Spicy Mac ‘N Cheese

Posted on February 26, 2010 by Andrea

While I was hobnobbing it at the Foodbuzz Festival last year, I was one of the few who got to sample the spicy mac ‘n cheese that got passed around Friday evening. It was creamy and spicy and I was thankful that it was a small portion because it tasted extremely decadent.

I made sure to tell Scott all about it and since then he has been saying, “Mmm spicy mac ‘n cheese” at random points.

Mac ‘n cheese isn’t something I make all that often but I have been making it since Scott and I first moved in together. He grew up on that crazy boxed stuff and I personally think that stuff is disgusting (Gee do I want powder cheese? Or cheeze-whiz in a pouch for the “creamy” version. EW!). We didn’t have it at my house. We didn’t have mac ‘n cheese period, except when my neighbor would bring over some of the homemade kind which was amazing.

Tuesday Tip Thanksgiving Edition: More tips on Brining

Posted on November 3, 2009 by Andrea

It’s November gang and that means that Thanksgiving is just around the corner! Last year, OHC brought you Thanksgiving related Tuesday Tips all the way up till the week of Thanksgiving. It was so fun that I think we should do it again! Last year we discussed the benefits of brining your bird and if you are still not on the brining bandwagon, what are you waiting for?! Get it!

Today’s tip is also about brining because there’s always more to learn!

The basic base for a brine is water right? But brining liquid doesn’t have to be just water based, oh no friends, you can use anything. A list of things I’ve used in brining include:

Wine
Beer (hellz yeah!)
Apple Cider
Unsweetened cranberry juice

All that sounds pretty tasty right? And it totally is! A brine consists of:

Liquid
Salt
Sugar
Seasonings and miscellaneous veggies

Some people don’t use sugar when they brine but that’s not a practice I subscribe to, so for the purposes of this post, we will be talking about a sugar and salt brine. I typically will use just a touch less sugar in my brine than salt. If it’s a straight-on even amount, I find that the meat becomes too sweet and you lose some of the savory components of a lovely roast or grilled dinner.

Bacon Wrapped Jalapenos

Posted on January 11, 2009 by Andrea

Crunchy jalapenos

Jalapeno poppers. Jalapeno bites, whatever you call them they have been making the rounds at parties and gatherings for a while now. They interested me but I also shied away from them since I tend to have a low tolerance for spicy dishes. I’ve been slowly working to become more immune because when one has a husband who loves spicy stuff it starts getting harder to avoid it.

I finally decided to tackle bacon wrapped jalapenos. Now, all recipes I have come across just call for some cream cheese in the jalapenos. If you know me, then you’ll know that I consider that too plain. Anyone can do that. I wanted to put a twist in it. Let’s bump this up and play around with it for a little bit and see what happens. I went back and forth thinking about what I could do. I wanted to keep it as simple as possible but still kick up the flavor. Finally it hit me, jalapenos are already spicy (well to me anyway) so let’s stick with that theme and keep the spicy going!

Sage Sausage Biscuits

Posted on November 23, 2008 by Andrea

Right out of the oven

One of the things I love making are handheld food stuffs. Especially if it’s for a party, potluck, or just something simple to have on hand for holiday gatherings.

Another thing I love is sausage. I grew up eating all kinds and being Polish, you know you have to eat kielbasa as required by law. Back in the day on the rare occasions that I had a McDonald’s breakfast (I know, totally ew, but hey who hasn’t had one? Uh huh.) naturally it was all about the egg sandwiches right? I took off the egg and tossed it because it was icky. I only ate the muffin and sausage. That’s where it was at for me because it was all about the sausage.

I still like that combination but worked on making it a little more healthy. Yes, the dish has sausage but that doesn’t mean the dish has to be a total unhealthy fest. I worked on looking at it from a different perspective and presenting in a different form. Sage Sausage Biscuits are the result!

Pumpkin Penne

Posted on November 20, 2008 by Andrea

Pumpkin

I love pumpkin and one thing I have resolved to do this year was to be more creative with foods. To experiment more and branch out more. I have been doing that a lot with pumpkin.

Pumpkin doesn’t have to be just regulated to pies and I’m sure all of you are aware of this fact already. I’m new to the party. Pumpkin can be savory? Pumpkin can be spicy? Well smack my bottom, let’s get this party started!

Some of you might be aware of the Blogger Secret Ingredient contest that has been going around. Well this week, Lindsay is hosting and she picked pumpkin. Since my new found love of experimenting with pumpkin, I wanted to create something that I could enter in this week’s contest.

The idea came to me earlier this week and I pondered it a bit before fully deciding what I was going to make and how exactly I was going to make it. Pumpkin Penne was the result!