Talk about a week of birthdays – just about every night I was at a birthday dinner! I’m glad December is a fairly low key birthday month, cuz September, October and November were just out of hand! One of the birthdays was for a friend who requested that I cook for him instead of us going out. Dinner was planned for a Monday night, so it needed to be amazing, but yet still quick enough to do after work. Luckily I had been channel surfing over the weekend and PBS was broadcasting Chef Hubert Keller.
Chef Keller was making a delicious winter dish, Pork Chops with Calvados Sauce, Sauteed Apples with Roasted Cream Corn. The recipe was simple, quick and looked outstanding! I decided that I would make the apples and the pork, but I’ve never been a huge cream corn fan, so I made my sage & pancetta haircot vert instead. The meal was perfecto. The pork was perfectly cooked, the sauce was delicious and the overall flavor combinations of the different elements worked exquisitely. Dinner was perfect and it was made more fun as we discussed the details of how each of us met and how we met the friends we know. Let’s just say we shared the way some of our friends got to know each other! Fun times for sure and great to get to know folks better. My only wish is that I had a digital camera and didn’t need to rely on the iPhone for the picture of the delicious meal below.
Today is my boyfriend’s birthday and to celebrate we are going to dinner at a restaurant close to his apartment and will follow that up with a cupcake party at his place. He has asked that I make coconut cupcakes. Now baking is probably my biggest weakness in the kitchen, I have this terrible habit of forgetting ingredients and the concept of measuring things exactly is foreign to me. One time I attempted to make banana bread and as I was pulling the sad, flat, rubbery looking thing out of the oven, I noticed on my counter the egg that was supposed to be in it!
To help ensure that I don’t screw this up – because lord knows I will not be happy with myself unless it’s perfect – I am using a recipe I’ve always wanted to try, but was never given a good reason. The recipe is from Ina Garten, who is one of my “go to” Chef’s! She also has my life – well the life I feel I should have. I mean a huge house in the Hamptons, cooking, TV, magazines, the barn and you know she has a martini or manhattan under the counter that she is sippin’ on in between takes. Her philosophy of really good ingredients cooked in a simple manner makes life a bit easier and 9 times out 10 the food is delicious. The Coconut Cupcake recipe that I’m following has received tons of great reviews and I’m excited to get this one under my belt.
So after a little bit of effort the cupcakes are cooked, iced and topped with the coconut. The frosting is delish! It’s a cream cheese frosting and then you sprinkle the coconut on top. Good stuff. The cupcakes themselves, I would say are just alright – not bad, but also not a wow. The guests arrive in a few hours, so we will see what their take on them is. Regardless they look fantastic and I may succumb to just eating the frosting on all the remaining ones 🙂
Brandon
If you're afraid of butter, just use cream. 