Green Goddess Dressing Attempt

Back during my culinary school days we spent a day or two learning about salads and salad dressings.  Stations were assigned to make different kinds of dressings and salads and I remember one group making a dressing called "Green Goddess Dressing,"  It was a tart, zesty beautiful green dressing and was the favorite dressing in class. 
I was skimming through a "Cooking Light" magazine and found a recipe for a lighter version of the dressing.

Parsley

Garlic, Lemon, and Chives

All the ingredients in a blender.  Greek yogurt, light mayo, anchovies, tabasco.

Finished dressing

Boo. It didn't taste as good as I remember it. It probably has to do with the fact that the version I made was low fat and had a thin consistency.  I'll have to go hunt down the old recipe we used in class. 

Las Vegas~Firefly Tapas Kitchen and Bar

Way back in June, Mike and I took a quick trip to Las Vegas to attend my sister's wedding.  I forgot to bring a hand bag that would fit my new camera, so I was not able to take pictures of all the wonderful food we ate.  I did manage to bring my camera to "Firefly Tapas and Kitchen Bar" one night to capture all the yummy food at this bar. 

Stuffed Dates-[bacon-wrapped, smoked almond, red wine reduction, blue cheese]. Everyone loved this dish!

Manchego Mac 'n' Cheese-[Baked w/baby shells]

Thai Beef Salad- seared beef, thai dressing, romaine, tomato, cucumber, ginger

Olives, Sweet Butter, and Crostini's

Filet Mignon Sliders-mini burgers w/Serrano ham, cabrales cheese, caramelized onions

Shrimp Tempura-beer-battered, ponzu dipping sauce

Fried Calamari

Firefly Tapas Kitchen and Bar
3900 Paradise Rd.
Las Vegas
702.369.3971

New York CIty~David Burke's Kitchen

I chose to go to a fancy lunch at "David Burke's Kitchen," which is known for farm-to-table sourced foods with a slight whimsical touch.  He also developed some flavor sprays that provide flavor without the calories. 

 Butter on a slab of salt.

 Lobster Soup with a lobster dumpling, coconut fennel creme, red watercress

 Salmon Pastrami with horseradish, mustard seeds, beet bellini. I liked how the salmon looked like pastrami slices.

 Spicy Spaghetti with shrimp, zucchini, and basil.  I had a difficult time eating this dish because the sauce had thai basil in it and I felt that the spicy thai basil flavor overpowered the whole dish. 

 Herbed mac and cheese with a prosciutto wrapped egg. 

Mmm...the egg was delicious and perfectly cooked. Mike and I were trying to figure out how a extremely soft boiled egg was wrapped in prosciutto, deep-fried, and it still retained its soft texture. Mike contemplated that the egg was placed in the refrigerator before it was deep-fried. 

 Apple Tart with lemon-thyme ice cream, apple cider caramel, and apple crisp.

I really was not a fan of my entree, but we ended the meal on a positive note. The desserts were delicious. The apple tart felt lighter version of apple pie with it's puff pastry crust.

 Cassis panna cotta with hibiscus meringue and rose jelly.

A good panna cotta goes a long way in our books. Mike and I are not fans of flower-flavored foods, but we didn't mind the hibiscus and rose in this dessert.

David Burke's Kitchen
23 Grand St.
SOHO, NY 10013

(212) 201-9119

New York City~Doughnut Planet, Gruppo Pizza

A couple of years ago, I remember watching a show that highlighted "Doughnut Planet" in New York City. It could have been the Travel Channel's "Fried Food Paradise" show or the Food Network's "The Best Thing I Ever Ate." 

Some of the donut flavors include: blueberry, banana pecan, carrot cake, green tea.  On the episode I watched, I remember them focusing on the peanut butter and jelly donut. The peanut butter and the jelly were all made from scratch.  I think the Doughnut Plant even had a secret patented process to make a filled square donut. 

Look at the unusual assortment of flavors and colored donuts!

Mmmmm...peanut butter and jelly doughnut! It's really a grape jelly filled donut with a peanut butter glaze. 

Mike and I concluded that we would chose Round Rock donuts over this donut, but I do not think it's fair to compare a gourmet donut to a hot, fresh, plain yeast donut.  It's also difficult to compare a $3-4 donut to one that is $0.70. 

Doughnut Plant
379 Grand St
New York, NY 10002
(212) 505-3700

Mike and I wanted to eat pizza in New York City and one of our friends that lives in New York recommended "Gruppo." I bought the lunch special, which was a drink and two slices of pizza for around $6-7. The pizza was delicious and just the way I like it...thin crust, but thick enough that it has a slight chew to it. 

Funny story about the pizza. I wanted to order one slice with olives and one slice with mushrooms. Did you notice that there is broccoli on the pizza? For some reason my brain did not communicate with my mouth and I ordered broccoli pizza.  (FYI-broccoli is one of my least favorite vegetables, unless it's stir-fried. No mushy broccoli for me).  Mike even looked at me funny, repeated, "broccoli?" and I said "yeah."  Dumb, dumb Lauren. I blame it on the heat and getting lost finding restaurants.   

Gruppo Pizza

186 Avenue B , Bet. 12th and 11th St.
NY, NY 10009
212-995-2100

New York City~Momofuku Milk Bar

One of the places I had to check out in New York was David Chang's Milk Bar.  I had read about the compost cookies, the crack pie, and all the wonderful creations at his shop. 

If you've been keeping up with all of Mike and my travels, you know that we have a tendency to get lost...A LOT. Especially when the maps I download on my ipod touch do not allow us to mark exact locations.  We were walking for what seemed like forever. The heat was getting to us and I was getting grumpy. We finally got to his corner and say the signature peach of momofuku.  I peered in and saw people eating noodles.

Mike asked, "Do you want to go and eat pork buns and noodles?"  I through a small fit and cried, "No, I do not want to eat at Ssam bar. I just ate pizza, you just had Katz, I want dessert, not lunch!"

Then Mike saw the neon pink sign "Milk" and we got really excited.  We walked into the clear doors and saw noodles being cooked. I asked one of the servers if I could see the dessert menu.  Then he directed me across the street to the Milk Bar. 

Ahhh!! We made finally made it there! The Milk Bar is a really small shop with only a couple of bar stools. I am guessing that people just pick up snacks after a late night out or after eating at the Ssam bar.  Here's the chalkboard menu. 

Truffles

There were so many choices at the Milk Bar, so we settled on buying a trio of cookies.    We bought the blueberry and cream cookie, the compost cookie, and the corn cookie. I have now added "creating a cookie with corn flour or corn meal" to my "Things to Do" list. 

Look at this cute birthday cake!

Creamsicle and Cereal Milk soft serve.  Yummy! It was so refreshing after walking miles to get there. Both flavors were not too sweet (just the way I like it).  For some reason I was expecting the cereal milk flavor to taste like the leftover milk in a bowl of Fruity Pebbles,m but it tasted like the leftover milk of corn flakes cereal.  It was good, but Mike and I both agreed that the creamsicle flavor was better.


Milk Bar
251 E 13th St
New York, NY 10003
Corner of 13th St / 2nd Ave

Spicy Buffalo Chicken Dip

I was pleasantly surprised when I came back from my work travels and saw the package containing the KC Masterpiece Buffalo Chicken sauce! Score! As part of the Foodbuzz Tastemaker Program, I received the KC Masterpiece Buffalo sauce.

I was at a bar in Michigan a few months back and had this awesome spicy buffalo chicken dip. It was so good that I told Mike about it and told him, "I want to try to make this!"  I have never made buffalo sauce from scratch, so I was so excited when the buffalo sauce came in the mail!

This was my attempt at the dip.  It was pretty much a warm dip containing shredded chicken, buffalo sauce, seasonings, and cheese. 

Spicy Buffalo Chicken Dip
1/2 cup KC Masterpiece Buffalo Sauce
2 cups cooked Chicken (shredded)
1 8oz package of cream cheese
1/4 cup ranch dressing
1/2 cup Sharp Cheddar Cheese
1 cup Mozzarella Cheese
Salt to taste (~1 tsp)

I was in a time crunch so I boiled some chicken tenders. I bet you could use canned chicken breast, although the texture of the chicken might be more fine and stringy. 

Pre-heat oven to 375F.

Beat cream cheese, ranch dressing, and Buffalo Sauce.
Fold in marinated shredded chicken. Spread mixture into a casserole dish or pan. Cover with foil. Bake at 375 in oven for 15-20 minutes. Serve with tortilla chips, or warm bread.

We decided to serve this to some friends who came over for a "Settlers of Catan" game night.   Everyone really enjoyed the dip.  This recipe will definitely be placed in my "keeper" recipes book!

New York~Museum of Modern Art

Mike and I both would not classify ourselves as the "artsy fartsy" types, but we I enjoy the occasional look see.  We were debating whether we should spend part of our short trip to NYC checking out the museum.  We finally decided to go because Van Gogh's "Starrry Night" is housed at the MOMA.  Mike spent most of his time in the museum sitting on chairs and benches waiting for me. 

Can you see me in the reflection? I'm under the "er" of the word "Modern."  The images below are some of my favorite pieces. 

Van Gogh's "The Olive Tree"

Piet Mondrian's "Trafalgar Square"

I'm not sure who the artist was, but I love mobiles.

Jackson Pollack's work.

Salvador Dali's "The Persistence of Memory"

It's probably one of Dali's most famous works. It was about the size of a piece of copy paper. I thought it would have been larger.

"Starry Night"~Van Gogh

This is my favorite painting of all time.  This is the main reason why Mike and I went to MOMA. 

Postsecret work Postsecret is an art project in which people anonymously mail postcards with secrets written on them.  Some of the secrets are super funny.  Other's not so much. This exhibit was composed of six video screens cycling through various postcards. 

A pyramid containing items that distracts people from doing actual work. An iphone is up there on that pyramid.

I saw this while we were walking in the city. I'm guessing it was called "Dandelion" or something along those lines? It's a water sculpture.

MoMa
11 West 53 Street
New York, NY 10019
(212) 708-9400