World's Best Cookies

I have long planned to do a post on all of the things I've made/ idea's I've implemented that I found on pinterest. However, these cookies deserve their own time in the spotlight. They are absolutely my new favorites. S'more cookies. SO GOOD. 

There are a few recipes for these out there, but I like this one from The Girl Who Ate Everything the best. She added a little bit of cinnamon that make the flavor just right. It's a wonderful gooey chocolate chip cookie with the taste of s'mores. 

The first time I tried to make them it was an epic fail.... because I didn't have graham crackers. They are crucial. Otherwise, the marshmallows fall through and stick to the pan. They are a little less dense than normal chocolate chops, so they need something to melt into. 

They have chocolate chips in them, but with 5 minutes left to bake, you add Hershey's bars. 

Perfection. I highly recommend trying these babies. In my opinion, they are even better the next day once they've hardened a bit. I've made them 3 times so far, and will surely be making lots more in the future. 

Thank you Pinterest for providing a world of inspiration for wonderful things. 

Here is the link to my sweets & such board on Pinterest. There are almost 200 recipes for yummy sweet things, most that I'd never thought of before. Enjoy! 

Meal Planning & Cooking in Asia

I've mentioned before that I had no idea how to cook before I moved over here. I have to say that times certainly have changed. When it comes down to it, cook from scratch or don't eat western food, you learn to cook from scratch. Here's the thing tho- it requires A LOT of planning. 

There are limited places where we can buy "imported" ingredients that we need- stuff like cream cheese, whipping cream, tomato paste, pasta, and most importantly cheese. Some of it has to be bought in bulk, and getting to the places where I have to buy it is no easy task that I don't desire doing frequently. It's a fun adventure though. 

Because hopping in the car and driving to the store is not an option, I need to plan ahead.

So I print out a bunch of recipes I want to make, and start assessing what I need with these handy kitchen themed post it notes. 

I group recipes by type and by common ingredients- like sour cream & cream cheese, that I need to use around the same time so they don't go bad. 

And then I make a shopping list, and get what I need.  

I've had a lot of stuff mailed from America as well. Our cabinet space is beyond limited in our tiny kitchen, so I have an "extra" stash. It's kept in a "Happy Everyday" plastic storage bin under our bed. You do what you can with the space you have here. 

We have all sorts of things stashed from canned stuff we bought here & Adam's coffee, to snack food & baking supplies. 

All things that have been graciously mailed from America. 

Thank you ALL for spending the time, effort, and money to ship me so much stuff. 

In addition to our "stash," I keep a lot of ingredients in our tiny cabinets. 

I keep all of our baking supplies in those plastic canisters. I have to keep EVERYTHING in plastic here- even boxes in ziplock bags because it is SO STINKING HUMID here. If I don't, it goes beyond stale and is moldy cabinet flavored. 

Another thing I love about our kitchen & meal planning here is the walls that I can write on with dry erase markers. Because everything is so jam packed everywhere, I keep an inventory of what we have on the walls. 

I also have lists of what recipes I plan to cook. 

Call me OCD all you want, but I like my system and it works. So, as far as the cooking process, I have plenty of systems as well. I hang whatever I'm cooking by these suction cup & hooks over the store. 

Another thing I love is my gas stove. They cook at SUCH high temperatures here- ya know with woks and such, that they have supped up gas stoves.  

I was an idiot when we remodeled our kitchen in America and REALLY wanted a cook top.... that takes a year to get hot and even longer to cook. 

This is my little spice rack, and the hooks where I hang stuff.  

I really have loved to learning to cook here. One of our very favorite recipes is for Veggie Calzones, that I adapted from this recipe. 

I love using my baking mat that I bought on EAian eBay, as well as my bread maker that I make the dough in. I also use this old parmesan shaker for extra flour. 

Rolling the dough out.

Here's the stuffing- so yummy. We add chicken to ours. 

It's amazing how good cream cheese, Italian dressing, and tomato paste taste together. 

We usually make 6, freeze 3 and eat 3. 

Seriously so good. They are just as good after they've been frozen. 

After dinner, dishes are to be washed... by hand. 

I have even come to love hand washing all of our dishes. I recently thought, "Oh I have to go back to a dishwasher in America.... that's no fun." I'm sure I'll change my mind soon after we're home. And I can {obviously} still wash things by hand. I even love this giant drying rack, and my ghetto rigged hang dry the baking mats & other hangy things system. 

And before you know it, the dishes are washed, our tummies are full and we're ready for a few episodes of whatever comedy we're watching on DVD. 

{We're currently enjoying Season 5 of 30 Rock}

Joyfully Cooking, 

Making Ricotta Cheese & Other Adventures in Italian Cooking

So my cooking skills have improved significantly since moving over here. I think I have mentioned that before we came, my friend Ash {the mast chef herself} told me that she didn't know how to cook until she moved over here {8-ish years ago}. 

I really begin to believe it more and more everyday.

 I have gone from hamburger helper and stouffers to cooking from scratch. 

After 4 or 5 tries, I have now mastered the art of making my own ricotta cheese from scratch. 

I took a few recipes that I found online as well as the advice of others, and tried a little something different from each every time and have my own little version now. I would highly recommend making your own the next time you make anything that needs it. Making it has to be a whole lot cheaper than buying it.  You only need milk, white vinegar (lemon juice works too), and something to act as a cheese cloth. 

So here it is: 

I start with about 6-8ish cups of milk {for us over here its about 1ish box of milk}. This makes about 2-ish cups of ricotta. Trust me "ish" works well here. 

First, Scald the milk.... meaning stare at it and just before it starts to boil, when its just beginning to move a little bit, take it off the heat. If it starts to boil, you've gone too far. The curds will be really small, and the amount of ricotta you end up with will be significantly less. 

Right when you take it off the heat, begin stirring in the white vinegar, 1 tablespoon at a time. 

For me, the first tablespoon doesn't do anything... just keep stirring. 

Somewhere between 2 and 3 tablespoons (depending on how much milk you are using), the curds and whey seem to magically separate. 

It is as this point that I always begin to recite little miss muffit.... not kidding. Every time its stuck in my head for the next few hours.... because when else have you ever heard anyone talk about curds and whey? 

Once it starts to separate, you can stop adding the vinegar. Its never taken me more than 3, and the most milk I've started with is 8 cups. Again, the milk is VERY different here so it might be different with non ultra-pastruized milk in the states. 

Then I just let it sit there for a while and cool off completely. Some websites say to let it sit for up to 24 hours... I say that 1.5- 2 hours is plenty. Plus your kitchen is now gonna stink a little... and who wants their kitchen to smell like vinegar and sour milk for 24 hours? 

After it has cooled, you need to separate the curds and whey. First I carefully pour a lot of the excess liquid off in the sink. Then I line a colander that is sitting in a bigger bowl with a cheese cloth. I'm pretty sure you don't have to have cheese cloth- any thin cloth that could strain in this way would work. 

Again, different places online say to let it sit overnight. I say that it isn't going to strain anymore than it does in 2 hours.

Half way-ish through, I kind of CAREFULLY stir it, lifting it up a little to let more liquid through. I also dump out the liquid in the bowl at this point and then set the colander back in. Does that make sense? I hope so. 

Once its strained as strained as its gonna be, you have ricotta! And apparently cottage cheese too. You make it the same way. 

For lasagna, I stir in an egg, as well as a little dried parsley and oregano until it looks a little like this:

It makes this SUPER tasty lasagna. 

Thanks to Jamie bringing me a large box of lasagna noodles when she came to visit in March, I have been able to make several batches. 

Peace out Stouffers. 

There's a new chef in town. Who makes her own ricotta from scratch.

A couple of weeks ago I took it a little further and made beef and cheese manicotti. 

I mixed the ricotta with parm, mozzarella, ground beef (that had been sautéed with onion and a tiny bit of very minced garlic), parsley, and a tiny dash of garlic powder. 

yum.yum.yum. 

Speaking of italian food with mozzarella.....

I bought a big block of mozzarella at the wholesale market here {please don't picture costco or sam's}, that needed to be shredded and frozen. The thought of shredding it by hand with a shredder seems.... horribly daunting and monotonous. 

BUT have no fear, Ash comes through again with her food processor that has a cheese grater attachment. 

Take what took 10 minutes to shred and do it in 10 seconds.... yes PLEASE. 

14 bags of shredded mozzarella in my freezer. i'm one happy girl.  

hooray for cooking from scratch in a foreign country. 

Joyfully Cooking LOTS of Italian,

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Baking Day

Welcome to "baking day" 

disclaimer1: I took these pictures on my ipod.... so to compensate for their lack of quality, I played a little (for the first time) on picik to spruce them up a bit, and I may now be obsessed. 

disclaimer 2: I live in Asia. This kitchen is not in America- 

I repeat, I did not choose for my kitchen to look this strange... it comes with the territory. 

You know it's gonna be a good day when my kitchen looks like this.... 

I have to say that we are exceptionally blessed with a "large" kitchen for where we live- and by large, I mean smaller than 98% of you who are reading this right now. But hey we do what we can with what we've got right? right. 

I have to admit- that for the almost 3 years that I lived in our house in Nashville, I don't think I went through an entire bag of flour.... maybe not even half of one. But why would I? I never needed to bake anything from scratch. 

How the times have changed- Every time I turn around, I feel like I'm going to the store to buy another bag. I think we go through a 5 pound bag every month. 

So on this baking day, I really went for it in the kitchen. 

Starting with this INCREDIBLE recipe for..... 

Baked Peanut Butter Oatmeal.

You know it's gonna be tasty when it starts out looking like this....

{Insert incredible smells wafting through the tiny kitchen while its cooking}.... 

and then.....

Done. This lasted about 5 minutes at our house. It was more like dessert then breakfast. 

  

Success. Thanks for the incredible recipe Tidy Mom.

On to the next endeavor....

Remember this fall when I made these with Ashlei? Well I've grown in my cooking skills, and ventured out into the world of baking making all by my lonesome. And I have to say they were most definitely a success! 

Thanks to this fantastic and simple recipe from Finding Joy in My Kitchen. 

Success. 

And now onto....

My sweet friend Kristin and her grandmother used to make these cookies together. It was my first adventure in cooking with molasses and I have to say they are sososo tasty! Thanks Kristin!

And a baking day wouldn't be complete without a DELICIOUS loaf of bread in my beloved bread maker.

I'm pretty sure that this is where a large majority of our flour ends up. At 3 cups a loaf for this tasty bread, it takes less than 6 loafs to go through a bag of it. 

I tell ya, Ashlei told me that she didn't know how to cook until she moved over here, and while I believed her I wasn't sure it would be true for me BUT I think she may have been right. I learn something new everyday! 

Joyfully Baking All Over the Place,