Over the weekend, I decided to make some awesome mallomars for my friend Bethany’s birthday. I also organized a dinner at Momofuku Ssam Bar (I’ll post about that next week) but I thought it would be a nice surprise to bring some treats to dinner since it was her birthday (and her husband’s the next day). The cookies were a tad on the dry side, but the marshmallows and dark chocolate really make the cookie pretty darn awesome.
Mallomars (also known as Chocolate Covered Marshmallow Cookies) Recipe courtesy of Gale Gand
Cookie Ingredients:
3 cups (375grams/13.23oz) all purpose flour
1/2 cup (112.5grams/3.97oz) white sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon baking powder
3/8 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
12 tablespoons (170grams/ 6 oz) unsalted butter
3 eggs, whisked together
Homemade marshmallows, recipe follows
Chocolate glaze, recipe follows
I was in the mood to be exact, so I pulled out my kitchen scale and weighed out the flour:
And the sugar:
And placed all of the dry ingredients (flour, sugar, baking soda, cinnamon, salt, and baking powder) into my mixer:
I also whisked my 3 eggs together in a separate bowl and set it aside:
I whisked together all of my dry ingredients using my paddle attachment and then added my butter until the mixture was sandy:
And then added my eggs to the mixture and mixed until a dough formed:
I wrapped the dough with some saran wrap and put it in the fridge for an hour (you can store it up for 3 days):
After about 3 hours, I took the dough out and used cookie cutters to make flower and square-shaped cookies (on a lightly floured surface):
Those baked in the oven for about 10 minutes (in a preheated 375 degree oven) and let them cool while I made my marshmallows.
Marshmallow Ingredients:
1/4 cup water
1/4 cup light corn syrup
3/4 cup (168.76 grams/5.95oz) sugar
1 tablespoon powdered gelatin (1 package of Knox gelatin)
2 tablespoons cold water
2 egg whites , room temperature
1 vanilla bean
In a saucepan, combine the corn syrup, 1/4 cup water, and sugar and bring to a boil until “soft-ball” stage, or 235 degrees on a candy thermometer (okay, I don’t own a candy thermometer so I kind of guessed…about 3 minutes of boiling like this picture):
While the sugar, corn syrup, and water were boiling, I mixed the gelatin with the 2 tablespoons of cold water:
I combined the syrup and the gelatin and let it sit for a couple of seconds while I put together the egg whites:
I whipped the egg whites until soft peaks formed and then added the syrup and the vanilla bean seeds:
Since I don’t own pastry bags, I used ziploc bags instead (just as easy and super cheap!) I put the marshmallows in the ziploc bag, snipped off an edge, and started piping them on the cooled cookies:
I also spread some pumpkin butter and cranberry apple butter (both from Trader Joe’s) onto the cookies before piping on the marshmallow:
You’re supposed to let the marshmallows set for 2 hours, but after an hour, I got impatient and started dipping the cookies in chocolate.
Chocolate Dip Ingredients
12 ounces dark chocolate (one bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips)
2 ounces vegetable oil
Melt the chocolate in a double boiler (or a bowl over simmering water). Dip the cookies topped with marshmallows in the chocolate and pick it up with a fork after tapping it on the side of the bowl a couple of times to get rid of excess chocolate. Final result:
Mallomar with a thin layer of pumpkin butter:
They were a little time consuming to make, but really delicious and I brought extras into the office the next day – another big hit (and the pumpkin butter and cranberry apple butter really added a nice fall touch!)
Mussels are an amazingly easy, quick, and delicious dinner. I saw them at my local Whole Foods and figured I’d give them a try – they are SUPER easy to make (as long as you know how to use a stove) and you can add all types of different sauces to make the mussels absolutely amazing. I am a fan of a beer or white wine broth (like from Freeman’s), but I’ve also had amazing tomato-based broths as well.
Ingredients:
2 pounds of Mussels
1 bottle of Grolsch (or 1/2 bottle of white wine like 2 buck chuck)
1 lemon
1 shallot
2 tablespoons butter (salted or unsalted)
A couple of garlic cloves
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
First, dice up the shallots:
Then roughly mince the garlic:
Add a tablespoon of the butter to a pot:
Add the shallots and the minced garlic:
Next, add the juice of one lemon:
Then add the two tablespoons of Dijon mustard:
Finally, add the entire bottle of Grolsch:
Let the Grolsch and other ingredients come to a boil:
While that’s sitting on the stove, quickly rinse the mussels (while they’re still in the netting):
Most mussels aren’t that sandy these days because they’re farm-raised, but I always do a quick rinse anyway. Once the Grolsch comes a boil, dump in the mussels:
Cook with the lid on for about 5 minutes, shaking the pot every once in a while to make sure all of the mussels cook evenly. While the mussels are cooking, toast up some bread (luckily, I bought a half-priced Balthazar loaf that evening). The finished mussels:
Pair with some white wine, seltzer water, or beer. The broth is so good that David may have drank it like a soup. We usually have mussels when we’re in the mood for something delicious but don’t have the time to cook an intricate meal – this is a super easy dish that you should definitely add to your recipe book!
Cost Breakdown:
2 pounds of Mussels – $5.99
1 bottle of Grolsch (or 1/2 bottle of white wine like 2 buck chuck) – $2.99
1 lemon – $0.69
1 shallot – $0.42
2 tablespoons butter (salted or unsalted) – $0.25
A couple of garlic cloves – $0.30
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard – $0.25
On lucky week 13, a lot of my thyme dried up, my mint decided not to grow back, and my basil was burnt (again):
I really like the taste of the basil from the Aerogarden, but it just doesn’t produce enough to make pesto. This week, there is a lot of new growth, and I might freeze some leaves so more can sprout up:
The dill has grown the most this week and I plan on using it with some salmon for next week’s quick and easy weeknight dinner:
Remember on The Office when Michael asks Pam’s mom if she has a snack in her purse because she’s a mom? Michael’s at Pam and Jim’s wedding, gets hungry for a snack, and asks Pam’s mom for something to eat since mom’s always carry SOMETHING:
Well, I’m not a mom but I always carry snacks in my pockets; nuts (especially roasted almonds, cashews, or marcona almonds with rosemary and sea salt from Trader Joe’s), dried cherries, or some dried fruit leather. One of my new favorite purse snacks – Kind Bars:
A PR company sent me those samples last week and suggested I give them a try; I usually don’t like fruit bars because they’re packed with sugar and are too sweet, but these aren’t too sweet (the mango macadamia nut is a good bar to share because I thought it was a lot sweeter than the rest). The bars are also all gluten free, are around 200 calories, and are protein-packed. A lot of the bars have shredded coconut, which isn’t always my favorite texture, but adds a nice flavor and sweetness to the bars. They might be a nice alternative to the usual candy you give out at Halloween! I keep some in my purse at all times, so if you’re ever with me and need something to eat, I will most likely give you one of these yummy bars.
Michelin’s 2010 guide for New York City was recently revealed. Last week, I started on my lofty goal of eating at every Michelin-starred restaurant in NYC (if I’ve gone to the restaurant before, I will most likely not go to the restaurant again). Rhong-Tiam is a new Michelin-starred restaurant located by the NYU campus that serves Thai food (by way of Bangkok). The restaurant is actually kind of easy to pass (I walked by it twice before actually seeing it):
The restaurant was empty on Wednesday night but it seemed like the waitresses weren’t in a rush to take our order (usually I don’t like slow waitresses, but the menu at Rhong-Tiam is pretty extensive so the extra time to talk over the menu was okay). When the waitress finally came around to take our order, I was disappointed to learn that some of their salads weren’t available. We ended up starting with the Thai sausage:
The Thai-style chorizo sausage had a nice crispy skin and was infinitely better when paired with the little peppers. The ginger, on the other hand, didn’t pair well at all (too fibrous and difficult to chew).
Our drunken noodles:
The drunken noodles tasted like beef ho fun that you order in Chinatown at a place like Big Wong. The lime added a nice flavor to the otherwise mediocre noodles.
We also ordered the pork-on-fire (Moo-Na-Rok):
I was ready to drink a lot of water for the pork-on-fire, but it wasn’t spicy…at all. I don’t think I have a high tolerance for spicy foods, but the pork-on-fire had more of a basil and lemongrass taste than spiciness. The pork-on-fire actually reminded me of a dish I used to eat in Champaign (at a Chinese restaurant, Mandarin Wok), translated as Three Cup Chicken (San Bei Gi – one cup of soy sauce, one cup of wine, and one cup of water with lots of basil). The dish was good, but the name of the dish was very misleading.
Finally, we actually ordered a little dessert – steamed sticky rice wrapped banana:
The sticky rice is similar to what my mom makes, but instead of adding savory items like mushrooms and pork, the restaurant added sugar and wrapped it around a banana. There was also lots of coconut cream and strawberry syrup topping the sticky rice. The dessert was super cheap ($2.50!) and actually really delicious.
Our meal was about $40 (for two people) and pretty enjoyable, although the amount of MSG used in all of the dishes was definitely extraordinary because I think I drank about 2 liters of water once I got home from dinner. I don’t think I’d return to the restaurant, but if I work late, I might be tempted to order take-out.
