best of 2011 | best eats

So the real reason I made those cooking collages each month was because at the end of the year I wanted to do this:

Our year, in food. 136 new recipes tried. BAM! It was a difficult task to narrow it down to just ten eleven favorites!

Best Recipes of 2011 (clearly, we're not vegetarians):

SPICY APRICOT WINGS
This was our most frequently made recipe of the year.


LAMB LOLLIPOPS WITH MUSTARD SAUCE
Technically, this was a 2010 recipe since we made it for New Year's Eve last year. But it was so good that we made it again. And again. And I thought I didn't like lamb!


KOREAN FRIED CHICKEN
OMG. These are messy. And awesome. They turned me into a gnawing-meat-off-the-bone carnivore.


CHICKEN TAGINE WITH APRICOTS AND ALMONDS
Our first international meal and first experience cooking Moroccan food. We're hooked.


PORK MEATBALL BANH MI SANDWICHES
Damn, these things are SPICY. Too spicy for Larry, but definitely one of my favorite recipes of the year.


GRILLED TURKEY BURGERS WITH CHEDDAR AND SMOKY AIOLI
This is our new favorite burger recipe. You'll never want a beef burger again.


CHIPOTLE KETCHUP
I ate this more than any other food this year. I put it on burgers, french fries, latkes, EVERYTHING. I haven't eaten Heinz in months and don't plan on ever going back to regular ketchup.


CATALAN FISH STEW WITH PIMENTON MAYONNAISE
Fish stew? Topped with mayonnaise?! Trust me, it's delish.

CHORIZO AND POTATO TACOS WITH AVOCADO AND TOMATILLO SALSA

Easy and delicious! Rick Bayless will never steer you wrong.

CHICKEN GOULASH WITH BISCUIT DUMPLINGS
Spicy, loaded with paprika, awesome.


JACQUES TORRES CHOCOLATE CHIP COOKIES
These are ridiculous.

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Most of our food experiences are focused on cooking at home, but we do love to go out to eat, whether it's searching for the best donut, tasting wines, grabbing a bite and a beer at our favorite local dive, or having a fancy meal out for a special occasion.

Our favorites of the year:

Best Burger | Burger Tap & Shake (Washington, DC)

Best Cheese | anything from Red White & Bleu (Falls Church, VA) 

Best for Fresh & Local | Falls Church Farmers Market (Falls Church, VA)

Best Restaurant Meal | Volt (Frederick, MD)

Best Scenery | Blue Mountain Brewery (Afton, VA)

Best Mac and Cheese | Cheesetique (Alexandria, VA)

Best Store Bought Cake | Wegmans Coconut Cake

Most Explosive Dessert | Celebration Cake at Central - it has a Roman Candle in it! (Washington, DC)

Best Food Festival | Truckeroo (Washington, DC)

Best Place to Stuff Your Face | The Apple House (Linden, VA)

Best Neighborhood Restaurant | Sea Pearl (Falls Church, VA)

Best Wine | Corcoran Vineyards (Waterford, VA)

Whew! I'm stuffed. Due to the aforementioned recipes and restaurants, Larry and I are each looking to lose 20+ pounds this year, so our focus in 2012 is healthy and low-cal. We're off to a good start, but I'm already missing bread and desserts...

delightful december!

The last cooking collage! I'm so glad to retire this series, because it was a real pain in the butt to assemble these collages every month. And I'm sure that Larry will be glad to be able to eat his food without it being photographed first! That being said, it is interesting (to me) to have documented what we cooked and ate throughout the year.

There wasn't a whole lot of cooking going on in December - I can't even remember what we ate during the first two weeks of the month, as I was so busy getting ready for two art markets. But once the holiday markets were over, it was time to indulge in ridiculous amounts of chocolate: Berger cookies (a Baltimore treat that a friend brought for my birthday), hot chocolate on a stick, Gardeners chocolates (my favorite - Larry's parents give me some every year!), and the last new recipe of the year: Mascarpone Brownies.

We hosted Christmas Eve dinner at our house - a non-traditional and multi-holiday meal of comfort foods: Mac & Cheese, Spicy Apricot Wings, and Latkes for Hanukkah (made by my brother's girlfriend), followed by a ridiculous amount of Christmas cookies. My favorite Christmas cookie recipe of 2011: Lofthouse-Style Soft Frosted Sugar Cookies (a copycat recipe of the grocery store "pink cookies").

The other food frequently consumed in December? Alcohol. After making a wine run to Red, White, and Bleu, touring three wineries on my birthday (and bringing home 8 bottles), being gifted a case of wine for Christmas, along with several other bottles being given to us by family and friends, we discovered we were in possession of 36 bottles of wine. I'm not complaining.

What we were eating and cooking this month: cookies, chocolate, wine, and comfort foods. (What else do you need?) The diet starts January 1st or whenever the cookies are gone!

satisfying november!

Ah, November! Full of hearty comfort food. Thanksgiving. Family recipes. The time to put your diet on hold and indulge for the holidays...

And we did just that! We had a lovely Thanksgiving - highlights included my grandmother's now famous recipe for Cranberry Jell-o Mold (no Thanksgiving is complete without it), my mom's amazing pies, and my aunt's fabulous recipe for Maple Whipped Sweet Potatoes with Hazelnut Butter. (Nut Butter...almost as funny as Sticky Nuts and equally delicious!)  I think this is the recipe, but I'll have to verify with my aunt. Everyone in my family agrees that the traditional recipe for sweet potatoes with marshmallows is gross - but sweet potatoes with nut butter? Awesome!

It was also a month for cake, as we celebrated another friend's 40th birthday. This called for another family recipe - carrot cake, a recipe that has been in my family for probably 30 years and is hands-down the best carrot cake on earth. It's so good that it has now become a tradition within my group of friends, too!

And it was also a month to break out the hot chocolate - something I drink nearly every morning. I've been on a quest to find the perfect hot chocolate mix - one that doesn't contain chemicals and is sinfully delicious. The hot chocolate from Penzey's is pretty good, especially if you add a handful of crushed candy canes.

What we were eating and cooking this month: Thanksgiving foods, cheese, cake, and my morning dose of hot chocolate.

scrumptious october!

Whoah, yum! October was good. Very good. We did a lot of cooking and a lot of eating out. Basically, it was a month of stuffing our faces. Fresh ingredients (from the apple orchard and the Farmers Market), meals out (date night at Graffiato, sandwiches at Cowgirl Creamery, a bloggers' brunch at Kramerbooks) and some delicious junk (treats at The Apple House, dinner at Truckeroo). It was a food-filled month punctuated by a Halloween meal of Chicken Goulash with Biscuit Dumplings and a fist-full of Halloween candy.

In addition to baking lots of apple desserts, I also discovered The BEST chocolate chip cookie recipe. Now before I go on, I should confess something: I don't actually like chocolate chip cookies. I know, I know, that's un-American, or perhaps even un-human. And that's not to say that I dislike them enough to not eat them (they are cookies after all!), but the chocolate chip cookie is my last choice cookie. I'd choose a sugar cookie or a peanut butter cookie over a chocolate chip any day. (The exception to this is the dough - I love chocolate chip cookie dough. So much better than the actual cookie.)

So you have to believe me when I tell you that these cookies are phenomenal. To the point of me hoarding them. And considering punching someone in the face if they were to take the last cookie...

The recipe is from A Tender Crumb and is a variation of Jacques Torres' (aka Mr. Chocolate) famous chocolate chip cookie recipe. (I had bookmarked the original recipe years ago and didn't realize I was making a translation of Jacques' recipe until the cookies were already in the oven.) Anyway, these cookies are awesome. Most cookies taste best warm and straight from the oven, but these cookies actually taste even better once they've cooled down. And even better the next day - the centers are chewy and gooey with chocolate (you will end up with chocolate all over your face when eating these - no matter what your age) and the edges are delicately crisp. Perfection.


A few things to consider if you make this recipe:

• The Tender Crumb recipe is actually a doubled version of Jacques' recipe. It makes a boatload of dough. The dough is very thick and it almost busted my mixer and overflowed the bowl. I suggest using a powerful mixer and a big ass bowl.
• Holy chocolate, batman! This recipe uses a lot of freaking chocolate. TWO pounds to be exact. (Use broken up chocolate bars, not chips.) That will run you about $25. Yes. There is $25 worth of chocolate in this recipe. It's insane. And totally worth it.
• The Tender Crumb recipe omits this step, but I suggest sifting the dry ingredients together. The dough was so thick that I feared I wasn't getting all the ingredients thoroughly incorporated without sifting first.
• Yes, you do have to use both bread flour and pastry flour. Do not substitute all-purpose flour. The texture of these cookies relies on the fancy flours.
• Make big cookies! Bigger is better. I used golf-ball sized balls of dough and it yielded about forty 5" cookies. (Your results may vary if your willpower to not eat the raw dough is stronger than mine!) I got perfect results when they were baked for 16 minutes.
• Because of the aforementioned boatload of dough, I rolled all the dough into balls and put the extras in the freezer. (And then I put an alarm on the freezer should anyone try to steal my precious dough! It's mine! All miiiiiiiiiiine!) This way you can bake 6-8 cookies at a time and have pre-rolled balls of dough in the freezer ready to pop in the oven next time you have a cookie craving.

See you in my belly, cookies!

(Now back away from my cookies and make your own!)

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What we were eating and cooking this month: apples and cookies (what else do you need?)

*This post brought to you by a big bottle of something from the liquor store - which I am headed out to get right now since my computer crashed and deleted this post multiple times. Cheers!

savory september!

I don't know about you, but I can't believe September is over already. I'm still stuck in August!

And after cooking 26 new recipes in August, I really slacked off in September. We ate sandwiches (including a second go-round of last month's favorite sandwich: Prosciutto and Brie Sandwiches with Rosemary-Fig Confit) and pretzels a lot. We ordered pizza and ate out - including a crab feast at The Crab Claw in St. Michaels, dinner with Sarah at Four Sisters, brunch with bloggers at Le Pain Quotidien, and some hilariously named dinner entrees at Present. (Larry had a dish called "Hard Working Piglet".)

Due to nearly a month straight of rain, we ate a lot of comfort foods this month - including our favorite vegetarian chili recipe (adapted from this fabulous recipe on Epicurious), fish tacos, more wings, and I invented my own mac & cheese recipe. I've written before how I've been searching for years for the perfect mac & cheese recipe, so I decided to just make my own - and it was really really good. Unfortunately, I didn't measure anything, just threw things into the pot, but it included cheddar, swiss, parmesan, lots and lots of Smoked Spanish Paprika, and a sesame seed topping. I also tried a recipe for Snickerdoodle Cupcakes which was unimpressive.

Backyard basil jungle.

I was sad that I didn't do a vegetable garden this year and my herb garden got annihilated by the heat this summer. However, September's rain brought my basil back to life and created a basil jungle - so I redeemed my brown thumb by whipping up a batch of pesto which I froze in an ice cube tray for individual servings to use throughout the winter.

What we were eating and cooking this month: comfort food and seafood.

ambitious august!

No wonder August flew by so fast - I spent most of it in the kitchen!

Last July, I went on a cooking spree and tried out 24 new recipes. So this August, when I realized I was nearing my previous record, I knew I had to beat it  - even if it meant laboring over an Indian feast that didn't make it to the table until 10 pm the day before we were to leave on our West Virginia trip. Was I exhausted? Yes. Did I beat my previous record? You bet - the new number to beat is 26:

 1.  Cornmeal and Ricotta Waffles
 2.  Baptist Church Fried Chicken
 3.  Chipotle Ketchup
 4.  Steak Fries
 5.  Tomato Pie
 6.  Lamb Sfeehas
 7.  Cheese Beoreg
 8.  Raspberry Clafoutis
 9.  Sweet Potato Fries
10. Blackberry Compote (for pork)
11. Fried Pies (both raspberry and blackberry)
12. Raspberry Buckle
13. Peaches and Cream Galette
14. Biscuit Bread
15. Kickin' Chipotle Fried Chicken Tenders
16. Peach Donkey
17. Spice-Rubbed Chicken and Vegetable Tacos with Chipotle Sour Cream
18. Raspberry-Banana Bread and Chocolate Chip Raspberry-Banana Bread
19. Hummus
20. Dukkah-Crusted Lamb Chops with Pomegranate Molasses
21. Egyptian Koshary
22. Prosciutto and Brie Sandwiches with Rosemary-Fig Confit
23. Blueberry Buttermilk Tart
24. Curried Lamb Samosas
25. Apricot Chutney
26. Rava Dosas with Potato Chickpea Masala

Whew! What a delicious month. (For the record I'm sitting September out and surviving on oatmeal and pretzels.)

Pies, pies, pies! Both savory and sweet:

Tomato Pie (topped with a runny egg for breakfast).

Peaches and Cream Galette.

What we were eating and cooking this month: fried food (the love affair continues) - especially fried chicken, breakfast for dinner, fruit - especially fresh-picked berries, pies, fancy cheeses, and lots of ethnic foods, including Lebanese, Egyptian, and Indian meals.

sweet july!

August is nearly over...so...here's what we ate in July...

Fresh produce, but certainly not as much as last July. We missed out on blueberry season this year, but made up for it with strawberries (made into homemade gelato and ugly cake), and wineberries, picked in the woods during our vacation at Luminhaus. Rainier cherries. Mini cantaloupes from the Farmers' Market. Summer squash - transformed into grilled white pizza, and zucchini from Mom's garden - transformed into Chocolate Zucchini Bread and Mario Batali's fantastic Fried Zucchini-Ricotta Fritters.

July also began my obsession with anything Cookies & Cream and our foray into frying and fritters - in addition to the zuke fritters, I made some awesome ricotta fritters. This month's bread was Grilled Naan, to go along with an Indian-inspired meal and some delicious Tandoori Chicken Sandwiches with Mint Mayonnaise. We had a fantastic meal of Pork Tenderloin with Tomato-Peach Compote and Carmelized Onion and Goat Cheese Cornbread after a day in the sunflower fields. We also tried a recipe for Tomato Lemonade. This was not a winner. (I think I'll stick with Strawberry and Peach Lemonade from now on!) And we can't forget the microbrews at Blue Mountain Brewery!

What we were eating and cooking this month: Fruits, vegetables, sweets, fried food, and microbrews.

delectable june!

Whoah. June was a month full of celebrations, delicious food, and adventurous eating.

In June I tasted sweetbreads at VOLT and frog's legs at Central. Both were delicious. (Neither tasted like chicken.)

In June we had a cake with a Roman Candle in it. Awesome.

In addition to the delicious restaurant dining, we also made some killer recipes. These three are definitely going to be on our list of top recipes in 2011:

• Pork Meatball Banh Mi Sandwiches (Holy hell, these were awesome. I didn't even use the jalapeno, and we were still sweating by the end of this meal.)
• Spicy Apricot Wings* (This was the second time we made this recipe in a week - it's that good. We first made it during our beach trip to the Outer Banks in May, and then we made it again after we got home.)
• Grilled Chicken Moroccan Style + Vegetable Barley Couscous (I altered this recipe so much that it's silly to link to the original, but the combo of spices - no matter what vegetables or type of couscous you use, is delicious!)

*I've never liked wings until recently (perhaps my problem is with buffalo sauce?), but now that I've discovered Korean Fried Wings and Spicy Apricot Wings, I've awakened my inner carnivore. Larry laughs and laughs as I morph into a voracious wing-eating animal vigorously ripping flesh with my teeth until there's nothing left but a pile of bones. I just can't help myself. GrrrROAR!

We also loved this Rhubarb and Raspberry Roly-Poly with Vanilla Custard Sauce. I just love the silly names the English give to their desserts. Just imagine Larry and I attempting a British accent while contemplating the invention of the roly-poly:

Larry: I know! We'll take a biscuit**, cover it with jaaaaaaaam, and then pour some custard on top!
Me: And we'll call it a Roly. Poly.

**The cake-like portion of the dessert tastes like an American biscuit, not an English biscuit (which is actually a cookie). Also, the Americanized version of this recipe uses butter instead of the traditional suet. Several reasons for this: 1) Who wants beef fat, or worse, mutton fat in their dessert?! (Answer: evidently the English) and 2) The only suet you can get in this country is covered with birdseed.

What we were eating and cooking this month: adventurous restaurant food and celebratory cakes, more strawberries, and flavorful and spicy meat.

marvelous may!

So, it's mid-June, and I'm just now coming off of May's sugar high...

May flew by and we ate quite a few store-bought treats - the world's biggest flan, crullers from our local hole-in-the-wall bakery, the new JUMBO MARSHMALLOWS (roasted both over our fire pit at home and over a bonfire on the beach). Have you seen JUMBO MARSHMALLOWS at your local grocery store? If you do see them, I recommend running the other way as fast as possible, unless you're trying to contract diabetes.

I've also been pigging out on strawberries. Every year I'm shocked by how quickly the strawberry season seems to fly by, so I'm trying to stuff my face with as many berries as possible before the end of June. They were awesome in Strawberry Shortcake Cookies (which are more like a breakfast cookie or scone) and on top of Smitten Kitchen's German Pancakes.

Oh and guess who else loves strawberries? Gravy. Sneaky beast has been raiding my strawberry patch. Here's how many homegrown strawberries we've eaten: Me - 1. Gravy - all the rest.

We took our annual trip to the Outer Banks over Memorial Day (see photos of White Peach Sangria, Duck Donuts, and hot dogs for lunch!) which has become rather competitive at meal times over the past few years. We go with a big group of friends and alternate cooking each night and each year the recipes we try get more and more difficult and the meals more elaborate and delicious. Unfortunately, I didn't photograph any of these fabulous dinners, but our friends made things such as pork tenderloin with cherry-jalapeno salsa, roasted corn soup, shrimp & guacamole appetizers, several types of fancy quesadillas stuffed with goat cheese and chorizo, and white chocolate cherry mousse pie.

On our night to cook, Larry and I totally copped out and made our favorite Grilled Turkey Burgers with Cheddar and Smoky Aioli. But Larry was also dying to try a new wing recipe, so he made Spicy Apricot Wings and they were killer. (In fact, they were so good, that as soon as we got back from the beach we made them again for ourselves and scarfed down 20 wings between the two of us.) I also made Blueberry Boy Bait for dessert which I loved. I'll definitely be making it again this summer.

What we were eating and cooking this month: sweets, strawberries, beach food, and a Spanish feast for our international meal of the month. Oh, and donuts. Have I mentioned I love donuts?

ambrosial april!

Ambrosial? Clearly, I'm running out of adjectives that are synonyms for "delicious".

Anyway, here's how we can summarize our eating habits in April (sing to the tune of Duck Duck Goose): Carb Carb Carb Carb...Salad!

Seriously, if making these food collages each month does one thing, it's highlight the shortcomings in our diet. Hi, I'm Rachel and I'm a carboholic. I say it every month, but look: puff pastry, pizza crust, fried chicken breading, hot dog buns, tart crust, quiche crust, bread, SALAD (but with croutons...and also cheese. And bacon bits.), pasta, more quiche crust, buns, cake! Oops. But it was good, oh so good. And I managed to make both an international meal (England/Ireland) and a bread of the month (Hot Cross Buns).

Now that the weather is finally getting nice, we're out on the patio and using our grill once again! Hallelujah! Mostly just burgers and dogs and our favorite - grilled pizza, but I'm looking forward to more and more grilled meals and evenings on the patio drinking wine and hanging out by the fire.

Our best meal this month was hands down the night we invited a few friends over to watch the game and for some reason decided to make an Asian-themed meal. It was a hare-brained and last minute idea. (Luckily, our friends are very patient with our culinary experiments and don't complain when the food prep takes ten times as long as anticipated or we wreck our kitchen in the process and end up eating at the counter among a pile of dirty dishes at 10 pm when the food is finally done!) Larry and I both love Asian food and have a cabinet full of exotic oils and pastes from our occasional attempts to cook it, but our previous attempts usually taste rather Americanized and not at all like what you would get at a Thai/Chinese/Vietnamese/Japanese restaurant. Larry made twice-fried Korean Fried Chicken which was an extra challenge since we rarely fry food for several reasons:

1. It is unhealthy.
2. It is scary.
3. It uses and wastes an ungodly amount of oil.

But Larry knocked this fried chicken out of the park. The secrets? Use a thermometer to regulate the temperature of the oil. Use a large deep pot. Don't skimp on the oil. Fry the chicken twice - this makes it extra crispy and totally awesome. After frying, the chicken is then tossed in a sauce made from gojujang, a spicy Korean chile paste. Seriously, I am not usually a fan of fried chicken or of gnawing meat off the bone, but this recipe blew my mind and my tastebuds. A top ten recipe for sure.

My contribution to the night was Spinach and Pork Wontons, which were surprisingly easy to make and fun to fold. And also delicious. I am now a little obsessed with wontons (I want to fry them next) and am on the lookout for more recipes.

And see that pic in the bottom right corner? That is flourless chocolate cake with BOURBON ice cream (which may be one of the most awesome things ever!) - both made by one of our friends. Luckily for us he left us the leftovers. The next day I topped it with strawberries and promptly fell over in diabetic shock. Sinfully delicious!

What we were eating and cooking this month: burgers/hot dogs/pizza on the grill, carbs, English/Irish food, Asian food, bread, and since no month is complete without trying at least one recipe from Smitten Kitchen, this Cauliflower and Carmelized Onion Tart.

What Larry was eating this month: Pie.

(In his defense, if there were ever a pie truck in my general vicinity during lunch time, I too would have two pieces of pie for lunch. Alas, we don't have food trucks out here in the suburbs.)

mouthwatering march!

Well, looky here...carbs, cheese, and alcohol...yup, that pretty much sums up what we consumed in March. Because I was out of commission most of the month due to my headaches (which are now in remission - yay!), I didn't do much cooking, and when I did cook, I wanted comfort foods! I also didn't drink at all for the first three weeks of March because alcohol triggers the headaches. But! We more than made up for that during the last few days of the month when Sara was in town - we spent a fantastic Sunday afternoon draining our wine rack and feasting on cheese.

I was obsessed with making biscuits this month - I tried several different recipes and highly recommend Orangette's Cream Biscuits. I also continued my quest for The Perfect Mac and Cheese Recipe. Food & Wine's recent recipe for Stovetop Mac & Cheese with Cheese Crisps (or as it turned out for me, "Burnt Cheese Leather") was very good...but still not perfection. I also made hamburger buns from scratch, and found a fantastic turkey burger recipe. And Bobby Flay does it again - his recipe for Chile-Honey Glazed Salmon with Black Bean Sauce and Jalapeno Crema was delicious!

But the best thing I ate this month, I didn't even make...it was Sara's Crawfish Pies. Seriously, phenomenal! And after witnessing how much work they are to make, I'm so glad she was in town to make them for me! Thanks, Sara!

What we were eating and cooking this month: Comfort foods - biscuits, mac and cheese, cookies, pasta, cupcakes (from a bakery), crawfish pies. And wine, lots of wine.

P.S. Wondering if anyone will comment that the cupcake pic looks like a boob before Larry does...

flavorful february!

Despite the fact that Larry was out of the country for half the month, and the other half I survived on a steady diet of Oreos, February ended up being a delicious and flavorful month. Due to our aforementioned busy schedules, I failed to cook our monthly international meal or a loaf of bread, but I hope to tackle those goals this weekend.

When Larry's away, I tend to take the opportunity to eat things he doesn't like: namely, chocolate pudding, curry, and broccoli. It's a strange collection of things that Larry doesn't like, and the chocolate pudding thing is just plain weird. Although, I'm probably weird for being excited about the prospect of eating broccoli! So while Larry was feasting on beef tongue (gaaaahhhh - go read my About Me section for my thoughts about this) and mutton (or as he calls it, old sheep) in Tajikistan, I was eating a mostly vegetarian diet while he was away (the exception being the bacon sprinkled on my broccoli, corn, and potato soup). I made egg curry - inspired by reading Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri and was on a pretty big Mexican kick this month. I made Mushroom, Rajas, and Corn Tacos with Queso Fresco and Salsa Quemada - aka Burnt Salsa - a recipe that starts with the instruction to "Make sure your kitchen is well-ventilated". This was good advice, because it turns out intentionally burning tomatoes is quite smelly. I was well-prepared for this endeavor though - not only was my kitchen ventilated, but I had this within arm's reach (which is especially important if you've disconnected your smoke detector):

Larry and I also made Chorizo + Potato Tacos with Avocado + Tomatillo Salsa. According to the website I got the recipe from, this was a Rick Bayless recipe. He does have a similar recipe in Mexican Everyday, but that recipe uses mushrooms and isn't quite the same, so we'll call it Rick Bayless-inspired. We'll also call it freaking delicious and super easy. Yum. Rick wasn't the only celebrity chef who's recipes we sampled this month - we also made Nate Appleman's Pork Loin Spiedino with Pine Nut, Garlic and Currant Cranberry Soffritto from the A16 cookbook. (I'll admit, after watching him on The Next Iron Chef, I do agree that he's a dick - also, is it true that he works at Chipotle now???)

Also, Larry made Ina Garten's Sour Cream Coffee Cake, but that is a (hilarious) story for another time.

And I promise to post the valentine cookie recipe soon - hopefully on Vicious Dishes later today, since I have gotten several requests.

What we (mostly I) were/was eating and cooking this month: vegetarian, Mexican - several types of tacos and homemade salsa, COOKIES, hot chocolate (it was a cold month!), and several recipes from celebrity chefs.

tasty january!

This month, Larry really picked up the slack in the kitchen (it seems I can either be creative with my art or my cooking - but not both at the same time! If it weren't for Larry I would've survived on cereal, cookies, and cheese this month). He cooked all sorts of comfort foods - homemade chicken noodle soup, white chili, meatball subs...perfect meals for a month that I'd prefer to hibernate through. By the end of the month I had rediscovered my cooking mojo and cooked up some comfort foods of my own, like Smitten Kitchen's Vanilla Bean Pudding (which I had been promising Larry for weeks).

I attempted donuts (on my list of things to make for the year) - I didn't have high expectations for baked donuts (a proper donut really does need to be fried), and as expected, I was disappointed as they tasted like donut-shaped corn muffins. In the successes column, we found a simple recipe for chicken breasts that actually has flavor: Herbed Balsamic Chicken with Blue Cheese. I also accomplished two Culinary Resolutions - cooking our first international meal and baking my first loaf of bread of the year.

What we were eating and cooking this month: comfort foods - soups, chili, sandwiches and homemade pudding, lots of cheese, store-bought cookies and sweets (yikes!), olives, chicken, and a Moroccan feast. 

gluttonous december!

We finished up 2010 with a total of 113 new recipes for the year! And like most Decembers, this one was full of carbs and sweets. It also appears we were into red and purple foods this month.

What we were eating and cooking this month: cookies, cookies, cookies, I ate my weight in cookies and found a new favorite Christmas cookie recipe. I cooked dirt beets for the first time, even though I cheated and hid them in a cake. We had a few snowy days, so we broke out Larry's famous Blizzard Chili (which we first concocted during Snowmageddon last February). I made this Creamed Haricot Vert and Corn Casserole twice. We busted into the homemade blueberry freezer jam for a taste of summer (made from the blueberries we picked in July). I tried out my new pizza stone for the first time. And we enjoyed lots of wine, cheese, and international foods on the last day of the year.

Here's to a delicious 2011!

P.S. See all the monthly cooking collages here.

gratifying november!

I got back in the cooking saddle this month - not only did I try 12 new recipes in November (without cooking Thanksgiving dinner - my newly retired mother tackled the whole meal on her own), but I hit my 100th new recipe for the year. (Yes, I keep track. This should surprise no one, given my obsession with list-making!)

It appears it was another month of beige (and orange!) food, but what can I say - beige food can be delicious! Despite the seeming lack of green, we did eat a lot of vegetables this month - parsnips and carrots and peppers - and I tried a lot of vegetarian recipes from my Moosewood Restaurant Cooking for Health cookbook.

I was obsessed with making soups this month - mostly because I always seem to have problems making soup - I can't ever seem to find a good recipe.  The Curried Pepper Soup was good - but only when served over rice, and the Latin Corn Soup was foul, so I guess I'll keep looking.

What we were eating and cooking this month: preparing for winter with some one dish comfort foods - mushroom lasagna (which I actually posted on Vicious Dishes) and the beef pot pie that as mentioned before, was so delicious it appeared in my dreams. Vegetarian dishes - soups, pizza, and black bean confetti salad. Chicken Meatballs. Roasted pumpkin seeds. Larry was out of town so that meant making chocolate pudding from scratch (Larry doesn't like chocolate pudding and yes, I think that's weird). And although I didn't make it from scratch, I finally found a delicious grocery store olive hummus and have rekindled my love for my favorite snack - hummus and pita bread - I eat it on a near daily basis. And the grand finale - cheese-filled pumpkin bread - oh yes!

on-the-road october!

Just when I thought I couldn't eat any less healthily or do any less cooking than I did in September, I went and showed myself up with the month of October. My culinary explorations have really gone downhill since I tried 24 new recipes in July. I had to scrounge to get 12 food-related photos this month, and of the 12, the only home-cooked dishes were the mushroom quiche and the mac and cheese. The apple cake, though delicious, was made by my mother. The pumpkin was actually the makings of a jack-o-lantern (though I did roast and eat the pumpkin seeds the next day). And I have not one, but two, photos of cheap beer (camping necessities!).

I have a good reason for this lack of cooking though - ten days in an RV doesn't lead to culinary masterpieces. And I didn't even think to take photos of what we were eating on our adventure (besides the Spaghetti-Os on the RV stove), but it was simple and satisfying after long days of exploring the national parks out west with our best of friends. As for the rest of the month (not spent in an RV) - those days were spent preparing and recovering from the trip, so again, not a lot of homecooking going on. Oh well, there's always next month!

What we were eating and cooking this month: RV food - instant oatmeal and hot chocolate packets, meat on the grill, Spaghetti-Os, pink cookies, cereal bars, fruit, lunchmeat and cheese sandwiches. Navajo fry bread in Arizona. Fall food - kettle corn and corn dogs.

simple september!

So in September we ate a lot of easy comfort food...and evidently a lot of beige. Seriously, did we eat any vegetables because the only green I'm seeing is perhaps a speck of chive in the egg salad! It is interesting to see how the colors of the foods we eat change throughout the year - there is definitely evidence of garden and farmers market produce in the August collage...but September was all about quick and easy meals - we were busy and seemed to survive on a lot of peanut butter sandwiches, cold cereal, pizza delivery and even some fast food (Chick-Fil-A during a road trip!).

There were some highlights though - we took our annual trip to the beach and everyone took turns making dinners - which was delicious - lots of fresh fish and cooking over open flame - unfortunately, I didn't take pictures of the food while we were on vacation. We also discovered an amazing donut shop - Duck Donuts - while not so healthy, it was a delicious breakfast treat (and I confess, donuts are one of my guilty pleasures).

What we were eating and cooking this month: comfort foods - pizza, hot dogs, egg salad, chicken and dumplings, even mac & cheese from a box; Chick-Fil-A; fresh fish, including several iterations of fish tacos, pickled onions (for the fish tacos - surprisingly delicious, and this is coming from someone who hated onions for the first 25 years of my life!), beer & cocktails, and lots of pie. This Peanut Butter Banana Cream Pie is the most addictive and evil thing I have tasted lately - and I don't even like bananas. I hope to post the recipe on Vicious Dishes at some point, but I made the crust out of Nutter Butters instead of vanilla wafers - and it was completely delicious, but I need to make it again to get the consistency just right.

appetizing august!

I loved the food photo collage from July so much that I've decided to make one every month to showcase what we've been cooking recently.

I definitely took a break from cooking as much as I did last month, but we still ate pretty well and tried 11 new recipes in August.

What we were eating and cooking this month: pulled BBQ pork (in Larry's new smoker) and then pescetarian for the rest of the month, so lots of fish (tuna and salmon); a lot of carbs, unfortunately - pasta/mac & cheese, bread, potato salad; poblano peppers that burned my fingers; plums of various colors and sizes; I tasted a pluot for the first time; and lots of cake! Yum! 

Recipes on Vicious Dishes:

• Summer Salmon Cakes
• Italian Cream Cake
• Chipotle Mac & Cheese
• Irish Car Bomb Cake

delicious july!

We ate well in July - lots of treats from the farmers' market, blueberry picking, a few homegrown zucchini, and I tried a record-breaking 24 new recipes!

What we were eating & cooking this month: corn on the cob, zucchini, tomatoes, lemonade, grilled (and smoked!) meat, and lots of blueberries.

Recipes on Vicious Dishes:

• Squash Pie
• Buttermilk Zucchini Bread
• Blueberry-Maple Parfaits
• Peach Lemonade
• Blueberry Galette
• Bleu Cheese and Red Potato Tart