Second Chance ChocoBeet Cupcakes

I wasn't thrilled with my last attempt at Chocolate Beet Cake. I didn't have any traditional cake pans, so I chose a recipe that could be made in a loaf pan instead. For me, the edges and top created a crust-type layer that was too hard and the middle was still gooey and uncooked. I wanted moist, fluffy comfort and I got something closer to the consistency of flourless cake. Rich and delicious to be sure, but just not what I wanted.

I knew I wanted to try again and when Abel & Cole sent me raw beets in my vegbox, I figured it was a sign that this was the time. My mom sent free-standing, silicon cupcake cups back with Joe when he was home in January and Ryan is here and he loves chocolate. Here's the new recipe also from BBC Food.

Ingredients

• 75g/2½oz cocoa powder or powdered drinking chocolate 
• 180g/6½oz plain flour 
• 2 tsp baking powder 
• 250g/8½oz caster sugar (or granulated - whatever) 
• 250g/8½oz cooked beetroot (I cooked and peeled raw beets myself, but pre-cooked beets are WAY easier) 
• 3 large eggs 
• 200ml/7fl oz vegetable or corn oil 
• 1 tsp vanilla extract 
• icing sugar for dusting (or two containers of cream cheese for frosting) 

Preparation method

1. Preheat the oven to 180C/355F/Gas 4. Arrange paper muffin cases in a 12-mould muffin tin.
2. Sift the cocoa powder, flour and baking powder into a bowl. Mix in the sugar, and set aside.
3. Purée the beetroot in a food processor. Add the eggs, one at a time, then add the vanilla and oil and blend until smooth. (I have a crappy blender, so I just put everything in at once. It fluffed up and looked like a berry smoothie.)
4. Make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients, add the beetroot mixture and lightly mix. Pour into the muffin cases.
5. Bake for 30 minutes or until the top is firm when pressed with a finger. (since I have the smaller size cups for 24 cupcakes instead of 12, I took mine out at about 18 minutes)
6. Cool on a wire rack and dust with icing sugar to serve.

These cupcakes were exactly what I was looking for! Light, fluffy, moist, and delicious. Chocolatey, but not too rich. Of course, I couldn't justify keeping two dozen cupcakes in the house, so I packed them up and brought them down to BrewDog as a Happy Saturday surprise for Joe, Ryan, and all of the BrewDog staff. It worked out especially well because one of the bartenders came in to celebrate her birthday and (randomly), I had brought cake!

Happy Birthday, Annest!

All the Food and Fantasy Grocery Shopping

My mom remarked several times during her visit that I've become calmer and more flexible here. This is partly true and partly a misconception, I think. In some ways, yes, I've tried to embrace the travel-Sarah attitude about taking advantage of things while we're here and being more spontaneous. But the other side of this perception is more complicated:

• I'm not actually a tourist here most of the time, so some things that would freak me out as a tourist don't cause (as much) panic as they would normally. For example, if the bus I'm waiting for doesn't show on time or I'm in a new place and don't know how to get home, there's (literally) an app for that. I don't need to panic because usually there are several possibilities for how to get to any given place in London and all I need to do is choose one on my trusty CityMapper app. (On the other hand, I still totally hate it when plans I've made are changed at the last minute because of something unforeseen like rain, or a mistaken booking, or holiday hours. The consolation is that I still have many months to see and do and eat whatever I want here in London, so it's not totally the end of the world.)
• Living in a small place and paying high prices for everything means I am much more ready to repurpose what I have, particularly ingredients, rather than buy something else I'll have to store. 
• If it seems I've become more adventurous as a cook, blame the vegbox. Because of the new vegetables I've received, I've looked up recipes that include further ingredients I've never used before. Some of these are more exotic than others. Since being here I have tried/cooked with/learned to like/found go-to recipes for: beets, romanesco cauliflower, Chinese cabbage, fresh sage, butternut squash, thai curry, leeks, onion squash, gem squash, red cabbage, potatoes au gratin, bruschetta, bolognese sauce, blood oranges, parsnips, and celeriac.

Showing my mom my London had a lot to do with this last point. It's all about food, grocery shopping, and cooking. After two days of gogogo, Janis wanted a day to relax at home and read. So, the Monday and Tuesday before Christmas were for my mom and I to do what makes us most happy, namely being together doing all of the things we would normally do back in California.

The solution to no coffee maker = individual drip coffee cups

Since I discovered how much I love Thai red curry, I had to take my mom to Taste of Siam on Camden High Street. If my dinner at Zupperia in Bergen, Norway that started it all was a 10, I'd give Taste of Siam a 7.5. It's very tasty, but lacks the variety of vegetables I like in my food. However, this place is close and I can stop there when I'm grocery shopping or on my way home from school.

I had already introduced my mom to my local Marks & Spencer, but I needed to take her to my giant Sainsbury's where I do most of my grocery shopping. If you don't remember my post about fantasy grocery shopping at M&S in Edinburgh when we were there in 2012, you will not understand that these are legitimate tourist destinations for my mom. In fact, I had to keep reminding her that we were running late for drinks at BrewDog and couldn't read everything in every aisle, as much as she was fascinated by my quirky British grocery.

Such a British Christmas thing:
mince pies in every variety, EVERYWHERE

Before heading out to a Christmas lights tour on a double decker bus that I would not recommend, we met Joe for a drink at BrewDog.

literally the ONLY picture Janis requested on the entire trip

Camden BrewDog gets festive! (I thought these Santa hats for the beers were adorable,
then I was informed the the manager's mum actually MADE them for the bar. Too cute!)

Christmas Eve was much the same. We didn't have plans until our dinner reservation and Joe and Janis both revelled in the day off. My mom and I did what we do.

Yup, we took at picture at Whole Foods.

Whole Foods in Kensington High Street is like a grocery store theme park. It's so beautiful that I had to stop myself from taking panoramic pictures inside. Check out these displays!

legumes

spices

On the top floor (there are three!), there is a food court filled with all sorts of organic, healthy options. (There are some less healthy choices to be made here, of course, but there's nothing like Burger King or Hot Dog on a Stick in this food court). We were intrigued by Shabu Shabu, a fondu-style method of cooking shaved thin meat and vegetables in boiling broth.

Afterwards we went on a fantasy grocery adventure, where we drooled and squealed and got ridiculously excited for two people who didn't need to buy anything. It was a perfect day (for us).

look! bread!

a room of artisan cheeses!

cheeky signage

way too happy to spend the afternoon in Whole Foods

she makes a great Londoner, right?

And then, on the bus ride home, we caught our first sight of Recipease, the Jamie Oliver cooking school... bet you can guess what we did on New Year's Eve.

Hearty Mushroom Soup

The two weeks of the moms' visit were a total interruption of life-as-we-live-it. This isn't a bad thing, it's just that regular activities like grocery shopping, cooking, laundry, and sleep were completely thrown off their routine course because our schedule and priorities were just different. Unrelated to this our trip to Paris and the alignment of the holidays meant that we went about 2.5 weeks without a vegbox delivery and at the other end I come out with three different kinds of mushrooms in the fridge and almost no meat or other essential ingredients for making a regular dinner. 

Remember this soup from Estonia that made Tallinn one of our favorite stops on our tour?

Well, I recently found a recipe for hearty mushroom soup that made me think I might be able to recreate it. I have never been a fan of creamy mushroom soup. It is probably the monotonous, smooth texture of a pureed soup that I don't like because I'm not keen on split pea or tomato soup either. The version we had in Tallinn, however, was broth-based, giving it a clean texture. Being able to actually see and identify the different ingredients, including several mushroom varieties, vegetables, and chunks of potato made the soup seem healthier and more satisfying than the flat, brown oneness of creamy soup. 

This soup got Joe's highest food rating (can we have this once a week?). Even though the recipe says it makes 4-6 servings, we could've easily polished it off in 3. The flavor was rich and bold, with strong but balanced flavors of rosemary, wine, and fall vegetables. I chopped most of the mushrooms as directed, but I did some in slices to add dimension to the texture. 

Ingredients

• 25g pack porcini mushrooms
• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 medium onion, finely diced (I only had purple onions. I did one smallish purple onion and one medium shallot)
• 2 large carrots, diced
• 2 4 large garlic cloves, finely chopped
• 1 tbsp chopped rosemary, or 1 tsp dried
• 500g fresh mushrooms, such as chestnut, finely chopped
• 1.2l vegetable stock (from a cube is fine)
• 5 tbsp marsala or dry sherry
• 2 tbsp tomato purée
• 100g pearl barley
• grated fresh parmesan, to serve (optional)

carrots, onion, and the larges mushrooms all from Abel & Cole

chopping: stage 1

chopping stage 2

Method
............................................................................................................

1. Put the porcini in a bowl with 250ml boiling water and leave to soak for 25 mins. (I didn't have porcini mushrooms, but I assume they are working with dried. I did this step even though all of my mushrooms were fresh just in cases.)
2. Heat the oil in a pan and add the onion, carrot, garlic, rosemary and seasoning. Fry for 5 mins on a medium heat until softened.
   
3. Drain the porcini, saving the liquid, and finely chop. Tip into the pan with the fresh mushrooms. Fry for another 5 mins
   
4. Add the stock, marsala or sherry, tomato purée, barley and strained porcini liquid.
   
5. Cook for 30 mins or until barley is soft, adding more liquid if it becomes too thick.
6. Serve in bowls with parmesan sprinkled over, if desired.

We finished the first batch so quickly that Joe even offered to go to the store for more mushrooms so I could make another batch the next day. (On this batch I'd run out of tomato paste and just made it without. It was still very tasty.)

Jamie Oliver Beef Stew

Our moms are on their way here and arrive tomorrow and it's hard to say who's more excited - me or them. To celebrate their first night in London, I wanted to make something comforting, wintry, and undeniably home-cooked. 

When we first started getting our veg boxes, I found this recipe for beef stew by Jamie Oliver. It's a somewhat unusual stew, including ingredients like sage and squash and parsnips that my mom never put into her stews at home, but I have fallen in love with it. First of all, stewing beef means I can't mess it up and it comes out melt-in-your-mouth tender no matter what I do to it. In fact, Jamie Oliver specifically recommends throwing the beef in raw and NOT browning it beforehand. Secondly, this stew is easy to re-heat on the stove top and actually tastes better the second time once some of the vegetables have broken down and melded into a thick, flavorful sauce. (Which explains why I'm making it tonight for their arrival tomorrow...) I am really excited to share this one with my favorite home cook!

an old ingredients picture

Ingredients

• olive oil

• 1 knob butter 

• 1 onion, peeled and chopped

• 1 handful fresh sage leaves 

• 800 g quality stewing steak or beef skirt, cut into 5cm pieces

• sea salt

• freshly ground black pepper

• flour, to dust

• 2 parsnips, peeled and quartered

• 4 carrots, peeled and halved

• ½ butternut squash, halved, deseeded and roughly diced

• 1 handful Jerusalem artichokes, peeled and halved, optional (these will eventually come in an Abel & Cole box. Until then, I will wait to try them out.)

• 500 g small potatoes

• 2 tablespoons tomato purée

• ½ bottle red wine

• 285 ml organic beef or vegetable stock

• finely grated zest of 1 lemon

• 1 handful rosemary, leaves picked

• 1 2/3/4 clove garlic, peeled and finely chopped

a new ingredients picture (I had butternut squash already cut up from my throw-everything-in pork stew)

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 160ºC/300ºF/gas 2. 
2. (The missing step in every recipe - spend a LONG time cutting all of the vegetables.) 

   

   really missing pre-cut butternut squash from Costco

   
   

   

   I had some mushrooms this time so I threw those in too

   
   
   
   
   
3. Put a little oil and your knob of butter (such a British term - I usually use about a tablespoon or less) into an appropriately sized pot or casserole pan (you mean my Dutch oven that I use for everything including as a mixing bowl and for salads?). Add your onion and all the sage leaves and fry for 3 or 4 minutes. 
   
4. Toss the meat in a little seasoned flour (since this direction is so abstract, I chose to add fresh pepper, dried garlic, and a touch of cinnamon to it), then add it to the pan with all the vegetables, the tomato purée, wine and stock, and gently stir together. 
   
5. Season generously with freshly ground black pepper and just a little salt. (I also put about 3/4 of the garlic in at this point.) Bring to the boil, place a lid on top, then cook in the preheated oven until the meat is tender. Sometimes this takes 3 hours, sometimes 4 – it depends on what cut of meat you're using and how fresh it is. The only way to test is to mash up a piece of meat and if it falls apart easily it's ready. Once it's cooked, you can turn the oven down to about 110°C/225°F/gas ¼ and just hold it there until you're ready to eat. 
   

According to Jamie Oliver: The best way to serve this is by ladling big spoonfuls into bowls, accompanied by a glass of French red wine and some really fresh, warmed bread. Mix the lemon zest, chopped rosemary and garlic together and sprinkle over the stew before eating. Just the smallest amount will make a world of difference – as soon as it hits the hot stew it will release an amazing fragrance.

An old pic of re-heated stew. It may not look it, but it's delicious!

So excited for tomorrow!!

Consolation Prize Pear Bread

Dilemma #1
Joe is at work. My mom and my best friend have just informed me via text that they are together in sunny California, eating delicious Mexican food and shopping at the outlet mall. I must find a way to drown my sorrows/keep myself busy for the evening...

Dilemma #2
Abel & Cole keeps sending us pears. Last week I put some in the Thanksgiving cranberry sauce. I've put them in a smoothie. I've poached them and eaten them with ice cream. I had thought there might be a reprieve from pears this week, but no go. Apparently it is Pear Season around here. I must find a way to use all the pears before they go bad...

Dilemma #3
Catching Fire came out last weekend and even though I have no one to go with I think I'm going to go tomorrow night when Joe's at work. As is tradition, I must watch the preceding film before seeing the newest installment...

Solution: Spend Friday night watching Hunger Games (because Joe isn't here so I can because I have the TV to myself) and baking pear bread!

I found a recipe from Taste of Home that looks yummy (ie had a good preview picture) and didn't require any crazy ridiculous ingredients. I had to borrow a loaf pan, but if it works out well I may go ahead and buy one.

Ingredients

• 3 Eggland's Best Eggs (that's convenient! Abel & Cole sent me organic eggs to try this week!)
• 1-1/2 cups sugar
• 3/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 4 cups finely chopped peeled ripe pears (about 4 medium ALL of the pears I have from this week and last!)
• 1 teaspoon lemon juice (didn't have lemon juice. oh well.)
• 1 cup chopped walnuts

Directions

1. In a bowl, combine the eggs, sugar, oil and vanilla; mix well. Combine flour, baking powder, cinnamon, baking soda and salt; stir into the egg mixture just until moistened. Toss pears with lemon juice. Stir pears and walnuts into batter (batter will be thick).
2. Spoon into two greased 9-in. x 5-in. loaf pans. Bake at 350° for 55-60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes before removing from pans to wire racks. Yield: 2 loaves.

super thick and goupy but smells great already

With limited space to keep things in my kitchen, I don't buy ingredients without a recipe in mind usually; I can't afford to have stuff taking up room (and potentially going bad) if I don't know how I'm going to use it. That's why I was excited to find little one-teaspoon sachets of baking soda and baking powder at Sainsbury. My baking cabinet at home is stocked with large containers of all the essential ingredients for home baking, but here I just don't invest in ingredients I'm not 100% sure I'll use.

Now we wait...

Looks tasty!

Yummy!!

I am not a big fan of banana-flavored sweets, so this quick bread is the ideal solution. It's moist and salty-sweet like banana bread but flavored with the mildness of pears instead. So yummy! I probably could have diced the pears into the smaller pieces, but generally (since chopping is my least favorite) I will deal with chunkier pieces rather than spend the extra time.

Take that, Friday night!

Update: when Joe got home he thought it smelled so good
he didn't want to wait to slice a piece off...

Tuscan Vegetable Soup

(This post is a little delayed because I forgot I needed to add the pics and hit publish. Oh well. You get the idea.)

As I've already mentioned, one of my goals during my time in London is to improve my cooking. Under the umbrella of that goal is the London List checkbox for using all of the fruits and vegetables that come in a single week's delivery within that same week. This can be surprisingly difficult, depending on the variety Abel & Cole offers and our schedule. For weeks we were sent clementines that we kept forgetting to eat. Sometimes we have so many carrots that I just can't get through them all in 7 days. (Then I look up a ton of recipes to get rid of a particular ingredient and end up having to buy more at the store in order to make all of them...)

This week, I think I may have done it!

The box included:

     - Fair Trade bananas (eaten and in smoothies)

     - Green curly kale

     - Carrots

     - Apples (eaten in Joe's lunches)

     - Pears

     - Red Pepper

     - White Mushrooms

     - Red Potatoes

kale this gorgeous can only mean one thing: veggie soup time!

Recipes of the Week

Poached Pears

with sugar, vanilla, and lots of cinnamon

Thai Red Curry

using A&C red pepper and mushrooms

recipe here, I added zucchini

Tuscan Vegetable Soup

using A&C carrots and curly kale, served with roasted A&C potatoes

Tuscan vegetable soup is a staple for me at home. My mom has doctored the original Panera recipe a bit, as usual and I usually make it as a lunch to take to work. Joe literally begs for "kale soup" at home, so he was happy to come home from work to the British version when I made it here.

Ingredients

1/4 c  pancetta

2	T olive oil
1½	c chopped red onions (I use white usually)
2	c chopped celery
2	c chopped carrots
4	large cloves garlic, minced (Or more. Really, you can't have too much.)
¼	t red pepper flakes (didn't do this here in UK)
1	can (28 oz) plum tomatoes in puree, chopped with juice (at home it's always San Marzano tomatoes from Sprouts. They make a HUGE difference in the taste - SO good. Here I just did the best I could)
8	oz kale (tuscan cavolo nero or lacinato kale)stems removed, leaves coarsely chopped
8	oz grean chard, stems removed, leaves coarsely chopped (I couldn't find chard here so I used a second kind of kale, cavola nero, or flat leaf kale)
2	c cooked or canned cannellini beans, rinsed and drained
7	c chicken broth
¼	c chopped fresh basil
½	t salt
3	c Panera country or sourdough bread cubes, crust removed (optional)
¼	c grated Parmesan cheese (instead of grating cheese, which just makes a big, sticky mess, cut off the rind and throw it into the soup when it's cooking. Remove the rind afterwards. All the flavor and very little of the mess.)

Directions

Heat the oil in a large soup pot over med heat. Saute the pancetta until crispy. Add the onions, celery and carrots and cook until the vegetables begin to soften 6-8 min. Add the garlic and pepper flakes and cook for 1 minute. Add the chopped tomatoes (with juice), kale and chard, and cook until the kale is wilted. 8-10 min (At home my mom uses a 10 quart stock pot to make this soup and I borrow hers when I make it myself. Here, of course, I don't have such a tool. Thus, I had to add the kale in stages and put the lid on the pot to make it wilt a little faster so I could fit more in.)

phase 2 of kale additions

Puree 1 c of the beans and 1 c of broth in a food processor. Add the beans, undrained and unrinsed, to the soup along with the remaining 6 c broth. Bring to a boil over high heat. Reduce the heat to low and simmer for 20 at least 60 min.
Stir in basil, salt, and bread cubes (if using) and simmer until bread thickens the soup about 10 min Sprinkle with the cheese

barely fit in my soup pot...

This soup is great for any time of year, really. I especially like it as a lunch with garlic bread on the side. We have also had it as our vegetable side with dinner a few times. Either way, it's delicious and packed with super healthy vegetables.