Food for Thought

Today seemed like a perfect day for strawberry shortcake. It was nearly eighty, a bit humid as Indiana tends to be, and it rained/thunderstormed all day long. So after getting all my laundry and errands done and cleaning more than I thought I'd get to today, I decided to treat myself with some delicious food. Dinner was grilled chicken...on the charcoal grill, not the George! :) and a delicious fresh artichoke. I LOVE artichokes. There is just something wonderful about them and I'm glad that my father instilled a love of them in me. Then I baked me up some fluffy, white angel food cake (hooray Kitchen-Aid stand mixer!), cut me up some fresh strawberries, and dolloped on a good helping of Cool Whip Free (which tastes as good, if not better than, the original fat full Cool Whip). Looks delicious, doesn't it? Trust me, it was. ;)

I have an ex-boyfriend who, if we were still together, or even living in the same town for that matter, I'd probably make this for, because I'm sure it'd be his favorite thing EVER. How do you feel about Chocolate Stout Bacon Cake? I don't know either, but I think I'm gonna make it soon and find out! Here's the recipe if you're wanting to explore on your own:

CHOCOLATE STOUT BACON CAKE
Cake
2 cups stout (I used Guinness)
2 cups (4 sticks) unsalted butter
1 1/2 cups unsweetened cocoa powder (preferably Dutch-process)

4 cups all purpose flour
4 cups sugar
1 tablespoon baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
4 large eggs
1 1/3 cups sour cream

1/2 pound cooked bacon, crumbled

For cake:
Preheat oven to 350°F. Butter three 8-inch round cake pans with 2-inch-high sides. Line with parchment paper. Butter paper. OR butter a large bundt pan and line 12 cupcake tins with cupcake papers (I did the bundt cake, came out great)

Bring 2 cups stout and 2 cups butter to simmer in heavy large saucepan over medium heat. Add cocoa powder and whisk until mixture is smooth. Cool slightly.

Whisk flour, sugar, baking soda, and 1 1/2 teaspoons salt in large bowl to blend. Using electric mixer, beat eggs and sour cream in another large bowl to blend. Add stout-chocolate mixture to egg mixture and beat just to combine. Add flour mixture and beat briefly on slow speed. Add bacon bits. Using rubber spatula, fold batter until completely combined. Divide batter equally among prepared pans. Bake cakes until tester inserted into center of cakes comes out clean, about 35 minutes (bundt cake will take longer, maybe 45-50 mins; use the tester). Transfer cakes to rack; cool 10 minutes. Turn cakes out onto rack and cool completely

Stout Frosting:
2 cups confectioners' sugar
6 large marshmallows
4 tablespoons (1/2 stick) butter
1/3 cup stout
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Sift the sugar into a large mixing bowl. Set aside.

Place the marshmallows, butter, and beer in a medium-size heavy saucepan over low heat. Stir until the marshmallows are melted, 3 to 4 minutes. Remove the pan from the heat. Pour the confectioners' sugar over the marshmallow mixture. Add the vanilla and stir until the frosting is smooth and satiny. You may need to add extra sugar to get the consistency you want - this comes out more like icing than frosting.

Use at once to frost the top of the cake.

And then I'm also amused, because it is my favorite cake EVER, at the recipe Cakehead offered for a bacon+cake combo which includes red velvet cake. They suggest using this recipe and just substituting the pecans with crumbled bacon. Again, I think this will be on my list of things to check out! Who wants to do a bacon cake tasting with me? :)

Do you remember that wine we had last night?

Have you ever been confronted with a moment where you had a great great wine, but you just don't remember what the name of it was the next day? Or when you go to tell someone? Now wine makers are adding a 'remember me' tab to the wine label that you can pull off and take with you so that you don't forget! Genius!

Green chopsticks!

The whole world is going green, and even a few steps towards a greener life are good for everyone, so why not in your food world? Here are some green chopsticks! I know I have a couple sets of chopsticks that a friend brought me from Japan, and I hate not having chopsticks when I'm eating Chinese/Japanese/Thai/etc. food, so buy yourself a set (or two) of these and feel good about your Asian cuisine eating!

I've been strangely absent from my new food blog here, although I've had lots to say...just not a lot of time to write it.

Today I'm intrigued by all the things going down in the news with Starbucks lately.

First of all they are switching to grinding their coffee fresh. One of my best friends is actually a GM at a Starbucks here in Indiana and this "not using pre-ground coffee" stuff seems to not be a big deal. In the Indiana market they've been using fresh ground coffee, so how are they going to get rid of that "burnt smell/taste" now? If you've ever been in an Indiana Starbucks, it smells exactly like any other Starbucks and so I'm not sure how this is going to assist things. And coffee loyalty cards? Thank goodness! (Sarcasm included free of charge) Now people will get a free $5.00 coffee for every 10? 12? $5.00 coffees they buy. Big deal. I'm still not impressed with their coffee enough to switch to it. I'll take Panera or Gloria Jean's or a local joint any day.

Second of all, Starbucks had a lawsuit against them regarding tip sharing. My first problem with this is, why do they even have tips? They don't do anything extra. There's no table service. They're just ringing the coffee and making it. I've never tipped at Starbucks and I never see that much tips in the tip jar...surely not enough to warrant a $100 million dollar payback. This is really just ridiculous. Seriously. As much as I think that Starbucks having a tip jar is ridiculous, this lawsuit is ridiculous. You're lucky you got tips period! If I was a Starbucks exec, I'd tell them "buh-bye tip jar!" and let that be that.
But that's not the only news regarding this issue. In the past few days it has come out that Starbucks is not going to comply with the judges orders because they're fighting back and the case isn't over. Now, I don't condone going against the law, but since I've mentioned my stance on this situation, good for them for fighting back. Although, I do wonder about one thing. The argument is that shift supervisors are partaking in the tips. I know that as a shift supervisor at my own food service job I am not legally able to take part in any tips. We don't have a tip jar, but customers do occasionally still tip, and it doesn't matter if they give it to me personally, I cannot take it. I have to give it to the associates or put it in the donation box. Now, I do know that Starbucks shifts surely do make coffee and take orders, I know their GMs do. And I know that at my job I do all the associate positions throughout a shift as well, so maybe not being able to take the tips legally is a stupid law. Yet for Starbucks to say that shifts have no managerial power? I'm not sure about that. I've never worked for Starbucks, so I can't say for certain, although you can guarantee I'll be asking my friend who works for them, but I know that in my own shift position I have a lot of managerial power. I do almost everything my upper management does. And I say almost because I'm still new to my position so there are still things I'm learning/have left to learn. I find it hard to believe that their shifts have no managerial power, because then what's the point of them? Glorified associates? Just a title? That's silly. I can get in the office. I have keys to the store/office. I have codes for the alarm system and the safe. I do deposits, check the email, run chart, do invoices, check in merch, etc. Maybe Starbucks should have a different system, as my company does, for shift supervisors. Yes, I am not allowed to take tips, but I have other bonus' that I can get based on performance, running my shifts, how much I work, IVR scores, etc.

So what do you think? Do you think their coffee will improve? Do you think this whole tip jar stuff is b.s.? Do you really believe that Starbucks shifts have no managerial power and thus should be able to take part in tips regardless of state law? What are your thoughts on all this Starbucks bad news?

I had my parents and youngest sister over for dinner last night. I felt like cooking, they didn't, so I won. Fortunately I was at the store when this was all decided and was able to peruse the grocery section for a while as I decided what I would make. Even though it was only four of us, I anticipated the love of delicious leftovers my roommate and I share, and so I wanted to make sure there was plenty to go around and then some. I'm not always one for recipes, so I improvise when not feeling like sticking to one. So what did I make?
Pasta! Rigatoni a la Dawn.
I caramelized some diced sweet onion and a couple garlic gloves. I then medallioned Italian sausage links and browned them. I used mild because that's what my family prefers. If it had been my roommate and I, I would have gone with spicy. Your choice, really. I also like sage sausage, but I have a hard time finding it sometimes. Since I had short notice to put on this meal, I used tomato basil sauce from a jar and spiced it up from my spice rack. Stirred in with all the deliciousness that the sausage, onions, and garlic had to offer, I say it turned out wonderfully. I then stirred it into the cooked rigatoni. It was all then spread into a casserole pan and topped with enough mozzarella cheese to make a person's head spin. I put it in the oven to melt and brown a bit. It ended up being delicious. Of course. Rave reviews from the fam, and very easy to put together.
On the veggie side, I had asparagus which was put in the oven after covering with evoo and sprinkling with sea salt. I also took the rest of my onion and put it on the stove in a covered frying pan with sliced up yellow squash and zucchini sprinkled with just a bit of evoo, sea salt, and pepper until it gets really soft.
Then I had bought some fresh Italian bread, rubbed evoo on it and sprinkled it with garlic salt before placing it in the oven to warm up.

All in all, a delicious, quick, and easy meal that pleased even my picky little sister. Maybe accented by the fact that it was about 60 degrees outside. Maybe I should have fired up the grill...? :)

Side note: I will try to post pictures of food that I discuss if I can, but I unfortunately forgot about it in my speedy cooking last night. Sorry!