December 3, 2008
European Hot Chocolate
One of the perks of being an international Flight Attendant is the opportunity to shop in foreign countries; and shopping in local foreign groceries was always on the must-do list on even the shortest of international layovers. Before the availablility of high quality international gormet goodies blossomed over the years, I would often clear Customs at Kennedy or Lambert with wonderful cheeses, chocolates, wines and breads not available here in the states. But one thing that I could never find was the rich, creamy dark hot chocolate that was served to us in London.
London. So many images come to mind. Trafalger Square, the Theatre District with their “Pearlies”, the pubs with their pints and Shepherd pies. But the one item that I was not able to duplicate was the hot chocolate served to our flight crews upon arrival. If you have flown international at all you know that most flights originate out of the US gateway city in the evening with arrival in your European city scheduled for early morning after the all night flight. Often we would arrive at our hotel in London (after staying awake all night working the flight over) way before the hotel housekeeping crews arrived for their days work of cleaning the rooms. That meant that our rooms were almost never ready for our occupancy upon our tired arrival and we had to sit in the lobby waiting for our rooms.
The hotel always sent beverages to warm us, my favorite being the hot chocolate. This is how it was served… the Crew was served three pots – One with the rich, creamy unsweetened dark hot coco; one with hot milk; and one with hot water — and of course, a bowl of sugar on a silver tray with the cups and saucers.
I love dark chocolate and always have and so, the rich creamy european dark hot chocolate is a treat that I have never forgotten and always kept an eye out for while shopping, yet never actively searched for it.
Until….one day in a fun store called Tuesday Morning I saw a box of Perugina Hot Chocolate packets. Hum-m-m… pretty expensive… and a really big box…what if I didn’t like it?…I would have spent all that money on something I would have to give away…. But the lure of remembering that taste from long ago won out over practicality and I purchased the box of Dark Hot Chocolate packets (not packaged for individual resale!).
I decided that the next morning would be the perfect time to try out my new treat. I was not disappointed. This is the hot chocolate I had remembered! I had found it! And now that I had discovered it, I wanted to share it with someone because it was just too delicious to keep for myself. And so I have given away several of the ambrosia containing packets to my dearest friends. Thank you Tuesday Morning!
November 29, 2008
How to Make a Roux
Roux Ingredients by PDXFirefly
What is a Roux? Roux is french for a basic white cream sauce. If you can master making a basic roux, you will be able to embellish it with cheeses, wines, herbs and other seasonings for a variety of accents to many basic dishes.
2 TBS Flour (you can lightly brown it in a skillet or heavy sauce pan to “cook out” the raw taste.
2 TBS Butter
1 Cup of liquid (milk or broth or a combo)
Melt the butter in a medium sauce pan. Add the flour until it bubbles slightly. Whisk in the liquid and continue to stir over medium heat until your mixture thickens.
Then you can add any other ingredients that you want such as cheese (mac n cheese), cooked pearl onions (creamed onions), diced turkey, or spices.
November 26, 2008
Turkey Butters
Turkey Butter by PDXFirefly
Many years ago, I obtained a mold to make butter pats in the shape of a turkey. It is one of those items that I only use once a year, but I use it every year and I would not want to be without it. Here is a picture of a turkey butter! Isn’t it festive?!! This year I made about 30 of these!
Pistachio Pudding
This is a Midwestern Family Holiday Favorite which I made for each holiday for over 15 years.
1 package of instant pistachio pudding mix
8 oz of cool whip
1 can of mandarin oranges
1 can of crushed pineapple
8 oz mini marshmallows
Drain the oranges & pineapple reserving the syrup.
Add half of the drained syrup to the dry pistachio pudding mix; whisk together well. Add more syrup if needed up to 1 1/2 cups. Fold in the cool whip. Fold in the oranges, pineapple and marshmallows. Refrigerate for several hours (overnight is best). This is very pretty served in a glass or crystal bowl.
October 28, 2008
Purple Hair II
With Halloween just a few days away, be sure to read my eariler post on how to temporarly dye your hair PURPLE (or any other color) with Kool Aid.
Just type “Purple Hair” in the search box to the right, click on the “go” button. When the next page comes up, click on the title of the blog you want to read. In this case it would be “Purple Hair”; this brings up the entire post for you to read.
OR you can click on “Beauty” under the “Categories” section to the right.
OR you can click on “September” under the “Archives” heading to the right. Then just scroll down to the correct entry.
To return to the main blog, just click on “Portland Firefly” at the top of whatever page you are on. Happy Costuming!!!
October 24, 2008
Toasted Pumpkin Seeds
Now is the time for pumpkin carving, but what do you do with all those seeds?! Well, I have an easy recipe for toasting them. TIP: After recovering the seeds from your pumpkin (or squash), remove all the pulp by placing 1/2 C seeds at a time, between 2 towels and rub to remove strings and flesh from seeds. In a colander, rinse seeds well and drain. The only way to do this is by hand, so make sure your manicure is completely dry!
In a 2 quart pan, bring water (2 Cups) and salt (2 T) to boil over high heat. Stir in seeds. Remove from heat and let stand until cool. Cover and chill 12-24 hours. Use less salt if you just want a hint of salty taste. Pour off the salt water solution and pat them dry for the day or overnight. Seeds will toast or roast best if dry. Drying tip: put seeds on a cookie sheet lined with wax paper so they don’t stick to it.
Oven: Spread seeds on a foil-lined (important for easy clean-up!) cookie sheet and bake them in a slow oven (250 degrees) for about 1 hour. Be sure to watch them and stir every 10 minutes so they don’t burn and are “golden brown”. Be sure to cool before eating!
Skillet toasting: Toast seeds in a heavy, dry skillet on medium heat, stirring constantly to prevent burning, until they start to pop open.
Microwave: Toast on high in microwave for 6- 8 minutes, stirring once every minute to prevent burning. Watch carefully as it is easy to burn things in the microwave, too.
These may be stored in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to a year, but my guess is that you will be lucky if you have some left over at Christmas!
You can also toast the seeds without soaking them in salt water. You can also spray them with oil (more calories) and sprinkle the seeds with various toppings (cinnamon/sugar, garlic salt, cayenne, onion powder, curry powder, etc) before or after baking.
Thanks to Susan List for the basic recipe, which Portland Firefly greatly embellished.
Portland Firefly tip: I couldn’t wait for my seeds to soak in the brine (salt) solution for 12 hours, so I just let them soak in the hot salt water for about 30 minutes. Then I let them dry and skillet toasted them. M-m-m-m-m Yummy! And just the right amount of salt for me!
Enjoy!!!! And let Portland Firefly know how they came out!
October 18, 2008
How to Boil Eggs
Ok, you have the eggs that you want to boil. Now get a small pan, not one that is too big for the amount of eggs you want to boil. Put enough water in the pan to just cover the room-temperature eggs completely. You can then put the lid on the pan and put it on the stove and bring to a boil. Just a SLOW boil for 10 minutes. Here is a picture of eggs in a slow boil. A full rolling boil is not what you want. A full rolling boil looks just like it sounds — lots of turbulence in the water and splashes.
Boiling Eggs by PDXFirefly
After slow boiling the eggs ten minutes, turn off the heat and put a lid on the pan and let them sit ( or is it set) for 5 minutes. Then you remove the lid and pour the water off and run cold water over the eggs in the pan. Repeat the running of cold water over the eggs. This is to hasten the cooling down process. Then you can put them in a bowl in the fridge to cool longer until you are ready to shell them.
You can also slow boil the eggs for 5 minutes and then let them set ( or is it sit) in a covered pan for 10 minutes.
When you go to peel them, they will be perfect! My recipie for Curried Deviled Eggs will follow in a later post! Yum !!
September 9, 2008
Purple Hair
My beautiful, talented Daughter has the coolest hair. It has been purple for several years and now she has her beautiful blond tresses shading from deep purple to turquoise. I actually love her hair in shades of purple the best —for some reason it just suits her and her effervescent personality! When she was a teen, I would allow her to “dye” her hair for special costume occasions. I was probably hoping that if I allowed her to do this “rebellious” thing that it would keep her from doing something really harmful. Besides it was fun – for all of us! I think it worked because she is a fabulous, successful young woman who has made a positive name for herself in the LA tech community.
And so she has given me the “recipe” for safe, non-toxic, non-permanent cheap coloring of your hair. Use Kool-aid! Yes, I said Kool-aid! The stuff you used to drink as a child; some of you still drink it. The TV ad with the big pitcher with the happy face on it! Here we go…..
First and foremost, you must only purchase the sugar-less or the kind where you add your own sugar (which you do not add). Reason? You do not want sugar on your head because the flies, bees and bugs will also want to be there! Mountain berry punch is suggested as the color of choice because it evidently gives good coverage, but you are limited only by your own imagination! You mix it in a small amount of conditioner – enough to make a paste- and apply it to your clean hair — as a colored conditioner. You may want to use gloves to protect your manicure! You may need to mix in three or more packages depending on how thick your hair is and how deep you want the color and how light your hair color is to begin with. Then pile your hair on top of your head, cover with saran wrap and wait at least 1 hour. The timing depends on hair length, texture, amount of Kool-aid, etc. You can clean up any mess you made during this time. The longer you leave it on, the longer the color has to penetrate the hair shaft and the deeper the color will be. Gently rinse the excess conditioner out and dry your hair as usual. You can also color just the ends of your hair, or a section of it; the whole idea is to have fun and be creative! Rainbows anyone??
When you are tired of your fun hair color you simply shampoo it. You may need to shampoo your hair two or three times to get all the kool-aid color out, but hey, what fun you had!!! This blogher is not responsible for any inacuaracies or mishaps!!! But, let us know how it went!
