German Pancakes

I don't know about you, but I've never heard of German pancakes before. They looked really good on this blog Smitten Kitchen, made them and wow! They're like half omelet, half buttery pancake goodness, so good! This would be great served with strawberries in a brunch setting. You will love these.

NOTE: When you bake these, they puff up HUGE bubbles, then settle down when you pull them out, no one told me that, so I freaked when this started happening to me!

German Pancakes
From Smitten Kitchen
Yield 2 9-inch pancakes.

4 eggs
1 tablespoon sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup flour, sifted
2/3 cup milk
2 tablespoons soft butter

Heat oven to 400°F. Butter two 9-inch cake pans well. Put eggs in blender container, cover and process at “stir” until light yellow in color. Push “mix” button, remove cover and add remaining ingredients; process until smooth. Pour into prepared pans and bake 20 minutes; then reduce heat to 350°F and bake 10 minutes. Slide onto hot plates. Serve with lemon slices, powdered sugar and butter if you follow recipes to the letter, raspberry syrup or maple syrup and fresh berries would also work.

Enjoy!

UMAMI

You don't know what umami is. That's okay, I didn't either. Umami is what they are calling as the fifth sense of taste. There's sweet, savory, sour, bitter, and now umami, which is described as a fullness or meatiness. This umami taste is imparted by the amino acids inosinate and guanylate, so if a food has more of these naturally occurring levels, the more umami! Truffles are a good example of a food with a large umami flavor, which is why they are so expensive and sought after. So why am I telling you all of this?? Because of UMAMI BURGER!

This restaurant in Los Angeles is 100% dedicated to the umami taste. Everything in the burgers and on the menu is built to give you the greatest amount of umami possible. It sounds a little wierd and a little scary, but OMG. Tyler and I tried this place out after a long day at the LA Tennis Open, and it was amazing!

I had the original Umami Burger, which comes with custom ground beef, ketchup(I opted for none), caramelized onions, oven-roasted tomato, shittake mushrooms, and a Parmesan twill.

Tyler had the Truffle Burger with italian truffle cheese and a truffle glaze, and we split a side of sweet potato fries.

(p.s. thts not blood, its the delicious truffle glaze!)

I took a bite of my burger, and my eyes opened wide. After we each tried the other's burger, exchanged a couple of "that's really good"s: SILENCE. Burgers were gone, and we were happy. I have NEVER eaten anything like this before, where each aspect of the meal work together to create an experience. I am a huge fan of sweet potato fries, but no one seems to get the actual sweet flavor out of them. Umami burger had the BEST FRIES EVER. I could eat them for days. Since Tyler and I are both going to live in Orange County soon, we will be about a half hour closer to LA, and we are coming back here a million times over.

Pumpkin Cream cheese Muffins

Shame on me for not posting in forever. I apologize. Things have been stressful to say the least, working on things like

• Finding, applying for, and buying things for my first apartment.


• Studying for my pharmacy technician test (on Saturday, wish me tons of luck!)


• Taking my final MSJC class online


• Planning my courses in transferring to CSUF
• Searching for a CVS to transfer my job over

I'm sure I'm leaving some things out, but my blog and cooking have been the last things on my mind! I made these a few weeks back purely for Tyler. Starbucks makes these muffins in October/November, and Tyler spends every penny he has on their muffins because he loves them so much! So when I found the recipe online, I was required in the Good Girlfriend Code to make them! The hard part of this recipe is the cream cheese roll that you freeze, but I think I took it out too early so it fell apart. Other than that, the recipe is mix everything together, bake, and done! Great for when you miss Fall

Tip: I didn't have pumpkin pie spice. Here is the equivalent:
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon + 1/4 tsp ground ginger + 1/8 tsp ground allspice + 1/8 tsp ground nutmeg = 1 tsp pumpkin pie spice

Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins (Like Starbucks)

SERVES 12 muffins

Ingredients
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
1/16 teaspoon cardamom (optional)
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
2 eggs
1 cup sugar
1 cup pumpkin
5/8 cup vegetable oil
4 ounces cream cheese
chopped pumpkin seeds (optional) or walnuts (optional) or pecans (optional)


Directions
Preheat oven to 350.
-Put the entire brick of cream cheese on a piece of wax paper or parchment paper and shape it into a long log.
-Put it in the freezer while you mix and fill the pans, up to an hour.
-Unwrap and cut with a sharp knife so each cream cheese disk equals 1-2 teaspoons. If the cream cheese disks are too big around, cut thick slices and then cut them in half. This lets you push it down into the batter easier.
-Mix all ingredients together (except cream cheese and nuts).
-Fill muffin tins (greased or paper cups) half full.
-Put cream cheese disc in the middle, pressing down.
-Sprinkle with 1 tsp chopped nuts.
-Bake at 350 for 15-20 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean from the muffin part (do not touch the cream cheese!).
-Let cool in pans for 5 minutes, then remove to racks to cool completely. Do not touch the cream cheese until it cools.

Happy Dad's Day!

Of course every member of my family for every holiday will except nothing less than a chocolate cake, so that's what I made for Father's Day! I took the recipe that I made for my mom's Mother's Day cake, and made it manly!

SO CUTE! It's supposed to look like its fresh out of the box with the tissue paper! The collar is a piece of card stock, and it's a little hard to see in the pictures, but there are two pieces or card stock on the sides as cuffs of the shirt, and the m&m's are cufflinks! My dad thought this was so cute, because I tried to make the tie match the one my sister's got him.

Add a black name tag and you've got a missionary cake! This was fun to make and a total crowd pleaser! Hope all the Dad's had a great Dad's day :]

Great Giveaway

Theres a great giveaway going on Whisk: A food blog, and awesome blog that I regularly follow. Check it out its really easy to enter. Click Here to check it out!

No Knead Bread Rolls

These were apart of my dad's birthday dinner. I needed a quick simple roll recipe and I found it! They were so easy to make and tasted really good w/ butter and the course sea salt I added on top. I don't have a stand mixer like the recipe calls for, but my hand mixer worked just fine. Definitely a new go-to recipe.


No-Knead Bread rolls
(makes 8- 12 rolls)
adapted by Lululu at Home

Ingredients:
1 tbsp instant dry yeast
3/4 cup lukewarm water
4 tsp sugar
2 large eggs, room temperature
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup unsalted butter, room temperature

Directions:
Sprinkle yeast over warm water in a stand mixer fitted with a paddle. Add sugar and egg, then blend to combine.

Add flour and salt, mix until flour is combined. Increase speed and blend until dough is stretchy and elastic, about 4 mins. Add butter, one teaspoon at a time, and blend until incorporated.

Set dough in an oiled bowl, covered with plastic wrap and let rise for 30 mins. {My dough was very loose like a pancake batter, so I let it sit in the original bowl. Turned out fine}

Divide dough into greased muffin pan, filling halfway full. Let rest uncovered until doubled in size, about 30 mins.


Preheat oven to 350F. Bake bread for about 15 mins, until golden brown. Unmold bread rolls while warm then cool completely.

Serve with lots of butter.

Pastitsio

I have absolutely no reason to post this recipe, because nobody is ever going to make this. Unless of course, you have a Greek-Italian father who wants you to make his favorite childhood dish for his 53rd birthday! He didn't even know how to spell Pastitsio, only that it was a pasta dish with a meat layer and a egg custard-like top.

It was fairly easy to make, and has a very unique taste due to the amount of spices used in the meat portion of the dish. This recipe calls for macaroni, but I found the apparently correct pasta, perciatelli, just a long spaghetti with a hole in it, but any pasta with a hole in it (penne, ziti, etc.). I am currently ranked number 1 on the favorite daughter list!

Pastitsio:

Ingredients

Meat Layer:
1 tablespoon butter
1 onion, chopped
3 pounds lean ground beef
3/4 cup water
1 (6 ounce) can tomato paste
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/4 teaspoon pepper
2 tablespoons ground allspice
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 eggs, beaten

Macaroni Layer:
1 pound uncooked macaroni
2 eggs, beaten
1 cup grated Parmesan cheese, divided
1/2 cup butter, melted

Cream Sauce Layer:
4 eggs, well beaten
3/4 cup half-and-half
1 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
ground nutmeg to taste

Directions
1.Melt 1 tablespoon of butter in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Stir in onion and cook until it begins to soften, about 3 minutes. Stir in the ground beef, and cook until crumbly and no longer pink. Pour in the water and tomato paste. Season with salt, pepper, allspice, nutmeg, and cinnamon; cover, and simmer for 5 minutes. Remove from heat, adjust salt to taste, then refrigerate until cold. Once cold, remove any congealed fat, and thoroughly mix with 2 beaten eggs, and set aside.
2.Preheat oven to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C).
3.Bring a large pot of lightly salted water to a boil. Add macaroni and cook for 8 to 10 minutes or until al dente; drain, and rinse under cold water to cool. Mix the macaroni in 2 beaten eggs until well coated.
4.Evenly spread half of the macaroni mixture into a 11x14x2 inch baking pan, sprinkle with 1/2 cup of the grated parmesan cheese, and drizzle with 1/2 cup of melted butter. Spread the meat mixture overtop, then finish with the remaining macaroni. Sprinkle the macaroni with another 1/2 cup of Parmesan cheese, and drizzle with 1/2 cup of melted butter.
5.Whisk together 4 beaten eggs with the half-and-half, 1 cup of Parmesan cheese, flour, and salt; whisk until well blended. Pour the cream mixture evenly over top of the pastitsio, and sprinkle with nutmeg.
6.Cover the pan with foil, and bake in the preheated oven for 15 minutes. Remove the foil, and bake until the top has turned golden brown, about 30 minutes. Remove from oven, and allow to stand for 15 minutes before serving.

(p.s. I made a pie instead of a cake because I'm making him an awesome cake next week for Father's day!)