Posts Tagged With: Spain

Chocolate Cupcakes With Cream-Cheese Frosting

Posted on November 20, 2012 by pauldelancey

American Dessert

CHOCOLATE CUPCAKES WITH CREAM-CHEESE FROSTING

INGREDIENTS

CUPCAKE

6 tablespoons butter
6 tablespoons confectionary sugar
3 tablespoons granular sugar
2 eggs
3 tablespoons milk
1/3 cup semisweet chocolate chips
1 cup flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons unsweetened cocoa

FROSTING

1/2 cup white chocolate chips
3/4 cream cheese

UTENSIL

cookie sheet
12 paper cups
electric beater.

PREPARATION

Take butter out and let it soften. Beat eggs lightly. (After all, they rarely ever beat you. They don’t even seem to try.) Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Put softened butter, confectionary sugar, and granula. Use same r sugar in mixing bowl. Use beater set on mix until butter and sugars have blended. Add milk, chocolate chips, flour, baking powder, salt, and cocoasetting on beater to blend all the ingredients.

Spoon an equal amount of the batter into each paper cup. Put the cups onto the cookie sheet. Put cookie sheet on center rack and cook at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes or until fork stuck into cupcake comes out cleanly.

Put white chocolate chips in small pot. Cook on low heat until all chips have melted. Stir constantly. Put cream cheese in mixing bowl. Add melted white chocolate chips. Blend with electric beater set to cream. (Some electric beaters have a “burst of power” button. It’s cool, like accelerating a FerrariTM. Well, maybe not. But a cool electric beater costs tens of thousands of dollars less.)

Meanwhile, put an equal amount of the white frosting on top of cupcakes. Serve to deserving people.

TIDBITS

1) Chocolate comes from the Aztec word “xocolatl” meaning bitter water.

2) My spell checker does not recognize “xocolatl.” Perhaps this is fair as the Aztecs didn’t recognize what sugar could do for cocoa.

3) But the 15th century Spaniards did. So, the Spanish royalty sent conquistadors and chefs to the new land.

4) After a generation of bloody conquest of Mexico, the sugar isles of the Caribbean were safe for hot chocolate.

5) Lacking minimal amounts of No DozTM or even Red BullTM energy drinks, Napoleon carried chocolate with him on all his military campaigns.

6) Napoleon’s energized armies racked up victory after victory until his enemies starting carrying chocolate as well. Defeat for the French became certain when chocolate rich Switzerland defected from the Gallic side.

7) The world today remains in a state of precarious peace, based on equal access to chocolate for all nations.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

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Chinese Lemon Chicken

Posted on September 21, 2012 by pauldelancey

Chinese Entree

LEMON CHICKEN

INGREDIENTS

1 1/2 cups rice
3 cups water

MARINADE
2 1/2 pounds chicken breasts
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1/2 teaspoon Poultry MagicTM spice (1 teaspoon total, with 1/4 tsp. for batter, and tsp. 1/4 for sauce.)

BATTER
3 eggs
1/3 cup cornstarch
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon Poultry MagicTM spice (1 teaspoon total, with 1/2 tsp. for marinade, and 1/4 tsp. for sauce.)

vegetable oil for frying

SAUCE
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 1/4 cups chicken broth
1/2 cup lemon juice
1 1/2 tablespoons honey
1/4 teaspoon ginger
1/4 teaspoon Poultry MagicTM spice (1 teaspoon total, with 1/2 tsp. for marinade, and 1/4 tsp. for batter.)
2 tablespoons vegetable oil

PREPARATION

Cook rice according to instructions on accompanying bag. This should take about 30 minutes.

Cut chicken breasts into 1-inch cubes. This cutting is easiest when the chicken is partially thawed. Use a large bowl to coat all sides of the chicken cubes with soy sauce and poultry spice. Put this bowl in the refrigerator for at least 30 minutes.

While chickens marinates or rice cooks, use whisk or fork to thoroughly mix eggs with cornstarch, baking powder, and poultry spice. Coat the chicken cubes with this batter.

Put brown sugar, chicken broth, lemon juice, honey, ginger, and poultry spice in bowl. Mix this sauce thoroughly with whisk, fork, or briefly in a particle accelerator.

Heat skillet to 350 degrees. Put chicken in skillet along with excess batter. Don’t stack chicken cubes; cook another batch instead. Cook until the chicken is done; it should be firm and white, not purplish and translucent. Remove cooked chicken cubes and place them on paper towels to remove grease.

Heat 2 tablespoons vegetable oil in sauce pan and mix in the sauce. Stir frequently and cook on medium heat until sauce becomes clear.

Put rice in bowls. Top rice with lemon chicken and sauce and serve.

TIDBITS

1) I have a lemon tree growing in my back yard as well as an orange tree.

2) We had a loquat bush and a guava bush when I was growing up.

3) Lemons grow in California, Italy, Portugal, and Spain.

4) Christopher Columbus discovered the New World in 1492. He hailed from Italy and sailed for Spain. Spain and Portugal were responsible for most of the world’s discoveries in the 16th century.

5) America was really first discovered by intrepid people crossing the land bridge from Asia to Alaska. They did not eat lemons.

6) Neither did the Vikings who discovered America about a thousand years ago.

7) My goodness, America got discovered a lot.

8) People during the Middle Ages served fish with lemon slices. They thought the lemon’s acid would dissolve any fish bones they accidentally swallowed.

9) Lemon juice slows the browning of sliced apples.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: cuisine, food, history, humor, international, recipes | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Italiano Pigs In A Blanket

Posted on September 14, 2012 by pauldelancey

Italian Entree

ITALIANO PIGS IN A BLANKET

INGREDIENTS

1 16 ounce package jumbo biscuit dough
2 slices provolone cheese (12 slices in 8 ounce bag)
4 teaspoons pasta sauce
8 links pork sausage

UTENSIL

cookie sheet

PREPARATION

This is a treat on Italian camping trips.

Defrost sausage links. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Separate the dough into eight pieces. Elongate each dough piece with a rolling pin dusted with flour or simply roll a frozen sausage link along the dough if any are remaining.

Cut the two cheese slices into eight pieces. Put one piece onto each of the eight dough circles. Add a 1/2 teaspoon pasta sauce on each biscuit. Smooth the sauce with a spoon. Put a sausage link near one end of a dough piece and wrap the dough around the link. Put this masterpiece on a cookie sheet so that the dough overlaps on the bottom. Otherwise, the dough will brake apart and you will have Italiano Pigs As Ground Cover.

Bake in oven at 350 degrees until biscuits are golden brown or for about 10 to 15 minutes. Be sure to monitor your Italiano Pigs in a Blanket to make sure they don’t burn or cook unevenly. It’s discouraging to have part of a baked dish be burnt on one side and doughy on the other. You might need to rotate the Pigs at least once. Heat escapes each time you open the oven, so in these cases you might need to cook the dish a minute longer.

Remember, vigilance when baking. It’s darn difficult to unburn something.

TIDBITS

1) The Italian Peninsula was fragmented into various states until 1494 and then, more or less, under the thumb of Spain, France, or Austria, until 1870, when Italy was completely united.

2) In 1983 I bicycled from The Hague, Netherlands to Nice, France. I put my bike on a train going to Genoa. I made it to Genoa. My bicycle never showed.

3) I’ve gone camping in France, but never in Italy.

4) I did the hokey pokey in Saint Mark’s Square in Venice. This occurred during the city’s big carnival. A lot of other people were putting their left foot in, so it was all right.

5) My gosh, there aren’t many free public toilets in Venice. And at many restaurants there is a fee to sit down at the dining table. Even Ryan Air, Spirit, and American Airlines have yet to do these things.

6) Napoleon, the emperor of France, was almost Italian. Genoa sold Corsica, his birthplace, to France only one year before his birthday.

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

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Santo Domingo: Land Of Many Flags And One Really Great Spice Blend

Posted on June 27, 2012 by pauldelancey

The pre-Facebook history of Santo Domingo

Period                   Owner of Santo Domingo
—————-     ——————————-
1500 – 1808        Spain
1808  – 1814       Santo Domingo
1814 –  1821        Spain
1821 –  1822        Santo Domingo
1822 – 1844         Haiti
1844 – 1861         Santo Domingo (voluntary return to Spanish authority)
1861 – 1865         Spain
1865 – 1870        Santo Domingo
1870 – 1872       Seeks unsuccessfully to be annexed by United States
1872 – 1916        Santo Domingo
1916 – 1924        Occupied by United States (which missed the 1870 invitation by 46 years)
1925 – 2000       Santo Domingo
2000 – 2010      Cruise ships
2010 – 2012       Cruise ships with WiFi, so passengers can access Facebook.

The most popular spice mix in Santo Domingo is sofrito and is rubbed on meats and sauteed.

I imagine that explains much of this country’s history.

Bacon!

– Paul De Lancey, The Comic Chef

My cookbook, Following Good Food Around the World, with its 180 wonderful recipes, my newest novel, Do Lutheran Hunks Eat Mushrooms, a hilarious apocalyptic thriller, and all my other books, are available on amazon.com.

Categories: history, humor, international | Tags: , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

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