Croissant French Toast

So, a while back, maybe in 2003 or 2004 Paul wanted French toast and I didn't have any bread except some leftover croissants - I thought, why not?  So I did :)

 It's not too difficult.  Slice the croissant where the tips come together all the way to the back but not through, like a hot dog bun :)  Make your basic custard to dip the croissant into.  I use eggs, milk, sugar, vanilla, pinch of Kosher salt and cinnamon as an after thought. Open croissant up and dip both sides in custard then griddle on both sides. Fold back together again and then you can put whatever you want in the middle like stuffed french toast.

We used fruit, homemade syrup and a cream cheese filling.  For the cream cheese filling, I used: 8 oz cream cheese way softened, 6 oz creme fraiche, 1/4 cup sugar and a touch of vanilla and pinch of salt.  Mix up.  Yum!

Paul's Happy Birthday Dinner....Happy Birthday Paul!

I love watching cooking shows, although I don't do it so often.  I'm into this show on the Cooking Channel, French Food at Home with Laura Calder.  I was watching and Paul was fiddling with one of his laptops.  Laura made a Boeuf en Croute.  He stopped fiddling and said, "That's what I want for my birthday dinner."  This was Friday night, I shrugged and thought, yeah I can do that, simple.

 So, we picked up a tenderloin roast.

 Gotta salt, pepper and brown it.  Cover with foil and cool way down.

 Then in the same pan used for the browning of the tenderloin, saute shallot and cremini mushrooms, with thyme and a bay leaf.  I didn't have a shallot, which for the life of me, have no idea where they went, because I'm sure I have some, someplace.  They're probably in the pantry with a bag of chips or something.  Anyways, I used leeks instead.

 Finish off the mushrooms with 1/2 cup of beef broth, Italian parsley and creme fraiche. Put into a bowl and stick in the freezer for a little bit, until it's cool.  You have to put it on phyllo dough, so everything should be coldish.

 Lay out the bed of mushrooms and place the beef on top of it, then another sheet of phyllo dough.

 Brush all over with one egg yolk and press edges together with a fork or whatever, just make it look pretty.

 Bake in oven at 400 degrees for 30 minutes.  While baking, start your sides.  I did a reduction of beef and chicken broth with thyme, bay leaf and leeks - then strained.  Herb new potatoes. Sauteed asparagus over high heat, seasoned with salt and pepper with white truffle oil.  And kale with bacon and onions.

 Plate and serve!  Then have the birthday boy do the clean up :)

Chicken Piccata....Caroline Style....

I love different types of lemon chicken - this one came out of a Barefoot Contessa cookbook by Ina Garten.  You brown the chicken then finish the cooking in the oven while you make the sauce.

 The sauce is just your basic reduction of lemon juice and chicken stock, salt and pepper.  You don't need a lot of sauce because the lemon is so strong.  Paul and I decided that we like it sweet, so I added an equal amount of sugar as the lemon juice...much better.

 As a side I used vermicelli with just a touch of white truffle oil and finished with Italian parsley and thinly sliced lemon.

Guava Cake

A few weeks ago I found out about a bakery in San Jose called Aki's Bakery.  They are sort of a Hawaii type bakery that has all the cakes we used to eat in Hawaii.  Guava, Passion Fruit, Dobash, Mango...etc, etc, etc.  YUM!!!

 We looked the place up on yelp.com and found out that you gotta get there early or all the good stuff is gone.  Just like in Hawaii!  We got up at 6:30am and were on their doorstep by 7am.

 We served the cake at our BYU football game party.  It was so delicious!