Nibbles & Sips

Fun with food and beverages: recipes and opinions about what, how, and why we eat.

Beggar’s CAN Be Choosers

Nibbles

Or choice morsels to treat yourself and guests too.

Minted Pea and Mushroom Beggars Purse

Minted Pea and Mushroom Beggar's Purse

I mean beggar’s purses, of course, like the kind I made for this year’s Fairy Fest. They most likely get their name from the Medieval-style cloth purses made from a circle of fabric and a simple drawstring. Whether made from pastry, as below, or crêpes or pasta, the fillings can be sweet or savory–really, anything goes.

Personally, I love the pastry ones best and prefer to use square pieces as a base as as not to have any waste. Puff pastry doesn’t do too well re-rolled (though if you’re going to try it, stack the scraps together and then roll out to the desired thickness–this keeps the layers intact the way just smooshing the bits together will not). Plus, when the sides are gathered up, the pointed corners make a delightful petal shape on top of the purse that is quite decorative.

Minted Pea and Mushroom Beggar’s Purses

Makes 36

8 oz Frozen Peas
1 stick (4 oz) Unsalted Butter, diced
8 oz Mushrooms, diced
2 Tbsp chopped Mint
1 Tbsp dried Thyme
1 Tbsp dried Parsley
1 tsp Sugar
Salt and Pepper to taste
2 packages Puff Pastry Dough (4 sheets)
1 egg, beaten with 1 Tbsp water, for egg wash
Fresh Chives, optional, for ties

To Make the Filling:

Cook peas according to package directions; drain off any remaining water.

Stir together the cooked peas with butter, mushrooms and seasonings, allowing the heat from the peas to melt the bits of butter. Set aside.

Preheat your oven to 375° F and line 2 baking sheets with parchment paper.

Divide each sheet of puff pastry dough into 9 equal pieces, about 3 inches square. On a lightly floured surface, roll each square out, gently, to about 4″ squares.

To Make the Purses:

To each square of puff pastry add 1 heaping tablespoon of filling to the center.

Brush a circle of water or egg wash around the filling (this will help the pastry stick together up top).

Draw together the centers of each side and then the corners, leaving the ends of the corners free to lay to the side like tissue paper out of a gift bag.

Squeeze together the top of the newly-formed pouch, just under the corner-points and finish with a tie of chive around the neck of the pouch. (See illustration below)

How to Form Beggar's Purses from Puff Pastry Squares

How to Form Beggar's Purses from Puff Pastry Squares

Brush the tops of the purses with egg wash and bake for 20-30 minutes or until the puff pastry is golden brown.

Either serve warm or let cool and refrigerate until needed. They keep very well and will reheat in about 30 minutes in a 350°-oven. They do okay in a microwave, too, but it’s not my first choice for reheating.

(adapted from the recipes “Sweet Peas with Mint” and “Mushrooms in Cream” from Celtic Folklore Cooking)

This filling would also be excellent pureed smooth and used as a filling for ravioli. They smell divine when baking and taste even better!

A Blast From Our Blueberry-Tinged Past

Sips

Welcome back for our second installment in the Alphatinis series. This week B is for Blueberry, but a little blueberry should never be left in the cold (vodka) on his own.

~~~oOo~~~

Blueberry Pomegranate Martini
A couple years back, Todd and I attended a local fundraiser and sampled an amazing Blueberry Pomegranate cocktail. It was so good that we decided to try our hand at recreating it at home–the first of many such experiences, some of which will find their way into this series (indeed, could even be considered the inspiration for it).

Trying to find a recipe online yielded the most likely answer: that the restaurant serving the drink was probably using a mix. Still, we had to give it a try and after 5 versions and some tweaking here and there, we hit upon the best possible combination of vodka and juices to match what we’d had that night. And I tucked the recipe away in that year’s little red notebook for future use.

It’s wonderful living in the future!

Blueberry Pomtini

2 oz Blueberry Juice
1 oz Pomegranate Juice
1 oz Vodka
1 oz Simple Syrup
Garnish: Fresh Blueberries

Combine all liquid ingredients over ice and shake like a brisk breeze is blowing through your arms, right into that chilly mixing glass. (Make sure to get a good seal on that Boston shaker–this mix will stain for sure!) Strain into a chilled cocktail glass and garnish with a skewer of fresh blueberries.

A sweet, generous cocktail, the Blueberry Pomtini is one you can enjoy as a quick drink or sip over the course of an evening without a lot of alcohol going to your head. Earlier version were based on a simple 2:1 martini ratio (not smooth at all) and even one a la a Cosmopolitan (the triple sec–this was before I was using strictly Cointreau–overpowered everything, as it’s wont to do). And without the sugar syrup the juice and vodka alone were much too tart.

That testing, however, was before we discovered our fondness for vanilla vodka (the brand we’re loving right now? 360 Madagascar Vanilla) so tonight I trotted out that little red notebook and gave the old favorite a run with our new favorite just to see how it fared. While the vanilla version was quite tasty–the vanilla lends a certain warmth to the drink–it did overshadow the delicate blueberry flavor more than we would have wanted. Ergo, we present it as originally concocted.

Now, for this past Halloween I made a version of this as a punch, Blue Blood Punch to be specific. Combining large containers of Cran-Pomegranate and Cran-Blueberry Juices with a 2-liter of Ginger Ale in a punch bowl or (in our case) 3-gallon drink dispenser with ice makes a very good punch for the masses. And for those who wish a little more bite to their drink could go inside to the bar and add a splash of spirits.

~~~oOo~~~

Every Friday we’ll be wending our way through the new Alphatini series. Discouraged by 2 sweets to start? Well, if you’ll hang with us through the C-tini to come next week, I promise a different twist is coming when we get to the big D!

Who Wants a Healthy Cookie?

Nibbles

Fruit thins and milk
Frankly, I think the point of cookies is not to be healthy, but it certainly doesn’t hurt to have a range of alternatives. After all, sometimes an apple or orange just doesn’t satisfy the way of baked treat can. Still, the trend of marketing snack foods as healthy or good for you just makes me roll my eyes.

So it was with a certain amount of both curiosity and skepticism that I tried Newtons Fruit Thins, Fig and Honey.

Let’s take this from the top down, shall we?

The package touts “made with real fruit” as opposed to what–fake fruit? One would certainly hope that it’s made with fruit as opposed to chemicals, but is it made with either figs or honey?

Turns out: yes. The ingredients list reads:

Unbleached enriched flour*, sugar, whole grain wheat flour, soybean and/or palm oil, rolled oats, dried figs, raisins, honey, salt, baking soda, rice flour, soy lecithin, natural flavor (contains cinnamon).

*I left out the bracketed enriched bits for the sake of clarity.

I also noticed a few other things. While enriched flour is one of those borderline ingredients (why pump vitamins in when they can be achieved through other ingredients goes the argument), sugar, salt and baking soda are all simple, understandable ingredients–the same ones we bake with in our own kitchens. Not too bad, Nabisco, not too bad.

So they seem fairly simple cookies, which I definitely prefer, but they’re still cookies. Emphasizing the words “fruit” and “thins” on the package doesn’t take away from the fact that they are a snack and not a building block of a healthy diet.

But how do they taste?!

At first I couldn’t put my finger on it–the flavor reminded me of something familiar but it wasn’t immediately recognizable. They are crisp–even several weeks after opening the package they were still crisp and not stale–and studded with bits of dried figs and sweet without being too sweet. In fact, the only downside of that first cookie was that the figgy bits were so dense that they can easily get stuck to your teeth. Still, once you’ve encountered the first one you tend to bite more carefully and the problem is avoided.

When Todd got home and I had him taste one, it finally clicked what the scent and flavor reminded us of: oatmeal raisin cookies. Now, we happened to really like oatmeal raisin cookies so this was a good thing.

As tasty as the cookies are on their own–and they are!–I can see these wafer-style cookies being used in a number of sweet and savory sandwiches. Filled with a sweetened boursin cheese or a salt chevre they’d make a nice little afternoon or late-night snack. Maybe even use them for s’mores instead of graham crackers!

Would we buy these over our chosen cookie indulgence, the mighty Oreo? Probably not as a general rule. But if I were looking for something tasty and non-chocolate for a road-trip snack or just wanted something different, Newtons Fruit Thins are a little higher on the list than they would have been.

Have you tried this or any of the other flavors of Newtons Fruit Thins? What did you think?

~~~oOo~~~

As part of the FoodBuzz Featured Publisher Program I was sent a free package of the product to try. All opinions are my own.

MxMo LIX: Beer Cocktails and a Return of the Glazed Doughnut

Sips

Glazed Doughnut Cocktail and Props

Ever since I started cocktail-blogging I’ve meant to participate in the Mixology Monday meme but always remembered too late. This time I was smart and actually put it on my calendar as one of my to-dos for today.

It also helps that this MxMo theme, hosted by Frederic of Cocktail Virgin Slut is cocktails made with beer. If you followed my 50 Shots of America series you know that I’ve made quite a few beer cocktails over the last year and a bit, some tastier than others, but none better than the first one, in honor of North Carolina and the Krispy Kreme doughnut that began there.

The Glazed Doughnut

2 oz Honey Wheat beer*
1 oz Sweetened Condensed Milk
1/2 oz Butterscotch Schnapps
1/4 oz Vanilla Vodka

Combine over ice in a sturdy mixing glass and shake as if the fryer’s broken and the pre-church crowd is about to descend. Strain into 2 small cordial glasses (or 1 martini glass) and steel yourself for the oncoming rush.

Shortly after creating this cocktail I was at the rehearsal dinner for my brother’s wedding and explaining some of what I do to my beer-connoisseur of an aunt. When I said I’d made a fabulous cocktail out of beer the look on her face could not have been more disbelieving. Once I explained about the need for that yeasty flavor in certain drinks and the only good way of getting it being beer, even she agreed that it made sense and even sounded pretty doggone good! The fact that the original recipe for Krispy Kreme doughnuts is said to have been purchased from a pastry chef from New Orleans, and we’re from that area of Louisiana, well, let’s just say our love for those pillowy breakfast confections is no longer a mystery.

MxMo Logo
I’m happy to report that this cocktail still makes me do a little happy dance and is still the perfect remedy to a late-night doughnut craving when you can’t quite justify heading to the doughnut drive-thru in your pajamas.

Beware the Hag With the Poisoned Apple

Sips

Welcome to the first of our new Alphatini series where we take a look at 26 varieties of the classic martini and come up with the best possible version of each, maybe even creating some new ones on the way.

~~~oOo~~~

A is for Apple

If we, in our gin-soaked haze, remember nothing else from those early learning years it’s that A is indeed for apple. That big, red, juicy fruit purported to keep the doctor away with one a day, win us extra points with the teacher and even find the first initial of our true love in it’s peel. Whether piled high in a pie, cooked down to sauce or juiced for convenience we’ve all had some sort of experience with apples in our life.

And while apples come in reds, greens, yellows and combinations thereof, exactly when did they become neon-hued and sour? While we may have become used to the chartreuse cocktail billed as an Appletini, it resembles an alcoholic candy more than what some believe the serpent tempted Eve with.

Let’s see if we can’t come up with something better, shall we?

Surveying the Orchard

Taking a quick stroll through bartending guides and web recipe repositories, the Appletini always seems to have a vodka base (sometimes a flavored vodka but often plain). The other main ingredient is apple schnapps–usually the sour sort like DeKuypers Apple Pucker. It’s not a bad ingredient, really, but I’d like to at least see a little apple juice in my apple martini (I know, shocking), not just booze. What I certainly don’t need is sour mix, citrus soda or cranberry juice mucking around my glass. They’re all find ingredients in their own right (well, except the sour mix–make your own!), just not what we really need here.

What could we add instead? Obvious would be apple juice or you could go even more direct with some apple puree. If you want to invoke the feel of a warm apple pie some vanilla and cinnamon would not go amiss (hello, vanilla vodka and maybe some cinnamon schnapps or syrup), even some condensed milk shaken in for that a la mode vibe. Or you could go a little classier with some Calvados (apple brandy) and a cinnamon stick for a cider-like cocktail.

In Search Of…

Caramel Apple Spice MartiniOnce, in a fairly decent chain restaurant, late one night after a holiday concert, I was intrigued enough to order a Caramel Apple Martini expecting something I wanted to just curl up in and take a nap. Instead what was brought to me was thin-tasting, bitter and gritty from the powdered cinnamon around the rim. The only thing it had in common with a real caramel apple was that it was sticky.

It’s so sad when a drink doesn’t live up to the menu’s hype.

Enter my solution: a dreamy, creamy caramel apple flavor with just a hint of spice. It’s definitely a dessert drink and even with less than 2 oz alcohol in there it’s pretty potent (the sugary ones always are). Sip it slowly and savor it.

Caramel Apple Spice Martini

1 1/4 oz Vanilla Vodka
1 1/4 oz Apple Juice
1/2 oz Caramel Sauce
1/4 oz Cinnamon Schnapps
Garnish: cinnamon-demerara sugar, apple slice, cinnamon stick

Combine the vodka, juice, caramel sauce and schnapps in a cocktail shaker over ice. Give it a good, long shake to toss the caramel sauce around and strain into a chilled cocktail glass rimmed with cinnamon-demerara sugar. Garnish with a slice of apple and a cinnamon stick.

The “secret” is to use a caramel sauce and not a syrup–the syrup will give a thinner mouth-feel and can have a very chemical edge to it. And yes, I mean sauce like you’d use for ice cream topping. When you mix the cinnamon sugar, go easy on the cinnamon–it really doesn’t take more than a sprinkle in a quarter cup of sugar (I prefer demerara for the natural color and large crystals) to get the point across without any grittiness.

For an extra treat, try sipping the drink through the cinnamon stick!