Smoked Salmon, Sweet Potato Blinis, and the last remnants of Valentine's Day

Okay, I am forcing myself to post nothing new until I've finally posted photos from the Valentine's Day event that I did way back when!  I'm actually quite proud of how everything turned out, despite the fact that I didn't get a chance to snap very good photos.  But, I do have a recipe at the end of it for you all--and a savory one at that!

So first, a bit of back-story to this Valentine's Day event that I did.  At my 'day job,' we are required when we are first year newbies to run Friday afternoon social events, which is basically food + beer + equally-attractive-non-alcoholic-beverages.  Everyone goes through it, and it's sort of a hazing ritual of "how good can you do a Social?"  When I was a first year, we were particularly competitive about it, and our Friday afternoon social events began to get more and more intense and involved and finally culminated in an eleven course gourmet dinner, served entirely in miniature at the end of the year.  I think that clearly established my year as the undisputed Social champions for quite some time to come.

Being the proud winner that I am, I find it necessary (and, I admit, a tad bit egotistical) to remind everyone of our dominance once every year.  And so on the Friday social of Valentine's Day every year, I step in and show them how it's done.

This year's menu included:

Red velvet cupcakes

Pina colada cupcakes

Orange, pomegranate, almond dark chocolate tartelettes

Chocolate-dipped tuxedo strawberries

Handmade dark chocolates

Apricot+goat cheese open-faced sandwiches

Red pepper hummus + pita bread

Smoked salmon, avocado cream, and sweet potato blinis

And, I love the tag-holders that I found!  Aren't they brilliant?  :-D

The event went really well, I think! though my kitchen still hasn't quite recovered from it all.  But, hey--as a one person job, I think I'm allowed some bit of mess in the kitchen.

Some of the things that I made were old favorites, like chocolate covered tuxedo strawberries and apricot goat cheese open-faced sandwiches:

Others, like icing shots, were new ideas that I was really itching to try out.  (They were popular, too!)

And, of course, you always need savory things to balance out the sweet, which is where platters like the red bell pepper hummus came in.

By far, one of the favorites this time around was a new savory dish: Sweet potato brown butter blinis, with smoked salmon, avocado sour cream, and chives.  It was a runaway HIT.  This is most definitely a dessert blog, but because these blinis were so good, I have to post the recipe for you all!  The blinis themselves have such a smooth, dense, earthy texture from the caramelized sweet potato and brown butter.  The fresh avocado sour cream adds a freshness to it all.  Top with the smoky saltiness of the salmon and the garlicky bit of chive, and you get one delicious bite of, well, delicious.  These work great as an appetizer and finger food, but they're so yummy that I could just sit down to a whole meal of them!

Finally with this post, we can bid adieu to all of the Valentine's Day festivities from this year!  Moving on to spring!!!

Ah, and one last thing that I learned from this whole experience: I desperately need to invest in an off-camera flash so that I can get decent on-site photos of food and events!


Read on for recipe...

Kiwi and Pineapple Sorbet, and the glory of a household with two ice cream machines

A few days ago, the people over @Tastespotting twittered the question: "so... how many of you have a stand mixer?"  Upon seeing that, I literally laughed out loud.  One stand mixer???, I thought, that's laughable! ludicrous! Because, folks, I have TWO.

Yes, that's right, people.  Count them: one-two- TWO!  One's a dainty four and a half quart-er that R gave me for our second dating anniversary (and, after six years, it still ranks as one of the best anni presents ever).  The other's a powerhouse six quart-er that we affectionately call "Bessie the Beast," which I have on extended borrow/loan/keep from my parents who bought her and used her all of... twice?  No, I don't live in a bakery, thought sometimes it sure seems like it, and yes, I'm quite proud of the fact that I'm probably one of the only graduate students out there with two stand mixers lying about.

But, the awesomeness of living in our little household here doesn't stop there.  No, no.  The craziness goes on.  At last count, I cataloged about forty cake pans that I own, and that was two years ago.  I have a feeling that I'm pushing upwards of fifty by now.  What?  Don't judge me!  People, for some unknown reason, enjoy gifting me with baking pans and cake molds, so it isn't all just me.  Oh, and by "cake pans," I don't mean tart molds.  Those have a whole 'nother count of their own, and if you let me include my mini tartelette molds individually (because, they aren't connected!), that puts me at well over fifty already.

Granted, there are times when our kitchen resembles your more average graduate student's.  Case in point: I have one frying pan, which I bought for ten dollars at Ross and which does not have a flat bottom.  Yes, it SPINS--which, I guess if you want to look at the silver-lining, is an extra feature that I didn't pay for!  (sarcasm, people.)  We also only own six normal sized plates, four bowls, four shallower bowls, and six rice bowls.  Add that all together, and it doesn't even begin to touch my cake pan collection.  Maybe we should just be eating out of my pans...

Okay, but really--you ask, where is all of this rambling going?  Here's the point: not only do we live in a house with two stand mixers, over forty cake pans, and one lone spinning frying pan, but we also live in a house with two ice cream machines.  Yes.  This is why we are awesome.  Two ice cream machines means that I can make two flavors at once, without having to wait 24 hours between each batch for the ice cream bowl to freeze properly again.  Two ice cream machines means that, within the space of less than an hour, I can whip out two yum-licious and refreshing flavors of sorbets--kiwi and pineapple--for a tropical party in your mouth.

Before you call me crazy (if you haven't already), I want to defend myself and say that both of these ice cream machines were wonderful gifts from wonderful people--no, I did not go out and buy two ice cream makers.  But anyways, back to the sorbets.  Sorbet-making, it turns out, is a great way to use up vast amounts of fruit that you might happen to have floating around.  I had a whole batch of pineapple puree left over from making pina colada cupcakes, so I added some water and a dash of rum, and voila!--an amazing, fresh, and icy-almost-wannabe-granita pineapple sorbet.  As for the kiwi sorbet, I added a dash of Grand Marnier--not enough to really taste but just enough to enhance the tart sweetness of the kiwifruit.  The kiwi sorbet also turned out awesomely.  The smooth texture is almost exactly like a raw kiwi, studded by crisp little seeds.  For an extra kick, I snuck a bit of finely grated chocolate into the kiwi sorbet at the very end, just to make it ever-so-slightly richer and creamier.  It was like eating summer in the middle of winter!

Anyways, have a wonderful first week of March, everyone! Spring is coming so soon!


Read on for the recipes...