A Spice Hunt and Sweet Wood Syrup

Right now is that time of the year when I want to surround myself with the scent of spices and the taste of spices and the delightful rich liquor flavor of maple syrup. The last two days I have been experimenting with making my own chai masala, so far my favorite part is the use of fresh ginger. I admit fresh ginger has become an addiction for me in my cooking lately, I love the spicy crunch it offers to dishes, I love the versatility of it, melding perfectly with sweet, sour, savory, sour, and salty. My experimenting in chai masala has left me realizing that I need clove and loose leaf assam tea for the base. That I prefer my chai without fennel seed and that it must have cardamom, peppercorns, cinnamon, and of course ginger! Another interesting realization maple syrup is wonderful possibility to use as a sweetner for tea adding the wonderful resinous sweetness that can only be had from maple syrup. So the question is what are your favorite spices?

image provided by artnet.com

Image: Striped Cloth and Ginger Jar by George Van Hook

Gone so long and so happy to be back.

It feels like I have been gone forever, major reason for not posting: the crazy google blogger switch over, but which I have finally gained some power over. So much has happened in the last few months it is crazy, but here are a few tidbits:

On the food front:
-I finally started to work with yeast, and it was a bit of journey. First two times I used to dry active yeast I killed it accidentally with too hot of water.
-Trying Lobio for the first time (I got my excellent recipe from NPR.org)
-Making my first double layer cake (Nigella's Old Fashioned Chocolate Cake); I kept on wanting to call it my "piece de resistance" (sp?)

Perfume Front:
-I am a candle addict!
-I think the reality is my signature scent is Egyptian Musk.

Tea Front:
-I finally finished a box of tea (my Assam Golden Tip) and I am very close to finishing others.

Body Front:
- I finally lost enough weight to fit into my "tiny" pants again, woo hoo!

And above all school and work will always kick your ass when it comes down to energy!

Lead me by your scent...Saffron

Saffron and I have had a bizarre relationship my first taste of saffron was not one that wanted me to go back for more, in fact the dish I ordered with saffron was not eaten, and I had a kind enough waitress who did not charge me for it (I really only took one bite and realized that it was not for me). Yet, what lead me back to saffron was a fragrance, that fragrance was Agent Provocateur, from there on that fragrance has spurred a search for the perfect saffron fragrance so far I haven't found it. Although one of my fragrances has a nice accent of it, which is Omnia. Otherwise I keep searching for the perfect Saffron scent. After Agent Provocateur I was willing to give Saffron another chance in the culinary field.

Pain d'Epice

If Helen of Troy was Pain d'Epice I could clearly understand the launching of a thousand ships in her name by Greece, unfortunately what we do know of Helen of Troy was she was very beautiful woman, who was not a heavenly spice bread. I am right now eating the second of my two toasted slices of pain d'epice that came from a loaf that I made last night, it has butter and Vanilla Pear jelly on it, it literally feels like I am eating autumn in toast form. The mere act of toasting it this morning brought out its heavenly spicy scent that I would pay great deal of money for if I found it in a bottled fragrance form (Now imagine how gorgeous the house smelled yesterday when I baked this and brought it out of the oven). So how did I come about making French spice bread aka pain d'epice in the middle of August, well when I was around 12 I went to visit my mother's family in France and was treated to my grandmother getting my brother and I, "gingerbread". I remember at first I did not like it because it was nothing like molasses gingerbread of the US that I was use to, and for the particular fact that it used anise seed which I did not realize until now is one of th main flavoring components to pain d'epice, yet suddenly in this last week I had an incredible craving (of course it is around August that I always have a craving for autumn and winter foods). So I did some research...and found that in fact that it was very makeable and I wanted to make some now. This is the first Recipe so far that I have used but I am now finding that there quite a few that invovle rye flour and after buying a bag of rye flour for the disastrous Nigella Lawson Rarebit muffins I really want to use my flour and this looks like the perfect way. Even if you don't like anise seed you might like this because the anise plays a role but with the blending of spices it reaches a whole new role that is rarely seen in American cookery.

By the way I have always held that if heaven exists and it has a scent, it would smell like Frangelico Liquour, well I'm adding Pain d'Epice as another scent for heaven.

My Red Lentil Quest....

I am on a quest for a perfect red lentil recipe...so far this quest has been interesting but none have lead me to going that must be apart of my recipe collection, and here is the rundown of what I have gone through:
-Red Lentil and Squash Soup recipe can be found here Recipe
I imagine this recipe would be richer with the adding of Vegetable or Chicken broth but I have a feeling this defeats the purpose. Over all not bad but it just doesn't wow, still the use of spices was excellent, but definately needs more lemon. I found myself having to add hot sauce and a runny fried egg was excellent on top (which once again defeats the purpose). Overall it reminds of the wonders a little fat can do to a recipe which this recipe didn't have and I ended up adding in the form of an egg fried in olive oil. Still this recipe seems ripe for playing with and making something amazing with it. This also needs lots of salt.
-Next up Curiousity Killed The Cooks Lebanese Mdardara I finally got this one to kind've work but I have come to a conclusion that elevation must play a huge role in the porpotioning of water to lentils and rice, also it began to burn on the way and I had to switch pans, luckly saved mixture, the fried onions were excellent on top, but the amount of times this comes to near burning rice hell makes it a definate not remake. Plus I added way more cumin. Plus a little hot sauce on top of this is excellent (I'm seeing a hot sauce trend here and I firmly blame my boyfriend).
-And lastly my Jubilance Soup sure it has red lentils but I do not feel this show cases red lentils so it really doesn't belong.
The quest continues...........

A curse on my kitchen

Alright, so not necessarily a curse, but none this less feels slightly curse like. A few years ago I got an ice cream maker and sadly let it sit around for about without use, finally this year I got the gall to use it, I have made four things in it, and it just broke in the middle of making Minted Earl Grey sorbet, luckly the sorbet is done, but I am none the less in need now of a an ice-cream maker. So I'm on the prowl for one. As for things I have made the last few weeks
*Milk and Honey Lavender Sorbet which can be found here:
Milk and Honey Lavender sorbet
I brought this to a barbecue and served it with Lolliaberrys which had been macerating in framboise and sugar. Went over well.
*I made Zucchine and Chocolate's Strawberry Clafoutis, which can be found here:
Strawberry Clafoutis
Mine wasn't nearly as pretty because I used ground unblanched almond flour, but not the less this was delicious and incredibly comforting. A gentle dessert. Yum
*A disaster that happened:
Lebanese Mdardara
It sounded good, but somewhere along the line I didn't one of my worst burn disasters on the stove, this is second only to the time my popcorn caught on fire, or my disaster with over nachoes (these would have been fine if I hadn't forgotten about them). I think the measurements for this recipe may be wrong. I'm going to email Curiosity Killed The Cook and find out. Otherwise I love her blog.
*I'm trying my hand at Liquors with this:
sweet prserved lemons
I have the luck to have an extremely fecund lemond tree and have been wanting to try my hand at liquor making, this hopefully will be wonderful.
And that so far is what is going on.

Things I've Cooked and I like Brie

Well, no pictures in this post but quite a lot of info. So first up what I have cooked the last couple of days:

*Fava if you love split peas like I do then you must try this Greek dish. Cheap and delicious. Basically yellow split peas are added to a sautee of onions and olive oil and cooked to the point of a polenta like consistency. Delicious with capers and kalamata olives or spread on toast. And followed the following recipe: Fava Recipe with Eggplant Compote. I didn't have a red onion so used a golden onion and didn't bother with the Eggplant compote. None the less it was delicious.

*Once again I made Chocolate and Zucchine's Vanilla Pecan Bars for mother's day for Francisco's mom, Juana. I did an a little something different which was my dollope of homemade cajeta** and topped each dollop with a pecan.

*And yesterday I made my first recipe from The San Francisco Chronicle Cookbook Volume II, Arroz Caldo (Filipino Rice Porridge). Well I like the concept of it, but found that 3 tablespoons of fish sauce is too much for me and have decided I will go next time with the Chinese version congee which does not include fish sauce with keeps the wonderful biting quality of fresh ginger. Besides I suspect if ever made Arroz Caldo again I would be run out of the house by Dad because of the smell.

*And today I made Chocolate and Zucchine's Yogurt Cake. This is quite frankly delicious. I cannot wait for her to come out with her cookbook. One thing I did different with used dark rum instead because I don't have any light rum. Moist and fluffy. I definately want to experiment with it.

**Cajeta is "A thick, dark syrup or paste made from caramelized sugar and milk — traditionally goat's milk, although cow's milk is often used. Cajeta can be found in several flavors (primarily caramel and fruit) in Latin markets. It's used in Mexico and in some South American countries primarily as a dessert by itself or as a topping for ice cream or fruit." -Epicurious

And now on to the cheese:

Well, if you know me then you know of my bizarre relationship with cheese, I can eat a great deal of them melted, but if in raw form I become the pickiest creature ever, and this pickiness has made steer away from cheese. Yet, of late this steering away has slowly begun to veer towards cheese. So the other day I am Costco and see samples of Brie and I figure what the hey if I'm liking gorgonzola on my salad I might now be liking Brie. Well I was correct. I am now Brie fan; I even went so far this last Saturday while at Trader Joe's to buy a piece of triple creame Brie. It is gone now and I want some more. Yet, I have yet to get to point of liking to eat the rind.

For the love of cardamom

Well sometimes it takes awhile to truly fall in love with a spice and then it knocks you out and suddenly you are a crazed lunatic that uses it everything until everyone else around you is saying "Why is there cardamom in my chicken tetrazinni?!" (alright I have never done this but it is the sort've thing people will do when they meet a spice that well ... "spices up their life.") So in my many adventures to Cost Plus World Market* I went their spice section and randomly chose some whole green cardamom pods because I felt adventuress well a month later I still have the pods in my cupbard.

Raspberry Yogurt Cake

Well this is the first time showing one of my creations off...so here it is:

My Raspberry Yogurt Cake!

The up close and personel image

and now for the not so up close and personal image:

Well I was really rather proud of this last night considering it is the first cakes I have ever gone on a decoration spree with, I got the recipe over at Chocolate and Zucchini Gateau au yaourt a la framboise

And I made a few additions to it:

*Took her idea of slicing it in half, at which point I spread Trader Joe's Raspberry fruit spread mixed with about a table spoon of Trader Joe's Framboise heated it up a little, and then spread it on the inside. I then sprinkled slivered almonds on tip of the mixture.

*Re-assembled the cake, sifted powdered sugar on to the top, sprinkled toasted almonds on to it, and then put the rest of my left over raspberries on top.

Overall I am incredibly proud of how it came out.