Almond jelly with fruit cocktail

Its hot. Too hot to bake. Though oddly enough Wendy and I decided to make some Pho. I've heard somewhere that eating hot soup on a hot day is supposed to somehow be refreshing? Not sure about that.

For dessert we cooled off with some almond jelly mixed up with fruit cocktail. You can make the almond jelly by using packets or sticks of agar and adding some sugar and almond extract. Its easier just to get the premixed pouches at the Asian grocery store. Unlike gelatin, which is derived from animal bones, agar is made from seaweed and thus vegetarian friendly. The agar sets up very quickly. Once it set up, we mixed it with a chilled can of fruit cocktail. It makes a cool and refreshing summertime treat!

Blueberries

Blueberries are in season and it feels like I'm eating them non-stop! Wendy and I decided to use up some blueberries and made some Blueberry Buckle. I'm not quite sure what a 'buckle' is, other than something on your belt. It seemed like coffee cake. The recipe called for shortening, but I think if I ever use this recipe again, I'll substitute butter for better flavoring.

It sure was tasty though, especially warm out of the oven with a scoop of vanilla bean ice cream!

Its only a matter of brine

Yesterday Dave and I decided to do an Iron-Chicken cook off. Before I get to that, Wendy and I also made some chocolate Nutella rice krispie treats. I'm not a big rice krispie treat fan, but they're a jazzed up version. I reduced the amount of butter and added in copious amounts of Nutella and Guittard semi-sweet mini chocolate chips. Next time I'll add the chocolate chips when its cooled a bit so they don't end up melting so much.

Sugary sweet palmiers

Wendy mentioned on Sunday that she really liked palmiers (aka elephant ears) and didn't believe me when I told her how ridiculously easy they are. So I came over for dinner and for dessert we rolled out some sugary palmiers.

Palmier [pahlm-YAY] is french for palm tree; aptly named because these cookies resemble palm fronds. Since I absolutely refuse to make pâte feuilletée aka laminate dough aka puff pastry without a pastry sheeter, we used an easy alternative: Trader Joe's frozen puff pastry. Now this stuff is a whole lot better than the Pepperidge Farm stuff; if you look at the ingredients its just butter, sugar, and flour. When it comes to pastries, what else do you need in the world?

More sugar! Or at least that's what we used. Rolled in sugar and then rolled onto itself, the palmiers were a snap to whip up. We baked them at 400 degrees for 7.5 minutes on one side, flipped them over and baked for another 7.5 minutes. They came out of the oven sweet, crunchy, and perfect.

Love is sweet

A beautiful bride. A handsome groom. A wonderful wedding.

It was a long time coming, but my brother finally walked his girlfriend of many years down the aisle. I generally don't get very emotional at weddings, but their carefully crafted, yet very personal vows really touched me. They really are an amazing couple.

Twilight

Okay okay.. so I'm not a teenie bopper, but the books are damn good! And yes I know Stephanie Meyer isn't a good writer. But the books are just addicting. I'm in the middle of book three and just printed out the leaked "Midnight Sun".

Finally saw the movie last night with Chino and Wendy. I'm buying that movie. I'm buying the boxed book set if I like Eclipse/Breaking Dawn.. or maybe just the collector's edition of Twilight. And maybe a cardboard cut out of Edward (for my cousin of course). Oh and by the way, Edward playing the piano? Hot. Obsessed? I think not... okay maybe just a little.

Cupcakes with Wendy

Tonight I hung out with Wendy and we made some yummy Boston Cream Pie Cupcakes! This is the first time this year I've baked. Actually the first time I've baked in quite a while. Its nice trying to get back into the swing of things. These were vanilla cupcakes filled with custard/pastry cream and topped with chocolate frosting! Yummers.

Up close:

Vegas baby Vegas!

Oh I'm tired. Vegas can be tiring. Vegas bachelorette party with a dozen hot girls is exhausting. Two nights.. lots of shots.. lots of dancing..limo..wheelchair..the bride-to-be/my future sister in law is a rockstar.