The Best Eggnog

Well I cannot even begin to take credit for this recipe. But I will tell about my experience using ¨The Best Eggnog¨recipe from this site:

http://www.chow.com/recipes/10758

So there I was on Sunday with an incredible craving for eggnog. Here in Seville you can't just go to the grocery store and buy a can of eggnog. If you want it, you've got to make it! I asked around, checked out some websites and finally found one a recipe that looked really good...and REALLY potent! I will say, I was skeptical with adding an ENTIRE bottle of bourbon, not to mention I don't even drink bourbon! But that along with the half a cup of rum and half a cup of expenive cognac, tasted great! I am sure that my fiance wasn't that pleased about my stealing the good stuff from his stash. But once he tries it tonight at the family Christmas Eve dinner, I am sure he'll ask when I'll be making it again.

On a side note, I added some vanilla and a lot of cinnamon. I didn't have fresh nutmeg and don't care for the store bought ground stuff, so I just added a pinch of it.

So as you can see in the first picture, I started by separating the yolks and whites.

Next I whisked the yolk until creamy and added the sugar.


And finally you can see that all of the ingredients have been mixed together: the yolks and the sugar, the rum, cognac and full bottle of bourbon and the 4 cups of milk and cinnamon and vanilla.


To serve, I beat some egg whites with heavy cream until light and fluffy and then folded them into the egg nog mixture. As you can see, it's nice to sprinkle some cinnamon or nutmeg ontop and serve on ice.

We'll see how it goes tonight at the Christmas Eve dinner, but I will say, I served this to my colleagues on Tuesday and it was a hit and they were begging for more!

Enjoy and a very Merry and Safe Christmas to you all!

Pastaless Lasagna

This recipe was invented as most do, by accident some time last year. I wanted lasagna and didn't have any pasta. So I decided to go about it, replacing the layers with layers of grilled veggies and loved it perhaps even more than the real stuff! This is just one of my many variations of Pastaless Lasagna.

First, slice the zucchini and eggplant. Soak the eggplant in water and salt and allow to soak for at least 20 minutes and up to several hours. This gets the bitterness out of the eggplant. Next, pour some olive oil in the pan and sprinkle with coarse salt and grill the zucchini and eggplant.

If you have some leftover tomato sauce, as I did, then put a layer of it on the bottom. If you don't then just use some fresh slices of tomato. After the tomato sauce, put a layer of the grilled zucchini.


After the layer to tomato sauce and zucchini, add a layer of grilled eggplant.

And then a layer of fresh sliced tomato with fresh or if you don't have fresh dried herbs on top. I sprinkled basil, oregano, parsley and salt.
Continue these layers until you can't fit anymore or have run out of ingredients. Top the lasagna with one last layer of tomato or tomato sauce and then grated cheese.
Stick it in the oven at 200 C for about 40 minutes.
Enjoy!

*Note, this would be very good adding ricotta cheese (or ground meat) into the layers...if you do this it's best to mix an egg with the ricotta cheese!*

Coming soon...

Bacalao con Tomate (Cod Fish in Tomato) and Pastaless Lasagna. Stay tuned...

The Long Awaited "Special" Banana Bread Recipe

I know that Thanksgiving at this point was one week ago, and I'm sure that everyone, like me, had leftovers. Some were easier to dispose of than others. I got stuck with 4 large egg whites from making holandaise sauce. I absolutely HATE throwing away food. In fact, I feel that it's sacrilegious! So there I was on Sunday morning trying to figure out what the heck to do with my container of egg whites? I searched the internet but didn't like any of the options. I didn't feel like making macaroons, didn't want an egg white omelette and certainly didn't want to make lemon meringue pie. So I decided I'd experiment because cooking is like a science project, isn't it? I had 2 frozen very ripe bananas in the freezer and a ripe banana in a bowl. So I looked up a recipe for Banana Bread and these are the ingredients I got:

Ingredients

• 3 or 4 ripe bananas, smashed
• 1/3 cup melted butter
• 1 cup sugar (can easily reduce to 3/4 cup)
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• Pinch of salt
• 1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour

I am not one to follow the instructions or measurements religiously while cooking, so I smashed up the bananas, and added one whole egg, sugar, butter, salt, baking soda, vanilla, pinch of salt and mixed it all. Then I addedthe flour (using half whole wheat flour and half white flour), measuring everything by eye. Separately, I threw the egg whites in the mixer, and mixed them until they were white and thick. After combining all of the ingredients, I scooped in the egg white and then did what I've seen done many times on the TV. I folded* the egg whites into the banana bread mixture. I then poured this mixture into a bread baking dish, with a piece of parchment paper covering it so that the mixture wouldn't stick. And I stuck it in the preheated oven at 350· F (170· C) for about 30 minutes.

* fold in, Cookery. to mix in or add (an ingredient) by gently turning one part over another: Fold in the egg whites.

As you can see in the pictures, it came out nice and fluffy and has been a wonderful breakfast all week long! Side note, and I learned this from my sister, to heat up bread without ruining it, dampen a piece of kitchen towel and cover the bread with the damp paper. Be careful not to overheat it or it'll ruin the bread! Just heat it for about 20-30 seconds depending on the potency of your microwave!

I hope that you enjoyed this recipe. And remember, never throw out food! There is always something that you can do with leftovers. And as a last resort when you don't know to do with something, just freeze it until you get a great idea! Good luck!