Monday, March 12, 2012

Strawberry Muffins

For the past couple of weekends, I've been craving muffins. Specifically blueberry, but really any muffins would do. I made a trip to the grocery store on Wednesday with the intention of buying blueberries (for the muffins) and instead stumbled across a whole shelf of discounted strawberries!

One awesome thing about strawberries on their last legs: they cook into amazingness. One of my absolute favorite things to bake is Smitten Kitchen's Strawberry Summer Cake - a pound cake-like base with strawberries sunk into the top. While the cake bakes, the strawberries literally melt into a jam-like consistency on top that is so awesome, I can't keep the cake in the house. Last-legs strawberries melt the best because they're already almost squishy.

When I saw the strawberries, I decided I'd try making blueberry muffins with strawberries instead of blueberries. This ended up being a fantastic idea. The strawberries melted inside the muffins, so instead of biting into crunchy fruit pieces, I bit into the muffins and it was like someone had injected them with little bits of jam. I made a dozen on Saturday, and I have another batch in the oven as I type.

Friday, March 9, 2012

Feature!


Happy Friday, everyone! My friend Kirsten from Eat The Queen came over last night to do a feature on my fridge - go check it out!

Then have an awesome weekend.

Thursday, March 8, 2012

Miso Fried Rice


My brothers and I love to go to Benihana for special occasions. One of my favorite parts of a Benihana meal is the fried rice - I always hope that I get served last so I get some of that awesome crispy bottom that's been sizzling on the hibachi extra long. Sometimes I get cravings for really salty, crispy fried rice, but this is the first time I've ever actually tried to make it. I think it's a success!

This is an approximation of the flavor of the fried rice at Benihana, with miso paste instead of what I've always thought was garlic butter (now I'm thinking it may be miso!). In addition, I was short a few ingredients for Benihana's special orange sauce, so I decided to go a totally different direction with a fried egg and sriracha garnish. Yum!