2) You might catch some of the above creatures in their natural habitat at the Austin Farmers Market. With the weather so lovely, it’s the perfect time to pick up some locally grown produce to go along with a lazy outdoor barbecue. We recommend the downtown market, which is held at Republic Square Park on Saturdays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. (be warned that good things run out quickly, so it may be worth setting the alarm), but you can also get your fresh fix at Sunset Valley’s Tony Burger Center from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. on Saturdays or The Triangle from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. on Wednesdays. If you’re on a budget, we recommend eating beforehand.

3) As you can probably guess from the Chickstermag URL, we like our magazines. Our love for print media is why we can’t wait for the new documentary Page One: A Year Inside the New York Times. The film actually played SXSW (although O’Husband didn’t see it), and based on the new trailer that came out this week, we will be the first in line when it debuts in theaters.

4) “The Office” may not have been appointment viewing for us lately, but we tuned in last Thursday night to say goodbye to Michael Scott. After seven years, Steve Carrell’s bumbling branch manager said farewell to his Scranton staff in a low-key way. We kept it together until his final exchange with Jim, during which we dissolved into a sobbing mess. In case you missed it, here’s the bittersweet scene:

5) Yes, we stuck it out through all the boring bits to watch Kate Middleton become Catherine, Duchess of Cambridge, early last Friday morning, but what we wish we’d seen on all that nonstop television camera was her heavenly reception frock, which was sleek, simple, and divine.

So take a look if you’re interested. I may be a failure in the world of cooking, but the cookbook still contains some very delicious recipes. See the book on Shutterfly here.

Today, after some not so subtle hints on Cynthia’s part, I’ve picked up the ingredients for caprese salad – an Italian classic that’s easy to put together, hard to ruin, and almost inevitably a crowd pleaser. The trick to the caprese salad, as is the case with all Italian cooking, is getting the freshest, most high quality ingredients. The most crucial of these is the tomatoes. They should be vine ripened, tangy, sweet, and dense. Homegrown cherry tomatoes are best.  Tomatoes from your local farmers market, likely picked that day, are a close second, especially if the stall owner will let you taste test one. If you do not have these, I recommend buying the very most expensive cherry tomatoes in the best commercial produce section that you can find. Or, if you do not like your guests that much, buy whatever tomatoes you want – however, the better the tomatoes, the better the salad, so maybe consider a sliding scale of how broke you are vs. how much you like your guests. Sometimes a compromise of generic grape tomatoes is fair.  Lastly, do not store your tomatoes in the fridge. It will leach all the flavor out of them in a matter of hours.

Second, the mozzarella cheese. The best caprese I’ve ever eaten was at essentially a train station café in the southern portion of Italy, near Naples (or Napoli, if you want to be fancy about it). In that area, they use a special process and a special kind of milk to produce a kind of mozzarella cheese I’ve never tasted the equal of, which ends up all runny and milky and coats the tomato in mozzarella wonderfullness. This cheese is also the reason that pizza in Naples is hands down the best pizza I’ve ever tasted.  However, we can’t get that cheese in Austin. You might be able to get it in New York, but I wouldn’t know where. What you can get, though, is fresh mozzarella packed in water in small round plastic containers. Buy the smaller balls of cheese, which should be about the size of a ping pong ball or smaller. The perlini, if available, are even smaller and look really good on a plate or toothpick. Again, you can substitute a cheaper version of the mozzarella for the fresh mozzarella if you like – I would recommend Sargento brand mozzarella if you’re going to do this, as it is better than average and available in almost every grocery store.

Presentation may vary. Sometimes if I’m feeling extra fancy I skewer two quarters of a mozzarella with two cherry tomato halves, but this takes a while. You can just quarter everything and toss it on a colorful plate. Cut everything up into small enough pieces that a single bite will include one or two pieces of tomato and mozzarella.

Dressing the salad requires drizzling it with olive oil and balsamic vinegar, and topping it with fresh (fresh! I mean it!) chopped basil leaves. The olive oil and vinegar, again, should be relatively high quality. I find that the Whole Foods 365 store brand olive oil to be a pretty good deal for the money. Also, make sure that whatever balsamic vinegar you buy, it reads “di Modena” on the label. It’s best if you make this dish just before you serve it, so that the tomatoes don’t have to hang out in the fridge while you wait for your guests to get hungry, but definitely save drizzling for just before you serve, as the vinegar will be absorbed into the cheese if it sits too long.

And that’s it! This dish usually gets eaten up as soon as it’s served, so maybe take a few bites yourself before you get out of the kitchen with it.

Seth’s Meatloaf

           3 pounds of ground beef
           2 eggs
           1 can of diced tomatoes
           1 can of tomato sauce
           3 slices of bread

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a large bowl mix ground beef, two eggs, and diced tomatoes. Tear the bread into 1-inch chunks, add to the mix, and hand mush all ingredients together. (Good to wash your hands first). Put mound into a deep cooking pan and cook in the oven for 50 minutes. Remove, pour out half of the grease, pour tomato sauce over it, and return it to the oven to cook for an additional 30 minutes. It’s simple and the only meatloaf I’ve ever liked….

Seth’s Stir-fry

         1 and 1/2 pound of beef stew meat, super trim
         Worcestershire sauce
         1 red bell pepper
         1 green pepper
         1 yellow bell pepper
         1 yellow squash
         2 red potatoes
         Tony’s seasoning
         garlic salt
         garlic powder

Cut squash into thin “half dollars.” Slice all peppers into strips. Cut potatoes into 1-inch chunks.

Put meat in a bowl and generously sprinkle with Worcestershire sauce and Tony’s and stir. Coat frying pan with butter-spray or a cap filled with vegetable oil. Put meat in pan and cook on medium high heat for about 10 minutes stirring occasionally. Strain the meat with a strainer.

Re-coat pan and put chopped vegetables into the pan adding a little Tony’s, garlic powder, and a tiny bit of garlic salt. Add the meat back to the pan and return to the burner cooking on high (but not boiling) heat. Cook for about 15 minutes, stirring continuously.

Beef Stroganoff

        1 to 2 lbs. sirloin
        1 can of beef broth or beef consomme
        1 small can tomato paste
        1/2 pint of sour cream
        12 or 16 oz of noodles
 
Meat: Cut up the meat into 1-inch chunks. Put a tbsp. of olive oil in a frying pan. Brown meat on all sides on high, reduce heat to low, add beef consomme (or beef broth), cover and simmer for 30 minutes. Turn off the heat and stir in tomato paste and about 1/2 pint of sour cream.

Noodles: Boil lots of water, add noodles, bring back to boil and cook for 7 minutes and then drain.
 
Copper Pennies

        4 large carrots
        1 green bell pepper
        1 can of tomato soup

Peel carrots and chop into “pennies.” Cut 1 bell pepper into 1-inch chunks (discard seedy center). Bring a small pot of water to a boil, throw in the chopped bell peppers and carrots and cook for 5 minutes on high. Pour vegetables into a strainer and then mix them with a can of tomato soup. It’s a great side.

Seth’s Spaghetti

          1 pound thin spaghetti
          2 jars of Prego Three Cheese Italian Sauce
          2 pounds of ground beef
          oregano
          garlic powder
          vegetable oil
          *put a strainer in each side of the sink

Noodles: Fill a large pot with water and add a cap full of vegetable oil. Break thin spaghetti in half and add to pot. With the burner on high bring the spaghetti to a boil which should take about 20 minutes. Once the noodles come to a boil and the meat is browned, the noodles are done. Strain the noodles in one side of the sink.

Sauce: Put the 2 jars of sauce into pot and add oregano and garlic powder to taste. Cover sauce and set on medium-low heat. Cook sauce until the meat is ready.

Meat: Cook ground beef in a large skillet on medium-high, browning it on all sides. This should take about 17 minutes. Stir often and break-up meat. Strain the meat (removing all grease) in a different strainer from the noodles. Wipe grease from the skillet and return the meat to the skillet. Add sauce to the skillet as well and return to the burner, cooking on medium-high heat for an additional 8 minutes.

*If you start cooking everything simultaneously, the noodles should be done the moment you combine the sauce and the meat and return it to the burner.

Chicken Alfredo

        2 to 4 chicken breasts (or tenderloins)
        1 lb. flour
        1 lb. butter
        1 bag skinner angel hair noodles (12oz.)
        1 bag of shredded mozzarella

Chicken: Dredge salted chicken breasts in flour. Heat up 2 tsp. of butter in a frying pan, add chicken to frying pan and brown on both sides on medium-high heat. Turn the heat down to medium-low, cover and cook for 20 minutes. Remove lid, raise heat to high and toughen crust on both sides for about a minute on each. Remove chicken from pan and lower heat to medium-high.

Noodles: Boil lots of water. Add noodles, bring back to a boil and cook for seven minutes covered and then drain.

Cheese sauce: Add 2 or 3 tbsp. of flour to what’s left in the pan and also add 2 tbsp. of butter, 2 cups of cheese and 2 cups of milk. Stir and cook it into something that resembles the thickness of gravy. If it becomes too thick, add milk. If it becomes too thin, add cheese. Serve over chicken and noodles.

Fried pork chops, mashed potatoes and gravy

     2 pork chops
     olive oil
     flour
     4 large potatoes
 
Peal and cut up 4 large potatoes. Put in a pot, and cover with water. Add 2 tbsp of salt. Bring to a boil, cover and let boil for 20 minutes. Remove the potatoes but DON’T discard the potato water. Mash up the potatoes with a potato masher. Add 8 oz.  of sour cream. Add potato water until you reach the consistency that you want. (Remember, you can’t take water back out.)

Salt and pepper (pepper optional) pork chops. Dredge in flour (roll on a mound of flower until covered). Heat 5 tbsp of olive oil in a frying pan on medium heat. Add pork chops and brown on both sides. Reduce heat to medium-low, cover and cook for about 20 minutes. (Be sure to flip the chops after 10 minutes.) Uncover and fry them on high with lid off for another 5 minutes (2 -1/2 minutes on each side). Remove pork chops.

Don’t pour out what’s left over in the frying pan after cooking the pork chops. Instead add 2 tbsp of flour and stir. All the flour should be absorbed by the leftover oil. If not, add a little more olive oil. Once you make a loose paste with the flour and oil, add 2 cups of the potato water and stir. Boil this mixture on high heat until it thickens into gravy. (If what you’re stirring doesn’t start to look like gravy, add either more olive oil or more flour until it looks right.) Cook until it’s thick. If it gets too thick, add more potato water to thin it out. If it’s too thin, cook it until it thickens. It will thicken a little as it cools but not much.

*If you choose not to attempt gravy add 8 oz. of cream cheese and 4 oz. of butter to the potatoes.

Not-Cooked Chicken

Buy a whole chicken, un-frozen. (This is the only ingredient, which is why I cheaply choose this recipe today. But just looking at a whole non-cooked chicken is enough to make you consider vegetarianism.)

Bring your largest pot, half-filled with water, to a boil with the lid on. (Yes, this is the tall one you could only imagine would be used for some form of gumbo but have never touched, or possibly that’s just me.)

With tongs, lower the chicken into the boiling water, submerging it entirely. Leave the chicken with the lid on for two minutes. (I did not have tongs so I tried fondue forks. The chicken easily slid into the pot and just as easily slid off the fondue forks. I tried shoving a wooden soup ladle through the chicken and twisting it so that the bigger end held it in place but that did not work either. I eventually had to pull the chicken out by stabbing knives into it until I was able to pick it up).

DON’T BURN YOURSELF while removing from (or lowering the chicken into) the pot. This is messy, splashy and hard.

Remove chicken, place it on a plate and witness a great deal of water coming out of it. (I guess there must be some reason for this?)

Put the lid back on the water and bring to a boil again. (Not a meager boil—a very furious boil.)

Lower the chicken into the water again, cover, turn OFF burner (I know it doesn’t sound possible, but it works), and let sit for 1 and 1/2 hours with the lid on. (Yes, hours. I misread this direction as 1 ½ minutes and called my dad demanding why the chicken looked completely uncooked. He asked “Well did you cook it for the full 1 ½ hours with the burner off?”  “1 ½ hours?” “Umm…I cooked it for 1 ½ minutes.” “That’s totally wrong. Oh no. Is that what I wrote?” [I checked. Nope.] “I have to go,” I said and hung up to the sound of my dad’s hysterical laughter.)

Let the chicken cool a little.

Remove the skin and discard along with the fat and bones. (Gross.)

When I was finally able to finish this chicken after watching both “Top Chef” episodes, I realized that I had no sides or any additional flavor for the chicken. Luckily my husband had the foresight to put Tony’s seasoning and garlic salt in the pot when we turned off the burner and let it sit. He also broke out the box potatoes and canned green beans, saving the meal.

This week I totally failed, but I think a more seasoned cook could easily fare better. I’m sure it can make tasty chicken if you have an idea of what you’re doing. Mine was pretty good, though it needed more seasoning and less confusion.

This week I made a recipe that has become a favorite of my husband’s and mine, one I have done multiple times. (Though I did overcook the steak once again).

Steak, Broccoli and Twice-cooked Potatoes

   1 broccoli head
   1 or 2 sirloin steaks (1 to 2 lbs.)
   2 medium potatoes
   1 bottle liquid smoke
   8 oz. sharp cheddar cheese
   8 oz. sour cream
   1 bottle garlic salt
   1 stick butter
   1 lemon
   oregano

Cook potatoes in microwave for five minutes on high. Turn them over and cook them another four minutes. Cut them in half, and let cool. Scoop out the insides of the potatoes and put in bowl, adding cheese, sour cream, half a stick of butter and 1/2 teaspoon of garlic salt. Stir and scoop mixture back into the potato skins. Then microwave on high for five minutes.
 
Cut off the heads of broccoli and put in covered pot with about 3/4-inch of water. Bring the water to boil on high, then turn it down to medium and steam the broccoli for 20 minutes. Pour off water, squeeze half a lemon over it and add 1/3 stick of butter and 1/2 teaspoon of garlic salt.
 
Sprinkle steak with liquid smoke, worcester sauce (optional) and oregano. Broil on high for five to seven minutes per side (only five minutes if the steak is thin). When done, salt to taste. (If you salt before cooking the meat can get tough.)

So let’s start with something simple:

Avocado, asparagus and artichoke salad (a.k.a. Salad-less Salad):
        1 avocado
        1 bunch of asparagus
        1 can of artichoke hearts
        1 tomato sliced or cubed (optional)
        lettuce (optional)
        Italian dressing or your choice of dressing

Cut 1 inch off the square end of the asparagus and discard. Cut 3 inches off the new square end of the asparagus, put in the bottom of a pan and cover with water (about an inch). Place the heads of the asparagus on top of the 3-inch pieces and bring to boil covered. Cook for 5 to 10 minutes. It’s only 5 minutes with a gas burner. Don’t overcook. You should be able to push a fork through the asparagus heads rather easily. Immediately douse the asparagus in ice water to stop the cooking. Drain well. Drain the artichoke hearts and cut into quarters. Cut avocado in half. Remove seed and scoop out the insides with a spoon. Mix all this together with your choice of dressing.

Orange Chicken (a.k.a. Chickster Chicken)

        2 Chicken Breasts (or small tenderloins-1.25 pounds)
        1 can of frozen orange juice
        1 bottle of Worcestershire sauce
        1 lb. flour
        1 lb. butter
        1 bag dumpling noodles (12 oz.)
 
Dredge salted chicken breasts in flour coating them lightly. (Basically this means rolling de-thawed chicken on a mound of flour on top of a plate. Will stick.) Melt some butter in a frying pan and place chicken in it. Brown the chicken breasts on both sides using medium-low heat. Turn the heat down to low and add 1/2 can of frozen orange juice (I actually prefer to use a full can but I really like orange) and 4 or 5 healthy squirts of Worcestershire sauce. Cook covered for 15 minutes.
 
Noodles: Boil lots of water, add dumpling noodles, bring back to boil, and cook for 7 minutes, then drain.

*Make sure to keep the orangey juice that remains in the pan after you remove the cooked chicken, so you can pour it over the noodles as a sauce. Don’t pour it down the sink as I did, only to offer my fellow Chicksters dry noodles.

What to expect from a class at Yoga Yoga? The first class can be free if you purchase a class pass, starting with an eight class minimum. Newbies should explore the Beginners series for a slower paced introduction geared toward those who are new or returning to yoga after a break. If you don’t have a yoga mat, you can rent one for as little as a $1 a class from the front desk. Blankets and bolsters are provided to aid you with different poses and teachers are careful to instruct you on how to avoid injury. With so many different yoga teachers at Yoga Yoga, you’re sure to find one whose teaching style you like. Classes run for 75 minutes, and while that may seem intimidatingly long, once you’ve settled into the final relaxation pose savasana you are guaranteed to be reluctant to end your session. A cup of delicious yogi tea is the only thing worth getting up for at that point, and Yoga Yoga never fails to serve it up in a biodegradable cup at the end of your practice. You’ll feel refreshed, rejuvinated and a lot more limber than if you went out for cocktails. You can enjoy Yogi tea from home too, from this delicious recipe off the Yoga Yoga website.

Yogi Tea

To make two quarts:

• 2 quarts water
• 15 whole cloves
• 20 black peppercorns
• 3 sticks of cinnamon
• 20 whole cardamon pods (split the pods first)
• 8 ginger slices (1/4-inch thick, no need to peel)
• 1/2 teaspoon black tea leaves (we use decaf)
• Milk and honey to taste

1. Bring 2 quarts of water to a boil in a 3-4 quart pot. Add cloves and boil for one minute. Next, add cardamon, peppercorns, cinnamon and fresh ginger root. Cover and boil for at least 30 minutes. For best flavor, cover and simmer for two to three hours! When ready, remove from heat, add black tea and let cool. Strain tea. When ready to drink, add soy or dairy milk and sweeten to taste with honey or maple syrup.
2. Drink often!

In addition to offering classes for yoga students, Yoga Yoga also offers their Teacher Training Program, a nationally recognized program for Hatha, Kundalini and Advanced Studies in yoga. Yoga Yoga also recently acquired The Natural Epicurean Academy of Culinary Arts, one of only a handful of vegetarian cooking schools in the U.S. Community cooking classes are currently being offered at Casa de Luz, but will be moved to Yoga Yoga’s South location in May.

Ross’ Sprinkles book tour kicks off with a release party at BookPeople on Tuesday, April 6, at 7 pm. Attendees are invited to bring their prized cupcake recipes to share in the cupcake tasting contest and enjoy along with complimentary Tito’s Vodka cocktails. Following the contest will be a book signing and reading by Ross. The tour also includes a stop in Dallas on April 13 as well as other select cities. For a sneak peek at one of the book’s chapters (including a cupcake recipe for “Everyone Likes A Cream Cheese Filling” pasted below), just click here.

Everyone Likes A Cream Cheese Filling Recipe (Yield: 14 cupcakes)

Ingredients:

• 1 cup or 2 sticks unsalted butter, room temperature
• 3 eggs, room temperature
• 1/2 cup buttermilk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 4 ounces semi-sweet chocolate
• chopped 1/4 cup Dutch processed cocoa powder
• 1 1/4 cups water
• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup cake flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon finely ground salt, either sea or ionized

To Make:

• Preheat oven to 350 F. Place 14 paper liners into cupcake trays.
• Cream butter and brown sugar together with an electric mixer until fluffy, about 3 to 5 minutes.
• Add eggs and beat another two minutes.
• Add buttermilk and vanilla.
• Boil water and mix with chocolate.
• Sift flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt into bowl.
• Alternate mixing into the batter the flour mixture and the chocolate mixture. Start and end with the flour mixture.
• Pour the batter into the paper liners. Fill two-thirds of the way to the top.
• Drop the filling into the center of each cupcake. You will see part of it peek out of the top.
• Bake for 20 minutes until a toothpick inserted into the middle of a cupcake comes out clean.
• Let cool for five minutes and then move the cupcakes to a baking rack.

Filling:

• 4 ounces cream cheese
• 4 ounces peanut butter

To Make The Filling:

• Beat the cream cheese and peanut butter together with an electric mixer until fluffy, about 3 to 5 minutes.

Sometimes I’ll come across a recipe, get excited about it and the end result will be pretty damn good. After seeing “Julie & Julia,” I made a really tasty coq au vin, but the nearly two hours of prep made that a one-off for me.

Other times, well, let’s just say that it’s better for all involved that my husband handles most of the cooking around our house.

And yet, when it comes to baking or making anything sweet, I am all over that. Basically, as long as I can lick the spoon, and that spoon will be tasting like chocolate or some other rich deliciousness, then I’m game.

So when I came across College Candy’s super simple recipe for Oreo Truffles (via one of my favorite sites, Lemondrop), I decided to give them a go for Valentine’s Day and ended up getting rave reviews, as in my husband actually said, “This is literally the best thing you have ever made.” That makes a girl feel pretty good.

Seriously, this recipe could not be any simpler. You don’t need an oven or a stove. All you need is a microwave and a fridge, which makes them perfect for College Candy‘s audience or anyone without a full kitchen.

All the ingredients you need are:

One package of Oreo cookies
A bag and a half of semi-sweet chocolate chips (approximately 16 oz. total)
8 oz. of cream cheese
Some wax paper
A blender or food processor

Now, I would suggest skipping my optional first step of trying to get the blender down out of a really high cabinet, accidentally dropping it on the ground with such a force that it shatters into a million tiny little pieces and then spending the next 30 minutes obsessively sweeping and vacuuming said little pieces so the cat and I wouldn’t end the night with bloody feet.

So instead of that, kick things off by using a food processor (or blender, if you still have one, or even your hands if you’ve got some time to kill) to chop the entire package of Oreos into small pieces.

In a bowl, use a spoon or your hands (I found my hands worked better) to mix together three cups of the Oreo bits and all of the cream cheese. Set the remainder of the Oreo bits aside to use later.

Then, on a cookie sheet covered with wax paper, roll out approximately 42 one-inch balls of the Oreo-cream cheese mixture.

Set the cookie sheet in the fridge for at least an hour to allow the balls to harden. During this time, you can relax on the couch while watching whatever girlie movie you like. (I was watching the 1999 version of “Mansfield Park” and trying to decide if I prefer Jonny Lee Miller as Edmund or 10 years later as Knightley in the recent Masterpiece Theater remake of “Emma“. The answer for this Jane Austen addict is both.)

After the hour has passed, take the Oreo-cream cheese balls (which should be firm now) out of the fridge and set out more wax paper.

Next, empty a bag and a half of the chocolate chips (according to the recipe, this should be approximately 16 oz., but I didn’t measure) into a microwave-safe container. Microwave the chocolate chips on high for two minutes, stopping every 30 seconds to stir. Try to resist licking the spoon when they start melting.

Now comes the fun part. Dip each Oreo-cream cheese ball into the melted chocolate and set on the wax paper.

After you’ve done them all, sprinkle the rest of the Oreo bits from the beginning over the tops of the truffles. Then put them in the fridge for another hour to harden. Resume your film and finally allow yourself to lick the spoon and all the remaining melted chocolate in the bowl.

When the hour is up, eat up and enjoy!