July 17th happy 16th birthday to my grand pa!

So today was my grandpas birthday and to celebrate I made my own carrot cake recipe and called it vinny's extreme carrot cake. The cake lived up to its name and has a pleasant spice of autumn spices and the cream cheese icing had Tahitian vanilla extract to really capture the flavor of it's delicate sweet flavor. When it came to decorating the cake I made a pattern with the candles that had 63 on it. Needless to say my grand pa was Rey happy and was amazed I re invented his favorite cake.

Soviet union/Russia- strawberries romanoff

So I was cooking this lovely dessert from Betty crockers around the world cook book, this dessert had to be the most simple and refreshing dessert. All you do is soak 1 quart berries in 3 to 4 tablespoons of kirsch or triple sec orange liquor mixed mixed with 1/2 cup of powdered sugar for 2 hours or over night. After 2 hours beat 1 cup of whipped cream until soft peaks form and fold in strawberries. (I used 1/2tsp of Tahitian vanilla extract with the cream because it enhances the cherry flavor of the kirsch, if used). Your dessert is very light and has a balance of sweetness and tang from the strawberries. It's amazing how such a simple dish was once popular in gourmet restaurants in the 1970's and now it's hardly known.

Italy- A taste of CAmpania's cuisine

Campania, best know for its pizza its cusine relies on sun kissed vegtables and herbs, salty capers, dried pasta, and freh farm house cheeses (the most known is water buffalo mozzarella. In the 19th century people living in the capital of were nicked named mangia maccheroni (macaroni eaters). To this day Neapolitans remain devout pasta eaters and there pasta is among the best an the most varried among Italy . I decided to try there 3 course meal starting with there Pizza napoletana that's aromatic flavors were composed of anchovy fillets, sun dried tomatoes, basil, and rosemary. The saltiness of the anchovy fillets we're balanced with the spices added and ironically this pizza was true Italian food, due to the fact it was very thin. It was not as thick as the dreadful American pizza places. . The main course was Tonno salernitana a tuna fillet with a pepper and tomato salad under neath and a very light dressing. The tuna was very light and had an almost chicken taste not fishy at all. The amazing dessert was Straberry sambuca tiramisu, a tiramisu that looked almost like a strawberry short cake and yet it had layers of whipped mascarpone mousse and strawberry soaked citrus sponge cake. The dessert also paired well with macchiato. A macchiato is a shot of very strong coffe and the word macccchiato means simply means marked or stained. In the case of caffè macchiato, this means literally espresso stained/marked with milk. Traditionally it is made with one shot of espresso, and the small amount of added milk was the stain. However, later the mark or stain came to refer to the foamed milk that was put on top to indicate the beverage has a little milk in it, usually about a teaspoon. This was the case with mine it was very good though since I personally love coffee with little to no milk in it. It sure beat American coffee. campiello's was the reasturant i got this amazing food at (its really good to go to) and they usually change there region of Italy every month so be sure to come get a taste of Campania's amazing cuisine!

Mexico- a sublime apitizer and comforting dessert

On the day I arrived in Florida I went to this mexican restaurant iguana Mia. They have a very good appetizer called yucca frita with garlic sauce. Yucca is a starch root vegetable and it pairs very nicely with the savory flavored garlic sauce. The dessert there was fried ice cream witch was really a ice cream rolled in common and sweet crispy oats in a dessert taco shell. Over all a comforting dinner.

France- cherry flan an easy dessert

Hello readers sorry for the long wait I have been busy with a lot of events in my life but I will now be posting more often. Currently I have been studying Simone Beck's and Julia child's recipes in honor of mastering the art of French bookings 50th adversary and Julia child's 100th birthday coming up in August. Well on Sunday I decide to make Julia child's recipe for cherry flan it's on page 655 in mastering the art of French cooking. It's a very simple dessert to prepare and very fun to make because you just blend up the batter for the flan and when making it in the blender I recommend using vanilla bean paste to really get the vanilla flavor that pairs well with cherry. The fun part was pouring a little bit of the batter in a glass dish and putting it on the stove burner for 1 minute to make it a crust. Than all you do is just put the cherries on and sprinkle them with sugar, than just pour the rest of the oven and bake it for 1 hour. I wait about 20 minutes before serving so its warm and set. It's better than Spanish flan because it's got a very good cherry and vanilla flavor. I recommend this dish for a nice dessert at home.

Japan- going to a hibachi grill

Hello guys! Sorry for the long reply I was in Florida for a week! So guys today I visited a Japanese hibachi grill called east Tokyo. The cool thing about Japanese cooking is that they use a giant grill called a hibatchi that reach temperatures to the extreme. Try start off buy giving you a salad with great dressing a a clear water soup. Clear water soup is ment to be a welcoming dish to start off to the feast your about to have. It's also what it sounds like its clear water mixed with at least 3 seasoning such as dried mushrooms, chives, and lemon. The grill starts off with a talented chef starting a controlled fire to wow the audience. He than show off his skills of throwing and catching his spatulas and knife. You will get to watch all your meals be made and about half way through he will do a trick where you will have to try to catch a piece of cucumber he throws at you with his spatula.Today was the first time In my life I caught it perfectly on the first time. The chef also did another trick where he aims at your mouth with a sake bottle (sake is a rice based Japanese wine) and i got such a mouth full of it I coulda been pulled over for driving drunk. I did also get to try edamame whitch is a preparation of soy bean pods with just a bit of salt on them. My main meal was chicken and lobster with some shrimp and pepper on a sekwer stick. Everything was well seasoned with sake and soy sauce. Dessert ended on a sweet note but as you in Japan they don't have desserts they usally end the meal with fruit. My dessert was mochi filled with red bean ice cream. Mochi is like a soy dough and you roll it out an wrap cold ice cream in it. Red bean ice cream really has a flavor of its own but it's like the perfect amount of a natural sweetness. Through out the meal I had green tea since I wanted to get the most of eating the Japanese way and my mom used a fork -_- ( hello use chop sticks). So go on out to your nearest local hibatchi grill and experience the beautiful art of Japan's savory cusine.

Happy Easter to my readers! :D

Happy Easter and I hope you all made a great dinner! I made some Passover recipes like cherry soup and eggplant salad. Since Israel has dietary laws they make things kosher and these recipes were flour free so the guest that joined us for Easter was able to enjoy very flavorful dishes despite his gluten allergies. The other food I made was from France there was stuffed mushrooms, queen of Sheba cake. The main course was a nice Easter ham with madeira wine sauce (from bon appetit magazine on the nook). desserts were mostly made of lemon because it's the in dessert for easter dude to the fact it's very light and not heavy after a filling meal. I made lemon fudge, lemon strawberry bavarian cream, and lemon mascarpone cheesecake (recipes from celebrate magazine on the nook). enjoy readers!

Cheeses of the world: France

Well before Easter I was at shop rite looking for cheeses and I happened to meet this cute girl who was giving out samples of cheese. One was age Gouda (will talk about in another post) and the other was a black truffle brie. It was a very creamy cheese that was almost sweet. It's a French cheese that has a rind (hard out side) and the funny thing was my grand ma would do a baked pastry that had brie in it and it would make every one gag as it tasted like we were eating a fossilized sock. It turned out that we were suppose to rid the cheese (cut off the hard out side of the cheese). On the other hand thesis type of brie has pieces of black truffles in them, a rare mushroom that grows under ground and they use pigs to locate them. Certain types of truffles are very expensive and as a fun fact fresh truffles smell like a combination of old sweaty shoes and that musty big like smell of a pool locker room.

America: my way of serving asparagus

I have been making asparagus with melted cheese and balsamic vinegar reduction sauce for so long that every week I don't even have to put the ingredients on my shopping list. It's simple as this: boil asparagus for 5 minutes, refresh with water put in thick reduction sauce (just boil balsamic vinegar until thick) and add cheese of your choice until it melts (mozzarella works really well). I have also found that the fun thing is that difrent brands of balsamic vinegar taste different and they have many flavors to choose from such as apple and orange honey blossom. So get experimenting!

Hungarian chestnut cake

Well I found this recipe online and it is much like the French queen of Sheba cake except that chestnuts have a different flavor. It had bittersweet chocolate and rum in it. It was also 100% flour free because of the beaten egg whites. It was also severed with chocolate covered chestnuts an run flavored whipped cream. I made this recipe my own by mixing the chocolate glaze into the cake because the cake is a bit dry.

French fruit desserts poached pears

when I hear poached me (as a kid) and the other millions of Americans think of poached eggs not chicken or fruit. Well the cool thing is that poaching means food submerged and cooked in a liquid that is barely simmering or shivering. The term can also be used poetically for things such as "chicken breasts poached in butter". Well I poached pears in port wine and the recipe was in "French classics made easy" (pg 284). It was an amazing experience because you never hear of a dessert that includes wine. It was as simple as this buy 6 Bosc or Comice pears, peel them and boil them in a mixture of port wine,red wine, lemon and orange juice and zest, and a small amount to sugar until the pears are soft and than chill for 2 hours. They were a bold burgundy in color and sauce had a sweet wine taste to it almost like sangria. It's a very colorful dessert that will impress any guest.

Cheeses of the world: Ireland

In addition to food I also love cheese and in this post I will be talking about Irish cheese and the one that I saw at shop rite around the time of St. Patrick's day was a type of white cheddar(my favorite cheese) in the shape of a shamrock it was dubliner cheese and it is a cheddar cheese that is hard in texture an is made from cow milk. The cheese is named after the city of Dublin, although it is made in County Cork. It combines the sharpness of mature cheddar, the nuttiness of Swiss cheese, and the bite of Parmesan. The cheese was developed by John Lucey and his secret recipe is exclusively held by the company Carbery. This cheese may also have small bits of white into it but don't worry it's just harmless calcium lactate. It's an amazing cheese of you love cheese or cheddar.

French vegtables

Well today I consulted mastering the art of French cooking for a recipe for cucumbers and found that you can bake them and to my surprise they need to be baked for 1 hour. While this may sound crazy because you probably think I ended up with a burnt mess I got a wonderfully seasoned and soft cucumber that had a taste of dill that made it seem like a classy dill pickle. I found it amazing that the way to remove there natural moisture was mentioned by julia child was not exactly to blanch them but to leave them in a bowl with salt,vinegar, and sugar. You can season the cucumbers with either dill or basil but I prefer dill it just seems like the spice for cucumbers. (recipe on pg 500 in mastering the art of French cooking.). The other side dish I made was creamed spinach in "french classics made easy" by Richard Grausman. And straight off the one thing I love about this French cool book is that it really does break things down and delivers authentic French food that a beginner cook can manage. The creamed spinach recipe I made (pg 191). Was simple because all I did was boil fresh spinach, right after I boiled it I refreshed it with cold water to stop the cooking and tossed it into a blender where I added white sauce to it and freshly grounded nutmeg to it. The dish was very edible and had a nice autumn spice to it from the nutmeg. My family thought it was pumpkin spice which made me laugh because some pumpkin spices do have but meg but maybe next time I'll add some pumpkin spice to it...

Hungarian food from a nice little old lady

Well today was her interesting since I have been reading a cook book called "Little old lady recipes" by Meg Favreau and what I found most interesting about this book in addition to the awesome and very funny "little old ladies who contributed there recipes was that this book is a melting pot of recipes from every where. I recommend it for cooks who like comfort food. Now onto the world food part lets talk Hungary. This is the first Hungarian dish I have made but I made a dish called goulash and it is a Hungarian stew that is made with steak in a sauce composed of sour cream, paprika, onions, salt, flour, butter, and red wine (I used burgundy). With only these minimal ingredients they sure made one amazing dish but here's my tips. When you have to brown the meat and onions I throw them in a big pot and cover until the onions soften and the meat brown than let it reduce leaving some liquid. Oh and also the recipe calls for 6 onions don't worry this may sound like a lot but onions shrink during cooking. Finally use a large casserole to cook it in (the recipe is on pg 94). The final results were amazing the steak was very tender and onions were soft, the sauce had a savory flavor with a hint of wine.

France

Well I am currently studying the art of French cooking by reading mastering the art of French cooking by Julia child. So far I have made a boeuf bourguignon (beef burgundy stew) and it is just an amazing recipie for a great fancy dinner and it dident cost much for my ingredents in addition to that I made turnips (witch I have never had) and queen of Sheba cake(a delicious almond chocolate cake witch it supposedly health because it was said to have no flour). The results were amazing and taught me how to brown meat and the boeuf bourguignon was a very heart stew in a thick sauce that that was a nice wine and spice flavor. It was also my very first time trying turnips and they have a very earthy flavor as I found out. I used the recipe for glazed turnips so they taste sweet but I recommend listening to the book and blanching them because they will have too strong a turnip flavor. The queen of Sheba cake taught me how to beat egg whites up and it was very easy but my rule f thumb for beating egg whites is to put them on a stand or use ad electric mixer and put a pinch of salt and 1/4 teaspoon of cream of tarter (it helps them hold there shape) than throw the mixer on the highest speed until soft peaks form than add 1 table spoon of auger to them and let it continue beating until stiff peaks form. Also when you do this cake do the egg whites last because they are delicate and if they get wrecked your cake won't be good because the egg whites make the cake almost like a lava cake and it has a delicious chocolate and almond flavor and it serves very well with coffee flavored whipped cream.

Intro

Hello guys I decided to make this blog about my love my love for cooking and baking. That said I also love world culture and when you put then together you get world foods :D so I study different countries and read world cook books so lets get cooking!