Scallop & Spinach Salad with Vanilla Chili Dressing

I saw this recipe posted on Steamy Kitchen and just had to try it. Any excuse to use those vanilla beans I bought on ebay, right?

Needless to say, like all of Jaden’s recipes, it was delicious. Unfortunately, we were only able to find (and afford) the little bay scallops, which, considering we added some chopped pear to the salad, you might struggle to pick out in the photo above. Scallop, or pear? That is the question! But as a seafood drizzle or a salad dressing, the Sweet Chili and Vanilla dressing was a treat. And yes, the recipe does call for ketchup. Do not snub your nose because of this. Make it, and then make your decision.

I think this would be delicious over shrimp – and you might actually be able to see them!

Scallop & Spinach Salad with Vanilla Chili Dressing

Makes 2 servings.
Recipe from Steamy Kitchen.

INGREDIENTS
scallops, shrimp, or whatever floats your boat
salad greens (we used baby spinach)
optional: add chopped pear for some extra flavor and texture.

For Dressing
1 tablespoon bottled sweet chili sauce
1 tablespoon tomato ketchup
1 teaspoon olive oil
1/2 teaspoon sesame oil
1 tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon water
1 tablespoon lime juice
1 teaspoon minced cilantro
1 pod vanilla or 3 drops vanilla extract

DIRECTIONS
Slice open the vanilla pod and scrape out seeds. Combine with the rest of dressing ingredients.

Pat scallops dry. If you got the frozen kind, it might help to toss them with a dusting of cornstarch to really suck up the moisture. Season with salt and pepper. In hot skillet with cooking oil, sear scallops over high heat until opaque (1-1 1/2 minutes per side depending on how big your scallops are). Remove from heat immediately. Serve scallops on top of salad greens and Sweet Vanilla Chili Dressing.

Rich Chocolate Cupcakes with Vanilla Bean Frosting

Yesterday was Taylor’s birthday. And at 8:00 at night I decided he needed birthday cupcakes.

Cut to tonight, a mere 24 hours later… there are 2, count them 2, cupcakes left. Out of a batch of a dozen. While I would like to blame the kitchen elves for this, or the kitty, I know that we, just the two of us, are solely responsible for the extinction of this batch of oh-so-rich chocolate cupcakes.

That should tell you something about the amount of deliciousness we’re talking about here.

I knew I had made something good when Taylor marched into the office at 8:15 am this morning, with a cupcake in hand, saying, “It’s my birthday. I can have a cupcake at 8 in the morning if I darn well please!”. Me, well, I waited until at least 10 to have my morning cupcake. :)

Rich and chocolaty, with a smooth and not too sweet frosting speckled with vanilla, topped with a few sprinkles… yes these cupcakes beat a birthday cake any day, hands down.

Rich Chocolate Cupcakes with Vanilla Bean Frosting

Makes 11-12 cupcakes.
Recipe from Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World.

INGREDIENTS
Cupcakes:
1 cup soy milk
1 teaspoon apple cider vinegar
1/3 cup canola oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
3/4 cup sugar
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup cocoa powder, Dutch processed or regular
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt

Vanilla Bean Frosting:
1/4 cup margarine (or butter), softened
1/4 cup tofutti (or regular) cream cheese, softened
2 cups confectioners’ sugar
1 vanilla bean, split and seeds scraped out, or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line muffin pan with paper liners.

Whisk together the soymilk and vinegar in a large bowl, and set aside for a few minutes to curdle. Add the sugar, oil, and vanilla extract to the soy milk mixture and beat till foamy. In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Add in two batches to wet ingredients and beat until no lumps remain (or very few remain).

Pour into liners, filling each with 1/4 cup of batter. Bake 18-20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Transfer to a cooling rack and let cool completely.

For frosting, cream together margarine and cream cheese until just combined. Add confectioners’ sugar 1/2 cup at a time, mixing each addition until smooth and creamy. Add vanilla, and beat until fluffy and smooth. Keep tightly covered and refrigerated until ready to use, then pipe/spread onto fully cooled cupcakes. Add sprinkles and don’t blink or they’ll all be gone.

No Knead Bread, a Pretty Pot, & Butternut Squash and Vanilla Risotto

Happy early birthday, to me, to me.

Very happy indeed!

I’m easily stumped when it comes to birthdays. I get asked over and over what do I want, what do I want, when really, I don’t know. I guess it’s a good sign when you are satisfied with what you have.

Since no one close to me ever wants to buy me fonts for my birthday (yes, I’m a design nerd), I was at a loss. Until I found the now infamous recipe for No Knead Bread. You see, no knead bread requires, well, a nice pot. A heavy pot that can go into the oven. I wanted this bread, and I wanted it badly. And I had no such pot.

Needless to say, I knew what I wanted for my birthday.

Lucky for me, we have a Le Creuset store downtown (next to Whole Foods, nonetheless!). And so Taylor and I made the treck to the hoity-toity shopping center. I was entirely planning to make the final purchase online, where I could surely get a better deal. Maybe it was the pushy salesman or the enticing shade of turquoise… either way, we left carrying (or, rather, Taylor was carrying) a lovely 5 1/2 quart Le Creuset, in Caribbean blue.

I’m in love (with a pot, yes, but with the boy who bought it for me too!).

And let me tell you, this bread is worth it!!

Of course, we couldn’t JUST eat bread for dinner. I recently saw this recipe for Vanilla Bean and Butternut Squash risotto over at Erin Cooks… and with my stash of ebay vanilla beans I am always looking for new ways to use them. While it might seem like an odd combination, the subtle sweetness of the vanilla is a perfect compliment to the squash and creamy risotto. Plus the tiny speckles are a sight to be seen.

Butternut Squash and Vanilla Risotto

Makes 4 regular or 6 side dish servings.
Recipe from Giada.

INGREDIENTS
4 cups vegetable broth
1 large vanilla bean
3 cups peeled cubed (1-inch wide) butternut squash, about 12 ounces
2 tablespoons butter, plus 1 tablespoon
3/4 cups finely chopped onion (from 1 onion)
1 1/2 cups Arborio rice or medium-grain white rice
1/2 cup dry white wine
1/2 cup freshly grated Parmesan
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons finely chopped fresh chives

DIRECTIONS
In a medium saucepan, warm the broth over medium-high heat. Cut the vanilla bean in half lengthwise. Scrape out the seeds and add them, and the bean, to the broth. When the broth comes to a simmer reduce the heat to low. Add the butternut squash to the simmering broth and cook until tender, about 5 minutes. Using a slotted spoon remove the butternut squash to a side dish. Turn the heat on the broth down to very low and cover to keep warm.

Meanwhile, in a large, heavy saucepan, melt 2 tablespoons of the butter over medium heat. Add the onion and sauté until tender but not brown, about 3 minutes. Add the rice and stir to coat with the butter. Add the wine and simmer until the wine has almost completely evaporated, about 3 minutes. Add 1/2 cup of the simmering broth and stir until almost completely absorbed, about 2 minutes. Continue cooking the rice, adding the broth 1/2 cup at a time, stirring constantly and allowing each addition to of the broth to absorb before adding the next, until the rice is tender but still firm to the bite and the mixture is creamy, about 20 minutes total. Discard the vanilla bean. Turn off the heat. Gently stir in the butternut squash, Parmesan, the remaining tablespoon of butter, and salt. Transfer the risotto to a serving bowl and sprinkle with chives. Serve immediately.

Vanilla Almond Cupcakes with Blackberry Buttercream

I was feeling fruity the other day. Feeling fruity and vanilla-y and almond-y. Normally I’d either do vanilla cupcakes or almond cupcakes, but not this time. No, I wanted both. And this light and delicate cake provided just that. Flecks of almond meal and vanilla bean, spiked with almond extract, and topped with a bright blackberry buttercream, well, I don’t have to tell you that these were delicious.

A perfect choice for a dinner with friends – perfect because, well, our friend’s daughter joined us for dinner, and her favorite color just happens to be purple. Let’s just say that she wouldn’t give in until she got her purple cupcake BEFORE dinner, where she proceeded to dive in and lick every bit of the purple frosting off of the cupcake before she was satisfied.

And unlike some cupcakes I’ve made, these beauties are naturally purple… or purply-pink, to be precise.

They almost became a post for the failed-cupcake-hall-of-fame. See, I first added a bit of tofutti cream cheese to the frosting as I didn’t want it too sweet. I’ve done it before with chocolate buttercream, and the other flavors in the frosting always overpowered any weirdness lingering from the tofutti (I admit, it is not a substitute for the real thing). But in this case, I took a lick and realized something was horribly wrong. Took a finger-full to Taylor too just to confirm my suspicions. He nailed it – the frosting tasted like berry flavored yogurt, a few too many days past it’s sell-by date. Funny how non-dairy cream cheese can give an overpoweringly dairy-like taste to an otherwise good frosting. In to the trash it went.

Take 2: much better. No cream cheese. Fresh blackberries, pureed and strained. Half a vanilla bean, scraped off the pod and beautifully speckling the violet fluff. Just a hint of fragrant almond. And to top it all off – proof that my spiffy new flower molds DO work with marzipan (not quite as well, marzipan is extremely fragile and doesn’t hold the delicate shape as well), but it was the perfect topping on the perfect cupcake.

I don’t think I am the only one to think that the timing of these couldn’t be any better – can you say, perfect mothers’ day treat? I know my mom in particular would swoon over these (or anything almond for that matter – like mother like daughter!). If only I could figure out how to ship cupcakes to her, I would send her a box of these in an instant.

Vanilla Almond Cupcakes with Blackberry Buttercream

Makes 12 cupcakes.

INGREDIENTS
Cupcakes:
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup almond meal
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1/3 cup oil
1 cup coconut milk
1/2 vanilla bean (seeds only)
1/2 teaspoon almond extract

Blackberry Buttercream:
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter or margarine, room temperature
3 cups confectioners’ sugar
3 tablespoons fresh blackberry puree, strained
1/2 vanilla bean (seeds only)
1/4 teaspoon almond extract

DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a large bowl, sift together flour, almond meal, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Add sugar and mix. Whisk together oil, coconut milk, vanilla bean, and almond extract. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour in the wet ingredients. Mix until relatively smooth. Fill cupcake liners with a scant 1/4 cup of batter (should be just under 2/3 of the way full). Bake for 20-22 minutes or until golden, and toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Transfer to cooling rack and allow to cool completely.

For frosting, cream butter in electric mixer for 1-2 minutes until fluffy. Slowly add 1 cup sugar and beat until smooth. Add blackberry puree and mix until combined. Add remaining confectioners’ sugar, 1/2 cup at a time, and beat until well incorporated. Add vanilla bean and extract and mix at medium-high speed until light and fluffy (2-3 minutes). Pipe or spread onto cooled cupcakes. Top with a marzipan flower, if desired.