The mini sunday brunch

cream cheese and smoked salmon crackers 

quiches and crepes

fruit salad

Fritters and coffee

It's been a while since I've wanted to do another mini meal so I thought brunch would be perfect! The first thing I made was the cinnamon buns. I made a basic recipe and served them a creme cheese frosting. 
Then I made mini quiches. I did a tomato, basil, and cheese. Let me say, they were fantastic! For the crust I did flour, salt, butter, and ice water. 
For the crepes I stuffed them with ricotta. I put orange zest, sugar, and strawberries. I made a strawberry sauce. I put orange in it as well. 
I bought smoked salmon, creme cheese, and capers. I was going to serve that with mini bagels that I saw at the store, but when I went back to buy them, they didn't have them so I got normal sized ones. Then when I was assembling them I realized I forgot to take them out of the freezer! So I used crackers :P 
Then I did fruit salad. I did mango, pineapple, and strawberries. 
Then my favorite: coffee with fritters! I did iced coffee in shot glasses and cream. For the fritters I put apple in them. No fried food is bad! ;) 
For the last, but not least, we made mimosas. We were going to use blood oranges but I forgot so I used navel oranges instead. Well that's it for now. 

mimosas

The Fried Chicken to Make All Other Fried Chickens Jealous

Well here it is! The best fried chicken you will have ever eaten! 

We get a cooking magazine called Bon Appetite, and their cover story was fried chicken. It just looked so good I couldn't resist! So me, Morgana Banana, and my sister, Meara Tempura, decided to make some for our family on the Superbowl!

Oh the greasy goodness! 

We started out with a dry rub over night. The rub consisted of salt, pepper, cayenne, paprika, onion powder, and garlic powder. The next day, we set up a dredging station with a buttermilk mixture and a seasoned flour mixture. Dip in wet, dip in dry, drop in oil! Fry at 325 degrees F for 10 min for wings and 12 min for other pieces, turning every 2 min. 

It was the juiciest chicken I ever sunk my teeth into! The seasoning was perfect, and the skin was wonderfully crisp (but not too crisp). 

Go make some of your own! Right now! Go! :)

and there was more!

Mmmm k. Well, it's late, really late on a Saturday night and I can't sleep, so great news for this blog! It must have been that late night nibbling on the half piece of chocolate toffee coffee fudgy cake left over for someone who was not me. But don't worry I didn't eat all of it. :)

I'm sure all two of you (yes I'm talking to you Morganna and Stinky Feet -oops did I just say that?? oh well!! I love you Meara!!) are so anticipating the next instalment of the mini dinner we did, right? :P

So, here below in not so much detail as the last post, are some of the rest of our creations that night!

The mini pizzas are what you see on the top there. Really awesome quick pizza dough recipe is

what we used. We rolled it out pretty thin, used a little circle cutter and cut tons of rounds out. They looked so cute lined up on the greased trays! On went pesto, little bits of sundried tomatoes, chopped up green onions, and we topped with Parmesan. SOOoo yummy! Except I think I could have baked them a little less.. What a surprise. :P

Dessert!!! yay. NOW we're getting to the real part of things. You see here an almond tuile with chocolate mousse - and most were drizzled with sour cherry compote. I thought they did pretty well - but being me there could have been more chocolate - like a fudgy piece of cake or brownie somehow stuck in there! But anyhow they were so much fun to make. Forming the almond tuiles and maintaining their shape when they just came out of a 425 degree oven has its' perks in that your hands are consistently developing a higher pain threshold for each time!

Because my mom absolutely loves strawberries and cream - a shortcake kind of thing, as well as cheesecake with strawberries, my option was to go with a roll (as you can see below), wrapped up with strawberry compote and aricotta cheesecake (baked in a separate dish, then spread on). Such a great not-too-heavy-dessert following that kind of dinner, we found.

And last but definitely not least - the applecran cheese slice. These were so good! We tried them the next day... and yes, I think chilling them does help enhance the taste a teeny bit. So simple, good and perfect when you`re in the mood for a little bite but not a whole tart! Below you can see the process...

et voila! There were a few more things we made, but unfortunately no pics :(

Ah I`m tired now. I think bed will work this time!

There will be dessert... but first comes the dinner

Dum de Dummmmmm... the blog begins! and I am writing it, and have approximately 20 minutes to finish it (which is asking a lot in Carmel time). No, I am not an amazingly skilled writer, how could you tell?? but I will do my best to jump start this awesome blog - obviously awesome cause of the delicious subject matter! And because of us. :)

So.... Bob Marley 'I Can See Clearly Now' is playing in the background as I begin. He's talking about the rain going away (which advice this rainy Vancouver area should LISTEN UP TO!). Anyhow, apparently it will be a bright sunny day, which I take to mean that this blog post about delicious types of food will cheer up your day immensely. :) That's a great way to think!

Most recently, my/our food exploits have been in the form of 'mini'. Exploring the world of miniature creations has been so interesting!!! And has caused much joy as we have tested and found the best ways to create the smallest (well, almost smallest!), tastiest delicacies. And the best part is that once you have created something you can ALWAYS improve and do it slightly different and better the next time. At least that is my attitude :)

The following are from a dinner made for my mother's birthday. We had the idea to do a dinner of hors d'oeuvres - finger food - and bite sized desserts. The evening turned out so lovely, and here is a break down of what happened on the food side of things.

First up is the Caprese salad. We had about 15 people to feed, so there are quite a few of these little salads on the plate. Because these would keep well in the fridge we were able to do them

early in the morning. Mozzarella, grape tomato, and basil are all skewered (that sounds horrible!!) onto a toothpick, alternating the basil in between the cheese and grape tomatoes. Just before serving we drizzled olive oil and sprinkled sea salt on top. Very tasty!

The Asparagus Bacon roll up was pretty messy making (!) but with Emmy Lou's help we managed through. This is one that is very tasty, but has a lot of room for improvement in assembly and baking. We used regular store bought white fluff bread, cut off the crusts, flattened it with a rolling pin, then slathered them with cream cheese. Unless you do this part

quickly and keep the bread fresh and moist, it will dry out very quickly and crack once you get to the rolling up part. During this time, have the bacon in the oven, until it's just easy to roll up -

not crispy. Break off the end of the asparagus. Using two at a time, wrap the bacon around, place in the middle of a slice of bread, then roll up, securely, and place seam-side down on a tray lined with foil. Repeat with remaining asparagus. Sprinkle with mozzarella/desired type of cheese. Can leave out on the counter until ready to bake, or prepare and put in fridge ahead of time, covering tightly so bread doesn't dry out. Bake at 375 or 400 degrees F for 10-15 minutes, or until browned. Very delicious!

Let's see... I have time for one more! :) I have the picture here of the mini quiches. Sharp cheddar cheese dough for lining the tart, then the filling is cream, eggs, sauteed minced onions and garlic, S&P, desired seasonings, finely chopped spinach and feta. I made/lined the quiche tarts way ahead of time and froze them, then defrosted them in the morning, baked them till lightly browned, and put them aside. Just before serving I popped them in the oven for 5-10 minutes to heat them up and add a little more colour. They were a total hit all around... so yummy!

And now I shall go! Twenty minutes has definitely been extended into more like forty five, so I should leave the rest for next time :)

Salted Caramel