Smoked Salt & Pepper

A few weekends ago, Reid and I went to a techniques class at Williams-Sonoma.  Technique classes are basically free classes where they teach you...you guessed it...cooking or baking techniques.  You should check one out at your local store:  Williams-Sonoma technique classes .  The one Reid and I attended was on how to make homemade pasta.  The pasta dough recipes I'm posting here are from the handout they gave us.   Williams-Sonoma Classic Fesh Egg Pasta Recipe  and  Williams-Sonoma Fresh Spinach Pasta .  The Alfredo sauce recipe is from Food.com.  Better than Olive Garden Alfredo Sauce Recipe .  Did you know that Alfredo was a chef who created Alfredo sauce for his picky pregnant wife by tripling the butter and cream in a traditional pasta sauce? Thanks, Dinner Party Download ! Dinner Party Download is an awesome Podcast, and I highly recommend it to everyone.  It starts with an ice breaker joke, has a drink inspired by histo...

One of my former lacrosse teammates, Lizzy, introduced me to pizza dip.  She would bring it to lacrosse parties and get togethers and pretty much any other time we could beg her to bring it.  It's amazing! You dip tortilla chips in the dip and it literally tastes like pizza.   In your mouth.  But on a tortilla chip.  We used to have "Fun Food Fridays" on some of our rotations at vet school, which is pretty much an excuse for residents and interns and the doctors to get fed by the 4th year students.  Anyway, I brought this 1 or 2 times and it was a hit.  I also brought this to work once when we had a pot luck day.  It's super easy to make and definitely a crowd pleaser!  Great game day food, too.  I altered Lizzy's recipe a little by adding oregano and dried basil to the cream cheese base. Pizza Dip Ingredients: 8 oz. softened cream cheese 1 tbs dried oregano 2 tsp. dried basil 3/4 c. tomato sauce 1&1/2 c. shredded mozzarell...

So you know how I love my new ice cream maker? Well, if you didn't, I do.  I've made blueberry pie ice cream  and vanilla ice cream.  My favorite so far is this salted caramel ice cream recipe from  http://espressoandcream.com/2012/07/salted-caramel-ice-cream.html .  It's really good.  My parents were in town once after I'd made some and my dad kept on saying I needed to start selling it.  Yea, it's that awesome.   I think my dad even told my sister about it and said we needed to start selling it.  Hah! The first time I made it the cream boiled over on my stove and made a huge mess, so watch it carefully! Don't leave even if you really have to go pee!  Also, the first time I made it I was really paranoid about the chunks of caramel that remained after adding the cream, but the second time I wasn't too worried and it turned out fine.  Espresso and Cream does not say when to add the vanilla, so I guessed.  Also, some of the dir...

Ok, I've been really slacking on my posts lately, so I'm about to unload so many. Hope you're prepared. I found the inspirations for this recipe on Pinterest at  http://cookingbride.com/main-courses/tequila-lime-skirt-steak/ .  I googled Tequila Lime Steak and also found a Food Network recipe here:  http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/grilled-tequila-garlic-lime-flank-steak-recipe/index.html  and kind of took from either one what I liked.  The result was a really delicious, flavorful, tender steak that both I and Reid really liked.  It was very easy to put together.  Plus, it uses skirt steak, which is super cheap! I served it with some roasted corn on the cob and potato salad I had made earlier in the week. Tequila Lime Steak Ingredients: 1&1/2 lbs. skirt steak 2 minced garlic cloves 1/4 cup tequilla 1 tbs. Worcestershire sauce 1/2 c. squeezed lime juice (2-3 limes) 1 tbs. soy sauce 1 tbs. brown sugar 1 pepper (Guy Fieri's rec...

Did you know that homemade bagels are AMAZE-BALLS?!!!!! Well, they are! OMG they are so good.  I don't know how anyone could ever give up carbs.  I mean, these bagels are so good.  They are totally worth the 2 days it took to make them.  Yea, it took two days to make them, but all of it wasn't hands on.  Most of the wait was waiting for them to rise for 24 hrs (and I didn't have time after work one night, so I actually let them rise for 48 hours).  I'd always been kind of nervous about making bagels because one super traditional recipe I read used lye to boil the bagels.  Lye? Like the caustic basic solution stuff? The recipe even had a note about how it's hard to purchase/illegal maybe to sell lye in the grocery store so you had to order it online.  Can't remember where I saw that recipe, Food & Wine or epicurious.  But yea, that put me off making bagels.  But then my friend Laura told me she made bagels with her mom and they were a...

Reid's parents were in Austin last week for work.  We met them up at Frank's hot dogs the first night they were in town.  Frank's is an artisinal hot dog restaurant in downtown Austin.  It was our first time there; I'd heard about it through friends and my old vet school counselor (thanks, Dr. Posey!).  It was really good.  They actually had currywurst on the menu! Currywurst is "a fast food dish of German origin consisting of steamed, then fried pork sausage cut into slices and seasoned with curry ketchup, regularly consisting of ketchup or tomato paste blended with generous amount of curry powder, or a ready-made ketchup-based sauce seasoned with curry and other spices" (thanks, Wikipedia!).  I'd had it almost any chance I could when I was studying abroad one summer in Germany during vet school and when I came back to the States, was saddened to never find it on any 'German" (aka Bavarian) restaurant menus in Texas.  Anyway, they had it so I ha...

You know what one of the benefits of getting married is? New kitchen gadgets!!!!!!!! Oh yea, and gaining a lifelong partner to share the joys of life and family and all that jazz.  But seriously, so many gifts.  It's like Christmas times a gazillion.  So the next few posts will be of me trying out all of the new goodies.  Like our waffle iron: Thanks, Marcus! Recipe from the St. John's church recipe book, a bridal shower gift.  This church is where both Reid's grandparents were members and where Reid's parents got married. Belgian Waffles Ingredients: 1 c. flour 1/2 tsp. salt 1 c. milk 1/2 tbs. melted butter 1 tsp. baking powder 1 tbs. sugar 1 egg, separated Directions: Sift dry ingredients together in a bowl. Beat whites until stiff; set aside. Add egg yok, butter and milk to the dry ingredents an dmix thoroughly. Stir 1/4 of the egg white into the batter to lighten it and gently fold in the remaining egg white. Bake accordi...