Closet Cooking...

Tomorrow marks the four week point until we move. Not like I am keeping a countdown. :)

After spending the past three years stocking up on food items while in America, and bringing back multiple, overweight pieces of luggage each trip, I have now reached the point where I need to use my stockpiles. Mixed among my American imports are also food items found in the local grocery stores. Certain items will appear in the store, and I have learned to buy (multiples) when items do appear because it is not guaranteed you will see them again soon, or ever.

My meal planning has taken on a new focus, something I am referring to as Closet Cooking. No pantry in my kitchen, only a closet near the front door to our apartment, the location of my food stockpiles.

The past week's Closet Cooking Culinary Creations:

Not an import, but an item Ryan found months ago during a shopping trip.
Sweet Chili Sauce for Chicken

I am still cooking mostly vegetarian meals, so rather than using the sauce on chicken, I used it to flavor a broth for what I call: "Sweet Chili Tofu, with Soba Noodles"

No babies in our apartment, but I do keep a supply of baby food in the closet. Mainly, apple for baking since I have yet to find applesauce here, and pumpkin as a substitute for canned pumpkin when there are no fresh pumpkins or squash to be found. 

Pumpkin ricotta twice baked potatoes. I added some diced pears for freshness and crunch.
Served with my absolute favorite salad combination, strawberries and goat cheese. 

Shredded coconut, for my husband that claims he does not like coconut. :)
Add in some almonds I have had for some time and leftover white chocolate from a previous creation. 

White Chocolate, Coconut, Almond Cookies
I took inspiration from the very popular candies, Raffaello. I am not sure if they are popular in the States, but they seem to be the candy of choice for any Russian holiday, event, or gift. 

My "Closet Cooking" is not only an attempt to clear the shelves before our move, but also to keep me focused during our last weeks here. After seeing the kitchen in our new house, I find it very difficult to cook in the "kitchen" I currently have. Adding a bit of entertainment should hopefully help me until I am cooking in my dream kitchen.

We went hunting...

Think a little less camouflage, and weaponry. Instead of animals, we were hunting for….HOUSES!

We were in Covington last week with one main focus, find a house. Our realtor was absolutely amazing. The first day we saw eleven houses, went back to the office, made an offer on one. The next morning, we found out the house was incorrectly listed, and was in a bad flood zone (major negative in Louisiana). It was a very quick decision to throw that house out, and we toured another five houses. Fell in love with a new build, went back to the office, ready to make an offer. After looking at the blueprint for the house, we noticed it did not match the house we just toured. Our realtor called the listing realtor, and realized we had toured the wrong house! The house had already sold the previous week (a Chevron employee actually bought the house, so Ryan is going to have to figure out who it is) The house we were supposed to tour was in the same subdivision, but we should have been one street over. We got back into the car, went out to find the house we had the paperwork for, the one we were supposed to tour, and we LOVED it!

It is a new build, not completely finished. Notice the lack of driveway, our first time touring the house was during a Louisiana downpour. I was determined to see this house, the realtor and I left our sandals in the car, walked through the mud to the house, washed our feet off in the rain, then toured the house. Good thing the floors had not been installed yet.

We met the builder later in the week, he is such a nice guy. He built an absolutely beautiful, perfect home. For now, we must wait, we have another five weeks in Russia, then it is off to Louisiana to start our next adventure!

P.S. This is the only type of hunting I foresee myself ever doing.

Cupcake Catastrophe

I do not think there could have been a better time to pause with my posting than on Ryan's birthday. I hope everyone has Ryan's birthday (March 21st) memorized. I honestly meant to blog weeks ago, but my mind has not been focused. I think my lack of focus led to this cupcake catastrophe.

Please do not take this as bragging, but I very rarely have a cooking catastrophe. Creations tend to turn out pretty well, and if they are not perfect then they are at least decent. The previous post, I showed the dinner and ice cream cake for Ryan's birthday, but I left out the birthday treats I made for Ryan's office. My main reason for leaving them out, was because I was determined to turn my cupcake catastrophe into a culinary creation, and prove to myself that I had not completely lost my mind.

It's only appropriate to explain what just happened during this post. I was typing along, type, type, type and I received a text from Ryan. We had received an email with a new listing from our realtor. Actually it was a price reduction. Since I have the entire real estate property listings for Covington and the surrounding 5 miles memorized, I immediately checked it out, confirmed the reduction, and then preceded to text back and forth with Ryan (he is currently away on a business trip) about whether or not it is now worth placement on our walk through list. It did make the list. But there was a huge discussion about a stupid fire hydrant right in front of the house. I have a hard time ignoring that (go figure). But I will give the house a chance. It's a nice house. 

Now back to the originally scheduled post. I hope you have a better understanding of why I am not able to properly focus these days.

The catastrophe began the day before Ryan's birthday. I was going to bake cupcakes for Ryan's office birthday treat. I had decided on a cookies and cream Oreo cupcake with a white chocolate buttercream frosting. I started mixing up the ingredients, had Pandora playing, it was great. Put the cupcakes in the oven, turned around to clean up the mess and realized I forgot to add the butter to the batter! In case you are wondering, when you leave butter out, the cupcakes still look normal, but they have a "gummy" (the word that came to mind when I tried it) texture.

I had to document this craziness. Cupcakes with no butter. 

I had originally planned to make 24 cupcakes to send into the office. I texted Ryan to see if only 12 cupcakes would be enough. I figured I would just make the second batch, adding all the ingredients in, and be done. Nope, Ryan said 24 cupcakes were needed. I remained calm, I had enough ingredients to make two more batches. I set into making the next batter. Really focused on adding the ingredients (all the ingredients) and put the cupcakes in the oven. They finished baking, took them out of the oven, and the all fell in the center. What was going on?!?! When I tried to test how they tasted, they crumbled in my hand (but they did taste yummy). I was losing my mind. I had now made 24 cupcakes, and still had none to send into the office.

Second try.
All ingredients, but this is what happened when I attempted to take the cupcake wrapper off. 

Things got serious. I sent that recipe packing, and researched a new one. Decided to give one a try, focused on adding all the ingredients in, but then I relapsed. I DOUBLED the amount of the last ingredient. Seriously, losing my mind. So I quickly rushed to double the remaining ingredients. I put the first batch of 12 cupcakes in the oven, and hoped that the remaining batter would survive hanging out until I could bake them. The first 12 came out beautifully, and it was time to put the next 12 in. Success!  48 cupcakes later, I had 24 cupcakes ready to be frosted for the office. The frosting was fantastic, the cupcakes looked awesome, and I was told they were gobbled up pretty quickly.

Successful third attempt. 

Finished product, ready for the office. 

Now for the other 24 cupcakes. I could not throw them away. The crumbled ones were delicious, and even the butter lacking ones were not worthy of the trash can. I decided to put them in the freezer until I was ready to deal with them. Their opportunity to redeem themselves came about a week ago. I decided to turn the catastrophe into a culinary creation. I took the bowl of crumbled cupcakes (probably 8 cupcakes worth after Ryan and I preceded to eat the crumbles the night I was baking) and made them into a no bake white chocolate cheesecake mousse pie. Success! The no butter cupcakes still sit in the freezer, and I will most likely turn them into another mousse pie.

From frozen crumbles to fantastic dessert. 

Maybe I am not losing my mind after all. Now back to checking on (stalking) all real estate listings of potential houses in Covington. I wonder if there is a support group for first time home buyers that are addicted to checking real estate listings. I think I would be a prime candidate.