Hiatus almost over

First of all, I'd like to say sorry for not posting in many many months. I've been a bit busy with a lot of stuff. Job hopping and all kinds of nonsense. Well, now I am happily teaching a biomedical career program and hopefully in a little time will also be working as an EMT. Yup, that doesn't leave much time for cooking.

But as much as I've been busy, it isn't the reason I haven't posted. The real reason is I don't have my camera here with me. I left it with my parents (luckily deleted of a certain variety of pictures). To be honest, I have been cooking up stuff. Well, not so much recently, but still. Since the last time, I made, quite possibly the best chicken I've ever had. Ever. I was so excited, but too bad you didn't see it. I used homemade chicken stock and all that jazz. I've made some chicken normandy, some apple pork chops, and some nice pasta things. I've also has some HORRIBLE disasters, too. I burnt my first try at chicken normandy, made brownies that were just damn ugly and terrible and overall just had some bad experiences with some foods I tried to improvise. Too bad the camera wasn't here. You would have seen the worst brownies ever. They looked terrible, and tasted terrible (even though my roommates couldn't get enough of the nasty brownies for some reason). Trust me though, when I say they were terrible, I don't mean it in the "I'm a snooty judge on Iron Chef and I say mean things about food to make myself look like more of a super critic." I mean it in the "I usually eat anything - even things that fell on the floor - but this is nasty" kind of way.

Anyways, I guess when I get the camera back, I'll be taking pictures of a lot of new things. It should be fun. Sorry for the super long hiatus.

OOOOOOO and I can't wait for the best holiday ever!

So Sorry

I'm sorry about the lack of posts recently. After the thesis, I was super exhausted and I couldn't cook. I've actually been cooking all week. I made blueberry scones, lemon marmalade, chocolate chip cookies, chocolate mousse, crème brûlée... Yea, I just forgot to take pictures of them all. If you want I can put up the recipes for them and you can make them but without any pictures. Anyways, I'm moving on Monday so future pics will be in a different location. Also, I'll be going on a little road trip with friends next weekend so there might not be any pics that weekend either. Seems like this blog is dying, no? I hope not. Just a little neglected, that's all. I'll be back soon.

Thesis Is Complete!

Now I know this is a blog about food, but I am going to talk about my life every now and then. So, today I finished my thesis. It is signed by one of my advisors and now will need to be signed tomorrow morning by my other advisor. Ah, what a crazy time it was. OK, I do admit that a lot of the time I spent "writing" was actually spent on Youtube or Facebook or Failblog or one of the many distractions that the Internet provides. Heck, even this blog was a major distraction.

Anyways, this past year was... well, it was an interesting year. Working in a lab is definitely not something I want to do. I'm not saying I didn't enjoy it, but I sometimes you just know it isn't really for you. And definitely, Dartmouth is not for me. This place was so boring I almost went "Shining" and murdered everyone.

Anyways, my time in the lab is coming to an end and now I'm wondering what I should do for everyone here at Dartmouth who has helped me along the way. I really want to do something for Dr. North, Bonnie, Mary, and Rhonda, but I don't really know what I should do. In a dream I did a big bow to Dr. North and I was thinking, in a private setting that might not be a bad idea. But then I think about it, and it might be a terrible idea.

Anyways, as awesomely excited I am about finishing my thesis, it makes it even more obvious to me that I now have nothing to do and am just rotting until someone gives me a job. At least before my thesis was done, I was able to say, "Well, I'm currently working on my Master's thesis and hopefully by the time it's done, I'll have a job to move on to." I mean, the job didn't need to start immediately after I finished. I would have looked at it like a vacation. But now I really wish I had a job. I want a job. No, I need a job. I know I sound desperate, but I'm really a good guy and a nice worker and I think I'm fairly smart. And heck, I do occasionally bring in goodies like cookies, and candied bacon and doughnuts, and stuff. So... are any of you hiring?

Bison Wings

So, today we're making buffalo wings! Yay!

Everyone that posts about buffalo wings always does that whole "No, it's not the wings of a giant buffalo." It's stupid.

If you really want to know about it, just go to wikipedia or whatever place you want for the history.

Wings are sooooo delicious though. And I'm telling you, if you want your friends to like you, just make some wings.

Here's a list of what you'll need:

Chicken wings

Canola Oil

Butter

Bottle of Hot Sauce

Cayenne pepper

Tabasco Sauce

So, first things first. You want to heat the oil up. NO, not like that! Oh, James Kim, you crazy.

You want to pour that into a high walled pan. If you have one made of cast iron that would be wonderful, but not necessary.

Anyways, make sure its about 1 - 1.5" deep in oil. Turn the heat up to just below high. Like 9/10. It's going to take quite some time for the thing to heat up though. So let's get the chicken ready.

Here's the bag of chicken. I don't know if you can see it, but there's that weird red liquid. It's part blood, but part weird anti-freeze damage liquid. And that is not good.

So, just wash it off. Just rinse lightly under some running water.

Drain the water off.

Now you didn't see here, but I patted them dry with paper towels. Make sure they're dry. Seriously, it's pretty important that they are dried. It'll make the skin crispy and delicious (I think... Actually I'm not really sure, but I like to dry it, so you do it too).

So, if you want, you can sprinkle some cayenne pepper on them.

See, I did a little bit.

Now, to prep yourself. That oil is damn hot. And if you get any on you, it will hurt! So, long sleeves, and I like to use this bag.

Now, if the oil is hot enough, get your chicken ready for dunking.

The chicken should do this. Put them in one at a time. The first few moments are key! DO NOT let them stick to the bottom! Just stir them around in the oil. Also, they'll probably try to stick to each other. If you have a lot, I'd do them in batches.

Just like with the steak, cover it. I'd highly recommend a splatter guard over the ghetto paper towel method though. You didn't see, but I went through a ton of paper towel because it dipped into the oil and just got soaked.

You're going to cook the chicken for about 20 minutes total time.

They'll be golden and delicious. I used one to check doneness. Check it before you take them all out.

Yup, it's done here.

And here too.

And here too. So basically the chicken is good.

The skin has a nice thin crispiness to it, while the meat is juicy and delicious. Perfect.

For the sauce, I like to start a little before the chicken is done- maybe like 5 minutes or so. Put two sticks of butter in a pan over low heat.

Melt it down until it's all liquid. No solids here please.

Now the trifecta of flavor.

Just pour the whole bottle in there.

And mix.

Oh you know how much I love my mixing shots.

Throw in some cayenne to taste.

And some of that Tabasco too. I usually put in about 10 squirts.

Dunk that chicken in there!

And swirl it in there. You might want to let it sit in the sauce for a minute.

All that's left is plating and enjoying. Some people like ranch; others like blue cheese. Personally, I like to eat wings by themselves. As for celery.... I hate celery.

*burp*

Oh, as for the leftover oil, let it cool down. Then filter it and pour back into the bottle. It's fine. Stop being a crybaby. Actually, the oil will get even better for the next time you make the chicken, the browning will be more awesome looking. I'm telling you, it's for the better.

Go out right now and pick up some stuff for the game today.

Ginger Cooooookie!!!!

So, I made cookies. I think like 3 people voted (Amparo, Julia, and Kevin. I don't know if Sarah was agreeing with them or just whatever) and said they wanted the ginger chocolate chunk cookies. So here they are.

First off, I'm not a baker. I cannot bake. Unlike regular cooking, where you can basically just wing it and throw crap in, I don't believe baking is like that at all. Baking is an exact science. If you measure a little too much flour or a little too much something else, the whole thing goes crazy. So I let professionals figure out how much is good and how much is bad.

So, full on props go to Susan Spungen, who made this recipe.

This is for 36 cookies. And at 12 cookies per batch, if you've done your math right, you'll need 3 batches to make the 36... although my 36th cookie was like a mini cookie. Well, here we go!!!

First the dry ingredients:

2 1/4 cups flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp cinnamon

1 1/2 tsp ground ginger

1/4 tsp ground cloves (or 3 whole cloves crushed)

1 Tbsp cocoa powder

1/4 tsp salt

I know the sugar is there, but I put it there by mistake. We'll get to it don't worry. We're not making a cookie with no sugar in it. Because as Gary Gulman says, "Every cookie is a sugar cookie. A cookie without sugar is a cracker."

OK, we all need a good lesson on how to properly measure flour. Seriously, people do this all the time and it bugs me. But here's a video on how to do it correctly. Use it.

So, I didn't have any ground clove, so I just used the whole cloves and crushed them.

Like this!

And got this. Just as good.

Once you get all your dry ingredients just whisk it together really well.

Now for the wets:

1 1/2 sticks of butter (ROOM TEMPERATURE!)

1/3 cup packed dark brown sugar

1/3 cup granulated white sugar

Eventually:

1 large egg yolk

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 cup molasses

Butter looks really weird huh? It's at room temperature as it should be. Looks gross but it'll be easier to work with and taste better.

Using a mixer, mix the butter just a little before you add anything else in.

Add the brown and white sugars

And mix for about a minute or two before adding anything else.

People think that molasses, because it comes from sugar, is probably going to be sweet and awesome smelling. I know I did. But this stuff smells really really bad. You're going to think something wrong happened, and that your cookies will taste like nasty crap. Especially when the smell won't go away even when you've mixed everything together. Don't worry; it will smell, but your cookies will not stink.

Just pour it in, with the egg yolk. It's really really viscous so you might want to just hold it there while mixing.

OK, for a while, I forgot to work the camera, so I'm really sorry.

So, after I mixed everything together with the butter, I scooped it up and put it on the flour mixture. Now, you can do this with a spatula, but I liked to use my hands. Don't go super crazy, but get it all mixed together. It is sticky and it will stay sticky. Just make sure there aren't any pockets of flour and that the thing is mixed pretty nicely.

Now for the fun parts.

Get a nice bar of good dark chocolate. And chop it up with a knife on a cutting board.

Then, get about 1/3 cup or so of candied (or crystallized) ginger, and do the same.

Mix it into the cookie dough.

Wrap it up, and put it in the refrigerator to chill.

It doesn't have to stay in there too long. But just until its pretty firm. You probably realize by now, how ridiculously sticky it is. I kept it in there for about 45 minutes?

While you wait, you might as well clean the other bowl, and any spills and all that fun stuff. That way you can enjoy the cookies when they're done instead of moping around while you clean as others chow down.

Oh, and get the oven preheated to 350F.

So, before you start, I want you to make a little station like this. A plate with some sugar in it next to the baking sheet with some parchment paper.

Why the parchment paper? Because it's amazing. The cookies won't stick to the pan, which is wonderful. And it makes clean up sooooo much faster. It's ridiculous how awesome it is.

DO NOT use wax paper. Wax paper does not go in the oven. The wax will melt and it will be terrible. DO NOT USE IT!

Now I want you to make your cookies about 1 Tbsp sizes. So just use that Tbsp measuring spoon to get them out.

I will warn you though. Because there are chunks of ginger and chunks of chocolate, you probably want to even it out. If you find that a spoonful has none or too many, remake it.

You don't have to roll it. Actually I'd say don't make it too rolly. Don't squish it.

But do roll it in the sugar. Give it a nice even coat. You think this is too sweet? Well, too bad; it's a freaking cookie. And the sugar is nice later on when it's all done.

Put them a good distance apart from each other. I had 12 (3x4) on my baking sheet. They will grow and spread, not huge, but they will and you don't want them touching.

So put them into the oven. Give them about 5 minutes, then turn the pan. I'd give it another 6 minutes or so.

Your cookies should have little cracks on top. Don't worry if they're not hardened or anything. You don't want them to be. They'll be soft to the touch, so let them cool on the pan for a minute.

Then transfer them to a cooling rack.

What the heck! Who bit that cookie!?

mmmmm, I did...

So, back to the parchment paper. You can reuse the piece of paper for the next batch. Isn't that wonderful!?

Look how clean that pan is. I'm so happy I used that parchment paper.

Mmmmm... ginger cookie. And don't feel bad about eating them. Apparently gingers don't have souls, so there's nothing wrong with chowing down. Except this kid, he's apparently upset about it. Hahaha, cookies and comedy. (especially at 0:44!) hahahaha.