Great Lakes Foodie » Food Network

Homemade Orange Marmalade

Great Lakes Foodie — Sun, 16 Jan 2011 11:47:11 +0000

It’s citrus season here in the Midwest. With our growing season on hiatus, we have all of the usual suspects in the market. Apples, pears, and oranges. (Admittedly, we have all sorts of produce varieties today. However, not much is local!) I bought a few bags of navel oranges to have fruit at work and decided to save a few oranges for marmalade. This is my first venture into making the sweet-tart condiment. I love trying all sorts of marmalades. When in London, I brought back three different kinds…including blood orange marmalade. When at World Market, I tend to grab the marmalade with ginger…a bit of a kick to the sweet-tart mixture.

Today I’m making plain old orange marmalade. I found a recipe on the Food Network website via the Barefoot Contessa library. The mixture has been simmering on the stove for an hour now. Another hour and I’ll be cranking up the heat to start thickening the mixture and bringing the sugar to the right cooked stage. Though it will be another 24 hours before I can try some, my mouth is watering thinking about it! Four canning jars are awaiting their molten bounty!!!

Recipe: Anna’s Orange Marmalade

Check it out!

Technorati Tags: Barefoot Contessa, Food Network, orange

Aarti’s Pumpkin Oatmeal…Maybe…

Great Lakes Foodie — Sun, 09 Jan 2011 16:00:39 +0000

Last weekend, I watched an episode of Aarti Party, Aarti Sequeira’s new Food Network show. She made what appeared to be the most decadent, extraordinary pumpkin oatmeal dish for breakfast. After seeing that, I was hooked and decided to make it this weekend. The recipe is easy (link below) and leaves your house smelling of pumpkin pie…a great not-so-distant smell of the holidays now ended. Ultimately, the smell was better than the flavor. I would recommend increasing the spices and possibly cooking the oatmeal with some sugar to enhance sweetness before the end of the cooking process. Will I make this again? Probably not. I do have two servings remaining…and will have a warming breakfast before work a few times this week. Try it and see for yourself…

Aarti’s Pumpkin Oatmeal Recipe (FoodNetwork.com)

Technorati Tags: Aarti Sequeira, Food Network, Oatmeal, Pumpkin

Wayfare Tavern – San Francisco CA

Great Lakes Foodie — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 14:58:22 +0000

Our anniversary trip to San Francisco included a trip to Tyler Florence’s new restaurant, Wayfare Tavern. Opened only a few weeks ago, this restaurant was truly exceptional. We started the evening off with fresh popovers. I’m guessing that this is a nod to Tyler’s southern roots. Next, we shared a few appetizers: deviled eggs and grilled calamari. Both were excellent.

While waiting for dinner, we had the fortunate opportunity to be seated in a booth with a great view of the kitchen. The darker, lodge-like motif of the dining and bar area were nicely muted to set off the bright subway-tiled kitchen. You could see everything in action, including Tyler himself ensuring each plate was produced to his satisfaction.

We wound up having three separate mains (two had the same dish). The first dish was a fried chicken dish. In addition to our approval of the dish, I’ve seen daily nods to Tyler via Twitter indicating the same. Two had the salmon dish. Both liked the dish. Though I didn’t try the salmon, I did have a taste of the Kennebec potatoes underneath. If I come back, I’m getting the salmon dish just for the side, I think! My dish was a pork chop with roasted peaches, Marconi almond butter, and fennel (both shaved atop and pureed underneath). This was a marriage I’m going to have to recreate at home. Pork and fruit, peaches and almonds, juicy meat and crunchy fennel….need I go on?

I would highly recommend this very new, destined to be successful restaurant.

Wayfare Tavern

558 Sacramento Street

San Francisco, CA 94111

415.772.9060

www.wayfaretavern.com

Technorati Tags: Food Network, San Francisco CA, Tyler Florence, Wayfare Tavern

Food Network’s Top 50 Recipes of 2009

Great Lakes Foodie — Wed, 30 Dec 2009 18:58:02 +0000

Food Network launched it’s top 50 of 2009 list of recipes. After receiving the notification email, I started to review some of the items. Clearly, 2009 was a year of comfort and frugality. Not a lot of truffles, caviar, crown roasts this year. So far, there are a large number of recipes that I’d like to try. I don’t like sticking with one style or nationality of food. This motley group of recipes (and TV personalities) makes for great variety. I won’t always pretend to be a huge fan of the revamped Food Network with it’s personalities-over-cooks mentality. The recipe content is sound in this case.

Food Network’s Top 50 Recipes of 2009

Click here for more Food Network Recipes

Technorati Tags: Cookbook, Food Network, Recipes

What wouldn't Brian Boitano do?

Great Lakes Foodie — Sun, 13 Sep 2009 18:20:19 +0000

I will preface this posting with the fact that I do like Brian Boitano. However, I’m growing tired of his new show. It is a bit hammy and quite forced. Is this is true personality? Is he trying to hard? Something is wrong with the show and I can’t quite put my finger on it..other than I get annoyed about half-way through.

I am not quite sure if I’m learning anything new from his episodes. There are quite a few of the standard “how-to” phrases that all Food Network cooking shows sprinkle in. Some of the attempts are a bit odd. The week on everything bacon was just that. Streaming bacon through every recipe at a party might sound good for the bacon lover. However, the over-powering smoked flavor could get quite boring.

Am I just whining…or does anyone else question why we need a Brian Boitano cooking show? What are your thoughts?

Technorati Tags: Food Network