Top Five Destinations For Wine Aficionados

Overnight Coffee Cake

Converse Sneakers Cake

Homemade Cheese Crackers

Chocolatey Rum Bread Pudding

Julia Child’s Master Crêpe Recipe

Hello, friends! We have some announcements to make:

1. Our February-March 2010 Newsletter is out! Subscribe here to get it in your mailbox, or view past issues.

February-March Issue

2) Remember those red maple leaf mitts during the Olympics?  We’re giving away a pair of medium ones!

3) Finally, the sequel to the Secret Santa Food exchange last December: Tête-à-Tea: An Online Tea Exchange Party

Come join us for tea!

4) We have a Facebook Page now, too. We hope you’ll join us there!

5. And lastly: we are switching to partial feeds for the recipe posts. We’re doing this for two reasons: 1) To prevent content theft; and 2) To shorten the main page with the long posts. The new RSS feed format will let you read the bulk of the each post. What is behind the ‘cut’ is the recipe. Those who want to read and download the recipe can do so by clicking the Read More link. We’ve had this system on our first year, and it worked quite well. I’m still working on a way so that the continuation will appear on the same page and not bring you to another, so it will be a win-win situation.

I know some people will only subscribe to feeds that offer full RSS feed, and we respect that. We hope that you understand our reasons behind this change and really wish that you will reconsider. We’d love to keep you. :)

Slow roasting at low temperatures is the best way to tame a not-so-tender cut of beef. The chuck is the best ‘cheaper’ cut for this recipe, but I’ve tested it even on a bottom round cut roast and achieved great results. So have some good, homemade roast beef any day of the week without blowing your budget!

Busy weekend here. I’ve some spillover work, and Gourmeted-related things to finish (aka The Newsletter), plus I’m helping out a friend with her wedding invitations. You’ll know just how busy I am just by the scarcity of my tweets.

Before I disappear into the haze, I’d like to leave you with this must-keep-on-hand recipe for slow-roasted beef. Pick up some beef and get cooking!

It tasted even better than it looks. It was so juicy and yummy!

Have a great weekend!

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I’ve been participating in, and hosting, snail mail exchanges online since 2001. Last December, we had the Secret Santa Foodie, where everybody got together to spread some holiday cheer. I ‘met’ a lot of new people, including Adrienne Mitra, who owns a travel agency with her husband. What’s so interesting is that they offer fully-customized culinary travel tours. Food and travel — what’s not to love? It’s impossible to have someone you know at every travel destination, who can point you to to the good eats or the best classes where you can learn to cook the regional fare. Guidebooks can only take you so far and it’s rare to have an unlimited vacation time to figure everything out. That’s where they come in. Travel runs through Adrienne’s veins and she loves good food. She is passionate about helping people plan their vacation according to how they want it, and not according to set “packages” (that term makes her cringe). And if there’s one thing I can attest to about Adrienne, she gets things done and she is on top of things — okay, that’s two! After talking and emailing with her, teaming up with them just seemed like an organic thing to do. So I’m very happy to introduce Celebrations International Travel to you guys! Please join us in welcoming them! Check out their site and their blog. You will learn more about them in the coming weeks and months. I’ll be inviting Adrienne to do a guest post about their culinary tours.

This is right up our alley, don’t you think? As the busy travel and vacation season begins, and as some of us scramble to make plans for the rest of the year (ahem, Me!), I can’t wait to find out what they have in store!

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Now onto the recipe!

MMM…pizza! Whether it be for any meal (yes, even breakfast — admit it!), a casual get-together or game night, the beloved pizza is welcome in our homes and in our bellies. Of course, there’s the debate about which is better: deep-dish or thin crust pizza, but we’ll leave that alone. For now, I’ll talk about my kind of pizza: thin, light, and beautifully blistered pizzas. You heard me: blistered. I get excited over the perfect thin crust!

We’ve been to the much-talked about Pizzeria Bianco in Phoenix, and my love for that pizza is right up there with Itzhak Perlman — that’s a high pedestal. The long line to get into the main restaurant is something I’d rather forget, though.

The following crust is no Pizzeria Bianco, and I can’t say it tastes the same as the A16 restaurant’s pizza (I haven’t eaten there), but one thing is for sure, this dough has earned top place among the pizza dough recipes I’ve tried.

Being at the top means there are also no compromises, especially when it comes to time. The A16 Neapolitan pizza dough takes the most number of days to make: three, realistically. But you can definitely make it in two if you plan ahead after reading the recipe. Raise your hand if you sometimes don’t carefully read the recipe before deciding to make it. Who does that? Hah.

I don’t have more “after” photos because I was busy stretching the pizza, filling it, transferring it to to oven, and preparing the next pie while that cooks for 7 minutes. Whew. I ran a tight ship and by the time I finished rolling out 4 pizzas, I just had enough to eat and hunger beat food porn. Plus, it’s something that can wait to be eaten. It was incredibly satisfying and even with all the work and wait involved, this is worth making again and again!

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“I love you more than rainbows.” – Ryan Bingham (best original song, Crazy Heart) When I heard that, I went “AWWW”. How cute was that speech at the Oscar’s?! [I'm a total sap!] I’m watching it as I type, can you tell?

This (raw) fudge cake might just be more lovable than those colorful arches.

Strawberry Ganache Fudge Cake: the indulgent-tasting cake that looks good and makes you feel good

The oh-so-decadent-looking ganache–would you believe me when I say it’s made of dates, agave syrup, avocado, and cacao powder? Grins. No, it’s not April Fool’s Day yet. This total eye candy is good for you!

In the beginning I wasn’t sure it would be as good as Elle said it would. It’s not that I don’t trust her, or Ani Phyo (the cookbook author). It’s just that the ingredient combination was a bit foreign to me. Really? Avocado?! I grew up eating avocados as dessert topped with powdered milk and sugar, so the sweet part I got. But…with chocolate? You’re kidding!

My apprehension disappeared as soon as I prepared and tasted it. Oh…my…god!

Raw ganache: the stuff of raw dessert heaven!

This chocolate frosting is UNreal in flavor. Wow. You wouldn’t think it has avocado in it. It is as good-no even better-than it looks.

Each cake layer is made of ground walnuts, cacao powder, medjool dates and salt. The major challenge for me when I made this was shaping the cake into 2 stackable layers. My smallest springform pan was 8 inches, and that produced a layer too thin to hold its shape. I ended up using a smaller-diameter fondue pot that I lined with aluminum foil tso I can easily pop out the layer once it’s compressed into a compact disc.

This is my low-tech solution to shaping the cake layers. It works.

I was eager to devour it after putting on the first layer of ganache, especially after tasting it with some leftover cake crumbs. I love eating tasting everything while making stuff.

First cake layer frosted with ganache

The original recipe called for fresh raspberries. I had strawberries at the time, so I sliced and macerated them in agave syrup for extra softness and moisture.

Mascerated sliced strawberries

After much fussing around with the frosting to make it look decent (I’m not good with icing at all), I had to wait 2 hours for the cake to firm up before cutting it.

A piece of chocolate heaven.

It was love at first bite. I know I say that about a lot of desserts, but wow, this was on its own level of chocolate goodness. If I was to make a list of 100 Things To Eat Before You Die, this will definitely make the cut. Ultra smooth and creamy ganache on two layers of nutty cakes and a soft layer of macerated strawberries in the middle – what could be better? It’s raw and it’s healthy for you, that’s what! This is pure indulgence without the guilt.

Don’t even entertain second thoughts, just make this now. This is pure indulgence without the guilt.

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