I may be vegetarian, but I have some family members who love this stuff, and this is a great tutorial. I love that it’s clear, explaining why some ingredients are beneficial, but it’s also non judgemental, allowing for personal preferences to come into play.
as i've posted on here before, wednesday is my Best Buddies Meal And Movie Night where my two best buddies come over and i cook them a meal and then we take turns picking a movie
today i made them rigatoni alla vodka and, not to toot my own horn or oversell it.. this may be the best thing i've ever made
here's my recipe if anyone's interested :~) i made it up myself and it turned out even better than i expected
1 standard size box of rigatoni, or whatever similar pasta you like
at least 2 tablespoons of olive oil
1 onion, diced (or 1-2 teaspoons of onion powder if you don't feel like chopping an onion — add that with the tomato paste if you're going that route) — here's a trick for how to easily dice an onion like a pro
a good pinch of salt and pepper
6+ cloves garlic, minced (ideally the pre-minced stuff that comes in a jar; who has time to mince 6+ cloves of garlic)
maybe 2-3 good handfuls of (clean) cherry tomatoes; exact amount doesn't matter and feel free to not include them if you don't want to
one of those 6 ounce cans of tomato paste
1/2 cup vodka
1/2 cup heavy cream
anywhere between 1/4 cup to 1/2 cup of grated parmesan cheese + more for when you eat it, if you want
this recipe was the perfect amount for three people, but it could be for four if you're serving something else with it (like bread, a salad, etc)
cut up the onion, mince the garlic, wash the tomatoes, etc — have everything ready to go before you begin cooking
boil the pasta according to box instructions, and then drain and let it hang out in the strainer while you cook so you don't have to juggle ten things at once (OR: cook at the same time if you're a pro — it is possible, but be careful and watch your shit so nothing burns/overflows)
on medium high (7 out of 10) heat, add 2 tbsp of olive oil and sauté the diced onion for about five minutes or so
while they're sautéing — stir them a lot, but also add a good pinch of salt and pepper during this time
lower the heat to 5 out of 10 and then add all that garlic; sauté for another 1-2 minutes
add the can of tomato paste and mix it all up in the pan until it's a dark red tomato-onion-garlic paste; this will take maybe a minute
IN THE SAME PAN: push the paste off to the side and add the cherry tomatoes and a little dash of olive oil on top of them if the pan looks dry (it probably won't, but more olive oil won't hurt anyone). half the pan is now dedicated to blistering these cherry tomatoes, the other half to the paste
add the vodka and incorporate that into the paste, mixing and tilting the pan if you need to, to keep it away from the cherry tomatoes. it doesn't really matter at all if the vodka and/or paste touches the tomatoes, but they'll blister slower if they're lost in the sauce
if the tomatoes are taking more than a couple minutes to cook, you can move your pan so the tomato half is over the burner and the paste half is off the burner. the tomatoes will start cracking and looking gold in color near the cracks as they blister; if there are blackish spots, that may be the tomatoes caramelizing (unless your heat is too high, in which case that is the tomatoes burning and you should turn down the heat)
once the tomatoes look slightly blistered, mix them into the paste and recenter the pan, and sorta just. squash the tomatoes with your spoon. not fully smashed — just pop them, essentially. use a wider spoon and squash them once they're mixed in the paste, and that way they won't splatter on you and burn your skin. mixed in the paste = no splattering (unless you're squashing them WAY too hard)
lower the heat to 3 or 4 out of 10, and then add the heavy cream and stir to mix it all together
turn off the heat and mix in the grated parmesan
once it's mixed: carefully taste it and see if you want more salt and/or pepper
You can often buy full fat dried milk in a steel can with a reusable lid. Keeping your cocoa mix in an opaque metal can also helps it stay fresh longer.
because i love y’all, i’m sharing my family’s recipe for apple tea (traditional fall/winter drink in west asia, turkey, and many areas of the balkans)
it’s like a more delicate version of apple cider and i basically live off of this stuff when the weather starts to cool!
Apple Tea (for two)
1 large apple or 2 small, shredded (you can use a cheese grater)
3 cups water
1-2 cinnamon sticks
2-3 pc clove (optional)
honey to taste
1 tsp of lemon juice (add at end)
green tea (optional! some versions call for green tea but i actually prefer it without. up to you!)
throw it all in a pot and let it simmer on a low temperature for an hour or so. while it’s simmering, it will also make your home smell delicious! (if you make it with green tea, add the tea at the end, about five minutes before taking it off the heat so the flavor doesn’t become bitter from oversteeping). strain into your cups and enjoy hot.
The secret is in the water; literally, it’s IN the water.
See, when you boil potatoes, a lot of special starches and sugars and stuff leeches out into the water. When you drain the water before mashing them, you throw away a lot of good stuff, which is a big part of what makes mashed potatoes “dry” and bland, even when you add large amounts of cream and butter and things.
So don’t throw out any water.
Here’s how you do that:
First, cut your potatoes into smaller cubes than you probably do. (I’ve left the skins on for flavor and also, that’s where a lot of a potato’s nutrients are, like protien and iron and vitamins B and C, just to name a few)
The reason for cutting them smaller (besides avoiding giant peices of skin) is so that there is less space in the pot between each peice for water to fill, so you use less water to cook them. That’s important because you won’t be draining any water, so you can’t afford to have too much water! For the same reason, just barely cover them with water when they go on the stove.
But! Before you do that, put the pot on the stove with some butter, garlic, and seasonings; let the butter start to sizxle just a little then put most of a single layer of potatoes in the pan and let the brown and sear. Turn them, brown them on all sides, get ‘em fairly dark (I forgot to get a pic here because I was worried I’d burn the butter).
Ready? now throw the rest of the potatoes in right on top, and add your water, give them a stir. This way, you’re boiling in some of that lovely fried potato/french fry flavor.
Okay, so, as they cook, you may need to add a little water, not too much! ideally the very highest piece of potato will be poking just above the surface. Now, when your potatoes are really really soft, mash them directly into the water. Just pull them off the stove, leave all the water in, and start mashing. Trust me. At first you’ll think there’s too much water. If you get them mashed and they ARE a little too liquidy, just put ‘em back on the stove. You’ll have to stir often or constantly, but they will steam off additional water without losing any good stuff.
Now add some salt, and taste. Right?! And you haven’t even put in any cream or cheese or anything yet.
Speaking of which, you can use like, a third of the amount of butter or cream or anything, and they will still taste better than usual. So they taste better AND they are higher in nutrients AND lower in fats and salts! That’s a lot of win — enjoy your potatoes!
Fuck Columbus! Indigenous Rights! And happy Thanksgiving!
lol this got on the tumblr radar again, got like another thousand notes in the last little while... all the stuff I write and make, all the time I invested getting out of my 20+ year restaurant career, and this is what tumblr likes from me lmao
A few years ago, when I was living in the housing co-op and looking for a quick cookie recipe, I came across a blog post for something called “Norwegian Christmas butter squares.” I’d never found anything like it before: it created rich, buttery and chewy cookies, like a vastly superior version of the holiday sugar cookies I’d eaten growing up. About a year ago I went looking for the recipe again, and failed to find it. The blog had been taken down, and it sent me into momentary panic.
Luckily, I remembered enough to find it on the Wayback Machine, and quickly copied it into a file that I’ve saved ever since. I probably make these cookies about once a month, and they last about five days around my voracious husband - they’re fantastic with a cup of bitter coffee or tea. I’m skeptical that there is something distinctively Norwegian about these cookies, but they do seem like the perfect thing to eat on a cold day.
Norwegian Christmas Butter Squares
1 cup unsalted butter, softened
1 egg
1 cup sugar
2 cups flour
1 tsp vanilla
½ tsp salt
Turbinado/ Raw Sugar for dusting
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Chill a 9x13″ baking pan in the freezer. Do not grease the pan.
Using a mixer, blend the butter, egg, sugar, and salt together until it is creamy. Add the flour and vanilla and mix using your hands until the mixture holds together in large clumps. If it seems overly soft, add a little extra flour.
Using your hands, press the dough out onto the chilled and ungreased baking sheet until it is even and ¼ inch thick. Dust the top of the cookies evenly with raw sugar.
Bake at 400 degrees until the edges turn a golden brown, about 12-15 minutes. Remove from the oven. Let cool for about five minutes before cutting the cooked dough into squares. Remove the squares from the warm pan using a spatula.
It basically makes the platonic ideal of commercial sugar cookies, only in bar form. When I give them to people (which I do a lot, because this is one of those simple recipes where the results seem very impressive), I just tell them they’re sugar cookie bars.
The OP version of this has become my go-to cookie for basically all things and I have a whole cohort of friends and colleagues who would murder each other to get them. Haven’t tried any add ons yet, since the base recipe is SO GOOD.
This stupid cake, made with potatoes … is delicious! It’s so sweet, moist, and decadent, just like a brownie! And I don’t even like chocolate or potatoes!
The recipe from the tiktok was pretty much impossible to find. I looked high and low, but everyone posted recipes that I KNOW he didn’t use because the ingredients and methods were different. After some searching, my grandma and I came up with our own recipe.
For the Cake:
1 cup mashed potato
2 cups sour cream
1 ¾ cup flour
1 ¾ cup sugar
¾ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
½ cup softened butter
2 eggs
1 ½ tsp baking soda
1 tsp vanilla
Pinch of salt
For the Drizzle:
4 oz semi-sweet chocolate
½ cup sugar
3 tbsp corn syrup
2 tbsp water
A lot of recipes called for a mixer or a processor, but my grandma and I wanted to make an every-man kind of recipe, since we know not everyone has those things. Plus they’re heavy and a pain to clean anyway, so bowls it is!
Instructions:
1. Peel and boil the potato, then mash it. Set aside to cool. Go to the bathroom, do your homework, then come back. That should be enough time.
2. Set oven to 350°F.
3. Cream butter. This means putting the sugar and butter into a bowl and mashing it together with a fork until it’s thoroughly mixed.
3. Put everything else in the same bowl, including the mashed potato. Mix and stir well. Work those muscles!
4. Grease a pan (doesn’t matter what kind you use) and spatula batter into pan. Even out if necessary.
5. Bake in oven for 40 minutes.
6. Test cake with pick. If nothing sticks, it’s finished. If batter does stick to pick, let it bake a bit longer but make sure it doesn’t burn. Remove and set aside to cool.
For the Drizzle:
1. Cut chocolate into tiny squares.
2. In a small pot, mix sugar, corn syrup, and water.
3. On medium heat, wait for mixture to sizzle and stir it. Do NOT let it boil.
Hey here is a thing that happened. We went for a simple ganache for the glaze. Heated 1 cup of cream till hot then poured over 1 cup of semisweet and 1 cup of milk chocolate chips. Whisk untill melted and pour over your chocolate mash potato cake
Found the original recipe! (Apparently it was listed as a caramel potato cake in the original recipe book??? Anyway, now there’s two CPC recipes!)
Chocolate Potato Cake
½ cup butter
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
½ cup milk
½ cup hot riced potatoes [just pure potato, mashed, no milk or butter or pepper or salt or whatever, just pure mashed potato]
1 cup flour
2 tsp baking powder
½ tsp cinnamon
½ tsp clove
½ tsp nutmeg
½ cup grated chocolate
½ cup chopped nut meats [optional, never ever feel pressured to add nuts to your chocolate cake, our guy here didn’t!]
Just… put everything into the mixing bowl in that order, with lots of mixing in between each addition.
Into a greased and/or lined tin, and then into a moderate oven for 55 minutes (or until cooked).
Frosting
2 Tbs butter
1 cup sugar
¼ cup milk
1 square unsweetened chocolate
½ tsp vanilla [also optional, since again, not mentioned by our maker here!]
Boil, but be careful it doesn’t burn. …Basically? Stir constantly! (also, apparently the vanilla only gets added after the mix is taken off the heat…)
“In this this world, you can be afraid of anything, I will always be beside you but you cannot be afraid of me. Do you understand? Especially my feelings for you. Be brave about it.” - Win, Until We Meet Again (2019)
“I want to meet the person that raised you to be this sweet/lovely” - Solo, Oxygen the series (2020)
“Kao. You dingus. I love you!” - Pete, Dark Blue Kiss (2019)
“Would you like something to drink, Doctor?” - Tutor Tan, Manner of Death (2020)
“You already know, Type. I will always be by your side.” - Tharn, Tharntype: 7 Years of Love (2020)
“Perhaps, I became a magic user to touch his heart.” - Adachi, Cherry Magic ! Thirty Years of Virginity Can Make You a Wizard?! (2020)
“My good boy.” - Dean, Until We meet Again (2019)
I’ll more than likely add more in reblogs but it would also be great if anyone wants to share theirs <3
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