Homemade Mac and Cheese

So I will be trying this recipe again tomorrow evening, but had great success a few weeks ago, so it has been requested that I do an encore.

Ingredients
8 ounces pasta (gluten free, the quinoa stuff is excellent)
1 3/4 cups of milk (we use low fat)
3 tablespoons of flour (gluten free)
1/2 tsp garlic powder (or more if you love garlic, or just chop up some cloves)
1/2 tspn of salt
1/4 tspn ground pepper
1 cup shredded extra sharp cheddar
1/4 cup shredded parmesan
1 tspn dijon mustard
Bacon or prosciutto crumbles/cubes
Taragon chopped

Cook pasta (I'm not going to question anyone's culinary abilities by explaining how)
Heat 1 1/2 cups of milk in a large pot, medium high, until it simmers.
Whisk the other 1/4 cups, plus all the flour, garlic, salt and pepper in a small bowl.
Add the flour mixture to the big pot, returning mixture to a simmer again, whisking constantly for a few minutes until its a little thicker.
Remove from the heat and whisk in the cheeses and mustard until everything is mixed and melted.
Drain the past and mix with the sauce and bacon.prosciutto.
Toss a little of the taragon on top the mac and cheese when serving.

Note - It is pretty easy to see where the cheese mixture is going, and if you want to add some more cheese, or salt or mustard to enhance the flavor in a particular direction.

Round 2, tomorrow night.

Bob's Burgers (not an animated series)

Everybody has their go to way to grill up some burgers. For some people that means buying pre-formed burgers and just slapping them on a grill. They are burgers, so they can be decent just about any way you prepare them. I tend to put a little more TLC (Left Eye Lopez is not involved). The first thing is getting good meat. The ground beef I used last night was sirloin that I purchased at a farmer's market. It has way more flavor than the preformed stuff, that doesn't look real. That's key because if you overcook it a little bit then all the flavor is in the grease pan. Good meat, is much more forgiving.

I've got the meat, but it is hardly ready to put on the grill.
Finely chop garlic.
Work the garlic into the hand formed patties without overworking the meat.
Season with salt and pepper.
Rub Worcestershire sauce on the outside.
Throw on the grill.

The extra steps infuse the burger with more flavor and moisture, keeping it savory and avoiding the hockey puck scenario.

Fixings are then important for the perfect burger experience.
Last night I used toasted sourdough.
Spread on horseradish cream sauce.
Topped the Burger with Swiss.
Add spinach and sauerkraut.

Delicious.

It has been a loooong time...

Just a couple quick food items.

Last night I made my stuffed jalepenos. The recipe is really easy.
Preheat the oven to 350.
Slice as many jalepenos as you want in half, cutting off the stem.
Seed the jalepenos with a spoon, to keep the oils from absorbing into your skin.
Fill the inside with creamed cheese.
Wrap Prosciutto around the jalepeno.
Cook for about 15 minutes
Add a little jam to the finished product and enjoy.

We had leftover prosciutto so the next day I just fried some eggs, and threw them on top of a bed of prosciutto and a little crumbled feta. It was a nice salty mix to go along with the runny yoke of the eggs.

Hello 2011

Happy New Year!

Denver Botanical Gardens 2010

B and I celebrated the New Year up in the mountains. New Years Eve we drove up to Georgetown to spend some much needed time away from the city and life. Bob’s dad prepared a New Years Eve feast for us. We enjoyed shrimp with extra spicy cocktail sauce, lobster tails, salad, baked Brie, and some drinks. Post meal and conversation, B and I were able to sneak out to the hot tub, where we enjoyed glasses of champagne and discussed the year to come – things we want to accomplish, things we are looking forward to, and things, such as his graduate program, that we will need to survive.

After our hot tub we sprinted back into the house, put on PJs, and enjoyed an episode of ‘House.’ Around 11pm, B said, “I’m ready for bed, I’m tired.” An initial thought of shock went through my mind – we can’t go to bed before midnight on New Years Eve. However, B was sick the last few days, we’ve been dealing with an extra amount of stress, and frankly, I think we were both tired of 2010. In that moment I wanted nothing more than to go up to bed and fall asleep near my honey (we were in 2 smaller bed up in B’s childhood room.) B wrung in the New Year around 3:30 in the morning when he awoke with a sore throat, stuffed up head, and cough.

Our first day of the year has been spent with one of the branches of our family. We enjoyed breakfast at the small town coffee shop in Georgetown. The fellas spent the day watching football, and as had become tradition, I spent the day reading. Since my first New Years Day in Georgetown, I have spent every New Years Day in front of the fire at my father-in-laws home, curled up with a good book. Last year, I read ‘Gluten-free Girl’ by Shauna James Ahern and this year, I cuddled up with the second installment, ‘Gluten-free Girl and the Chef.’ I saw Shauna and her husband, Daniel Ahern, speak a few weeks back at Tattered Cover. I love them.

I specifically chose this book as my New Years book because I wanted to start 2011 inspired.

With that, her are my New Years resolutions:

1)   Start running and attempt a half-marathon in June

2)   At the end of the day, I would like to leave work at work. I’ll try to do this by writing more, taking pictures, cooking, sewing, and my other various interests.

3)   Spend as much time as possible with my love.

Happy New Year to all. B and I are off to Vegas for a few days where we will eat, drink, and be merry.

My new obsessions - Project Runway and Prosecco

In an episode of 30 Min Meals, Rachael Ray suggested you buy Prosecco, sparkling Italian wine, instead of Champagne. Its cheaper, and unless your a snob, you'd never know the difference. I love a mimosa! My most favorite is the bottomless blood orange mimosa at Root Down. 

B and I have 'Breakfast for Dinner' on Sunday evenings. We've been doing screwdrives, but sometimes its nice to mix it up with a mimosa.


The new things I enjoy doing is drinking prosecco, eating popcorn, and watching this current season of Project Runway. I feel very Marilyn Monroe doing this - she enjoyed potato chips and champagne.


Anyway, I like Valerie and Mondo. I don't like Ivy and Gretchen. Valerie makes fun and flirty clothes. Mondo is just all around awesome. Mondo is also from Denver.

Tuna Melt

Sometimes life gets ya down. When that happens to me - I like to have good old fashion diner food - at home. I like a tuna melt and sweet potato fries.

I make my tuna melts untraditionally. First step, pull some gluten free bread from the freezer and pop it in the toaster. While its toasting, I mix my tuna. I mix 1 can of tuna with lots of tarragon, dill, basil, and garlic. I add sliced green olives or capers to give the mixture the moisture. and thats it. I don't like to add mayo to tuna salad when I'm making a tuna melt because it can get soggy.

I pile my tuna mixture onto each slice of the pre-toasted GF bread. Then, I top each slice with a piece of cheese. Throw it under the broiler for a few mins to melt the cheese.

I serve my tuna melts open faced. Thats how they serve them at one of our favorite restaurants, Bull & Bush. They serve theirs on an english muffin, which is what I used to use at home prior to going GF.

Update - our summer 2010

Well, again - it has been a few months and we have failed to accurately document our summer.

Here is what we did Summer 2010:

In June, Bob traveled to Michigan with his dad. They stayed with a family friend. While on this trip, Bob learned how to make Chicken Marsala. He drank a lot, smoked a cigar, fished, and came home relaxed.

When Bob returned, we celebrated our first anniversary. We went to Colorado Springs, played mini golf, saw a minor league baseball game, and enjoyed a picnic at the Garden of the Gods park. 

As with  every summer, we explored Denver and Colorado. We tried new foods at new places. Perhaps the most memorable of the summer was Liks Ice Cream in Denver - B correctly answered the trivia question so we received a free scoop. We ate our ice cream outside on a warm evening, and ended up just having ice cream for dinner that night.

In July, Bob and I enjoyed a week in the Outer Banks or North Carolina. A week of sun, fun, beach, family, and sea food. We loved catching up with the east coast branch of the family, and I learned how to pick crabs. Each night someone would take charge an make dinner for the group, and Bob's cousin, Dari, took charge of breakfasts. She made a GF waffle for me one morning! Dari's husband, Sam, and Bob's cousin, Bill, played bartenders. We enjoyed some Dark & Stormy's, homemade cucumber infused gin, and my very first bloody mary. We ate one amazing dinner out at a place with cheesy art on the walls, and B and I bummed around some local art shops one afternoon, and enjoyed East Coast style Mexican food.

While in North Carolina, I participated in a phone interview, and a day later I was offered, and accepted a new job. More hours, more money, a change of scenery, and a new chance to grow. This new job is perfect for me and I love it. The only downside is that it cuts into the education I was getting from watching a lot of daytime Food Network.

In August, I went to Las Vegas with my mom and my sister. Las Vegas is one of my all time favorite places to go. There is so much to see and to photograph. I love to walk on vacations, and Vegas is perfect for that. I treated my mom and sister to dinner at my favorite Vegas restaurant - Mon Ami Gabi, then, the rest of our stay, we hit up some buffets, at which I proceeded to eat my weight in smoked salmon with capers, crab legs, and sushi. We also "enjoyed" the soda tasting at the Coca Cola store, but I use the word enjoyed very lightly.

This summer was busy. We cooked a lot. We saw a lot. We ate a lot, and perhaps we will post about it in the future. All of our experiences shape our culinary skills. There are photos on my camera, but right now, we are tired. It time for Fall and football.