It's French For Melted

That’s right, it’s Fondue. Everyone favorite melted dessert from Switzerland. With the weather turning cold it seemed like the right season to invite people over to eat some well heated foods. Rather than sticking to one kind, I went ahead and made the traditional cheese and chocolate fondues, and then as a third, made pumpkin pie fondue with white chocolate and bourbon. That’s right, three fondues (I don’t own three pots, two were borrowed). All three were excellent, and were eaten up by the end of the evening. The chocolate and cheese fondues were both as you’d expect, but I thought the pumpkin was great (maybe just because it was my own idea), it really tasted like warm pumpkin pie, with a good kick of bourbon in it. Perfect for winter. Also, as a side dish I made ground up pecan praline, so that you could roll something dipped in chocolate or pumpkin in praline. Anyway, I’ve provided all of the recipes here, as well as suggestions for things to dip. I recommend preparing all of these in pots, and then pouring the fondues into the serving pots, as you’ll have better control of the heat over an oven, than over a sterno or whatever you call the controller in electric pots.

Cheese Fondue (From Simplyrecipes)

½ lb gruyere cheese, shredded

½ lb Swiss cheese, such as Emmenthaler or Jarlsberg, shredded

2 T cornstarch

1 clove garlic, peeled and halved crosswise

1 cup dry white wine

1 T lemon juice

1 T kirsch (optional)

Pinch fresh nutmeg

1. Toss the cheese and cornstarch together in a freezer bag and set aside.

2. Rub the inside of the pot with the garlic and discard. Add the wine and lemon juice, bring to a simmer over medium heat.

3. Gradually add the cheese, stirring constantly in a zigzag motion (this helps to keep it from becoming stringy). Do not let it boil.

4. Stir in the kirsch and nutmeg, transfer to serving pot

Suggested dippers

• French or Italian Bread
• Cut and blanched vegetables (broccoli, carrots, asparagus)
• Sausage, other cubed meats
• Pretzels
• Apples and Pairs

Chocolate Fondue (Also from Simplyrecipes)

12 oz dark chocolate, chopped

8 oz heavy cream

Frangelico or Amaretto (to taste)

Pinch of salt

1. Put the chocolate chopped in the fondue pot. Bring the cream to a simmer on the stove. Pour the cream over the chocolate and let sit for 30 seconds (If this sounds surprisingly like making ganache, that’s because that’s basically what it is).

2. Stir in the frangelico and salt. Keep over very low heat

Suggested dippers

• Fruits (apples, pears, bananas, pineapples)
• Pound or Angle-food Cake
• Graham crackers
• Peanut butter cookies (indulgent but wonderful)

Pumpkin Pie Fondue

1 cup milk

1 cup pureed pumpkin

½ tsp cinnamon

¼ tsp ginger

Pinch cloves

Pinch nutmeg

1 tsp vanilla

1 ½ cups white chocolate chips

1/3 cup bourbon

Splash bitters (optional)

1. In a heavy bottomed saucepan over medium heat, whisk together the milk, pumpkin and spices, bring to a light simmer. Remove from heat.

2. Stir in the white chocolate; continue stirring until it has melted. Add the bourbon and bitters, stir to combine. Transfer to fondue pot and keep over low heat.

Suggested dippers

• Graham cracker
• Gingersnaps
• Pound or Angel-food cake

One Quiche, Two Quiche

Since everyone was back in town once school started back up, I threw a potluck. People brought lots of food, and a good time was had by all. I followed my traditional potluck style and made an entrée, and a dessert. This time for the entrée I decided to make two quiches. First, I made a pesto and goat cheese quiche with caramelized onions, and then I made a broccoli and garlic quiche with cheddar. Unfortunately the pictures are a little lacking, since I didn’t cut them until it was time to serve, at which point people dug in with a gusto which left no leftovers. The plus side is that it certainly seemed to mean that people liked the quiches (I sure did), and I would recommend them to anyone. If you’ve never tried making a quiche, it is remarkably easy, and if you’re lazy like me you can use a frozen, store-bought pie crust to make things even simpler.

For the pesto quiche I used homemade pesto, but you can just as easily use store brought if you don’t happen to have any around. I got the instructions for caramelizing onions from simply recipes. The one change is that I found it too

Goat Cheese and Pesto Quiche

1 deep dish pie crust, frozen

½ a large red onion, sliced into thin strips

2 tsp olive oil

½ tsp balsamic vinegar

¼ cup pesto, divided

5 oz goat cheese, room temperature

1 ½ cups low fat sour cream

6 large eggs, lightly beaten

1 large tomato, sliced into quarter inch thick slices

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Put oil in a medium, heavy bottomed saucepan over medium heat. Add onions and a little salt. Cook for 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Reduce heat to

medium low and continue cooking for another 30 minutes, until onions are well browned, stirring occasionally. Add the balsamic vinegar, and cook for another 10 minutes. Remove from heat.

2. While the onions are cooking, blind bake the pie crust. To do this, poke holes in the bottom

of the crust with a fork. Line the crust with tin foil or parchment paper, pushing all the way into the corners. Fill the pie crust with pie weights or dried beans. Bake for 15 minutes. Remove from the oven, and let cool briefly. Remove the pie weights or beans, and place the pie back in the oven for another 10 minutes. When this is done, turn the oven up to 400 degrees.

3. Put one T of the pesto into the pie crust. Using a pastry brush, spread the pesto around the inside of the quiche, trying to cover the entire bottom as well as the sides.

4. In a large bowl, whisk together the goat cheese (it really just turns into small crumbles) and the sour cream. Add the remaining pesto and the eggs, and whisk until thoroughly combined. Stir in the caramelized onions.

5. Layer the bottom of the quiche with the sliced tomatoes.

6. Pour the quiche filling over the tomatoes (you will probably have a little extra).

7. Bake for 1 hour to 1 hour 15 minutes. It’s done when the edges are set, but the center is still a little shaky. I should note that my quiche souffléd like crazy (it rose a good two inches, probably means I overbeat the eggs, that’s why I’m saying you should beat them lightly before adding them), which made it hard to tell when it had reached this point. I took it out after an hour 10 and it was fine (and fell back down to normal levels). Cool until just warm and serve.

Brocolli-Garlic Quiche

1 deep dish pie crust

1 cup broccoli florets, 1-2 inches of stem attached

3 cloves raw garlic

5 cloves roasted garlic, divided

6 large eggs

1 ½ cups half and half

¼ tsp ground nutmeg

¼ tsp cayenne

8 oz shredded cheddar cheese.

1. Preheat the oven to 375. Blind bake the pie crust. To do this, poke holes in the bottom of the crust with a fork. Line the crust with tin foil or parchment paper, pushing all the way into the corners. Fill the pie crust with pie weights or dried beans. Bake for 15 minutes. Remove from the oven, and let cool briefly. Remove the pie weights or beans, and place the pie back in the oven for another 10 minutes. When this is done, turn the oven up to 400 degrees.

2. While the crust is baking, bring 3 quarts of water to a boil. Add the broccoli, and cook for 4 minutes.

3. With a generous pinch of salt, chop up the raw garlic until you make it into a paste. Mush in three cloves of the roasted garlic.

4. Take the remaining two cloves of roasted garlic and place them into the pie crust, using your fingers, gently crush them, and do your best to spread them around the bottom of the crust, without breaking it (this is a challenge).

5. In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs and heavy cream. Add the garlic paste, nutmeg, and cayenne.

6. Line the bottom of the crust with half of the cheese. Pour over the egg mixture. Place the broccoli in the quiche, and cover with the remaining cheese (that has not yet been done in the picture below).

7. Bake for 1 hour to 1 hour and 15 minutes. I found this quiche souffléd a lot as well, but I took it out after an hour, and it seemed well set (maybe because it was on the upper rack, and so cooked a little faster). Cool until just warm and serve.

Roasted Garlic Pizza with Veggies

This is the first of the three pizzas I’m posting about this week. For background, as well as cooking instructions and the dough recipe, check out the introductory pizza dough post.

I got the idea for this pizza from one of my favorite pizza places I ate at when I was a kid. There was a restaurant I my home town called Bertuccis (this is not the chain restaurant Bertuccis that you sometimes see around). They made a number of wonderful pizzas (including a to die for clam pizza I hope to recreate someday). One of my favorites was a pizza with chicken, red peppers, and broccoli. I don’t remember what the sauce was, but I know it wasn’t tomato. I embarked on this pizza hoping to recreate just a little of that childhood memory, though I skipped on the chicken because I had some vegetarian friends coming. I thought this pizza was tasty, but not my favorite. I made it with a roasted garlic béchamel sauce, white onions, broccoli, and red peppers. If anything, it could have used something to give it a little more kick (this can be solved with the addition of some red pepper flakes to the top), and maybe just a little salt. This pizza was also the one that faired the poorest on reheating. Still tasty though.

Roasted Garlic Béchamel Sauce

Makes ~ 1 cup

2 Tbs unsalted butter
2 Tbs all purpose flour
1 cup milk
~ 10 cloves roasted garlic
1 tsp chopped fresh garlic
1/3 cup grated parmesan cheese
Salt to taste

1. Melt the butter over the heat. Once completely melted, stir in the flour. Cook briefly, (45 seconds to a minute) stirring constantly. Do not allow the flour to color.

2. Add the milk and whisk to combine. Add the roasted and fresh garlic. Add the parmesan, and salt to taste. Let the mixture get hot enough that it just starts to bubble.

3. Pour the heated sauce into a blender, and mix until smooth. This step is optional, skip it if you want chunks of roasted garlic in your sauce.

Roasted Garlic Pizza with veggies

Makes one ~14 inch pizza (my pizza’s were irregularly shaped, makes it hard to guess a size)

Rolled out Dough for one pizza
½ cup Roasted Garlic Béchamel sauce (see above)
½ medium white onion very thinly sliced
2-3 Tsb chopped garlic (use as your taste prefers)
2 cups broccoli (just the florets)
½ red bell pepper, sliced
1 ½ - 2 cups Cheese Blend (see Dough post)

1. Use a pastry brush or spoon to spread roasted garlic sauce all over the pizza. Be generous.

2. Add the raw garlic, followed by the white onion, then the broccoli and red peppers. Top it all off with the cheese.

3. Bake for approximately 10 minutes, or until dough is cooked and cheese is melted (see dough post for more details).

Quick Bean and Cheese Empanadas

This is another in my series of quick dinners. I was looking for a quick meal tonight, but couldn’t find anything to eat; I was even out of lean cuisines! I had plenty of ingredients around, but for the most part not the kind of things you could put together into a dish. Then I saw some refried beans on my counter and remembered that I had a part of a package of puff pastry in my freezer, so I set about thawing it and making myself a quick dinner. I threw these together from things I had around the kitchen, and the filling can be easily changed to just about anything. I thought these came out pretty tasty, especially when I served them up with some salsa verde left over from this post.

Bean and Cheese Empanadas

Makes 3

1/3 of a sheet of puff pastry
¾ cup refried beans
1 cup shredded cheese
¼ cup red enchilada sauce
2 Tbs chopped Vidalia onions
2 tsp chopped garlic
¾ tsp cumin
¼ tsp chili powder
¼ tsp red pepper flakes
¼ tsp ground coriander
1 egg, beaten
1 tsp olive oil
Flour for dusting

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Put the oil in a pan with the onions and garlic. Sautee over medium heat until onions become translucent and garlic begins to brown.

2. Mix the beans, cheese, enchilada sauce, garlic and onions, and the spices in a bowl, set aside.

3. Cut the puff pastry into three equal squares, about three inches on a side. On a well floured surface roll out each puff pastry square until it is roughly 5 inches by 5 inches (I actually ended up with more rectangles).

4. Place 1/3 of the filling onto each piece of puff pastry. Roll up the filling in the puff pastry, and crimp the edges. Brush each empanada with beaten egg.

5. THIS STEP IS IMPORTANT: use a fork or the tip of a sharp knife to poke several holes in each empanada to let out steam. I only poked two holes in mine, and they blew up a little. At least one of the empanadas I made ended up close to hollow. Fortunately, a little salsa covered the hole nicely.

6. Bake the empanadas for 18 to 20 minutes, or until puffed and golden.

Best Popcorn Ever

I know that may seem like a boastful name for a blog posting, but this popcorn recipe has earned it. I began making it for my friends a few months ago, and it caught on fast. People liked it so much that I continued getting compliments on it the next day (who gets compliments for popcorn at all, not to mention the next day). The recipe uses some ingredients that might be hard to come by (I don’t know because I’ve never looked for them other than where I get them). The recipe relies on granulated roasted garlic and Vermont cheese powder. The two ingredients together really give this popcorn some zing. Truthfully, there is no particular recipe for this, you just add the spices until it tastes right. However, I’ve done my best to reproduce it below.

Garlic-Cheddar Popcorn

Canola Oil
2/3 Cup unpoped popcorn kernels
~7 Tbls Vermont Cheese Powder
~5 tbs Granulated Roasted Garlic (you can use garlic powder in its place, but the roasted is better)
~ 1 ½ tbs chili powder
4 Tbs melted butter (optional)

1. Pour enough canola oil into a large pot to coat the bottom. Place over medium high heat with 3-4 kernels in the pan. Heat, covered, until the kernels pop, then add the rest of the popcorn, and reduce the heat the medium. Make sure to recover, and wait for all of the kernels to pop, agitating the pan occasionally. Note, if you prefer air popped or microwave popped popcorn instead, do that.

2. Once all the kernels have popped, remove the pan from the heat. Add the butter at this point if you’re going to use it, it will help the spices stick to the popcorn. Add about half the cheese powder, granulated garlic, and chili powder, and mix the popcorn. Add the other half of the spices and mix again.

3. Pour into a bowl or serve right out of the pot, and enjoy.