Has it Really been a month?

Has it seriously been over a month?

Hmm.
Okay- Well I'll leave you with these.
Maybe you'll still lurve me.

Whip It Up Week 8

Um.... It's week 8?

Already?
Does that mean that summer's over????
Shit.

Okay well this week's theme was "Make Your Own Take Out".
This recipe sort of follows the theme.
I love Chicken Piccatta, and I order it a lot.
So when I came across this recipe in this week's RR Menu Planner. I jumped on it!

Chicken Salad Piccatta- Rachel Ray

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 pounds small red potatoes, quartered
• 1/2 pound green beans, halved crosswise
• 1/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
• 2 tablespoons coarsely chopped capers
• 1/4 cup chopped flat-leaf parsley
• Grated peel and juice of 1/2 lemon
• Salt and pepper
• 1 large egg
• 1/4 cup flour
• Two 6-ounce skinless, boneless chicken breast halves, lightly pounded
• 1/4 cup chicken broth

Directions:

1. In a large saucepan, add the potatoes and enough salted water to cover by 1 inch. Bring to a boil and cook until almost tender, about 10 minutes. Using a slotted spoon, transfer to a colander. Add the green beans to the boiling water and cook, stirring, for 2 minutes. Drain in the colander with the potatoes; let cool slightly.

2. In a large bowl, whisk together 1/4 cup olive oil, 1 tablespoon capers, 3 tablespoons parsley, the lemon peel and half of the lemon juice. Add the potatoes and beans and toss; season with salt and pepper.

3. In a shallow bowl, beat the egg. In another shallow bowl, season the flour with salt and pepper. In a large nonstick skillet, heat the remaining 2 tablespoons olive oil over medium-high heat. Coat the chicken breasts with the seasoned flour, then dip in the egg, allowing any excess to drip off, and coat with the flour again, shaking off the excess. Add to the skillet and cook, turning once, until golden, about 8 minutes. Transfer to a cutting board and cut into strips.

4. Add the chicken broth to the skillet; cook over medium heat, scraping up any browned bits. Remove from the heat and stir in the remaining 1 tablespoon capers, 1 tablespoon parsley and lemon juice. Top the salad with the chicken and drizzle with the pan sauce.

This was super easy and really good.
It made a lot though, so I have been eating it for leftovers.
:)

WIU Week 7 Wrap Up: Your Favorite Chef!

What a week!
Sorry that this is a few days late everyone!
Tim and I finally made our triumphant move this Saturday and we're slowly getting settled.

This week's theme was a recipe from your favorite chef.
Let's see what this week's WIU-ers came up with.

Mains:

Megan made Giada's (and yes she IS a chef) Salmon Baked in Foil.
Julie blew me away with Jose Andre's Rice with mushrooms, cuttlefish and artichokes.
Kim tried out Rachel Ray's Spinach- Artichoke French Bread Pizza.
Brandi also chose a Rachel Ray pizza recipe: BBQ Chicken Pizza.
Jennifer is perfecting her Asian style cooking with Pei Mei's Stir Fry Beef with Green Onion.
Sherry used Abe and Erin's recipe for Chinese Dumplings.


Desserts:

I finally had an excuse to watch my boyfriend crush Gordon Ramsay and I whipped up his Rasberry Souffle.

Laura was inspired by her favorite food blog when she decided to try Green Tea Macarons with Passionfruit Buttercream Filling.

Julie M. loved her Paula Deen Orange Coffee Cake.

Erin K. whipped up Paula Deen's Key Lime Pie with Meringue Topping and tried her luck at re-creating her favorite restaurants Onion Strings.

Drinks:

Julianne sipped on Martha Stewart's Sangria.


Others

Meredith used all of her lovely tomatoes on a Gazpacho. SEND ME SOME!!

Carissa made Zucchini Cake for this week and Picka Picka Pico Salsa for Week 6.



Next week is Week 8 and our final week!
So go! And MAKE YOUR OWN TAKE OUT!

Week 7: Recipe from your Favorite Chef

My all time favorite chef, besides my mother of course, is the one and only Gordan Ramsay.
I love him.
Everything about him.
The way he swears. How angry he gets. Everything.
I guess that's why I came up with this week's theme. I have made a few of Gordon's recipes in the past. But I saw this one recently on his show The F Word... and I knew I had to try it.

Just to let you know- some of the conversions are weird... grams to whatever. But I have a scale, so I was able to convert grams to ounces. I was just too lazy to write them down... so you'll have to google them or something. Ha!

Othe than that, I changed almost everything else into US measurements. If I missed anything let me know.

Gordon Ramsay's Raspberry Souffle
Taken from The Channel 4 Website- The F Word Recipes

Serves 4
Ingredients

* 400 grams raspberries
* 2 tbsp cold water
* 100g superfine sugar
* 1 vanilla pod, split
* 1 quantity pastry cream
* 2 large egg whites
* Icing sugar to dust

For the pastry cream

* 3/4 cup milk
* 1 cup double cream
* 20g plain flour
* 15g cornflour
* 3 free range large egg yolks
* 40g superfine sugar
* 3-4 amaretto cookies
* 1 tablespoon Eau de Vie (fruit brandy)
* 80g fresh raspberries, lightly crushed

For the dishes

* 40g unsalted butter, melted
* 4-6 tbsp grated dark chocolate

Method: How to make raspberry soufflé

1. Pre-heat the oven to 375 degrees.

2. Brush 6 - 8 deep ramekins with a generous layer of melted butter, using upward strokes. Dust the insides either with the grated chocolate and chill to set.

3. For the crème patissière base, heat the milk and cream in a heavy-based saucepan until almost boiling. Sift the flour and cornflour together. Beat the egg yolks and sugar together in a large bowl, then mix in the flour. Add a splash of the hot creamy milk and whisk well until the mixture is smooth, then gradually whisk in the rest of the milk. Pour back into the pan and whisk over a medium-low heat for 3-5 minutes until thickened and smooth. Transfer to a bowl, cover and cool to room temperature, stirring occasionally to prevent a skin forming.

4. Put the raspberries in a saucepan with half the caster sugar, the vanilla pod and seeds and heat slowly, stirring until the sugar dissolves. Cover and simmer for about 5 minutes until the fruit has softened into a puree. Sieve the puree through a sieve, pushing it through with the back of a ladle. Discard the raspberry seeds and vanilla pod and leave the puree to cool. Mix the raspberry puree into the crème patissière.

5. Soak the crushed raspberries with the eau de vie. Place the amaretti biscuit in the bottom of the ramekin and scatter the raspberries round it.

6. Whisk the egg whites in a clean bowl to firm peaks, then gradually whisk in the 50g caster sugar a spoonful at a time to make a firm, glossy meringue. Whisk a third of the meringue into the crème patissière base, then very carefully fold in the rest, using a large metal spoon or spatula.

7. Divide the soufflé mix among the prepared dishes and tap them on the work surface to level the mixture. Smooth the tops with a palette knife, then run the knife around the edge (this helps the soufflé to rise evenly). Sit the ramekins on a wide baking tray and bake for 10-12 minutes until well risen and lightly golden on top. The soufflés should wobble gently in the middle when ready, dust with icing sugar and serve at once.


SOOOO GOOD!!!
And not too hard.
Seriously!

Whip It Up: Week 6 Appetizers

This week's theme is Appetizers...
How did you all choose what you wanted to make??
Seriously?
That's a pretty broad theme!

I decided to make one of my favorite appetizers: deviled eggs.
I absolutely love deviled eggs... but I have never tried to make them. I think I maybe tried once, and then decided to just make egg salad because it was easier. haha

Anyways here goes:
Curried Deviled Eggs
From Allrecipes.com

Ingredients:

• 12 eggs
• 1/4 cup mayonnaise
• 2 tablespoons prepared yellow mustard
• 1 tablespoon horseradish sauce
• 1 teaspoon curry powder
• 1/2 teaspoon poppy seeds
• 1/2 teaspoon chicken bouillon granules
• 1/4 teaspoon ground coriander
• 1/4 teaspoon dried minced onion
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/8 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1/8 teaspoon ground turmeric

Preparation:

1. Place eggs into a large saucepan in a single layer and fill with water to cover the eggs by 1 inch. Cover the saucepan and bring the water to a boil. Remove from heat and let the eggs stand in the hot water for 15 minutes. Drain the hot water; run cold water over the eggs to cool. Peel once cold.
2. Slice the eggs in half lengthwise; separate the whites and the yolks. Arrange the whites on a large platter; place the egg yolks in a large bowl. Mash the yolks with a fork until smooth; stir the mayonnaise, mustard, horseradish sauce, curry powder, poppy seeds, chicken bouillon granules, coriander, dried minced onion, salt, pepper, and turmeric into the mashed yolks until smooth. Chill the mixture in the refrigerator for 30 minutes.
3. Spoon the yolk mixture into a heavy plastic bag; snip a corner off the bag to create a 1/2-inch opening. Pipe the yolks into the egg white halves. Serve cold.

Um.
Holy hell these things were tasty.
Originally the recipe called for 24 eggs... but I halved it considering it was just Tim and I at home.. and um well I didn't want to have to eat 24 eggs. It was pretty easy considering all the prep and separating whites and yolks...

I will definitely be making these again!

Happy Week 6!!