Marky is Famous!

THERE HE IS!  "Can I see some ID?"

Last night was pretty exciting, because I got to watch my boyfriend on television!  He had a small part in a movie called The March Sisters at Christmas, which was played on the Lifetime Network last night.  It was so cool to see him on the screen, and even hear him say a few lines!  Needless to say he stole the show, in my opinion :)

Since it is not every day you get to watch your boyfriend be a movie star, I decided to throw a little premiere party complete with tons of snacks.  I went grocery shopping after book club and between5:30 and 7:30, I managed to make four different appetizers: homemade pretzel bites, feta dip, oven toasted ravioli, and cheddar and olive balls.  A special thanks to Kenzie for helping me plan my menu and finding most of the recipes :)

First I started with the pretzel dough.  I have made homemade pretzels before, but this recipe was quicker because it only needed one 1-hour rising period.  I still had to boil and then bake them, but that's really not all that much extra work.  I was serving them within two hours from starting them, which is pretty incredible with any yeast bread! I tried to turn them into little bites as the recipe says, but they puff up fairly large when you boil them, which I forgot, so my bites turned into little rolls, which ended up being just fine because everyone loved them.  Betsy said they might be the best thing I ever made, and they all went.  I made way more than the 8 pretzel bites that the recipe claims to make; like I said, I thought I was making lots of tiny little bites.  Even without them being tiny, they were still small enough to get a big batch of pretzels.  I salted them pretty well once I had the egg wash on them right before baking, and we all agreed they were salted just perfectly.  I did not brush them with melted butter when they came out of the oven like the recipe says; it's not needed!  These are great as is.

Guilty much?

The next appetizer I made was the feta dip.  Sometimes my family calls it bruschetta dip; we discovered it this summer and it has been made for numerous parties and get-togethers since then!  It is so easy and really, really delicious.  Basically you just combine olive oil, diced tomatoes and scallions, and Greek seasoning on a platter, and serve with fresh sliced baguette.  That's it!  It is so good and always one of the first snacks to disappear.  This was the case last night.... except unfortunately, it did not disappear the way I wanted it to.  You can ask Delilah about that :(

I made oven-toasted ravioli for another party last month, and they were a big hit.  They are also really simple: dip frozen (and thawed) ravioli in an egg/milk wash, dunk them in bread crumbs and parmesan, and bake.  That's it!  Then you serve it with warm marinara.  Simple and delicious.  I made a huge pan of them last night and nearly all of them went.

Last was a bit of a gamble: cheddar olive balls.  I love cheese and I have a newfound obsession for olives, so I had pinned them a while ago and Kenzie thought I should try them out last night.  Basically they feel like the unhealthiest thing I made last night; you have to mix up shredded cheddar cheese and a whole stick of butter; add paprika and flour and then you use the dough to wrap around olives, and bake.  The dough ended up being a little dry, and I had no more cheese to add like the recipe recommends, so I added a little water and it worked out that way.  I thought these were good - Betsy pointed out that somehow, they taste fried! But I also think that olives themselves are so delicious that they probably don't need to be wrapped in a crunchy cheesy buttery layer.  I would have most likely enjoyed a platter of plain olives just as much if not more.  Nevertheless, people liked them.

Today, being my last day of Thanksgiving vacation, is a bittersweet day, but we are having a second Thanksgiving for just my family here, and I am going to attempt a couple new recipes, so stay tuned!

Recipes:
homemade pretzel bites
feta dip
cheddar and olive balls


oven toasted ravioli
 from Plain Chicken blog

Ingredients:
12 frozen ravioli, thawed (I have found that you can make far more than 12)
1 egg
1 Tbsp milk
6 Tbps Italian bread crumbs
2 Tbsp grated parmesan cheese
cooking spray
marinara sauce or pesto for serving

Instructions:

1) Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

2)  Whisk together egg and milk in shallow bowl. In another bowl or pie plate, combine bread crumbs and parmesan cheese. Dip ravioli in egg and then in bread crumbs. Place on baking sheet. Repeat until all ravioli are coated. Spray ravioli with cooking spray.

3)  Bake for 12-15 minutes or until golden brown. Serve with warm marinara or pesto

Celebrating Good News

I got some great health news this morning, and texted everyone to let them know.  Within seconds, my phone was full of happy texts, including some from Susie recommending a celebration, and jokes from Mom that it was a baked Alaska kind of night (we've always joked about making baked Alaska because it's so difficult), and Kenzie telling me to get back into the kitchen!  I knew they were all joking, but I figured, why not throw a party tonight? It's not every day we have great health news in my house, after all.  Tonight was a night to party, and a night to make baked Alaska!

slicing into it!

So, if you don't know, baked Alaska is ice cream topped with meringue that gets baked in the oven.  Yes, you read that right: ice cream that gets baked!  And it doesn't melt!  The meringue acts as an insulator... I might have to teach about this when I get to heat energy.  It's pretty fancy schmancy, but it was a special occasion, so it was the first thing I started when I got home.  I made the bottom "cake" first.  I say "cake" because it has no flour (Kaz!); it is a spongy kind of cake made from lots of eggs, chocolate and sugar.  Then I took a plastic wrap-coated bowl and filled it with softened pistachio and cherry ice creams (apparently those are the flavors used in baked Alaska; who knew?) and froze it up, and worked on the meringue frosting.  The ice cream gets put on top of the cake, and the meringue gets spread over the entire thing.  Then into a 500-degree oven it goes for 3 minutes, until the meringue starts to brown.  It seems miraculous when you cut it open and the ice cream isn't melted!  This thing got absolutely rave reviews.  Betsy requested that any time I make it, we invite her over immediately.  There were lots of moans and compliments from the baked Alaska.  I may have even a spotted a certain mother of mine eating seconds! It was really not that hard to make - there are just a lot of steps - but it has wow factor!

All baked and browned!

Mom was my froster

raviolis!

I also made an appetizer that was kind of spur of the moment; I was worrying that I was taking too long to get dinner done, and I had recently pinned a recipe that I knew I had all the ingredients for, so I gave it a shot: oven toasted ravioli.  They were very easy and surprisingly delicious.  You just take frozen ravioli and defrost them, then dip them in egg and milk wash, and then bread crumbs and parmesan, and bake.  That's it!  I served them with some tomato sauce that I added some basil and oregano to, and everyone loved them.  Rachael said they were the best thing I've ever made, which is great since they were so easy.  I should say one reason why I think they were so great, though: Mark and I made our own bread crumbs!  We were out, and instead of going to buy some, I knew we had some old crusty bread and a brand spanking new food processor, so we gave it a try.  We sliced the bread and processed it, and it was turned into crumbs in no time.  Then, since the recipe called for Italian bread crumbs, I found a recipe that gave me the spices to mix in, and Mark whipped them up for me.  We had to bake them for 10 minutes, and then they were done!  I really think they made the raviolis even better, and I might never buy bread crumbs again.

photo credit: Susie!

Last but certainly not least, we made pizzas for dinner.  I made my usual dough, courtesy of Bobby Flay's recipe.  Mark was mostly in charge of the pizza making; he does a great job flipping the dough up in the air and everything.  I think our best pizza (we made four!) was with sauce, ricotta, mozzarella, and fresh basil.  Mmmmmm!  Our pizzas got rave reviews.

I also heated up the remnants of my soup from the other night and it was a huge hit yet again.  I even got rid of a couple more bread bowls :)

All in all, I am totally exhausted from this party; I cooked for 4 hours after work to party it up with 12 of my favorite people, but it was totally worth it.  We had a lot to celebrate, a lot of great food to eat, and a lot of love going around :)

Recipes:
baked Alaska
oven toasted ravioli
Italian bread crumbs
pizza dough