Thursday, February 28, 2013

Chicken Tikka Masala Pizza


Such a good idea, right? I couldn't resist when I came across this recipe on Rasa Malaysia (a great website in general). I love cooking with Indian spices, and I love pizza. Done and done.

Saturday, February 23, 2013

Thanksgiving Part IV: Pumpkin Spice Cake with Chocolate-Pecan Filling

Oh my God, you guys, this cake is ridiculously good. I made it as a dessert for Thanksgiving to combine and put a twist on the traditional pumpkin and pecan pies. The result is something straight out of a fall dessert dream. I realize it's no longer fall, but I don't recall there being any rules on when pumpkin could be consumed. This will be the last but certainly not least installment of Thanksgiving recipes from 2012.

Friday, February 15, 2013

Seared Scallops and Foie Gras

This year's contribution to our annual Valentine's Day meal is by far the fanciest, most decadent, and most gorgeous addition to the recipe family. Previous years brought us the good ol' surf n turf and the unique duck pizza. This year I copied a recipe from Top Chef, pretty much the only reality show I can stomach. For those of you who have not tried foie gras, it is fatty duck liver that melts in your mouth in buttery savory sweet amazingness. It's so decadent that you can't eat very much at once, which is good because it's freakin expensive. $28 at Wegman's for ~5 oz.


There are several components to this dish: a french toast-like bread called pain perdu, apple preserves, spiced pecans, maple foam, and of course the scallops and foie gras. You can make the preserves and pecans ahead of time, but the rest needs to come together simultaneously so unless you are a Top Chef it would be good to have a sous chef slash willing husband available.
I don't have any fancy equipment to make the maple foam, so I used my immersion blender and scooped the foam off the top, immediately before serving so it would hold. It's not as thick as a foam you'd see in a Colicchio restaurant, but it tastes the same.
We meant to have this as an appetizer (2 each), with a seared duck breast salad as an entree, but we were too full to make the duck. Full disclosure: we also had a pre-appetizer of cheese.
I halved the recipe for the apple preserves (already halved below), but you could probably also 1/2 the pecan and foam recipes as well. We have leftover pecans which is actually not a bad thing, but did throw out a lot of foam.