pretty woman

hi everyone! happy tuesday! i have a bunch to do today so i'm just going to crank this out.

last night i came home with a dinner plan all set; i'd spotted these scotch eggs on tastespotting earlier in the day and decided to make my move. i've always wanted to try these things, and as they require some frying, i figured it'd be best to get them out of my system before it gets so bleeping hot in my kitchen i barely want to cook, much less negotiate with hot, splattery oil. i changed the recipe a bit to suit what i had, and to make it small enough for me & sam. i paired it with these sesame soba noodles and fresh squeezed juice to try to keep it light. a great meal it was, but light it certainly wasn't. don't make this for dinner unless you plan on retreating immediately afterwards to bed to watch a movie. (fortunately, this was exactly what i had in mind.)



vietnamese-ish scotch eggs

4 eggs, soft boiled (put eggs in a pot; boil some water; pour it over them and turn the heat to medium; set a timer for 6 minutes; remove the eggs and plunge them into ice water. peel when cooled.)
1 lb ground pork
2 stalks of lemongrass, chopped
3 small green chillies
4 cloves of garlic
2 inch piece of fresh ginger (skinned)
a spoonful of brown sugar
zest of one lime
fish sauce
salt
1/2 bunch of cilantro
a couple cups of flour
a couple cups of panko
1 egg, beaten

combine the lemongrass, chillies, garlic, ginger, and lime zest in the food processor until quite pulverized. add the brown sugar, then turn on the food processor and stream in fish sauce until it turns into a loose paste. add salt to taste. (beware: this will be pretty spicy. i was talking on the phone when i was making mine and i somehow got chili on my hand and then on my phone and then on my face, and way too much of my conversation became about my face being on fire.) finely chop the cilantro. mix this, the pork, and the paste together well.

now you're going to want to get a piece of saran wrap. grab a piece of the pork about as big as your fist (a little bigger, in the case of my toddlerhands,) and pound it out so it's about 1/2 inch (or less) thick. put the egg on top. caaaaarefully use the saran wrap to envelop the egg in the pork mixture. seal it well and make it as round as possible, then pop it in the freezer until you're ready to use it. repeat 3x.




once you're ready to go, get some oil going in a pan on medium-low heat until it's good and hot. take your eggs and roll them in flour, then egg, then panko and plop 'em in the pan. you want to cook them until they are very dark on each side - 3-4 minutes - and turn so every side is well cooked. repeat. you can keep them warm in the oven; i set them on a drying rack as they came out and put them in at 300.

and voila! they were so tasty - sam had his with some sriracha sauce and i just drank lots of milk to minimize sweating. they are hot and heavy, but so good, and paired with fresh juice and soba noodles it was a pretty great dinner.





aaand an outfit at last! i had to get dressed in a hurry today - i'd planned on tights but it was already over 70 by the time i left my apartment this morning and i was worried i'd overheat. what i should have worried about was wearing newly-thrifted shoes without road-testing them first - my feet hurt so bad after walking to and from the subway this morning that i'm truly not sure how i'll make it home today. and the title of this post doesn't refer to my appearance, but the fact that this dress is straight outta that 1990 julia roberts classic.





dress: thrifted
belt: urban outfitters
shoes: painfully thrifted


all right, that's all from me for now! have a lovely tuesday!

xo audrey

sunday supper

hello hello! i hope everyone had a great weekend. friday night i got dressed up and went out, for the first time in ages; an office i worked in for a year when i first moved to the city is closing its doors for good, so all employees, past and present, met up for the first time in ages and knocked back a few. a jolly good time was had by all, and i poured myself into bed at about 2 am and slept until 11. saturday was a much-needed cleaning day: my bedroom has become a dumping grounds for weeks, and it was piled knee-deep with bags of ribbons, vellum, and invitation stuff, as well as about 38 pairs of shoes, clothing in need of mending, and god knows what else. i sorted through it all, hung all my clothes, and now the bar in my closet is bending to the point that i am starting to worry it'll snap.

and i finally COOKED! glory hallelujah! my little sister sent me a crock pot as an early wedding present (she being the on-top-of-it one in the family,) and i have been so itching to use it to make pulled pork sandwiches that sam has actually had to stop me once or twice. (he: "if it takes 12 hours and you start right now, you'll have to wake up at 3 am to turn it off. how about we just do it tomorrow?") i got it started saturday, though, and last night we had a pulled pork family dinner FEAST. it was awesome. (recipes below.)


ashlee: make sure you get my boobs in the picture. me: don't worry. they refuse to be left out.





pulled pork

prep time - 12-18 hours

3 lbs pork tenderloin (i've read that shoulder works just as well at 1/3 of the cost; this is just what they had at our market.)
1 large yellow onion
your favorite barbecue sauce (i wanted to make my own, but sam swears by kc masterpiece)
your favorite spices: i used fennel, paprika, smoked salt, turmeric, sage
a couple cups of apple juice

do a rough chop of the yellow onion and put it in the crock pot. rub the tenderloin with the spices, or just a rub you like if you have one; put it in the crockpot and add more spices, if you like (i don't measure these, just do 'em to your fancy.) pour about a half bottle of barbecue sauce on the pork, and then enough apple juice to almost cover it. cover the pot, put on low, and let it go for 8-12 hours. (it'll start to blacken; it's ready to pull when it falls apart easily when forked or picked up.) pick out the big piece of meat and put it in a bowl; strain out the juices, save the onions, and dump them in the bowl with the meat. now start pulling. you just want to shred the meat as much as possible. it's a pretty visceral activity, really. once you've got it really well shredded, dump it back in the crock pot and add the remainder of the barbecue sauce. turn it back on low and let it go until you're ready to serve.

pickled onions

prep time - 10 minutes
(best if you let them sit for an hour or so before using.)

2 large red onions
about 1/2 cup white wine vinegar
1 t mustard seeds
4-5 allspice berries
4-5 coriander seeds
some ground fennel (okay, yes, i just put this in everything.)
a few pinches of sea salt
plenty of fresh ground pepper
pink peppercorns (if you've got 'em)

thinly slice the red onions and put them in a bowl. add everything else and mix well. let it sit. ta-da! the longer you wait, the better they'll get; these'll keep for a couple of weeks if well sealed.




i gorged myself on momofuku last thursday, and one of the best things i had was a brussels sprouts dish with thick cut bacon and carmelized apple. i took a stab at it last night and it was sooo delicious; i subbed duck prosciutto for the bacon, since i had some that i needed to use (because i'm a weirdo) and the one thing i'd change was the way i cooked the brussels sprouts - steam them, don't boil them like silly me - they get too wet that way.

brussels sprouts with duck prosciutto and apple

about 3 cups of brussels sprouts, cut into quarters (or half if they are really small)
3/4 cup or so of thick cut bacon, duck prosciutto, or whathaveyou cut into lardons (thick dice)
one apple, peeled and cut into dice

steam the brussels sprouts for about 4 minutes, until they are starting to get tender. at this point i would try to get them as dry as you can - maybe squeeze them in a towel to release any residual liquid. set aside.

get a good, steel-bottomed pan going on medium high heat. once it's good and hot, add the bacon and cook it until it's good and crispy. add the brussels sprouts and toss them around for awhile to get them nice and bacon-y. add the apples, toss around, and then take off heat and serve with salt and pepper.



and lastly, for dessert, i made little almond lemon-curd and blackberry tartlets. super easy (so long as you have lemon curd in your fridge begging to be used, as i do,) and SO tasty.



almond tart dough (from here)

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, room temperature
2 tablespoons confectioners' sugar
1/2 large egg, beaten
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 cup plus 1 tablespoon almond flour

beat butter and sugar together in mixer until combined. add the egg and mix it just until combined; you may need to help it a long with a spatula. add the flours all at once and mix just until it comes together.

lemon curd: when i made mine, i used this recipe (to use up egg yolks) - it worked perfectly.

so - roll out the almond dough. i used powdered sugar instead of flour for my bench. use a cutter (i think mine was about 3 inches) and a mini cupcake tin to get the mini tart shells; put them in the freezer until they're firm, then bake at 350 degrees for 10-15 minutes, until browned.

in the meantime, clean your blackberries, add a bit of vanilla and some sugar to them and stir until coated.

pipe in the lemon curd and top with a single blackberry. crank the oven to 400 and bake them for about ten minutes, until the curd has set. let them cool for a few minutes. they are great on their own, or you can top them with some ice cream or whipped cream; ashlee whipped up some cream with a bit of powdered sugar, then i poured the juice from the blackberries into it to give it a little flavor.





and today, back to the grind. the highlight of saturday was probably the uconn game; sam and i had intended on going out to watch it and NOT be total hermits, but instead i put on pajama pants and we drank coors light and watched it on his macbook pro. ah, domestic bliss. so today i'm wearing uconn blue and we've promised ourselves to leave our apartment and watch the game in the presence of actual living human beings. it should be a good time.







dress: madewell
brooch: snagged off a necklace, courtesy of accessorize
belt: snagged of a top from the (now defunct?) church & state
socks: american apparel

shoes: madewell

that's all from me for now. thanks for reading, happy monday!

xo audrey