Apple Pie Stuffed Apples

I gave you a healthy applesauce recipe, then a completely over the top cake recipe, so it seemed like this recipe would touch on parts on both the healthy and sweet worlds. It’s apple pie, but minus the majority of crust – so a bit healthier?

Also really cool looking. Seriously – look at those babies. Everybody gets their own individual apple pie. I feel like Oprah right now – you get a pie! And you get a pie! And I get two pies!

That’s not how it went?

That’s how it goes in my kitchen at least.

Pork and Cabbage Dumplings with Homemade Wrappers

When I last posted a Potsticker recipe, I mentioned how afraid I was of pleating and choose to use premade wonton skins to make life easier. I was still afraid when I made these, but I didn’t remember to buy the skins when buying all the other ingredients on a massive grocery shop. So when I realized making homemade wonton wrappers was literally adding water to flour (which I always have on hand), I figured worse came to worse, I could just pinch the edges closed and hope for the best.

I don’t think I’ll be winning any dumpling pleating prizes with these photos, but it was surprisingly fun. I tended to be able to make about 2 nice pleats per dumpling, but it’s not like it affected how good these tasted. This filling recipe is slightly different than the previous one – no ginger and no cornstarch for one, while I added garlic and sugar – but tastes just as good. I also cheated and just used half a bag of coleslaw instead of buying a cabbage. I figured I was already giving myself enough grief with the homemade wrappers – I might as well let someone else chop the cabbage for me.

I’d recommend taking the plunge and trying to make homemade wrappers yourself. It takes some effort, but it’s seriously worth it! These are just as thick and chewy as my favorites from the Chinese takeout place – but for the price of 6 at the restaurant, I got 40 at home!

Beef & Potato Empanadas

It’s not exactly a secret that I like stuffed dishes. One of the tags I use regularly on this blog is “stuffed with good stuff”. There’s just something more fun about biting into something and finding another layer of taste.

So empanadas were clearly sorely missed on this blog – I’d done wontons and “fauxmosas”, but not empanadas? Partially this is because DC is home to some very fine empanada shops and I can buy homemade (and often fresh out of the oven) empanadas pretty much whenever I want and partially it’s because I didn’t own a rolling pin/didn’t want to deal with the amount of mess that would come with making my own empanada dough.

But once the temperature cooled and hanging out in my kitchen seemed less like torture and more fun, I couldn’t resist the lure of meat encased in buttery, flakey pastry without having to put on proper clothing to enjoy. So I gave a basic empanada recipe I shot and found it pretty easy!

Hope you enjoy as well.

Homemade Ravioli and Summer Squash

I promised you more zucchini and here I deliver. In today’s recipe it plays second fiddle to homemade ravioli, because why not? If you’re going to go to all the trouble of making ravioli by hand, you want it to be the star of your dish. And since zucchini is pretty easy to find right now, might as well make a bed of it to add some veggies to your meal.

When I last tackled ravioli (seen here), I lamented that I couldn’t master egg yolk ravioli. Today is still not that day. But I am getting one step closer! One of these days…

It’s not as easy as using wonton wrappers because you actually have to make pasta dough. You would think this might have given me a clue that my kitchen was about to be inundated with flour, but I marched on to my cleaning hell unconcerned. Don’t skimp on flouring your work surface. It might make cleaning up more interesting, but your pasta won’t roll out nicely without it. Necessary evil folks, necessary evil.

(And yes, that is an instagrammed picture of the pasta I made. Can you tell I got a smartphone recently?)

Chocolate Banana Peanut Butter Muffins

I made these over Superbowl Weekend. Because when everyone else is talking about chicken wings and nachos, I want peanut butter and chocolate. To be fair though, I want peanut butter and chocolate all the time. In any case I thought they would be a good compromise between breakfast and dessert.

In that I would eat one for breakfast on the Saturday I made them and then serve them as dessert on Sunday when I watched the Superbowl. Yup, I’m crafty that way.

I know I've said I don't really like it when super sweet things are called "muffins" when they are clearly cakes, so you might be surprised I'm calling these muffins in spite of the cocoa powder, chocolate chips, and peanut butter. Honestly, I debated over it for a while. But despite everything these aren't particularly sweet except for the bites with the peanut butter.

We clearly need a word for things that straddle the muffin-cupcake divide. Mufcake? Cupfin? Those both sound disgusting. I'll get back to you.

In any case, I'm sorry I've kept these from you for so long. I think a part of my brain was afraid that if I shared the recipe there would be no more for me. It's a strange place, my brain. It likes to hoard delicious delicious recipes. 

Though once you eat one of these suckers, I think you'll begin to understand. Hope you enjoy!

Homemade Funfetti Cupcakes

I lucked out in the roommate department. We were watching figure skating one Saturday afternoon and I really wanted a funfetti cupcake for some reason. No matter that I’d never had one or had made chocolate chip muffins earlier in the day, I needed a cupcake. Immediately.

But if I made cupcakes, I’d end up wanting to eat them all. I needed a comrade in arms, something to help me weather the storm of sugar about to descend into our tiny apartment. So I turned to her and asked if I made cupcakes, would she help me out with them?

This is why my roommate is awesome – she just looked at me.

Right, stupid question. Who says no to a homemade funfetti cupcake?

Twenty minutes later these were out of the oven and waiting to be frosted. Luckily we have some Betty Crocker in the fridge (again, awesome roommate!) but feel free to make your own if you’d rather. Just make sure to top with sprinkles, otherwise all that effort was wasted.

Maria Speck's Artichoke Tart with Polenta Crust

Does anyone else read the name of a recipe and immediately want to make it? Even when several components include things they’ve never made before? 

I read The Wednesday Chef and she talked about this recipe. “Maria Speck’s Artichoke Tart with Polenta Crust.” I mean seriously, aren’t you drooling? So what if I’d never made polenta before, didn’t know where to find artichoke hearts, and forgot to buy half of the ingredients for the custard – I was making the recipe come hell or high water.

Or burned fingers, but we’ll get there in a minute.

Never one to assume I can’t do something, I made the monthly pilgrimage to Whole Foods hoping it might help me find polenta and artichoke hearts. Luckily, it came through. Polenta is really just coarser ground corn meal, so if you can’t find ground polenta in your area I think it’d be a fine substitution. However, I was lucky enough to find Bob’s Red Mill Polenta in the cereal aisle and canned artichoke hearts packed in water next to the canned beans. Whew.

Everything went fairly smoothly – the polenta came together really easily and the custard was super simple the make. So don’t worry if you’ve never done this sort of thing before, give it a try. And don’t forget to wear oven mitts.

Yes, I know, Baking 101. After you use oven mitts to take something out of the oven, you can’t them move it with bare hands. It was a brain fart on my end, but luckily the blister is already starting to heal. Pro Tip from a Part-Time Blogger: safety first! Wear oven mitts. Always.

Cinnamon Heart Buns

What is this? A Monday post?

I know, how unlike me to deviate from my careful Tuesday-Thursday posting schedule, but these were too cute and too timely not to share. What better way to celebrate Valentines Day than with some heart shaped buns? You can share them with your sweetie or do as I did and revel in the fact that these can be all yours.

My friend Caitlin passed this recipe along to me after talking about her homemade cinnamon buns on Facebook. I played around with her original recipe a bit, but I really like its simplicity. My favorite cinnamon buns are from SmittenKitchen, but those take hours due to the necessary rising time for yeast. These are yeast-free but still utterly delicious. And seriously, fresh cinnamon buns in about 30 minutes (and that’s including pre-heating time for my oven) cannot be beat.

There’s an odd piece of equipment for this recipe – dental floss. I’d read about the trick before, but it had never seemed worthwhile. Let me tell you, it’s totally worthwhile. It makes cutting the log of dough into buns so much easier and cleaner. Plus, you’ll then have the floss on hand for when you need to brush your teeth from the sugar bath they’ll receive from eating the buns!

I think you might be well served by putting the rolled dough in the fridge for a minute or two to help it firm up. It’ll make cutting and forming the hearts a bit easier.

Tortellini Soup with Spinach

Chicken noodle soup may be the default meal when you’re sick, but I think I like this pasta soup better. It not only includes cheese and spinach, but if you include the red pepper flakes it has a bit of a kick as well. Perfect for clearing up those clogged sinuses!

Normally soup would make perfect sense for the end of January - cold dreary weather demands comfort food. Except that it was 65 degrees today. I ate lunch outside on the patio this afternoon. Seriously, I'm calling this the Year without Winter, and for a snowlover that is pretty devastating. So in defiance of the weather, I'm eating soup anyway. Haha wea-THOR (aka the God of Weather), I'm going to eat warm and comforting soup even if I'm wearing shorts (which is deeply disturbing)

I hope you enjoy!

Oreo Cheesecake Cupcakes

One of my favorite ice cream flavors in the world is cookies ‘n cream. Sweet cream + oreos? Winning combination in my book. It was always the one flavor I didn’t mind mixing when I worked at the ice cream store. So when I saw that the Martha had created a cupcake that not only added cheesecake to the mix, but also made creating the crust easier, I was sold on the concept.

These are awesome. Sweet, tangy, and full of Oreos. Winning combination! Also kosher. Anyone else remember the celebrations that went on when Oreos got certified as kosher? I’m fairly sure my best friend at the time was close to tears she was so happy. Thus is the power of Oreos.

Seriously, it’s the holiday season and that means there’s no way your going to be sticking to your good intentions anyway. So make this and bring tears of joy to your face (and maybe your friends’ if your in the holiday spirit). They’re that good.

Pork Potstickers

Whenever my family ordered Chinese food, I always insisted on potstickers. Our local place made them perfectly – thick, chewy dumpling with perfectly seasoned pork filling. I hated sharing them. It got to the point where other family members would look at me cautiously asking for permission to have a single potsticker with the same tones you ask a crazy person if they can give you the knife. You don't know how badly I always wanted to say no.

I’ve been curious how to make them for years, but once I realized you had to pleat dough I bailed. I can’t hang a picture straight (and there’s plenty of evidence of that in my living room), there was no way I was going to be able to make so many perfectly folded pleats in a baked good.

So this isn’t a perfect potsticker recipe. It’s a starter recipe. For when I feel ready to tackle the scary world of making my own potsticker skin dough and trying pleats. This one uses pre-made skins that I found at my grocery store and a modified seal. Directions below!

Stuffed Shells

I’ve been wanted to make a stuffed shells recipe for a while now, but two things held me up: 1) it was a bit warm for the abundance of cheese and carbs and 2) I couldn’t find jumbo shells anywhere. So finding a box of jumbo shells the same weekend DC had a freak October snow (it wasn’t a storm here, don’t let anyone tell you differently) seemed to be a sign from the cooking gods that this dish needed to be made. I like to rationalize that the equal ratio of spinach to ricotta almost makes this dish healthy.

Almost.

Still, they are tasty and fairly easy to make. Also, don't they look cute in that ramekin? My friend Amber gave me four last time she came to visit and I've tried to think of recipes that make small enough quantities I can use them for photos since. Luckily, two stuffed shells fit perfectly! Thanks again Amber. 

Chicken Stuffed with Almonds, Spinach, and Feta

I made plans with my friend Alisha to meet for dinner a few weeks ago. The plan was for her to come over to my apartment and I’d cook us dinner. I started to panic the Saturday before because I realized two important facts: 1) because of things such as this blog, people think I actually eat well every day, and 2) dinner parties suffer dramatically when the host serves Kraft mac ‘n cheese. Clearly some advanced planning was required.

I started searching for a recipe that would convey the image of sophistication and skill while also being relatively cheap and easy to make. This fit the bill perfectly. It looks impressive – stuffed chicken breasts with fancy sounding ingredients! – while actually taking under 20 minutes to prepare. It’s pretty healthy to boot. Served with some couscous, an apple-spinach salad, and a few black bottom cupcakes, the meal tasted and looked impressive.

Of course, our mini-dinner party never actually occurred due to illness, so I ended up with some very fancy leftovers to enjoy for a week. Still, worth it to know I have this in my back pocket next time I have a guest over for dinner!

Egg and Pesto Stuffed Tomatoes

This is the time of year where you try to figure out how many ways you can eat a tomato. I always feel vaguely guilty for squandering a wonderful opportunity because my first inclination is always to add some olive oil and balsamic vinaigrette and eat them raw. But you can only eat that dish so many times before it becomes boring and then I ignore tomatoes until January, when I desperately wish they were in season instead of turnips.

Because seriously, in the battle between tomatoes and turnips is it really a question?

So this recipe was a nice discovery. It’s quick, easy, and it’s another way to eat fresh tomatoes. Win all around!