I cheated - I didn’t make any of this. I got the BBQ chicken and smoked gouda from Trader Joes and the pasta from Foodies. I just wanted to make sure that this flavor combination works. Now that I know it’s to die for, next time I’ll make everything from scratch (except the gouda, of course). Here is my “recipe”:

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BBQ Chicken and Smoked Gouda Ravioli - Take One

• BBQ Chicken (I used shredded bbq chicken from Trader Joes)
• Smoked Gouda
• raw pasta sheets
• Alfredo Sauce

Lay out the pasta sheets (make sure they are thawed if they were frozen… duh). Cut them into 4″ x 8″ strips. Put 1/2 tbsp of bbq chicken and about the same amount of gouda - depending on the ratio you prefer, of course. Don’t put too much stuffing in the ravioli, cause they will burst when you boil them. As soon as you’ve added the stuff, use your finger to spread a little water around the edge of the pasta. Fold the sheet over and seal by pinching the pasta together. You can also use a fork to press the two layers of pasta together. Let the ravioli dry for ~30 min.

Boil water, add a little salt. Cook the ravioli for about 3 min -or until just tender. Carefully drain the ravioli (to prevent them from bursting). We served it with a little alfredo sauce and shredded gouda.

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These spicy sweet potato fries are Chrys’s favorite and he doesn’t like it when I make them for other people (let alone post the recipe online). I serve them with spiced up mayo… it really hits the spot!

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Spicy Sweet Potato Fries

• 2 sweet potatoes, chopped into “fries”
• 1-2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 tsp cumin
• 1/2 tsp chili powder or cayenne
• 1 tsp onion powder
• salt

Preheat the oven to 450F. mix olive oil and spices together, then toss in sweet potatoes. Spread the fries on a pan lined with aluminum and bake for 15-20 min, turning fries every 5 min.

Lime-garlic Mayo

• 1/2 C mayo
• lime juice to taste
• 1 tsp minced garlic
• 1/2 tsp cumin
• 1 tsp paprika

Mix together.

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Bacon Ice Cream #3 was so promising… This time we made Bacon Butter Pecan Ice Cream. The butter pecan base was really yummy and we fried the bacon perfectly. Unfortunately, I didn’t freeze the ice cream bowl overnight, so the ice cream didn’t freeze in the machine. Instead we created a Bacon Butter Pecan smoothie (really good, but not what we wanted). We tried the old fashioned way:

We put all the ice in our freezer into a bowl with water and all the salt in our kitchen and stirred that and measured it’s temperature. Then on top of that we had the bacon butter pecan slush, which someone else was stirring to minimize ice crystals as it froze. Either we didn’t stir it for long enough or we didn’t have enough ice, or maybe this ice cream just wasn’t meant to be. After about half an hour with the slush no thicker, we gave up. I left it in my fridge and refroze the ice cream bowl. Four days later (the next time i had free time), I refroze the ice cream in the machine.

Anyway, I found the recipe from this site, but here is it is anyway - I’m sure it will be wonderful if done right!

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Butter Pecan Bacon Ice Cream

• 3 cups heavy cream
• 1 cup milk
• 1 1/4 cups firmly packed dark brown sugar
• 4 egg yolks
• 1 cup chopped pecans
• 1 pound bacon, cooked until very crisp, blotted on paper towels and finely chopped (about 1/2 cup)

1. Combine the cream, milk, and sugar in a heavy saucepan and cook over medium-high heat until hot and the sugar is completely dissolved, stirring occasionally.

2. In a small bowl, beat the egg yolks until smooth. Slowly whisk in 1 cup of the hot cream-milk mixture. Return the yolk mixture to the saucepan, beating constantly. Cook over medium heat, stirring continuously, until the mixture coats the back of a wooden spoon, 6-8 minutes. Do not let it boil.

3. Strain the mixture into a clean bowl and let it cool completely. Stir in pecans and bacon and freeze in an ice cream maker according to manufacturer’s directions. To showcase the ice cream’s flavor, before serving, remove from freezer and let it soften slightly.

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The first bacon ice cream was sweet… so we decided to make something savory this time: Spicy Avacado Bacon Ice Cream. There was very little cream in the recipe, in fact, it is pretty much frozen guacamole. But still really delicious. It goes really well with chili - the cool avacado really complements the warm chili, the same effect adding sour cream has. I don’t think i’d just eat this on its own. It needs something like chips. And it doesn’t melt when it’s left out. Just turns into regular guac.

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Spicy Avacado Bacon Ice Cream

• 3 ripe avocados
• 4 oz. cream cheese, crumbled
• 1 fresno chili, minced
• 2 T. lemon juice
• ½ c. heavy cream
• ½ t. salt
• ½ t. sugar
• ~ 1 T. tequila
  
• 1/2 lb bacon
  

Fry bacon in skillet until crisp. Place between paper towels to soak up all the grease. Leave at room temperature and chop into bits. Halve avocados and scoop out flesh. Place in a blender with cream cheese, chili, and lemon juice. Add about half of the cream. Pulse into a thick puree. Add the rest of the cream, salt, sugar, and puree until smooth. Add tequila to taste and blend until mixed. Freeze in ice cream maker. Add bacon bits during the last 5 minutes of freezing. Serve with chips and chili.

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Shirley Temple (When She Was a UN Ambassador and NOT a Virgin) Jello Shots

• marischino cherries (1 per shot)
• 1 3-oz box of cherry-flavored jello
• vodka
• sprite or 7-up
• 1-oz plastic cups*
• vegetable oil
• turkey baster**

Boil 1 cup of sprite and add to gelatin. Stir until completely dissolved. Add 1/2 cup cold sprite and 1/2 cup cold vodka. Chill at room temperature for about half an hour. You want to make sure that the jello won’t melt the plastic cups. Meanwhile, using a paper towel dipped in vegetable oil, grease the plastic cups. place 1 maraschino cherry in each cup and using a turkey baster fill each cup with cherry jello. Refridgerate for several hours until the jello is set.

*Note, dixie cups are more commonly used for jello shots, but the paper absorbs the jello and makes a mess. I really prefer using plastic cups. You can’t find small ones at the grocery store - you have to go to a party supply store. They are kind of expensive ($6 for 150?) but definitely worth it. They are easy to unmold and if you just want to serve it in a cup, you can squeeze the cup and the jello shot will pop right out. No mess.

**Using a turkey baster instead of a ladle or another plastic cup really minimizes mess. When jello solidifies it is really a pain in the butt to clean up.

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Jello-shots are my specialty. I started making them in college for the same parties where we drank boxed wine and danced to “boom boom boom” and “we like to party”. I’ve learned a few things since then and my jello shots have come a long way. This recipe is for jello shots that look like oranges slices.

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Orange-Slice Jello Shots

• 4 medium sized oranges
• 2 packets orange jello
• vodka

Slice oranges in half and scoop out all the flesh.
Make orange jello according to instructions on the box. Substitute 1/4 of the liquid with vodka.
Pour orange jello into scooped-out orange shells and chill until set.
Cut orange into ’slices’.

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My fridge is the bottomless pit of apples. We went apple picking over a month ago and I’m beginning to run out of things to do with the apples. My goal is to finish them before I go home for Thanksgiving. I have a week. Tonight, I made baked apples.

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Baked Apples

• 4 Apples, sliced in half and cored
• 4 Tbsp brown sugar
• 2 Tbsp butter
• 1/4 C dried cherries, chopped
• 1/4 C pecans and/or almonds, toasted and chopped
• Cinnamon, to taste
• Nutmeg, to taste
• 1 C apple cider

Preheat the oven to 400F. Put 1/4 Tbsp on each apple half, then sprinkle with brown sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon, cherries and nuts. Place in a shallow baking dish and pour in the apple cider. Bake for 15-20 min, spooning cider over apples every 5 minutes or so.

Serve with yogurt.

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Dan and Chrys ordered nacho pizza from last week. It was so amazing, I had to recreate it myself. My version doesn’t taste anything like theirs… much much healthier, but equally satisfying.

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Nacho Pizza

• Pizza Dough (I went with Trader Joes’s whole wheat pizza dough. It burns at very high temperatures, so this is not the best dough to use with a pizza stone)
• Tortilla chips (I used blue corn chips so it would look pretty)
• Pizza Sauce
• Chili or ground meat flavored with taco seasoning
• Mexican blend cheese
• Lots of jalepenos
• Black beans
• Salsa

Roll out the pizza dough, cover with sauce, then make nachos! We put so much chili and salsa on the pizza that the chips got soggy - but still tasted good. the blend of flavors was great.

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Tom had a scary foods dinner party for Halloween. I made Death by Chocolate Cupcakes following a modified version of a Mississippi Mud Cake recipe taken from the July 2000 issue of Bon Apetite:

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Death By Chocolate Cupcakes

For Cupcakes:

• 2 1/4 cups sugar
• 2 cups unbleached all purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/2 cups whole milk
• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
• 3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
• 2 large eggs
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 6 tablespoons whipping cream
• 6 tablespoons dark corn syrup

Preheat oven to 350°F. Line muffin pan. Whisk sugar, flour, baking soda and salt in large bowl to blend. Whisk milk, butter and cocoa powder in heavy medium saucepan over medium heat just until butter melts and mixture is smooth. Remove saucepan from heat. Whisk cocoa mixture, then eggs and vanilla into dry ingredients. Pour batter into cup cake pan. sprinkle with 1 cup chocolate chips. Bake cake until tester inserted into center comes out clean, about 20-22 minutes. Cool cup cakes in pan. Meanwhile, bring whipping cream and corn syrup to simmer in heavy medium saucepan. Add remaining 1 1/3 cups chocolate chips. Whisk until chocolate chips have melted and glaze is smooth. Cool glaze 15 minutes. Pour glaze evenly over cake. Chill for about half an hour.

For the Monster Cupcake:

This is easy. You need two pieces of candy to resemble eyes (or one for a cyclops), one piece of “mouth” gummy (see picture below), a gummy bear and red sprinkles. Place eyes and mouth on the cup cake, then place the gummy bear inside the mouth. You might want to behead the gummy bear first. Use red sprinkles around/inside the mouth - this is ‘blood’.

For the Mummy Cupcake:

Warm a piece of liquorice allsorts (use the round kind) in the microwave for 5 seconds. You just want to warm it so that when you slice it in half it won’t crack. Once you take it out of the microwave, carefully slice it in half and place the two pieces in the middle of the cupcake. These are the mummy’s eyes. Melt a couple marshmellows in the microwave (use defrost option) until it is of spreadable consistency. It cools quickly, so you might have to work quickly (or remelt). Alternatively, you could use marshmellow fluff. Starting from the bottom of the cupcake, use a spoon to spread the marshmellows from left to right. Start the next ‘bandage’ above the first, slightly overlapping, making sure that there is minimal cup cake visible. Be careful not to spread the two layers together, otherwise your cup cake won’t look like it’s being wrapped in bandages. Continue all the way to the top, making sure not to cover up the eyes.

For Graveyard Cup cake:

I used choclate milano cookies as tombstones. Slice of the bottom of the cookie, then use a thin icing pen to write on it. There isn’t much space, so choose your words carefully.

• Anita Infusion
• R.U. Next
• Ima Goner
• Manny Bones
• C.U. Later
• Willy Rott
• Bye

Once that’s dried, place the cookie on the cup cake. Use gummy bears  (the living), pumpkins and green sprinkles to decorate.

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Dining options in college were limited and hardly palatable. Our dorm had a giant kitchen in the basement but it was so disgusting, I refused to eat anything that came out of it. My roommate, Lori, and I equipped our room with as many small-appliances as we could fit, and managed to make some pretty gourmet dishes with a toaster oven and a double-burner. In fact, Lori makes a damn good spaghetti sauce that I still crave, 4 years later. “Awesome Sausome” is what everyone calls it. Today is her birthday (Happy Birthday Lori!!!!) and she is kindly letting me share her recipe here:

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Ghetto Awesome Sausome

by Lori

Ingredients:
1 Pepper, your favorite color, chopped to your favorite size
1/2 Large Spanish White Onion, or 1 Small Spanish White Onion, chopped to your favorite size
1 jar red spaghetti sauce, your favorite brand
Some Olive Oil
Basil
Oregano
Minced garlic (I usually use about one head per jar of sauce, normal people should use maybe a tablespoon)
Cayenne Pepper
Parmesan
Red wine, your favorite grape
Pasta, your favorite shape

Pour yourself a glass of wine. Cook up your onion and garlic in a saucepan. Cook it in olive oil at medium heat ~3-5 minutes if you’re impatient; in butter at low heat ~10-15 minutes if you want it slower and sweeter. When your onion is soft and tasty, throw in the pepper (and add a tablespoon of olive oil if you had cooked the onion in butter). Cook for about a minute on low to medium heat.

Pour on the jar of sauce and reduce to low heat. Pour in 2-4 ounces of wine. Refill your wine glass.

Start cooking your pasta.

Add a couple teaspoons of basil and oregano. Use more basil if you want your sauce sweeter; more oregano if you want it spicier. Add 1/2 teaspoon of cayenne. Stir it up. Let it simmer for about a minute.

Now do an herb check: Stir it up, taste it real quick. Not enough cayenne? Add more. Probably needs more wine too.

Refill your wine glass. Might need to open another bottle.

Simmer the sausome for about 5 minutes. Add a couple tablespoons of parmesan.

Taste it. Tastes like victory, eh? Take a celebratory drink of wine.

Put the sausome on your pasta and eat up.

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