French onion dip is amazing

           A long time ago my cousin asked me to make my French onion dip for her son’s first birthday party because she loves it. That party is tomorrow, so today I made the dip. It’s always best to make it a day or two before it’s needed so it can sit in the fridge and the flavors can become one. Plus, it takes 3+ hours to cook the onions the way they need to be cooked.

            First, you want to find some sweet onions preferably. I usually choose Vidalia’s, shallots and red onions, and mix them together. This time I chose to use only Vidalia’s because they were on sale. They ended up being incredibly fresh, which in turn made them hard to cut, (I cried the whole time).

            Onions should be cut depending on what they are being used for. Because I want to sauté them for awhile, the best way to cut them is to cut the onion in half, and the cut from the core in slices as pictured in the slideshow above. If you cut them the other way, you will have half-circles and that is more of a salad-cut and not what is desired for this recipe.

            When the cutting is finished, it’s time to sauté. Start with a hot pan and a small amount of vegetable oil, only enough to get it going. The onions will release what seems like a lot of liquid so a lot of oil is not needed. Let the onions cook until the liquid is gone, and the onions turn an amber color. Depending on how long they cook, depends on the color they end up being.

            When they reach the desired color, take them off the heat, transfer to a heat-safe bowl and put them in the fridge. When they are cooled, I always cut them up a little bit, which makes them easier to scoop later.

            Then mix into sour cream, and that’s it. You can add Worcestershire sauce or mayonnaise if you like, but I don’t personally like it. If serving to a party of people, garnish with thinly sliced green onions to give it a pop of color. I usually like Wavy Lays potato chips but any type of chip will do. My friend likes pretzels.

            Hopefully the pictures above help and give an idea of what the onions need to look like. Please comment and let me know what you think if you try this recipe. Happy cooking!

           

            

For the love of chocolate!

  


           Making devil’s food cake cake is only good when made from scratch, believe me. It's rich, moist and extremely chocolatey – and pretty easy too.

I weigh my ingredients out when I bake, and I use grams, not ounces. This makes your measurements more accurate than when using cups and tablespoons. Another tip is to sift everything you can. I can’t tell you how many times I have sifted flour right out of the bag and found little pebbles of something, not sure what. You don’t want that stuff in your cake, so it’s best to just sift it right away.

            First, you measure your dry ingredients, except the sugar, and fat, be it shortening or butter, and I of course like butter. My recipe actually calls for high-ratio shortening (a.k.a emulsified shortening) which is NOT the same as the Crisco you can buy at Wal-Mart. It has special emulsifiers in it which help it retain more moisture, so it’s chemically different than regular shortening.

            Anyway, mix the fat and the dry ingredients, except the sugar, until it’s mixed thoroughly.  Don’t forget to stop and scrape the bottom of the bowl, so you can get everything evenly mixed. Then add the sugar, half the milk, and vanilla, mix thoroughly, and again stop and scrape. While this is mixing, you can weigh out your eggs and milk. If you are going to weigh your ingredients out, I recommend weighing out the eggs first, because they are the messiest. Usually a regular grade AA egg will weigh about 2 ounces, but this is not always true, because it is nature.

            So now, add the egg and milk, but only do it a third at a time – this ensures everything will get incorporated correctly and you won’t have those pesky lumps we all hate. Keep mixing until the batter turns a light brown color, and will appear whipped and not lumpy.

            While you are waiting for the batter to finish whipping, (it’s gonna take a couple minutes) you should prepare your pans. If you are planning to make sheet cakes or round ones, it’s best if you use fat and flour on the pans to ensure the cakes will come out of the pan without sticking. You can always make cupcakes though, and that’s self-explanatory.

            I bake my cakes at 360˚F, but depending on the recipe you have, it varies. It also matters on your oven. Bake until the cake has pulled away from the sides of the pan, and when a toothpick is inserted, it will come out clean. The time also varies depending on oven, pan, size and many other factors.

I have made my cakes many times and have learned my equipment with time. If you don’t get a perfect product, keep trying. Happy baking!