Potato cheese sticks

I just read the book "Julie and Julia" by Julie Powell

and like most people who have read it, I got inspired to try out some of the recipes myself.

 Well, one recipe in particular - Potato Cheese Sticks.

The recipe: Bouchées Parmentier au Fromage (potato cheese sticks)
½ lb. baking potatoes (2 medium potatoes)
1 cup sifted AP flour
1 stick softened butter
1 egg
1 cup grated Swiss cheese
⅛ tsp white pepper
Pinch of nutmeg
Pinch of cayenne
pepper Salt, to taste
Yields: 60 pieces

Peel and quarter the potatoes. Boil in salted water until tender.

Drain, then put through a ricer. You should have about 1 cup. Stir the potatoes over moderate heat in a heavy-bottomed saucepan for 2-3 minutes until they form a light film on the bottom of the pan, indicating most of their moisture has been evaporated. Beat the flour into the potatoes, then the butter by fractions, then the egg, cheese, and seasonings. Taste and adjust seasoning. Preheat oven to 425. Either butter 2 baking sheets or cover them with parchment paper. With a fluted pastry tube ¼ inch in diameter, squeeze the mixture into 2½-inch lngths spaced ½-inch apart onto the baking sheets. Bake both sheets at the same time for about 15 minutes, or until the sticks are lightly browned.

While waiting for the sticks to bake, I couldn't help myselp-- I kept checking it every 2 minutes. Is the oven hot enough? Is it browning too slow? Too fast? Why does it look the same after 45(!!) minutes!!!

Arg, I should've realise it earlier........... the recipe  called for a 425 F oven. We use Celsius. I didn't check the proper conversion. I asked S who told me to put the oven to 160C. I should've checked!!!

After 15  minutes, they were still as soft as they were when I first put them in the oven. And 45 minutes more in the oven did not help. As I said, I should've checked. The oven should be arounf 220C. So okay, technically it IS S's fault but I should keep a little blame on myself.





So being someone who will eat absolutely ANYTHING, S resumed cooking them on the stove in a little olive oil and promptly ate them. At least there's an audience for my experiments! Albeit for now, failed experiment!

Honeycomb: first attempt

S was craving for Honeycomb so we found a recipe in M's vast library of cookbooks.

Our ingredients for this deceivingly easy recipe.

I researched a bit for suggestions as we did not have any golden syrup on hand and most agreed honey would be the next best thing and would work equally as good. I might beg to disagree The end result

Does not even resemble a honeycomb. Trying to figure out where we went wrong- didn't boil the mixture enough, not enough bicarb of soda?

Moroccan calamari in tomato sauce

As S keeps catching squid, we decided now might be right time to try some squid recipes. S found a recipe for Moroccan calamari in tomato sauce

Ingredients all lined up

• 1 pound of calamari (squid) - cut into rings
• 2 tomatoes - peeled and pureed

• 1/2 onion - chopped
• 1/4 cup of finely chopped parsley
• 1 can of tomato sauce (8 oz)
• 2 tablespoons of olive oil
• 1 teaspoon of salt
• 1/4 teaspoon of pepper
• 2 teaspoons of paprika

calamari (squid) that was cut into rings
2 tomatoes we pureed in the blender

1. Add the olive oil, tomatoes, onion, parsley, salt, pepper, and paprika in your cooking pan. Cover the cooking pan and let all the ingredients cook for 5 minutes on medium heat.

2. After few minutes, add the calamari to the sauce. Cover your pan and let the calamari cook for 45 minutes - 1 hour. Stir from time to time.

We used Basmati rice which I rinsed around 3 times in cold water then boiled stove top with a little salt and oil
For more Moroccan recipe ideas, check out Cooking with Alia.

Breaded Tommy and garden salad lunch

Or should I say Brunch?

Slept in after feeding the dogs this morning and woke up at a respectable weekend time - 1130a.m. I couldn't think about cereal at this time so S decided to cook the batch of Tommy GG caught off the jetty yesterday. We decided on a simple breaded fish and salad.

For the coating, we used, flour, eggs and bread crumbs. For the breadcrumbs we just used store bought as we didn't have the time, recipe or energy to make our own though I'm sure it would be easier than it sounds. Or maybe it IS as easy as it sounds.

Our breading production line






All breaded and ready to fryThe trick for not getting all the breading on your fingers is to use one hand for the wet - egg batter and the other for the dry - flour and breadcrumbs

Fry until golden brown.

We had a discussion about this with S's brother DO on how to properly fry fish. I said flesh down while he said skin down. You be the judge.

For the simple salad, we had lettuce, tomatoes, cucumber and beets drizzled with balsamic vinegar.


Simple lunch for a lazy Saturday at home