Dark and Chewy Hot Fudge

I really love the hot fudge at old style ice cream shops (or should I say shoppes?). The kind that is gooey and a little chewy once it chills on the ice cream. The only problem is, I usually like my fudge a little darker than the stuff they serve. After searching and testing, this is what I came up with: It has the texture that is more like goo than syrup, with a dark, creamy, taste that's not too sweet and melts in your mouth.

6 oz dark chocolate of your choice
1/4 C cocoa powder (I use a combo of regular and Dutch processed)
2 TBS butter
1 can of sweetened condensed milk
1 tsp Vanilla or coffee extract

Chop chocolate into chunks. Put all ingredients in a saucepan on medium low heat and stir until melted. If you like even chewier hot fudge, cook it for a few minutes after its melted. Use it to make old fashioned ice cream sundaes. Store it in an airtight jar in the fridge. I've never had it go bad on me.

Whole Wheat Bread

This is my go-to whole wheat bread recipe. I really like that it makes enough dough for multiple loaves, so I can store the extra and pull it out and let it rise when I want a fresh loaf. It's also good if you need to make multiple loaves all at once.

This isn't for people who don't like some serious, dense whole wheat bread. It's not so heavy as to be inedible, but it ain't Wonderbread, which is in my humble opinion an excellent thing.

Take the time to let it rise twice, as it makes it a lot less dense. It's worth the extra time. The actual amount of time you have to pay attention to the dough is fairly minimal, but plan on the whole process taking somewhere around 4 or 5 hours from start to out of the oven.

Panna Cotta

For reasons I can't articulate, I've been terrified of custardy desserts. Maybe it's the fantastic failure at my attempt at a lemon meringue pie, or maybe it's the bother of stirring constantly lest I scald boiling milk and thereby ruin my dessert.

Anyway.

Panna cotta is so stupidly easy that my terror of it is rather embarrassing. Had my pregnant self not been craving it so strongly, I probably wouldn't have ventured.

Ingredients:

1 envelope unflavored gelatin (about 1 tablespoon)

2 tablespoons cold water

2 cups heavy cream

1 cup half and half

1/3 cup sugar

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Directions:

1)In a very small saucepan sprinkle gelatin over water and let stand about 1 minute to soften. Heat gelatin mixture over low heat until gelatin is dissolved and remove pan from heat.

2) In a large saucepan bring cream, half and half, and sugar just to a boil over moderately high heat, stirring. Remove pan from heat and stir in gelatin mixture and vanilla.

3) Divide cream mixture among eight 1/2-cup ramekins and cool to room temperature. Chill ramekins, covered, at least 4 hours or overnight.

4) Dip ramekins, 1 at a time, into a bowl of hot water 3 seconds. Run a thin knife around edge of each ramekin and invert ramekin onto center of a small plate.

Passover Meal

We celebrate Passover every year. We do so with a lot of flexibility to the menu, the date and the passover script, but still fun. If you've never tried it and want to, try this meal plan and I'll e-mail you my much-abridged Passover script. Cheers!

This year's Passover Menu:

Appetizer-- Potato Latkes with Applesauce and Sour Cream

Drink-- lots of 100% grape juice in lieu of wine

The Seder Plate (These foods are more symbolic than filling. We include the orange on the Seder plate symbolizing the right of women to become rabbis)

The Passover Feast--

Melted Onion chicken
Matzoh Ball Soup
Bitter Herbs Salad

Dessert--
Fruit and other non chametz delicacies. Any ideas for desserts that use absolutely no leavening?

Grilled Brined Shrimp

Brining is a surefire way to get tasty shrimp. Under-salted shrimp always has an off flavor, and it can't be covered by salting after cooking. I find that shrimp either has to be brined or have significant salt while boiling or cooking. I made these babies tonight.

Brine:
3 C water
1 C white wine
1/3 C (yes, cup) kosher salt (use a little less if using table salt)
1 lemon, chopped
4 bay leaves
spices--I used a tsp of cajun spice. Old bay, garlic,

Add 1 lb of de-veined (peeled or unpeeled) shrimp to brine so that every shrimp is covered. Pop the bowl in the fridge for 30-40 minutes. Don't brine for too long, or they'll get too salty. Also note that brine is a very inexact science. Substitutions and experimentation are encouraged.

Skewer shrimp and grill on medium, medium low heat for about 4 minutes. Shells will be pink and meat will no longer be gelatinous.

Serve with lemon and garlic butter and LiT Chick's amazing clam chowder.

Roasted Chicken with Melted Onions

This recipe is so simple and so tasty it's absolutely elegant. Onions are cooked in chicken drippings until they're mild, melted, savory, and sweet. Then the melted onions are served with the chicken--a combination so good I was making embarrassing audible groans and moans when I ate it. This meal tastes like it could come from Communal or Founding Farmers. Seriously.

Ingredients:
1 whole chicken (any size)
2 sweet onions
kosher salt

Instructions:
1. Chop onions in big, wide chunks. Place in the bottom of a heavy roaster (preferably one with a lid).
2. Prep the bird--remove gizzards, liver, anything else in the cavity and rinse well. Pat dry. And salt generously. It's going to be a little more salt than you think you need.
3. Place chicken atop the bed of onions and add 1/2 C of water to the roasting pan.
4. Cook the chicken. There are many ways to cook a chicken, but this is how I do it:
I start it at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes, just to get it going. Then I decrease the temp to 325 until the internal temperature is 155.
Then I uncover it, turn on the broiler and let it go for about 3-5 minutes until the skin is crispy.
Then I take it out and let it rest on a plate under loose aluminum foil for 30 minutes. The chicken temp usually jumps up 10 to 20 degrees during the rest period. This will put you well within the safe zone of 160-165. You may like your way better. I'm cool with that.
5. After removing chicken from roasting pan, access the amount of liquid you've got in the pan. I had a lot of liquid for my last batch, so I drained most of it off (and saved it for stock) so my onions are still moist. If your liquid is low, add some. The onions should be wet but not swimming in juices.
6. Cook the onions in your roasting pan over the stovetop while your chicken rests.
7. Carve the chicken and serve with melted onions on top.

Different Blueberry Muffins

Meg posted an awesome blueberry recipe a couple of months ago. It looked fab, but I didn't have all of the ingredients. One of my very favorite recipe blogs, Smitten Kitchen, had a super fab-looking blueberry muffin recipe, too. They are tangy and a bit lemony (I didn't have a lemon for zest, so I ended up using lemon extract) and yum.