by Trish

When I first read the title of the article on Food Republic, I had to check the date to see if it was April Fool’s Day. Lupe Fiasco is branching into food writing. Be still my beating heart. 

You tend to get certain “types” in the food blog world. You get a lot of mommies who love to post pictures of their toddlers eating elaborately decorated cupcakes. You get guys who are really, really into hamburgers. You get hipsters who aren’t impressed unless the restaurant serves heirloom quinoa grown on the roof of a converted industrial loft. But you don’t get too many rappers. Then again, I guess a rapper’s gotta eat (even if it’s greasy). 

You can follow Lupe on Food Republic, where he’ll be blogging his way across Australia. First stop, Brisbane, where the man sizes up Wagyu beef and grilled mackerel at Wagaya. 

So there you have it folks. A rapper who knows his way around a wagyu steak and isn’t ashamed to blog about it. Sure beats a lot of other rappers’ beef, I’d say. 

via Food Republic.

by Trish

Ask anyone when the the last time they had a homemade savory pie and I’d venture the answer would be a very, very long time. Sadly, even the stuff you get from the neighborhood pub is usually straight from the freezer. It’s not entirely surprising, chicken pot pie certainly isn’t the worst option in the freezer aisle, and it beats rolling pastry. But if you find yourself on a Saturday afternoon with lots of ambition and even more time, making the stuff from scratch will provide you with perhaps the most satisfying meal of all time, and then days of leftovers that are just as good. 

This is my favorite recipe because it has lots of vegetables you might not generally see in a pie, big pieces of roast chicken, and saffron in the sauce. It is a lot of work, but every step is worth it. If you want to cut corners on anything, you can use frozen puff pastry instead of making your own. This is a great dish to treat your friends to, pretty much everyone loves it and you can make the whole thing even a day ahead, baking just before the company arrives. 

Chicken Pot Pie

Dice the veggies small (3/4 inch dice) but leave the chicken in larger chunks for the nicest results.

• 4 chicken breasts, bone-in, skin on
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 12 tablespoons butter
• 2 cups diced yellow onions
• 1 fennel bulb, thinly sliced
• 1/2 cup flour
• 2 1/2 cups chicken stock
• pinch of saffron threads
• 3 tablespoons heavy cream
• 2 medium white potatoes, diced (1 1/2 cup)
• 4 carrots, diced (1 1/2 cup)
• 1 1/2 cup butternut squash, diced
• 2 cups frozen peas
• 1/2 cup flat-leaf parsley, minced

Pastry

• 3 cups flour
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 cup vegetable shortening
• 1 stick cold butter, diced
• 1/2 cup ice water
• 1 egg, beaten
• kosher salt and pepper

1. Preheat the oven to 350. Rub the chicken breasts with olive oil and sprinkle generously with salt and pepper. Roast for 35-40 minutes until cooked through. When they cool enough to handle, remove the meat from the bones and dice the chicken, discarding the skin. 
2. While your chicken is roasting, chop and prep all your vegetables.
3. Melt the butter in a large pot/dutch oven over medium heat. Add the onions and fennel and cook until translucent but not browned, about 10 minutes. Add flour and reduce heat to low, stir and cook for 3 minutes. Slowly add in the stock, using a whisk if necessary to avoid lumps. Add saffron, heavy cream, 1/2 teaspoon of pepper, and salt as needed (depending on how salty your chicken stock was). It should be highly seasoned - remember you’re adding a lot of veggies to this mix! Set this mixture aside.
4. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the potatoes. After 5 minutes, add the squash and carrots, boil for 5 more minutes. They should be tender. Drain and add to the onion/flour mixture, along with the peas, parsley, and chicken. Mix until well combined.
5. Now on to the pastry: In a food processor mix the flour, salt, and baking powder. Add the shortening and butter, toss quickly to coat with flour. Pulse until the mixture resembles small peas, about 10 times. With the ice water ready, turn on the machine and add the water with the machine running, processing just until the mixture comes together. Dump the dough out onto a flour board, give it a quick knead into a ball, and wrap it up in plastic wrap to rest in the fridge for 30 minutes. Give yourself a pat on the back. You, my friend, are on home stretch.
6. Preheat the oven to 375. Divide the filling amongst whatever vessels you fancy to use: two pie plates, 4 individual ovenproof bowls, a 9 x 13 glass pan, or some permutation of the three. 
7. Crack the egg in a bowl and beat up with a bit of water, brush some of this on the rim of your vessel of choice. 
8. Take the pastry out of the fridge and roll it out on a floured surface to a size large enough to fit over the top of your pies. Cut out the approximate shape and put it on the top. Do you best to try and make the edges look pretty: crimping it over the edge to stick. Don’t worry, even if you massively fail at making it look pretty it will have that great “rustic” look. Brush the tops with more egg wash, make a couple slits in the top, and give it a sprinkle of salt and a couple turns from the pepper mill. 
9. Place on a baking sheet and bake for 1 hour, or until the tops are golden. 
10. Enjoy! (And believe me, you will!)

Adapted from the Barefoot Contessa. This recipe is essentially her Vegetable Pot Pie (Barefoot Contessa Parties!) and Chicken Pot Pie (available online) recipes combined. 

by Trish

Food policy is in the news lately. Denmark has a fat tax, Americans are overweight, why you should be a locavore, these are just a few topics I’ve seen in recent weeks. For a refreshing take on food policy, check out a great article by Adam over at the Amateur Gourmet about keeping food in perspective. Read it!

by Trish

Sure, it looks like a bowl of cashews. A bowl of cashews with a bit of annoying greenery poked in it. But really all I can say about these is that they’re really, really good. Good enough to stand on their own rather than play second fiddle to a foamy beverage. Yet simply enough to require no more skill than the ability to turn on your oven. 

Bar Nuts

You can use any variety of nuts besides cashews, in fact a mix of nuts would be even better. Don’t use dried rosemary here (blech!). 

• About 2 or 2.5 cups unsalted cashews or mixed nuts (no peanuts)
• 1 tablespoon butter
• 2 tablespoons chopped rosemary
• 2 teaspoons brown sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon cayenne
• 2 teaspoons sea salt
• few grinds of pepper

1. Preheat the oven to 350. Roast the nuts on a sheet pan until warmed through (5 minutes), or if they’re unroasted, until they begin to slightly brown (10 minutes). Be careful, they burn easily.
2. While waiting for the nuts to heat up, melt the butter in the microwave. Add the rosemary, brown sugar, cayenne, salt, and pepper.
3. Put the nuts in a mixing bowl and add the butter mixture. Stir to combine. Serve warm in a pretty bowl with a nice IPA.

Recipe adapted from Nigella via 

Food Network.

by Trish

File this one under “way too much time on your hands.”

Henry Hargreaves, a Prada model and photographer, has made a rendering of the alphabet in an Old English font made entirely out of bacon. The project took Hargreaves and his assistant two days to complete and about 15 lbs of bacon, which they made into bacon jam after they finished. 

Why this is newsworthy, I cannot tell you. But it does take the cake for the most ridiculous thing I stumbled across on the internet this week. Which is no small feat, considering I also discovered Foogos. There you have it.

Via the LA Weekly.