Greek Tomato Salad

      At the beach today, so I am going to make this short.  A fresh salad recipe for when you are tired of lettuce, but don't want something like pasta or potato salad.  Just a few simple ingredients 
 2 pounds tomatoes, cut into bite sized pieces ( I got some red and some yellow, because there were no heirlooms at the beach grocery store, but whatever kind is your favorite)
2 cucumbers, peeled, seeds removed then large diced- remove seeds by cutting in half lengthwise and scraping the seeds out with a spoon
1 red onion, very thinly sliced
8 oz (or so) Feta, crumbled
1/2 cup olives (optional, but remember if you use them they will add to the salt, so adjust accordingly)
1/2 cup Greek balsamic dressing (recipe to follow)
1 TBS fresh oregano, chopped
a large pinch of sea salt and a few grinds of fresh pepper
       Put everything in a bowl and mix it together.  Let it sit at room temp so they flavors can marry for at least 15 -30 min and serve at room temperature, the tomatoes will just taste better.

      This dressing is a little bit of a cheat, but it is always tasty, so why make yourself work harder than you have to.  I always make it with a immersion blender, but honestly you can just put all the ingredients in a jar and shake, it will work just as well.
1 tsp Greek seasoning (see, I told you it was a Greek dressing)
1 clove garlic, minced
1 tsp oregeno, finely chopped
1 tsp honey 
1 tsp dijon mustard
1/4 cup feta (optional, and really not necessary for the tomato salad since you are putting some big chunks in anyway)
1/4 cup balsamic vinegar (if you use white balsamic it won't cover the color or the tomatoes as much, but the regular tastes just as nice)
pinch freshly ground black pepper
add all of these ingredients and if you are using a stick blender slowly add in
1/4 cup olive oil
1/2 cup salad oil
or just add the oil into your jar and shake.  This will make about a cup of dressing so you'll have some for your salad, and some left over for another project.  I always love to put this dressing on my bean salads as well, to be honest it could be used for just about anything.  How about a marinade for some chicken or a steak, or maybe even let some mushrooms sit in it for a few hours and have some nice marinated mushrooms to put on an antipasti plate or portabellas to throw on the grill.  It is a versatile dressing, and pretty basic, so if you want a little different flavor exchange the Greek seasoning for Italian or take out the herbs altogether and mix in a fruit puree. 

What not to do to a cake

      When you are frosting a cake there are many things to think about, and tonight . . . well I was drinking and baking and I just forgot.  It's my dear husband's birthday tomorrow and I finally dragged out of him just what he wanted.  A spicy chocolate cake with Kaluah frosting.  I have a tried and true spicy chocolate cake recipe, but honestly it's a lot of work, and remember I was baking with a bit of booze.  And then those darn Duke's mayo commercials with the chocolate cake have been quite enticing, so I kinda decided to make the Duke's chocolate cake.
      I did change it a bit, because, you know, it's what I do.  For the water I substituted coffee.  Then I added come cayenne, chili flake and a bit of cinnamon to give it that nice Mexican hot chocolate flavor.  Otherwise I stuck to the recipe, and I'll tell you what, this cake really is moist and delicious.  But is it maybe a bit too moist? Well this it yet to be determined, as it's possible when I got to frosting I just didn't let it cool quite long enough. 
      The frosting you should know about from my previous blog post, but I kind of messed up.  I didn't have any butter  (I know, me, no butter, very strange) so I figured, you know, it will be ok with just the cream cheese and powdered sugar right? Yea no . . . it really needs the butter because the butter stiffens up more than the cream cheese will.  And even 3 pounds of powdered sugar didn't rescue it, in fact all it did was leave me with WAY too much frosting.
      So frosting made and cake cooled (or so I thought)  I started building my cake.  I have to say Thank God it was only 2 layers.  I did my crumb coat and put it in the fridge because my freezer really needs to be cleaned out.  When I came back it looked like this:

AAAAHHHHH ok, this is sad and horrible! My cake split into 4 pieces.  8( so sad.  So I put it back in for a bit longer hoping it would stiffen up enough that I could put another layer of frosting on it, but it never did (this is caused by the no butter thing)  So I tried to put another layer of frosting on the kind of glue it together.  Well this just made it worse.  Then as the sliding got worse (and the cake broke into now 5 pieces) I tried to push it back together and skewer it so that it wouldn't slide anymore.  UGH this is just a terrible nightmare.  UGLIEST CAKE EVER.
      No worries though, in the end we are having a party with friends and no one will much care what it looks like and eat it anyway, as long as it tastes good.  So we will cover it in candles, an spit all over it and devour.  Maybe I'll just pass forks around and have everyone dig in . . . or serve it with a big spoon . . . yea I'm bringing a spoon to the party.  Maybe we'll all be too drunk to notice anyway. ;)
      So I say cheers! And happy eating to all!

PS.  Thank you Susan for the suggestion to call this an Earthquake cake.  it's a perfect name for it.  Everyone loved it, we did eat it with spoons, and no one cared that it was ugly (in fact someone asked me it she could have one just like it, ugly fishers and all) Here it is all decked out for the party.  Couldn't take it out of the box because it was sure to fall apart even worse.  Notice (BTW) how this has now split into 5 pieces with the extra frosting I tried to put on it to glue it back together just dripping down into the cracks. 

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bran Muffins

      Fall is my favorite time of year. It might just be due to the fact that by mid August I am completely done with summer. The things that always so excite me about the beginning of the season become old hat by the end. That's what good about the constant change that comes from the flow of the seasons. I think, though, that what I love the most about it is the food that reminds you of holidays with family, the falling leaves, and evenings out of the porch with the air just a bit cooler than comfortable with a glass of warm cider in hand.
      The fall mood has overcome me a bit early this year, and I thought I'd make some pumpkin muffins. Since I am trying to eat healthier I thought I'd try to do something higher fiber and try to cut the sugar a bit. So I made these as bran muffins (also because I love bran muffins) and replaced some of the sugar with applesauce. Of course once I started cooking I realized that I didn't have any good dried fruit around ( I was looking for cranberries) so I thought I would go with dark chocolate chips, because you know dark chocolate is good for you . . . right? Yea, maybe not so much as you will see at the end, but still Chocolate is tasty.  It won't hurt the recipe to leave them out, replace them with nuts, or dried fruit, or maybe using cocoa nibs instead of chocolate chips.  Yum!
      Start by soaking
1 1/2 cup All Bran Flakes in
2/3 cup Milk
Then mix together 1 1/2 cup  flour- I used whole wheat white flour, but using regular whole wheat flour would work just as well and be awesome. 
1 TBS baking powder
1 TBS pumpkin pie spice **
1/2 tsp Cardamom (optional)
1/2 tsp salt
Once the bran flakes begin to soften add
1/3 cup apple sauce
1 egg
1 cup pumpkin puree
1 TBS brown sugar
and mix together with an electric mixer until fairly smooth.  Add the flour mixture and beat until combined.  Then fold in 2/3 cup dark chocolate chips. Divide into a greased muffin tin (I made 6 big muffins) and bake for approximately 25 min at 325 degrees.  They are done when you can insert a toothpick and it comes out clean .  . . well except for a bit of melted chocolate.
      When all is said and done they come out super moist and they smell awesome.  The pumpkin along with the apple sauce give it a rich smooth texture without adding a lot of fat or sugar.  In the end (even with the chocolate chips) one large muffin is 340 calories (224 without) with 10 grams fat, (no chips brings it down to 3) 24 g sugar (again, without is 11) and 5 grams of fiber.  And for those of you that don't care, well don't worry about it, and just eat them because they are delicious. 
     

** no pumpkin pie spice? use 1/2 tsp cinnamon, 1/2 tsp ginger, 1/4 tsp ground clove, 1/2 tsp ground allspice and 1/4 tsp nutmeg

mmmmm . . . veggies

        Wish you ate more vegetables? Wishing there was a quick easy solution for   those perfect vegetables that everyone loves?  This is something I learned while working at Outback all those years ago.  Not all restaurants do this, but sometimes I wish more would because this method gives you perfectly steamed vegetables that still have a nice crunch to them.  I actually kind of forgot about it for a few years and just thought to do it this morning.  Decided that I am going to just make up a bunch of baggies of different veggies to have available all the time.  Hopefully this means eating more vegetables instead of chips or something, because the biggest problem with cooking them for me is just washing the dishes. 
      Very simply cut your veggies into bite size pieces, broccoli, slices of squash or zucchini, beans, sliced carrots etc.  Put about a cup of veggies into a plastic bag.  I usually use just a fold over sandwich bag, but a zip-lock bag is fine too, just be sure if you use the sandwich bag that you get a good twist on it so that it steams well.  You can cook them at this point if you'd like a salt free and fat free version, but I am of the opinion that a little flavor won't hurt a thing, so I put in mine about 1 tsp of butter or olive oil and a pinch of salt.  If you'd like a little different flavor maybe some seasoned salt, Greek seasoning, Cajun seasoning, a pinch of basil or some popcorn sprinkle, basically, your imagination is the limit!  Then just pop them in the microwave for 1:15 min for a single portion, 2:00 for two portions and another 30 seconds a piece after that.  Allow them to sit in the bags for about a min before opening and serving them.  Just remember that denser things like baby carrots or cauliflower will need to go a little longer, maybe 30 seconds more, unless you like them really crispy. 
      One of the really great things about this is that if you have picky eaters making a different vegetable for everyone isn't that big of a deal, maybe even make it fun for the kids and have them make their own bags before dinner, just be sure that an adult is opening up the bags because you have to be careful that you don't get burnt by the steam.   Or you can do like me and just make a bunch up in advance to have to pop in the microwave for whenever you need a quick snack.