Over the weekend we celebrated Octoberfest with some friends…yes, yes.. a tab bit late…but eh whatever. We raise our “steins” to our favorite German flavors like sausage, pretzels, warm German potato salad, German Beer Cheese, rotkohl, apfelkuchen and yes, beer. Prost!
Wow! Did you guys realize that February 9th was Fat Tuesday (Mardi Gras), Pancake day, chocolate day, pizza pie day and national bagel day?! How does a girl decide what event to observe?!
How about you? Did you do anything special on the 9th? Oh, wait… and we cannot forget sweet Cupid knocking on the door to this weekend too, huh? Whew!
While I’ve never officially experienced Mardi Gras in New Orleans, I like to think of myself as slightly indoctrinated into the festival and of course the feast! Yes, my dear friend Mary, born and raised in New Orleans, and her family would celebrate and make a big shebang and invite us on over to partake. When I say shebang…. I’m talking full-scale! The glitz, glitter, beads, masks, Mardi Gras decor, and of course good ol’ N’awlins food!
AH! Each year I looked forward to it! I could practically taste the King cake as the month of February approached each year. You know, looking back and reminiscing, I’m pretty sure she always made sure that I got the baby in my piece of cake too. Mmmmm such sweet memories to savor for a lifetime.
Unfortunately my friend Mary and her family moved onto another country and I feel like it’s my duty to uphold the our little tradition, even if we cannot enjoy it together. Sooooo… deciding what we’d celebrate on February 9th wasn’t a big deal after all. Bring on that good ol’ N’awlins colorful feast!
All of the recipes I used were passed onto me by Mary herself.
^Creamy Cajun Deviled Eggs
^Black-Eyed Peas Salsa served with multi-grain tortilla chips
^Shrimp Creole served with steamed rice
You could practically hear the New Orleans jazz and brass bands in the background couldn’t you? Haha! I feel like we represented well and made her proud this year flying solo? Perhaps next year I’ll snag her King Cake recipe and give it a go and snag some beads for an even more festive feel.
Here are some inspirational Mardi Gras recipes to tickle your fancy. Enjoy!
I’ll spend forever showing you how much you mean to me.
Vegan Rosemary chocolate chip cookies at 6am.
He adores them, and I adore him.
Click, Ship & treat yourself!
Man do we love banana bread!
Banana bread is just SO easy to whip up, and to be completely frank, we always seem to have two bananas lying around from the bunch that are on their last leg. It’s almost like the food gods are telling us to just reserve those two just for the excuse to bake up a fresh loaf. Haha! Okay… Maybe not… but it is a great excuse right?!
I find that with banana bread I’m always challenging myself to make it differently each time. A tweak here, an addition of this ingredient there, etc. Heck sometimes I just open up our cabinets and throw whatever I can get my hands on into the batter.
But for blogging and sharing sake, I actually typed out quickly what went into this loaf.
Are you ready? (“Because this shi* is bananas!”) SORRY! Couldn’t resist!
I decided a banana bread would pair well with coconut….so that’s just what I did…. And my predictions were spot on! Don’t you just love when that happens? Yeah, me too!
Before popping into the oven, I topped the bread off with a little mixture of sweetened and unsweetened shredded coconut flakes for that additional flaky texture, man was it a game changer! Mr. B couldn’t resist topping his with homemade whipped cream left over from a cake I made.
If you bake a loaf, let me know what you think!
Coconut Banana Bread
Makes one loaf
Ingredients:
2 very ripe bananas, peeled
1/3 cup melted coconut oil
3/4 cup coconut sugar
1 egg, beaten
1 teaspoon coconut extract
1 teaspoon baking soda
Pinch of salt
1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour
1/2 cup coconut flakes mixture of sweetened / not, reserve 2 Tablespoons for topping
Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C), and grease or butter a 4×8-inch loaf pan.
In a mixing bowl, mash ripe bananas with a fork until they are smooth. Stir the melted coconut oil into the mashed bananas.
Next, mix in the baking soda and salt. Stir in the coconut sugar, beaten egg, and coconut extract. Mix in the flour and shredded coconut flakes.
Pour the batter into your prepared loaf pan. Use reserved 2 Tablespoons of shredded coconut by sprinkling over the top of the loaf. Bake for 1 hour (check at 50 minutes, depending on your oven) at 350°F (175°C), or until tester inserted into the center comes out clean.
Remove from oven and let slightly cool. Slice and serve!
What in the world is sous vide? Sounds rather fancy and like something that takes a lot of work. Am I right?!
WRONG! First let’s get down the pronunciation together lets (say “sue veed” or, “soo–veed”). Great job! So…cooking your food sous vide is actually a very simple, easy, most consistent way to get amazingly delicious results in your restaurant or home kitchen. We are talking tongue tantalizing steaks, to the most flavorful vegetables, to the softest fish ever!
One of the million-zillion reasons that cooking your food sous vide is awesome is that you get to ultimately pick what your desired doneness is. You are setting a water bath to the appropriate time and temperature with your immersion circulator (we use an Anova), the water bath then does all the hard work being heated to the just the right temperature and cooking the food without any worry or fuss about over or under cooking anything. Seems to good to be true? Seriously, it’s not!
^We like to joke and giggle that we are cooking our dinners in a condom. LOL!
Sous Vide by definition is French for “under vacuum”. We seal our little “condoms” of food with a vacuum-sealer and drop it off into the pool to cook. Again, super easy!
So let’s see just one of the results of our condom cooked food, shall we?
After searching high and low in Korea for a duck breast like the one we prepared in France, Mr. B finally discovered the ticket! Gmarket! If you are living in Korea, and obviously under a rock like we have been, the site is in English and user-friendly. You simply find what you are looking for, click, pay, and next thing you know it’s at your door packed on ice. Talk about convenience! Oh, and here is the link to the duck breast.
I think the photos really speak for themselves, but just to reassure you…. absolutely delectable!
