Shannon and I decided to start having dinner parties. For our first, we hosted Jordan and Will, and decided to make risotto, bruschetta, and broccoli. After some internet browsing, this is the risotto recipe we landed on:

Butternut Squash Risotto

• Ingredients1 small butternut squash (about 1 1/2 pounds)
• 1 3/4 cups chicken broth
• 1/2 cup water
• 1 small onion, chopped (about 1/2 cup)
• 1 large garlic clove, sliced thin
• 1 1/4 teaspoons minced peeled fresh gingerroot
• 3 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1/2 cup Arborio or long-grain rice
• 1/4 cup dry white wine
• 2 tablespoons chopped fresh chives
• 
  

Garnish: chopped fresh chives and Parmesan curls shaved with a vegetable peeler from a 1/4-pound piece of Parmesan at room temperature

Preparation

Preheat oven to 450°F.

Halve squash lengthwise and discard seeds. Peel one half and cut into 1/4-inch dice. Put remaining half, cut side down, in an oiled shallow baking pan with diced squash and season with salt and pepper. Bake squash in middle of oven, stirring diced squash occasionally, until tender and browned lightly, 15 to 20 minutes. Holding halved squash in a kitchen towel, scoop out flesh and chop coarse.

In a saucepan bring broth and water to a simmer and keep at a bare simmer.

In another saucepan cook onion, garlic, and gingerroot in butter over moderately low heat, stirring, until softened. Stir in rice and cook over moderate heat, stirring constantly, about 1 minute. Add wine and cook, stirring, until absorbed. Stir in 1/4 cup broth and cook, stirring constantly, and keeping at a simmer throughout, until absorbed. Continue simmering and adding broth, about 1/4 cup at a time, stirring constantly and letting each addition be absorbed before adding next, until about half of broth has been added. Stir in diced and chopped squash and continue simmering and adding broth in same manner until rice is tender and creamy-looking but still al dente, about 18 minutes. Stir in chives and salt and pepper to taste.

My comments: I mostly stuck to the recipe on this one. However, I added the squash when most of the broth had already been added to the rice ... because I misread the directions, not because I thought it would be better that way. It was still delicious. Oh, and also, I found that it took longer than 20 minutes for the squash to become tender.

A huge hit with the dinner party. I would make more next time - even though I doubled the recipe, four people polished off easily.

The full spread!

Caramel Brownies

I'm not even sure if this justifies a post... but this is a baking blog and even if it's not a legit recipe I'll put it down for the record books.

My family swears by Duncan Hines brownie mix, so when you add caramels... Well, it doesn't get much better. Yesterday Shannon and I both had some free time, and instead of getting ahead on work we decided it would be well worth it to make some caramel brownies.  We're still incredibly excited about our oven.

Neither of us usually like to opt for box mixes, but I had brownie mix from home that I had brought up and I assured her it was good. Next time I we'll try the recipe with a homemade recipe, I think.

The concept is simple: make the brownie mix, and pour half of it in a tray and bake for a bit. Then put the caramel mixture on so that you have two layers, followed by tablespoonfuls of the rest of the brownie mix. Swirl to your heart's desire and stick it back in the oven.

The brownie part was simple: just follow the instructions on the box. For the caramel part, I looked at a few recipes for caramel brownies and they suggested 14 oz of caramels (the pre-wrapped kind, which I happened to have for just this purpose) combined with 14 oz of evaporated milk or sweetened condensed milk. You heat the two ingredients up and when the caramels are melted you're ready to pour your caramel layer.

The only problem is that we didn't have evaporated milk or sweetened condensed milk, and neither did our neighbors in Brunswick P. There's a small corner store by our apartment, however, so I walked over and was delighted to find that they stocked both. I bought some sweetened condensed milk and the baking process continued without further ado.

Since the bag of caramels was already open, we didn't use a full 14 oz. I'd say we used 10-12 oz. And since we figured our creation would be sweet enough, we only used about half of the can of sweetened condensed milk - probably a bit under 7oz. It was a perfect consistency, despite not being what the recipe called for.

We used a large tray, so we cut the cooking times down, though we kept the oven at 350. After 5 minutes or so of the first layer in the oven, we took it out and put the caramel layer on, then the rest of the brownie mix. We cooked it for at least 20 more minutes then took it out a bit undercooked. After letting it sit in the pan for over an hour it was easy to cut but still gooey - exactly how I like my brownies.

Chocolate cookies with white chocolate chips

I had free time on a Wednesday, and since this is probably one of the few times it'll happen this semester I decided to use it wisely. I went to an informal fireside talk by Representative Craig Hickman in the Bowdoin Outing Club - it was incredible to hear him speak about his experience with organic farming and his transitions between varied careers, ending up in the Maine House of Representatives (though still a farmer, poet, writer, etc). After dinner he gave a more formal talk as the keynote speaker of Bowdoin's MLK Day series of events/lectures. He moved seamlessly between the topics of Family, Community, and Prosperity, talking of his (and his family's) history and how farming can alleviate poverty by eradicating local hunger. He has a background as a performance artist (his first performance, actually, was at Bowdoin many years ago) so as you might imagine his speech and delivery were spell-binding. If you ever get the chance to meet him or listen to him, I cannot urge you strongly enough to do so. He was one of the most moving and inspirational speakers I've listened to.

Early in the afternoon Bowdoin facilities folks came and installed a new oven in our kitchen - Shannon had submitted a work order a couple days ago given our many oven troubles (although, I must say, regardless her chocolate tart was delicious). They responded much more quickly than I would have expected, and so today I had the opportunity to bake inaugural  cookies. After an extensive search for eggs and the long process of chopping at our rock-hard block of sugar with a knife, Sunita, Quinn, Shannon and I got to work.

I was in a chocolate mood and we were limited to one stick of butter, so we opted for this recipe.



Ingredients
1/2 pound unsalted butter, at room temperature
1 cup light brown sugar, packed
1 cup granulated sugar
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
2 extra-large eggs at room temperature
2/3 cup good unsweetened cocoa
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon kosher salt
1 1/2 pounds good white chocolate, coarsely chopped

Directions
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

Cream the butter and both sugars until light and fluffy in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Add the vanilla, then the eggs, 1 at a time, and mix well. Add the cocoa and mix again. Sift together the flour, baking soda, and salt and add to the chocolate with the mixer on low speed until just combined. Fold in the chopped white chocolate.

Drop the dough on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper, using a 1 3/4-inch ice cream scoop or a rounded tablespoon. Dampen your hands and flatten the dough slightly. Bake for exactly 15 minutes (the cookies will seem underdone). Remove from the oven and let cool slightly on the pan, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.



My comments/alterations:

• We didn't have 1.5 lbs of good white chocolate... We had a bit over half a cup of Nestle morsels, so we put those in along with some good old Ghirardelli milk chocolate chips.
• We didn't follow the directions to bake for "exactly 15 minutes," instead checking the cookies at 8 minutes then putting them in for another 2 or so. They didn't seem particularly underdone, so we took them out and I think that was a good choice:
• They harden a bit more than I would have liked out once they're taken out, so I might edit this blog post later with an update on that. But straight out of the oven they were delicious. The one issue was that the sugar remained a bit grainy in the cookie. Given that it started out as a brick, though, I was happy with that.
• The yield was as advertised - about 4 dozen cookies!