Medianoche Sliders

I'm back in Baltimore for my family's Christmas Eve extravagaannzzaaaa and to destroy my mothers kitchen in a boozy flurry of baking, roasting, sautéing, and probably something involving my new smoking gun. 

I can make a truly excellent mess in a kitchen. 

Every year for our Christmas Eve party, I get to make an apetizer, a side dish, and my absolute favorite Garden and Gun bourbon punch. I've been striclty assigned those three items in a futile attempt to limit my mess. But this year, I'm allowed to do more!

This Christmas Eve party stared small, but over the years it has grown to almost 100 people. Kids outnumber the parents, which actually made things easier at one point. Throw some frozen chicken nuggets in the oven and heat up some mac and cheese and us kids were good. Leave the fancy roasts and side dishes for the grown ups.  

But now the "kids" are graduating college, getting married, and the BABIES that I remember being born are old enough to drive. Oh, and we all want to eat the grown up food. 

Which brings me to these sliders. Instead of preparing enough steak for 100 "adults" (!?), I get to make one more dish! 

YAY. 

These sliders aren't your typical cold weather, curl up by the fire, burrow in a blanket with a good book food. But they are sweet, salty, savory, and oops-did-I-just-eat-the-entire-tray delicious. 

They're really great for all seasons, the pulled pork makes them feel like fall, the pineapple makes them feel like spring, and they can be served hot in the winter or cold in the summer.

I've made these sliders so many times for so many different occassions. For the boyfriend's law school class, for my golden birthday, and for a honeymoon-themed Bridal shower to name a few. They're called "medianoche" because they're what you want to eat in the middle of the night, which happens to be when the Christmas-eve party ends. Whether you spent the night drinking, partying, studying, or netflixing in sweats, these are the perfect late night snack. 

They are also SO EASY and as close to mess-free as you can get. They only need 25 minutes in the oven, and if you have pulled pork in the fridge (or if you just leave it out of the sliders), the sandwiches can be put together in less than 10 minutes. Perfect for those times you forget that you are supposed to bring food to a party. If that doesn't sound like you (aka if you are an organized and put-together human being)... you can assemble the sandwiches two days in advance. 

medianoche sliders

for the sandwiches: 

• 2 packs Hawaiian dinner rolls

• 2-3 packs deli ham (go with 3 if leaving out the pulled pork or if the ham is thinly sliced)

• 2 packs sliced Swiss cheese

• 1 jar sweet pickles

• pulled pork

for the pulled pork (you will have extra):

• 2 lbs pork loin

• 1/2 cup smoky BBQ sauce

• 1 can pineapple

• 1 tsp liquid smoke

for the sauce: 

• 1 stick butter

• 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard

• 1/2 small sweet onion

Preparation:

to make the pulled pork, rub salt and pepper over the pork loin and place it in the slow cooker. Whisk the BBQ sauce, pineapple (liquid and all), and liquid smoke in a bowl, and pour it over the pork. Cook on low for 6-8 hours. Remove the pork from the slow cooker and shred with two forks (or use an electric mixer to shred). Discard all but 1 cup of the liquid in the slow cooker, and return the shredded pork and the reserved liquid to the slow cooker, and set aside. 

to assemble the sandwiches, put the bottom half of the Hawaiian rolls in the casserole dish. Layer in the ham, followed by the pulled pork, then the pickles, and finally the swiss cheese. Add the tops of sandwich rolls, and cover & refridgerate if you will not be baking right away. 

to bake with the mustard sauce, preheat the oven to 325 degrees F. Finely dice the onion and melt the butter in a microwave safe bowl. Whisk the Dijon mustard and diced onions with the melter butter. Pour the sauce over the sandwiches and cover with foil. Bake covered for 15 minutes. Remove the foil and bake for 10 more minutes or until the top is crispy (but not burnt). 

slice and enjoy hot or cold for breakfast, lunch, dinner, or as a midnight snack. 

Marzipan Chocolate Chip Cookies

So desserts are not really my thing. Generally, I feel like dessert recipes are overly complicated (this one requires THREE types of sugar) and they take too long and use fifty bowls and then once you're done you can only have a little bit of whatever sugar-filled item you painstakingly labored over.   

So why am I sharing a cookie recipe today? Because, it's Christmas darlings.

...and because its also law school exam season and the boyfriend has banned all things merry and bright until after exams are over ON THE 19TH! That baaaaaarely leaves any time for Christmas cheer.

[insert overly dramatic sigh here]

Luckily, this ban does not apply to food so I am cooking and baking my heart out. So far, I've made my 10 step breakfast bread, two batches of pop tarts - one batch the boyfriend stress ate so I had to make a second batch, which I forgot to take pictures of, so I'll be making a third batch soon - then I had extra pie crust so I made super yummy chicken pot pie from scratch, and then I got tired of baking/all of my pans and mixing bowls were dirty so I made a huge batch of my favorite momofuku soy sauce eggs (I'll be sharing my paleo version soon) which I then proceeded to eat on everything and anything, and finally, I ran out of pop tarts and needed to get my sugar fix elsewhere. 

Enter cookies.

These cookies are delicious. They are salty and sweet and have the best sugary-almond surprise. The recipe is kind of a pain in the ass, but only if you plan on baking alone. Grab some friends (preferably one who has a kitchen aid stand mixer), a bottle or three of wine, and gather in the kitchen. That's what the holidays are about.  

Chocolate Chip & Marzipan Cookies

adapted slightly from i am a food blog 

• 100 grams marzipan (i buy this marzipan found in most grocery stores and use half of the package in this recipe)

• 1.75 cups all purpose flour

• 0.75 teaspoon baking soda

• 0.5 teaspoon salt

• 1 stick butter

• 2 tablespoons white sugar

• 2 tablespoons Turbinado sugar

• 1 cup brown sugar

• 1 large egg

• 1 teaspoon vanilla

• 1 bag milk chocolate chips (the bag I used was 12 oz)

• flaky sea salt

Preheat the oven to 360°F.

Roll marzipan (100 g) into little balls, roughly the same size as the chocolate chips you are using. 

Whisk together the dry ingredients (1.75 cups flour, 0.75 tsp baking soda, 0.5 tsp salt) in a medium bowl. Set aside.

In a separate bowl, use a stand or handheld electric mixer to cream butter (1 stick), white sugar (2 tbsp), turbinado sugar (2 tbsp), and brown sugar (1 cup). Once the butter/sugar is light & fluffy, add 1 large egg and vanilla (1 tsp) & mix until combined.

On a low speed, slowly add the dry ingredients, chocolate chips (12 oz bag), and marzipan balls until all the ingredients are is just barely incorporated.

Roll the dough into 1 inch balls and flatten oh so very slightly.  Place the balls on a baking sheet lined with parchment paper. You'll want them to be about 2 inches apart. 

Sprinkle with flaky salt and bake for 10 minutes. After 10 minutes, check on the cookies. You want to remove them from the oven once the edges are golden, but before they turn golden brown.

Once you've reached (or surpassed.. it happens) the perfect golden edges, remove from the oven and let the cookies rest on the baking sheet for five or so minutes.

Enjoy with red wine or whatever bottle is open by the time you finish the recipe.

Happy holidaze! 

Butternut-Bacon Soup

Crisp air, falling leaves, and the holiday season are upon us. It may be too early for Christmas music, but it's never too early for cozy dinners with friends and family. A couple of years ago, I wrote about how French onion soup was my favorite comfort food. Okay, maybe it was my senior year of college, and maybe it was four years ago, and maybe I'm freaking out that I've been out of school that long. 

French onion soup has cheese, bread, and alcohol. It's hard to beat. But it can also leave me feeling heavy. That's why this bacon-butternut squash soup is my favorite feel-good food. It has all the comfort of soup and will fill you up without so much hearty-ness. Is that a word? Probably not.

It also has bacon in it. And bacon is everything. 

In the warmer months, the last thing I want to do is be stuck in the kitchen making a long recipe. Once the temperature drops below 60, that's all I want to do. Even though this takes less than an hour to make, there's something oh so comforting about hanging out in the kitchen on a cold day (preferably in leggings, an oversized sweater, and camp socks that Dixie hasn't chewed a hole in) and having the entire house smell delicious.

There you have it. A delicious smelling home. Good feels. Bacon. Why haven't you already started making this?

Did I mention the bacon?

 Ingredients 

• 1 butternut squash (2.5 - 3 pounds)

• 1 white onion

• 1 red bell pepper

• 1 pack uncooked bacon (at least 8 slices), divided

• 2-3 tablespoons cooking oil, divided

• 3 cloves garlic (or 3 teaspoons minced garlic)

• 2/3 teaspoon dried thyme

• 32 ounces chicken stock

• crumbled goat cheese, optional

• chopped chives, optional

Directions:

1. Prep for cooking. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees F. Peel, seed, and chop your butternut squash into 1-inch chunks. Roughly dice your onion and red bell pepper, and discard the pepper seeds. Divide your bacon in half. Roughly chop 4 slices into 1-inch squares and chop the other 4 slices more finely. Mince garlic cloves (or just buy minced garlic because mincing garlic is terrible).

2. Toss the Butternut squash, onion, and red bell pepper in a bowl with 2 tablespoons cooking oil (I like to use hazelnut oil).

3. Lay the 1-inch slices of bacon in a single layer of your baking dish, the pour the squash-onion-pepper mixture in the baking dish over the bacon.

4. Roast the squash-onion-pepper-bacon mix until the squash can easily be squashed (or mashed with a spoon if you aren't into puns). This will typically take 30-45 minutes. After 13 minutes, check to see if the bacon is good and crispy. Once it is, stir the mixture so the bacon is mixed in and the yummy bacon grease coats the other veggies.

5. While the veggies are roasting, heat a bit of oil in a Dutch oven or stock pot over medium-high heat. Cook the remaining bacon. Set the bacon aside on a paper towel when it's good and crispy. Try not to eat it all while cooking or feed it to your dog like I did. Reserve 1 tablespoon bacon grease from the Dutch oven/stock pot.

6. When the veggies are done, heat the reserved bacon grease over medium heat. Add minced garlic and thyme. Cook until fragrant. Optional: while the garlic and thyme are cooking, mash the squash mixture with a spoon in the pan.

7. Add squash mixture to the Dutch oven and stir to combine garlic and thyme. Gradually add chicken stock and blend with an immersion blender.

8. Once all the chicken stock has been added and the soup is blended and smooth, turn the heat to high and bring it to a boil, stirring occasionally.

9. Once the soup has thickened a bit, remove it from heat. Serve with goat cheese, reserved bacon, and chives.

10. Enjoy with a cozy blanket by a fire.

Enjoy darlings! 

No-fail Pizza dough!

I love pizza, but I haven't really had the chance to make it from scratch very often. Something about throwing food in the air and all the flour needed to roll out the dough frightens my mom. I think her aversion to it comes from the time my youngest brother threw full, open GoGurts into a ceiling fan in a newly painted room. But now that we are older, I finally got to make homemade pizza with my brothers! This base recipe is great on its own, but with a few changes it can make an awesome breakfast, dinner, or desert pizza!

Base recipe:

• 2 c. flour

• 1 t. salt

• 2 t. baking powder

• 2/3 c. water

• 1/4 c. vegetable oil

Preparation

Combine dry ingredients in a large bowl, add water. Next knead the mixture on a floured surface until it is easy to roll out onto a pizza pan. brush outer edges with vegetable oil. Cook at 425 for 3-5 minutes. Remove from oven and put whatever toppings you please. Return to the oven for 15 minutes. Remove, let cool, and enjoy!

Christmas Morning Casserole

When I was younger I would be up at 5 am digging through my stocking and then waiting at the top of the stairs with my brothers at 7 am, barely able to contain my excitement about running down and seeing what Santa left under the tree. Now things are a little different. We still have our Christmas Eve party, but now that everyone is older, the party usually doesn't end until 1 am. Then my brothers and I  are left to clean up after the party and set out the presents and get everything ready for Christmas Day. We usually don't get to sleep until 3 am, later if one of my brothers starts opening his presents instead of helping.

Thanks to years of 8 am classes, I can't sleep past 9 am... so Christmas Morning I sit in my room watching The Year Without a Santa Clause (the best claymation in existence), and waiting for my family to wake up. Patience is not my virtue and I get bored waiting for everyone in my house to wake up. In my experience, nothing wakes people up like the smell of a great breakfast. This year when I woke up at 9 am to the sound of my dad snoring two rooms away, I got my dogs and my DVD and went downstairs and brewed a pot of The Fresh Market's Christmas Blend coffee and baked a sausage and egg breakfast casserole. The smell of this breakfast woke up the house and started a wonderful Christmas!

This casserole is the perfect start to any morning, just pop it in the oven--the wonderful smell will wake even the deepest sleeper up and the savory taste will make sure they stay awake!

INGREDIENTS

• 0.5-1 lb sausage (I honestly cannot say how much sausage I used. I bought 1 lb, but then my dogs and I had a little snack as we waited for the oven to preheat)

• 6-8 slices of bread

• 6 eggs, beaten

• 2 cups milk

• 1/2 teaspoon dry mustard

• 1/8 teaspoon onion powder

• 1/2 teaspoon salt

• 1 cup shredded sharp cheddar cheese

• pepper to taste

Remove sausage from casing and cook in a skillet over high heat. While the sausage is cooking, grease a 9"x 13" baking pan and line the bottom of the pan with slices of bread. In a large bowl, beat the eggs. Add the milk, dry mustard, onion powder, and salt. Pour the egg mixture over the bread. Add the cooked sausage to the baking pan as evenly as you can. Liberally add the cheese to the top of the casserole.

((Can be refrigerated for 24 hours))

Bake at 325 degrees for 45 minutes to an hour.

Holiday kisses,

Megan