Food and Wine (or booze) Fridays!!

[Jules]

I love cooking. I'm a very, very good cook. What are some of your favorite recipes? Let's have a dinner party, ok?

My favorite salad dressing:

2-3 oranges
2 lemons
(you could use any citrus you like, including limes, tangerines, tangelos, clementines, grapefruit, or you could add berries too)
a generous splosh of champagne vinegar about two tablespoons. (you can also add a dash of balsamic
pinch dijon
about a tablespoon (scant) of sugar
salt
a small shallot
half cup good olive oil

Chop the fruit and shallot and place in blender-peel, seeds and all. Add a little water, salt, sugar and blend until its an absolute mash.
Place mash into a strainer and squish all the juices and oils into a bowl.
Place the cup or so of juice and the vinegar back into the clean blender.
Pour the olive oil slowing into the blending juice until you make an emulsion.
Let this set for at least four hours. Taste and then doctor it up. I like my dressings more tangy.
This is good over field greens and grilled (then cooled) portobellos. Or fresh mozzarella and ham. Also nice with some toasted pine nuts and grated pecorino. I generally like adding fruit like orange or strawberries or even avacado to the salad. Yum.

NOTE: If this proves to be too bitter for you, you could zest the citrus fruit and only add that and the juice.

[valetoile]

I made up a pretty good sauce for pasta the other day:

Take some marinated artichoke hearts, sautee them in their own oil in a large pan. When the pan is nice and warm, turn the fire down a bit and add cream and a little milk, about 2 or 3 to 1 ratio. Add a pinch of cayenne pepper. Cook until the sauce begins to thicken, then let it sit. Spoon over pasta, top with toasted pine nuts.

[vine311]

White Trash Better Than Sex Cake

Ingredients:
one box of strawberry cake mix
one box of strawberry jello
one tub of Cool Whip (the ONLY brand worth using)
one tub of fresh strawberries

Directions:
Prepare cake batter according to directions.
Chop up a few of the strawberries and fold into the batter before pouring into the cake pan.
Bake the cake according to directions.
When cake is done, remove from oven and let it cool a bit.
Mix Jello packet according to directions
Poke holes in top of the cake with a fork and pour the dissolved jello mix over the top of the cake letting it soak in.
Put the cake into the fridge for a while to set the jello inside of the cake.
When jello is set, slice up remaining strawberries and lay them over the top of the cake.
Top the whole thing off with the entire tub of Cool Whip.
Put back in the fridge and eat it cold or serve immediately.

Another variation is to sprinkle several chocolate chips on top when you add the strawberries to the top of the cake.

[Jules]

Now that is what I"m talkin' bout!

[kbadr]

I'll bake a pie!