Food Pic of the Week

“KWABLO’S PLACE” 

OUR APARTMENT IN HARLEM

Trying to get into the Christmas spirit . . . I guess.

Bacon, Chocolate Chip, Peanut Butter Cookies

The plan was to make two batches of cookies - the bacon chocolate chip cookies (aka aconbay ocolatechay ipchay cookies - Get it? Pig Latin since the cookies have bacon) and the peanut butter cookies. However, I was lazy and did not feel prepping two batches of cookies so I just threw everything together into one bowl. While delicious, this time I had time to refrigerate the cookie dough before baking, I think these cookies had too much stuff in them. Although not pictured, I did prepare a whiskey glaze for the cookies. Remember that I have to add booze to all of my desserts.

Food Pic of the Week

“Kwablo’s Place” 

OUR APARTMENT IN HARLEM

Earlier this week, I had a wonderful opportunity to attend and participate in a virtual baking class through Yelp Elite.

Chef Mel, a 2X winner of Chopped, took us through the process of making macarons (https://www.bakeitwithmel.com/). Overall, the event was kind of cool, but I admit that the class sometimes was a bit difficult to follow. This had nothing to do with Chef Mel, but because there were 130+ people in the Zoom room. I guess these types of things are better in smaller groups.

Within the first moments of the class, the instructions were kind of intense so I prepared myself a “get it together” cocktail. I was a bit of a struggle, even with chef hubby’s help, but I think I was about average compared to the rest of the Yelp Elite party. Why do I have to make everything a competition? When my macarons were finished some people were still on the first step of making the merengue. For the most part, my result looked like actual macarons.

-Overall, the event was very fun even with the somewhat difficult recipe.

-Chef Mel was really nice and a great instructor. Although the event ended around 9 pm, she was willing to hang out to help the folks that were struggling. She even gave folks the option to message her after the event if they were still having trouble with the recipe. You can check out her website where she sells her at-home baking kits (Link: ***).

-The cohost of the event was kinda annoying because he would talk over Chef Mel while she was giving instructions. I think he was supposed to assist her, but it was like he was trying to take over the event. Also, he was trying way too hard to be funny. MAN, just tell us for hold we have to caramelize the sugar and leave it at that.

-Next time, I think that I’ll just buy my macarons instead of making them. It was a lot of work (maybe not that much) and a lot of dirty dishes for 10 macarons.

-Shoot there was something else. Oh well, I guess it was that import

Happy week before Christmas.

Quarantine Home Cooking I

Because of COVID-19, I have not been able to check out local restaurants and be one of those people who takes pictures of his food before devouring it for the sake of posting on social media. Until I’m allowed to mingle with my fellow foodies, I’ll have to post food pics of things that we are making during our “new normal”. BTW, I hate the term, new normal. Here goes.

First up: Banana Nut Bread

It seems that banana nut bread has been the COVID-19 go to these days. That said, we (and by “we” I mean my hubby) did not bake your ordinary banana nut bread, we threw in chocolate chips and M&Ms. I’ve already come to the realization that I will probably gain 10 pounds once this pandemic is over.

Stay safe and healthy out there.

Home cooking I

Every now and then, I’ll make things at home. It’s very rare, but it happens . . . sometimes.

Here is my take on a chai spice apple ricotta galette. The recipe can be found here (link: ***). To make the recipe a bit more fun/adult/boozy, I added a bit of whiskey to the maple syrup spice mixture.