ChemEats

Chocolate Flourless Cake for Passover

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Mon, 25 Mar 2013 23:33:00 +0000

I always thought it would be hard to make this chocolate flourless cake, but then I realized that the ingredients that go into it are surprisingly simple. Just Chocolate, Eggs, Vanilla and Sugar! Sure, you have to separate the eggs and whip them up so they are light and airy, but even that was easier than I ever expected.

Pancakes for Dinner?

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Sun, 17 Mar 2013 23:39:00 +0000

I think so!

Corned beef sandwiches.

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Sat, 07 Apr 2012 22:13:00 +0000

What are a few of my favorite things to cook? Challah and Corned Beef! I thought it would be fun to pair the two together for a delicious dinner.

I cooked the corned beef according to the package directions. Each sandwich had two slices. The meat is so good that I didn't add any sauces to my sandwich, there was enough delicious moisture!

I have made this challah dough dozens of times. Normally I split the dough in two to make two loafs, or make one big loaf. This time I pulled out little pieces of the dough to make knots. I let these knots rise a bit before putting them in the oven. I made 6 knots this time, but there was enough dough to make 10-12 rolls.

I cooked these for 20 min at 350 degrees. I skipped the egg wash because I didn't want to waste the excess egg. A lot of the definition was lost when the rolls cooked up, but they had a shape that was perfect for mini corned beef sliders. Yum!

Sweet Potato Gnocchi Fail - But a nice creamy sauce

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Mon, 02 Apr 2012 22:46:00 +0000

I realized that I had never shared the pictures of my failed sweet potato gnocchi attempt (mentioned in the previous post.)

A couple of the dumplings held their shape, but I had to rescue them from the boiling water with a slotted spoon. Whoops! I am not sure what was off about my recipe, but I will add more egg and flour next time. I think the sweet potatoes soaked up more liquid than the russet potatoes normally do.

I cannot find my notes on the sauce, but I started with some thickened flour and butter, added heavy cream and some powdered sage. I may have added a tiny bit of brown sugar. The sauce was fantastic, too bad it was like soup with my gnocchi!

Fried Gnocchi

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Tue, 27 Mar 2012 22:26:00 +0000

A while back I tried making some sweet potato gnocchi. I had some sweet potatoes that were going to go bad, and while making normal gnocchi I mixed some mashed sweet potatoes into half of the mix. I also decided to try freezing the dumplings for the first time.

Unfortunately, this first attempt failed. When I tried to boil my sweet potato gnocchi they lost their shape and clumped together. I still had some dumplings in the freezer, so I needed to try something else.

I thought that the dumplings would keep their shape better if I fried them. I heated up some canola oil on the stove in a frying pan. I didn't want to use a ton of oil, so the oil was just deep enough to cover the bottom of the pan.

I let the gnocchi brown on one side (5-6 min) before flipping them over. This was careful work because there was a lot of oil splattering. Next time I am going to use a deeper pan! Thank goodness I had a splatter shield to protect me.

The gnocchi come out looking like mini tater tots.

The next big question was an important one... how do I serve fried gnocchi? I thought that I would turn this into a kiddy dinner by serving it with a side of manara sauce. (Well, salad isn't very kiddy, but I wanted to counteract all of that starch and oil!)

Keith had some other ideas, and while I was trying to not get burned (or to set the house on fire) he was setting up our table with candles!

Gnocchi is one of Keith's favorite meals. I will need to try something else next time I try sweet potato gnocchi, but I now know that frying them is a decent save.

Chicken Shrimp Coconut Curry

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Thu, 22 Mar 2012 00:54:00 +0000

Sometimes you have a bunch of ingredients laying around, and have no idea what you can make with them. I had some potatoes, carrots and onions laying around that needed to be used up quickly. (I didn't feel like making gnocchi again!) I found a can of coconut milk in my pantry and the idea of curry started forming.

Ingredients

1, 13.5 oz can coconut milk
1 cup water
1 chicken bullion cube
some chopped baby carrots, chopped
2 russet potatoes (pealed and chopped)
1/3 sweet onion, diced
1 chicken breaste, cubed
8 shrimp
+3 Tblsp brown sugar
20oz can of pineapple (drained)
8 tsp curry powder.

Instructions

Combine milk, water and spices with potatos, carrots and bring to a summer. Cook for 5-10 minutes until the veggies soften. (covered)
Add onions, chicken, shrimp and pineapple chunks and simmer covered, stirring occasionally until the meats are cooked
remove from heat, serve over rice.

Initially when I tasted the curry, I felt there was something missing. There was something different from what I've had in similar curries at restaurants . I finally realized... SUGAR! The little bit of brown sugar listed in the ingredients brought this curry from ordinary to extraordinary!

Matzah ball soup

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Wed, 14 Mar 2012 23:25:00 +0000

I have a huge backlog of pictures and recipes that I need to write up and post. For now, I thought I would share a delicious picture of some matzah ball soup.

I made the chicken soup from scratch. I don't know what normally possesses me to make two chicken soups, but I like to have a lot to put in the freezer. I added some rosemary and thyme to the soup base and it gave a nice fragrant twist.

Hopefully I will be able to be back with regular ChemEats posts in the near future.

7 Layer Taco Dip

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Wed, 22 Feb 2012 14:59:00 +0000

Everyone loves my Taco dip, but I'm not sure that it's actually 7 layers. It is a great way to prepare for any party, because you can make the dip the morning of, and then stick it into the oven once guests arrive. This way, they are guaranteed to enjoy a warm, melted, delicious taco dip!

Ingredients

1 package taco seasoning
1- 16oz can refried beans
1 - 8 oz cream cheese
1- 16oz sour cream (use half)
1 jar salsa
1 bunch green onions
1 can black olives
Shredded cheddar cheese (lots)
Avocados
lime (for garnish if making guacamole)

Layers:
1) mix beans with taco seasoning

2) Sour cream and cream cheese (blended)

3) Guacamole (or in this case sliced avocado)

4) black olives

5) green onions

6) salsa

7)cheese

Bake at 350 degrees F for 30 min (or until cheese is melted), serve and be happy. Make sure you enjoy some of the dip quickly, because it won't last long!

Pasta Time

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Fri, 17 Feb 2012 00:36:00 +0000

What do you do when you have extra heavy cream in the fridge that you want to use up? Why turn it into a creamy tomato sauce! I use pasta dishes as an excuse to use up ingredients in the fridge.

This time, I used 4 Trader Joe's Pesto Sausages, half of a sweet onion and 1 green bell pepper. I sauteed them with some olive oil and then added 6 ounces of tomato paste and some heavy cream until I get the consistency I want.

It is funny that the pasta of this dish is the least important part!

Pizza Pie

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 04:30:00 +0000

What is the secret to good bread machine pizza dough? Well it is adding garlic powder and other spices to the dough. This way, the dough has some good flavor if it is too thick in places on the pie. A 2lb loaf creates enough dough for 2 - 13 inch crusts.

I baked the crust in an oven prheated to 400 degrees F before adding the toppings. This time I used mozzarella cheese, tomato sauce and caramelized onions. (Most of the time I add raw onions and peppers.) Making pizza is so easy and simple, that I try to always keep some dough in the fridge for a last minute meal.

The pizza was baked until the cheese started to bubble, about 10 minutes. Let it cool and then enjoy a yummy, yummy pizza!

Indy's Sick Day

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Thu, 02 Feb 2012 17:18:00 +0000

Last fall, Indy (our American Eskimo puppy at 4 months old) got really sick (*cough* digestively.) The vet told us to keep him on a bland diet of boiled rice and chicken with no salt or oil. Enter the rice cooker + 3.5 cups rice + 7 cups water + 2 chopped up chicken breasts = Indy's food for the weekend.

I knew there is no butter or spices in the mix, but it smelled AMAZING. Even I wanted to eat it!

Indy was particularly excited when he smelled this food. (He also had not had anything to eat for a while that day.)

I think that Indy liked this bland dinner more than his standard kibble... Despite being sick, he was a very happy boy at mealtimes.

Since this bout with illness, Indy has been very healthy. And I have learned a good trick to temperarly help with digestive issues... canned pumpkin!

Margaritas

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Sun, 29 Jan 2012 01:15:00 +0000

Fresh lime juice is the best when you want fresh margaritas, but sometimes you just cannot get your hands on that many limes! In a pinch, here is a recipe that I like to use for Margaritas:

1 can of frozen Minute Maid Limeade
3 cans of water
200 mL of tequila (~1 cup)
100 mL of tripplesec (~1/2 cup)

And voilà, a yummy pitcher of margaritas.

Gnocchi for Six

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Mon, 23 Jan 2012 03:38:00 +0000

Handmade gnocchi is a lot of fun to make, but I am always afraid of it clumping during boiling. (I had one disastrous experiment when I tried a variation of my recipe and I ended up with a mashed mush.) I wanted to make gnocchi with my Pals so I doubled the normal standard recipe, keeping my fingers crossed that I would be able to fit them all in one pot.

To set the stage for dinner, I steamed broccoli and placed it in the bowls. Cream and broccoli go so well together, don't they?

Before dropping the gnocchi in the water, I set up the creamy pesto sauce (discussed in the previous post) to simmer. I put the dumplings directly in the sauce after they floated so that way they would not stick together.

I was so lucky that there was no clumping! It was a bit stressful dropping so many gnocchi into the pot at once (trying not to compress them as I put them into the water) but it ended up even better than I could have hoped.

With any yummy sauce, you need to have some bread to wipe up what is left! I whipped up some bread machine pizza dough and twisted them into breadsticks. The dough was brushed with olive oil and sprinkled with garlic salt before baking.

I am very lucky to have great friends to share wonderful food with. Especially when those friends decide to come out to Evanston to visit. Anyone else want to come to dinner? :)

Pesto

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Sun, 15 Jan 2012 15:30:00 +0000

Growing up, I was not a huge fan of pesto. Keith has always loved it, and after meeting him my appreciation grew. We frequently have gnocchi in a creamy pesto sauce, but the best I had ever had was from our cooking class where everything was made fresh. Since we were going to have friends come to town, I thought it would be fun to make gnocchi from scratch with creamy pesto sauce, but I wanted to pre-make the pesto.

This a nut free pesto since one of our friends has an allergy. It contained:

4 cups fresh basil leaves
1 cup freshly grated parmesan cheese
6 teaspoons minced garlic
1.5 cup olive oil

Of course we had to test the sauce out to make sure it would be suitable for company. I heated the pesto up in a 1:1 ratio with heavy cream and served on pasta with fresh grated parmesan cheese.

Fauxagna

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Sun, 08 Jan 2012 23:46:00 +0000

It is no secret that Keith and I really like Lasagna. It is easy, fun to make, and there are plenty of leftovers. Now that I have a pasta press, it seems silly to me to purchase dry lasagna noodles (I still have to write up my post on my first lasagna from scratch.) Instead, I decided to make a faux lasagna with layers of pasta.

I love caramelized onions, and putting some into baked pasta dishes gives them a wonderful sweet twist. In the pictures above, I am caramelizing two whole onions because I wanted to save some for another dish I would make later this week. I wish that I had used a little less butter, not because of taste but because of health and there was plenty of liquid.

Keith loves garlic bread, and sometimes I'll make it from scratch. Today, I decided to just make some fresh bread to dip in the leftover tomato sauce.

The Francesco Rinaldi Chunky Garden tomato sauce is my favorite. I have no idea why I love it so much, but it really holds up well with a lot of cheese, so it is perfect for baked pasta dishes.

I cooked the pasta for 8 minutes, not the 10-12 recommended on the package because I knew it would cook more in the oven. I layered sauce, noodles and the cheeses. I used whole milk ricotta cheese (yes, I am bad), shredded mozzarella, and some spices.

The caramelized onions were sprinkled on top under the final layer of mozzarella. I only cooked it at 350 for 10-15 minutes since I just wanted to warm things up and let the cheeses melt.

I think the fauxagna was a complete success. Keith had 3 helpings!

My Favorite Wine

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Mon, 26 Dec 2011 12:02:00 +0000

I haven't posted in a while, not because I haven't been cooking but because I haven't had the time to write up the posts. ChemEats will come back in force in 2012.

I am just going to quickly share some photos of my newest favorite wine: Opala Vinho Verde. I don't know much about this wine, except it appears clear in the slightly green tinted bottle. This is a crisp, light and refreshing wine, perfect for a summer day. You can find this wine at Whole Foods.

RR Wine

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Sun, 20 Nov 2011 22:24:00 +0000

I was exploring the corner market of our new home, and I made a fantastic wine discovery: A bottle of wine that had the label "RR".... and it was purple! How could I not get this wine to try?

The wine was actually pretty good. The flavor was light, which I often prefer in reds. You never know what you're going to get when you choose wine strictly by the label, but I am thrilled that I went with my gut this time.

We paired it with a caramelized onion & turkey kielbasa pasta concoction.

Tequila lime shrimp

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Fri, 11 Nov 2011 16:11:00 +0000

I used to love to buy margaritaville's tequila lime shrimp, but it has been so expensive that it is worth trying to find a recipe I like myself. I found a recipe that I could modify to my purposes.

My Tequila Lime Shrimp Pasta Recipe

1/4 cup butter
8 Tblsp tequila
6 Tblsp Lime juice
3 tsp minced garlic
Frozen, pealed shrimp
Cayanne pepper to taste
1 box pasta
1 cup frozen peas

Instructions

Boil some lightly salted water (for the pasta.) Drop the pasta and cook according to the manufacturer's directions.
Saute the garlic in the butter for 1-2 min, then add the tequila and lime juice.
Once the sauce is simmering, add the frozen shrimp until they are cooked through (completely pink and curled up.) If the sauce isn't thick enough, then remove the shrimp and keep reducing the sauce.
Drain Pasta (don't rinse) and combine with frozen peas, stirring thoroughly.
Pour sauce and shrimp over the pasta and mix.
Enjoy your yummy pasta dish!

Talapia

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Tue, 08 Nov 2011 22:23:00 +0000

Whole Foods date nights are a lot of fun. Rather than going to a restaurant, we'll go to a nice market and pick up ingredients that are a little pricier than we may choose normally. We found a coconut lime marinade, decided to pair it with some talapia.

We marinated the fish in the fridge for one hour and then lightly sprinkled it with plain bread crumbs. . We baked it at 400 degrees for 13 minutes

The fish was light creamy and yummy. We still have plenty of the marinade for more dinners. We served the fish over some plain white rice and with a small salad. What a yummy date night!

Pasta Medley - Yum!

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Thu, 03 Nov 2011 16:07:00 +0000

I had a bit of a dilemma when it came time for dinner. I had a lot of different kinds of pasta, but none of them were enough to make a complete meal. I therefore decided to combine a bunch and make a pasta medley.

The sauce had some stir fried kilbasa sausage, peas and tomato sauce.

I got really excited about this meal, and decided to take advantage of some more leftovers I had laying around. I had some homemade pizza dough in my fridge, but there wasn't enough for a pizza big enough for both me and Keith. (I had considered making an individual pizza for lunch, but had never gotten around to it.) I shaped the dough into stitcks, brushed them with olive oil and then sprinkled them with garlic salt.

I baked these breadsticks at 350 until they were solid (around 10 min). This meal that was just thrown together ended up being quite amazing! I will definitely make these breadsticks again.

Homemade gnocchi

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Sat, 29 Oct 2011 17:56:00 +0000

It was time for me to try making homemade gnocchi all by myself. I started with 1lb 9oz of russet potatoes and boiled them until they were soft (30 min).

After they were pealed and put through the ricer, I had 1 lb of potatos to work with for the dough.

It really does look like rice!

For the dough I used 1 lb of the riced potatoes, 2.5 oz flour, 2 tsp salt and 1 egg. This ended up being fairly salty, so the sauce didn't need any additional salt.

I still don't have a gnocchi board, so I scored them with the back of a fork.

I'm not sure the scoring made a huge difference, but it was easy enough to finish rolling out the entire batch of dough.

I wanted to make the gnocchi so badly that I hadn't given much thought to the sauce. I like to use a creamy pesto mix for gnocchi, but I couldn't bring myself to use a packaged sauce on my first batch of homemade gnocchi. I therefore whipped up a simple browned butter sauce.

I thought the packaged gnocchi I bought from Trader Joe's cooked up fast... but man these started floating almost as soon as I had them in the pot! I put them in a bowl to toss with the sauce, but the gnocchi were so soft that some of them got a bit squished. Next time, I'll either put them directly in the pan with the sauce or directly into the serving bowl.

Needless to say, Keith was very excited to come home for dinner. The whole process is so yummy, I know I will be making gnocchi a lot. Soon I'll have to try out some variations and see how well they keep frozen.

Croutons

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Wed, 26 Oct 2011 01:33:00 +0000

What do you do with stale bread? Well I decided to take advantage of my French Bread ends that were hard as a rock by turning them into croutons.

I chopped up the end of a stale loaf of French bread, drizzled them with olive oil and then sprinkled on garlic salt and oregano. Apparently I should have brushed the sides with oil first before cutting, since tossing the bread in oil didn't work as well as I had expected (it wasn't very even.)

I put the bread pieces in the oven at 400 degrees (F) until they started to brown. Voila! Simple and fast croutons... what an easy salad solution.

The croutons, just out of the oven.

My salad.

Beef with broccoli

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Sat, 22 Oct 2011 18:26:00 +0000

I picked up this beef and broccoli mix at the supermarket, and decided it would be a nice variation to my standard teriyaki beef stir fry.

I chopped up some stake and stir fried it with onions. I added some defrosted broccoli towards the end (so the broccoli would not get soggy.)

I was expecting the sauce to be a brown sauce like you would find at a restaurant. Instead, it is a clearer sauce. It would be really amazing with shrimp. I will definitely use it again.

Omelette

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Tue, 18 Oct 2011 23:58:00 +0000

I had some heirloom tomatoes and an avocado that needed to be used up fast. Sounds like a yummy omelet to me!

I was really hungry, so I used 3 eggs in this omelet. This was so fresh and vibrant that I had to share it, no matter how simple it is!

I smothered the omelet in salsa, and then had an amazing lunch.

Chicken Parmesan

noreply@blogger.com (ChemKnits) — Sun, 16 Oct 2011 02:06:00 +0000

I am thrilled to finally own a meat tenderizer! I'm ready to pound some chicken for the first time to make Chicken Parmesan.

I pounded the chicken breasts inside ziplock bags (where they had defrosted). The breast on the left has been pounded about 1/4 inch thin, the breast on the right is unaltered.

I pan fried the chicken breasts for ~5 minutes on each side.

Our pans are VERY non-stick, so we only needed the tiniest amount of oil.

Our griddle pan hadn't arrived in the mail yet, so I had to use two different pans to cook dinner. Thank goodness these pans are dishwasher safe!

What Italian meal would be complete without garlic bread? I had this in the oven to crisp as the chicken was cooking on the stovetop.

After I put the mozarella cheese on top, I stuck the pans directly in the oven at 300 degrees for a min so the cheese would melt.

This meal was so fast and easy to prepare. I cannot see myself ever using pre-breaded chicken again!