Have you ever wanted that special something you could send out along with the gift of food or a certain special recipe? I know that as a food blogger, I rarely donate food to a function without trying to find some way of letting everyone at that event know that it came from me, and at the very least I send a stack of cards with my wife so that they can find my blog if they liked the item I sent along.

Now I have another option. By the end of next month I’ll be sending along one of the photo cards that I just ordered from CardsDirect. I whipped up a snazzy little picture to go on the front, one that will (hopefully) do a god job of getting those people to grab a card or jot down my url.

Of course these cards would be great to send on holidays as well. Just put a picture of yourself or the family on the front and ship them off for a wonderful Christmas greeting or as the perfect Mothers Day or Fathers Day card. The choices really are pretty endless and they have a ton of designs to choose from, so why not pimp your blog a bit.

They say that a picture is worth a thousand words, so why tell them when you can show them?

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“Welcome to the Daring Bakers, You are tasked with making the one thing in the world that absolutely terrifies you.”

Yup, that’s how it felt. I finally decide to go and join up with the rest of the blogging world and try this baking stuff out only to find that my three worst fears had been realized on my very first challenge.

First, I had to make bread. Bread scares me. It’s the simplest thing in the world, I mean four ingredients, that’s it. Four. But yet I have never managed to make a loaf of yeast bead that was even close to edible. No matter how diligently I worked at it, something always went wrong and I ended up with something akin to a hockey puck in the end.

Secondly, This was Julia Child’s’ Recipe! Fer Chrissakes this woman was a culinary deity. I have repeatedly lauded out love and admiration for the Grande Dame of America’s culinary consciousness on many occasions. I was already facing bread, my arch kitchen nemesis, and now I had to try to live up to Julia Child!?!? I was feeling pretty bleak by this point. To fail this recipe challenge meant failing Julia. No pressure there, eh?

Third. The rules clearly stated “No Substitutions”. GiveMeAFreakinBreak! I’m the “Seat of my Pants” Guy, remember?!? I never follow any recipe exactly, no-way no-how!

I thought about backing out of the whole DB thing right there, I really did. I knew there was no way I was going to make this work. I glanced over the nine frakken pages of recipe and sat for a while in a cold sweat. I mean, I’m not a baker! I couldn’t DO this!

And from somewhere deep in my memory came the voice of reason. A voice I had heard all my life at one time or another and in one form or another. A small voice to be sure, but the most encouraging one I have ever heard.

“Well, it seems the souffle didn’t rise as I’d expected. Don’t worry. This will come out much better when you do this at home”

It was Julia’s voice, from a guest spot on Emeril Live just about a year before her death. It wasn’t the fist time she’d said it, though. It was her mantra. She cooked, sometimes she failed. She did this in front of millions of people once a week for most of her adult life. She inspired millions by doing so. Such names as Emeril Lagasse, Cat Cora, Sara Moulton, Jaques Pepin have all been directly influenced by the powerhouse in an apron. Many more of us nameless home cooks have decided that we too could tackle that seemingly impossible recipe just because Julia said we could manage it.

I believed her then, I believe her now, and she was right.

I read, re-read and then read the recipe again. Nine pages is a lot to take in, especially for something as simple as bread, but Julia was pretty adamant about the methods involved in a traditional loaf. I bought the lower gluten flour that was recommended. I purchased a pizza stone to cook the loaf on. I got everything ready and I dove in.

NOTE: This recipe is massive. Far to massive to be printed here. For convenience, I’ve added it as a pdf file Julia’s French Bread Recipe – PDF Format, or you can check the original at the Breadchick’s Website here.

I measured carefully. I let the mixer work its magic. I hand kneaded a bit and then I waited. Precicely three and one quarter hours later the volume had tripled and I was ready to punch, so punch I did. A little knead and back in the bowl to rise again…

About this point the spirit of Julia was in me, so I popped open a bottle or port (sorry, no sherry in the house) and began happily sipping away while I worked on other projects. The dough just kept doing its thing, and two and-a-half hours later, I was ready to get this thing going.

Plop it out, cut, fold into 12 lovely lil’ pieces and wait 5 minutes. OK, time for more of that port. Unfortunately, we weren’t cooking anything I could splash the port in, so I just tipped my glass towards the bread and uttered another of my favorite Julia-ism’s “Some sherry for the sauce, and some to sauce the chef!”

OK, form up some little rounds, lay out on flour rubbed linen and cover. No problem. Back to other things for about an hour, check in and everything looks petty good, so crank the oven to 450 degrees with the stone in the top 1/3. Get a basting brush ready and sharpen the bejeebus out of a boning knife for nice clean slashes on top of my little soon-to-be buns.

With the oven hot and a pizza peel ready and liberally coated with cornstarch, lift each of the little guys and flip ‘em over. One clean slice and it’s on to the next. All 12 in the oven, door closed and brush with water every three minutes for 15 to 20. No problem

And in the end..

Perfection.

You were right Julia. This would come out better when I tried it at home. I’m glad you said it, I really am. Otherwise I would have returned to my happy cook’s world, still devoid of measuring spoons and such, and I never would have had the best bread I’ve ever eaten. I never would have decided to make it three more times over the course of the month, and I never would have thought I could.

Thanks also to the Daring Bakers and to this month’s hostesses Sarah, and the Breadchick, without whom I would not be writing this today or snacking on French bread as I type.

I suppose this makes me an official Daring Baker, so I’ll set about adding the logo to the site at some point today. To all the other daring baker’s out there, have a wonderful day!

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(I’m combining this post with my weekly Thursday Thirteen, if you were just here to see the TT, scroll to the bottom of the post.)

As foodies we are sometimes driven to try the most recent trend in foods. To go after more exotic ingredients and preparation methods. To push our cooking skills and palate’s further than they have ever gone before. All of these are good things and make for a very interesting culinary life. Food should never be boring, after all.

While I subscribe to the concepts mentioned above, there are still times I when just want a really good French Fry, and yesterday was one of those days.

I’ll be honest, I haven’t liked fast food french fries in a very long time. Most are nothing more than overcooked, greasy little processed things that don’t do anything at all for me, other than perhaps cause a case of indigestion later. On the other hand, I rarely turn down the opportunity to indulge in a homemade fry, whether I’m the one making it or not, making fries one of the things I almost never order in a restaurant. I’ll take mine my way, thank you.

I prefer to make fries in a cast iron skillet rather than in a deep pan or heavy dutch oven for several reasons. One, the oil heats much more quickly in a heavy shallow pan. Two, it cools more quickly when the heat is lowered because of greater surface/air ratios. Three, It’s a lot harder to crowd the pan, which allows me to see each and every item that I’m frying while keeping my temperatures constant. Taking out the guess work is a good thing, as it means that you won’t end up with greasy food.

(Read the bottom of the post to see the thirteen things I will almost never order out)

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If you have ever wanted a personalized refrigerator magnet, this is your lucky day. All you have to do to get yourself 25 free magnets with any image you’d like printed on them, is just follow the preceding link and enter the following coupon code:

Blog25FreeMag

There you have it. You can have magnets with photos of your kids, your dog, your blog (Whatcha’ think I’m going to be getting?) or anything else you’d like to see stuck to something metallic. This is a novel little gift to send grandparents, aunts and uncles, especially if they live out of town and don’t get to see the little ones often.

If you’ve been looking for a way to promote your blog, grab some and send them out with Christmas cards or birthday cards. It’s a pretty sure bet that someone will notice them. Heck, you can even raffle them off with other stuff you’re not going to use in the kitchen any longer. It’s a great promotional tool if used preoperly, and you get the chance to try out 25 of them for free.

Though my information does not say yay or nay, you will usually be billed for shipping and handling on any free offer, so check the fine print for the details.

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Ladies and gents, I just received my copy of Cat Cora’s Cooking from the hip. I’ve only had a moment to flip through it at this point, but at first glance I get the feeling I’ll be visiting this book often. I’ll let you know more when I’ve had a chance to sit down with the book, a good hot cup of coffee and an hour or two.

Honest reviews take time, and I try to make sure that I do in fact review honestly, so give me a week or so to try out some recipes and I’ll let you know what I think.

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In case you haven’t heard, you can download a free cookbook from Barilla with recipes from such greats as Mario Batalli, Chris Daughtry, Deborah Messing, Natalie Portman, Stanley Tucci, Marissa Tomei and David Tuterra.

The download is completely free, but for each copy downloaded before February 29th, Barilla will donate $1.00 to America’s Second Harvest, up to $100,000.00 worth of helping the less fortunate. How can it get better than that?

[EDIT] Gah! Forgot the link. Sorry if this hits your reader twice!

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As a long time cook I am well aware that nearly nothing I make is a completely original creation. In most cases I probably couldn’t tell you what the original dish that inspired me was. It may have been something I saw in a cookbook, a magazine or on television several years ago. It may have been a dish I used to make when I cooked professionally, well over 20 years ago. Regardless, for some reason the concept of the dish stuck with me, and I feel compelled to revisit it at some later date with no real guidance at all save my memories of the flavor combinations. This dish is not one of those.

In this case, I know precisely what inspired me. When I saw Peter’s recipe for “Steak Sandwich, Greek Style” on his blog, Souvlaki for the Soul, I knew I would be doing something similar. The concept itself was simply brilliant. A simple and elegant combination of flavors that I could not begin to find fault with. Even though Peter’s “steak” was actually lamb, which is quite a luxury item here in Texas. ($8.99-$12.99 per pound), I was pretty certain I could come up with something along the same lines using beef, which we have in abundance around these parts (And can be found for less than $1.00 per pound, if you know where to look.).

The result? According to Mrs. Seat of her Pants, this was one of the best dishes of the year. I think I have to agree, really. In the end though, I owe the idea to Peter, who got the gears in my head spinning. It’s a very nice and very rare occasion to be able to give credit where it is due and I’m glad to be able to do so.

I, My wife and our stomachs thank you, mate!

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Looks like I’m workin’ hard, dunnit?

I don’t usually fall victim succumb to the urge to participate in most meme’s, but when the Good Dr. Biggles from Meathenge tags you with one, you just have to answer the call. The topic had me grinning anyway. I mean, who can resist dishing a little dirt, especially when you’re dishing it about yourself! The when you’re done dishin’ your own dirt, you get to go pick five other suckers of your friends to do the same. Sounds good to me!

So without further ado, let’s dive in to five sordid little tidbits from my life…
(Sorry Feed Fans, you’ll have to visit to see the rest…)

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If you’re looking for a meal that is cool, light and refreshing, look no further than this simple pizza. While it may sound odd for me to talk about cool meals in the wanting days of February, our part of the world has seen some pretty strange weather this winter, with temperatures ranging from the sunny and a bit over-warm 80’s, then dropping to a very crisp 24 degrees the very next day. It was on one of the warmer days that I decided something a little light was in order.

I used Alaskan smoked salmon for this dish that my wife had bought me as a Christmas gift. Unlike Nova Scotia smoked salmon, or Pacific Northwest “Jerked Style” salmon, this particular preparation leaves the consistency of the fish much like what you would find in a canned salmon. It would be a lot more attractive with slices of the other type, but aside from having slightly milder flavor than the hard cured varieties, this pizza was absolutely fantastic. (Enough so that I told my wife I needed to make it again for “testing” before I posted it here. I think she knew the truth, but she, as usual, let me think I was getting away with something. What you’re looking at is my second attempt, which was just as wonderful as the first.)

I got the original recipe for this pizza from Rachael Ray’s Food Network Recipe collection and modified it to suit my tastes from there, but her inspiration is almost definitely taken from the famous Wolfgang Puck, who introduced his version of this pizza to a hungry audience at Los Angeles California’s Spago in 1982, thus starting the gourmet pizza craze and making “California Cuisine” a term recognized worldwide.

It was great then, it’s great now, give it a go!

Do you have any great seafood pizza recipes? Care to share them with us? Leave a comment!

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For those that know me for my need to destroy those Food network Celebrity “chefs” that I find to be lacking in culinary skills of any kind, this post will most likely shock and amaze you.  This week’s Thirteen focuses on someone I highly admire, not only for her skills as a chef, but for her efforts in the war on world hunger.

Most of you probably know Chef Cora either as the food network’s only female Iron Chef, or as the Executive Chef of Bon Appetite Magazine, but there is more to the story than that.  She is also the author of a new cookbook “Cooking From the Hip: Fast, Easy, Phenomenal Meals” , the head of a worldwide charity, a mother, and she is preparing to open her signature restaurant, CCQ  (a BBQ concept), at the Macy’s in Costa Mesa, California.

What more can I say than that?  Read on to find out!

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