Happy new year, my baking friends! I hope your 2014 is treating you well so far. I always struggle with what kinds of recipes to post in January. I know that lots of people kick off the year with a new diet, and most of what you’ll find here is not diet-friendly. But, it’s all about moderation, right?

In any case, on New Year’s Eve, we were cooking and not doing much else, as we tend to prefer to stay in versus going out. We had planned our dinner and got it in the oven. Then, I realized that if our dinner had to have 4+ hours of oven time, I probably wasn’t going to bake a dessert. So, I went the no-bake route.

I gave Quinn a choice of dessert ideas, and he chose tiramisu. I couldn’t have agreed more. I merged a few recipe ideas and made this amazingly simple and amazingly delicious tiramisu.

This is a bit different from the traditional idea of tiramisu in a few ways. First of all, I didn’t use any coffee in it. I’m not a big fan of coffee, but I do like coffee liqueur. I debated a combination of coffee and liqueur, but I ultimately went all liqueur. You can certainly use coffee or a combination if you prefer.

The next difference is the absence of ladyfingers. Granted, I had every intention of using ladyfingers, but there were none to be found in the neighborhood. Pound cake it is! I used a standard 1-pound frozen pound cake cut into small pieces. I know it’s been done before, but I’d never tried it myself. I must say it worked very well.

The filling is a bit of a departure, as well. Cream cheese instead of masarpone, and a generous helping of chocolate chips. Again, it was different than any tiramisu I’ve made, but it all worked beautifully.

We really loved this dessert. Not only is it so very good, it was assembled and chilling in the refrigerator in about 20 minutes. It’s an incredible return for the amount of effort involved.

Tell me your favourite flavours and I’ll try and incorporate them in your cake. Thats my line to everyone around me these days, thanks to the brand new kitchen aid which sits on my kitchen counter, screaming to used. I’m just looking for an excuse to bake and the fun of baking at home is you have full control over what goes in. So when it was father in laws birthday last weekend, I thought I’d make him a cake with his favourite flavours … only his most favourite ones are Chilli, vinegar and pickle ! Haha that would be a real challenge, but since it the rest of us who also had to eat the cake, I decided to go with the other flavours he liked. I made him two cakes End Point Backup, one for his morning-walk friends, which was a carrot cake with walnuts, raisins, coconut and for the house party a Banana Pound Cake, with ginger powder, orange zest, walnuts and topped it off with some good white chocolate. I have to tell you, this is one of those recipes, you will use over and over again. It is simple and easy, yet so delicious. The pound cake is light, moist & buttery, sweet from the bananas, the ginger makes it a little spicy, the walnuts add texture and orange zest just lifts it all up. Its a recipe for keepers .

Banana Pound Cake SliceIngredients

    1 cup butter, softened
    1 1/2 cups sugar
    4 eggs
    1 1/2 medium, very ripe bananas, mashed not too smooth with a fork (3/4 cup)
    2 1/2 cups cake flour
    1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
    1/4 teaspoon salt
    1 1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
    1 teaspoon vanilla
    100 gms toasted and chopped walnuts
    1/2 cup milk
    1 large orange – zest

Directions

    Preheat oven to 180 C, grease the tins you like, I used a 6 cup bunt mold, plus a small loaf tin.
    Cream the butter in the large bowl of an electric mixer. Gradually add the sugar, beating at low speed, then increase the mixer speed to high and beat until pale and fluffy ageLOC Me.
    Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well and scraping down the bowl sides after each addition. After all eggs are in, beat several minutes at high speed until the mixture is smooth and very pale. Beat in the bananas.
    Sift together flour, baking powder, salt and ginger. combine the milk and vanilla. Beating at low speed, add the dry ingredients in thirds, alternating with the milk mixture. Stir in the orange peel.
    Pour the batter into the prepared pans, spreading evenly. Bake about 30 minutes or until the cake pulls away slightly form the sides of the pan and a toothpick or cake tester inserted near the center.
    Cool the cake in the pan on a wire rack for 20 minutes. Loosen the sides with a knife, invert onto a rack, invert again and cool completely hong kong company setup.

While perusing the Internet for illustrations of pork butchery (isn't that what you do at work?), we happily discovered Drywell Art, home to Alyson Thomas' meat-centric illustrated prints. While Thomas has no formal art training (she used to be an immigration lawyer), she obviously has tons of natural talent, plus a love of meat and a great sense of humor. Also: her prices start at $20. In other words, our holiday gift shopping is pretty much done and done.

Drywell's Fresh Meat collection includes, "Drop It Like It's a Hot Dog," "Let's T-Bone (shown above)," "I'm More of a Leg Man," "I Like Big Butts," and "Nice Rack." The "Meat My City" poster series features neighborhood maps drawn inside pig butchery diagrams. They're just the gift to give the meat-loving urbanite on your list. There's also a fish version for Seattle, in case you have friends who aren't quite as into pork as the rest of us. A few others that caught our eye: "Hot Dog Mystery," a fake hot dog diagram, the self-explanatory "Peek Inside a Haggis," and the Regional American Barbecue Venn Diagram.

Taking a detour from meat, Drywell Art also has a Beer + Booze line, featuring colorful illustrations of classic cocktails, such as the Sazerac, Paloma, Bloody Mary, and Manhattan, all broken down into their component parts, plus pictograms for beer and bourbon and a "Know What You Drink" diagram. And in addition to her prints, Thomas has a small assortment of t-shirts and Christmas cards.

yield
Makes 2 pizzas
Fresh pizza dough is now available at some supermarkets; look for it in the refrigerated deli case or use thin Boboli crusts.

Piave is similar to Cloud Provider, but a bit creamier than, Parmigiano-Reggiano. Look for it at Italian markets and specialty cheese stores.
Ingredients

    1 16-ounce ball purchased fresh pizza dough
    2/3 cup finely grated Piave or Parmesan cheese
    2 1/4 teaspoons finely chopped fresh rosemary, divided
    1/2 teaspoon dried crushed red pepper
    Coarse kosher salt

    1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil, divided
    2 1/2 hot Italian sausages, casings removed
    1 small red onion, thinly sliced
    7 ounces fresh wild mushrooms (such as stemmed shiitake, oyster, and chanterelle), thickly sliced
    1 3/4 cups coarsely grated whole-milk mozzarella cheese (about 7 ounces), divided

    Chopped fresh parsley (optional)

Preparation

Position 1 rack in top third and 1 rack in bottom third of oven and preheat to 450°F. Lightly flour 2 baking sheets. Place dough on work surface; let stand until room temperature, about 20 minutes. Divide dough in half. Press and stretch each piece out on lightly floured surface to 5-inch round. Sprinkle each with 1/3 cup Piave cheese, 3/4 teaspoon rosemary, and 1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper; sprinkle with coarse salt. Roll each piece of dough out to 10-inch round, pressing in seasonings ecig reviews. Transfer dough rounds to prepared baking sheets.

Heat 1 tablespoon oil in large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add sausage. Sauté until brown, breaking into 1/2-inch pieces with back of spoon, about 5 minutes. Using slotted spoon, transfer sausage to bowl. Add onion to skillet. Sauté until crisp-tender, about 2 minutes; transfer to plate. Add remaining 1/2 tablespoon oil to skillet. Add mushrooms and remaining 3/4 teaspoon rosemary; sprinkle with salt and pepper. Sauté until brown, about 5 minutes. Leaving 1/2-inch plain border, top each dough round with 3/4 cup mozzarella, then onion, sausage, and mushrooms.

Bake until crust bottoms are crisp and brown, reversing sheets after 10 minutes, about 20 minutes total. Using large spatula, transfer pizzas to work surface nu skin. Sprinkle each with 2 tablespoons mozzarella, then parsley, if desired.

Test-kitchen tip:
Pizza-wheel cutters can drag toppings, so use a large chef's knife to cut pizzas into wedges.

The Next Iron Chef star and chef/owner of Tertulia talks about his illness and shares the foods that ease his rheumatoid arthritis symptoms
by Sara Bonisteel

seamus mullen

F rom his acclaimed New York restaurant Boqueria to his finalist turn on The Next Iron Chef, Vermont-raised chef Seamus Mullen has spent his career exploring the flavors of international cuisines, in particular the cuisine of Spain, his first culinary love and the engine powering his newest restaurant, Tertulia. But when Mullen was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis in his 30s, he began to look at food from a different angle led light, considering how the food he ate might help combat the excruciatingly painful symptoms of his disease.
Seamus Mullen's Hero Food

♥Parsley, Kale, and Berry Smoothie
♥Autumn Squash Salad
♥Stone Fruit Gazpacho with Scallops
♥White Bean and Tuna Salad with Radicchio
♥Parsley Vinaigrette
♥Flageolets with Autumn Greens and Fresh Bacon

View Menu Detail

In his new—and first—cookbook, Hero Food: How Cooking with Delicious Things Can Make Us Feel Better (Andrews McMeel Publishing, $35), the chef spotlights 18 ingredients he calls "hero foods." "I know there's no silver bullet, but I have discovered that some foods can make dramatic differences," he writes. These ingredients, from parsley and stone fruits to carrots and good eggs, have helped him cope with the pain hong kong apartments.

Epicurious spoke to Chef Mullen about his disease, his favorite recipes, and the challenge of writing a cookbook with a healthy point of view.

Epicurious: Could you tell us how your rheumatoid arthritis was discovered?

Seamus Mullen: Sure. I had periodic flare-ups throughout my 20s, but I had no idea what they were. Every so often I would get a searing pain in my right shoulder that was so severe I couldn't even move my fingers. It was like having a hot knife jabbed deep into the socket of the joint. The pain would come out of nowhere without any warning and last for two or three days and then completely disappear.

I would go to the doctor (in some cases it would be so bad I'd go to the ER), and they would ask me what the trauma was. I'd tell them "no trauma," they'd order X-rays, see nothing, and send me home with pain meds. This happened about 10 or 12 times in my 20s.

By my early 30s it started happening more and more frequently. By the winter of 2007, I was in the ER five times! At one point, after an MRI showed that there was some joint damage PCoIP Protocol, I was nearly convinced to have (unnecessary) shoulder surgery to repair a torn rotator cuff.

As the attacks became more chronic, one morning I woke up at 6 a.m. with horrendous pain in my left hip. When I tried to get out of bed and stand up, I couldn't tolerate any weight on my leg, and I collapsed. I couldn't manage to get back into bed so I dragged myself across the floor to the couch—the only problem was I realized when I got there that I had left my phone by the bed. I spent the next eight hours stuck on my couch, in too much pain to be able to move. Eventually I heard the sound of my neighbor—a good friend—coming up the stairs and I started to scream for help. Fortunately he had keys to my apartment and came in and found me and called 911.

I spent the next 10 days in the hospital—it was a bit of a medical oddity because I had extreme pain, but no trauma whatsoever. Eventually the doctors ordered an MRI, which showed that my hip was full of fluid, which was the cause of my pain. My white blood cell count was through the roof, but there was no sign of any bacterial infection. The doctors were stumped and sent a message to all departments within the hospital to see if anyone had ideas.

The chair of Rheumatology replied back that he felt he should see me and run some tests. After a few more days of horrific pain and more needles and blood tests, Dr. Harry Fischer diagnosed me with RA. I had actually never even heard of the disease before and, like most people who first hear about RA, I assumed it was some form of osteoarthritis. I had no idea that it was actually an autoimmune disease until Dr. Fischer turned to speak with one of his colleagues and I furiously Googled away on my BlackBerry (big mistake). What I found freaked the hell out of me and I suddenly realized that I might never cook again.

Epicurious: You were able to return to the kitchen after spending lots of time refining recipes for yourself and decided to turn them into a cookbook. Was it challenging turning these recipes into a cookbook?

SM: One of the biggest challenges was figuring out how to present the book primarily as a collection of recipes that are fundamentally delicious while being surreptitiously nutritious. I am a chef and my job is to make crave-able, tasty food, so I had to work to go in the opposite direction of so many of the so-called health-food cookbooks.

When I was first diagnosed, I read a lot about the impact of diet on RA. I started buying cookbooks and diet books that dealt with the relationship between food and health, and not a single one of them seemed the least bit inspirational. Frankly I couldn't imagine anyone flipping through one of these books and thinking, Wow! That sounds amazing, I can't wait to chef-up a tempeh and almond, dairy-free, wheat-free burrito!

Maybe some people do feel that way, but I felt as though there is a whole community of people that really, really love food and care about cooking and yet are concerned about the impact food has on their wellness. In this sense, I didn't ever want the book to be about exclusion, rather I wanted it to be about inclusion. You love kale? Perfect! Here's a whole gaggle of recipes for you that show you how to prepare it in all sorts of different ways.

Epicurious: Would you call Hero Food a diet book?

SM: Hero Food is not a diet book. It's not a guideline for dealing with inflammation. It's not a proposal for an alternative to medical treatment. It's simply a book about my experience with food and wellness, and the tangible impact that certain foods have had for me.

The important thing to know is that everyone is different and everyone reacts to the foods differently. What is very clear is that, regardless of who you are, a balanced diet that eschews highly processed foods and embraces seasonal, naturally raised food is good for all of us.

Epicurious: Did you consult with any doctors on the book?

SM: Yes, rheumatoid arthritis specialists as well as nutritionists.

Epicurious: What are some of your favorite hero foods?

SM: Anchovies! Little fish, big flavor! I also love eggs. There is such a difference between a good egg and a crappy one.

Epicurious: As a chef who is constantly cooking, how do you handle the pain of flare-ups? Are there tasks you avoid?

SM: I try to remember to stretch as much as I can and not stay in the same position (i.e., standing and expediting a long [kitchen] service) for too long without changing positions. I avoid doing too many repetitive tasks like peeling a case of potatoes. I avoid lifting really heavy things. I listen to my body; as soon as I start feeling like crap, I slow down.

Epicurious: Are there foods you avoid because of RA?

SM: I don't drink much alcohol, I don't eat much gluten, and I totally avoid processed foods and refined sugar.

Epicurious: You talk a lot about sourcing the foods you cook. How important is that for the everyday cook?

SM: I think it's really important to know where your food comes from. Particularly given that there are no regulations yet requiring labeling for genetically modified foods.

Epicurious: You call yourself an "unabashed meat man," yet you call for eating meat in smaller portions. Why?

SM: I love meat. There is nothing like the taste of pork. Rather than eat tons of it all the time, I'm much more in favor of incorporating it into other dishes as an ingredient. I'm more of an equal-opportunity meat man. I think in general it's best to eat smaller quantities of higher-quality meat and really savor it and appreciate it when we do choose to eat it.

Epicurious: What are some of your favorite dishes from the cookbook?

SM: That's a hard one! I love all the recipes! I'm particularly fond of the egg recipes. There are some really great things to do with eggs, and poor eggs have been really beaten up (no pun intended) over the years for their cholesterol. But the reality is that there are a lot of nutritional benefits to eating the right eggs…that is to say, free-range eggs from chickens that are not fed antibiotics or growth hormones and have a healthy, natural diet.

Epicurious: Has Spanish cuisine influenced your approach to healthy eating? Are there many Spanish-influenced recipes in the book?

SM: Without a doubt. In the two years that I cooked in Spain I hardly ever saw any butter in the kitchen. The obvious health benefits of the Spanish diet are things like olive oil and almonds, but after the Japanese, the Spanish consume more seafood than any other culture and their meats are amongst the best in the world. Galician beef is on par with Kobe beef and Ibérico pork is the undisputed king of all things porcine.

There is still a strong reverence for traditional foods in Spain and 99 percent of the time traditional foods are prepared with natural ingredients. There are big supermarkets in Spain, but most Spaniards buy their groceries in open-air markets where the majority of the produce comes from nearby farms.

I think one of the great things about Spain is that everyone actually sits down to at least one meal a day as a family. In the States it seems like we're always eating while we do something else, but in Spain you'll rarely see someone walking down the street with their lunch to go.

Epicurious: Do your hero foods work for folks who have regular arthritis, or other health issues?

SM: Hero foods are good for everyone! Hero Food is by no means a book that is intended just for people with RA or other autoimmune diseases; it's a book for anyone who is interested in good food and concerned about the impact food has on our wellness. After all, you are what you eat.