Lemon Scallop Fiasco

I have come to accept the fact that an occasional fiasco is just a part of the process of cooking! I have had a couple of duds recently, hence the blog silence!

I decided to write anyway this evening because I gave my Lemon Scallops a valiant effort!

I really enjoy an occasional dinner at P.F. Chang's restaurant. My favorite dish there, hands down, is the Lemon Scallops. Scallops are one of those foods that I love to order in restaurants precisely because I never cook them for myself. However, on our last office order at Coleson Foods, I got brave and ordered myself a pound of Scallops. I spent a little time online and found another blogger who came up with a copy-cat recipe for the P.F. Changs dish that I love. Her recipe is here:

Lemon Scallops

Lets just say that as simple as that sounds, I was just not meant to fry things. I have NEVER had a successful meal that included any form of frying. My oil got too hot and started splattering and burning me and making a greasy mess of my kitchen. The outside of the scallops was mushy and not crispy. I got impatient and after doing the first 1/2 of the scallops in little batches, I gave up, didn't dip them in the egg or flour and just put them all in the pan. But they didn't brown because they were too "crowded". So I got slimy little Scallop balls. Ugh!

Sigh... It makes me laugh to write this out. My kitchen was not a pretty sight tonight!

Of the whole deal, the sauce was actually decent. I got side-tracked trying to wash up a few dishes while it simmered and the green onions overcooked and turned limp and stringy and ugly green-gray. BUT, the flavor of the sauce was actually pretty good. I might try it again sometime and just drizzle it over some kind of broiled fish.

I am convinced that the problems here were "me-related" and not recipe-related. Someone with a better knack for frying things could probably pull this off. For the future, I will allow the talented people at P.F. Changs to give me my Lemon Scallop fix!

On a side note though, I did make some yummy Gluten-Free Pumpkin Chocolate Chip cookies last night. Most of you who read this are not gluten-free people so I'm not planning on putting the recipe here. But let me know if you want it and I'll be happy to share. Off I go to comfort myself with a cookie and clean up my very messy kitchen...

(Spicing Up Your Coffee... Update!)

So I tried some other additions to my coffee grounds:

1. Added almond extract - Couldn't taste it...
2. Added Amaretto liqueur - Couldn't taste it...
3. Added cocoa powder - Couldn't taste it...

So this morning I'm back to a little vanilla and a delicate shake of cinnamon and it is wonderful!

If any of you try something else and it works, please share!

Spicing up your coffee...

I really enjoy a good flavored coffee. Now... my definition of a "good flavored coffee" is extremely narrow and pretty much leaves me splurging on a pound or two of Gloria Jeans coffee only once or twice a year and drinking it plain the rest of the time. Forgive me, but I will turn my nose up at the flavored coffees or creamers you can buy at the grocery store. But if you happen to live near a Gloria Jeans shop and ever had the urge to buy me coffee (wink wink), my favorites are the Amaretto, Pumpkin Pie, Mocha Merry-Mint and German Chocolate Cake!

That said, my mom and dad went away for a little romantic get-a-way this past weekend and stayed at a B&B in Leadville, CO. (And I must say on a side-note, Mom and Dad, I love that you still do this kind of thing after 33 years of marriage!). My mom sent my sister and I an email last night telling us about their trip and mentioning that the B&B had exceptional coffee. When they asked the hostess about it, she said that she sprinkles some cinnamon and vanilla over the grounds before making it.

Brilliant!

So this morning I gave a few hearty shakes of the cinnamon bottle over my coffee grounds and about a 1/2 tsp of vanilla. I might have slightly overdone it on the cinnamon, but the end result is still really nice! (In other words, don't get carried away in your enthusiasm like I did. Aim for delicate sprinkling as opposed to hearty shaking!)

And, of course, now my wheels are turning about what else I could try. Maybe some almond or mint extract? Or some pumpkin pie spice? Or even a little kahlua or coffee liqueur? Perhaps some cocoa powder?

I'm pretty excited to play around with this over the next week!! If any of you have done something similar or if you try it out, let me know what you think!

Flourless Chocolate Cake

I love being a girl! For as long as I can remember I have loved being a girl. However, I have few quirks that occasionally make me feel distinctly un-feminine (at least by typical American standards...). I don't like shoes, either the wearing of them or the purchasing of them; I hate having to buy a new purse; I get super stressed out over the whole topic of coordinating an outfit with accessories and last (and most atrocious), I don't typically crave chocolate. Once in a great while I can be attacked by a chocolate craving with the best of them, but more often than not my crazed emotional food obsessions lean toward the salty and crunchy (think french fries or potato chips).

But a few months ago I found myself dating this adorable man who LOVES chocolate and specifically seems to love eating chocolate with me! He also happens to be super supportive of my variety of food "issues" and allergies, which has left us exploring what this city has to offer in the way of flourless chocolate cakes. We have found a few really good ones so far and I have actually been pretty surprised at the number of food establishments with one of these on the menu. Our list of keepers thus far includes Biaggi's, the Cafe at Poor Richards and the Wisdom Tea House. The tea house one is my favorite of the three. It turned me right into a puddle on the floor! I have heard that P.F. Changs has one too but we have not tried it yet.

This weekend, I stepped out and made my very own flourless chocolate cake. Jeff's mom sent me the recipe off of the blog of a friend of hers. If you look closely at the recipe below you will very likely think something to the affect of, "What?! Weird!" and maybe even, "Gross!" I will ask you to trust me on this though. I was skeptical as well, but the end result was wonderful with a really rich dark chocolate "fudgy" taste. I would recommend this one even to those of you who can eat regular chocolate cake.

Here you go:

Flourless Chocolate Cake

1 1/2 c. semi-sweet chocolate chips
1 (19oz) can garbanzo beans, rinsed and drained
4 eggs
3/4 c. white sugar
1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. vanilla

- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
- Grease and flour (with gluten-free flour) a 9-inch cake pan.
- Place chocolate chips in a bowl and heat, stirring every 20 seconds or so until they are melted and smooth.
- Combine beans and eggs in a food processor and process until smooth. Add the sugar and baking powder and pulse to blend. Pour in the melted chocolate and blend until smooth.
- Transfer batter to the prepared cake pan. Bake approximately 40 minutes or until an inserted knife comes out smooth.

Just the plain cake was lovely. Next time I might try adding a little Amarretto and topping it with raspberries and Cool Whip or maybe adding some instant coffee and Kahlua. The possibilities are endless! What is cool is that with the bulk of the cake coming from the beans, it is definitely a much healthier version of "cake" than what is traditional.

If you try it out, let me know what you think!