Today was my last Christmas present: Henry's parents gave he and I tickets to a wine and chocolate class. I was pretty nervous to go to this particular one; although I usually love the wine classes I take at the Cooks of Crocus Hill, this particular class was at the Lakeville Arts Center and I learned that my boss and his wife frequently attend their wine classes. To add to the complications, one of my least favorite (and my boss' most favored) projects is running a nonprofit. His most recent project for me was to arrange a fundraising wine tasting through the Lakeville Art Center, so I was dreading the possibility of my entire Christmas present evening being consumed with discussions with my boss about a project that regularly destroys my work ethic and morale. Luckily, they picked today as the day to skip and so I happily ate far too much chocolate and drank a few too many glasses of wine.
I primarily learned two things in this class: first of all, I really like port wine. I've never tried it before, and to be perfectly honest next time I try it (when I haven't already tried 4-5 glasses of wine) it may be less delicious, but it was something completely different and pretty darn good. We tried a few different varieties, one from Australia and 3 from Portugual, and in the end Henry won us a bottle of my favorite type! Secondly, I learned that there is a fantastic chocolate shop in Burnsville. After trying a few types of truffles, I think my Valentine's Day plans are set: order a large box of chocolates (they have everything from French silk milk chocolate truffles to caramel s'more candy) and drink my new bottle of port!
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Sunday, February 6, 2011
Food experiments: Attempting a heart attack
All week, I was doing a good job of eating healthy and exercising. This weekend, I took a flying leap off the bandwagon in some pretty darn unhealthy experiments.
For starters, Henry's friend sold us a deep fryer at a deep discount on the condition that he was allowed to come and eat some of the food we made with it. Saturday night's dinner was made up entirely of deep fried experiments, from trying to create the perfect onion ring to succeeding in making fair-quality cheese curds. Topping that off with a full yellow pepper may have added a few nutrients, but I'm pretty sure there wasn't much I could do to redeem the day.
Today was worse. Deep-frying experiments finished, we hauled the deep fryer to the superbowl party and threw in everything from cheese curds and onion rings to jalapeno poppers, mozzerella sticks and fried chicken. On top of that, my planned experiment for the week was Chicago-style deep dish pizza.
I found a great blog entry detailing how to make Chicago-style deep dish pizza, which I have to say I was pretty impressed with. I used about a pound and a half of mozzerella and colby jack cheese, a bunch of canadian bacon, a red pepper, a bunch of onion and tomato. I also made my own sauce and crust. The weak point of the pizza was by far the crust, which was a little soggy and didn't rise nearly as much as I think it should have. The homemade sauce and the toppings were pretty good, though, and with a little tweaking I'm hopful for the crust! (Picture will be following as soon as I can manage to get it off my phone!)
For starters, Henry's friend sold us a deep fryer at a deep discount on the condition that he was allowed to come and eat some of the food we made with it. Saturday night's dinner was made up entirely of deep fried experiments, from trying to create the perfect onion ring to succeeding in making fair-quality cheese curds. Topping that off with a full yellow pepper may have added a few nutrients, but I'm pretty sure there wasn't much I could do to redeem the day.
Today was worse. Deep-frying experiments finished, we hauled the deep fryer to the superbowl party and threw in everything from cheese curds and onion rings to jalapeno poppers, mozzerella sticks and fried chicken. On top of that, my planned experiment for the week was Chicago-style deep dish pizza.
I found a great blog entry detailing how to make Chicago-style deep dish pizza, which I have to say I was pretty impressed with. I used about a pound and a half of mozzerella and colby jack cheese, a bunch of canadian bacon, a red pepper, a bunch of onion and tomato. I also made my own sauce and crust. The weak point of the pizza was by far the crust, which was a little soggy and didn't rise nearly as much as I think it should have. The homemade sauce and the toppings were pretty good, though, and with a little tweaking I'm hopful for the crust! (Picture will be following as soon as I can manage to get it off my phone!)
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