We’ve had a busy month. Nick traveled to New York for work while I polished off a pan of brownies. We visited my brother before he returns to London. We hosted a dinner party. We spent a weekend in Virginia. And we completed our second secret ingredient challenge of the year. Challenge Oranges! Obviously orange [...]
I can always count on Mark Bittman. In How to Cook Everything, Bittman recommends poaching pears with sugar and vanilla bean for a simple, light dessert. And that’s exactly what we needed after pizza and ravioli. We were really not very hungry, but I had to finish out the Challenge with my third and final [...]
Next up for Challenge Pears: the main course. We had pizza as our appetizer, so I decided to stick with the Italian theme. And I know cheese pairs well with pears, so how about nestling the fruit inside a soft egg ravioli with Pecorino Romano and mascarpone? Perfect! But first: the dough. We followed a [...]
When Nick revealed the seasonal ingredient of our first Challenge, I immediately thought of pizza. Not pepperoni or mushroom or Margherita, but … pear pizza! Over the Christmas holiday, we dined at a wine bar in Escondido, California. We ordered glasses of local red wine and no less than five pizzas for the group, including [...]
Way back in 2007, Nick and I initiated our first Iron Chef Battle. During that fall, we challenged ourselves to concoct meals using the following ingredients: limes, peanuts, and apples. Highlights included: skirt steak in lime marinade, peanut butter pork stir-fry, and sweet potato and apple soup. Unfortunately, we abandoned the battles somewhere between getting [...]
A successful dinner party begins with a well-planned menu. And so on the occasion of our first dinner party in our new home, we spent more time choosing the dishes than we spent preparing them. (We also spent a lot of time cleaning and organizing the first floor to make it presentable for company. I [...]
This is not your typical chocolate chip cookie. It’s soft, dense, chewy, and chocolatey. In other words, it’s dangerous. Sister-in-law Megan introduced us to these “monster cookies” during our Christmas trip to Michigan. In fact, we enjoyed them so much that Nick helped to make a second batch on our third day there. Enjoy them [...]
We spiced things up this week and asked Mrs. Megan Wiley to choose the secret ingredient. She chose a seasonal item: apples! The Culinary Couple teamed up for this one, so as you can imagine it was nothing short of perfection. The menu: First course was a hearty soup of Ginger Gold apples (mild and [...]
My turn on the chopping block. This week, Nick chose “peanuts” as the secret ingredient, and I produced a most delectable meal of Asian influence. My sous chef arrived in State College in time to accompany me to Wegmans for ingredients selection. Though not as refined as the Wegmans south of the Mason Dixon line, [...]
The inaugural Iron Chef Battle was Emily’s attempt to test my creativity with limes. I kicked-off the meal with blue corn tortilla chips served aside a mouthwatering pico de gallo of ripe tomatoes, onions, and cilantro in lime juice. Note: I had to whip up a second batch after someone (ahem, Emily) finished it off [...]