Eat: NYC Dining

Brunch at The Grey Dog (Chelsea/Meatpacking District) - salad of avocado, smoked salmon, and poached eggs on arugula was yummy; kids loved the dog bone shaped pancakes. We ended up getting another order to satisfy them. The chicken soup with meatballs was a tad salty but otherwise good. Alas, as with nearly every meal in NYC, it was pricey.

Broadway Bites at Greely Square

Broadway Bites at Greely Square - awesome seasonal pop-up in a park-like setting. I enjoyed the Connecticut lobster roll from Red Hook Lobster Pound. Gua bao from Kaya was decent but doesn't compare to the ones back home in Taipei. Jicama California Street Food - kids enjoyed the watermelon agua fresca (I liked that it wasn't too sweet), taco was decent, and the tamale was a little disappointing (too mushy). But an excellent different experience just minutes from our hotel.

Baked Pacherri Pasta Stuffed with Ricotta Mushroom Filling

This was an experiment as I had a lot of enoki mushrooms and ricotta to use up. I sautéed chopped enoki mushrooms with some garlic, and then folded it into ricotta. I stood the Pacherri on end in a casserole, put the filling into a plastic bag and piped it into the tubes, then covered the whole in bottled pasta sauce and sprinkled with cheese. I baked it in an oven for 45 minutes. Next time I'll actually pre-cook the pasta before as it came out very chewy, but it wasn't bad.

KAF Easy Cheesecake with Thermapen

Mr. Nomad Foodie gave me a Thermapen recently. Tonight I made King Arthur's Easy Cheesecake - it's been awhile since I've made it, and I wasn't paying close attention as I was cleaning up the kitchen. The cheesecake is clearly too brown, and the thermometer bears witness: the pie registered at 190°F when I took it out, 20°F higher than it should be. Tomorrow I'll know for sure how it's affected the texture.

Travel Update

The world (23 countries; 25 if you count Hong Kong and Macau separately, 10% of the world):
create your own visited country map

The United States (29 states, 56%):
create your own personalized map of the USA

Canada (3 states, 23%):

create your own personalized map of Canada

Hot-smoked salmon with dill pasta

I keep buying hot-smoked salmon from Costco in an attempt to up my Omega-3 intake, but most recipes that use smoked salmon refer to cold-smoked salmon (the kind you'd put on your bagel with cream cheese). Then, the packets of salmon just sit around my pantry forever.

Anyways, I found this recipe from BBC Good Food (seems like hot-smoked salmon is more common in the UK than in the US). I didn't have just plain peas, so I subbed the frozen veg mix I had on hand, as well as leftover heavy cream for the creme fraiche. Still quick and delicious!

Little Miss Nomad Foodie seemed to like the salmon and dill, but not as much as the pasta Bolognaise that I made a couple of weeks ago.

Garlic Butter Roasted Mushrooms

From Gourmet via Smitten Kitchen - excellent, something I'd make again:

1 pound mushrooms such as cremini or white, halved lengthwise if large
2 tablespoons capers, rinsed and chopped
3 large garlic cloves, minced
2 tablespoons vegetable oil
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into pieces
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
1/4 cup chopped flat-leaf parsley

Preheat oven to 450°F with rack in middle. Toss mushrooms with capers, garlic, oil, 1/8 teaspoon salt and several grinds of pepper in a 1 1/2- to 2-qt shallow baking dish. Top with butter and roast, stirring occasionally, until mushrooms are tender and golden and bubbly garlic sauce forms below, 15 to 20 minutes. Stir in lemon juice and parsley. Serve immediately, with crusty bread on the side for swiping up the juices.

Cake-y Goodness

I recently made cupcakes for the Parent Pages Rummage Sale's lemonade stand: Martha Stewart's Best One-Bowl Chocolate Cake recipe with paired with her cream cheese frosting, and Smitten Kitchen's Best Birthday Cake (a yellow cake) frosted with Martha Stewart's chocolate frosting. Smitten Kitchen's yellow cake was awesome. I had saved a few for our home and by Tuesday night they were gone. So that meant Wednesday night I was bemoaning the fact that there were no more sweets in the house. So I made cupcakes again - this time trying the Easy-Mix Yellow Cupcake recipe from Elinor Klivan's Cupcakes! book. Unfortunately, that cake didn't have the buttery richness nor the fine crumb of the the Smitten Kitchen yellow cake.

So here are the ingredients I used for Smitten Kitchen's yellow cake, converted to weights:
340g apf
60g cornstarch
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda

1 teaspoon salt

8 oz (2 sticks) unsalted butter, at room temperature
400g sugar

2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

4 large eggs, at room temperature

1 cup "buttermilk" made with 1T vinegar and milk to make 1 cup + 1 cup sour cream, well-shaken

Ingredients that I used for Martha Stewart's chocolate frosting:
259g powdered sugar
1/4c cocoa powder
6oz cream cheese
6oz butter
9oz bittersweet chocolate
3/4c sour cream

Yes, I know my weights go back and forth between metric and Imperial, but that's because my scale can do both and so I don't bother to convert to metric if the weights in Imperial are already provided.

Incidentally, the chocolate frosting recipe is from the April 2010 "Best" issue. The same recipe appears again in her September 2010 issue with every ingredient doubled except the butter. A typo, perhaps? Stick with the April 2010 version.