The Good Plate

Archive for the ‘Morning’ Category

Well, I guess The Good Plate is “poopular” because our old host said we were too busy, so we moved to a new host. Lots of things happened while we were away, and I’ll have to get you all caught up.

We had a wonderful Halloween, and quite the turn out.  I was sick all that week, but I still made Halloween happen.  I cut my hair, and you can see in this photo that I look a little pale.  I was still sick.

But, enough about me, let’s talk about food!  It’s been very cold lately, and I don’t like sending Spane off to school without a warm breakfast.  When he was a toddler, his favorite breakfast was Grape-nuts and milk warmed up, softened, in the microwave.  I don’t like hot cereal, so I never tried it.  Well, after I doctored it up, it was very good.  You have to try this!

Read the rest of this entry »

Stuffed Barbari Bread

Recipes in this Post

• Stuffed Barbari Bread

I have a friend who is a cab driver. A long time ago, when taking me to work one morning, he introduced me to Babari bread. I fell in love. Barbari bread is a fluffy, flat Iranian bread with sesame seeds on top. It is wonderful with butter and honey in the morning, or a quick lunch of Barbari bread and cheese. The loaf is flat and long, and often the checker at the store will fold it in half to fit in your grocery bag – it doesn’t hurt it. Barbari bread, because it has no preservatives will dry out rather quickly. If it does, cut it up and use if for croûtons, bread crumbs or stuffing.

This morning, as I was looking for something to make for breakfast and not wanting to heat up my kitchen, I thought it was be very good stuffed. It was, Spane had four pieces!

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In This Post

• Rosemary Garlic Chicken Wings with Dipping Sauces
• Dead Refrigerator!

Usually on the Annual Cruise Night in Glendale, I usually cook up a bunch of Route 66 food, invite friends over, and then walk over to Cruise Night. This year was a little different, so only Spane, and Amber’s children went. I didn’t have people over, but Spane and I both like chicken wings. Read the rest of this entry »

In This Post

• Milkless French Rasin Bread Toast
• Super Salad at Scarantinos

I love it when I discover new ways of making things. My friend John, who was Chef at Birds in Hollywood in the 1990′s, brought me some wonderful raisin bread a few days ago. This was interesting bread in that it was thick, crusty – almost like a sour dough.

Milkless French Raisin Toast

I got the bread out, and I got eggs out, and then I looked in my refrigerator and realized I did not have any milk.

No problem, I thought. So, I got a bowl and put some cinnamon and sugar in it, and I got an iron skillet and melted butter in that.

Then I took each slice of bread and dipped it in the sugar/cinnamon mixture, and put them in the butter. I let them absorb some of the butter, then took them out and redipped them, then let them brown on both sides before putting them on a plate.

Spane loved them! They were crispy sweet, with an almost candied coating on each side.

The only thing you need to do if you are going to make this is not get a bread with a fine crumb. It has to be an artisan bread that will stand up to all that.

Scarantinos

Spane was diagnosed with Dandy Walker Syndrome. You can read about Spane and my adventures with DWS at the Spane Beeper blog. We had an appointment with a new doctor, and the new doctor’s office was right next door to Scarantino’s.

I have wanted to go to this restaurant for years, but never had the chance. The staff was wonderful.

Super Salad!

Waiter

You spaghetti meal comes with soup or salad, which one do you want?

Spane

Spaghetti

Waiter

Well, it comes with soup or salad, which one?

Me

Spane, the waiter wants to know if you want (slowly)soup or salad(end slowly) with your meal.

Spane

Salad

So, when the salad came, Spane looked at it a little funny. It was a just a nice side salad.

Spane

Oh, that’s super salad.

It took me a while, but finally I started to laugh when I realized he thought he was getting a SUPER salad, not soup OR salad.

Me – laughing hard

Spane, it’s Soup OR Salad, not SUPER salad!

The waiter and I both laughed, and we had a very nice lunch.

I highly recommend you go to this wonderful, family owned restaurant that has been around since 1967! Enjoy!

Recipes in this post

• Scrambled Burger Quiche

Many years ago, we used to go to a restaurant that had something called Scrambled Burgers. I loved them, being a mixture of ground beef, spinach, onion and cheese. I thought that combination would make a wonderful quiche. Read the rest of this entry »

A few days ago, I went to my favorite Armenian store and bought a whole bunch of apricots in season.

I don’t know about you, but I really love apricots.  They are not in season too long – if you blink you miss them.

So, there I was with all these apricots.  I ate a few, Spane ate a few, Maria ate a few, even Noelle ate one, but still, there I was with a baker’s dozen of apricots, and I did not want them to go bad.

Years ago, I was visiting my adopted mother, Helen Reeves Pearson, and I made this apricot cake that turned out really ugly, but really tasty.  I called it a buckle because it looked all buckled when I took it out of the pan.  Helen and her guests loved it.

Luckily, I had saved the recipe in my old Meal Master, and imported it into BigOven.  But, when I looked at the recipe, it seemed a little off.  I decided to make it anyway.  The original recipe called for Marsala wine, and it did not call for baking powder.  I decided to eliminate the Marsala, but add baking powder.  I’m glad I did.

Because there was no Marsala, and because of the addition of baking powder, the cake was not too juicy and did not look ugly when I turned it out of the pan this morning. I still had a little of the White Chocolate Ganache left over from Spane’s Rosary Wafer Cake, so I spread that on top.

When I woke Spane up this morning and told him I had cake for breakfast, he jumped out of bed.  He tasted the cake, and he really liked it. 

I’m sure you will, too!

Apricot Buckle

Ingredients

12 Apricots pitted
1/2 cup Butter
2 cup Sugar
1 tablespoon Vanilla
3 Eggs separated
1 teaspoon Baking powder
1 cup Flour
1 teaspoon Salt fine

Instructions

Grease a 9×13 pan and line it with parchment or wax paper. Grease that as well. Preheat oven to 325.
Reserve 6 apricot halves, and puree the rest in the food processor.
Sift the flour, baking powder and salt together. Set aside.
Separate the eggs, making sure to get absolutely no yolk in the white. Set aside and have a beater readry.
Cream the butter and sugar together, add the vanilla, then add the egg yolks one at a time. Add about a third of the apricot puree, mix, add about a third of the flour, mix, add more puree, remainder of flour, then rest of puree. Mix thoroughly.
In a separate bowl, beat the egg whites until stiff peaks form. Take a little of the batter and add it to the egg whites, mix slightly. Fold this mixture carefully into the batter, you will have white streaks remaining. That’s okay.
Take the 6 reserved apricot halves and put the cut side down in the prepared pan. Carefully pour the batter over the apricots, smoothing it out as you go, but not disturning the apricots.
Bake in the oven for about 30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.
Remove from the oven, and cool in the pan on a wire rack for about 1 minutes. Get a nice plate, and turn the cake out on to it, so the bottom of the cake is right side up.
You can sprinkle with powdered sugar if you want, or pour some milk icing on. Serve warm.