Disappointing My Rice Pudding Lover
Tuesday, November 18, 2008 at 08:00 E loves rice pudding and was very disappointed that I'm sitting out on Tuesdays with Dorie this week; but as we're off on holiday on Thursday, I'm more focused on emptying the fridge versus filling it. Although I had ample time to whip up Dorie's Arborio Rice Pudding on Sunday, I spent the day recovering from Saturday's dinner party on a diet of crackers and tea. I'm afraid I'll have to save this experience for another time, but I hope that you'll peruse the TWD blogroll, to see how everyone else did, I'm positive that there are some fabulous variations out there! Stay tuned next week for the Thanksgiving Twofer Pie!
Dinner Party Hangover
Monday, November 17, 2008 at 22:54 
I can just about eat (and drink) again, after Saturday night's dinner party. I spent the last several weeks dreaming up a menu that I thought would be worthy of my sweet friend Chris, a true gourmand, whose 40th birthday bash on a gulet in the middle the Aegean I missed out on because of my knee injury in September. This is the second year in a row that I've made him a belated birthday dinner, last year we bbq'd in the rain, but this year I wanted to take it up a notch. When we spoke on the phone a month ago, Chris had mentioned that he'd like to eat rabbit, and immediately started thumbing through my cookbook collection to see what there was to offer. I originally intended to do a North-African/Mediterranean influenced menu; but when I came across the following recipe in Simon Hopkinson's Roast Chicken And Other Stories
dinner, entertaining Escaping to Malaga
Monday, November 17, 2008 at 08:27 
To make up for the fact that we missed out on the much anticipated sailing trip with friends in Turkey in September, E and I are off to the Andalusia region of Spain, for a much needed break this Thursday. Seven days in Malaga, and if we can be asked maybe a day trip or two, to Cordoba or Ronda. The temperature difference alone (Amsterdam is currently 47ºF/8ºC to Malaga's 64ºF/18ºC) will be enough to rejuvenate us, but days spent strolling and eating at the laid-back tempo of the Spanish, with a long siesta in the afternoon for good measure is the perfect preparation for busy holiday season ahead.
If any of you have been to Malaga, or Cordoba or Ronda, and have nice suggestions for restaurants, purveyors of food and wines, and any other shouldn't be missed foodie activities, please leave a comment here!
announcements, travel Is it Pumpkin, or is it Squash Soup?
Thursday, November 13, 2008 at 08:14 
Things can very easily get lost in translation when you're living abroad. What are called squashes in other parts of the world, is called a pumpkin here. My favorite pompoen, in fact is s actually a Red Kuri Squash, also known as Japanese squash, Orange Hokkaido or Uchiki Kuri squash. Whatever you call it, I call it lekker!
I had the girls over for our weekly TV night on Monday night, which has been more sporadic than weekly as of late, but I didn't for the life of me know what to make for dinner. I had a wealth of lovely produce on hand, a rare white aubergine, wild spinach, red swiss chard and a beautiful "pumpkin". I drove myself crazy all day Monday trying to come up with an idea for dinner, until my friend Liz called me up with promises of leftovers from Dorie's stuffed pumpkin for my lunch (lucky me!), and passed on her pumpkin soup recipe. She told me and I quote, "Even my sister who can't cook and hates vegetables makes this at home." You can't really go wrong there, huh?
TWD - Kicking off the Holiday Season with Kugelhopf
Tuesday, November 11, 2008 at 08:21 
The Christmas lights suddenly appeared out of nowhere in the shopping streets of Amsterdam this past week; and although it's pretty autumnal around here, weather-wise, I can feel that the holidays are just around the corner. I love the holiday season, because for me the holidays represent a time of feasting with family and friends. I come from a big family of serious food lovers, cooks, bakers and eaters, and for us the holidays are just an excuse to indulge ourselves by making far too much food and then attempting to eat as much of it as possible (with my three strapping brothers around, there is never a need to worry about waste). I've missed out on a lot of family holiday dinners during my last ten and half years in the Netherlands, but I do my best to recreate the feeling here with friends, and I'm always looking for new recipes to add to my reportoire.
TWD - Rugelach
Tuesday, November 4, 2008 at 15:41 
When I read that the Tuesdays with Dorie bakers group was going to be baking Rugelach for this week, I wasn't particularly thrilled. My only memories of Rugelach (also spelled Rugulach, Rugalach, Rogelach, Rugalah, Rugala) were of the poppy seed filled variety, and as I only like poppy seeds on bagels, I had decided that I wasn't a fan of Rugelach. However, the great thing about TWD and cooking your way through one cookbook, is that you get to try things that on first impression you might think that you're not going to like, and in the end it turns out that you do. Thus was the case with these little crescent shaped beauties, which originate from the Ashkenazi Jews, descendants of he medieval Jewish communities of the Rhineland in the west of Germany (thank you Wikipedia).
Daring Bakers: Pizza Gone Wrong!
Tuesday, November 4, 2008 at 00:27
When I read that Rosa of Rosa's Yummy Yums chose Peter Reinhart's Basic Pizza Dough for October's challenge, I had just made pizza a few days before and posted about it. Great minds! I was excited to try another pizza dough recipe, in the hopes that this one would be "the one," and being the pizza lover I am, I wasn't at all fussed about having pizza twice in one month.
Daring Bakers, pizza TWD - (Mini) Chocolate-Chocolate Cupcakes
Wednesday, October 29, 2008 at 17:58 
I feel like I'm up for the bad blogger award this week! I'm running running behind schedule on my posts, but this should in no way reflect on how yummy these cupcakes were! I'm glad that CB's hubbie "coerced" her into choosing Dorie's Chococolate-Chocolate Cupcakes as our TWD recipe this week. I have a favorite chocolate (cup)cake recipe, so I tend to save lots of chocolate cake recipes, but I never acatully make them. I particularly liked the rich chocolate flavor that the melted bittersweet chocolate lent to the cupcakes, even though I consider this a light chocolate cake in comparison to my favorite recipe which is dark and cocoa rich like a Devil's Food cake.
