Jessica's Dinner Party

Archive for the 'recipe' Category

Sweet Potato Cupcakes

Hypothetically, the best thing about Thanksgiving is the amount of choices you have when it comes to your plate. Yams or potatoes? Cranberry sauce or gravy? Cake or pie? However, does anyone ever choose one over the other? I sure don’t. I pile my plate with full servings of everything and finish it clean. Then, when my pants are unbuttoned and I place my hands on the six month food baby I’ve created in my stomach, I start to think, maybe I should’ve cut back. That’s why you have to bake all your desserts in the mini. It’s faster, cuter, and you feel less guilty if you decide to sample all of the desserts.

November 17 2009 | cake and dessert and recipe and thoughts | 7 Comments »

Simple Apple Tart

Thanksgiving is just around the corner and if you’re like me, you already have a long list of dishes to choose from. My list always includes some interesting and daring recipes like tamale inspired stuffing, Caribbean scented sweet potatoes, and a vegan chocolate cheesecake. I think: maybe this year we should go with a Southeast Asian theme or try doing everything Southern style. But alas, we always stick to the basics, the recipes we know, and end up craving. How can Thanksgiving pass without grandma’s famous stuffing and a plain old pumpkin pie? Never.

November 16 2009 | dessert and fruit and recipe and thoughts | 9 Comments »

Buttery Croissants

While I was browsing through Gourmet recipes I came across one for croissants. I immediately tagged it, knowing that I would never come up with the nerve to make them. It would be a reference, in case I ever wanted to know how to make them, or if someone wanted a link to a sound recipe. I really didn’t think I would be baking croissants any time soon, but I guess I surprised myself.

November 15 2009 | bread and recipe and thoughts | 14 Comments »

Nigella’s Scones

A few days ago, I wrote about my search for an English scone recipe. Specifically, the English scone recipe from my mom’s London memories. Luckily, a friendly British, blogosphere neighbor, Kate gave me a link to a tried and true scone recipe (by the way, her blog, Coquette & Dove, is also a fantastic read, full of beautiful things you wish you had and beautiful people you wish you could look like). The recipe comes from Nigella Lawson or the Domestic Goddess. I’ve never tried any of her recipes but have always been very fond of her. I immediately wanted to make them, but decided to wait a few days before baking another batch. I knew I could eat scones for days, but I wasn’t sure if the rest of my family wanted to. If my family didn’t eat them, then that means I would eat all of them, and that would end up being a very ugly site. A lot of thought went into waiting a few days.

November 14 2009 | bread and recipe and thoughts | 7 Comments »

Alice Waters’ Italian Meatballs

I never got around to writing about what we ate at the mini road trip my friends and I took before I left New York. Week after week passed and when November hit and I decided to, a little absentmindedly, participate in NaBloPoMo, I tagged this recipe in my head for that one day when everything falls behind and it’s almost midnight and I still don’t have a clue what I’m going to write about. I was pretty organized that first week. I made something during the day, wrote about it at night, and posted it the next morning. But this week has been a bit of a struggle. I’m not at that point where I want to tear my hair out and beat myself over the head for doing something crazy like promising to post every day for one whole month. Somebody told me today to post a picture of a fried egg, but I won’t go that low…yet.