of the light bulb going off above my head in undergrad when I realized that classes for my political science major could also count as my general curriculum requirements. In lieu of a language, I could apply classes I was already going to take for my major and count them as culture requirements. Score!

I went through a similar feeling when the stars aligned properly for the two cooking groups in which I participate. This week’s Whip It Up up theme is “Favorite Chef” – i.e., make a recipe from your favorite chef. Well, the chef part was easy for me – Jose Andres. Those in the D.C. area know him from his outstanding restaurants Jaleo (my favorite), Oyamel, Zaytinya, Cafe Atlantico, and minibar. The rest of you may know him from his public television show “Made in Spain" or perhaps from his appearance on Iron Chef, where he defeated Bobby Flay in ‘Battle Goat’. But then came the hard part… what to make? I don’t own any of his cookbooks, so I scoured the internet. While there were several recipes that piqued my interest, such as this amazing looking Guacamole in a New Way, I was often lacking access to ingredients or supplies (for example, my ice cream maker for the guacamole is in storage in my parents’ basement along with the rest of my kitchen supplies, waiting until I have a kitchen larger than a shoebox).

Then, the Daring Cooks’ challenge recipe was announced. And what was it? Rice with mushrooms, cuttlefish, and artichokes from none other than… Jose Andres.

Cha-ching!

The recipe was chosen by Olga of Olga’s Recipes, and you can view the original recipe here (I made a few changes in my version). She suggested adding in squid in lieu of cuttlefish, which is what I did, since I was easily able to purchase fresh, cleaned squid at Whole ~~Paycheck~~ Foods. I was a bit concerned about the squid in the recipe since it is boiled for so long – I have not worked with cuttlefish so perhaps it is perfect for the cuttlefish – but decided to just go ahead and try it as the suggested direct subsitute. Typically when I deal with squid, if I am boiling it, I do it for no more than 30 seconds. This recipe has a good 12+ minutes of boiling with the squid. Indeed, the squid did turn out far chewier than I would have liked. In retrospect, I should have listened to my gut and pan seared the squid in the beginning, removed it from the pan, and then added it to the boiling mixture for no more than a minute. I need to be better about trusting my own judgment in the kitchen even when it deviates from a reputable recipe. Even with the rubbery squid, I still enjoyed this quite a bit, and will certainly experiment with it more in the future.

Rice with Mushrooms, Cuttlefish, and Artichokes
adapted from Jose Andres

Ingredients:

6 artichokes, cleaned, chopped into eights
1 large portobello mushroom, chopped roughly
1 bay leaf
1 generous splash white wine
1/2 pound squid, mixture of tubes and tentacles
3 tablespoons sofregit (recipe below)
1 cup Arborio rice
3 cups water
1/4 teaspoon tumeric

Directions:

Cut squid tubes into strips. Cut apart any large clumps of tentacles.
Add 1 tablespoon olive oil in a frying pan and add the squid. Add bay leaf, artichokes, and mushrooms.
Sauté until artichokes are golden in color.
Add splash of wine to deglaze the pan.
Add sofregit and mix well to distribute the flavors.
Add water and bring to boil. Stir in rice and boil over high heat for 5 minutes.
Add tumeric and lower heat to medium. Boil another 8 minutes. or until rice has softened.
Remove from heat and let sit 5 minutes before serving.

mmm… squid

Sofregit

Ingredients:

1 tablespoon olive oil
2 giant tomatoes, or 3 medium sized, chopped
1 onion, chopped
1/2 green pepper, chopped
3 cloves of garlic, chopped
1 portobello mushroom, chopped
1 bay leaf
salt to taste
pinch ground cumin
pinch oregano

Directions:

Place all ingredients in a frying pan and sauté slowly until all vegetables are soft, approximately 1 hour.

Mushroom & Gruyere Quiche

2009-08-07T17:14:00.004-05:00

This week's theme for Whip It Up is appetizers. I struggled quite a bit with this -- while I love to prepare (and eat!) a wide variety of appetizers, now that I'm living on my own, I have no reason to make them. I'm down to cooking once or twice a week and eating leftovers for the rest of the days, and well.... I just can't subside for multiple meals off of something based with spinach, artichoke, and puff pastry. So instead, I decided to make something that works for dinner as well as for appetizers -- a quiche. If I was going to make this as an appetizer, I'd press the rolled pie dough into muffin tins and spoon a bit of the filling into each to make a perfect two-bite sized quiche. But for me for dinner, I just made one big quiche. I use my own hand-rolled pie crusts (I really hate rolling out pie crust so whenever I need one, I'll roll out 6 at a time and leave the rest in my freezer), but I am quite sure that a store-bought pie crust would work just as well for a quiche.

Mushroom & Gruyere Quiche

Ingredients:

1/4 pound cremini mushrooms, quartered
1/4 pound portobello mushroom caps, diced
1/4 pound shitake mushrooms, quartered
1/2 medium onion, thinly sliced
1 tablespoon olive oil
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon black pepper
1 pie crust
1/2 cup heavy cream
2 eggs
1 tablespoon chopped fresh thyme
4 ounces gruyere cheese, shredded

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400F.
In a large bowl, toss mushrooms with onion, olive oil, salt, and pepper, and place on a rimmed baking sheet in a single layer. Roast for 15 minutes, or until cooked and firm. Remove from oven and set aside.
Pick pie shell all over with a fork. Prebake for 10 to 15 minutes, until lightly browned.
Reduce oven temperature to 350F.
Whisk together cream and eggs with thyme. In a large bowl, combine roasted mushrooms and onions with the shredded gruyere. Spread mixture in the bottom of the pie shell in an even layer.
Pour cream-egg mixture over the mushrooms, ensuring that all of the mushroom mixture is covered.
Bake for 45-55 minutes, or until a knife inserted into the center of the quiche comes out clean,

Tamale Pie

2009-07-31T12:05:00.002-05:00

This week’s Whip It Up theme is “spicy”. Normally when opting for Mexican-inspired dishes, we turn to Mexican lasagna,vegetarian chili, or tex-mex pasta. But Whip It Up calls for new recipes, so Tamale Pie it was!

Tamale Pie

Ingredients:

1 pound soy crumbles or ground beef
1 tablespoon olive oil
1 onion, chopped
1 clove garlic, minced
1 green bell pepper, chopped
2 cans diced tomatoes
1 can whole kernel corn
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoons chili powder
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 can diced green chilies
1 package cornbread mix
1 egg
1 1/3 cups buttermilk
6 tablespoons butter

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400F.
In a large skillet over medium heat, brown the beef in oil. Add onion, garlic, and bell pepper, cook for 2 minutes, until just tender. Stir in tomoatoes, corn, and seasonings; simmer for 5 minutes longer. Pour into a 13x9-inch baking pan.
Prepare cornbread batter using egg, buttermilk, and butter. Mix drained green chilies into batter. Carefully spoon over top of beef mixture.
Bake 15 to 20 minutes until cornbread is lightly brown and filling is bubbling.

Stuffed Peppers

2009-07-23T00:28:00.002-05:00

This week’s theme for Whip It Up was “healthy”, so the choice was obvious for me; stuffed vegetables. There is nothing better than a vegetable stuffed with more vegetables (Husband disagrees, which is why I am enjoying cooking just for me lately) and these certainly did not disappoint. Easy, healthy, and delicious!

Stuffed Peppers

Ingredients:

4-6 bell peppers
1 pound soy crumbles or ground beef
2 onions, diced (separated)
4 cloves garlic, minced
8 ounces crushed tomatoes
mexican blend cheese
1 ripe tomato, cored and quartered
1 jalapeno pepper
1 cup long grain white rice
1 teaspoon canola oil
1 cup vegetable broth
1/2 tablespoon tomato paste
3/4 teaspoon salt

Directions:

To prepare rice, process tomatoes and onion (1) in food processor until smooth, about 15 seconds. Remove ribs and seeds from jalapeno, mince, and set aside.
Heat oil in saute pan with lid. Add rice and fry, stirring frequently, until light golden and translucent, 6 to 8 minutes. Reduce heat to medium, add jalapeno pepper, and stir until fragrant, about 1 minute. Stir in pureed tomatoes and onions, vegetable broth, tomato paste and salt; increase heat to medium-high and bring to a boil. Cover pan and transfer to oven; bake at 350 for 30 to 35 minutes, until liquid is absorbed and rice is tender.
Cut tops of peppers and remove seeds and ribs from inside pepper.
Heat large pan over medium-high heat. Add soy crumbles or ground beef and cook until browned. Add onions, garlic, and crushed tomatoes. Stir occasionally for 5 minutes.
Add a small handful of shredded cheese and one to two cups rice mixture (to personal preference) and mix thoroughly.
Fill each pepper with the mixture, squashing down to fill as much as possible. Stand upright in a baking dish.
Cover with foil and bake at 375 for 15 minutes. Remove foil, top each pepper with more shredded cheese, and bake for an additional 5 minutes.

“Chicken” Pot Pie

2009-07-18T17:07:00.001-05:00

This week’s theme for Whip It Up is “regional favorites”. I was really stumped by this – I’ve been living in D.C. for 8 years now, and I really couldn’t think of a single food that was distinctly D.C. in nature. Next, I pondered my future home in a few years – Philadelphia. There are a plethora of foods associated with Philly – cheesesteaks, soft pretzels, cheese whiz, cheesecake, to name a few – but none which I was interested in making (or eating). Bypassing Philly as well, I thought about my hometown where I grew up – Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.

Now, I’d like to point out the flaw to the “Pennsyltucky” theory that Pennsylvania consists of Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, with Kentucky in the middle. I grew up in the state capital, and I never knew a single person who lived on a farm, had more than a half acre of land surrounding their home, owned any sort of livestock, owned an old beat-up pickup truck, or anything else that would fit into the typical “small town” theme. In fact, my parents’ own home is so urban, their mailbox hangs on the front door – none of that mailbox on a post at the sidewalk stuff that plagues the suburbs.

But, most of the population fails to recognize Harrisburg as an actual city, and groups it into “Central Pennsylvania”, which typically conjures up images of Amish and the Pennsylvania Dutch. I have absolutely zero Pennsylvania Dutch in me – both of my parents were born in New York City. I grew up in a very health-conscious household, so we rarely ate Pennsylvania Dutch type foods which were common in the area, but it’s the closest culinary theme for my hometown region. I contemplated making my mother’s favorite Central Pennsylvania-related food – traditional Amish whoopie pies – but I am not really one for chocolate. I considered my father’s favorite Amish delight, shoo-fly pie, but I knew Husband wouldn’t be intrigued by the molasses-based dessert, and since he came down to visit this weekend, I wanted to make something he would eat. So finally, I settled on chicken pot pie, which I have to confess, I’ve never had before.

Traditional Lancaster-county chicken pot pies are laden with gravy and cream, and not something I would eat, even if I did eat chicken. So, instead, I lightened it up, and made two separate smaller pot-pies, one with chicken for Husband, and one subbed with portobello mushrooms for me. I always enjoy rolling out my own dough, but if you wanted to make it even easier, I won’t tell if you buy premade pie dough. I was really pleasantly surprised with this, and look forward to my leftovers during the week. Husband, who has only ever had the gravy/cream/lard version before, was disappointed with my lighter version and felt it lacked all the flavor and substance (and calories.. and fat… and cholesterol) of the traditional version. I guess one of the benefits to being in a long-distance marriage means that I can cook for myself and not for him… so I can make this whenever I want in the future just for me!

Lightened-Up Chicken Pot Pie

Ingredients:

1/2 cup trans-fat free vegetable shortening
2 cups flour
1/3 cup cold water
3 tablespoons butter
2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
1teaspoon dried thyme
1 tablespoon garlic powder
1 teaspoon sea salt
2 tablespoons milk
2 cups chopped carrots
1 cup peas
1 cup corn
1/2 cup green beans
3 cups cubed cooked chicken OR 3 cups chopped portobello mushrooms
2 cups vegetable broth

Directions:

Cut the shortening into the flour until the mixture resembles coarse ground oats. Add the cold water and gather the mixture into a ball, flatten, and cut into four equal pieces. Coat each piece in flour.
Roll each quarter of dough out thinly, and place two of the sheets into 2-cup pie pans or mini-casserole dishes. Let the excess dough overlap over the edges.
Melt butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add flour and all the seasonings once butter has started bubbling. Stir vigorously until the mixture has thickened and fully mixed.
Add the milk and broth, bringing the mixture to a boil. Once boiling, turn off the heat and add the rest of the ingredients, stirring until everything is coated. Spoon into prepared pie crusts, allowing the filling to heap in the center.
Cover each dish with a second sheet of dough, rolling the edges together and tucking on top of the pie. Brush the top with milk and cut several steam vents in the top. Cover with foil.
Bake 30-40 minutes at 450F. Remove the foil for the past few minutes of baking to allow the crust to fully brown.

Isn’t It Ironic?

2009-07-17T22:06:00.001-05:00

I just happened to notice that my post yesterday on my protein purification woes drew Millipore as an advertising sponsor. Obviously, this makes sense – I talk protein science, scientists come and read, a life science research biotech company sees a target audience.

But the irony comes in the particular product which Millipore is toting – a 0.5mL centrifugal filter for concentrating or desalting/buffer exchange of proteins.

Have I mentioned that I have literally spent 3 years (do you see a trend in my never-ending, unsolvable research problems) attempting to dialyze imidazole out of Protein X? And how many Millipore columns I have used?

Millipore, why must you taunt me so? What’s next, Pierce advertising their Slide-a-Lyzer dialysis cassettes for quick and easy buffer exchange? (I am pretty sure that I am single-handedly keeping Pierce in business with the number of dialysis cassettes I use for all my unsuccessful dialysis attempts.)

New rule: if you advertise something as “delivers great performance”, then you better come to my lab and make it work with MY protein!

Impossibilities

2009-07-16T21:20:00.001-05:00

Last week, I had a committee meeting. In preparation for the meeting, I met with my PI to discuss how to rework my aims, change my hypothesis, and the best way to lay out the “future manuscript” my committee likes to see (i.e., when I acquire data, I will put it into a paper like so). This lead to a very long discussion in which my PI decided that I had too much chemistry in my project (too MUCH chemistry? blasphemy! there is no such thing.) and wanted to try to shift it back to the biochemistry/biophysics side of things.

Now, let’s backtrack a wee bit here. My second and third years of graduate school were encompassed mostly by failed purification attempts of a fragment of a particular protein which binds to the main protein studied by the lab. Let’s call this protein fragment Protein Y. Now, I was not the first person to be assigned the task of purification; rather, a post-doc in the lab and our protein purification lab tech had each sacrificed months of their time in lab attempting to purify Protein Y with no success. I, however, was not aware of the previous failed attempts, and presuming Protein Y to be like any other protein for which I found a purification strategy, forged ahead with elaborate plans of what to do with said protein, including crosslinking and mass spec to identify the region where Protein Y binds to Protein X, and attempts at co-crystallzation, thinking that perhaps Protein Y would stabilize Protein X enough to form crystals.

I then spent two miserable years trying to purify protein Y, with no success at all. I certainly do not consider this time to be a waste… rather, I acquired so much knowledge about protein purification and various ways to purify a protein that I have now become the resident protein purification expert. The chair of biochemistry has informed me that there is quite the demand for biochemist post-docs with expertise in protein purification, so even though the project tanked, I still think it was integral to my future purification success and perhaps even obtaining a future position.

The Protein Y Purification Project never officially closed, but rather, my time was shifted to working on other projects to help get a paper out the door. I, naively perhaps, assumed that since my thesis aims had shifted to reflect new developments in the lab, and a project which interested me much more (more chemistry! more biophysics!), I was off the hook from my dreaded Protein Y purification days.

Until last week, when I met with my PI. He wants me to go back to Protein Y purification, and re-visit the crosslinking and co-crystallization ideas. Nevermind that the lab has now spent 3+ years trying to purify the protein, racking the brains of one post-doc, one protein guru technician, and one very disgruntled graduate student. I moaned. I groaned. And boy, did I complain. And then, I offered up a perfectly acceptable solution for determining the binding location without having to purify the protein. My PI thought about this, and agreed that it would be a good alternative… but really, he’d rather just have me purify the protein. I have no doubt that this has less to do with my own experiments, and more to do with all the things he thinks he could do with a purified protein after I leave… after all, his priority is the future of the lab, and not getting me out the door in a timely fashion.

At my committee meeting, after I presented everything (quite well, according to my PI), the chair of my committee asked what I thought the biggest challenge would be to completing my aims. Without hesitation, I pointed directly to Protein Y as the source of my likely shortcomings. The other members of my committee nodded and agreed, after witnessing two years of my failed attempts. But, never one to be discouraged or accept that perhaps a protein just cannot be purified, my PI immediately jumped up and went through a spiel about how I am a better biochemist now than I was two years ago and how I will certainly have much more success this time.

After just one more week back with Protein Y, I already want to strangle myself. I wonder how many more years I will have to spend on this before my PI accepts that maybe, just maybe, my research is impossible.

Rigatoni Pie

2009-07-12T08:31:00.001-05:00

First off, I apologize that the last several weeks I have only managed to post recipes on the weekends. I have so many things I want to write… and zero motivation. Ever since Husband moved away, my motivation has just all gone out the window, and when I get home from lab I just sit on the couch and read or watch TV. I’m not sure why – honestly, at least this far along it really doesn’t feel like things are that different since I was used to him being on call so much and the rest of my life is exactly the same – but if anyone locates my motivation, send it this way.

This week’s Whip It Up theme is “guilty pleasure” and this recipe has multiple reasons why it fits that category. For starters, it is pasta based, and I try not to eat a lot of pasta even though I love it. Second, it’s a recipe that I’ve had bookmarked from Martha Stewart for ages, and crossing a recipe I’ve wanted to try off my list is definitely a pleasure – I love trying new things. Finally, it involves me being creative with food and taking a very long time to do something that has to do with presentation and not with actually getting dinner on the table – wasting time to do something fun is ABSOLUTELY a guilty pleasure, when I have the lab in the back of my head nagging me 24/7.

Rigatoni Pie
adapted from Martha Stewart

Ingredients:

1 pound rigatoni
2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
1 pound ground beef (I use soy crumbles in lieu of meat)
2 garlic cloves, diced
1/4 teaspoon ground pepper
1 can (28 ounces) crushed tomatoes
1 cup finely grated Parmesan cheese
8 ounces grated mozzarella cheese

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400F.
Cook pasta until slightly underdone per directions in a large pot of boiling water. When done, rinse in cold water and drain again. Toss pasta with 1 tablespoon of olive oil to coat.
Heat remaining 1 tablespoon olive oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Add beef/soy crumbles. Cook, stirring occasionally, until brown (or heated through for soy). Add garlic, pepper, and salt (to taste). Cook 2 minutes more.
Add crushed tomatoes and simmer until thickened, about 20 minutes.
Toss pasta with Parmesan cheese. Butter a 9-inch springform pan. Tightly pack pasta into pan, standing each piece on end.
Spread 2 cups sauce on top of pasta, poking it into each of the holes (after trying a fork and chopsticks, I suggest the best way is just to use a finger). Bake 15 minutes, sprinkle mozzarella on top, and return to oven until cheese is golden, 10 to 15 minutes more.
Remove from oven and let stand 15 minutes. Run a knife around the edges to loosen; unmold. Cut into wedges and serve with remaining sauce.

Patriotic Desserts

2009-07-04T15:01:00.001-05:00

I recently joined another food challenge of sorts, Whip It Up. Each week a topic guideline is given, and I have to prepare a new-to-me recipe and post it. I’ve already been posting a recipe each week, so this just means that I’ll have to make something NEW, rather than posting from my constantly increasing stash of recipes and food photos waiting to be posted. I figure that between Whip It Up, Daring Bakers, and Daring Cooks, it will at least guarantee that I’ll be trying 6 new recipes a month, which should help me from losing my touch in the kitchen now that I am no longer living with Husband. I suspect that, rather than my routine cooking 7 nights a week, I will be resorting to cereal or popcorn for dinner since my hours in the lab are going to increase even more in an effort to finish as quickly as possible.

This week’s theme is “Holiday Food”. And, given that today is a holiday (and one of my favorites, to boot – I am a huge sucker for a good fireworks show, and living in D.C., I have the best at my doorstep!), I opted to make some appropriately colored desserts for a gathering I am attending pre-fireworks festivities. (I’m also bringing a triple batch of my spinach and artichoke dip – recipe here, for those who missed it the first time.)

First up, a red, white, and blue colored trifle. The inspiration for this came from Sandra Lee, but her ‘semi-homemade’ concept is a little too semi for my tastes – if I’m baking, I want to bake. So, I used my own most favorite devil’s food cake recipe (rather than box mix) and made my own vanilla pudding and mixed it with the CoolWhip (rather than just two tubs of cool whip). But, if you want to cheat and use premade cake mix, I won’t judge (too harshly). :) And then, because it sounded like fun, I decided to try my hand at chocolate covered pretzels.

4th of July Trifle

Ingredients (red for cake, blue for pudding):

1 1/3 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup cocoa powder
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 stick butter, room temperature
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup granulated sugar
3 large eggs, room temperature
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 oz. bittersweet chocolate, melted and cooled
1/2 cup buttermilk, room temperature
1/2 cup water, warm
2/3 cup chocolate chips
1 bottle red food coloring (if you want a reddish tint to the cake)
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup all purpose flour
3 eggs, separated
2 cups milk
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 (8-ounce) tub frozen whipped topping
2 quarts blueberries
1 quart strawberries

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350F. Grease 9x13 inch cake pan.
In a medium bowl, mix together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, and salt.
In a large bowl, cream together butter and sugars until light. Beat in eggs one at a time, followed by vanilla and melted chocolate.
Combine buttermilk and water. Working in two or three additions, alternate adding liquid mixture and flour mixture to the mixing bowl. Add bottle of food coloring. Mix just until combined. Stir in chocolate chips.
Bake for 25-30 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool cake in pan.
To prepare pudding, mix sugar, flour, and salt in top of a double boiler. Blend in 3 egg yolks and milk. Cook, uncovered over boiling water, whisking constantly for 10 to 12 minutes or until thickened. Remove from heat and stir in vanilla. Cool in refrigerator.
Once cool, slowly fold frozen whipped topping into vanilla pudding.
Cut cooled cake into 1” squares.
To assemble trifle, layer bottom of trifle bowl (or large glass mixing bowl, if your trifle bowl is in storage of your parents’ basement…) with half of the cake squares. Squish down with hands to form a solid layer. Spread half the pudding mixture over the cake. Top pudding with 1 1/2 quarts of the blueberries. Top the blueberries with the remaining cake squares, followed by the rest of the pudding mixture. Cut tops off strawberries and place, cut side down, around the perimeter of the bowl. Pour remaining blueberries into center.

Chocolate Covered Pretzels

These were so simple to make, and so delicious! Dip pretzel rods in melted modeling chocolate for candy making (I found the Melt ‘n Mold brand at Safeway). I melted the chocolate in a tall and skinny juice glass, and then tipped the chocolate to the very edge and rolled the pretzel in it. Lightly scrape the sides of the pretzel on the lip of the glass to remove excess, then sprinkle with desired toppings (sprinkles, nuts, etc.). Since I was going for a 4th of July theme, I used red, white, and blue colored sugar crystals and piped on frosting, which I tinted red and blue with food coloring (I fear my hand will be blue for days!). The icing didn’t stick as well to the chocolate as it does to cookies or cakes, so it wound up sliding a bit and looking messy… but… they’re fun, festive, chocolate covered pretzels, and that’s all that counts!

Bakewell Tart (Daring Bakers’ Challenge)

2009-06-27T17:39:00.001-05:00

The June Daring Bakers' challenge was hosted by Jasmine of Confessions of a Cardamom Addict and Annemarie of Ambrosia and Nectar. They chose a Traditional (UK) Bakewell Tart... er... pudding that was inspired by a rich baking history dating back to the 1800's in England.

Before seeing this as the monthly challenge for the Daring Bakers, I had never heard of a bakewell tart. But I can assure you that I will certainly be making this again – I loved it!

I made this the day Husband moved, figuring that baking would help cheer me up (plus, Husband dislikes almond flavors and any fruit based sweet, so there was no point for making it for him). Due to some unexpected circumstances, we were out of town until the day before he left, and we did not have the chance to make one last grocery trip using his car, so I made several substitutions with what was already in my kitchen. The frangipane called for 4.5oz icing (confectioners) sugar, but I only had half a cup… so I subbed the rest with regular granulated sugar. I also needed 4.5oz of ground almonds, but after tossing all the almonds I had into my food processor and came up short – since I had no idea what the texture would be with fewer nuts, I just filled the rest with ground walnuts and added extra almond extract to mask any walnut flavor. And you know what? It was great! Confession: I ate a piece for breakfast every day this week!

Bakewell Tart

Ingredients:

For shortbread crust-

8 oz all purpose flour
1 oz sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
4 oz unsalted butter, cold
2 egg yolks
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1-2 tablespoons cold water

For frangipane-

4.5 oz unsalted butter, softened
4.5 oz icing (confectioners) sugar
3 eggs
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
4.5 oz ground almonds
1 oz all purpose flour

For filling-

1 cup jam (I used apricot)

Directions:

Sift together flour, sugar, and salt for shortbread crust. Grate butter into the flour mixture, using the larger grating side of a box grater. Using your finger tips only, rub the butter into the flour until the mixture resembles bread crumbs.
Lightly beat the egg yolks with the almond extract and quickly mix into the flour mixture. Keep mixing while dribbling in the water, only adding enough to form a cohesive and slightly sticky dough.
Form the dough into a disk, wrap in cling wrap, and refrigerate for at least 30 minutes.
To prepare the frangipane, cream the butter and sugar together until very fluffy. Scrape down the sides of the bowl and add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Batter may appear to curdle – normal! Pour in the almond extract and mix for another 30 seconds. With the beaters running, spoon in the ground nuts and the flour. Mix well.
Place the chilled shortbread dough on a lightly floured surface. Flour the rolling pin and roll the pastry to 1/4” thickness. When the pastry is the desired size for a tart or pie plate, transfer it to the pan, press in, and trim excess dough. Chill in the freezer for 15 minutes.
Preheat oven to 400F.
Remove shell from freezer and spread an even layer of jam onto the pastry base. Top with frangipane, spreading to cover the entire surface of the tart. Smooth the top and bake for 30-35 minutes. The finished tart will have a golden crust and the frangipane will be tanned and poofy.

Temporary Delays

2009-06-23T09:38:00.002-05:00

I apologize for all the delays in posting, but things have been kind of a zoo around here. I intend on updating about my grandmother, sharing some pictures from our vacation, lamenting about how all of my friends suddenly happen to be moving away from D.C. the same week as my Husband… but first, I have to finish helping him pack up all his belongings and load them into the car, as he moves back to Philadelphia this afternoon.

Who knew a year could fly by so quickly? Let’s hope the next two-ish years pass by even faster.