Jen Caputo

New Years Eve 2012

This post is for my friend, Jeff, who complains I don’t post on my blog enough.

Adam and I hosted a small New Years Eve dinner party. Small because the food was expensive and we can only comfortably sit ten people indoors for dinner. We worked really hard on the 30th to get as much done as we could to make the 31st relatively stress free. So I’ll share what I made, the recipes I used, and what I did ahead of time.

 

The hors d'oeuvres spread included crostini, cheese, nuts, and olives.

 

On the left, we have Crostini with Ricotta, Honey, and Lemon Zest and on the right, Pear, Walnut, and Ricotta Crostini. I toasted all of the crostini the night before so that just before guests arrived all I had to do was slather on the ricotta, and toss on the other toppings.

 

 

Not much to the cheese plate, we just set out the blocks with a few chunks cut off with a knife on a cutting board. We served a 10 year cheddar, a Mango Stilton (I know! It was really good though), a havarti from Wisconsin, and a Gruyere. We set out cranberries, almonds, and pistachios, a variety of olives, and melba toast.

 

This sparkling gin punch was a huge hit.  In fact we had to make another batch midway through the night! We first tried it at Andrew and Meg’s holiday party last year and we were amazed at the Grapefruit flavor considering there is no grapefruit in it.  We don’t have a punch bowl so we improvised with a gravy ladle and a big stainless bowl. We froze ice blocks using old yogurt containers for molds. Our local grocery store sells fresh squeezed juice so Adam ran out of the morning of the party to pick it up so we didn’t have to squeeze 20 oranges. He made the grenadine the night before (equal parts sugar and fresh pomegranate juice) as well.

 

The Roasted Pear Salad with Pomegranate, Blue Cheese, and Hazelnut Vinaigrette was delicious.  I kept the blue cheese and pomegranate seeds separate in case people didn’t like them.  I roasted the pears and made the vinaigrette the night before. I also removed the seeds of two pomegranates the morning of.  We didn’t need them all for the salad so the leftovers were used as cocktail garnish. To serve all I had to do was toss the greens, pears, and dressing together.

 

My famous Rosemary Rolls are based off Pioneer Woman’s. Instead of using frozen rolls, I make them from scratch using the Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day master recipe (which I made the night before).  They take a few hours to rise so I buttered the pan and formed the rolls 2 hours before guests arrived and then stuffed them in the microwave to rise until the prime rib came out of the oven and they could go in.

 

Roasted Brussels Sprouts and Shallots. The day before I cleaned and chopped the sprouts and shallots and sealed them in the fridge.  They roast in 10-15 minutes while the prime rib rests.

 

I started getting lazy about ‘plating’ my sides at this point so the Sous Vide Glazed Carrots were served out of the pan I glazed them in.  These were totally made in advance, I threw them in the Sous Vide Supreme to reheat them and just before we ate they went into a pan to reduce the glaze a bit.

 

 

Like I said.. I was getting lazy.  I made the mashed potatoes the night before and scooped them into a ziplock. I threw the whole damn bag into the Sous Vide Supreme 2 hours before dinner at 155 to rewarm them keeping the microwave free as a place to let the rolls rise and the oven free for everything else that needed to be in there.  It worked out great and as tacky as that plastic bag serving ‘dish’ looks, it sure made putting the leftovers away easy!

 

We went to the butchers and requested two USDA Certified Prime Rib Eye Roasts cut from the chuck side. They were the crown jewel of the meal.

 

We followed Kenji’s recipe for Perfect Prime Rib with Red Wine Jus and I’d say it came out pretty perfect.  Edge-to-edge beautifully medium rare and super juicy. The Red Wine Jus is not pictured. We salted the roasts the night before and left them uncovered on a rack in the fridge to help build the crust and let the seasoning penetrate more deeply. The roasts went in the oven about 6-7 hours before we were ready to eat it. I let it rest for a little over an hour (the middle still read 123 degrees on the Thermapen) while I dealt with everything else that needed to go in the oven and we ate our salad. The oven was cranked up to 550 and the roasts went back in on a clean pan to sear the crust.

 

 

Here is my dinner plate with an oxtail I fished out of the jus.

 

I forgot to get a picture of the dessert until after it was half eaten. I made Mascarpone Ice Cream with Berry Compote following Daniel Humm’s ice cream recipe but modified to cook the custard Sous Vide (which basically means whisk all the ingredients together, put them in a ziplock bag, and cook at 183 for 30 minutes). I made the custard the night before and spun it the morning of after it was nice and chilled.

 

We kept the drinks pretty simple.  A few bottles of Cabernet Sauvignon to go with the Prime Rib. A case of Cava, a box of sugar cubes, and an assortment of bitters so people could make their own Champagne Cocktails. The help yourself Gin Punch and beer cooler meant Adam didn’t have to mix up a single drink.  Actually when a few people requested an Old Fashioned, Adam offered to teach all the boys how to make one instead! 

 

How did you enjoy New Years Eve?

Shoe Corner Makeover

This was our lovely mountain of shoes that sat in the back corner of our family room. This is it now:

Definitely one of the best pieces of furniture that Ikea sells!

It holds a ton thanks to my love of ballet flats.  4 pairs of them will fit in the space of one of Adam’s.   I recommend anyone trade their mountain of shoes for a Hemnes cabinet!

Sous Vide, Soft Boiled, or Poached Quail Eggs?

In a few weeks I’m entering a cooking competition in which I will need to create 200 small portions. I’ve decided on a Lyonnaise Salad (the key ingredient of the competition is bacon), and the best part of that salad is the poached egg on top. But chicken eggs are way too big for the small sized dishes we’re supposed to be serving so I turned my attention to quail eggs.

It’s roughly a fifth the size of a chicken egg.

Since I need to cook 200 of them, I wanted to find a quick and easy way to do it. My first try was just soft-boiling them in shells.  I boiled a pot of water, dropped in a quail egg, and pulled it out 1.5 minutes later. Following this tip from Wylie Dufresne, I put them in ice water for an hour before warming them back up and cracking them open. He says it will make them easier to peel. What a disaster. I mean the eggs were cooked perfectly but I spent about 5 minutes trying to get the shell off while the egg kept the pretty shape to no avail. I didn’t take pictures. It was ugly (but tasty!)

Next, with my fingers crossed, I tried Sous Vide. If it worked, it would by far be the easiest solution. All I had to do was throw a bunch of eggs in the Sous Vide Supreme, set the temp, and let ‘em hang out in ice water until I wanted to heat them up to serve them.

What temperature though?  I want a runny yolk and a set white that wouldn’t freak people out. When I normally cook my chicken eggs I do 63.5° C for 60 minutes so I shortened the time and gave that a try. I also found a chart from Douglas Baldwin and the Ideas in Food people chimed into this thread suggesting 75°for 5 minutes or so, so I tried that too. My results:

I would have been happy serving any of those but look at my shells:

Still a disaster with most of the white left behind.  Quail Egg shells are so annoying!

So yes, I could easily cook 200 eggs perfectly, but getting them out of the shell neatly was not going to happen. No Soft boiling, no Sous Vide… I have to cook these eggs outside of the shells.

I originally thought poaching a bunch of eggs was going to take forever, but Quail eggs take less then a minute to poach. And once poached, they’ll hold in ice water in the fridge for 24 hours easily, after which I can warm them up in a pan of water over a sterno at the event. I just need to make sure I keep the sterno water under 60°C (the temp at which the eggs might start to cook some more)

I started a pot of boiling water on the stove, added a splash of vinegar and cracked 3 quail eggs into 3 ramekins.

I swirled the water, carefully dropped in the eggs, and took them out with a slotted spoon about a minute later. No picture because I was working too fast at this point.  They came out of the simmering water and directly into a bowl of ice water.

Into the fridge they went. I left them there for a few hours to kind of simulate cooking them the night before. Then I filled a pot with hot water (50°C), put some toast in the oven, and fished my eggs out of the ice water and into the pot to warm them up (I cut off the long stragglies with scissors).

They were warmed through in 5 minutes, so onto the toast they went.

Perfect!  It’s going to take a while, but I think the standard poach of these quail eggs is the way to go, thanks to their impossible to peel shells.

Wish me luck in the bacon competition!

The Whole Duck

On Leap Day, D’Artagnan had a great sale and I took them up on it. When you order from them, you get to choose the day the food is delivered so that it doesn’t sit around outside when you won’t be home. It comes in a cooler loaded with ice packs.

This is what I got

• 6 Tubs of Black Truffle Butter
• 2 Tubs of Duck Fat
• Free-Range Australian Lamb Shoulder
• Whole Muscovy Duck

I was totally thrilled with all of my purchases. We love the truffle butter melted on top of a steak. We slow-roasted the lamb shoulder and had meals for days – it was delicious. Potatoes roasted in the duck fat – heaven!

I had really big plans for the duck though, and stretched it just about as far as I could. I started by butchering it (I watched Alton Brown butcher one and took notes)

 

I’ve got a bowl of scraps and the carcass in the back. 2 breasts, 2 wings, 2 legs/thighs, and a big pile of duck fat. I started with the fat.

It went in a heavy bottom pot just covered with water over medium heat. The water will all cook out but it helps the fat begin to render.

 

I put the bones in the bottom of my pressure cooker and threw in carrots, celery, onions, rosemary, peppercorns, bay leaves, parsley stems (frozen from last summer), and thyme. Then just barely covered with it water.

Then I dumped all of my salt on the ground.

Fun times.

I clamped on the pressure cooker lid, brought it up to high-pressure, reduced the heat to maintain pressure, and let it rip for 45 minutes before bringing the pressure down naturally.

Meanwhile. I attacked the legs/thighs. They were going to become Duck Confit!

I weighed the legs so that I knew how much salt I’d need to cure them and then mixed together some bay leaves. salt, juniper, cloves, etc.

 

I rubbed the cure all over them and put them in the fridge overnight.

Next, the breasts – soon to be Duck Prosciutto!  I covered the bottom of a glass dish with kosher salt, put the breasts in, and then covered them with more salt.  Into the fridge for 24 hours went this one as well.  

About 40 minutes had passed since I started rendering the duck fat. Most of the water had simmered out and the skin was almost crispy so I let it go a little longer. When they were finally done, I strained out the cracklin’s (they went in the oven with Brussels sprouts later that evening)

 

This is the fat I had left, which got strained through cheese cloth into a jar and then stored in the fridge.

 

At this point the stock was ready so I let it cool a bit and then strained it as well through a cheese cloth lined strainer.

 

At the end of day one (after about 1.5 hours of work), this is what my fridge looked like:

Duck Fat and Duck Stock on the top shelf. Duck confit on top of duck prosciutto on the bottom shelf..

After 24 hours it was time to take the legs and breasts out of their salt cures. As you can see, the legs had released a lot of liquid.  I rinsed them very very very well and then dried them off (but apparently not well enough, more on that later).

 

They got vacuum sealed with some duck fat

 

And I threw them in the sous vide supreme at 165F for 8 hours.  When the time elapsed, I dunked them in an ice bath to chill them before throwing them in the fridge where they stayed for 3 weeks. (Confit is a preservation method, they would have been fine for a few more weeks in the fridge at least)

 

I pulled the breasts out of the salt and rinsed them super clean as well. They got wrapped up in little cheesecloth bundles and tied with string.

 

I weighed them and marked their starting weights on a piece of masking tape along with their target weights. When these guys are fully dried they should lose 30% of their weight in water. I hung them in my basement and waited, checking their weights every few days.  It took just over 2 weeks before they were ready.

 

And here’s what they looked like when I unwrapped them.

 

I sliced it up as thin as I could so we could sample it. Wow! I must insist you all go get yourself some duck breasts and try this yourself. It is so easy and so delicious. Rich and salty and ducky. Yum. We brought it to two parties and got rave reviews, we’ve only got about half a breast left and I’m bummed. Definitely going to be making more of this.

And just this week, we finally decided to eat the duck confit. I pulled it out of the fridge and quickly dunked it in the sous vide supreme just to warm it through and melt the fat. Then I cut open the bag and dumped the whole thing in a cast iron skillet to crisp up the skin.

 

I made a spring risotto by sauteing mushrooms and onions in duck fat, toasting the rice, and then using the duck stock as the liquid to plump the risotto.  I added asparagus in the last 5 minutes or so and then plated the risotto topped with the crispy duck confit.

It was also delicious but the confit was a little on the salty side. I think next time I need to be much more diligent in making sure I get all of the salt off before vacuum sealing it. If I’d confit it in the traditional manner (in a big pot of fat in the oven) the salt wouldn’t have been an issue, but in the sous vide it is. We had a ton of the risotto leftover so the following evening I dunked some turkey drumsticks in the sous vide supreme before work and then shredded them in for dinner.

So, that was my adventure with a duck. I do still have two duck wings vacuum sealed in the freezer because I didn’t know what to do with them yet. I’m thinking I’ll have to get a few more ducks before cooking up all the wings together one day. I definitely think I got my money’s worth and then some out of this quacker!

The Velvet Roof

You’ll remember last time I checked in, I was begging you to vote for Adam’s cocktail in the Pama Home Bar Star competition. Hopefully you’ll be glad to know that Adam won 1st prize in that contest! Unfortunately, 1st prize does not equal grand prize, so instead of a trip to Aspen, we’re getting some Pama swag (cocktail shaker, glasses, blanket, hat, etc.)

Well I’m back to beg again. Adam is now entering the IWSB Star of the Bar contest. Voting only goes till Thursday at noon and there are only 20 entries. The 6 finalists will get a trip to Chicago to demo their cocktail live at the National Restaurant Association IWSB show!

Adam invented this cocktail for the competition and I’m not exaggerating when I say it is my favorite cocktail he’s ever created. It features my homemade black raspberry jam (we just opened our last jar – eek!) and a grind of black pepper floating atop a velvet roof of egg white froth (so you get the aroma of the pepper without getting it stuck in your teeth). I’ve been drinking a lot of them lately while Adam has been perfecting the recipe – in fact, I’m drinking one right now as I asked Adam to make them again so I could snap a photo of the finished product.

I’m going to of course, ask you to go vote for Adam again. It takes 2 seconds (unless you want to stick around and watch the video of him making one!) So if you wouldn’t mind, please head over here and vote for Adam’s The Velvet Roof. Bonus points if you know where he got the name from! http://iwsb.restaurant.org/star_of_the_bar.cfm

Want to make one yourself?  Here’s the recipe:

The Velvet Roof
1oz Broker’s Gin
1oz Aquavit (we used North Shore)
.25oz Gran Classico Bitter Liqueur
1oz Grapefruit Juice (Fresh Squeezed)
.5oz Lemon Juice (Fresh Squeezed)
1 Egg White (it’s how you get the roof)
Large Barspoon of black raspberry jam (or blackberry jam)

Add all ingredients to a cocktail shaker without ice. Shake hard for 10 seconds to emulsify the egg white. Add ice, shake hard for another 10 seconds – you really want to break up the jam. Double strain into a chilled cocktail glass and garnish with a crack of fresh ground black pepper.

It’s a Rosy Jack World

Look at this beautiful cocktail

See all those pretty red bubbles?  What if I told you that when you slurped one into your mouth they exploded into delicious Pama Liqueur? Yup, it’s as awesome as it sounds.

Adam and I created this cocktail for the Pama Home Bar Star contest. OK, it was mostly Adam but I’m giving myself credit because I helped with the chemistry needed to create the Pama caviar (aka “pama”-granate seeds).

We’ve already managed to make it to the top 25 (out of 200+ entries) but now we need your help to get to the top 10. We would absolutely LOVE to win this contest – we’d get to go to Aspen for the Food and Wine classic!! If you’d be so kind, or you’d like the recipe or something, PLEASE click over here:

http://www.pamaliqueur.com/homebarstar/voting.php?show=85

to vote for us! You can vote once every 24 hours and we would be eternally grateful, in fact, we’d even make it for you next time you stop over (FYI, you do have to enter you birthday so that they can validate you are 21 before letting you vote)!  And if you’re wondering about the name, it’s because the cocktail is a bit of a riff on the classic Jack Rose, and one of our favorite bands from the 90’s – the Blake Babies – have an album named “Rosy Jack World”.

‘Pin’spired cards

I’ve been pinning a lot of cards lately and I thought I’d share some that I made recently, ‘pin’spired by my pins. (There’s got to be a better way to say that)

The first card that inspired me is this one by Shari Carroll for heroarts.com

Source: heroarts.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

My experiments with this didn’t turn out too great so I’m going to need to play more but here are my versions so far:

 

 

My next card is a combination of two pins:

   

Source: leascupcakesandsunshine.blogspot.com via Jennifer on Pinterest  Source: mailebelles.blogspot.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

I made this:

I loved the simplicity of this card, in fact I love everything that Maile Belles does!

Source: mailebelles.blogspot.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

I made these:

 

 

And finally, here are a few cards that weren’t inspired by pinterest, but while I was working on the cards above I found these images that I’d stamped and colored years ago and figured it was finally time to make them into cards.

 

I made the backgrounds with alcohol inks. For the one on the left, I smeared alcohol inks on the back of a piece of vellum. For the card on the right, I lightly swirled a felt pad tabbed in alcohol ink on white glossy paper.

If you want to follow me on pinterest you can do so right here. Leave me your pinterest links in the comments so I can follow you too! Have you made anything you were ‘pin’spired by? I wanna see/hear about it!

Valentine’s Dinner

For Valentine’s Day we got home a little early so that we could make our favorite pasta dish, Fresh Ricotta and Egg Ravioli with Sage Brown Butter. (Who am I kidding, it’s one of our favorite dishes period! There’s really nothing like it.)

I paired it with a salad of shaved fennel, brussel sprouts, pea shoots, cranberry. and honeybell orange. And baked a baguette to mop up all the delicious brown butter and egg yolk.

 

Runny yolks get me every time!

For dessert, I made heart-shaped sous vide strawberries.

Cut a notch in the top of each strawberry.

Position the strawberry in an egg slicer as shown above.

Slice and repeat!

And you get a happy little strawberry heart family

They already look pretty perfect but we went a step further by putting them in a sous vide bag with a teaspoon of sugar and a quarter cup champagne, sealed ‘em up and then dropped them in the sous vide at 183F for 15 minutes.  Topped with a bit of freshly whipped cream (spiked with homemade vanilla sugar) and you have a lovely light romantic dessert!

Sous Vide Lobster w/Oyster Mushroom Barley Risotto and Asparagus

This is one of those things that I can’t believe I actually created myself.

It started last night. I ran into the Aldi across the street from work to pick up a few small things and on my way to checkout, I saw these lobster tails.

I know what you’re thinking, I was too… seafood? from Aldi? Are you sure you want to do that. Well I checked the ingredients list on the package. Maine Lobster Tail. That was it. And the price was right – $11 for both. What the heck. I threw ‘em in the cart.

When I got home, this package of dried mushrooms I ordered from Michael Ruhlman’s Open Sky store was sitting on the counter. Adam asked me what on earth I was going to do with them, so I accepted the challenge.

Before I went to bed, I opened the package of oyster mushrooms, poured some white wine(Sauvignon Blanc) over them, weighed ‘em down with pie weights to keep them submerged, and threw ‘em in the fridge to rehydrate overnight.

  

Tonight when I got home from work I pulled out some homemade chicken stock from the freezer and warmed it in a pan and drained the oyster mushrooms (reserving the soaking wine) and dried them on a paper towel.

 

I cut up an onion and removed the lobster meat from their shells. I threw half the onions in one saucepan with some butter and the lobster shells. This pan will be the sauce eventually.

 

I put the other half of the onions in a second pan with olive oil and butter. I chopped up the drained oyster mushrooms and added them to the sauce pan after the onions softened.

 

I measured out a half cup of pearl barley and added it to the onions. In the sauce pan, I sprinkled everything with a bit of flour.

 

I ladled in a half cup of the warmed chicken stock and added it to the pearl barley. I added the reserved wine soaking liquid from the mushrooms to the sauce pan. As the stock cooked down out of the barley pan, I added in another half cup. I repeated this process about 6-8 times until all of the stock was incorporated into the pearl barley ‘risotto’.

 

Meanwhile, I vacuum sealed the lobster tails with a half stick of butter, sliced up some spinach, and pre-heated the sous vide supreme to 59.5 degrees Celsius (about 140 F) Not pictured is Adam who snapped the ends off the asparagus, peeled them, tossed them with olive oil, salt, and pepper and threw them in a 400 degree oven for 25 minutes.

 

After the sauce reduced by about half, I pulled out the lobster shells, stirred in a squirt of tomato paste and some half and half. As you can see, the barley is plumping up nicely.

 

When I thought everything else was 15 minutes to being done, the lobster tails went for a bath in the Sous Vide Supreme. I took most of the mushrooms out of the sauce pan and transferred the rest of the sauce and mushrooms to a smaller pan, using my immersion blender to blend it to a sort of smooth, sort of chunky consistency.

 

The mushrooms I pulled out of the sauce got added to the risotto as did the spinach, just minutes before I was ready to plate.

 

I cut some slices of a sage compound butter that I had frozen this fall and stirred it, cube by cube, into the sauce. The butter poached lobster came out of the sous vide. We reserved the butter for another use (I’m thinking seafood bisque)

 

Then I plated (Two different ways, I was trying to be creative).

I didn’t plan this meal ahead of time, in fact, I wanted to make mashed potatoes with it but I didn’t have any potatoes in my cupboard. The barley was a last minute replacement. Everything came from the pantry or an earlier in the week grocery store trip. And it was so good! So much flavor. I didn’t provide a ‘recipe’ because I have no clue how much of anything I used… I know that 2/3 of the wine bottle was gone before we sat down to eat and I didn’t drink any while we were cooking… so there’s a lot of wine in this dish. I guess I won’t turn my nose up at Aldi seafood next time so long as it inspires creativity.

Dinner at EL ideas

It’s been a long time since I’ve lugged my camera to a restaurant to take pictures of my meal. But I was so excited that we managed to score reservations at EL ideas that I dusted her off and toted her along (also, I’d heard they were camera friendly).

Reservations are rough to get because there are only 14 chairs at EL. Not tables, chairs. When you make your reservations (and pre-pay by the way) you are emailed instructions.

• Don’t be late. Dinner service starts promptly for all guests, if you show up late, you get whatever course is currently being served.
• No dress code
• BYOB. No corkage fee. They send you pairing suggestions such as a sparkling wine for the first few courses, a medium bodied white for most of the rest. We also chose to bring several beers and a bottle of 12-year Calvados from France.
• They’re off the beaten path and cabs don’t come by so if you let them know you’ll need it, they will rent a towncar to drive you home.
• Food allergies/dietary preferences can not be catered too.

People were nervous about being late I believe so most everyone arrived 10-15 minutes early. You are greeted by the sole front-of-house staff, Bill. Among other things, he is in charge of the music (think really fun 80s cover songs, tv theme songs, remixed hits), the chalkboard drawings, and chilling/serving your beverage of choice. Bill is awesome.

 

The playlist running off the laptop, the Aqua Teen Hunger Force chalkboard drawing that Bill spent 4 hours on, and the BYOB table – somehow he kept straight who brought what

You are seated in a small dining room overlooking the kitchen and invited to come into the kitchen to watch, take pictures, even help plate and serve!

Everyone at EL is so friendly and warm. You feel as if you are being welcomed into the home of a friend for the most amazing dinner party of your life.

plating everything bagel

The food is so beautiful and

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delicious. After everyone receives their plate (which happens very quickly as all three of the chefs are serving and there are only 14 people to serve anyway) the chef who created the dish comes out to explain their inspiration and the ingredients.

 

crab sunchokes/grapefruit/pink pepper

chicken salad gherkin/celery/mayo

everything bagel gravlox/cream cheese/cucumber

roe radish/katsoubushi/tapioca

 

bay scallop cauliflower/leeks/perigord truffle
The camera refused to focus on one of the most beautiful and delicious dishes. The photo on the right shows what my plate looked like when I finished it though.

I just love the look of the Buddha’s Hand

Mise en place

 

Beginning to plate the foie and the black bass

black bass salsify/onion/aged sherry

foie gras kohlrabi/buddha’s hand/verjus

snail grenobloise/celery root/chard

 

plating is an artwork at EL ideas

pata negra brussels sprouts/butternut squash/anise hyssop

plating the pork course

pork cornbread/hot sauce/mustard greens

 

carmelizing the marshmallows for the final course

veal & lobster parsnip/cabbage/apple

citrus meyer lemon/tangerine/passion fruit

 

Phil makes the french press coffee while Adam enjoys some in the kitchen along with a truffle

s’mores chocolate/marshmallow/graham cracker

At this point I had planned to list my favorite courses. But I realized I’d put nearly the entire menu in that category so it won’t be much use. I will say the single course that didn’t work for us was the pata negra. The ham was fantasic, but it was paired with root beer flavors of which I’m not a huge fan.

If you’re spending nearly $200 a person (with tax/tip) on dinner you expect the food to be this good. What you don’t normally get at other fine dining restaurants in Chicago is the warmth, the fun, the laughs, and the overall experience that EL ideas provides. Reservations are tough to get, and will only get harder the more people hear about this place. The menu is constantly evolving, to the point where if we went back next month there will not be a single course we’ll recognize. Sure is going to make it hard to stay away from this gem for long!

Homemade Ginger Liqueur (in less than 3 hours!)

UPDATE: Tried again with Brandy - way better! See bottom of post.

 Koval Distillery here in Chicago makes an organic Ginger Liqueur that I've come to call "crack". It is delicious and once I open a bottle, it's hard to put it down. I like it either on the rocks or with a splash of club soda.

Last weekend, we started a few batches of Limoncello and Pompelmocello (grapefruit flavored) and it made me wonder... what else could I make this way. My mind went immediately to my "crack" so I began researching ginger liqueur recipes, all of which required 2 weeks to infuse. But you see, I'm out of "crack". And I don't want to wait 2 weeks for more. Then I remembered reading about doing infusions en sous vide. And how it can cut down infusion times from 2 weeks to 2 hours. Meaning with cooling and prep time, I could probably be enjoying some homemade ginger liqueur in just 3 hours.

You can't vacuum seal liquids in a traditional foodsaver type vacuum sealer. You can only do that in the commercial $1000+ chamber sealers. So in order to seal the liquids you need food-grade plastic bags (that are safe when heated) like these from Sous Vide Supreme, and then you can use the Archimedes principle to displace the air. But I didn't have any. What I did have was one of these  Lekue 1 Liter Fresh Bags. They are reusable and dishwasher safe but I'll be honest, they are pretty tricky to seal while getting the extra air out.

Anyway, here's how you make ginger liqueur in under 3 hours!

Ingredients

• 3.5 oz fresh ginger
• 375 ml vodka
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 cup water

Pre-heat the Sous Vide Supreme to 135 degrees F.

Peel and grate the ginger

add it to the bag

Top it off with the vodka.

Remove all air from the bag  and add it to the Sous Vide Supreme. I used the rack to weight it down just to make sure it wouldn't float.

Set the timer for 2 hours. When the time is almost up, make the simple syrup by adding 1 cup of water and 1 cup of sugar to a saucepan. (I like to use this kettle because it has a spout for easy pouring)

Bring to a simmer, stirring until all sugar is dissolved. About 5 minutes. Remove from heat.

When the timer goes off (or anytime after, nothing bad will happen if you leave it in for longer), take out the infused vodka.

Prepare a bottle and line a funnel with a coffee filter (or double layer of cheese cloth)

Filter the mixture into the bottle

And then add the simple syrup to taste. If you like it sweet, add all of the syrup, I personally used a little less.  It won't really taste right until it's chilled though so I would add about 75% of the syrup, throw it in the fridge, when it's chilled taste it, then decide if you want to add the rest.

Your liqueur is done. Again, I prefer to drink it over ice or with a splash of club soda. 

Things to try:

• Use higher proof liquor to make it more shelf stable. I'll be keeping this one in the fridge since it's probably only about 40 proof. Will probably require the addition of more syrup or water.
• Use more ginger. This one has a really nice bite on the end but I can never get enough ginger so I think next time I'm going to try to add even more.
• Don't have a sous vide machine? Throw the vodka/ginger in a jar and let steep for 2 weeks instead. Then filter and add the syrup. 

UPDATE:

Ok, I tried again since this was so easy. This time I used Brandy instead of Vodka, 4.5 oz of ginger instead of 3.5oz, and a little less simple syrup. I like it soooo much better! So my new recommended recipe is this:

4.5 oz fresh ginger

375 ml brandy (I used Presidente Brandy. It's an awesome value)

.75 cup sugar

1 cup water

Follow the procedure outlined above, adding the simple syrup to taste. Like I said, I LOVE the bite of fresh ginger so this may be a little heavy handed for some, but for me - Oh Em Gee (I don't get that, why did we decide to elongate OMG? I'm assuming it's to stress our emotional reaction so I'm leaving it 'cause I'm excited) Yup, making this with brandy is something I believe I will be doing on a fairly regular (weekly?) basis!

Here is a (really crappy cell phone) side by side photo of the vodka based vs. the brandy based:

The brandy-based is a lot darker, but man, I LOVE the flavor so much more! Make it with Brandy! Heck, make it with vodka too, do your own comparison... brew a half batch of each and decide for yourself.

Well...since I was talking so much about Sous Vide

While checking out black friday deals from the comfort of my couch I saw that Sous Vide Supreme is giving away a free vacuum sealer when you buy the Sous Vide Supreme Demi (Which is the one that I have). This is an awesome deal, especially if you are looking for an amazing gift for that special aspiring chef loved one. Check it out:

See how I use mine here or here.

What I've been cooking

I've been pretty crummy about posting lately but that's because I've been pretty busy cooking.  Our friends bought us a Sous Vide Supreme as a late wedding gift (which I talked about here) and it's inspired me to want to cook every night.

Check out some of the things I've made recently:

Sous Vide Belly of Pork with Soy Bean and Udon Stir Fry with Momokawa Diamond Sake

We sous vide the pork belly Tuesday night, chilled it, then seared it Thursday night. Stir fry of shitaki mushrooms, udon noodles, Swiss Chard (from the backyard), and shelled edamame. Reduction of soy sauce, red wine, garlic, and bay leaves. Based of a recipe I found here. 

It wasn't perfect (but oh so close). But it was pretty damn good and we learned a ton. It was also pretty quick (besides the 12 hour sous vide and 2 day rest), less than an hour of work total. We'll definitely be making this again.

 

Sesame-Crusted Tuna with Ponzu Sauce over a fennel-frond, grapefruit, avocado, and cucumber salad.

I'm proud of the way this dish came together because it was totally unplanned and just thrown together with stuff we had in the fridge. All the flavors matched beautifully. But the tuna was originally for Wednesday's dinner so it wasn't the freshest and dragged the meal down.

 

Sous Vide Seared Scallops and Oyster Mushrooms over a Soy-Ginger Butter Sauce.

At $25 a plate for a homemade meal (not counting the wine), the most expensive thing I've ever cooked. Delicious. Wine: 2010 Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc from Kim Crawford, New Zealand. Recipe from Bon Appetit.

The scallops were beautiful, but $3 a piece. Didn't want to take any chances over cooking them so we washed and dried them, and sprinkled with salt and pepper, then vacuum packed them with olive oil and sous vide them.  We dropped the bag in ice water to quickly cool them before searing them (again, to avoid over cooking). The Soy-Ginger Butter sauce was ridiculous. This was also my first time dealing with Oyster Mushrooms.

 

Sous Vide and Skillet-Roasted Chicken over Barley Risotto with Acorn Squash and Spinach topped with a pan gravy.

Recipe: from Bon Appetit (adapted, I didn't have farro so I used Barley, I made a pan gravy instead of the herb Pistou the recipe makes. I had leftover spinach so I didn't buy kale.)

This is one of the best meals I have ever made in my life. You start by splitting a whole chicken in half and then vacuum packing it in olive oil and a ton of herbs and letting it marinate over night. The next day, you throw it in the sous vide for a few hours (I did 4 but I'm sure it's fully cooked in 2). Then you crisp the skin in a skillet and throw the whole pan in the oven. In the meantime, you make a risotto type dish with Barley and roasted acorn squash. The flavors are incredible, the meat is so moist and tender... Make this!!!!

 

Greens, Dates, Walnut, and Bacon Lardon salad (from a friends' homemade bacon), Porterhouse steak done sous vide at 133 for 6 hours and then pan seared in the rendered bacon fat. Regular 'ole baked potato.

Our friend makes his own bacon and always brings us in a slab. I cut it into lardons to crisp, I then made a warm vinagarette using the bacon fat in place of oil. Awesomesauce! 6 hours sounds like a long time but remember, the meat is just sitting in the water bath, you are doing no work. It's like a crock pot, you can go to work and leave it and it'll be fine when you get home. No overcooking is possible because it can't ever get above the temperature you have the bath set of (so 133 degrees for a medium rare steak).

 

Rib-Eye, Truffled Broccoli, Garlic Rosemary Potatoes.

All cooked sous-vide over 2 days, topped with a red-wine sauce. Man, would you look at that edge to edge red meat!  The only way you can achieve that kind of perfect consistency is by cooking it sous-vide. I undercooked the potatoes.. they weren't so good. I have yet to perfect my sous-vide veggies.

 

Homemade Pasta, Spinach Pesto, Garden Tomatoes, and Herbs with Garlic Bread

I made the bread and pasta from scratch. I mixed the pasta dough before work and left it in the fridge to relax until I got home. I then used my kitchenaid attachment to roll it out. I always keep bread dough in the fridge (using the Artisan Bread in 5 minutes a day recipe) The tomatoes and herbs are from my backyard. The pesto was made and frozen when my basil was in its prime a few months ago. This dish is divine.

 

Rabbit Two Ways over Celery Root puree w/poached apples. Served with Lagunitas Bavarian Styled Doppelweizen. The most perfect pairing in existence.

The two ways: The loins were cooked sous vide, then bacon wrapped and seared.  The hindquarters were braised in apple cider. Based on this recipe. This was my first time making celery root puree. I'm in love!!!!!! (Also my first time cooking rabbit)The apples were poached in the braising liquid. The greens are watercress.

 

Mussels and Frites w/homemade garlic aioli and Goose Island Matilda

I had just learned to make my own aioli from scratch (who knew it only took 5 minutes from start to clean up!) so was looking for ways to use it. This is an awesome 20 minute meal.

 

Sous Vide Short Ribs over Celery Root Puree & Peas.

I told you I loved that celery root puree. Also, these short ribs were f'ing ridiculous. Cooked to perfection over 72 hours to 134 degrees in my Sous Vide Supreme . Believe it or not, this dish took about 30 minutes to put together.  I bought a bunch of short ribs when they were on sale a few weeks ago. As soon as I got them home I seasoned them with salt and pepper, vacuum packed them in groups of 4 and threw them in the freezer. So when I want to cook them, all I have to do is throw them in the water bath and walk away for 3 days. Obviously the peas steam in about 5 minutes and the celery root puree takes about 20.  A quick sear of the short ribs takes 2 minutes as well. See, you can have an amazing dinner in less than 30 minutes and it can be completely from scratch!

 

This last one I made at a friends house so they are crappy camera phone photos but this is also the very best thing I've ever made so I'm posting them anyway.  Here I am making them:

And cracking them open.

Ricotta and Egg Yolk Ravioli

Get the recipe right here, and make this immediately. Everyone you serve it to will love you forever. You only need one per person as an appetizer. 2 is good for a main course.

 

So, that's what I've been up to. Has anyone else been making anything amazing? Does anyone have a sous vide machine yet? I'm always looking for blog recommendations, especially those cooking sous vide, I always need more ideas for my new toy!

Honeycrisp Breakfast Sausage

Pork Butts were on sale, honeycrisp apples are in season, and with the frost soon approaching, our sage wasn't going to last too much longer in the garden. Seemed to be the perfect time to whip up a big 'ole batch of breakfast sausage.  You should too! Here's what you'll need:

Ingredients:
10 lbs Pork Shoulder (aka Pork Butt)
6 large honeycrisp (or similar) apples
1 sweet onion
1.5-2 cups fresh sage leaves
8 tsp kosher salt
4 tsp freshly ground black pepper
4 tsp fennel seeds (Optional)
2 Tbsp. vegetable oil

Before you start, take your meat grinder attachments and stick them in the freezer. Also take a large metal bowl and stick it in the freezer or fridge. 20 minutes before you grind the meat, stick it in the freezer as well.

Begin by peeling, coring, and dicing the apples. I got to try out my new Pinzon Apple Peeler, Slicer, and Corer. I bought in on a whim because last time we made this sausage, prepping the apples was the worst part. This thing is a dream! I had all of the apples done in probably 5 minutes. Highly recommend it even if you only peel apples once a year. The machine slices them horizontally while it's peeling them so then all you have to do is give it a few chops in the vertical directions.

Peel and chop the onion too

In a large skillet, heat the oil over medium heat.  Throw in the onions and saute until soft and translucent (3-4 minutes)

Add in the apples and continue to cook until the apples begin to soften (but you still want them to be kind of crunchy) and brown slightly.

Set aside in a large bowl to cool. They need to be completely cool before you mix it in the sausage so consider putting the bowl in an ice bath or in the fridge or maybe even doing this step the day before.

Go to your backyard and pick a huge bunch of sage leaves. We grow regular and golden sage. If you don't grow it, try to find the fresh stuff in the supermarket. Use 1/2 the amount of dried sage as a last resort.

Stack up a bunch of leaves and chiffonade them.

then dice the chiffonades.

Now we need to crush the fennel seeds. You can do it with a mortar and pestle if you want, or try to crack them with a knife, but I've found the easiest thing is to slightly grind them in a spice (aka coffee) grinder. I keep this one just to grind spices and it is awesome. (Just before I ground the fennel, I used it to grind the peppercorns that were going into the sausage too. I wasn't worried about cross contamination because it would all end up in the same spot, otherwise I would have cleaned it in between).

You aren't creating a powder or a dust, you just want to slightly crush the seeds to release their aromas and flavors. Just a few pulses until you get something that looks like this:

Some people hate fennel so you can skip this step if you want.

Now it's time to grind the meat. The secret to the perfect textured sausage is to make sure none of the fat melts prematurely. This is why at the very beginning we froze our grinder attachments, bowl, and made sure the meat was as cold as possible (without being frozen).

We had two pork shoulders, if you do too leave the second one in the fridge while you work on the first. Using your grinder of choice (I use the kitchenaid food grinder attachment), cut the meat into strips and then pass through the grinder. Don't throw out the fat, grind the fat, you need the fat. You are looking for a ratio of 20% fat to 80% meat.

Once all of the meat is ground, cover it with plastic wrap and stick it in the fridge for 20-30 minutes. Remember, we want it to be super cold before we mix in the rest of the ingredients since the mixing process will warm it up.

While the meat is chilling, retrieve the apple mixture and add in the spices

and the sage

Mix well

After the meat is well chilled, dump the apple mixture into the meat bowl

And use your hands to combine. Don't overmix, remember, you don't want to melt that fat!

Once the meat mixture is combined, it's time to make breakfast! No really, this is a crucial step. Before you do anything with the sausage you need to cook up a little patty to make sure the flavor is right. We were starving for breakfast at  this point so we threw 2 patties in a cast iron skillet.

Added them to a toasted baguette and topped them with a fried egg.

Divine!!!! But we were glad we did the taste test because we decided it definitely needed more salt and a tad more pepper. (Recipe above was adjusted to account for this). Since the salt and pepper we were adding didn't have the benefit of being mixed with the other ingredients you need to dissolve them in a tiny bit (tablespoon) of water and then mix thoroughly.

Then it was time to package up the sausage. We opted not to stuff it in casings since we figured we'd mostly want to make patties. I tried a few methods of storing them.

First I laid out some plastic wrap

And dropped a bunch of meat in the center

And shaped a log

Which I then vacuum packed.

I also tried just throwing the meat in the bottom of a food saver bag

and then kind of forming logs before sealing them.

I think I prefer the shape of the ones I did in plastic wrap better.

The plan is to pull out a log when we need one, cut off a few slices, and then seal it back up. We're also going to try to sous vide a log as is in the bag, removing them from the water bath, slicing, and quickly searing them in a screaming hot pan. We're actually going to try that at the Michigan/Northwestern tailgate next weekend so I'll be sure to update with the results.

So what do you think? Have you ever made your own sausage before? Thinking about trying it?

Abeja Libre Cocktail

Ingredients

2 oz Pisco (Italian Style)
.75 oz Barenjager Honey Liqueur
.5 oz fresh-squeezed lemon juice
4 sage leaves
1 small egg white

Directions

1. In a cocktail shaker, lightly muddle three sage leaves with lemon juice, bruising the leaves but not chopping them
2. Add pisco, Barenjager and egg white
3. Dry shake (no ice) for 10 seconds
4. Add ice, shake again
5. Double strain into chilled cocktail coupe
6. Slap remaining sage leaf between palms and place on top of the froth

 

This is the Abeja Libre Cocktail that Adam invented this evening. It's a bit of a riff on a Pisco Sour and mighty tasty.

Our First Sous Vide Dinner!

We have these amazing friends. Quinn, Kristin, Harper, and Dave, knowing how much we love cooking, decided to get us a Sous Vide machine for our wedding. They thought we needed one. And we didn't know it at the time, but they were right, we did.

It showed up about a week ago and we tried a few soft-boiled eggs in it (they were great), but we hadn't tried a piece of meat until tonight.

In case you aren't familiar with Sous Vide, I'll explain quickly. Sous Vide means "Under Vacuum". If you vacuum seal something and submerge it in water held at a constant temperature, it will never get hotter than that water temperature. So, if you want a piece of medium rare meat (134 degrees Fahrenheit), you seal a piece of meat, drop it in water that's held at a constant 134 degree temperature, and after an amount of time, the meat will emerge perfectly cooked. So after 45 minutes, a 1 inch thick steak is perfectly medium rare. But after 4 hours, it's also perfectly medium rare. In fact, you can keep it in the water for up to 8 hours and it will only get better and never be a degree over medium rare.

So why didn't we all own one of these machines?  Because up until a year or so ago, machines that could accomplish this were completely un-affordable for the home cook. I'm talking several thousands of dollars. It's just recently that they've come down in price. And they are still really expensive but they're down around several hundred dollars now and if you are really into perfectly cooked meat, this is the way to do it.

Ok, enough talking.

We started with a super cheap piece of meat. This is a top round steak. It cost $7 and easily serves 4.  But what makes sous-vide so awesome is that you can take the cheapest cut of meat and make it taste like filet.

I started by well seasoning (with salt and pepper) both sides of the steak. Then I vacuum sealed the steak with 4 cloves of garlic, 4 sprigs of rosemary, 4 sprigs of thyme, and 2 tablespoons of butter. (I actually did this as soon as we got home from the grocery store yesterday and just threw it in the fridge this way)

Today, I set my Sous Vide Supreme for 133 degrees (they recommend 134 but since I knew we were going to sear the meat later, I opted for a tiny bit undercooked).

Then I dropped the meat in and ran out to a 6:30 beauty salon appt I had.

When I got back about 45 minutes later, it looked like this

 

it's really not this pretty at this point. But it was technically done cooking. I could have taken it out right then and it would have been delicious, but I still had to finish our sides.

We had a ton of cherry tomatoes in the garden so I worked in a Cherry Tomato and Blue Cheese Salad and I'd also just picked up a bag of fingerling potatoes from the farmers market so I made my very favorite potato recipe. It's a variation on this one from Martha Stewart, but instead of salt and vinegar, I add fresh rosemary and garlic from the garden along with plenty of sea-salt.

When these the sides were just about done, I had Adam go heat up a skillet on the grill burner. I removed the bag from the machine, cut it open, pulled the meat out and handed it to Adam on a platter. It looked like this:

Kinda gross, huh?  Gotta be patient dude, it'll get awesome soon.

Out on the piping hot grill, (after a small splash of oil) it soon looked like this (by the way, you could totally do this on your stove, we just were trying to keep the inevitable smoke out of the kitchen).

After 30 seconds (literally) we flipped it.

After a 10 minute rest under foil, it was time for the moment of truth.  We crossed our fingers and Adam began slicing.

Oh my God. Do you see that edge-to-edge pinkness? The perfect medium rare across the entire steak? The beautiful crust we achieved by a 30 second sear in a hot pan on each side. And do you remember that this is a super cheap, $7  hunk of meat?

Yeah, this was an absolutely delicious dinner and probably the best cut of beef we've ever made. Adam thought the tomato salad was a bit too rich so he ran out to the back of the garden.

And came back with some Swiss Chard that he rinsed off and then tore up into our tomato salad. (sorry no pics of the finished salad)

When we got back in, Adam sliced up the remainder of the steak, I baked a homemade baguette, and we're going to make steak, tomato, and blue cheese sandwiches for lunch tomorrow.

Can you even begin to get over that perfect edge-to-edge color?  Or how awesome Quinn, Kristin, Dave, and Harpster are for hooking us up with this machine?

Tomorrow we're making Olive Oil Poached Salmon.

Harvest Monday

Every Monday, Daphne's Dandelions hosts Harvest Monday. All of the blogging gardeners post their take for the week and I've never played. Because frankly, my harvest is wimpy compared to theirs. But today, I got my first tomato and my first cucumber so I had to join in!

I harvested Swiss Chard, a Boston Pickling Cucumber, a Honey Bunch Tomato, a teeny tiny Black Pearl tomato, 2 sugar snap peas (ha! I'm pretty sure it's my last 2).

Loads of basil and parsley

The basil and parsley got added to the blender with a clove of garlic, salt, pepper, balsamic, and olive oil. Blended up it became a hybrid chimichurri/pesto sauce to top our steaks.

The swiss chard, tomatoes, peas, and cucumbers became a salad dressed with balsamic and topped with homemade croutons.

Dinner consisted of bacon-wrapped filets topped with the chimichurri/pesto, truffle fries (ore-ida fries tossed with truffle oil and sea salt), and my salad.

While dinner was cooking, I made a harvest cocktail too!

 

I started with some mint and a few slices of that cucumber.

 

I added them to a jar with a teaspoon of sugar, a dash of ango bitters, and a squeeze of lime juice. Then I muddled. In went two ounces of gin and some ice, stirred well, topped with club soda. 

Garnished with some spanked mint and a cucumber slice. So refreshing!!!

Our New Patio Set

I had been searching for the perfect patio set for 2 years. I couldn't decide between a couch/sectional set or a dining set. I really wanted the perfect combination of the comfort of a couch AND the usefulness of a dining set. As far as I could tell, there was no such thing. So when we received money and gift cards for our wedding, I promised I'd set aside some of it to buy us a new patio set, just as soon as I could find one I loved.

And finally I found it - it does exist! The perfect combination of sectional and dining set. It's comfortable, all-weather wicker, from Target. To make the price a little more palatable, I went through ebates to get an extra 3% back ($30! Not bad!), plus we managed to get $40 for our old one (which was more than a little rusty) through craigslist.

It arrived a few weeks ago and so we've had a few opportunities to put it to use.

Here is the first dinner we ate at it:

But let's rewind a bit so I can show you more of that delicious dinner.   I was growing Pak Choi in my window boxes and it was starting to bolt.

So I cut it all down (isn't it gorgeous?)

 

And we sauteed it out on the grill with sesame oil and soy sauce

It was fantastic and I'm so sad it's all gone. Since it won't grow in the summer heat, I'm definitely going to grow more in the fall. Meanwhile, Adam grilled these bacon wrapped filets:

We also had fries dressed in truffle oil. The meal was accompanied with a Predator Zinfadel. We loved our first dinner on our new table :)

It also got exercised at our recent 3rd annual Sausagefest Memorial Day party. Adam and I make 25 pounds of various sausages (italian, spinach/chicken/feta, sage/apple/cheddar breakfast) over the weekend, everyone comes over to eat it, and at the end of the night, we throw a projector up in the backyard and watch a movie under the stars (movie tradition inherited from our Lost Finale party last year). We were super impressed with the amount of people it could sit. The benches that claimed to sit 1 person comfortably sat 2 and those that were supposed to sit 2 sat at least 3, meaning we can easily accommodate 10 people for an outdoor dinner.

See the mason jars holding the candles hanging from the umbrella? I got the idea from Martha Stewart:

Source: marthastewart.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

 

Ok, hers looks better... but here's a few more pictures of mine anyway :P

And here's our hot tub being put to good use as a buffet!

I forgot to take pictures of the movie watching set up so picture 14 bag chairs + 2 princess chairs around a big screen (pretty much just like our Lost Finale party setup).

So a huge thank you to everyone who gifted us cash for our wedding, we love our new patio set and think it brings such a sense of warmth to the backyard. And for anyone who is curious, I bring the cushions in when we are not using the set to prolong it's life as long as possible.

PTI Blog Hop: June 2011

It's been a long time since I've played around with a Blog Hop but since I'm home sick instead of at the Green Music Festival with Adam, I decided to jump in.

Nichole gave us this photo as inspiration:

{photo credit}

I loved the way the colors all blended into each other so I focused on that as my inspiration. I took a piece of vellum and used Alcohol Ink in stripes, blending as I went all over it. This left me with a full sheet of striped paper so I cut it into quarters and used it as the background for 3 cards.

The artist in me really wanted to add some buttons to this card but I am sick of my recipients telling me they arrive damaged due to the buttons getting stuck in the machines at the post office so I restrained myself and went embellishment free.

All of the white stamped designs are embossed (after letting the alcohol ink background dry for a few hours).

This one uses Background Basics: Stars and Tiny Tags.

For this one I stamped various circles from Borders & Corners: Circle. The sentiment is from an anniversary set a few years ago. I really wish this one had a few buttons :)

Finally, I stamped a bunch of whales (they are so cute!) from Whale Wishes.

The color is off in all of these photos, the olivey green strip of paper is actually "Simply Chartreuse" but I took these pictures at 7pm so it's about all the natural light I could hope for.

Anthro-Inspired Yellow Beaded Necklace & Earrings

I came across this necklace at Anthropologie and thought I might try to make my own version.

Source: anthropologie.com via Jennifer on Pinterest

 

My supplies:

• Chain
• Earring Wire
• Beading Wire
• Round Beads
• Focal Beads
• Wire Snips
• Needle nose Pliers
• Crimp Pliers
• Flat nose pliers
• Clasp
• Jump Rings
• Head pins
• crimp beads

I started with my focal beads. I strung a wire through it and curled both ends into a loop. I did this three times, once for the necklace, and one for each earring.

Then I started on the necklace. I strung two crimp beads, a jump ring, then back through the two crimp beads. Using the crimping pliers, I closed the beads.

Then I just strung the round beads with the focal bead in the middle.

Two more crimp beads and another jump ring.

Here's how the necklace looks finished.

Next I worked on my dangles. I threaded a single bead onto a head pin

Trimmed down the pin and bent it at a 90 degree angle

And used the needle nose pliers to create a loop

 

I cut a bunch of random segments of chain, opened up the loop, strung them on the chain, and closed the loop. I did a bunch of these.

 

I opened up the loop on the focal bead and threaded on all of the chains.

And here's my finished set. Total cost was less than $10 compared to $58 for anthro's, and mine came with earrings!