I love Eggs Benedict. If a brunch menu has them, you can count on me to order them. I am never disappointed. Seriously, try to find somewhere that serves bad eggs benedict. I don’t think it exists. Naturally the next step in my love of eating eggs benedict was to make them myself. Pioneer Woman never fails to disappoint with a fabulous recipe. I was terrified about poaching the eggs properly, but take a look at how everything worked out!

Prep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 15 minutes
Yields: 2 Eggs Benedict

Ingredients:
2 English muffins
1 cup spinach
Pinch of garlic powder
Tablespoon of olive oil
2 whole eggs
3 egg yolks
2 sticks butter
Juice of 1 lemon
Cayenne pepper (to taste)

Directions:
Bring a pot of water to a rolling boil. This is important!

Sauté spinach to taste. I used a pinch of garlic powder and about a tablespoon of olive oil. Spinach should shrink and look wilted. Set aside.

Poach eggs as follows, and don’t panic! It will be fine, I promise.

With a wooden spoon, stir boiling water until there is a small tornado in your pot. I’m serious. The faster the better!

This is me trying to tornado boiling water and photograph at the same time. It didn’t go as well as I planned. Crack one egg into a bowl and then pour it into the swirling tornado of boiling water.

Cross your fingers and hope for the best! The swirling motion should make the egg stay together, but don’t be alarmed if some egg whites separate. I poached my eggs one at a time so as not to panic too much about it not working. It was surprisingly not as difficult as I thought it would be, although my eggs did end up being significantly smaller than expected in the end. Boil eggs for 2-2 ½ minutes.

Prep for the Hollandaise sauce by separating 3 egg yolks into a bowl.

Juice 1 lemon and set aside.

These next steps are very important! Follow me close.

Melt two sticks of butter in a pan.

Put your 3 egg yolks in a blender and blend on low speed until combined. Once your butter has completely melted, open the top of the blender and slowly pour the butter into the egg yolks while the blender is still running on low. Beware of splattering!

Once butter has been mixed in, add lemon juice.

Finally, add cayenne pepper to taste. Blend until the sauce is thick and not super runny anymore.

Toast English muffins.

Time to plate your delicious meal! Butter your English muffins.

Add sautéed spinach.

Layer on your poached eggs.

Top with many, many spoonfuls of Hollandaise sauce.

Dive in and enjoy!

That’s it — enjoy these babies on your weekend to make it perfect.

How do you poach eggs? Do you use a fancy poacher, or do you do it tornado-style?

So as many of you know, I have several friends who are on gluten free diets, including three people at work. Since I make treats for my co-workers on their birthdays, I usually feel bad when the treat is not gluten free – that means three people miss out on something delicious! The worst part is when I look at whatever I made, I say, “I guess I could have made this gluten free.” So, when the next birthday came around, I did: I made a gluten free pie.

The dough was simple, and I found it to be on par with the ease/difficulty of making “regular” pie crust. The only ingredient I needed that I didn’t already have was xanthan gum, and I got that from Whole Foods easily. The recipe I used came from King Arthur, though I did not use clear jel because I couldn’t find it. (They didn’t know what it was at Whole Foods, which meant I was not likely to find it in a pinch. Luckily, it was optional, so we were fine.)

Recipe for a two-crust pie (top and bottom crust):

2.5 cups King Arthur Gluten-Free Multi-Purpose Flour
2 tablespoons sugar
1teaspoon xanthan gum
1 teaspoon salt
12 tablespoons cold butter
2 large eggs
4 teaspoons vinegar

Your first step is to mix the flour, xanthan gum, sugar, and salt together in a bowl.

Add in your cold butter in pats (about scant a tablespoon big, or so.)

You can use a pastry blender or a fork to incorporate the butter – there should still be small chunks, but not too big. Think pea-sized.

Now, onto your wet ingredients. Take the eggs and whisk them up with the vinegar, until they are frothy.

It’ll look something like this.

Add your wet ingredients to the dry, and mix until it comes together, then roll into a ball.

Now you have to refrigerate for about an hour. (I wrapped mine in plastic wrap to stick in in the fridge.)

Meanwhile, rinse your blueberries and spread ’em out to air dry. The recipe I used for the inside of the blueberries was as follows, adapted gluten free by me:

2.25 lbs fresh blueberries, rinsed and stems removed
1/2 tsp lemon zest
1 tbsp lemon juice
1/4 cup gluten free multi-purpose flour
1/2 cup white granulated sugar (100g)
1/4 tsp cinnamon
2 tbsp butter (unsalted), cut into small pieces

egg wash:
1 egg
1 tbsp. milk 

Mix together your lemon zest, lemon juice, flour, sugar, and cinnamon.

Coat your blueberries in the sugary mixture.

Now, you should be about ready to take your dough out and roll it. You need to let it sit out at room temperature for about ten minutes before you roll, otherwise it’ll be too crumbly.

I will say this about gluten free dough: it is not easy to move. But it’s OK. You can move the largest piece you can get into the butter pie dish, then push the rest in to complete the bottom crust.

See? Don’t fret. It’ll work out.

So, after your bottom is rolled out, you can fill your pie with blueberries. You might think they are not going to fit into the dish, but they will. I didn’t think they would fit. They did.

See? They all fit. And if they don’t, just eat one or two. Now, at this point, put the butter, in pieces on the top of the blueberries. I did not do this. I forgot the butter. The pie was still a delight, but you know, butter makes things better, so you should maybe add it in.

Because gluten free dough is more fragile than regular pie crust dough, I opted to cut the dough into stars and then cover the pie. That way, you don’t have to move an entire top, and it is properly vented, and it is pretty. So, pretty much a win, win, win.

Use an offset spatula to pull the dough up, so you don’t rip your stars (I ripped a few. It happens. You can re-roll the dough if needed.)

Roll until you run out of dough, and just keep layering the stars on the pie.

After you’ve layered the stars, you can let it sit in the fridge for about 30 minutes to firm up. Then give it an egg wash (1 whisked egg + 1 splash of milk) and then stick it in your hot oven (425 degrees.) You will let it cook at 425 for 20 minutes, then 350 for about 40 minutes.

And this, my friends, is what your pie will look like!

Please enjoy! Making this gluten free was easy peasy, and greatly appreciated by my gluten free coworkers. And the best part was you couldn’t even really tell!

 Recipe:

2 Crust Dough
Time: 20 minutes active, 70 minutes nonactive

2.5 cups King Arthur Gluten-Free Multi-Purpose Flour
2 tablespoons sugar
1teaspoon xanthan gum
1 teaspoon salt
12 tablespoons cold butter
2 large eggs
4 teaspoons vinegar

1. Mix dry ingredients (flour, sugar, xanthan gum, salt.)
2. Chop cold butter into pats. Incorporate into dry ingredients.
3. Whisk together eggs and vinegar.
4. Add to dry ingredients, roll into ball.
5. Refrigerate for 1 hour prior to rolling, and let sit at room temperature 10 minutes before rolling.

Pie filling
Time: 20 minutes active, 60 minutes nonactive 

2.25 lbs fresh blueberries, rinsed and stems removed
1/2 tsp lemon zest
1 tbsp lemon juice
1/4 cup gluten free multi-purpose flour
1/2 cup white granulated sugar (100g)
1/4 tsp cinnamon
2 tbsp butter (unsalted), cut into small pieces

egg wash:
1 egg
1 tbsp. milk 

1. Mix all ingredients except blueberries and butter.
2. Add blueberries and mix well.
3. Put blueberries into pie crust.
4. Top blueberries with butter pieces.
5. Top buttered blueberries with top crust (or crust stars).
6. Refrigerate 30 minutes (Pre-heat oven at this point).
7. Egg wash the top.
8. Place in oven for 20 minutes at 425.
9. Lower heat to 350 and let bake 30-40 more minutes.

This weekend, Los Angeles is going to be seeing 100 degree weather. For a girl like me who wants to stay healthy, eat home cooked meals, but has no air conditioning, this seems to be a challenge.

I turned my oven on the day before last, which was a terrible idea, so last night we stuck to the stove top (which really was still too hot.)

Here are some recipes to keep you cool in this August heat.

These are peach-orange smoothies from Mel. Something tells me this will be my breakfast for the next week.

A Chopped Italian Salad from Onions & Chocolate. I might actually just head to her house and have her whip me one up.

I must admit, I’m a sucker for summer salad. Here’s another with parm, celery, and beans. Yum!

I also might finally have to foray into homemade popsicles….someone come over and help me, please? (I’m looking at you, Megan.)

I’m also craving this recipe from Corelyn last year…it might be time for some shrimp dishes!

What are you favorite summertime dishes? What gets you through the hot days??

Hello Folks!

I have to start by saying that I love a good cut of red meat. I tried my hand at making a beef brisket only a few months ago and have been refining the way I like to do it ever since. I spent a large portion of that time trying to figure out how I could incorporate some sort of alcohol into the dish and finally landed on beer. While this meal is a bit more time consuming than previous recipes I have posted, it’s still very simple, and the results are wonderful!

Oven Temperature: 350 for the first hour & 300 for the subsequent 3 hours
Servings: 4-6 (But it is great for leftovers if you have a smaller group)

Ingredients:

1 4 lb. cut of beef brisket
1 pint of beer (Preferably a Stout or Lager.  Lighter Beers tend not to soak up into the meat as well)
2 tbsp chili powder
2 tbsp salt
1 tbsp garlic powder
1 tbsp onion powder
1 tbsp black ground pepper
1 tbsp granulated sugar
1 tbsp of bay leaves
2 tsp of dry mustard seed
1 tsp of cilantro
1 tsp of basil
1 tsp of thyme
1 tsp of marjoram
1 tsp of dill weed
1 tsp of celery salt
1 ½ cups of beef broth
1 cup of olive oil

Directions:

First thing you want to do is to trim the fat off of the beef brisket you have purchased. There tends to be a great deal on the bottom of the cut, and while you will want some fat for the cooking process, you don’t want too much so it doesn’t overwhelm the beer or the dry rub that is to be used.

After you have trimmed the majority of the fat off the meat go ahead and put the meat in a cooking tray or pot that is large enough so the entire cut can be laid down flat. Lay it down and pour ½ a pint of the beer you have selected. For something like this I like to use Guinness, because it is an extra heavy stout and soaks up beautifully into the meat.

Let this cut of meat and the beer sit in the covered container for at least 2 hours. I like to keep the cut in room temperature during this time because I have found it allows for better soaking of the beer than sticking it in the fridge. Make sure you cover it though; you don’t want any bugs or dust getting in there while it sits.

The next step is to prep your rub. I like to get a large baking sheet out and pour all the ingredients for the rub onto it. This will include everything but the beef, the beer, the broth, and the olive oil. Once you have all the spices on the tray go ahead and use your hands to mix it all up. You want to make sure you get an even allotment so it spreads evenly on the meat.

Next step is to remove the remaining beer that is soaking in the tray with your meat. Do not discard the liquid because you will need it again later in the process – put it in a bowl. After you have removed the liquid take the cut of meat out and put it on the dry rub tray. Make sure you coat the cut of meat as thoroughly as possible, covering all sides with the rub as best you can. This will do two things: first, it will ensure the flavor remains even and second, it will act as a sort of shell around the meat so the beer doesn’t escape as easily. It almost nestles it in there.

After you have finished applying the dry rub to your meat go ahead and pre-heat your oven to 350 degrees. While the oven heats up get your pot that was used to soak the beer into the meat and pour in the olive oil. This will assist you in ensuring the meat doesn’t burn during its first hour of cooking. After you have added the olive oil and generously spread it around the pan, grab your coated piece of meat put it back into your pot. Make sure you put the fatter side on the bottom, because that can be trimmed off later.

Put the pot in the oven for 1 hour uncovered and let the meat sit. In order to allow even cooking, turn the pot 180 degrees at the half hour mark.

After an hour ,remove the pot from the oven.

Lower the temperature to 300 degrees and pour the beef broth and the leftover beer you have saved into the pot. Then you want to cover the pot tightly and allow the meat to simply sit for the next 3 hours.

At the 3 hour mark check your meat. If it is fork tender you are ready to go.

Trim any excess fat if you would like, slice and serve.

Good Spirits Folks!

So my best friend in the whole world recently sent me a Toddy Cold Brew System. She claimed it would make a lovely, acid-free iced coffee — and she was very, very right.

It’s pretty similar to the iced coffee I showed you earlier in the summer – only this coffee has a filter, so it is less acidic (which makes for a happier stomach!) The coffee is a smidge sweeter than normal iced coffee, which takes a bit of getting used to, but let me tell you my  acid reflux has thanked me (and my taste buds, for that matter!)

Here’s your cast of characters: toddy system, water, coffee, scale.

This is the filter. It’s coffee dirty. Sorry. You dampen, then place at the bottom of the system. Under that is a stopper that keeps the coffee from getting into the glass carafe while it’s brewing.

So you take your coffee and add it to the system, alternating water, coffee, water, coffee, water, coffee, water. The instruction manual is more in detail, but you get the idea.

Then you let your coffee sit for 12 hours (overnight.)

In the morning, your coffee grinds will look like this. Awesome.

At which point you take your stopper out and let it drain.

I let it drain for about fifteen minutes.

The thing about the Toddy is that it makes coffee concentrate, so you need to add water. I use about half and half, although the Toddy suggests you use one third to two thirds water. Whatever floats your boat.

I also like to add a splash of milk, because I like the way it looks, and because it tastes delicious.

See? Delicious, non-acidic, iced coffee.

Come on over, and I’ll make you a glass! Thanks to Lauren for sending it to me to try — you were right, it’s awesome.