Bloody Mary Bisque (Healthy and Easy!)

I know, I know - Bloody Mary Bisque? What?? Well, as per usual for this time of year, I'm getting heaps of tomatoes from the CSA and it's game on versus the fruit flies to see who gets to eat them. Usually I make some form of tomato soup for my end game. Deconstructed, what is tomato soup? Tomato juice and seasoning. What are Bloody Marys? Tomato juice and seasoning. I've never been happy with using canned tomato sauce or the V8 types in my soups, so I figured I'd check out the liquor aisle. Because that always has the answers.What sold me was a new horseradish mixer. I can usually take or leave a Bloody Mary, but if there's horseradish, I want six. The nice thing about making tomato soup with mixer is that you get a bunch more flavor without having to use a bunch of cream.

Ingredients:
1 TBS butter
1/2 onion, roughly chopped
6 cloves garlic, lightly crushed
4 medium-large tomatoes, cut into chunks
1.5 cups of your favorite Bloody Mary mixer
.5 cup broth
Salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup milk, half and half, or cream if you really like
1/2 cup Greek yogurt
1/4 cup vodka (optional, but it's Bloody Mary Bisque)
Big handful basil, chopped

Directions:
One reason I like making soups is that since it all gets blended together anyway, it doesn't really matter how you chop stuff. So throw your butter in a big pot with a lid, turn the heat to medium, and once it melts, toss in your onion. While it cooks a bit, crush your garlic, and toss it in too. Give it a stir a couple of times until the garlic and onion start to brown.

Toss in your tomatoes, mixer, broth, salt and pepper. Cover and cook 20 minutes or so until everything is nice and squishy. Turn off heat. If you have an immersion blender, stick it in the pot and puree. If you don't have an immersion blender, go get one. With the blender stick running on low, slowly pour in your milk, then add your yogurt. This will help prevent the dairy from curdling, which it likes to do when it gets hot.

Add your vodka and basil, and stir it all up. Taste and adjust seasoning if needed. Cheers!

Raspberry Zinfandel Chocolate Cupcakes; Mascarpone frosting and Raspberry Cream filling

Oh boy. I had the idea for these kicking around for a while with a fridge full of raspberries, but needed a day that wasn't in the 90s to bake them, as well as the motivation of a hard workout to make me feel less guilty about eating them. I think climbing the highest mountain in the state fit the bill for that. It's four days later and my legs still hurt. Fortunately these are totally worth it.

I used boxed cake mix in these. Some people consider this "low quality" or "cheating," which I understand as it isn't 100% from scratch. But look at the ingredients on your box of mix: Flour. Cocoa. Baking soda (sodium bicarbonate). Salt. The same. exact. things. you. would. have. combined.  yourself. anyway. Probably even in the same proportions. So please, do yourself a favor, stop scoffing at boxed cake mixes if you are somebody who does so, and enjoy the convenience of not having to clean a bunch of measuring cups. Now the directions they give you on how to mix oil and water with the cake mix? That's another story, and that's where I come in. With alcohol.

This made exactly 19 cupcakes, just to screw with me.

Ingredients:
1.5 cups raspberries, divided, plus extra for garnish (if desired)
1 box chocolate cake mix
1 cup plus 2 TBS red zinfandel, divided
3 eggs
1/3 cup (or 5 1/3 TBS) butter, melted
1 pint very cold whipping or heavy cream, divided
4 TBS sugar, divided
8 oz very cold mascarpone cheese
1/2 cup powdered sugar
Red food color, if desired

Directions:
Rinse your raspberries and pat dry. Preheat oven to 350 and line couple of muffin tins with cupcake liners. (I really do not recommend greasing the bottom as the cake contains raspberries and could fall apart if not held in tact by the liners.)

For the cupcakes: Combine box cake mix with 1 cup zinfandel, the eggs, and the butter. Beat till smooth. Scoop half of the cake mix into another bowl (I used a measuring pitcher for easy-pour into the tins) and mix in half of the raspberries. Pour into muffin tins, filling a scant 1/2  way up. Distribute the rest of the batter evenly on top, filling the tins to almost-full. Bake about 20 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out dry. Allow to cool, then cut cores out of the top half.

For the Cream Filling: Place the remaining half of the raspberries into a bowl and dump a couple of TBS sugar on them to sweeten them and draw out their juice. Let stand a few minutes. Pour half of your cream into a large mixing bowl and add the sugar plus a couple teaspoons of zinfandel. Beat on low, then medium, then high speed until stiff peaks form. With a slotted spoon, remove raspberries from bowl and juice, and carefully fold them into the cream. When cupcakes have cooled, spoon them into the holes you carved out.

For the mascarpone frosting: I hate using two bowls, but you have to. Beat in one bowl the mascarpone with the powdered sugar, adding the raspberry juice and another couple teaspoons of wine. In the other bowl, whip the remaining cream, as before. Fold together, adding food color if desired. Spread or pipe on top of the cupcakes. (Note: this is not a stiff buttercream with which you can make fancy roses, etc. But it tastes a lot better.)

Garnish with raspberries if desired (I forgot to). Refrigerate any leftovers immediately as frosting will run if it gets warm.

Chocolate ginger tartlets with honey borboun figs

Figs! It's fig season! Most people right about now are posting all of the pictures and recipes of freshly picked berries (which I love, and which actually grow in Vermont), but OH MAN FIGS!! I may have a slight obsession with figs and curse Costco's name when they run out of the giant bags of dried ones. But fresh is so much tastier, and fig season is up there with pumpkin season in my book.

This was an experiment that resulted from having three pounds of figs in the fridge and wanting to try that trick that's been all over the web of making cookie cups on an upside-down muffin tin. (Spoiler: it works!) I had originally come across a similar recipe for a chocolate tart in a ginger crust, but it seemed like it was 90% chocolate ganache, and while chocolate ganache is rather heavenly, it can easily overtake other flavors and textures. On the other hand, I found a recipe for chocolate ginger cookies on the Taste and Tell Blog that looked like the perfect carrier of said ganache and figs. So I present my own fig experiment, whose results were classified as Dangerously Tasty.

(Sorry I didn't put a doily under these to make it pretty. Or notice the glare. Oops.)

Ingredients:

For the cookie/crust/thing:

1 stick butter, room temp

3/4 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup sugar

1 egg

1/2 cup molasses

2 cups flour

3 TBS cocoa powder

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp ginger

1/2 tsp cloves

1/2 tsp cream of tartar

1/4 tsp nutmeg

pinch salt

For the chocolate ganache:

1 1/4 cup bittersweet chocolate, chopped fine

3/4 cup heavy cream

For the figs in honey bourbon ginger sauce 

About a dozen figs, halved

1/2 cup bourbon

2 TBS honey

1+ tsp ground ginger

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 and combine cookie ingredients in usual fashion: cream together butter, brown sugar, and regular sugar until smooth or fluffy or whatever adjective seems right to you. Beat in egg and molasses. Add dry ingredients gradually, beating together on the lowest setting and alternating flour with everything else. Wipe splattered dough off the counter, floor, and dog.

Give the underside of a mini muffin tin a spritz of cooking spray. With about a tablespoon of dough at a time, roll a ball, and pat down over the bottom (top?) and sides of the upside-down muffin cups. You will want the dough to be fairly evenly distributed and almost but not quite touching the underside of the top. Wow, words are hard. Here's a diagram:

(Art was never really my thing.)

Bake about 15 minutes, and upon removing them from the oven, immediately trim any excess that may have spilled over, giving you adjoined cups.

While the cookie/crust/thing is baking, make the ganache: place half the chocolate in a bowl, and heat the cream to a simmer. Remove from heat and pour over the chocolate. Stir to blend. Add more chocolate gradually until it has all been incorporated. Allow the ganache to cool.

While cookie/crust/thing and ganache are cooling, prepare the figs: place in a saucepan with the bourbon, honey, and ginger, and simmer until the liquid volume has reduced by half.

Assemble the tarts: Into each cookie/crust/thing, pour ganache most of the way up. Top each with a fig half, and pour the bourbon syrup over the tops.

Butterbeer!!!

Omg you guys. I got to escape this awful winter with a trip to Florida for a couple of days where we visited the Wizarding World of Harry Potter. Normally give me wilderness over crowded theme parks any day, but loving the books as I do, I really wanted to see what they did with it. I predict a series of posts in the not too distant future of replicates of (and improvements to) lots of the things we found there. But first, everyone's favorite: Butterbeer!

We're going to start out by making some butterscotch sauce and then use it as a base for all of the other things we're doing. Butterscotch disappoints me in the same way butterbeer does in that it doesn't actually contain scotch. According to the ever-reliable Wikipedia, "scotch" may have come from a word for "to score," given that butterscotch candies had to be cut in a very specific way, or from "scorch," which is what we do to the sugar. This sauce is rather addictive and you might just want to eat it and not bother with the rest. And that's completely okay. Butterscotch is basically the same thing as caramel with the only difference being that butterscotch is made with brown sugar, true caramel with white. Regardless of etymology, I put the "scotch" back in the butter. Cause that's what I do. Yeah.

Butterbeer (Butterscotch) Sauce Base:
4 TBS butter
1 cup brown sugar (light brown is preferable for the right color, but it doesn't matter)
1 TBS corn syrup
1/4 cup heavy cream
1 TBS vanilla extract
2 TBS scotch or bourbon (optional - and I would not recommend a blended whiskey)
pinch salt

In a medium, heavy-bottomed sauce pan or dutch oven, heat butter, sugar and corn syrup over medium heat until the butter melts, the sugar starts to liquefy, and you get a nice gloppy clump of artery clogging goo. Add the heavy cream. Boil for 2-3 minutes, stirring, until you get a bunch of foam and the mixture thickens. Remove from heat. Carefully and slowly add vanilla and whiskey - the low boiling point of alcohol will cause it to splash and splutter. Add the salt, and stir to combine. Allow to cool so you can taste it and add more vanilla, whiskey or salt to taste. Store leftovers in a mason jar in the fridge.

(Honestly you could probably get away with just using store bought butterscotch syrup, but... ew.)

Regular Butterbeer (This is ridiculously easy)
2-3 TBS butterbeer sauce depending on how sickeningly sweet you like your drinks
2 TBS water
1 cup cream soda
Shot of whiskey (optional)
Head foam (optional - see below)

Combine the sauce and water in a microwave safe cup and heat 10 seconds or until you can mix them together. Pour in cream soda and whiskey, add ice as desired. (If you have been to the WWoHP and own this souvenir mug, it is not microwave safe.) Top with head foam if desired (below).

Hot Butterbeer - Universal Orlando Style
I found this sickening. It came in a 12oz cup and between the two of us we couldn't finish it. If you like drinking heavy cream, this may suit you, however I thought it would be a nice accompaniment to a Hagrid-sized tankard of coffee.

1/4 cup butterbeer sauce
1 cup whole milk
Use a steamer to steam the milk. If you don't have a steamer, heat the milk in the microwave in tupperware, cover tightly, and shake the bejesus out of it. Pour over the butterscotch and stir.

Hot Butterbeer - my style
My style is modeled off a hot toddy. It's still way too sweet for my taste, but with optional whiskey, you can take the edge off so to speak.

2 TBS butterbeer sauce
3 oz water
1 oz the whiskey you used to make the sauce unless especially if serving to small children
1 TBS cream
4 oz room temperature cream soda
Put everything except the cream soda into a mug and microwave 30 seconds or so until nicely warm but nowhere near boiling. Add the cream soda. You can adjust the water:whiskey ratio if you like.

Butterbeer Ice Cream (use to make frozen butterbeer, or just eat on its own with butterbeer sauce)
Generous 1/2 cup  butterbeer sauce
1 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup milk
2 egg yolks

Combine sauce, cream and milk in a heavy bottomed sauce pan and simmer, stirring, till combined. Break your egg yolks into a container, beat them up a bit, then carefully pour in a little of the butterbeer cream at a time, whisking it into the egg yolks until you have incorporated all of the cream mixture. Pro tip: use a measuring pitcher or other container with a narrow opening, and pour the butterbeer cream through a funnel to avoid a hot creamy mess on your counter top! Once you have whisked it all together, return mixture to pan and simmer until thick and foamy, about 5 minutes. Transfer to a container, seal, and place in the fridge 4-6 hours or until very chilled. Follow directions as per your ice cream maker to freeze. Scoop it into a freezer-safe container and put in the freezer to harden.

*note: this will produce a hard-type ice cream. To make it more like soft serve, omit eggs, and change milk and cream to be 3/4 cup of each. I prefer the hard type, but WWoHP served it soft.

Frozen Butterbeer (My favorite of the ones WWoHP offered, and we got one for free at the Three Broomsticks! It was around closing time and their staff had just made a humongous batch.)

1/2 cup ice, crushed
1/2 cup butterbeer ice cream*
1 1/2 cups cream soda

Crush the ice in a blender, unless you have one of those fancy refrigerator ice crushers that does it for you. Then crush the ice into a blender. Add ice cream and a splash of the soda to help it go, and blend thoroughly. Add the rest of the cream soda and pulse a few times until it's all mixed up. Pour into mug and top with head foam if desired.

*If you do not have an ice cream maker or simply don't want to be bothered with making it, try to find plain butterscotch or caramel ice cream without chunks of anything in it. I would not recommend using vanilla ice cream and sauce as the sauce does not like to blend or mix with other things unless it is hot.

Optional head foam

This honestly doesn't have much function but can help give the illusion of beer and an impressive appearance if you are, in fact, trying to impress someone. 

1 TBS heavy or whipping cream

2 tsp cream soda, divided

Shake cream  and 1 tsp soda vigorously in a sealable tupperware container. Pour over butterbeer. Slowly pour a little more cream soda over the top. Dairy and carbonation make fizz, as anyone who has prepared a root beer float knows.

Butter Actual Beer (this is my kinda butter beer!)
1 scoop butterbeer ice cream
12 oz your favorite dark beer, preferably a stout or porter (I used a nice, bitter coffee porter - remember the thing about the hot butterbeer being good in coffee?)
Put them in a glass together and try not to get your whole head stuck in the mug as you lick out the bottom. Cheers!

Amaretto Brownies with Irish Cream Salted Caramel, Peanut Butter and Pretzels

I have not posted much lately due to illness, but I reward your patience with these quadruple-layer, everything-but-the-kitchen-sink brownies. These are the result of cold and snow. Yes, we bake in the winter as an activity to keep warm when the furnace seems to be struggling to do the same. You might even say the furnace feels under the weather! (Eyeroll)

In not being able to decide whether I wanted to bake something chocolatey, or peanut buttery, or something with caramel and/or pretzels, I said screw it, I'll take them all! Together! In one epic square of diabetes-inducing deliciousness! (Seriously, don't eat more than one of these at once.)

Also these look like a lot of work, but they are really pretty easy.

Amaretto Brownies:

2 oz unsweetened baking chocolate

1 stick butter (8 TBS or 1/2 cup)

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

1/2 cup amaretto

1/2 cup flour

Pinch salt

Preheat oven to 350 and grease an 8x8 pan. In a small saucepan over low heat, melt chocolate and sugar together, stirring, until all melted and combined. In a bowl, whisk together sugar, eggs and amaretto. Mix in the melted stuff, then slowly stir in flour and salt. Pour into pan and bake 35-40 minutes until toothpick comes out clean. Cool completely. (You can stick it in the fridge to speed this up.)

Caramel layer:

1/3 cup brown sugar

4 TBS butter (1/4 cup)

2 TBS Irish Cream Liqueur (or heavy cream works fine)

Coarse sea salt

Melt sugar and butter together on medium heat in a heavy saucepan, stirring constantly. Allow to come to a boil, cook another minute, stirring, and remove from heat. Stir in Irish cream. Allow to cool at room temperature (you want it pourable but not boiling).

When the brownies are cool, pour the caramel on top. It may not all fit - if not, stick them back in the fridge and let the caramel set. Pour the remaining caramel on top. Sprinkle with sea salt, and return to fridge to harden slightly.

Peanut butter frosting:

3/4 cup creamy peanut butter

6 TBS butter, softened

1/2 cup + powdered sugar

Use electric mixer to cream together butter and peanut butter. Gradually add sugar, about a quarter at a time, until you get the right consistency. When caramel is slightly firm, put frosting in a pastry bag with the widest nozzle you have. (I used a disposable bag and cut a large piece off the tip. And then stopped to pull my brain out of the gutter. If you have no pastry bags, you can use a ziplock bag, squeeze the frosting into a corner, and cut the tip off that.) Squeeze frosting around perimeter, and then make lines going up and down the middle of the brownies. Use a spatula to very gently join the lines of frosting together, making an even coat. You don't want to do this with a knife because that caramel isn't solid.

Pretzel layer:

Miniature pretzels. Put them on top. (This is the hardest part.)

These four flavors and textures go excellently together, but be warned: sugar overload!

Update! If you find yourself with a bunch of extras and the caramel hardens completely, you can re-goo the whole thing by sticking it in the microwave on 30% power for ten seconds, depending on your microwave. Take the pretzel off first. And you may need a spoon.