Woodkid and gingerbread muffins and my own creation.

Sometimes you want to make something so you search and search for a recipe that suits but never find it. Sometimes you make the closest thing but sometimes you decide to get creative. Today was options 2. I started by making my new favorite super spicey gingerbread muffins. Seriously, I love them. I think they taste like Christmas. However, I was also in the mood for something super chocolately, but not my famous death by chocalate brownies. So I decided to make muffins (I'm on a kick, what can I say). I spent a good 30-40 minutes looking for a chocolate muffin recipe I likes and came up with bubbkiss so I decided to create my own. I have never made my own baking recipe before. Cooking is a bit different. You add a little spice here, a little something there and can sort of fix it. Baking, once it is in the oven if it doesn't work there is no going back. You have a heap of crap on your hands. So I was nervous. Thankfully, my housemate Brendan's brother, and my favorite guinnea pig, Stephen was here to be my test subject.... again. After they came out of the oven and cooled a bit, I offered him one and got the "These are gorgeous" thumbs up and actual mouth words too. So I will be making them again. And I'll even post the recipe for y'all to make 'em yourselves.

Strangely I was also in the something different music wise too. Earlier this year my friend Mirek introduced me to this French band Woodkid. I don't even know how to classify them, but I totally dig them. Like a strange mix between post-progressive and French pop, they are a weird mix of angst and joy, longing and hope. I highly recommend them.

Gillie's made-up chocolate muffins.
2 1/2 cup flour
1 cup sugar
1 tbsp dutch chocolate cocoa powder
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp pure vanilla extract
1 cup boiling water
250 grams mix of semi-sweet and milk chocolate squares
1/2 cup butter
2 medium eggs

pre-heat oven to 375 degrees
Melt chocolate squares and butter together in pot.
mix dry ingredints together, including vanilla extract
fold in eggs
add cup of water
pour in chocolate/buttter mixture
stir until smooth.
Fill paper muffin wrappers until anywhere between 1/2-3/4 full depending on how big you want muffins to be.
bake for 35 minutes.
makes anywhere between 9-12 muffins.

Chocolate cookies, gingerbread muffins and Swing

Today I tried out a couple of new recipes, one for uber-chocolate cookies and one for gingerbread muffins. The cookies were a disaster.... like I can't even look at them as they make me sad and the muffins are heavenly, spicey and glorious. I have to figure out what went wrong with the cookies, as they were really meally and icky. Maybe too much flour? Who knows?

Today I was in the mood for some 1940's fabulousness, music wise. So on went my Benny Goodman jango station and as I puttered round my kitchen I sang my little heart out and when I wasn't singing I was dancing along. I am sure anyone who passed by the window thought I was mad, but who cares? Not me. I have gingerbread muffins and they don't.

Garlic Cheesy Mashed Potatoes and Neko Case

While this combination of food and song may not make any sense (although there are those who believe very strongly that Neko goes well with everything) there was never any question in my mind that the savory and sultry needed to happen together.

I have been doing a lot of sweet stuff baking recently. Cupcakes, brownies, muffins..... you get the idea. So when I woke up this morning I was in a "I need comfort food of a different sort"; not that the sweets weren't magical, beccause they were, at least according to my housemate Brendan who ate a fair share of yesterday's brownies. So I rummaged in my pantry, looking for something of the savory variety when it hit me that I hadn't played around with mashed potatoes in a while. I thought about doing a quiche with mashed potato crust but quickly disccarded the idea in favor of an old favorite of mine.... mashed pototoes. I mean really, something is wrong with you if you don't get comfort from the smooth creamy yumminess of really good mashed potatoes.

As for Neko Case, I needed some really good proactive sadness music. None of this sitting around moping shit for me yeterday. Hell no. I had mashed potatoes to make and she may be sad and filled with angst, but she isn't stagnant or even able to just let her agnst consume her, she is always doing other things, even being angry. But most importantly there is a hope to it... and I like it.

Brownies and Bluegrass

Last night was one of those days during the middle of the week when I needed my chocolate and cooking fix..... thankfully I make death by chocolate brownies, so both needs can be met in one fell swoop. The musical selection was a little more difficult to decide on, however. One of my housemates was studying in the kitchen, which meant any sort of angry loud music (naturally my first choice) was out. I tried working to Bach for a second, but wasn't feeling it, so I settled on the melodies of Gillian Welch, which of course proved to be the perfect choice. There really is something about cooking and baking to music inspired by a sort of melancholia that just does the heart good and makes a certain sense, especially if you are in that frame of mind to begin with. This is also why cooking to jazz (Miles Davis "Knida Blue" and anything by any of the song birds) works perfectly too.

They didn't turn out quite as good as they normally do.... a little too gooey in the middle, like I didn't cook them long enough, despite the testing tooth pick coming out clean. I am thinking the funk I have been lately may have something to do with it, like I am not as in tune with my culinary creations as I usually am.... who knows. But they still turned out pretty damn good. At least my housemates think so.... I came down stairs this morning to the whole pan almost gone..... Really glad I decided chow down on some last night.

The first of yet another blog.

So I thought with all of the baking and cooking I have been doing of late I would start writing about my (mis)adventures into this (not so) new creative outlet of my life.

Today's attempt was mac and cheese. People have been promising me they would send some and I got tired of waiting so, I figured I would teach myself how to make this delight of hangover/comfort food. As first tries go, I have to say, I don't think it went too bad. The cheese didn't melt as smoothly as I would have liked it to, but it was still a little bit of white cheddar heaven in my mouth, which is good. I am thinking about adding some chicken and veggies to make it more of a meal. We'll see.

I have to admit, there is something about making dishes from home, which aren't readily available in other countries. It helps to quell the random moments of homesickness, which happen to us all, even those of us who love living abroad. Mac and cheese is no exception to this. For me, one taste of this simple noodle and cheesy dish and I am seven again, sitting with my mom on a Sunday, watching the 49ers getting their asses handed to them, listening to her frustration about their (lack of) playing and completely happy.

Anyway look for more of these to come, as I chatter about old favorites (brownies and lemon bars) and the new stuff I teach myself.