Barbacoa

Last night my Community Group girls made Mexican food for dinner. I brought the barbacoa - shredded braised beef - for tacos. I found a Chipotle copy-cat recipe online and tried it, and it was spot on! I love Carnitas too but sometimes you just need beef. When that happens, try this recipe!

Barbacoa Beef

Ingredients:

1/3 cup cider vinegar

3 Tbs. lime juice

3 canned chipotle chiles

4 cloves garlic, roughly chopped

3 1/2 tsp. ground cumin

2 tsp. dried Mexican oregano

1/2 tsp. ground cloves

1 1/2 tsp. black pepper

1 1/2 tsp. salt

2 Tbs. vegetable oil

3-4 lbs. boneless chuck roast, excess fat removed

3/4 cup chicken broth, plus more as needed

3 bay leaves

Directions:

Combine the cider vinegar, lime juice, chipotle chiles, garlic cloves, cumin, oregano, clove, black pepper and salt in the bowl of a food processor or blender and puree until completely smooth — about a minute or so. Transfer the spice paste to a bowl and set aside.

Dry the roast all over with paper towels. Heat the 2 tablespoons of oil in a very large pot set over high heat until it begins to shimmer. Sear the beef on both sides until deeply browned, about 3-4 minutes on either side. 

Add the chile puree to the pot and stir until the beef is well-coated. Add the chicken stock and bay leaves and bring the liquid to a boil.
Place the meat and liquid into a crock pot and cook on low for 5-6 hours, removing the lid during the last hour or so to allow the simmering liquid to reduce slightly. Allow the beef to cool slightly, spoon off any easily removable fat from the braising liquid and then use two forks to pull/shred the beef into bite size pieces.

Best Fail Ever!

Last night I made birthday dessert for my friend, Sasha. She said she liked cookies rather than cake and liked peanut butter, other than that, I was on my own. I found a recipe on Pinterest for a chocolate peanut butter cookie pie. Perfect! When it was done baking it looked good but it wiggled a bit and I knew it wasn't quite done in the middle. I figured it would be OK but after it cooled I cut into it and the insides gushed out and I realized that it was REALLY underdone. Well, what do you do at that point other than serve it with a "Hey, I tried" shrug. I dumped spoonfuls of the goop in bowls and topped it with vanilla ice cream.

I sat down to take a bite and when I did I realized that I had made the best mistake ever! It was warm and gooey and sweet and amazing. You know something is rich when ice cream is necessary to cut the sweetness. Anyway, if you want to give this a try, it is a yummy dessert. If you want it set, I would recommend baking it a bit longer, if you want it to gush everywhere, follow the recipe as written :)

Pretzel Crusted Peanut Butter Cup Pie

Ingredients:

2 cups crushed pretzels

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 stick of butter, melted

2 sticks of butter, room temp

3/4 cup light brown sugar

3/4 cup granulated sugar

2 eggs

2 tsp vanilla

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp kosher salt

2 1/4 cup flour

1 cup semi sweet chocolate chips

1 (8 oz) bag Reese's minis

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350°F

Combine crushed pretzels, 1/2 cup melted butter and 1/2 cup sugar in a bowl. Press mixture firmly into the bottom and up sides of a 10" pie or tart pan.

Bake for 8 minutes. Remove from oven.

While crust is baking make the pie filling.

Cream butter, 3/4 cup granulated sugar and 3/4 cup brown sugar with your mixer.

Add eggs and vanilla and beat until combined and smooth.

On low speed add in your baking soda, salt and flour until incorporated evenly.

Still on low, add in your chocolate chips and Reese's Minis until evenly distributed.

Press mixture on top of baked crust.

Place pie back in oven for 30-35 minutes until just set.

Let cool on wire rack before serving.

Cut open and watch it gush out into sweet chocolatey goodness!

May the Odds be EVER in your favor...

I went and saw the Hunger Games. Twice. Yes, it has only been out three days. For those of you who haven't seen it yet and don't want any spoilers, stop reading now.  You can come back to this after you go see the movie. What are you waiting for? Go see the movie. Now!

Ok...are you back? Alright, settle in, here are my thoughts:

I first heard about the Hunger Games Trilogy from Aubree, the 13 year old daughter of my friends, Ben and Tricia. She started to explain the plot to me and as she talked I just stared at Tricia in amazement. Kids, picked at random and forced to fight to the death in an arena and it is required viewing for the entire country and considered entertainment for many? And she is reading this in school? Whaaaa??? Tricia assured me that though the subject matter is pretty intense, it is a great series and worth the read. I trust her judgement and so I borrowed the books. 

When I get into things, I really get into things. I read through the series twice. I loved them!  Although, Suzanne Collins really doesn't know how to end a book. The books are great right up until the last 10 pages and then she just rushes through the ending. But that is a whole other blog post. 

Anyway, back to the movie. To be honest, I really wish I hadn't seen it at midnight.  (no offense, Tricia and Aubree, I enjoyed hanging out with you!) I normally get a kick out of going to the midnight showings. I have done that most recently with Harry Potter and Twilight. Yes, I am one of the oldest people in line, but it is still fun. The die-hard fans are there and they are full of energy and excitement. There is a lot of screaming and it makes going to a movie a real experience. For example, in Twilight, when Jacob takes off his shirt all of the teenage girls scream and squeal in delight. It is a bit ridiculous but whatever, I get it. In fact, truth be told, I am holding back a bit of a squeal myself. Let's be honest, Taylor Lautner is pretty ripped! I'm just saying...

What was interesting was that in this movie, whenever one of the kids would get killed in the game, all of the teenagers would squeal with delight. It was sooooo creepy! It is one thing to get excited over some werewolf muscles, it is another to get excited about someone's neck getting snapped. It was so disturbing and honestly quite ironic. The movie is about The Capitol of Panem - a sick society of people that force others to watch their kids kill each other for entertainment and here we were watching the same thing acted out and being entertained by it. Being surrounded by such excitement made me almost feel as though I was a part of The Capitol watching the games. Highly unsettling to say the least. 

Another thing that I realized was that the reason books will always be superior to their movie counterpart is because our imagination can create so much more than even the most advanced technology. The story is richer and more intense when read rather than watched. I never thought about this but the opposite is true as well, our imagination can filter quite a bit when reading. As I read about the brutal deaths in the Hunger Games, I didn't have to imagine all the gory details, I was able to kind of breeze over it. In the movie, the scenes that I might not have fleshed out were unavoidable. That being said, the subject matter (which is disturbing no matter how you look at it) was much more unsettling to me when watching the movie, especially while surrounded by a screaming mob of excited teenagers. I left the movie pondering the desensitization of a society in regards to the value of human life and wondering where we were at on that scale. 

I saw the movie again last night with my friends, Brooke and Charley and it was much better the second time around. Mainly because I knew what to expect and it was an older audience that reacted more appropriately to events in the movie so I didn't have that same feeling of being surrounded by a blood thirsty mob. I got to enjoy the movie for what it was. Putting everything that I previously said aside, it was a great movie! The characters were all very well cast, I can't think of a single one that I would have changed. Lenny Kravitz did amazingly well as Cinna and Woody Harrelson was just perfect as Haymitch! I was a bit bummed out that they didn't include Katniss' prep team. I really liked them. And they didn't really capture the depth in Peeta and Katniss' relationship but I think they did the best they could. I would imagine it is nearly impossible to adapt a first person narrative to screen without losing a lot of the emotion and depth that is portrayed in the book. All in all... it is a good movie, a great book and I recommend both. I am very excited for Catching Fire!

Then and now

This week, my friends Jimmy and Amanda have birthdays. They are also getting married on Sunday - busy week for them! I realized when I was baking Jimmy's favorite carrot cake (recipe here) that it was last year on his birthday that I decided to take cake decorating lessons because while my cakes tasted good, they looked like a Kindergarten project!

I have to credit the classes at Michaels because a year makes a big difference!

I also realized that I have been blogging for over a year now so a lot of recipes are repeats. People need to start branching out with their birthday requests so I can try new recipes!

Oh, and guess what my friends did for me last week? All 25 or so people from my two community groups got together and sent me flowers at work! They said, "You make us feel special on our birthday's all year long, we wanted to make you feel special today, we love you!" Isn't that soooo sweet? I get to do what I love doing all year long and get flowers out of the blue for it! It totally made my day. I love my friends!