Tag: February

February Cookbook Update

Posted February 29, 2024 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book Events and Tours, Uncategorized / 2 Comments

 

 

Hi, everybody! Just wanted to give you an update on how things are progressing with the extended edition of A LITERARY PICNIC:

  • THE ROAD SO FAR. I’ve already finalized several recipes, including some that I thought would be really difficult. I’m loving my progress so far! Right now I’m mostly working on bread recipes, since I can freeze them for use in picnic pictures when the weather warms up. Check out these beautiful potato rolls I made:

  • HOW BIG WILL THE EXTENDED EDITION BE? Hopefully 50 recipes (double what it is right now). However, I may have to cut some if I can’t get copyright permissions. Four of the books I’m making new menus for are public domain, but I’m considering two different copyrighted books for the final menu. I’ve contacted the publishers, but it can take months to hear back (and I don’t know how much the permissions will cost). Fingers crossed that I hear back in time and can afford the fee!
  • PRINT FORMAT NEWS. I got some good news regarding printing! As you may recall, my book will be printed/distributed by IngramSpark. I thought for sure I’d have to reformat my whole book for print, since I doubted they offered an 8.5″x11″ option. As it turns out, they do! I’m so relieved! I expected to spend at least a few weeks reformatting, but now I won’t have to do that at all. 🥳
  • MY PIE-IN-THE-SKY SUMMER DEADLINE. Does the time I’ll save on formatting mean I’ll achieve my dream of a summer publication date? Maybe, but it’s still very uncertain. Some of you might remember that I made a menu for ALL CREATURES GREAT AND SMALL last year because I was having health issues and craved comfort TV. My symptoms have improved but could show up again soon. My doctor has me on some new medication that may help, but I’ll need to take it easy and go in for extra appointments to monitor the situation. Since I don’t want to push myself, I’m still treating a summer publication date as possible but not exactly probable.
  • NEW COVER? I totally love the book’s original cover, but I’m toying with idea of having one professionally done. This will heavily depend on the cost and how long it would take. Hopefully I’ll have an update on that next month. If you know any cover artists who you think would be a good fit, share their name and website/socials in the comments!
  • Also check out this funny little quiche I made with leftovers from a pastry recipe!😆

 

I’ll post another update in a month or two,
hopefully with more pics to share! See you then!

Chili and Cinnamon Infused Chocolate Bonbons with Horchata Caramel Filling

Posted February 15, 2024 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments

 

 

Time to wrap up my first menu of the year with a dessert I’ve been looking forward to for months: chili-cinnamon chocolate bonbons with horchata caramel filling, inspired by MY FINE FELLOW! When I first read the book, the descriptions of elegant gourmet food floored me, and this was one of my favorites. The idea of chili-cinnamon chocolate sounds amazing all on its own, but throw in caramel flavored with horchata and you’ve got something downright decadent.

To make these bonbons, I added ground cinnamon and chili powder in a pot with some chocolate and melted it down, letting the chili and cinnamon infuse into the chocolate. I used this chocolate to line some candy molds (I decided to use a crown mold since, in the story, these are made for the Royal Culinary Exhibition). For the filling, I started with an horchata recipe I found on AllRecipes and subbed out the milk for heavy cream (this helps cut down on the water being added to the caramel later, which helps control consistency). I caramelized some sugar in a pan, then added in some butter, a bit of the horchata cream, and a touch of chili powder.

These. Bonbons. Are. INREDIBLE! I can’t get enough of them. The chili lends a savory warmth that is accentuated by the horchata, and it helps cut the intense sweetness of the caramel. Interestingly, the individual flavors of the chili, cinnamon, and horchata aren’t easy to isolate. Instead, they come together to make a new, warm, rich flavor, which is balanced by just a touch of bitterness from the chocolate. My four-year-old tried one, and when I asked her if she liked it, she sighed and pretended to faint on the floor. I’d say that’s high praise!

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Queso Fresco Strawberries: Homemade Queso Fresco Colored with Powdered Beets, Studded with Black Sesame Seeds, and Topped with Basil

Posted February 1, 2024 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments

 

 

It isn’t often that I make a recipe and say, “That was fun! I’ll probably never make it again.” 😆 This is one of those rare recipes: fun, whimsical, easy, and pretty tasty . . . but also a little too “out there” for regular use. I had a feeling that might be the case when I decided to make it for my current blog menu, but I was so intrigued when I read its description in the book MY FINE FELLOW, I couldn’t help but make it!

In MY FINE FELLOW, main character Elijah enters the Royal Culinary Exhibition and makes this recipe as one of his competition dishes. It’s not really meant to be something you’d make at home. Instead, it’s supposed to showcase Elijah’s gourmet cooking skills. The book describes these cheese bites as homemade queso fresco colored with beet powder and dotted with nigella seeds, each with a strawberry stem on top.

I had a LOT of fun puzzling out how to bring a dish like this to life! First, I dried my own beets in my dehydrator and ground them down to a powder. Then I mixed them in with queso fresco I made using a recipe from Goodie Godmother. Rather than dotting the outside with nigella seeds, I decided to use black sesame, which I already had on hand and looks similar. Since strawberries aren’t in season, I topped the finished cheese bites with basil leaves instead of strawberry stems. The final flavor combo was a bit different from the story but still really delicious. I was pleasantly surprised that you could really taste the beets!

While I probably won’t be making beet-dyed, sesame-studded queso fresco strawberries again soon, I DO intend to use the methods I learned again in the future. The basic queso fresco recipe will become part of my regular cheesemaking at home, and I’m looking forward to experimenting with more powdered fruits and vegetables as natural dyes and flavor enhancers.

I’ve been having so much fun learning knew recipes and techniques as I make this menu. It’s been such a refreshing challenge. I can’t wait to see where it takes me next!

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Caramel Apple Upside-Down Cake

Posted February 17, 2022 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments

 

 

If you can believe it, today’s recipe is actually inspired by Wilbur’s slop in CHARLOTTE’S WEB! Stay with me here. 😉 When the author lists the scraps included in Wilbur’s meals at the farm, he mentions upside-down cake and baked apples. I loved the idea of merging the two together into an amazing dessert, so here we are!

When it comes to upside-down cakes, I’m a total novice. I made one once but didn’t like how it turned out. So rather than try to develop my own recipe for this post, I turned to the Caramel Apple Upside-Down Cake from Sally’s Baking Addiction. Sally’s recipes are always winners for me, and I knew a sure-fire recipe would give me a good sense of how an upside-down cake should look at each step in the process. That way I’ll feel more confident developing my own upside-down cakes in the future!

As expected, the recipe was easy and turned out great. It was a HUGE hit with my 5-year-old son, who gobbled it up while chirping that it was “A-MA-zing!” I whole-heartedly agree. The caramel apple topping moistens the tender spiced cake just the right amount, and I appreciated that it wasn’t super sweet, allowing the apples and cinnamon to shine. It reminded me a bit of a breakfast bread, which has me scheming about making upside-down banana bread in the future! 😀

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Mrs. Arable’s Canned Peaches: Learn to Can with Me

Posted February 3, 2022 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments

 

 

One of my favorite things about food blogging is it pushes me out of my comfort zone on the regular. For example, even though I found eclairs super intimidating when I first learned to cook, I made lavender lemon eclairs after only a year of blogging because they were perfect for my Secret Garden menu. I used to be terrified of cooking big birds, but now my cookbook, A LITERARY HOLIDAY COOKBOOK, has recipes for turkey AND goose. Over time, I’ve gotten a lot more comfortable pushing my culinary boundaries, and just this past month, I tried something I’ve had my eye on for years: canning.

In CHARLOTTE’S WEB, Mrs. Arable serves canned peaches to the farmers. Peaches are a great intro to canning because they are high in acid (making them a pretty safe option) and easy to process. Here was my perfect opportunity to take canning for a test drive to see if I like it! I don’t have any special tools (canner, jar rack, jar lifter, etc.), so I used tips from a few different sources to help me learn to can with the tools I already have. Here are the sources I consulted:

Canning is an exact science, so I highly recommend researching before you begin. This will help the whole process go smoothly and safely. Plus, I’m a novice myself, so the recipe below isn’t the be-all and end-all of canning advice. It’s a description of my experience, which worked well for me, but I’ll probably change my methods a bit as I learn more.

Overall, I had a good experience. I think it’s a bit too much work for small batches, but it’s a great option if you have a lot of fruit, jam, sauce, etc. and don’t want to waste any. I don’t think I’ll buy any canning tools quite yet, but I have lots of young berry bushes started in the backyard. Once those are fully established, I could definitely see myself having enough berry jam for big-batch canning. I’m glad I gave it a whirl!

NOTE: Just to reiterate, I am not an expert. Fully research canning before you begin and use recipes that have been approved for canning. This post is not a comprehensive guide and does not address every variable that can affect the canning process (such as elevation or lower acid foods). Consuming improperly processed canned goods can result in botulism. Be safe out there!

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Mr. Rochester’s Bonbons

Posted February 18, 2021 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments

 

 

Make way for bonbons! Today we’re making the last recipe in my Jane Eyre menu: bonbons inspired by Mr. Rochester’s time in France. Although the rest of this menu was heavily influenced by early 19th century recipes, I had a difficult time finding bonbon recipes from the period. Luckily, the basic process doesn’t appear to have changed that much over the years, so I decided to use modern techniques but stick with period-appropriate flavors. Let’s take a look at the flavors we’re using today: Read More

Roasted Potatoes: My Take on an Early 19th Century Recipe

Posted February 4, 2021 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments

 

 

Today my foray into early 19th century cooking continues! I’m making a recipe for roasted potatoes I found in the 1823 cookbook The Cook’s Oracle by William Kitchiner. Roasted potatoes may sound like a dull choice, but I think this is the perfect recipe to showcase one of the fascinating differences between modern and historical cookbooks: the level of detail in the recipes. Read More

Mirror Shard Mini Ice Cream Cakes from The Snow Queen

Posted February 6, 2020 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 0 Comments

 

 

I’m back with another Hans Christian Andersen recipe! When I created a poll asking folks what Andersen stories they wanted to see recipes for, “The Ugly Duckling” won by a landslide (you can see my recipe for it here), and there was a three way tie for second place! Today I’m making the first of those three: The Snow Queen. It seemed best to do it now since winter is almost over. It feels strange to write that, since winter here has been so mild that it feels like it just started. It’s almost like God is apologizing for last winter, which was monstrously cold and felt eternal.

The recipe we’re making today is inspired by the magic mirror that causes so much trouble in “The Snow Queen.” Splinters of the broken mirror lodge themselves in the heart and eyes of a little boy named Kai, making him see only the ugliness and evil of the world and none of its beauty. I’ve always found the story’s mirror quite intriguing since it doesn’t actually change anything about the world—only people’s perception of it, which is rather fitting for a mirror—and thereby corrupts them to evil, revealing just how much impact perception can have on our lives.

For the recipe, I wanted something frozen of course, which led me to the idea of an ice cream cake. I liked the idea of mini cakes better, since larger, more elaborate ice cream recipes can get tricky if they take so long the ice cream starts to melt. These easy cupcake-sized cakes feature a crushed almond and shortbread crumb crust, amaretto ice cream filling, whipped cream, and mirror “shards” made from melted Jolly Ranchers.

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Wuthering Heights Gingerbread Manor

Posted February 22, 2018 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 6 Comments

 


I made a gingerbread house last month for my Grimm’s Fairy Tales menu, so at first it felt weird making another gingerbread house so soon. But how could I not when the house of Wuthering Heights is so iconic AND gingerbread is the most prominent dessert in the book? 🙂 Plus, I loved the idea of trying a different look for my next gingerbread project. I didn’t want to just copy and paste the structure and style from my last gingerbread escapade, so I decided to increase the challenge by adding detailed icing work, putting “glass” in the windows, and making the house two stories high. I thought of making it a HAUNTED gingerbread manor, but the ones I looked at for ideas were pretty elaborate. I didn’t think my skill set was there yet (this is still only the second gingerbread house I’ve made as an adult), so I stuck with a more classical design. I loved the thatched roof effect of the Mini Wheats on my last roof, but this time I went with chocolate Belvita Bites for a more traditional shingle pattern.

Like last time, I used a dough recipe from Sprinkle Bakes (this time a double batch) and an icing recipe from Make It and Love It. This time I incorporated Pretty Cake Machine’s advice to use brown icing for all the structural work, and I LOVE how much cleaner all the edges look.

Throw in a gingerbread ghost and a scowling gingerbread Heathcliff, and you’re all set for life at Wuthering Heights!

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Balsamic Roasted Turnips

Posted February 15, 2018 by Alison's Wonderland Recipes in Book of the Month Recipes / 3 Comments

 

 

The lowly, modest turnip. I’ll admit I rarely (if ever) give it a second glance in the produce section. I’m guilty of passing it up hundreds of times in favor of more attractive veggies like a bunch of fresh carrots or a head of bright green broccoli.

Yet when I saw that turnips are one of the few prominent side dishes in Wuthering Heights, I knew I needed to find a way to make them enjoyable. For me, this means ROASTING. I am a firm believer that if you’re having trouble getting yourself to eat your vegetables, a little olive oil and salt with some time in the oven goes a long way.

This recipe I found from Kalyn’s Kitchen takes it a step further and adds some balsamic vinegar for extra oomph. She suggests tossing the roasted turnips in a light coating of balsamic at the very end as well, and I highly recommend it. Turnips are mild little guys, so I think they benefit from just a bit of zing from the extra balsamic.

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