I swear I’ll be posting more than food soon. I’m getting all the bad stuff out of my system before I start Cross fit on Tuesday! Well not all of it, because I will indulge and blog yummy things, I’ll just figure out a way to give it away.  This was my second time making this cake, I wanted to be sure the first time.  I got the recipe from Smitten Kitchen who halved the original recipe since it was a ton. This cake is super moist and the secret ingredient isn’t milk, or butter milk but Chocolate Stout Beer. Any stout can replace it such as Guinness, but I fell upon this while in Whole Foods.

I was talking to a friend the other day about this cake. They seemed a little intimidated by the thought of using a double boiler. I’m here to state that a double boiler doesn’t have to be fancy or complicated. I simply took a sauce pan, filled it with an inch of water and place a bowl over top. I got that bowl from Ikea for two bucks. I love this bowl and it’s bigger momma bowl I use both of them on a regular basis.

This is a fairly easy cake to make. It’s moist and delicious and the glaze only has three things ingredients. Once it’s completely cooled the icing hardens a bit….firms for a lack of better words. it taste great reheated with a glass of milk.

1 cup stout (such as Guinness)
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter
3/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder (preferably Dutch-process)
2 cups all purpose flour
2 cups sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
3/4 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
2/3 cup sour cream
6 ounces good semisweet chocolate chips
6 tablespoons heavy cream
3/4 teaspoon instant coffee granules

Cake prep:
Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter or spray a bundt pan well; make sure you get in all of the nooks and crannies.  Bring 1 cup stout and 1 cup butter to simmer in heavy large saucepan over medium heat. Add cocoa powder and whisk until mixture is smooth. Cool slightly.

Whisk flour, sugar, baking soda, and 3/4 teaspoon salt in large bowl to blend. Using electric mixer, beat eggs and sour cream in another large bowl to blend. Add stout-chocolate mixture to egg mixture and beat just to combine. Add flour mixture and beat briefly on slow speed. Using rubber spatula, fold batter until completely combined. Pour batter into prepared pan. Bake cake until tester inserted into center comes out clean, about 35 minutes. Transfer cake to rack; cool completely in the pan, then turn cake out onto rack for drizzling ganache.*

Ganache:
For the ganache, melt the chocolate, heavy cream, and coffee in the top of a double boiler over simmering water until smooth and warm, stirring occasionally. Drizzle over the top of cooled cake.

Cool the cake completely in the pan before releasing it or you’ll have pieces missing and stuck in your pan.

Recipe copied from (here)

I’d like some feedback on how I post Recipes.

The last three I did differently, and I’d love to know which you liked the best.

Have a great week…

-Elle-

Okay maybe that’s a bit dramatic but I do love them, and If I could choose any breakfast and magically eat it everyday without gaining one butter laden pound it would be pancakes!  I wanted to try adding my next favorite food Bacon in there!  So there! You’ve been served a yummy plate of Sweet Waffles with a hint of BACOOOON!

I lied it’s not a hint, it’s a whole lot of Bacon -_-

These waffles are seriously light and fluffy the recipe is from here. I added a few extra things like a couple Shakes of Cinnamon, Crispy Bacon, and a Touch of Cocoa Powder. I wanted something sweet and savory. In a nutshell here is the easy recipe, please take note that the recipe that I linked is a huge batch of waffles, I halved it, and it made 7 Belgium style waffles. We all ate two with one waffle causality since I forgot to spray the waffle iron once.

Ingredients

1 1/3 cups flour

4 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons sugar

2 eggs , separated

1/2 cup butter , melted

1 3/4 cups milk

Optional but nessecary (in my opinion)

4 Strips of crispy Bacon (chopped finely)

1/4 teaspoon cinnamon

1 1/2 teaspoon cocoa Powder

Directions

Turn on your Oven Broiler, and place Bacon inside until Crisp and Done by not burnt.

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together all dry ingredients, including

Separate the eggs, adding the yolks to the dry ingredient mixture, and placing the whites in a small mixing bowl.

Beat whites until moderately stiff; set aside.

Add milk, melted butter and bacon to dry ingredient mixture and blend.

If the mixture is soupy sprinkle in flour in small amounts at a time but remember the batter doesn’t need to be thick, it’s supposed to be lightly.

Fold stiff egg whites into mixture. (don’t over fold)

Ladle mixture into hot waffle iron and cook.

*Editors Note*

Okay, so I sprinkled Nuts on here for picture purposes!

I don’t recommend it, it made the waffle too salty, and I ended up plucking them off.

Regular syrup will do the trick, I tried it with butter Pecan Syrup and it wasn’t that good either.

-Elle

It’s safe to say that I’ve become very anal about taking pictures with natural lighting. It’s even safer to say that I’ll probably only do food post on the weekend so I can take advantage of that until I learn a little more about artificial lighting.

Chicken you’ve been SERVEDDDD! I found this recipe on A Cozy Kitchen.  My mom loved it, little sis has yet to try it. I loved the aioli sauce because typically I’d put plain blue cheese on it and cause a mess. According to Adrianna (who I found out isn’t a fan of  Bloggers leave their Blog Tag in a comment, her approach is kinda entertaining) this is a easy recipe which is true if you follow hers through and through. But if you’re like me who likes to make shit really complicated…then it’s still easy but involves the extra step of frying the chicken breast instead of using Tysons Chicken. I don’t like the taste of Tysons or the nutritional value situation they have going on. Not to say that Frying Chicken is any better but at least I know there aren’t any preservatives of fillers and I can control the salt in there.

O-K-A-Y now i’m rambling.

So anyway my recipe for the Chicken is this. Fry it the way you like it fried, or you can do this

2 Cups of Flour

1/2 Teasoon of Kosher Salt

1/4 Teaspoon of Season All

1/2 Teaspoon Garlic Powder

1/2Teaspoon Onion Powder

1/2 Tablespoon Paprika

1/2 Tablespoon Black Pepper

4 Chicken Breast

Your favorite frying oil

Bottle of your favorite Hot Wing Sauce.

Place two brown lunch bags in one another. Throw all dry ingredients in the brown lunch bag and give it a shake.

Cut the chicken breast In half (Cross Wise) You should have the top end of the chicken the meaty breast area and the lower portion. Take a kitchen mallot and tenderize the chicken pieces. You should have eight pieces of chicken. Heat your Oil in a frying pan. Place one or two chicken pieces in the brown bag full of flour and shake. Repeat until you have three pieces. Fry your Chicken until it’s golden brown and done. repeat for the rest. Place the chicken pieces on a set of towels until the grease is soaked up. Toss chicken pieces in Buffalo Wing Sauce and Coat well. Set them aside.

Now that that’s covered. If you don’t want to fry the chicken refer back to A Cozy Kitchen for the recipe.

The Rest of the Recipe is PRETTY Simple after this.

1 cup of bleu cheese, crumbled
1 1/2 cup of mayonnaise
Salt and pepper to taste

Hamburger Buns (good quality…or not it’s your life)
Romaine Lettuce
Tomato Slices

To make the Bleu Cheese Aioli mix the Blue Cheese, Mayo and Salt and Pepper and set aside. Place Aioli on the bottom bun, Please Chicken on top, top with Lettuce and Tomato Slice.

And there you have it.

If you’re interested in the Oven Fries in the picture then I’ll tell you how I’s made them!

Garlic & Herb Oven Fries

2 White Potatoes

4 Garlic Cloves

1 1/2 tablespoon Herb De Provence

1/4 or more of Olive oil

Preheat over to 425.

Wash potatoes thoroughly and cut into wedges. Using a food processor blend Garlic, Herb De Provence, and Olive Oil until smooth.  Coat potatoes with Olive Oil mixture and lay across a cooking sheet and sprinkle with salt and pepper. Make sure you line the sheet with foil and a light coating of cooking spray. Cook until Golden Brown, alternatively shaking the pan to insure even browning.

Seems that quality buns are really thick, I would recommend warming it first.

So with that I bid you a great day!

-Elle

If I had it my way eating tons of pasta wouldn’t make you pudgy. In my perfect world eating bowls of pasta would equal  the caloric intake of Broccoli I’d eat it for breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Well…. maybe Not, but I’d eat it a ton if I had a choice and no consequences. One of our household resolutions as a family is to gather as a family more often. I think this is a total win for everybody, we talk about our day, normally I cook, and if I’m not too tired I can blog about it with pictures. I adapted the recipe from Eat this Not That. Which leads me to my wishes that WILL never come true about pasta. Eat This, Not That! is a cookbook that allows you make your favorite comfort foods without all the calories and salt that restaurants ladle in. A typical ziti dish from say a place that rhymes with Schmolive Darden can pack up to 1050 calories and 2300 plus mg’s of salt.  This recipe in it’s original form amounts to 410 Calories and 600mg of salt. I’ll provide the orginal recipe but I did alter it and add Spinach and Mushrooms and skipped the Olive Oil.

10 oz Ziti (Whole Wheat) if possible

1 Tbsp of Olive Oil

2 Links precooked Chicken/Turkey Sausage (I used Tomato,Basil & Sundried Tomato Chicken Sausage that I still had to cook)

1 medium Yellow Onion

2 Cloves of Garlic, minced

1 tsp Red Pepper Flakes

1 can (28oz) Tomato Puree

Salt and Pepper to taste

1 Cup of Basil leaves and extra for garnish

3/4 Cup of Cubed Aozzarella

Parmesan for topping.

Serves 4

1. Preheat Oven to 400 Degrees. Cook Pasta until al dente and drain.

2. Heat Olive Oil in Large Skillet or Saute Pan over medium heat. Add the sausage and cook for about 2 minutes (if precooked) 8 minutes if using raw sausage remember to remove from casing and cook until it’s done. Add onion, minced garlic,red pepper flakes,and cook until the onion is soft. Stir in the tomato puree. Add a decent amount of Salt and Pepper reduce heat and let sauce simmer for 10 minutes.

3. Mix pasta and toss with sauce. Remove from the heat and stir in basil and mozzerella. Dump pasta into a baking dish and sprinkle the top with Parmesan and cover with foil. Bake for 15 minute, then remove the foil and bake for another 10 minutes, until the top is crusty and browned. Throwing it in the Broiled actually works well too.

Additions.

I added Finely Chopped Mushrooms and spinach to the sauce. I figured Id try to get more veggies in.

Apparently even comfort food can somewhat be healthy. My mom loved it, and so do I . I made my sister a non-veggie version and she liked her as well.

-Elle-

They came out great, and I’ll just say that I’ve had mango salsa! Never Peach Salsa like the recipe calls for! All I can say is that it was simply devine! It was so good, and I had to stop myself from eating it by the spoon while my Shrimp cooked.

Crappy picture, all the rest had steam around it!

The Finish product!!

Yummy and so Easy!

Top with a little light sour cream, and some line juice and voila!

]]> http://chellbellz.com/2011/07/25/shrimp-tacos/feed/ 4 ChellBellz IMG_5207 IMG_5208 IMG_5227 IMG_5225 1tag http://chellbellz.com/2011/06/24/around-town-annies-paramount-steakhouse/ http://chellbellz.com/2011/06/24/around-town-annies-paramount-steakhouse/#comments Fri, 24 Jun 2011 13:44:43 +0000 Elle of Chellbellz http://chellbellz.com/?p=4666 ]]> Earlier this week I cashed in my gift card credit from Restaurant.com. I couldn’t find anything on there that was worthy of spending it on! Finally Annie’s Steakhouse popped up! Alas I clicked on the link, and the restaurant didn’t look sketchy, and there it was! I grabbed my good friend who I happen to be celebrating ten years of friendship with! Kendra and I walked through the vibrant area of Dupont Circle after  we found parking right in front. After 5 minutes of bitching about parking meter cost we sat down. Our Waiter Clark, apparently a legend served us. He was simply the sweetest thing by the way!

He was honest about the menu and with Kendra having weird  seafood allergies we settled on Fresh Mozzarella. I guess we were expecting something that was probably frozen, NOPE. They came out, and they looked delicious.

After about some catching up on gossip and things our main courses finally came!

Kendra has Steak Medallions, String Beans and Baked Potato.

I had Crabcakes, Beans and Mashed Potatoes. I should have passed on the gravy it wasn’t needed. The Crab cake sauce was so good.

Just when we thought we were stuffed Clark our waiter said….You sure you don’t want dessert?

This was the lightest, yummiest piece of cake I’ve ever had!

My overall experience would be a 5 out of 5.

I’m going back again! We couldn’t decide what we wanted. We saw the best looking Steak Salad, and wanted to check out the Country Fried Steak.

1609 17th St NW
(between N Corcoran St & N Q St)
Washington, DC 20009
Neighborhood: Dupont Circle

(202) 232-0395

After that filling meal we walked around and sat in a little park we found. Sometimes that’s all you can do after eating good food.

Me: Gap  Shorts| H&M Floral Top | Atlantis Dry Goods Vintage necklace | Marc Jacobs Watch | Aldo Bangle

Kendra : H&M Chinos

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My weight journey started about a year ago. I read somewhere that cutting out foods that are bad slowly are the best ways to help in the long run. I can honestly say that after watching food inc. My more then 6 month strike on most things face food has still going strong and clearly worth it.

I even cut my juice habit, well processed juices. I thought I would never get to enjoy the sweet taste of Apple Juice, Cranberry, Mixed Fruit Juices.

I was window shopping through Target and saw this. I got it for my mother on mothers day, and she has yet to use it. Too lazy to read directions I suppose!

I figured since i’m going to drink juice that I would attempt to make it healthy!

So I grabbed some of the things that I symbolized with healthy juices, and that where sweet.

*Carrots

*Apples

*Beets

Eww beets right, actually they are pretty sweet! The apples make everything sweet and the carrots who cares, it’s carrots :-*

Pretty!!! Delicious and Healthy!

If you have a juicer I suggest making this! I did a search on google for juicer recipes and they have a juice for just about everything!

I also love making granny Smith apple Juice! It’s so sweet, and so yummy!

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12 oz of Ground Beef

1/2 cup of Cilantro

1/2 Cup of Finely Chopped Onions

1/2 Jalapeno Pepper Finely Chopped

4 Burger Buns

1 cup of Black Re-friend beans

1 Avocado

4 Slices of Cheddar Cheese

Mix hamburger, with Jalapeno, Cilantro, and Onions. Mix well and shape 4 patties. Heat Griddle pan, and cook hamburger to your liking. Heat Black Beans with a few drops of water in a small saucepan. Toast Burger Buns, and place garnishment on the bottom piece of bread. place Burger and cheese on the garnishment such as lettuce or tomato.  Place a tablespoon of Black Beans on top, with a few slithers of Avocado.

I hope you like it!

Bare with me still shooting in Manual Mode!

I didn’t use a recipe but if you don’t know how to make Caramelized onions you can go find it with a google search

I’m not a vegetarian but I believe this counts as a vegetarian meal. It was really filling, and really good with Hot Sauce!

xoxo

Michelle

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