Sprinkle Some Fries on those Cupcakes.

This post is dedicated to the brilliant and hilarious Patton Oswalt.  

For those of you familiar with the comedian, Patton Oswalt, you may have heard a bit on his CD Werewolves and Lollipops where he describes this recipe when he concurs with Brian Dennehy at a party that nobody cares if character actors get fat.

One day, when I was contemplating some salty-sweet combos, Patton's voice rang in my head and I thought, "It's sounds crazy, but I gotta try it".   The result?  Something incredibly rich.  Perhaps almost too rich for one person.

With all of the trendy cupcake shops opening up, I figured I'd skip the baking step (like a typical stoner) and try out a few fancy pants cakes from a local cupcake, uh, boutique??  I grabbed a White Chocolate Chocolate and a Strawberry cupcake and toasted up some shoestring fries from my freezer.  These cupcakes had TONS of frosting on them (as you can see) and it was delicious cream cheese frosting.  However, the icing mixed with the greasy fries made it so that I was unable to take more then a few bites before having my fill.  These are definitely for sharing!

Recipe

Make your favorite cupcake recipe or go to a hip cupcake shop and pick up a few 'cakes.

Obtain fries from your favorite restaurant/fry vendor, or bake up a few of the frozen variety.  Pretend you're doing Japanese flower arranging and place the fries atop the cupcakes.  Eat in a straight forward manor or remove the fries and lick off the ridiculous amount of icing (like birthday candles!)  Invite a few friends over, fire up the pipe, pop in one Patton's albums and pass the cupcakes to the left.

Sweet Potato Samosa Pot Pie

I have been dreaming about making this dish ever since the thought of it popped into my brain.  Originally the idea was just for a Samosa Pot Pie: all of the ingredients of a Samosa in a Pot Pie form; which I've learned from Google is not an original idea.  The recipe changed at the last minute after I harvested a bunch of sweet potatoes from my garden and thought "What if instead of

regular white potatoes...."  I must say that the experiment was a success in flavor and form (although the crust definitely looks stoner-constructed).

If you're not a fan of sweet potatoes, this may be the recipe to change you over.  The curry flavor transforms the sweet potatoes into a very different taste bud experience.  If you're still not convinced, you can substitute the recipe with regular white potatoes.  

Having never made traditional somosas before in my life (see Cheeseburger Samosas), I found this Samosa Recipe website very helpful in my endeavor.

Ingredients

1 pie crust

1 sheet puff pastry

5  sweet potatoes, medium-large

2 cup vegetable broth

1 1/2 cups sweet peas, frozen or fresh

1 medium onion, chopped

4 cloves garlic, chopped

1 1/2 tbsp ghee or butter

1 cup cashews, roasted

2 tbsp Madras Curry Powder

1 tsp cayenne pepper

Directions

First, pierce sweet potatoes with a fork and place in an oven @ 375 F for approx 45 minutes, or until thoroughly cooked.  Remove sweet potatoes from oven (but leave the oven on...you'll need it later!)  Let the potatoes cool ~10 minutes and then mash them in a medium bowl.  Place vegetable broth in a sauce pan and heat to medium heat.  Melt ghee or butter in a large skillet or pot.  Sauté onions and garlic in melted ghee/butter for 5 minutes.  Add mashed sweet potatoes and 1 cup of vegetable broth to the onions and garlic.  Stir.  Add curry powder and cayenne pepper to mixture and continue to stir.  When all of the liquid is absorbed, add the rest of the broth and the sweet peas, raisins and cashews.  Continue to stir until broth has been absorbed.  Taste and add salt if you need to.  For me the saltiness of the vegetable broth I used was plenty, but everyone's different.

Ok.  Now you can place the mixture in your pie crust.  If you wanna, you can make your own, but I used a frozen pre-made crust to simplify the procedure.  Load it up high.  The mixture should rise above the sides of the crust.   Next, roll out your puff pastry and cut into a circle and plop on top of the pie.  Pinch it to the edge if you can or just let it ride on top if you want.  Place in the oven for about 30 minutes, or until crust turns a golden brown and you can't stand the enticing aroma any longer.  Let sit for about 5 minutes before slicing and serving.  Leftover pie tastes awesome too and there should be plenty unless you're feeding an army.

Better than Ramen: Thai Noodles with Spinach and Quorn Chicken

I love going to the Big Lots closeout store.  Especially the one about 20 minutes outside of town in the "boonies" where several of my friends share a house.  I almost always find tons of organic and natural non-perishable food items out there for CHEAP...untouched by the traditional country shopper.  Thai Kitchen's Instant Rice Noodle Soup varieties are already cheap (about 70-90 cents/pack), but I recently found every variety marked at $.50 and so I stocked up on about $10 worth for the winter.

I was visiting with my friends after my shopping trip, enjoying the unseasonably beautiful November weather with great company, good beer and a little smoke.  Before long I had to put something in my belly and my little soup packet came to the rescue!!  They make great quick meals (take about 5-7 minutes to cook).  Sometimes I'll drop and egg in at the end of cooking the soup to make and Egg Drop Noodle soup, but on this particular day I added a few nuggets of Quorn "Chicken" and some cooked spinach that my friend was making in another pot.  These little guys travel well and taste great on their own, but it's always fun to try adding different varieties of veggies and protein. 

Ingredients

1 packet Thai Kitchen Roasted Garlic and Vegetable Noodle Soup

1/2 cup of water

1/2 cup cooked spinach

5-8 nuggets of Quorn "chicken" (or real chicken)

Hot sauce

Directions

Follow directions on package of Thai Kitchen soup.   Add Chicken when you add the noodles into the soup.  Add cooked spinach (I usually use frozen spinach, but you can steam some fresh spinach).  Pour into a bowl and let it sit for a few minutes before eating...it will be HOT!!!  Then dig in and slurp some noodles.

Pizza Eggs

                    

So I'm a huge fan of the Showtime series Weeds.  Somewhere in the 1st season there is mention of Pizza Eggs, with no further explanation.  It is a reoccurring meal mentioned on the show.  Ever since I heard those two words put together, my mind has raced with many interpretations of the actual dish.  This will be one of several Pizza Egg recipes that will be posted in this blog, both to pay homage to the fine writers at Weeds and because this first experiment was DELICIOUS!

  Lucky for me and this recipe, my boyfriend works at a pizza restaurant, and I received a beautiful gift of leftover slice-pie pizzas and bread loaves the other night.  Although this pizza was just plain cheese, ANY pizza topping combos that you fancy would be excellent in this dish.  I chose to simply add some capers to my pizza...my new favorite pizza topping.  After trying to explain where capers came from to a friend and consulting this killer book:  Food Plants of the World , I discovered that not only are capers flowers, but they are one of the most popular pizza toppings in the world!?!?  I tried it and fell in love.  Of course, you can order or make whatever kind of pizza you want. 

Leftovers on Huevos, Part II

Ingredients

1 slice leftover pizza (any and all toppings optional)

2 eggs

1 tbsp goat cheese or cream cheese

1/2 tbsp butter

Parmesan

Red Pepper flakes

Oregano

Hot sauce

Salt and Pepper

Directions

Reheat leftover pizza slice in oven.  Remove and let cool for 5 minutes.  Cut off the bone (crust) with a knife, and nibble on it while you cook-like an appetizer.  Cut the cool, but still warm pizza into 1-2" chunks and set aside.  Heat butter in a frying pan on Medium-High heat.  When the butter has melted, begin making the scrambled eggs.  I personally like to crack the eggs in the pan and then take a wooden spoon and start scrambling.  I add a little goat cheese (if it's not already on the pizza) straight into the pan instead of milk to add some cream and fluff to the eggs.  You may also find it helpful to occasionally lift the frying pan off of the eye while scrambling to prevent overcooking the eggs.  About halfway through cooking the eggs (~3 minutes), add the pizza chunks in.  Continue to scramble another 3-5 minutes until eggs are cooked and the pizza has assimilated.  Garnish like you would pizza and/or eggs:  add any combination of parmesan, red pepper flakes, oregano, salt, pepper, hot sauce or whatever else you throw on your Pizza Eggs, and feast on this stoner breakfast of champs!