Balsamic and Bacon Salad Dressing

For the longest time, I've had two slices of bacon in my refrigerator. What can a person possibly do with two pieces of bacon? Seriously.

Well, I was making a basil pesto and pea pasta dish for dinner tonight. I'd already decided to add crumbled bacon to the pasta to add a little crunch and protein and decided that a salad sounded nice (and responsible). However, I only have ranch and bleu cheese dressings - neither of which sounded terribly appetizing.  So....homemade dressing it is. Might as well not waste the bacon drippings! 


I'd put a little bit of brown sugar on the bacon while it was cooking, so my dressing was a tiny bit sweet. Brown sugar and balsamic go together wonderfully, though, so it worked. 

Heavenly Tomato Onion Butter Sauce

I don't know how or why, but despite my actual German/English/Scottish/Russian/Southern US ancestry, my favorite food is far-and-away Italian. There is NOTHING better than a mix of tomatoes, garlic, cheese, basil, and carbs. Pizza, spaghetti, caprese salads, garlic bread...all these things take me straight to food nirvana. 


Everyone has "their" red sauce. You know, the one that they grew up eating or learned to make in college. The only one that they will make for guests. The one they plan on teaching their children. I am lucky, because I have THREE sauces. There is the completely inauthentic one with ground beef and a seasoning packet that I grew up with. It was the first thing I learned to cook (besides boxed mac and cheese). I've made some slight improvements, including using real garlic and onions in olive oil instead of garlic and onion powders. 2 cans tomato sauce instead of 1 can paste and some water. I got rid of the disgustingly slimy canned mushrooms. But still, the McCormick's spaghetti sauce with mushrooms seasoning packet - I can never get rid of that. (No other brand is as good, either.) 


Then I have the basic pomodoro sauce. That's the marinara sauce with herbs and some soft garlic and onion. Once in awhile a tiny bit of red pepper flakes makes it in there just for a surprise. Left over red wine makes it luscious. Quick, easy, versatile, it is perfect for a surprise guest because I always have the ingredients. With eggplant or chicken parmigiana, as a dip for garlic bread or pizza rolls or even as a makeshift pizza sauce at the last minute. This will probably be the first thing my children learn.

Almond Poppy Seed Bread - ish

I've been aching for almond flavored things lately - especially after making a ton of lemon cakes and cupcakes for my friend Renee's birthday last week. A local coffee shop sells a pretty good almond poppy seed bread but it has a couple things against it: too expensive, first to sell out, and topped with chunks of almond that are way too thick for the delicate bread underneath. 


After my success with Tyler Florence's amazing banana bread, I wanted to try almond. I thought about adapting his banana bread somehow, but I couldn't get around how to take all the bananas out and still get something so good. I spent almost an entire day searching the interwebs for a good recipe and I narrowed it down to two. 

Good taste, delicate crumb and texture. Ok for a first try, I suppose.

Heads up!

I don't have a recipe box. I have recipe books that I rarely use, but mostly I have about 1,000 bookmarks in Google Chrome that I have to search through to find something I want. Lately I've taken to jotting stuff down in a cute little spiral notebook. The problem is, I used to use it for a journal. So somewhere between my Extreme Chocolate Cookie recipe and the notes I have written down for altitude adjustments is a 5 page long multi-colored missive about a guy that goes from pathetic to hopeful to truly ugly. 

Who wants to read recipes around this? No one. Not even me.

Somehow, I just don't feel like I should hand that to anyone when I want to share a recipe. 

I want something I can 1) add to easily 2) share easily 3) change easily (I hate scratching out and re-writing on cards) and 4) use to link to original content. So few of my recipes are truly my own. I mostly copy and adapt others and want to be able to share them with others in case you don't think my version is perfect. (Hint - it's not!) Pictures will be bonuses. My photographic skills aren't exceptional - I frequently have issues with the ISO and graininess - but sometimes it works. At the very least, they give you an idea of what my process and food look like along the way.

Sometime soon - a couple notes about how I cook and write. I have my own kitchen shorthand because I've been cooking for awhile. I know what it means to use the creaming method. You might not. I'll probably just link to an Alton Brown video for that. He explains way better than I do. 

Welcome. This won't get updated as often as it should. It won't always be well written or even understandable to anyone but me. Most of the time there will be no background or stories, just recipes and notes. But since I'm doing this for me, I think that's okay.