Archive: August 2008

We did it!  Two months of testing recipes has come to a close, and we have arrived at this, the final Whip It Up wrap-up.  I owe big thanks to Nic for having the initial brainstorm for this project, but mostly for putting up with my obsessive spreadsheet control freak tendencies with much grace and aplomb.

Without further ado, the geekery!

The Stats

• 51 participants tested a total of 335 recipes.  Only 6 recipes were duplicated within the eight weeks.
• Of the 335 recipes, participants rated 97% as easy to follow; 87% as tasty; and 85% as likely household repeats.

The WIU participants created dishes in fourteen (non-parallel) categories (that Nic and I made up as we went along), and the two most prevalent ones were Dessert (21.2%) and Pasta (17.3%).  As of the midpoint status report, Pasta had a slight margin over Dessert for the lead category, but I suspect that the last week’s theme pushed sugary delights over the edge to claim victory.  Carbs and chocolate — that is what the WIU folks are about, apparently.

All of the eager WIU signer-uppers started off the challenge strong, with a spike of 56 recipes tested in the first week.  The recipe submission trailed off toward the end, and not everyone remained eligible for the prize-winning drawing.

The Winner!

With help from the Random Integer Generator, we congratulate Heidikins, the lucky winner!  Out of  29 eligible participants, she will be the happy recipient of her choice out of the following cookbooks:

• Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking, by Marcella Hazan
• The America’s Test Kitchen Family Cookbook
• Barefoot Contessa at Home, by Ina Garten

Heidikins, let us know where to send your prize!

The Conclusion

• Thank you so much to everyone who participated.  It was really fun to read about your culinary adventures, and together, we tried over three hundred recipes in just two months!  The sheer volume of recipes is really staggering to me, and we could not have seen that success without you.
• I had a lofty aspiration to put together a printable PDF of all of the WIU recipes, but even I will not attempt that project with this many recipes.  The recipe index will remain live for your reference, so bookmark it and come back whenever you need new inspiration!
• The future of WIU is unclear, mostly because Nic and I have not even broached the subject of what that might look like.  As we figure it out, please send us your feedback.  We want to hear from you!

Finally, I present the last round of recipes.  Allez cuisine!

Continue reading →

Hello, long weekend.
Where have you been, exactly?
It’s been a while.

JG’s back at school,
Although not with students yet,
But the week was long.

Tomorrow, JG’s
Volleyball team is playing
In a tournament

At his old high school,
And he’ll coach in the same gym
Where he played. So strange.

We have a long ride.
The bus leaves at 5:15!
In the morning! Gah.

Wake-up call’s at 4,
But as sleepy as I’ll be,
I’ll be a great fan.

I made some cookies
For the girls, but they’re so flat.
Sigh. Still tasty, though.

I hope they play well,
The season starts out nicely,
And JG is pleased.

But then, Labor Day!
It’s the last day off I’ll take
Before Thanksgiving.

Maybe I’ll sleep in
And catch up on some reading.
Yes, that sounds lovely.

It’s the eighth, last week of Whip It Up!  The final wrap-up post will go live on Sunday, where we will reveal the last batch of recipes, the lucky winner of the prize drawing, and — of course! — fascinating facts and figures from two months of testing new dishes.  Oh, there will be graphs.

For this last theme of dessert, I chose Nutella ice cream, which I first spied depicted in comic-book form by Adam Roberts, The Amateur Gourmet, who found it at Chocolate and Zucchini.  Whew!  It’s like food-blog Telephone/Whisper Down the Alley.  When I found Adam’s post months ago, I sent the link to JG, and he responded, “Awesome.”

Method
This recipe is ridiculously easy.  Two ingredients, just a few steps, and ice cream as a reward for patience.  Although it calls for an ice cream machine, it’s possible to create this dessert without one. I made the ice cream on the same night that I prepped a slow cooker of beef burrito filling for the next day, made a black bean salad, and cooked chili mac for dinner, and that is not at all a testament to my multitasking skill, which seems to view the kitchen as a Do Not Enter zone.  This ice cream is really that simple.

I estimated that one jar of Nutella would be enough for the recipe, but it came up short in my plunger measuring cup, so I added some peanut butter, per one of the original commenters.  As is my unfortunate custom, I used a bowl that was just large enough to hold the ingredients, but not to mix them, so it was a slow whisking process, indeed.  Nevertheless, the hardest part was pouring the chilled mixture into the small mouth of the ice cream machine, and that is something I will not do on my own again.  I am not that coordinated, and I need to accept that.

Taste
The ice cream firmed up in the freezer overnight, and I scooped out a portion for JG last night.  I should clarify that, at our house, we have RA- and JG-size ice cream portions, where JG’s portions are roughly three times the size of mine. When friends come over, they know which size to request, although I’ve noticed that people generally lean toward the RA-size helping.  In any case, I scooped out a JG-size dish of ice cream and tossed in some pretzels, since we love pretzels in Nutella.  In JG’s words, the ice cream was delicious, awesome, rich, and heavy.  In fact, he thinks he should have gone with an RA-size bowl.  How about that?  I took a small taste, and it just about knocked me over.  The hazelnut flavor was very pronounced, and the texture was fantastic, but it was insanely heavy.

Repeat appearance
I think I would make this ice cream again, but I would not top off the jar of Nutella with any peanut butter, and  I might add more evaporated milk to thin out the mixture.  The idea of Nutella-based ice cream is great, but since the spread itself is so thick and rich, the resulting ice cream packs a punch.  I would probably prefer a vanilla-Nutella swirl with hazelnut chunks, but that is certainly more work than this two-ingredient shortcut.  I’d recommend making this ice cream, but a shot glass might be a more appropriate serving vessel than a JG-size bowl.

Continue reading →

I dream in first person. I don’t watch myself; I am in my body. My pulse quickens when I am fleeing, and I gasp aloud when I’m afraid.

Last night, I dreamed that JG and I were arguing about something maybe related to decor, but it all came back to money. The cold timbre of our voices, the stony silence, and that familiar tightening in my chest were eerily vivid. Eventually, JG had had enough, and he walked away in disgust. I was so angry that I picked up the closest thing to me to hurl it into the wall, but it was just a wad of plastic bags, and I flailed in my efforts to send it crashing. Immediately, I was ashamed of myself, and I let out a barbaric yawp of frustration. And I heard myself heaving deep sighs of unrest and slapping the mattress as I thrashed into wakefulness.

JG whispered, “Are you okay?”

I lingered in the fog. No, I’m not okay.

Later, I told him how I dreamed that we fought. “But we didn’t in real life,” he said. I know, but the foreboding and frustration are deep inside my bones as though we had.