Whew! We Made It!

It’s been one heck of a year here at Authors Kitchen!  Along with all the food triumphs and failures, there’s been all kinds of other drama.  I made a cross country move, dodged tornadoes, survived a massive heat wave, and learned how to cook in a hotel.  Seeley had to survive her own heat wave up north… with no air conditioning and she was driven to the brink of insanity by calculus.  In spite of it all, it’s been great food and great fun.  So, with the year coming to an end, we decided to take a trip down 2011 memory lane.

As I mentioned before, there have been successes,

And there have been failures.

I’ll be sure to cover them both.  The first thing I asked Seeley was, “What’s your favorite close up shot?”  For me, the answer was easy.  Macaroni and Cheese.

I mean, that picture still makes me salivate, just looking at it.  Apparently Seeley had a hard time narrowing it down to just one.

Pistachios in the yazdi cakes post? Cheese melting on my chili? The taco filling post. The drop of orange glaze dripping down below the rack on the creamsicle cookies. The cheese rolled up in the biscuit dough on the biscuits and gravy post. Um, I like the extreme close up food porn pics

Since the pistachios were a close second to the mac n’ cheese, I took the liberty of choosing that one for her. 

Seeley had a much easier time choosing when I asked, “What was the best action shot?” 

Has to be my tiny perfectly round droplet of oil in the roasted garlic post.

Or your egg on its way into the cheesecake; perfect fucking balance.

Well, at least she got it down to two.  As it happens, the egg yolk was my choice, as well.  I have to give honorable mention to this one, though, since I even mentioned the little happy dance I did in the Snack Mix post. 

“What’s your choice for worst picture?” 

I think it’s definitely this one.  It’s a sad, sad day when you have to resort to salt and pepper from packets to put in your breakfast.  Boy am I glad to be done with hotel living. 

Seeley, on the other hand… My epic pile o dishes in the stupid mug cake post. I bitch about dishes a lot. I work my recipes around how many dirty dishes I feel like making. Nearly all of my posts include the "dirty dishes will be the death of me" tag. Fucking dishes.     

“What are your 2 favorite Taneasha recipes?”

Mint Limeade; two of my favourite flavours and I love seeing that fucking juicer. omg the juicer.

And the baked beans. They're really baked!

My first favorite Seeley recipe is her green chili.  Hubby and I both loved that stuff. 

And the second one has to be the crepes.  OMG!  I have made those at least three times and they are freaking amazing! 

There were two categories where the winner was chosen unanimously.  The first was for most creative recipe.  I hate to toot my own horn, but I have to agree with Seeley that the award has to go to my Colorful Cookies, made with no artificial colors.  The best part is… they were amazingly tasty, as well. 

The other decision we agreed on was for biggest failure.  I mean, there was really no competition.  That award definitely goes to Seeley’s mug cake.  Sadly, it wasn’t even really a failure.  It turned out just the way it’s supposed to, but… well in this case, a picture really is worth a thousand words. 

Next up, most pornographic picture.

So perhaps I went the obvious route by choosing one with a pickle in it, but really…

Seeley was a bit more creative (and crass) with her choice.  

Pic that looks most like a c*** (lady part): last pic in my raspberry crepe post (tilt your head to the right). 

When I asked Seeley which post she had the most fun making, she chose a post that I think deserves multiple awards. Mint Chocolate Chip Ice Cream. 

Recipe Guy and I had just figured out that in all the time we'd known each other, we never talked about our favourite ice cream flavour. And so of course as soon as we figured out it was mint chip for both of us, we had to make it. That screaming ancient ice cream maker on the porch at 11 pm on a Monday night in Texas; we were risking getting shot, we knew it, but as Southern Momma said "fuck 'em, I want ice cream." Writing the post was hell though because of the Mayhem missing auto save. But. There were toads. And toads are cute.

I think it wins for most surprising outcome, considering everything.  I mean, the post has pictures like this,

And this,

And yet, in the end, she ended up with amazing looking ice cream.  Now, I haven’t counted, but I’m pretty sure this post also wins for most use of the word fuck. 

For me, I couldn’t decided which was the most fun to make.  It was a tie between the Strawberry Lemonade Bars, which were amazingly beautiful,

And the Peanut Butter Twigs.  It was basically making my favorite candy bars in my own kitchen.  How fun is that?

“Which recipe was the biggest surprise?”

I have to go with Ice Tea Granita.  It’s the one I have made more than anything else on here.  When I had told Hubby about my idea to make it, he thought it would be lame, and now it’s his favoritest treat in the world. 

And for Seeley, Hooker noodles. I actually made a pasta dinner in 20 minutes. I'm as amazing as a prostitute!

Now, last but not least, I wanted to share what our favorite sweet and favorite savory recipes were.  I’ll start with the savory because you have to save sweet for last, right?

Seeley's choice for savory?  The epicness of the epic sammich of epicness. (aka muffaletta).

She might be right.  That is a pretty amazing sandwich.  I had to go with something hot and baked, though.  Bubbly cheese is pretty much a prerequisite, so I chose Tacos in Pasta Shells.

On the sweet side, Seeley and I both decided on a cookie.  She picked one of hers, though, and I one of mine.  Perhaps we still have a bit of a bias when it comes to our own cooking. 

Black Forest Cookies. Those were a fuck tonne (a metric one even) of work though. Most people consider cookies to be simple things. They can go screw themselves because these ones take effort and you can totally taste it. If you want to impress someone with dessert, this is it.

I, on the other hand, had to go with my cookies with ganache for dipping.  Seriously, I don’t see how I’ll ever top that. 

I hope you enjoyed our stories of sugar and spice for 2011, and that it’s been as much fun to follow our crazy adventures as it has been to create them. 

Be sure to let us know what you’d like to see us make in the coming year.  Don’t hesitate to ask, we’re up to just about any challenge.  And feel free to join in the year end fun and vote for your favorites in any of our many categories. 

Happy New Year!!

Got Leftover Turkey? Put it in a Pie!

Since Angel was the winner of our Black Friday contest, we decided to give her a little bonus, and make the two dishes she requested.  I’m starting off with turkey pot pie.  I mean, who doesn’t have leftover turkey right now?  And with the cold weather, what’s better than a hot, baked meal? 

Here’s what you’ll need:

For the crust:
2 ½ cups flour
12 Tablespoons (1 ½ sticks) butter
¼ teaspoon salt
1 Tablespoon corn starch
½ teaspoon baking powder
6-10 Tablespoons ice water

For the filling:
2 cups-ish diced turkey (or chicken)
1 medium carrot
2-3 celery stalks
1 leek
¼ cup frozen peas
2-3 garlic cloves
1 Tablespoon fresh parsley
2 cups chicken milk (huh?)
¼ cup (1/2 stick) butter
¼ cup flour
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon pepper

So, the first thing you’ll need to do is make the crust.  It needs to chill for at least an hour before you can roll it out.  I made it the night before.  So, I have a confession.  I’ve never actually made a pie crust.  A crumb crust, sure.  A shortbread crust, of course.  But a fat and flour, rolled out crust, nope.  Sad, I know, but the pie crust horror stories have always scared me away.  Well, this time I decided I was going all in.  So, if you’ve never made a crust, you can learn along with me.  First, whisk together your dry ingredients.

Next, cut your cold butter into little cubes. 

Now comes the hard part, unless you have a food processor, which I don’t.  I haven’t yet bought a pastry blender, either, so I decided to go with the ‘two knives’ method of cutting in. 

Yeah, that was a mistake, but my mom said that’s how she used to do it.  I even watched a youtube video that made it look easy enough.  Pfft... yeah right!  Basically, you just cross two butter knives in a cutting motion.  When my arms started getting tired, I thought maybe putting a damp towel under the bowl would help with the process. 

Well, it did help to keep the bowl still, but I needed more help than that.  When my arms were about to fall off, and the mixture looked like this…

I decided to just dive in with my fingers and rub the flour in.  I know, I know, touching the butter will warm it up and make the crust tough… whatever.  In no time the mixture was ready.  Don't get me wrong, I'm not suggesting you should use this method.  I'm suggesting, if you don't have a food processor, you should definitely get a pastry blender.  I had one before the move, and I'm sure it was less than $10.  Anyway, the mixture should be sort of crumbly, and the butter should be pea sized, or thereabouts. 

Now it’s time for the water.  It should be ice cold.  Add it 1 Tablespoon at a time, and sort of just fold it in. 

You’re looking for a consistency about like this.

I know it looks dry, but you’ll know it’s ready if you can squeeze a handful of it and it stays together.

Divide the dough in half and form two discs, then place them inside ziplock bags.  Place them in the fridge for an hour, or overnight. 

When you’re ready, start chopping your veggies for the filling.  I assume you can figure out how to dice the carrot and celery and mince the garlic, but a lot of people don’t often use leeks.  Leeks are basically like giant green onions.  They have lots of layers.  Dirt like’s to find its way between them, see?

Cut the leek into quarters, about ¾ of the way up the stalk.  Leave the green part whole to keep everything together, then run water between all of the layers to get out any sand or dirt.  See, nice and clean. 

Then just chop it up.  You’ll only want to use the white and light green parts. 

Heat a tablespoon of olive oil in a pan, and dump in the veg minus garlic. 

Sprinkle over ½ teaspoon of salt, stir and cook over medium heat.  When the veggies are nice and sweaty, add the garlic.

Yes, there are little specks of green in my garlic.  My cloves had little sprouts starting, but no problem.  I’ve never noticed any difference in the flavor.  Continue to cook the mixture until most of the moisture has cooked off, then add the frozen peas, turkey, and parsley. 

Stir them together for just a minute, then put them in a bowl and set them aside.  Time for the sauce.  Remember that ½ stick of butter you have left from making the pie crust?  Here’s where it goes.  Throw it into the pan and allow it to melt completely.

Sprinkle over ¼ cup of flour. 

Stir that in and continue stirring while it cooks for about 3 minutes.  Now is also a good time to add the rest of the salt, and a good sprinkling of pepper. 

Now is where you should add the chicken milk.  That just sounds wrong.  I used 1 cup of chicken stock and 1 cup of milk, but you can use any ratio of those you’d like, just so it come out to 2 cups of liquid.  I said ‘should’ because, if your brain is out to lunch like mine was, you’ll just dump in the vegetable mixture, instead of the liquid. 

Oh well, no big deal.  Either way, just pour in the chicken milk and stir until it comes to a boil.  In the end, you should end up with a vegetable and sauce mixture that is nice and thick. 

Now’s probably a good time to preheat your oven to 375°.  Then pull your first piece of dough out and place it on a well floured surface.  Sprinkle flour over the dough, as well.

Now, if I had made a pie crust before, I probably would have pulled it out of the fridge for about 10 minutes before I started to roll it out.  It ended up, well… 

Yeah, I know, it’s a wreck.  But even if yours looks like this, I promise it will be ok in the end.  Just roll it onto your rolling pin so you can transfer it to the pie plate. 

There, you can patch any cracks and make whatever repairs are necessary.  Surprisingly, mine actually worked out fairly well once it was placed in the pan.  Be careful not to stretch the dough when you shape it to the pan.  Supposedly that will make it shrink when it’s cooked.  Now, roll out your second piece of dough. 

See, a few minutes to warm up just a bit, was definitely a good plan.  This one is much more acceptable.  So, when that’s ready, pour your filling into the bottom pie crust. 

Roll your second pie crust around the rolling pin like you did the first, and place it carefully on top of the pie. 

If you have lots of excess in places, you can trim it a bit with scissors. 

Then just press both layers together and fold them under. 

I then went around the edge and did a crimp kind of thing.  Not entirely necessary, but I was really trying to make up for that first crust disaster.

Make a few slits in the top for steam to escape.

Then onto a sheet pan and into the oven.  Bake at 375° for 45 – 60 minutes, or until the crust is just starting to brown. 

I’m thinking brushing the crust with melted butter, milk, or egg wash would have made it brown better, but you know, hind sight and all that.  Besides, I think it looks pretty good for a first attempt.  Now, your house is going to be smelling really good, and it’ll be hard, but you must let the pie rest for at least 10 minutes before cutting it.

I’ll be honest, I was beginning to wonder if all that work was really worth it.  But then I took a bite.  Oh my.  Never have I had any pot pie that was so delicious.  The crust was flaky, but sturdy enough to stand up to a savory pie, the turkey was moist and tender, and the vegetables were cooked to perfection.  And that sauce… I’m salivating just thinking about it now.  Absolutely to die for. 

So there you go, Angel.  Turkey pot pie, just for you!  I hope it meets your expectations.