molai's.

“Nothing would be more tiresome than eating and drinking if God had not made them a pleasure as well as a necessity.” -Voltaire

[molais]

Blueberry Gateau.

[molais]

Shrimp/Crab and Corn Bisque.

[molais]

Zucchini and Ricotta Fritters.

[molais]

The perfect, light lunch: wild sockeye salmon baked/steamed in little foil pockets of love.  Seasoned with lemon, rosemary, olive oil, and a bit of homemade garlic/thyme butter (I saved and froze up from last time).  Took me 30 minutes total, and barely any cooking! Served with warm, crusty bread with butter.

[molais]

Baked shrimp scampi.  I have to admit, I love the butter-garlic topping more than the shrimp itself.  Definitely a mixture of ingredients worth writing down: butter, garlic shallots, parsley, rosemary, crushed red pepper flakes, and lemon zest.  Sooo flavorful!

[molais]

Asian glazed chicken wings.  This would be ideal finger food if I were ever to own a hip Asian bar.  The "asian glaze" is all in the reduction of Sriracha sauce, soy sauce, balsamic vinegar, sugar, freshly minced garlic, and grated ginger.  Topped with a scallion garnish.  It was exactly what I was craving: a sticky, tangy, and flavorful afternoon snack!  

[molais]

Ratatouille: a traditional French peasant dish!  This dish is typically served up chunkier and more stew-y.  However, since I am in love with the animated film, Ratatouille, I decided to go with the impressive and sophisticated version of ratatouille they do at the end of the movie!  I got the recipe from Smitten Kitchen, where you will see that the process is almost exactly the same as in the movie!  Zucchini, yellow squash, baby eggplant, and red bell peppers were sliced thin and layered on top of a tomato puree with fresh garlic and onion.  I drizzled the colorful masterpiece with olive oil and seasoned with salt, pepper, and fresh thyme!  So simple, beautiful, and delicious.  Extra good with goat cheese garnish.

[molais]

Spicy Cajun Shrimp.  I got this recipe from Cooking Up a Storm: Recipes Lost and Found from The Times-Picayune of New Orleans, given to me from a friend.  I love reading through the heartfelt stories behind each recipe in this book. Reminds me that there's truly nothing like comfort food! You may not be able to tell, but the sauce is wonderfully rich.  Basically, imagine straight-up butter, spice, and beer.  Mmmmm.  A favorite!

[molais]

Individual sweet potato gratins.  I had one extra sweet potato leftover from the sweet potato fries I made a few days ago, which wasn't enough to make a full-sized gratin.  So I modified a little.  I mimicked the same concept as a recipe I found at Tasty Kitchen and adapted Bobby Flay's recipe for Smoked Chile Scalloped Sweet Potatoes.  I layered thin rounds of sweet potatoes, cheese, thyme, cayenne pepper, and heavy cream (I regret not having bacon on hand for this one!)  One medium-sized sweet potato was enough to make 8 miniature gratins.  You might notice that I accidentally overcooked the bottoms (oops), but once I imagined them as little tartlets, all was well (;  All in all, I wasn't crazy about the end result... it tasted decent, but not my favorite way to eat a sweet potato.  So I'll have to play around with this one--I'm determined to find more innovative ways to cook with muffin pans!  They make for impressive-looking snacks.

[molais]

While looking for a good blueberry muffin recipe, I was torn between two recipes: Alton Brown and Ina Garten's.  Although I was tempted to make both and do some sort of controlled experiment with a large random sample (haa), I found myself with limited ingredients.  SO-- I went with Alton Brown's recipe, which saved me a trip to the market!  Luckily, Alton's recipe is apparently "less cake-y" than Ina's (according to reviews on foodnetwork), which is exactly what I was looking for! The verdict?  A delicious, light, and tasty blueberry muffin.  As for Ina's recipe... I guess we'll never know.

[molais]

Chocolate eclair cake... wow.  I have been waiting absolutely all week to make this!  When I asked my boyfriend for ideas on what to cook up next, he immediately suggested his mother's recipe for this delicious dessert.  When she heard about this, she was so kind and mailed me the recipe packaged along with all the ingredients I needed (pictured above)!  Incredible. 

There were so many things I enjoyed about making and (more importantly) eating this cake!  First of all, I was able to use two ingredients I had never used before: karo syrup (corn syrup) and choco-bake liquid chocolate.  The choco-bake really amazed me--it was so nice to use unsweetened chocolate without having to dealing with the mess of tempering chocolate or using cocoa powder!  

Taste-wise, this cake honestly blew me away... and I am not just saying that because my boyfriend's mother will probably read this (: My favorite part? The texture of the graham cracker layers.  After sitting in the fridge, the layer became soft, cakey, and added a lovely dimension to the cake.  Needless to say, my family loved it and we couldn't stop eating it tonight!  I will definitely be making this for years to come.

[molais]

Baked sweet potato fries seasoned with sea salt, black pepper, brown sugar, and extra virgin olive oil. 

[molais]

I regret to inform you that I attempted to make Ina Garten's salmon lox, and failed! ): I made two huge mistakes.  First, instead of cracked white peppercorns, I used white pepper (in powder form). This made the lox overwhelmingly peppery.  Second, I didn't get the correct weight of salmon, so the lox were overcured and extremely salty! After a eating a few slivers, I realized the lox were nearly inedible ): Despite the failure, I am still convinced that this is a great recipe and that I will try it again in the future!

[molais]

Homemade dumplings.  I love how versatile dumplings are in the ways you can cook them.  You can boil, steam, deep fry, pan fry, throw em into broth or soup, etc.  Here, I pan fried, then steamed the dumplings.  Best of both worlds.  In other words, potstickers!  A time-consuming process, yet well worth the labor.  You'll have to trust me with that! The homemade dumpling skins (so easy-- just find the perfect ratio of flour to water!) by far trump store-bought ones. I made two types of fillings: both are pork, but vary in seasoning.  Sort of tedious to explain, so you'll have to ask me directly for the family recipe! (;

[molais]

It's hard to make meatloaf look good in pictures, but it tasted great.  It was the simplest yet most promising recipe I came across.  Thank you again, Ina Garten! (:

[molais]

Carrot cupcakes with caramel and cream cheese frosting.  I got this recipe from the Food & Wine's top 10 favorite cake recipes.  Moist and delicious.  I ate two consecutively last night!

[molais]

Bringing this to my college bible study group this week.  Spicy tomato salsa, mango salsa, and guac.  Served with tortilla chips.  My favorite snack!