I am generally pretty fearful of vegan, gluten free, paleo, etc. recipes but this one is yummy and healthy. It’s filled with cashews, coconut, dates, almond extract, and peanut butter and topped with dark chocolate. From Gwenyth Paltrow’s 2nd cookbook, It’s All Good.
If I can keep up with demand, I’d like to take these to work for a healthful afternoon snack.
We invited the family over for Christmas dinner. I am cooking the prime rib roast. It’s a 9 pounder so hopefully I get the temperature right. I seasoned with garlic and rosemary.
Earlier this morning I whipped up some chocolate mousse for dessert. I added some amaretto into the mouse and the whipped cream. Making too much whipped cream was a lovely mistake I was happy to take care of.
Put the mousse in wine glasses. They are in the fridge and ready to go.
Salted caramel ice cream is freezing.
Cheesy cayenne parsley biscuits ready to be baked just before dinner so they’re nice and warm.
The table’s set!
I have made salted caramel ice cream before so I thought it would be just as easy making salted caramel candies. It was terrifying! I had no problem snorkeling in the ocean in Maui after a shark attack and a few shark sightings…but pouring that hot cream into boiling hot liquid sugar is life threatening. It was like a witch’s brewing cauldron. I’m no pansy. Here are photos from the third batch after I wised up and realized I needed a much deeper pot!
Used Ina Garten’s Fleur de Sel recipe with regular sea salt instead of the hard to find and expensive fleur de sel.
I cut them into large pieces and wrapped them in pieces of parchment paper. They sort of look like saltwater taffy sans all the colors.
We just got back from our wedding and honeymoon in Maui, Hawaii. I have so many things to share from our amazing family and friends to the beautiful scenery and weather to the food so I’m going to separate the posts starting with the food.
The morning we arrived we had to wait for our room to be ready so we had lunch at Ferraro’s at the Four Seasons in Wailea. I had the panna cotta. It had a mango topping on it. As you can see, I started ordering guava juice the first day and every day thereafter. Guava and POG (see below) should be on every menu on the mainland…just sayin’!
We ate at some pretty fancy restaurants while in Maui but one of my low brow faves was the banana macadamia nut pancakes with coconut syrup at Kihei Cafee. I’m still dreaming about those pancakes!
The pork fried rice was a lovely savory dish to eat alongside such a sweet breakfast and since it’s a Hawaiian novelty, I had to try it. I had it twice on our trip; it was so good.
Finally, the Hawaiian shaved ice was the one other thing we managed to try on one of our last days in Maui. You think it’s just gonna be like a snow cone but it’s so much more! It’s the equivalent of eating sweet freshly fallen snow. I had the Hawaiian plum and POG (passion, orange, guava) flavors.
More posts on food later since we have a bunch of posts coming on the wedding and the trip (and the holidays)!
It was nice to stay home for consecutive days before heading on our next adventure. We had Thanksgiving dinner at Pat’s sister, Kaillee’s, new house. I was charged with making the dessert. It looks like a regular pumpkin pie.
But it’s made extra yummy with a crunchy sweet topping of walnuts, brown sugar, and butter!
It was a lovely dinner. Then we ate dessert outside at the firepit Kaillee built.
Kaillee’s dog, Duke, got hit by a car last week so he’s a cone head for a little while but is doing a lot better. This is Pat’s brother, Kevin, with Duke.
On Saturday I was invited to Pat’s step-mom, Kris’, birthday dinner at Kaillee’s house. A few of Kris’ close friends were there. Kaillee prepared a wonderful dinner.
Oh and today is my 4 year anniversary as an attorney. Can’t believe it’s already been 4 years since I was sworn! Getting ready for Maui now!
Kim, Pat, Cat 