Thursday, February 9, 2017

Strawberry Lemonade Cheesecake

This idea started at a bithday party, I was approched by a friend who told me one of their favorite things to do with lemon bars, which I should note were being served at the party, is to pair them with cheesecake. I thought "hmm, lemon bars and cheese cake, that sounds like a pretty good combination." and then I thought, "Wait a second why not make a lemon bar cheese cake!" so I started trying to work it out in my head.

Sunday, July 19, 2015

Chicago and the NRA show





    The NRA Restaurant and Hospitality Convention, just took place in Chicago Illinois, and the Fork and Easel was there. It was a great trip, from getting off the first plane to sitting here in the airport waiting for the second, Chicago had a lot for us to experience.

Lou Malnaties



Probably the biggest thing Chicago is know for among foodies, is the deep dish pizza. This re-invention of an American favorite has definitely  become a staple in the culinary world. Though there is a hot debate over who created the first deep dish, the restaurant that claims to posses this honor, and is most widely accepted as the best if not the first, is Lou Malnati's.

Wednesday, June 3, 2015

Salty, sweet, and fried



Sardines, why would you want to eat them? Well first of because they are really good for you. I don’t really want to dwell on that too much, but you can look it up, Alton brown does a good Job of explaining it in the, Diet plan episode( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gdK8YLfJHYk) the point is, there are a lot of ingredients out there that people tend to shy away from, generally because they are considered unappetizing, Brussel sprouts, radishes, shell fish, and sardines to name a few, if you happen to like all of these things, then props to you. 

Friday, May 22, 2015

Paprika

In the modern kitchen we are givin more spice options to add flavor to our food then ever before, unless of course you're from India, where they have been making the rest of us envious of their spice mastery for centuries now. However it seems like as more and more spices collect on our shelves, the less and less we know about them. Because of this I think we are a little scared of this wonderful orchestra of flavor, terrified that if we add to much, or not enough, the dish will be completely ruined. And forget about ever trying to add these mystery spices to one of your own dishes.
These fears are well founded (you can easily runin a perfectly good dish with the wrong spices) they are unnecessary. Maybe if we understood what some of these spices are, we would be more confident in their uses, thus opening a door to a wonderful world of flavor all our own.

Monday, March 23, 2015

S’more S’mores




Camping season is finally here again, well for some of us, for those of you still stuck in way to much snow to do anything with, you have my sympathies. But for the rest of us coming into spring it is a great time to get out your tents, go find a spot and build a campfire.
One of nearly every American child’s favorite camping memories is roasting marshmallows over the fire, sticking them between two pieces of graham cracker with some chocolates. Now we have seen some pretty crazy things done with s’mores including many different candy bars being used to provide the chocolate, not to mentions last year’s post we did which including strawberry’s http://theforkandeasel.blogspot.com/2014/07/artisan-smores.html) However this year we are exploring a different twist on the s’more, and it is anything but classic.


Mozzarella

I promised a tutorial on making mozzarella, so here is it, seriously don’t be daunted by the length of this post, homemade mozzarella is actually pretty easy and totally worth it.