Is there anything more delicious than an Upper East Side? The combination of Hendricks, Lime, Mint and Cucumber is truly outstanding. So what do you do when you're at home with none of the ingredients? Improvise! 

A note on the gin in the photo: It's made in Pennsylvania. What can I say? We're all about local :)

If we were to do this again, I think we'd try basil and raspberry. What do you think? What's your favorite unusual beverage?

The Upper South Florida Side

A handful of basil

Juice from one grapefruit (we used orange, I don't recommend, too sweet)

A small spoon of honey

An ounce of gin for each person 

Ice

Muddle the basil and juice together until the smell of the basil is quite strong. Mix in the honey, pour in the gin, fill the shaker with ice and shake. Double strain it into a martini glass and garnish appropriately. Drink!

 

 

Ok, so I'm not that great at taking pictures. This cake is very tasty, but you only need a little tiny slice! That might be because I put an inch of frosting on the top. Let's not get into the details too  much.

Anyway, here's the recipe for caramel frosting. Use in moderation:

1 cup butter

2 cups packed dark brown sugar

6 tablespoons of whipping cream

 1 tsp of vanilla

3 1/2 cups of icing sugar (or up to 4...judge as you are mixing it together)

Directions:

Melt the butter, then toss in the brown sugar. Bring it to a boil. Pour in whip cream and vanilla, then bring it to a boil again. Let it cool for about an hour, then put it in a mixing bowl. Stir in the icing sugar and mix until it is a smooth frosting-like consistency. Frost stuff!

I think ground chicken makes for the tastiest meatballs. I usually dump a whole bunch of stuff in the them and they always turn out delicious. For this, I used:

A package of ground turkey

A good amount of feta, crumbled

An egg

Some crumbs of some kind (I like to use smushed rice crackers)

Several kalamata olives (I like around 6 per person)

Enough servings of corn pasta for each person

Grape Tomatoes, chopped in half so they don't squirt in your mouth when you bite into them

Lots o' spinach (1 or 2 cups per person)

Olive oil, salt and pepper

Directions

First up, make the meatballs. Mix together the chicken, feta, egg, some salt and pepper and whatever type of crumbs you like to use (or don't use crumbs, but they sort of hold together better if you do). Roll them into balls, put them on a cookie sheet and bake them at 375 for about 20 minutes. I am paranoid about undercooked chicken, so I always cut one in half to check on it before I take them out.

After you've washed the raw chicken goop off your hands, make the pasta according to the directions. Cooking gluten free pasta varies from 4 mintues to 25, so pay attention. Otherwise you will be eating glue. I don't really like too much pasta, so I actually make it according to the suggested serving size as well. This is not the amount you get when you go to the Olive Garden (please stop eating at the Olive Garden). 

Be amazing and time everything so you can drain the pasta, then put everything into the pasta bowl at the same time, including the cooked meatballs. Drizzle with enough olive oil so that everything slides together then toss in the pasta bowl over the turned off element (or on really low if you have a gas stove) until the spinach is just barely wilting. Season with salt and pepper and put into pasta bowls. 

 

Does anyone not like chocolate chip muffins? Those are the people that are not to be trusted. Here's a basic recipe that you really can't screw up. This is good, because I've been experienciing a number of baking fails since arriving in Philly. It is always so sad to have to throw stuff away as inedible.

Ingredients

2 cups AP Flour

1/2 cup of sugar

1 tablespoon of baking powder

a little salf

1 egg

3/4 cup of milk (or almond milk if that's your thing)

1/3 cup vegetable oil (or applesauce, but they only keep a few days if you use applesauce, so you end up eating them twice as fast, so it really doesn't seem any healthier to me)

3/4 cup of choco chips (or some combination of chips and nuts or dried fruit)

Directions

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees and grease a muffin pan up. In a large bowl, mix the first four dry ingredients.

In a smaller bowl, beat the egg up and mix in the milk and oil. Once mixed, dump the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix until there's no clumps of flour, but just until that point, Never beat muffin mix like it owes you money. Fold in the chips, then scoop out the mixture into the muffin tin. This mixture makes 12 reasonably sized muffins. 

In the picture above, I added quite a bit of cinnamon in the batter and used half choco chips and half white choco chips. I did this because I ran out of choco chips and it was raining outside. If you experiment like this, think about balancing the flavour. As white choco chips are so sweet, I wanted to give the batter a little more depth with cinnamon. I think it worked. 

I believe that's the actual recipe name, yes.

Ingredients

1 lb of really fresh fish (red snapper or tuna are both good choices)

1 1/2 cups of lemon/citrus juice (you wanna add a little orange or grapefruit juice in there? go for it)

1 small red onion, diced

1 red bell pepper (orange peppers look pretty too)

1 clove minced garlic

1 tablespoon chopped cilantro

1 jalapeno, minced

3 tablespoons lime juice

Corn Tortillas

Oil for frying

 

Directions

Dice the fish into 1/2" squares and marinate it in the citrus juice for 5 hours

Combine the rest of the ingredients in a separate bowl. When the fish has hung out for 5 hours, get rid of most of the juice and mix it in with everything else.

Cut corn tortillas up into wedges and place in hot oil. As they start to brown (not too long, maybe 10 to 15 seconds), take them out, place them on paper towel and lightly salt them. 

Scoop up the ceviiche with the tortilla chips. serve with salad. 

note: part of the fun of ceviche is adding in other flavours. Depending on what looks good at the grocery store, toss in a mango or an avacado. Experiementing is delicious.

 

It's like hummus, only it's salad dressing. As I write that, I think to myself, "why go to the all the trouble to make this when you could probably just add a little water to hummus, mix it up and call it dressing?" but you can't call that a recipe. 

Ingredients

1 tablespoon of tahini

3 tablespoons of lemon juice

2 tablespoons of olive oil

1 tablespoon of water

1 clove of minced garlic

some salt and pepper

Directions

Mix everything up until it is smooth. Pour it on salad. I think it tastes especially good on salad with cucumbers, tomatoes and olives, with some grilled salmon on the side. 

This sweet potato hash is kind of sweet, kind of spicy. Just like your high school girlfriend. 

Ingredients

1 sweet potato per person (of a reasonable size) - I like the garnet ones because they are such a pretty colour

1 turkey breast cutlet per person (or a hunk of smoked turkey breast)

a couple of roasted red peppers, cut into small strips

about a tablespoon of brown sugar per person

cayenne pepper, salt and pepper and maybe some rosemary

1 + 1 tablespoon of olive oil

an egg or two per person depending on how hungry you are

 

Directions

Chop up the sweet potato into bite size chunks. Toss them into some boiling water and let them boil for about 5 minutes. 

While the sweet potato is boiling, sprinkle some rosemary, salt and pepper on the turkey cutlets, then cook 'em up in a really big, really deep frying pan with 1 tablespoon of the olive oil. They won't take very long as they are skinny. 

When the sweet potato has been boiling for 5 minutes (they shouldn't be rock solid, but they shouldn't be mushy, either), drain the sweet potato. Put the sweet potato back in the pot and sprinkle in some potato flour. enough to give each cube a light dusting of it. This helps make sort of a brown, crisp coating around the sweet potato chunks. 

Pop the cooked turkey cutlets onto a cutting board and add the other tablespoon of olive oil into the big frying pan. heat up the frying pan so it is hot and toss the lightly coated sweet potato in. Let it hang out there for a few minutes while you chop up or shred the trukey cutlets.

Check on the sweet potato cubes. they should be a nice brown on the outside. Toss in a sprinkle of cayenne pepper (I like more than most) and the brown sugar. Gently stir it all being careful not to make sweet potato mash... 

Add the turkey and roasted red pepper to the pan. While everything is hanging out and getting to know each other in the big pan, start cooking some eggs. I like mine over easy, but you could also poach them or do them sunny side up. The whole point of eggs on hash is to let the yolk ooze out all over, so if you don't like a runny yolk, you'll miss out (note: totally judging you for not liking runny yolks). 

Put some of the sweet potato mixture on a plate, toss and egg on top and eat it with a healthy amount of your favorite hot sauce. 

Hey Sarah, why would you post a picture of little kid barf in a bowl? Good question. I don't think anyone will argue that my photography skills are non-existant. If you can get past how it looks, you'll really like this dip. You can also use it for dressing if you add about 1/4 more oil (maybe olive oil?), but I like it really thick and carroty!

Ingredients 

1 carrot

2 tablespoons ginger

some onion (maybe a shallot or about a 1/4 cup of yellow onion)

1 tablespoon sesame oil

1 tablespoon mellow miso (I think that should be the name of a band)

3 tablespoons of water

Directions

Put everything in the food processor until it is the consistency you'd like it to be. Scrape it into a bowl and dip cucumber slices and red pepper in it. It looks less like vomit with a bunch of brightly coloured veggies around it. Also, it will make your tummy so happy!

I adapted this recipe from something I saw on Smitten Kitchen. If you'd like to look at a proper recipe blog, you should check it out. 

Ingredients

2 nine inch pie shells (you know how to make pie shells, right?)

3 chicken breasts (boneless or not, whatever you prefer)

a handful of stuff like a chunk of onion, a carrot, some peppercorns, some fresh herbs

1/4 cup of butter

2 leeks all sliced up (and washed..leeks get lots o' dirt all up in 'em)

1/2 cup of grated sharp cheddar

1/4 cup of parm

about a 1/4 cup of fresh herbs (parsley or basil might be tasty)

2 Tablespoons of whole grain mustard

1 teaspoon of cornstarch

1 1/4 cup of heavy cream

salf and pepper

1 egg, beaten

Directions

Go ahead and make the pastry. While you are letting the dough set in the fridge for an hour, fill a pan with water. Throw in the handful of stuff you gathered to make the chicken tasty. Drop in the chicken breasts and cook 'em until they are tender. Once cooked, let them cool. 

While the pie shell is baking, take the cooled chicken out and start slicing it up or shredding it with two forks. Set it aside. Take the pie crust out of the oven and set it aside too.

In a new frying pan, melt the butter and toss the leeks in. Stir the leeks until they are soft. Then stir in the cheeses and herbs for a hot minute. Take it off the heat and dump half the mixture into the baked pie shell. cover the mixture with chicken, then top with the rest of the leek mixture. In a bowl, mix together the mustard, cornstarch and cream. Stick your finger in it, taste it and add some salf and pepper if you need to.

Pour the mustardy creamy mixture over the top of the chicken and leeks. Put the other pie crust on the top, pinch the crusts together and brush the egg over the entire thing. Pop it back into the oven for about half an hour. 

Take it out, let it set for a few minutes, then slice and eat it. There is no part of this recipe that is low fat, so this should be about 8 portions.