Merry Christmas from HERMAN

One of my all time favourite holiday traditions is the Christmas cards that come with newsie letters. Would I ever send one of these, NO WAY- but I absolutely love getting other peoples! One of my very clever friends decided to take it upon them to write a newsie letter from Herman's perspective. Those of you that know this person will for sure know who penned this little gem of a note, but everyone else might as well enjoy this hilarious holiday treat!- So without further adieu- Merry Merry Christmas from Herman! 

HO HO HO!

To my friends-family-and miscellaneous fans,

2011 has been a crazy year for a city pup like me! My mom always keeps me extra busy. I can’t believe I turned 2 people years in July (my mom had the best party ever for me with pupcakes!). I wanted to give you all a brief update on my happenings…


First, I want to go through all of my traveling throughout the year. In March, my mother took me to the Highlands with my kooky grandfather, my Uncle Winston and her best friend Laurie. It was so fun!
My mom didn’t think that I could hike all the way up the rocks, but I showed her (and Winston too!). My next trip was to Sea Island in May. I absolutely love going to the beach (except for all of the baths I have to get) & chasing other pups (regardless of their size). I was a little sad that we didn't get to stay in our own house, but our rental was almost just as great. My mom had about 10 of her friends over for a Junior Staff Reunion and I terrorized them so much. After those two adventures, I have been to my family’s homeland-- Athens, GA --many of times. I love visiting my grandmother’s house (and I always love to sleep in her bed with Uncle Bentley). I always eat lots of treats there and get to visit with my extended family. My young cousins are great and only are on my nerves some of the time.


As for my education, I am currently in the middle of 2nd grade. SPOT is the best school ever. We got a new headmaster, who is a little mean and demanding, but I guess she is alright. My report cards have all been good. I love showing my mom and Uncle Rex my high marks! Sawyer is my best friend at school and I really want to have him over for a sleepover soon. I keep telling my Mom that if Rex is able to have spend the night company, I am definitely old enough! I still wish that my Bullbeagle girlfriend Louie went to SPOT! My favourite subject is Agility. My school even entered me into a competition at Washington Square Park! I won 1st place out of almost a dozen other pups! My mom was so proud of me and was happy because it paid for a part of my tuition!


The biggest milestone of the year for me was moving into a new apartment. My mom and I lived in a studio on 7th Avenue and recently moved in with Uncle Rex, Carol T and Blakers on Waverly Place. I miss 7th Avenue because we had lots of dog neighbors and Uncle Rex always slept on the floor. I always had an eye on him and now he got his own room (no fair!). My new apartment is so much better though. We are so close to my favourite NYC park and I get to terrorize so many more people. There is also a huge hallway to play fetch & chase Rex. As for bad news, my heat & soul—BT (Bone Toy)—went missing. I wanted to file a missing person’s report, but my mom wouldn’t let me. She keeps telling me that Grandma found him, but is it really true? Guess you won’t find out until next year!


As for the future, I am really looking forward to going home for the Holidays (Christmakuh at my house) and to my Bar Mitzvah next month! You all will be invited!


Happy Holidays,


HERMAN MARIE ADAMS- 2011

Holiday Popcorn

I feel like this is one of those food/traditions that you love or hate. I am one of those people who loves the giant holiday tin of popcorn, filled to the brim with 3 delicious types of popcorn(we all know the cheddar and caramel disappear first....) Alas, no one sent a holiday popcorn tin to my apartment this year. So I decided instead of going out and buying myself one(sad?) I would just make some caramel popcorn. While the argument between caramel and cheddar is a tough battle, I am always a sucker for the salty/sweet combo, so caramel won out. 

I went to the grocery store thinking I would just get a box of bag popcorn and pop a bunch. Well when I realized that a huge jar of unpopped kernels was WAY cheaper, I decided it might be fun to go old school and pop it on the stove.....
I was quick to do some google research and came across this awesome set of directions. I followed these to a T and ended up with a giant bowl of perfectly popped popcorn. Now for the fun part- making the caramel topping!

Ingredients:
1 cup unpopped kernels
1 cup butter
1 cup light corn syrup
1 can sweet condensed milk
2 1/4 cups light brown sugar

Directions:
-Cover a large cookie sheet with wax paper
-Melt butter over medium heat, once butter is melted add the rest of the ingredients and combine. You need to stir constantly throughout this entire process!

-Once all ingredients are combined turn heat up slightly and bring ingredients to a boil.

-Boil for 3-4 minutes until the mixture begins to lighten slightly. Then remove from heat and pour over cooled popcorn.

-Stir the popcorn until all kernels are coated. The pour onto baking sheet to cool! 

It was really hard to let it cool, and while it was yummy while it was warm, it was even better once it had a chance to set, so try to hold out! I also added a little extra sea salt to the top once I spread it out on the baking sheet! This stuff was SO good! It was also really easy to make! It would be a great holiday treat for friends and family or any easy sweet to set out at a holiday gathering! 

Hope everyone is getting into the holiday spirit! Herman will make a holiday appearance on the blog later this week in order to send out his holiday greetings! 

SquirmieHermie and Thanksgiving

So first off- on a not totally food related note- Herman has joined twitter. You can find him at SquirmieHermie- and he will be posting blog updates as well as all sorts of kooky things! I mean who wouldn't want to hear what this little guy has to say? 

On a more food related note my room-mates and I did a little pre-thanksgiving feast in our apartment. It was so good! We had turkey and gravy, sweet potato casserole(with crunchy and marshmallow topping), green bean casserole, mac and cheese, corn bread, and chocolate bourbon pecan pie. WOAH- It was a lot of food and it was all SO good!
I do not have all of the recipes as I did not do all of the cooking. I did contribute the following: green bean casserole, the recipe I used can be seen  HERE and I made the pecan pie(I make this pie every year for thanksgiving!)- that recipe can be seen HERE. I also made the sweet potato casserole and followed the recipe from The Gift of Southern Cooking. Sweet Potato casserole is probably my favourite dish of the thanksgiving spread and I think this recipe is hands down the VERY best. This cook book is really great and this recipe alone makes it worth purchasing! The combo of Edna Lewis and Scott Peacock is pretty much a dream team, so if you don't have this cookbook put it on your Christmas list!

We went all out and even cleared out living room out enough to unfold the dining table so we could all fit. We went around the table and said what we were thankful for- and my weepy room-mate managed to only cry twice! It was a fun night and a great way to kick of the thanksgiving week! Now onto Christmas!!

Game-day Chilli and Cookies

This past weekend was a big football weekend in our apartment. We are a house divided with 2 UGA and 2 Auburn fans.(Good news though, the Bulldawgs dominated!!) We all have been going about 100 miles a minutes since the beginning of fall so we decided we would  hunker down and watch the game from the comfort of our living room. Since we were going to have friends coming and going I wanted to make something that could just sit on the stove all day and people could eat at their leisure- eureka, CHILLI! The weather here has been crazy and it does not feel like winter has gotten here at all, but luckily this past Saturday was cool and grey so chilli felt like the perfect comfort food. 
This chilli recipe is relatively simple and this is one of those foods where it is best to taste as you go. This way you can adjust the flavours to your preference. I do not like things to be super spicy so I went with a pretty classic chilli flavour profile and let people spice it up as they see fit. This was my first attempt at making chilli and I have to say it was a huge success. I made a giant helping, and there was barely enough left over for 1 lunch the next day! Everyone fixed theirs up a little differently and it was greatly enjoyed by all- a super easy way to feed a big group! Next time I will for sure make some corn bread to go along with it! 

Ingredients:
3 pounds ground chuck
1 can dark kidney beans
1 large white onion finely chopped
1 clove garlic (minced)
1 green pepper chopped
1 large can tomato sauce
1 small can tomato sauce
1 small can tomato paste
1 can diced tomatoes
1/4 tsp oregano
1/2 tsp ground cumin
black and cayenne pepper(to taste)
salt(add intermittently throughout cooking)
generous amount of chilli powder(I used almost half of my small bottle)


Directions:
-Sauté onion, garlic, and green pepper in olive oil until soft(lightly the coat the bottom of the sauté pan in olive oil)
-Add ground beef and cook until browned
-Drain grease from sauté pan and add contents of pan to large pot and place on stove
-Add diced tomatoes, tomato sauce, tomato paste(also refill tomato paste can with water and add to the mix) and finally add all of the spices- then stir stir stir!!!
-Continue to taste and adjust throughout the cooking process
-Cook over low heat for at least 2 hours over low(simmering) heat
-Serve with grated cheese, sour cream, and fritos or oyster crackers!

Here are some prep and cooking pics!

 

Compost Cookies:
I decided we would need something sweet to go with the salty/spicy chilli so I decided to try to recreate one of the best cookies I have had recently. Last week a co-worker brought back cookies from momofuku milk bar. I grabbed a compost cookie out of the box, and oh my goodness it was awesome. I am a huge fan of the sweet and salty combo, and this cookie had it all!

Ingredients:(dough recipe borrowed from this site)
2 C plus 2 T flour
1/2 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
12 T butter (1 1/2 sticks) melted and cooled until warm
1 cup brown sugar (light or dark)
1/2 C granulated sugar
1 large egg + 1 egg yolk
2 t vanilla extract

Extras:
Chocolate chips
butterscotch chips
pretzels

Ruffles potato chips

(you can add just about anything, so customize it to your taste!)

Directions:

-Heat oven to 325 degrees. Mix flour, salt, and baking soda together in mediumbowl; set aside.

-Either by hand or with electric mixer, mix butter and sugars until thoroughly blended. Mix in egg, yolk, and vanilla. Add dry ingredients;mix until just combined. Stir in all the extra ingredients(chocolate chips, pretzels etc.)

-Take 1/4 C dough and form into a ball.  Break ball in half and place dough on cookie sheet with broken edge facing up. Bake until cookies are set around outer edges start to harden yet centres are still soft and puffy, 10-13 minutes.  Cool cookies on cookie sheets. Serve or store in airtight container.

This cookie dough recipe is awesome! I was really happy with how the cookies turned out, but next time I will probably be even more liberal with the add ins- great way to get rid of all the mostly empty bags of snacks in the pantry! ENJOY!

Home

It's all in the name when it comes to this restaurant. I am going to keep this short and sweet because you can only constructively elaborate so much and this place was simply great. This tiny west village gem is a HOME run!! The small tables, and elegant back garden(equipped with heaters) is a cosy and elegant environment for enjoying plates of food that made me feel like I was back in GA for Sunday night family dinner. 

(pork chop with brussles and onion rings)

(skillet mac and cheese on the right and braised short rib with spinach mash potato on the right!)

                                     

(Skate with sweet potato and celery root mash and some crispy sweet potato chips)

The pork chop came highly recommended and was out of this world. The brussels sprouts it was paired with were delectable and the portion was enough to make a least a meal or two our of the leftovers! Any restaurant that is going for a comfort feel would be lost without a skilled of mac-and-cheese and this creamy dish did not disappoint. Everything on the menu looked good, and tasted even better! I look forward to visiting this spot regularly, as even for the west village it is very reasonably priced! So while nothing will ever completely compare to Mom's home cooking, this is a close and satisfying second! 

Home

20 Cornelia St

New York NY 10014

212-243-9579