I Can Retire: I've Made it on Fox

Did you all know I am a ladies arm wrestling champion? I made this video documenting my victory.

Recently, my favorite bar in Greenpoint, The Diamond Bar hosted a Ladies vs. Wimpy Guys (under 145lb) and it made it onto Fox TV (my favorite station) at 2am.
Watch the newest video here.

YOU LOVE YOU

Getting ready for Valentine's Day I have a lot in the works. I am planning a big Love Bird's Market at the Lutheran Church of the Messiah on 2/11/12 for Greenpointers. Lots of fun gifts, food and music.

I am going to sell these postcards, because before you can love anyone, you need to know how to love yourself.

Oh the cream pie!

Growing up we always got a Chocolate Cream Pie from Days Bakery, an old fashioned German bakery in Honesdale, Pennsylvania. There was a major gap in my cream pie eating until M.Wells came along and the lovely pastry chef reignited my passion. Coconut Cream Pie, Banana Cream Pie, Maple Cream Pie. If it has a creamy pudding topped with heavy whipped cream frosting on a pastry crust it's as good as gone.
While up at Lake Hopatcong, we were trying to figure out dessert for New Year's Eve. Eureka! Coconut Cream Pie! I picked the easiest recipe I could find. It isn't the quickest because this pie isn't baked so it has to solidify in the fridge for about 4 hours before you can smother it in more cream. All we had to do all day was look at birds, so no rush.
I like recipes that call for you to add everything and mix. My banana bread recipe is the same. And it was the first time I ever have made a homemade pudding! Super duper easy and the boxed kind we had in the pantry was from 1988. I only eat expired food from the 90s. I have class! 
I think we could have let it solidify a bit longer than we did on the stovetop because it didn't do much more solidifying in the fridge. It was more like a spoon pie, but it didn't matter, it was delicious. I may try some corn starch next time.
The recipe calls for frozen whipped topping, but make the real thing! (Just some heavy cream, sugar and a little vanilla.) Next time, I'll add some coconut flavor to the pudding as well, because other than the toasted coconut flakes, it wasn't very coconut flavored, but it's so creamy and perfect and addictive it didn't matter that much.
I also might try to make my own pie crust. I know! The frozen ones are pretty good though and so easy. Just make sure you bake it and let it cool before you add the pudding. We forgot until it was time to pour in the pudding, but it didn't really matter. 
Stay tuned: next cream pie will be Banana Cream Pie! I am loving the cream pies.


Coconut Cream Pie, adapted from Carol H. recipe at All Recipes.com

• Filling:
• 3 cups half-and-half
• 2 eggs
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup flaked coconut, toasted
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 teaspoon coconut extract

• 
  
• 1 (9 inch) pie shell, baked
• 
  
• Topping:
• 1 containter heavy cream
• 1/4 C. sugar or less (I prefer no sugar in my whipped cream.)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla

Start by pre-baking then cooling your pie shell.

In a medium saucepan, combine half-and-half, eggs, sugar, flour and salt. Bring to a boil over low heat, stirring constantly until pudding-like in texture. Remove from heat, and stir in 3/4 cup of the coconut and the vanilla extract. 

Pour into pre-baked pie shell and chill 2 to 4 hours, or until firm.

To make your topping beat heavy cream, sugar and vanilla until desired consistency. Top pie with whipped cream, then sprinkle the rest 1/4C of toasted coconut on top.

To toast coconut, spread it in an ungreased pan and bake in a 350 degree F (175 degrees C) oven for 5 to 7 minutes, or until golden brown, stirring occasionally.

And I thought Rainbow Cookies were hard! This is a Mondrian Cake made by Caitlin Freeman of Blue Bottle Coffee for Moma SF.

Caitlin Freeman of Blue Bottle Coffee from Post & Grant on Vimeo.

Expired

Warning: Eating expired food may cause death.

Photos: Jon Pywell & Jen Galatioto

Rainbow Cookies

From Greenpointers, Recipe: Rainbow Cookies

I've had this recipe for Rainbow Cookies on my fridge since last year and decided to make it. Working my first job as a counter girl at an Italian bakery in Queens and accepting collect calls from the grumpy bakery owner's son, who was in jail for idiotic low-level racketeering, gave me have a distaste for Italian pastries, with the exception of a few things: Pignoli Cookies, Rainbow Cookies & Cannolis (but only the cannolis that the nuns from the San Carlo monastery on Erice, a medieval mountain town in Sicily make. God is in them.) The rest of the Italian pastries can burn in hell.

Rainbow Cookies are pretty pricey per pound and if you're going to buy them around Brooklyn I would recommend Fortunata Brother's on Manhattan & Devoe.

Making the rainbow cookies seemed pretty pricey, too. It didn't help that I had to buy 3 half sheet pans at $15 a pop from The Brooklyn Kitchen, plus 4 tubes of Almond Paste at $8 a pop! I definitely came home grumpy.

"I should have just bought them at the bakery," I said as I laid the ingredients on the counter. But the process and the end result were worth it, plus we got between 150-200 cookies out of it.

I cut the recipe out of New York Magazine from the chef of Torrisi Italian Specialties, a great Italian restaurants down on Mulberry, the walls lined with Manhattan Special: my favorite drink, espresso soda.

If you plan on making rainbow cookies, make sure you have an entire day off plus a partner with good hand-eye coordination. I am lacking in that area and Jon, who is mechanically inclined proved, to have amazing cake layering and chocolate spreading skills. Had I tried to take this endeavor solo, I assure you these cookies would not be so pretty.

When it comes down to it, "it's a lot of work, Jane," as Nonna, my Sicilian Grandma would say. There are many steps: beating the egg whites for stiff glossy peaks, splitting one batter into three for coloring, baking three cakes separately until just underdone so they stay moist, cooling the cakes then layering them using orange marmalade as glue, letting them set then spreading warm chocolate on the top and bottom. Start as early in the morning as you can.

While getting closer and closer to chocolatey soft almond cookie goodness, I was giddy. I remember saying, "this sure as hell beats last minute christmas shopping." In fact, making these cookies is what the holidays are all about: slowing down, spending time with someone you love, making something you love, then giving to people you love." These cookies put a truer smile on faces than anything you can unwrap and rip a price tag off of.

Torrisi Rainbow Cookies Recipe from New York Magazine

12 large eggs, separated

2 2/3 cups sugar

24 oz. almond paste

8 sticks butter, softened

5 2/3 cups all-purpose flour

2 tsp. salt

2 tsp. red food coloring

2 tsp. green food coloring

16 oz. orange preserves, heated and strained

8 oz. bittersweet chocolate, chopped

Preheat oven to 350. Beat egg whites in electric mixer until they just hold stiff peaks. Add ½ cup sugar, beating until whites hold stiff, slightly glossy peaks, then refrigerate. Beat together almond paste and remaining sugar in mixer. Add butter gradually and beat until mixture is fluffy, about 3 minutes. Add yolks and beat until well combined. Reduce speed to low and add flour and salt and mix until just combined. Fold in egg whites. Divide batter equally among 3 bowls; wearing gloves,(1) whisk red food coloring into one and green into another, leaving the third batch plain. Spread each batter separately and evenly, about ¼-inch thick, onto 3 half-sheet pans, each greased and lined with parchment paper. Bake until just barely set, about 7 minutes. (2) When layers are cool, spread half the preserves onto the green layer. Invert plain layer over it and discard paper. Spread on remaining preserves, and invert red layer over it; discard paper. Wrap with plastic and top with a weighted baking pan. Refrigerate for several hours. Remove plastic and bring to room temperature. Melt chocolate in a double boiler, and (3) spread thinly on top layer. Chill in freezer briefly until firm. Cover with wax paper, place another baking sheet on top, then invert cake onto sheet pan and remove paper. Quickly spread with remaining chocolate and return to freezer until firm. Trim edges, slice, and serve.

On Miguel

From Space for a Small Owl, Jon's blog: On Miguel. 

Marofoto.tumblr.com

THE DISORGANIZED LEADING THE DISORGANIZED: TIP #1 - JOCK STRAP AS CHEESE STRAINER

One of my biggest hurdles in life is that during embryonic development the organization gene turned up missing. I apply the same theory of sports aptitude to organizational aptitude: you can be born with it like a natural athlete or can practice the shit out of it, which is what I am attempting. There is a much that high school sports can teach us, aside from how to use a jock strap as a cheese strainer.
It feels like the shit hits the fan everyday and everything is scattered everywhere. Where do I start? I run around my apartment in hopeless despair and only make the situation worse.
I start by picking up all the underthings my cat traipsed around the apartment in his jaws but I don't finish because I see that I left that bottle of unmentionable prescription meds out so I run to hide it away in a cabinet (even I can't look at it) but I don't get to close the door before I notice I left my vibrator on the nightstand in the bedroom. I open that drawer and scream at the chaos of batteries and used tissues inside then notice it could use a cleaning so I run it into the bathroom and look under the sink for the gallon of bleach but I see that the cat left me a smelly gift in the litter box. I scoop that up but forget to flush because I notice an even more special gift in the corner where I dropped my toothbrush. On and on. What began as an attempt to straighten up, leaves my home looking like a perverted horror house. Think back to a more innocent time.
I played basketball in high school and when I stood at the foul line, all eyes on me, I took a deep breath and focused just on that one shot. I forgot about all that happened in the game before and everything that was ahead. I dribbled once, bent my knees and took my shot, and didn't forget to follow through with my arms. It kept me right there, not rushing ahead and I made more shots that way.
Applying this to organizing my life helps. Task at hand: burn old photos from vacations with ex-boyfriend. Follow-through: finish them off until the are charred bits that disintegrate into thin air. You don't need scraps of paper soaked in lighter fluid near the candles of the shrine to your new boyfriend, do you? Done. Move on.
You can only do one thing at a time. So when you feel scatterbrained and like there is so much to do, breathe and think to yourself I can only do one thing at a time. Do this one task, finish it, then move on. Getting anxious about everything you have to afterwards is only going to make what you're doing less fun and you won't do the best job. Organize in the moment. One miserable task at a time!