Happy Easter!

This year, I went the traditional route and made my own Easter egg dye out of red onion skins.  I used this recipe from the Kitchn, and it worked very well.

I made my dye in the evening and left the onion skins in overnight, then strained the dye in the morning and cooked and colored the eggs.

When the eggs were dry I polished them with a little olive oil, and I'm so pleased with how the color looks.  I used brown eggs, so there's nifty speckles and variations in the color.

Carrot Ginger Soup

So finally, it's starting to feel like fall!  Fall is my favorite season - I love the cooler weather, the changing colors, the smells...and of course the food.  So here's one of my favorite cold weather soups to kick off the season!

Recipe:
1 large Onion, chopped
6-8 large Carrots, cut into large slices
Garlic, to taste
2 handfuls Cashews
1-2 inch piece of fresh Ginger, chopped
Sea Salt
Butter
Water

Melt 3 tablespoons of butter in a large pan.  Add chopped onions and cook until transparent.  Add carrots, garlic, and ginger, cover with water and cook until the carrots are tender.

In a small fry pan, melt 1 tablespoon of butter and add cashews.  Cook, stirring frequently until lightly toasted.  Add to carrot mixture.

Puree soup, adding water as needed, until smooth.  Return it to the pot and add salt to taste.

Serve with sour cream or plain yogurt (I prefer Greek yogurt).

Here I sprinkled some chopped fresh cilantro into it and that was pretty good.  This is a nice spicy soup, it's not an immediate hot-and-spicy, but the ginger packs some heat that kind of builds up slowly.  The spicy ginger and the sweet carrots are great together and the cashews add a nice earthiness.

This soup also gets surprisingly creamy, even if you don't add sour cream or yogurt to it.

Like I said, this is a great cool weather soup - it's warming, easy to make, and look at how cheerful that color is!

Peanut Butter Popcorn Balls

I'll be honest -- I'm not a fan of popcorn.  I don't especially dislike it, but I don't choose to eat it often.  Usually, at the movies, if I have a taste for popcorn, I'll just snag a handful of someone else's (that I'm with, of course) and that satisfies my popcorn craving.  Well this afternoon I was at a movie, I had a taste for popcorn but was by myself, so I actually ordered a thing of it.  And ate less than a quarter of it before I was totally over my craving for popcorn.

Being thrifty, I brought it home thinking that I'd just eat it later, but then I realized it would be totally gross by the time I felt like eating it.  So I hit the internet, hoping to find a way to use up a giant bag of movie popcorn, and found this.

Recipe:

4 cups Popcorn
1/4 cup Honey
2 tablespoons Sugar
1/4 cup Peanut Butter
1 teaspoon Vanilla

Measure the popcorn into a large bowl.
Melt honey and sugar in a medium saucepan.  Bring to a boil and simmer 2-3 minutes.  Stir in the vanilla and peanut butter.  Mix until smooth.
Pour over the popcorn.  Stir to coat the popcorn.
Form into small balls while still warm, and store in an airtight container.

Now, I wore a pair of surgical gloves while forming the popcorn balls and this served two purposes.  First, it provided some protection from the hot peanut butter mixture, and second, I was able to form the balls without getting my hands all messy.

Quick, easy, and delicious!  And yes, apparently I'm also the kind of person who has surgical gloves around.

Sweet, salty, buttery, peanuty...yum!

And I had enough popcorn left to make a double batch.  Yes, 8 cups of popcorn.  Because my local theater has psychotic servings.  Seriously, a small drink is 32 oz.  Ridiculous!

Cheese

That's right, I made cheese.

This wasn't exactly planned.  I opened my milk yesterday and found that it was well on it's way to being curds and whey.  Now, this was almost a full half gallon of organic milk, less than a week old, and only one day past the sell by date.  So I was positively cringing at the idea of tossing it.

So, I consulted the internet and gave it a whirl, figuring that if nothing else, I'd be entertained for the morning.


Step 1: Curds and Whey


I heated the milk, which was chunky to begin with, until it separated completely.  Appetizing, I know.

Curds and Whey

Straining

Step 2: Straining

I got one of my mixing bowls, put the colander in it, lined the colander with cheesecloth, and secured the cheesecloth with clothes pins (because, apparently, I'm the kind of person who has cheesecloth and clothespins on hand).  Then, I poured the curds and whey into the cheesecloth, where the whey drained from the curds.

I let this sit for about an hour, so the whey could drain.

Step 3: Whatever You Call This

Whatever You Call This

Basically, I gathered up the edges of the cheesecloth and tied it around a wooden spoon and let it sit for about 2 hours.  Then when it wasn't dripping whey anymore...

Step 4: Unveiling

Voila!

Voila!  Fresh cheese.  The texture is kind of like dry ricotta.  It's very mild and smells amazing, but has an acidic whey aftertaste that I find unpleasant.  It's not great for eating on it's own, but just fine for cooking!

The half gallon of milk ended up making about 1 cup of cheese, which I used to make Hungarian Open Faced Cheese Cakes.