The class assignment for which this was created is officially over. However, I’ve really enjoyed working on my cooking and baking, and sharing it with all of you, so I’m going to try to update as often as I can with new things I’ve made.

However, this is a tough part of the semester, with all those final papers and law school applications, so it might be a while.

But thanks for sticking with me, and commenting, and hopefully I’ll be back soon!

-Heather

I love coffee, and it loves me. (PHOTO CREDIT: Flickr user Ahmed Rabea)

I am a coffee purist. I prefer my coffee to be strong, flavorful and accompanied with a splash of half-and-half and a small spoon of sugar.

Therefore, I’m not usually a fan of instant coffee – partly because I don’t like the flavor, and also because I like having the cream and sugar to put in it, and if you’re going to bother to have those, why are you drinking instant coffee?

But my mom got from her boss a packet of the new Starbucks VIA instant coffee, which come in small single-serving tubes.

They even come in different varieties. (PHOTO CREDIT: Flickr user Slightlynorth)

The directions are pretty simple – boil 8 oz. of water, add the packet (which is easy to open) and stir.

My thoughts:

First, smelling it, I thought that it didn’t have a bad smell, but it didn’t have the same just-brewed scent wafting up.

I tried it black, to keep with my theory that it would truly be “on-the-go” for me, without the luxuries I usually put in coffee. I didn’t really like it like that. It was kind of weak, and although I don’t usually drink black coffee, I would prefer brewed black coffee over this.

Then I added the usual amounts of cream and sugar. This made it better. However, it’s got a strange dichotomy – a strong roasted smell, but pretty weak on the actual coffee’s strength. I also personally believe that Starbucks heavily roasts its coffee – almost to the point of being burnt – and this instant coffee is no exception.

Overall, this is the best of the instant coffees I’ve tried. I might keep the rest of the pack on hand in the event that I’m late and don’t have time to brew some coffee, but I’d still prefer to buy a brewed cup or make mine as often as possible.

PHOTO CREDIT: Ahmed Rabea and Slightlynorth

Today’s theme? “101 Head Starts on the Day.” Thanksgiving Day, that is.

While I’ll be heading North to visit family this Thanksgiving, and will leave the cooking to more experienced, willing participants, some of these look like great ideas to try at any time.

(PHOTO CREDIT: Flickr user ginnerobot)

Godiva’s Chocolate Rewards Club does the unthinkably awesome – gives you your choice of truffle out of the display case once a month, for free, no strings attached.

The first time my friend Abby and I went in, we were sure it was some sort of trick. The woman behind the counter was very patient with us as she explained that no, we didn’t need to pay for a membership, or register for a program – all we had to do was accept a keycard from her and pick which truffle we wanted.

There are few words for how amazing this is, so the card has made it into my  key ring next to my grocery rewards card and my gym membership card just to remind me every month.

So head to the nearest Godiva store (for you Triangle people, it’s at the Streets of Southpoint mall in Durham) and try whichever one you want. Yesterday, I got one of the new holiday-themed ones: candy cane.

It almost made up for Santa’s chair already set up in the concourse and the incessant holiday music.

PHOTO CREDIT: ginnerobot

Fluffy, butter and soft - these did not contribute to my new running plan. (PHOTO CREDIT: Flickr user Sea-Turtle)

When I studied abroad in London in Fall 2007, my friends and I came to realize there were just some foods that you couldn’t find overseas. None of them were debilitating by any means, but it was still strange to not find sweet potatoes, iced tea (ignoring that I don’t even like sweet tea) and maple syrup.

Sure, there were all sorts of cool foods you can’t get in the U.S. or have to pay import prices for, but after about two and a half months, I started to crave biscuits.

Problem was: “biscuits” in England are essentially cookies. They have scones, but nothing comparable to the cholesterol-spiking balls of goodness we have here. We even did an experiment by going to all the American fast food chains in central London (McDonalds, Burger King, etc.) for breakfast and ordering what we thought would be the same food as here.

What did they have? “Bacon, Egg and Cheese BAGELS.” It blew my mind. And when my parents came to visit before Thanksgiving, they wouldn’t sneak a Bojangles biscuit into their luggage for me. (Yes, I would eat it after a seven-hour plane ride.)

So my friend Andrew took pity on us one night and whipped up a pan of drop biscuits. They didn’t have that classic round shape, but they were excellent. And they satisfied my biscuit craving until I got home, although I demanded a Bojangles stop on the ride home from the airport.

With that as inspiration, I decided to make my own biscuits a couple weeks ago. The recipe I tried came from America’s Test Kitchen’s online recipe archive. Once you register for the site, you get access to all the recipes from all the seasons.

It was a pretty simple recipe, especially once I substituted the fresh buttermilk for powdered buttermilk reconstituted with skim milk. I’ll post about this tip later, but this simplified the number of ingredients you need and makes these biscuits something you can make whenever you want with simple ingredients.

According to the recipe, you also have to do a special procedure to mix the butter and buttermilk – and it is not attractive. Just a warning.

See? Ew. But they said so, and it works. (PHOTO CREDIT: Heather Mandelkehr/thedormcook)

However, the reasoning behind this procedure worked – the butter clumps allowed the biscuit to have air pockets once it baked, and therefore they were fluffy, not dense.

My only other modification to the recipe would be to recommend that you reduce the two tablespoons of melted butter to brush on top of the biscuits to one tablespoon. The recipe only makes 12 biscuits, and there was so much better on top, it was running off the sides. I know that’s probably good, but I bet they’d be fine with half as much butter.

I decided to shape them a little bit also - this helped them come out more uniformly than if I had just "dropped" them. (PHOTO CREDIT: Heather Mandelkehr/thedormcook)

————-

Best Drop Biscuits

2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour (10 ounces)

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon sugar

3/4 teaspoon table salt

1 cup buttermilk (cold), made from powdered mix

8 tablespoons unsalted butter , melted and cooled slightly (about 5 minutes), plus 1 tablespoon melted butter for brushing biscuits

Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 475 degrees. Whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar, and salt in large bowl. Combine buttermilk and 8 tablespoons melted butter in medium bowl, stirring until butter forms small clumps.

Add buttermilk mixture to dry ingredients and stir  until just incorporated and batter pulls away from sides of bowl. Using greased 1/4-cup dry measure, scoop level amount of batter and drop onto parchment-lined rimmed baking sheet (biscuits should measure about 2 1/4 inches in diameter and 1 1/4 inches high).

Repeat with remaining batter, spacing biscuits about 1 1/2 inches apart. Loosely shape biscuits if desired. Bake until tops are golden brown and crisp, 12 to 14 minutes.

Brush biscuit tops with remaining 2 tablespoons melted butter. Transfer to wire rack and let cool 5 minutes before serving.

PHOTO CREDIT: Sea-Turtle

Since I wasn't a prepared journalist and didn't have my camera, my cell phone camera had to cut it. (PHOTO CREDIT: Heather Mandelkehr/thedormcook)

If you’re not sure what this is, it’s a two-inch-tall container of gelato I found in the frozen section next to the ice cream. Gelato, which originated in Italy, is a similar frozen dessert to ice cream.

It’s often billed as a healthier alternative to ice cream, claiming to contain less fat because of ingredients and the process by which it is made. In my opinion, gelato is also creamier than ice cream, and has a consistency suited to both cream and fruit bases.

Strangely enough, I’m picky about my gelato. When I went to Italy a few years ago, I ate at least one serving of gelato a day (often two, but I think the hiking and walking I did made up for it), and found gelato back home lacking that special edge – most of it strongly resembled ice cream instead.

However, when I saw this little container, I decided to give it a try and was pretty impressed. I got the Turkish Pistachio type (they also had Blood Orange that day) and thought the consistency was very good – not as thick as ice cream and smoother.

I also like how the single-serve container is perfect for me – I don’t eat ice cream or gelato often, so I don’t like keeping whole containers in the freezer. But these are perfect – the right amount of gelato at one time. I also prefer the gelato because the mini ice cream containers of the same size still seem to be too much for me because of the density of the product.

I would certainly get these again, and not just because they come with a little plastic spoon built into the lid!

However, if you’re interested in having fresh-made gelato instead of from a container, the Whole Foods in Chapel Hill installed a gelato bar (about the time it also installed a barbecue bar, which is a whole other story) which I think is pretty authentic.

As one of the people serving gelato told me, they rotate flavors based on what they feel like making, so every time I’ve gone over, there’s something new. They even have my favorite flavor from Italy – stracciatella, which is basically like plain gelato with thin chocolate shavings. Give it a try and let me know, or better yet, I’ll come with you!

- a cool interactive map showing the best and worst food at Major League Baseball stadiums throughout the country (although the only one I’ve been to is Nationals Park in Washington, D.C.) (New York Times)

- an article explaining the new food choices (sushi and seafood, anyone?) in both New York stadiums after the concessions revamping (New York Times)

A Halloween cupcake with some leftover decorations in the apartment - a small fraction of the roommates' effort this month. (PHOTO CREDIT: Heather Mandelkehr/thedormcook)

Inspired by my friend Katie, who cut a recipe out of October’s Bon Appétit and mailed it to me, I had decided about a month ago to theme this week’s meeting food on Halloween, which was especially timely because Halloween fell on a Saturday this year.

However, I ran into a problem with the original recipe – it made mini-cupcakes. And let’s just say the people I’m serving prefer larger servings. I also don’t have a mini-muffin pan.

I didn’t trust myself to modify the recipe to fit into larger muffin pans, so I turned once more to the Internet for a new recipe, and found one, courtesy of Martha Stewart.

It was super easy for a recipe from scratch – it only required two mixing bowls for ingredients, and I didn’t have to use an electric mixer – everything could be done by hand.

However, I made an important modification to the original recipe, which called for separate amounts of cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg and allspice. I went grocery shopping for these spices, and whoa, are they expensive.

I couldn’t justify paying $1.50 – $2 for each little bottle of spice when I knew I could buy a whole set of them for cheaper, so I settled on buying one container of “pumpkin pie spice,” which worked out very well.

And they were a hit, when topped with cream cheese frosting (fine, I bought that pre-made) and a candy corn flower. They went over well at my meeting, and I even had some left over to share with others.

My roommate Nancy, who ate one of the leftover ones, said, “You should serve these with coffee.” And that launched us into a discussion about what differentiates a muffin and a cupcake – I personally believe a cupcake is iced, while a muffin is not. And, a muffin has a more crumbly texture.

But since these included fruit and were pretty dense, I thought they tasted a lot like muffins – and it didn’t help that I kept calling them muffins. Either way, they worked out, and maybe I have a new recipe to bring to the family’s Thanksgiving dinner at the end of the month…

————

Pumpkin Cupcakes (makes 22)

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon coarse salt

2 1/2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice

1 cup packed light-brown sugar

1 cup granulated sugar

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, melted and cooled

4 large eggs, lightly beaten

1 can (15 ounces) pumpkin solid pack

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line cupcake pans with paper liners; set aside.

In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and allspice; set aside.

In a large bowl, whisk together, brown sugar, granulated sugar, butter, and eggs. Add dry ingredients, and whisk until smooth. Whisk in pumpkin.

Divide batter among liners, filling each about halfway.

Bake until tops spring back when touched, and a cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean, 20 to 25 minutes, rotating pans once if needed.

Transfer to a wire rack; let cool completely.

I’m going to share some thoughts about tofu and why I love it, and why it bemuses me that most people turn a lovely shade of green when they even consider eating it.

Tofu. Yum. No, not being sarcastic. (PHOTO CREDIT: Flickr user arimoore)

I absolutely love tofu. And no, I’m not vegetarian, or vegan – I enjoy a freshly seared medium-rare steak as much as the next person.

I just happen to enjoy tofu. In case you’re unfamiliar with it, Wikipedia describes tofu as a “soft white food made by coagulating soy milk, and then pressing the resulting curds into blocks.”

Sounds appetizing, no? Actually, the biggest complaint I’ve heard about tofu is about its texture – being spongy and moist, it’s a little like Jell-O…with no flavor. On its own, I mean.

I grew up eating tofu – it’s a staple in many Asian foods, and my Chinese grandparents made it in a variety of delicious ways, by stir-frying it with oyster sauce and serving it with sweet-hot pepper sauce.

So it never occurred to me that tofu would be viewed as this “other” food, something to turn to in lieu of meat – whether it be for health reasons or personal reasons.

Personally, I’m not a fan of tofu products that imitate others – Tofurky, etc. – partly because I do still eat meat, but also because I think you can do so much more with tofu than try to make it something else.

I made a tofu stir-fry a couple nights ago in the apartment, and while I was cleaning up, my roommate Christian and her sister Nikki came in and started asking me questions about my dinner.

Christian doesn’t like tofu, but Nikki does, although she had an important question that stopped her from cooking it herself – “How long do you have to cook tofu to make sure it’s safe to eat? Is there a time limit?”

I told her that as far as I knew, there isn’t any restrictions to cooking tofu if you don’t have health concerns, but I try to stir-fry it until it browns a little. She still seemed a little skeptical, but a couple days later a hermetically sealed package of tofu appeared on our counter. Maybe I’m making a little change in the world.

PHOTO CREDIT: arimoore

While some of my friends were hardcore enough to take on the Marine Corps Marathon 10K on Sunday, I…was not. I stuck to what I do best – eating.

Washington, D.C. from a crosswalk on Pennsylvania Ave. (PHOTO CREDIT: Heather Mandelkehr/thedormcook)

What’s great is that my friends (for the most part) are into good food and trying new places, so we’re often poring lists of restaurants and asking acquaintances for recommendations.

So here’s a recap of the weekend’s food tour:

Friday:

Capital City Brewing Company – For all you Chapel Hill people, this place reminded me a lot of West Franklin St.’s Carolina Brewery. Both have comprehensive beer lists and menus full of filling burgers and entrees.

I had the “Pentagon Pear Salad,” which was awesome, and they even brought out a tray of stadium-style hot pretzels before our meal. Score.

Saturday:

Mr. Smith’s of Georgetown – This was a combo bar/restaurant on M Street in Georgetown we just stumbled upon while wandering. They had a pretty comprehensive specials and brunch menu, from which I ordered the quiche of the day (spinach and mushroom).

The setting was really cool as well – we were in a kind of indoor greenhouse/garden decorated with Christmas tree garlands with hibiscus flowers attached to them.

Busboys & Poets – This was an awesome, very hip bar/restaurant near Mt. Vernon Square and the Washington Convention Center (though there are two other locations in the city).

Named after poet Langston Hughes, it also features a bookstore on the ground level, poetry readings and live music. We didn’t make it on a night with poetry readings (not going to lie, I’m not too disappointed about that), but we did take advantage of the diversity of the menu – from my grilled Brie sandwich with sweet potato fries to vegan pizzas.

Red Velvet Cupcakery – No week is complete without a cupcake. So we went to this precious little place after dinner and got cupcakes…and did not drop them on the sidewalk.

Also, how precious is it that this place is a "cupcakery"? (PHOTO CREDIT: Flickr user aliciagriffin)

Sunday:

ESPN Zone – Alright, so this isn’t exactly one for the food adventurer. But it does accommodate large  groups easily, and we got there right in time for kickoff for the early games, including the Patriots game broadcast from London…so I was happy about it.

Though I didn’t get to try it, I heard there’s a room filled with recliners and all the TV monitors, so you can watch the games and get your food served in total comfort. I guess that’s not conducive to group conversation though.

PHOTO CREDIT: aliciagriffin