Friendsgiving!

So we finally have one major eating holiday behind us and another less than a month away.  I can't say I'm excited.  While I love my family, for many reasons I tend to be closer to my friends.  I'm not formal and I'm not religious.  It just is what it is.  BUT, I do have some awesome parents and between my parents and my friends, I have had what was probably my best Thanksgiving holiday yet.

I spent my morning with my mom and dad and let's start with some facts.  Despite me being mouthy and crazy, these two people know me.  So I arrived at their house to this:

Deviled eggs.  Fact - I can eat this entire tray in one sitting without any problem.  I love deviled eggs.  Sometimes I buy two cartons of eggs so I have one for cooking and the other to use to make hard boiled eggs.  

Next I got to eat this:

I love fresh, raw veggies.  I'm not one of those weird people who are afraid of vegetables or will only eat them if they're covered in some fake processed cheese sauce.  Although don't get me wrong, I love fake processed cheese sauce and would totally eat them like that.  But I prefer them like this.  Except green olives.  The list of shit I won't eat is pretty short, but green olives are on it.

So I filled up on veggies and deviled eggs - okay and turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes and green bean casserole at my parents, and off to Friendsgiving I went!

Friendsgiving went a little like this.  "Raise your hand if you don't have anywhere to go to eat and want to have an awesome meal" (raises hand).  

We recieved our menu a few days before hand.  Yep that's right, we got a menu.  And a fancy one at that!

As you can see, I was tasked with bringing desserts. I've said it before and I'll say it again.  I like making desserts the least of all things yet I always get asked to make them.  I think it's because I like eating sweets less than anything else.  I don't know exactly what it is, but apparently I'm not too terribly bad at it because people just. keep. asking.  THIS was the one day I will say I was more than happy to oblige.  I mean, look at that menu! How was I going to complain about making a few desserts when I got to go eat all that?!?  So I happily went on my dessert menu hunting trip.  It was kinda fun.  I don't normally search for dessert recipes and ideas and let me tell you, people LOVE THEIR DESSERTS.  They are not fucking around with this.  Good lord, reading some of these reviews was like if the Food Network had a soap opera.  I'm sure I didn't help much by doing a dramatic reading in my head as I did my "research" but it was worth it.  I knew I wasn't going to do a pumpkin pie - so boring.  But then part of me still wanted pumpkin. So I settled on pumpkin cheesecake for my first dessert.  And with that came only name on the list for pumpkin cheesecake and it was Paula Deen herself! I knew I was in trouble when the recipe called for a stick and half of butta' and a cup and half of suga'.  But I operate on the 'go big or go home' philosophy when it comes to the holidays, so I was all in.  

Dessert number two.  I knew I wanted something lighter and for this I combed my usual food blogs.  I eventually settled on a recommendation from one of my fav's - So Delushious.  'Not Yo Mama's Banana Pudding' made by.......Paula Deen!  Yep.  Two Paula Deen desserts.  If anyone was going to die as a result of this meal, I was sure to blame.  

I arrived to Friendsgiving just in time for the first course.  Yep, I said course.  Butternut Squash Bisque with crumbled bacon on top.  

This soup wasn't even supposed to have crumbled bacon on top so imagine my surprise and obvious delight when my bestie Craig (oh god he's going to hate me for calling him that, HAHA) decided the bacon "went really well" with the soup.  Yes it did Craig, yes it did.  And Craig's biggest mistake of the day was leaving the extra crumbled bacon for the corn out on the counter.  A bottle of champagne and 3/4 a liter of wine later, drunk Heather was hungry and I may or may not have sneaked into the kitchen and ate half of the bacon that was leftover.  I can neither confirm nor deny my actions...

We basically hung out, watched some football, played some Apples to Apples - by the way.  Super fun game.  Even more fun when you're drunk.  Here is how drunk people play Apples to Apples:

Pretty soon it was time to eat.  No, feast.  Gorge?  Feast, we'll go with that.  We (as in not me because I was taking pictures for this blog entry) carved the turkey and set the table.

And the final product? Mass amounts of AMAZING FOOD!

To paraphrase the hundred's of hours of Top Chef I've watched in my life, it sucks to overcook something, it sucks to undercook something, but for the lova god DO. NOT. UNDER. SEASON. THE. FOOD.  You have no idea how terrible under seasoned food is until you've had it.  And I gotta say, to no surprise to me or anyone else there, all of Craig's food was perfectly seasoned (and cooked perfectly too, for the record).  

Awe, look at our little table of homeless Thanksgiving members.  For the record, they made me set at the kids table (aka the table that was 2" lower than the other) since I'm the youngest.  

After a little digesting, it was time for my desserts.  They turned out great, Paula Deen didn't disappoint or kill anyone with her butta' and suga'.

Here's the links to the two recipes I made.  Use them if y'all would like to make some delicious desserts, talk with a Southern accent for a bit (I think it's required when you cook a Paula Deen recipe) or attempt to kill your friends or family by way of butter and sugar.  

Pumpkin Cheesecake - http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/pumpkin-cheesecake-recipe/index.html

Not Yo' Mama's Banana Pudding - http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/paula-deen/not-yo-mamas-banana-pudding-recipe/index.html

The rest of the night is a food and drink coma blur that consisted of me passing out on the floor for a couple hours.  I prefer to call it "napping".  I don't think I ate till about 3 the next day but I what I was thankful for, was that I have awesome friends who were kind enough to invite me and make an amazing meal.  Happy Friendsgiving!

Restaurant-in-Review: Graze

For those of you who don't travel outside of Cedar Rapids much, I'm not sure what to say to you sheltered, deprived people except put your Applebee's and Olive Garden down, and drive the 25 miles south to Iowa City to get some culture and amazing food!

Last night I went with a friend to Graze, a martini bar/restaurant located in the Ped Mall in Iowa City.  I'd been to Graze once before with some friends, loved the place, and was wanting to go back and try some other things on the menu.

The first thing you should do at Graze is order a martini.  It's their thing.  You don't want to mess with perfection.  They have quite the list of martini's to choose from, and had even added a 'Spicy Martini' section featuring a bloody mary-type martini with.....SRIRACHA!  Yes, for the record I will be requesting Sriracha in my bloody's from here on out.  Even better, on Thursday's drinks are 1/2 off if you order $15 worth of food or more.  Challenge accepted.

I started with the Ruby Slipper Martini - Smirnoff Orange, orange, pineapple, grapefruit and mango puree.  "Bubbling!" is what the menu says, and I assumed this meant they added something "sparkling" but no, my martini was literally bubbling.  The entire time.

My friend got the spicy Mockingbird martini that consisted of Tito's handmade vodka (I don't know who this Tito guy is, but I feel like I should be friends with him), pineapple, lime, chile syrup, cilantro and a jalapeno for a garnish. I didn't get a pic of it, but I did try it and it was fantastic!

Next up, the food.

We decided to do small plates so we could try more things and share them, but I gotta tell ya that there isn't anything on this menu that I don't want to try.

We started with Edamame.  Those of you not familiar with edamame, it's a soybean in the pod that is boiled and served with simple seasonings like salt.  Good for you and HIGHLY addictive.  Edamame is like chips and salsa at a Mexican restaurant.  No matter how full you are, you just keep eating the stuff.  Here's my friend Andrew, requesting to get his picture taken for the blog, while eating edamame.  See how good it is!

Next up, the small plates.  We ordered Pork Belly Sliders, Ahi Tuna Steak, and Chicken Lips.  

The Pork Belly Sliders consisted of four sliders with peach balsamic BBQ and picked onions.  Holy. Shit.  For starters, I'm fairly certain I see an obsession coming on with things that are pickled, so beware those of you that read my blog.  These were incredible!  The bun was light and flaky, the pork wasn't dry and was cooked well, they put just the right amount of peach balsamic BBQ on it so it wasn't overpowering, and the pickled onions give it a could contrast and kick.  Awesome.

Next, the Ahi Tuna Steak.  I know I say I love a lot of things, and I really do, but ahi tuna is definitely on the top of that list.  The ahi tuna was marinated tuna, avocado salad and crispy wontons on top.  I'm not sure what the sauce was, but it had a good kick to it.

This dish was so fresh and amazing, there was talk of comparing it to some really good sex (I think this is where the term "food porn" comes from).  God knows I'm not eloquent enough to convey this in words, so the best way I can describe it is to show you this famous scene from the movie When Harry Met Sally.  If you have been living under a rock all of your life and don't know what I'm talking about, then I suppose it's my obligation to tell you not to watch this at work or at the very least have headphones in.  

And finally, the last dish we had was their Chicken Lips.  I don't know exactly what chicken "lips" are, unless that's the term for the worlds biggest hand breaded chicken strips, but none the less, I was in.  This is actually a signature dish for Graze and since my friend had never really ate at Graze before, I thought it was important for him to try them.  The chicken lips have a light buffalo sauce on them - again, the perfect amount so that the food isn't overpowered with it and you still get the light crunchiness from the breading.  And they're served with Budweiser blue cheese dressing.  I will say that I used to HATE blue cheese dressing.  With a passion.  Thanks to trying this Budweiser blue cheese dressing a year ago I now really enjoy blue cheese, so I definitely give them some credit.

When it was all said and done we almost made it through the meal, but we were full and happy with (almost) clean plates.

Graze definitely gets two thumbs up, 5 stars - whatever rating scale you're so inclined to use.  I definitely want to go back and try more things, and would highly recommend taking a trip down to Iowa City to check them out!  Here's a link to their website where you can check out their menu, prices, directions - all that good stuff that websites have:  http://www.grazerestaurant.com/

Sriracha Peanut Butter Cookie Ice Cream Sammiches

Sriracha.  It's the mother of all condiments.  It's the latest "thing" in cooking and eating and people are putting it on and in the strangest things.  So when I stumbled across a recipe for Sriracha Ice Cream Sandwiches, I figured why the hell not?  It wasn't too hard to recruit some candidates for this experiment either.  Boys like to eat.  It's pretty simple. And most of them love themselves some Sriracha, so all we had to do was pick a day and time and we were set.  

First thing's first and we had to assign the toughest job to our friend Tony - supervising.  See - look how hard Tony's working - drinking beer and "reading" Playboy.  

Back in the kitchen we got to work on starting the cookie portion of the ice cream sammiches.  Yes, for the record I have taken to calling sandwiches 'sammiches' and I am aware this is incorrect.

So first thing's first, and that is toasting, or roasting, or whatever you prefer, but brown some coconut.  If you like coconut.  I'm not the biggest fan of coconut but I did try it with the sammich and couldn't really taste it, so it didn't make any diff to me.  

Next, you gotta make the cookies.  Pretty straight forward peanut butter and chocolate chunk cookies EXCEPT THE SRIRACHA!  

So you're gonna mix all the stuff together for your cookies in a mixer except the Sriracha.  Once you have the cookies all blended together, it's time for the good stuff.  

And the money shot....

So the blog that I pulled this recipe from said a 1/4 of a cup of Sriracha.  1/8 of a cup for most people.  I think we used 1/4 - 1/2 cup.  Yep, we live our life on the edge like that.

Here's the first taste testing of the batter as we eagerly await his reaction...

And Sriracha FOR. THE. WIN!  After that it was time to make some cookies.  We knew we needed six cookies (duh, three people, three ice cream sammiches), and that they'd be bigger than normal cookies.  I started rolling them in balls and flattening them but with the oil from the peanut butter and butter, they kept falling apart.

So genius me (of course I was genius, I was drinking vodka during this process) flattened them ON the cookie sheet and not in my hand.

Get them all laid out and make some hashes in the cookies and bake.  Side note.  The recipe that I'll link you to for this says to bake them for 10-12 minutes, but we ended up baking them for 20 minutes.  

Next, the ice cream.  So this was SOOO strange to us, but you get yourself some vanilla bean ice cream and you dice up some basil and add it in.  Yep, you read that right.  Basil. You're putting herbs, into your ice cream.  Now the recipe calls for Thai basil, and naturally our Asian food market in town was out of it, so we used regular basil.  Dice it up, fold it in and put it back in the freezer to harden up some more.  Sorry guys, I didn't get a pic of this part.  I think I was refilling my vodka when Craig was doing this part.  Seriously.  BUT let me tell you the basil actually was awesome in the ice cream so don't skip this part!

After your cookies have cooled and your ice cream has hardened, make yourself your Sriracha ice cream sammich!

And ta-da!!! You've just made yourself a Sriracha Peanut Butter Cookie Ice Cream Sammich!

Happy friends!  

See, even the dog knew a good thing when he saw it!

Word of advice, the ice cream melts quickly, so hurry and eat it.

You can find this recipe over at the crazy guys who write for the food blog The Glut Life.  They're a bunch of crazy Texan's who love to eat and have sense of humor, so check them out if you dare!