I Heart Mashed Potatoes

Since I was a young child, I have loved mashed potatoes. No matter how full I am at the end of a meal, none shall go wasted in my house.

One thing I don't like is actually making mashed potatoes. I even have a potato ricer so I can make smooth, velvety spuds like my MIL made when Paul was a child.

So, I'm in love with prepared spuds that can be purchased in all different varieties at the Crazy B.

This week, I tried the H-E-B brand Homestyle Mashed Potatoes. It was love at first bite! The texture isn't like the other prefab ones - nor is it like the ones served with an ice cream scoop. Instead, they were this fluffy, starchy pillow of potatoey goodness.

Others I've tried and think are buy-worthy:

• Simply Potatoes. I love all the varieties, though I haven't tried the sweet spuds.
• Ore Ida frozen mashed potatoes. They were my intro to premashed pots. I first tried them as recommended in a recipe for my delish Cheesy Garlic Potatoes (see below). I think this may have been the first incarnation of the prefab spuds, but looking at their site - they no longer offer them. (I've moved on since those days in 1998-99.)
• Country Crock. I have to admit that I like the Deluxe Loaded variety. I bought them once by accident, and I think they're pretty tasty (when I'm in the mood for bacon).

Cheesy Garlic Potatoes

Your choice of prepared mashed potatoes, heated according to package
directions

Garlic and Herb Alouette spread

Shredded Cheddar Cheese, to taste

Add the Alouette and cheddar cheese, to taste. Microwave and add a
little milk, if needed. Yummy!

The Omnivore's Hundred (a MeMe)

As I've said before, I'm quite known as the Foodie in my circles. I've had dinner at The French Laundry (and I covet my wooden clothespins that I keep in my top drawer in my bathroom - looking at them every morning reminds me of these delicious little smoked salmon "ice cream cones" filled with creme fresh). I've personally prepared a multiple-course meal and even stir-fried with Martin Yan. Yep, I'm a foodie.

So, when I saw this list, I thought, "How Fun!"

British food blogger Very Good Taste cooked up a list of a hundred things that every good omnivore should try.

Here are my notes. Things I've tried are in bold and red. Things I'd never eat in a million years are italicized and in blue.

Once you've made your list, leave me a comment so I can compare notes! (I've only missed 23 on the list - and just 2 made the list of NEVER, though I may have had a Scotch bonnet in salsa, but I think of this as a challenge to have it solo!)

The Omnivore's Hundred

1. Venison (This is Texas!)
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros (Ditto Numero Uno!)
4. Steak tartare
5. Crocodile (I've had alligator, though!)
6. Black pudding (just learned about this on "Bizarre Foods with Andrew Zimmern - like, about 45 minutes ago - no lie!)
7. Cheese fondue (Though, Paul will call it "fon-don't")
8. Carp
9. Borscht (not a beet fan, but I'll try - almost - anything)
10. Baba ghanoush (Is any other food more fun to say?)
11. Calamari (mmmmm....)
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich (not a fan, but I'll eat it)
14. Aloo gobi (also fun to say!)
15. Hot dog from a street cart (in Central Park, no less!)
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle (delish in mashed potatoes!)
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
19. Steamed pork buns (mmm, buns)
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras (I heart foie gras!)
24. Rice and beans (again, this is Texas)
25. Brawn, or head cheese (ditto)
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper (I'm a foodie, not a glutten for punishment!)
27. Dulche de leche
28. Oysters (fried, raw, chicken fried, sauteed, with ginger sauce ...)
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl (from Boudin Bakery to now-closed Barnacle Bill's - yumO)
33. Salted lassi (have enjoyed with No. 14)
34. Sauerkraut (deslish on No. 15!)
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar (though, one time I did try a "gourmet" amaretto cigar from Cuba at a party - and I threw up out the window while my smarter hubby drove down the freeway!)
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O (here in the South, we call 'em "jello shots," and my mother once called me to ask how to make them!)
39. Gumbo (my mama makes the best!)
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat
42. Whole insects
43. Phaal (My fave Indian restaurant doesn't make it - probably too hot to appeal to the masses. I bet they'd whip some up for me, though, if I asked.)
44. Goat's milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth 60 GBP/$120 or more (No, but I can name one!)
46. Fugu
47. Chicken tikka masala (Buy Ethnic Gourmet's meal in your freezer section and check this one off your list - you'll go back for more! And, hit your local Indian buffet for the real deal!)
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut (I've made a rule to only eat them hot and fresh - that prevents me from eating too many! And, I've only pulled over twice because of the beacon on the sign!)
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly Pear (You can get it as a margarita at Boudro's on the River Walk!)
52. Umeboshi
53. Abalone
54. Paneer (Again, get thee to an Indian buffet and check a lot off the list.)
55. MacDonald's Big Mac Meal (sadly)
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini (oh so good, and yet oh so bad!)
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine (Sort of - I've had fries covered in cheese and white cream gravy)
60. Carob chips
61. S'mores (As a kid, I've even had one made with marshmellows toasted over the open flame of my mom's gas cooktop!)
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin
64. Currywurst
65. Durian
66. Frog's legs (again, I'm from Texas)
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake (yes, yes, yes and yes)
68. Haggis (Paul just tried to convince me that "it's just sausage, in a natural casing." Just the name turns me off - and I've tried some really gross stuff!)
69. Fried plantain
70. Chitterlings, or andouillette
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini (When preggo with Mitchell, I actually asked the OB if I could have caviar on New Year's. He said no, so Mitchell came out early. - I don't think I had any that New Year's, though.)
73. Louche, absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie (Granny always had a ton on hand, and the coconut was always my favorite.)
78. Snail
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini (The white peach bellini at the Rose Pistola in San Fran kicks butt!)
81. Tom yum
82. Eggs Benedict (Try it with smoked salmon!)
83. Pocky
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant (Again, The French Laundry)
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
89. Horse (Rumor has it that it's what's inside the 2 for 99 cents tacos at Jack in the Box, so maybe ...)
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam (not a fan, but mama likes hers fried)
92. Soft shell crab (Decedant at Louisana Lagniappe in Destin, Florida - served on top of grouper!)
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish
95. Mole pablano
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaica Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake (rattlesnake in chili or as nuggets, yikes!)

Bon Appetit!

PNO: Silo

Instead of blogging about a great meal I made this weekend, instead I'll share a great meal we enjoyed for Parents' Night Out.

This past Friday, Paul and I enjoyed the best perk of daycare: Parents' Night Out. One night a month, the daycare will keep the kids until 11:30 so we can go out on a date. Like grown-ups.

I like to take full advantage of PNO and go somewhere we can enjoy fancy grown up stuff like foie gras or pretty much anything that doesn't come with a side of fries (unless, of course, it's the delicious pommes frites at Bistro Vatel!).

This weekend, we decided to go to Silo. Their tag is "elevated cuisine," and their gimmick is that the restaurant is upstairs so you take an elevator from the bar and the hostess greets you by name at the top.

We arrived a few minutes before our reserved seating but declined to wait in the bar. (I think their bar is kinda creepy, and they allow smoking inside, which I think is disgusting.) Instead, we went up to our table and enjoyed a pre-dinner drink there. Paul had a Heineken, and I had their signature cosmo, which was so smooth it could be very dangerous if consumed in quantity.

We skipped appetizers since neither of us were extremely hungry and, instead, preordered the molten chocolate cake for dessert.

Paul had the surf-and-turf special with a petite filet and lobster tail. Both just melted in your mouth. The steak was beautifully rare and had the perfect amount of smoky flavor. (Wood-firing is big here in San Antonio.) The lobster tail was served split and was sublime.

I started with the spinach salad, which was perfection. It featured dried apricots and cranberries plus a dressing that I could bathe in. For my meal, I chose the foie gras special appetizer. It was Heaven on a plate! It was perfectly seared and served on toasted brioche with a rich demi glaze.

And, of course, that warm chocolate cake was the sweet ending to a great night out.

Sad to report that I was at the daycare to pick up the boys before 9 o'clock!

Burgers, Pasta and Play Dough (oh my!)

Okay, I've been a little lax about posting here. But, I haven't been lax about cooking.



Here are the highlights of the past week or so:

• Sun-Dried Tomato Burgers with Balsamic-Glazed Onions. Yum! We had these with sweet potato fries (complete with the garlic-mayo dipping sauce). These burgers are super flavorful and take no time at all to throw together. Pictured at right.

• Greek-Style Pasta with Shrimp. Heaven on a plate! I add a little of the pasta cooking water to make it into a svelte, creamy sauce.

• One-Pot Salmon with Snap Peas and Rice. I'm in love with this recipe. You put the rice on to cook, then add the salmon, a little later toss on the peas and then throw on the sauce. One dirty dish, dinner in less than 30 minutes - what's not to love! Even Mitchell will eat this one - and apparently so will Noah! He was loving the salmon. (I must say, something awesome happens to the salmon when this dish cooks. It comes out soft as butter - but not mushy or anything. It just melts in your mouth. Delish!)

And, food's not the only thing cookin' in our house. Mitchell's new preschool asks that parents bring homemade play dough to the parent orientation. Given my track record with strange stuff that I have to make, I thought I'd test drive the recipe. Lo and behold, I made play dough! The stuff is so smooth (though it is very salty smelling).

Cooked Play Dough

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 cup salt

4 teaspoons cream of tartar

2 cups cold water

2 tablespoons oil

Food coloring (Use WAAAAY more than you think you need! The few drops I added at first made something that looked like snot!)

Mix the dry ingredients in a large pot. Mix the wet ingredients (including the food coloring) in a measuring cup then add to the dry ingredients. Turn on the heat and stir like a mad woman - this required quite a bit of strength, as this is a thick mixture. Something strange happens and it magically becomes a ball of play dough!

Remove from heat and let cool then knead to make it smooth. Store in plastic bags.

Friendly (Fridge) Reminder

We keep a dry-erase board on the fridge as a quick place to jot down temporary notes to one another - honey-dos, grocery list add-ons, silly things Mitchell said.

Occasionally it's blank, and Paul just can't resist adding a little something. (I love how he signs his work!)

Steak Sandwiches

Tonight, I decided to try a new steak sammy recipe. We have a passed-down one that we love that features a delish beer-butter sauce, but I saw one in my new Bon Appetit and thought I'd try it.

On a scale of 1 to 10, I give it a 7. The Crazy-B (Mitchell's nickname for our grocery store, HEB) didn't have tri-tip steak, so I subbed London broil. I only cooked it for half the time recommended for the tri-tip, but it was way overcooked. The marinated veggies were nice on top, but you couldn't taste the watercress, so I could have saved a few bucks and skipped it.

All in all, the recipe had great flavor ... and potential. We'll probably make it again and will tweak the cooking times and ingredients. We had it with a side of sweet potato fries with a garlic-mayo dipping sauce that's a reliable stand-by. (The boys loved the sweet potatoes!)

Paul's rating: "6, but only because the beef was overdone. Had it been more tender, it would have been an 8 or 9."

Mitchell's rating of the sweet potato fries: "25, because they're supper yummy. Even better than cookies."

Breakfast of Champions

For breakfast this morning, Mitchell enjoyed

• a chocolate-banana smoothie (recipe below)
  
• fig Newtons
  
• edamame (yes, the soybeans) with sea salt sprinkled over the top

chocolate-banana smoothie
crushed ice
2/3 cup milk
1 banana, sliced
1 heaping tablespoon chocolate milk mix
1 teaspoon honey
Mix and enjoy!

Welcome!

I'm Mary Anna, known around the kitchen as Foodie Mommy. My passions are food, food and more food. I wake up thinking about it, go to sleep thinking about it and even think about it while I'm eating.

I have a wonderful husband who will eat just about anything and two fantastic boys.

I blog about them here.

This blog will be about my culinary aspirations, from my fear to baking to my triumphs of preparing a Christmas feast for the entire family.

So, pull up a chair and take a little taste.