Emeril's Sweet Potato Hashbrowns

One of my latest obsessions is hash browns; Andrew and I go to nearby diner pretty much 2-3 times a week and I always order the hash browns. This morning, I woke up and immediately decided I needed my fix. Then, I looked out the window and realized it was raining! So, I thought I should make my own, except I only had sweet potatoes... no matter, I decided to make sweet potato hash browns! I followed Emeril's recipe, which calls for diced bacon and onion (I omitted the garlic) and man, am I glad I made these! They were absolutely delicious and easy to make, despite the fact that they do make a bit of a mess in the kitchen.

Fried Sweet Potato Hashbrowns

(serves 2)

What you'll need:

• 1 2 medium sweet potatoes, washed, peeled and grated
• 6 oz bacon, diced
• 3/4 cup diced onion
• Salt + Pepper

 First, you'll need to wash, peel and grate the sweet potatoes. Place the grated potatoes in a bowl, cover and place in the fridge. Then dice up your bacon and onion and set aside.
Heat a large nonstick pan over high heat and cook bacon until crispy, about 6-8 mins. Lower to medium-high and add in onions and stir; cook till soft (about 2 mins), and finally throw in grated sweet potatoes. Season with salt and pepper. Sautee over medium-high heat for 10-15 mins. Serve warm!

Etsyyy

I put some new stuff up in the Etsy shop; Go check 'em out!

I've been posting these everywhere

I found these boots at the thrift store and they are perrrfecccctttt

I am so in love!

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls w/ Maple Cream Cheese Frosting

Continuing with the pumpkin theme (seeing as I have all this pumpkin puree lying around)... I've been craving Cinnamon Rolls for some time now and decided to buy yeast the other day. Then, as I was starting to gather my materials to start making the rolls, my roommate suggested I make PUMPKIN cinnamon rolls! And that I did!
I found a recipe on GoodLife Eats and modified it slightly! I made a maple cream cheese frosting instead of a regular cream cheese frosting because I thought it be tasty (and it was)!
Here we go!

Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls with Maple Cream Cheese Frosting

What you'll need:


For the Dough:

• 1/4 cup warm water (about 110 degrees)
• 1 package active dry yeast (2 1/4 teaspoons)
• 1/3 cup warm milk
• 1 large egg, beaten
• 3/4 cup pumpkin puree  (fresh or canned)
• 1 tablespoon melted butter
• 3 1/4 cups all purpose flour
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cardamom

Filling:

• 3/4 stick butter, melted
• 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1/4 cup brown sugar
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon each of allspice and ginger
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cloves

Maple Cream Cheese Frosting:

• 4 oz cream cheese, room temperature
• 1 stick butter, softened
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
•  2-3 cups powdered sugar
• 1/4 cup maple syrup

In a large bowl, stir yeast into water to soften. Add milk, eggs, pumpkin, oil, 4 cups flour, brown sugar, salt, ginger and cardamom to yeast mixture. Beat vigorously for 2 minutes.

Gradually add remaining flour, a little at a time, until you have a dough stiff enough to knead. Turn dough out onto a floured surface. Knead, adding flour as necessary, until you have a smooth, elastic dough.

Put dough into an oiled bowl. Turn once to coat entire ball of dough with oil. Cover with a towel and let rise until doubled, about 1 hour. 

While your dough is rising, combine white sugar, brown sugar, cinnamon, allspice, ginger, nutmeg and cloves.

After your dough has risen, transfer it to a lightly oiled surface and roll out to a rectangle shape, about 16" by 12". Spread the melted butter over it and top with spices mixture.

Grease a 9x13in baking pan (I used leftover melted butter).

Roll the dough into a log (the long way); the log should stretch a little in length while your roll. Take a sharp knife and cut about 15 slices (I only got 13)! Place the slices in the greased baking pan, cover with a towel, place in fridge and let rise for about 45 mins.

Preheat the oven to 375°F. Once the rolls have risen, bake in the preheated oven for about 30 mins or until they're brown around the edges.

While your rolls are baking, make your cream cheese frosting! Throw your cream cheese, butter, vanilla extract and maple syrup into the bowl for a mixer. Start mixing at medium speed until ingredients are combined, then begin adding powdered sugar, 1/2 cup at a time, stopping in between to scrape the sides and bottom of the bowl with a spatula.

Take your rolls out of the oven when they're done!

and top with cream cheese frosting while they're still warm!

These were amaaazzzinnnggg and I highly recommend them!

P.S. For all you bacon fans: Andrew topped his with some high quality bacon and it was VERY tasty, so that might be something to consider...

How to Make Pumpkin Puree + Home-made Pumpkin Spice Latte Recipe

Hi y'all! In the past two weeks I've been extra busy with a trip home to Miami and midterms, so I haven't been able to update. In fact I still have one more midterm to go, but I decided to take a break from the studying to make myself a pumpkin spice latte!
A few weeks ago, I got some pie pumpkins because I couldn't find any canned pumpkin. I wanted to make pumpkin puree with these fresh pumpkins but I kept putting it off. I finally did it today and it was nowhere near as annoying or time consuming as I thought it was! Here's a step-by-step guide:

I started off with 3 pie pumpkins. This yielded A LOT of pumpkin puree so some might want less. The good thing is that you can freeze the puree and use it later!

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

Cut the pumpkins in half.

With a large, metal spoon, take out the seeds and stringy parts.

Then, cut the halves in fourths and place them inside down in a roasting pan.

Add a cup of water into the pan.

Place in oven and bake for about 45 mins or until tender enough to stick a fork through the skin and have it go through easily.

You can see that I poked all of the chunks with my fork. Some of them were less baked than others, I put those pieces back in the oven until the inside was a dark orange color.

Place on a plate to cool for 5-10 mins and then scrape the inside off of the skin. It should come off very easily.

Place the pumpkin chunks into a food processor or stand mixer bowl and mix until it reaches desired consistency!

Using that pumpkin puree, I made my very own home-made pumpkin spice latte!

Home-made Pumpkin Spice Latte

What you'll need:

• 2 cups milk
• 1-2 shots of espresso, depending on how strong you like your latte
• 1.5 tablespoons pumpkin puree
• 1/8th teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/8th teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 2 tablespoons sugar

First, make your espresso through your desired method (I use a stovetop bialetti mocha thingy or my Nespresso machine)
Then, in a small pot over medium heat, pour in milk and add pumpkin, spices, vanilla extract and sugar. Stir with a whisk until the milk has reached 140 degrees (or hotter if you'd like, but not over 160).
Pour the espresso in a mug and pour pumpkin milk mixture over it. Top with whipped cream if you'd like and enjoy!

• a dash of ground ginger

Have I mentioned how much I love breakfast?

Just a quick picture of the whole wheat pancakes I just made/ate! Breakfast is the best meal of the day.

Also, here are some of the vintage items I picked up over the week:

 

New Items!

New items up in my Etsy Shop (including this beautiful leather bag)! Go check it out!

Cafe Con Leche

I'm fortunate enough to have experienced a lot of Latin American food. Having been raised in a Cuban household/living in Miami for so many years, I know a thing or two about good Latin American grub. When I moved up to Chicago, I figured that this was just one of the things I'd have to sacrifice to live in the big city, and boy was I wrong! Granted, you can't find Cuban food at every corner and I've only heard of one Argentinian restaurant in Chicago but there are still many great options.
One of these great options for tasty food is Cafe Con Leche in Logan Square (the best neighborhood in Chicago for those of you not familiar); not to be confused with the one in Wicker Park/Bucktown. I'm not even sure if they are the same place or have the same owner, but I've never been to the one in WP so I can't speak for it. The one in Logan Square, however, is amazing! I ordered a breakfast sandwich and a cafe con leche for under $10! The food was amazing, the servers friendly and the music was fun. They had lots of typical Cuban and Puerto Rican sandwiches on the menu that I'm definitely going to have to try next time I go. The coffee was A+ and the sandwich was perfect! Not to mention that it's nearby my house, so I can go whenever.

Martha's Butternut Squash Risotto

On my quest for canned pumpkin, I found REAL pumpkins (more on this later) right at the French Market as well as some butternut squash! I decided to grab the squash on a whim, and then I started looking up recipes... and then I bought some Parmesan and some white wine... So, I made some Butternut Squash Risotto. I decided to use Martha Stewart's recipe because it looked pretty simple (as far as risotto goes, since it's a naturally annoying and time consuming thing to make).
First off, make sure that the white wine you buy is one that you'll enjoy drinking as well. I got a good recommendation from the dudes at Pastoral for the dry white wine (and Parmesan) part of the recipe, and was able to sip this wine the entire time I was stirring the risotto (which was a looong time). Plus, I liked the name a lot!

 

You should also be aware that this will lead to a really messy and dirty kitchen, proof:

But that's beside the point of this post. This was a very tasty and delicious dish and I highly recommend it to everyone! Here goes:

Martha's Butternut Squash Risotto

Recipe slightly adapted from Martha Stewart

What You'll Need:

• LOTS of butter (I used about 2-3 tablespoons)
• 1.5 lbs of Butternut Squash (peeled, seeded and diced into 1/2 inch chunks)
• Coarse salt and pepper
• 1 cup Arborio rice
• 3/4 cup white wine
• 3 1/2 cups chicken broth
• 1/3 cup parmesan
• 1 tablespoon fresh chopped sage

First, start warming up your chicken broth (first on high heat, then on low to keep it warm while you're cooking/stirring)

While the chicken broth is warming up, peel, seed and dice your butternut squash and set aside. Melt 1.5 tablespoons of butter in a big, deep pan.

 Throw Squash in pan. Stir.

Add in coarse salt and pepper, keep stirring and cook for about 8 mins, until the edges soften.

 

Add rice, stir to coat. It'll look like there's way too much squash compared to the amount of rice but don't worry!

Throw in the wine and stir until all the liquid has evaporated, about 1 to 2 mins.

Reduce heat to medium-low and throw in 1/2 cup of warm chicken broth. Cook, stirring, until all liquid is absorbed. Repeat, 1/2 cup at a time until all broth is gone (35-40 mins total).

In the meantime, grate your parmesan if need be and chop up your sage.

When you have used up all of your chicken broth, throw in parmesan and sage. Stir for a minute or two then serve immediately. Top with extra sage and parmesan for garnish and enjoy!

Serves about 4.

P.S. Andrew toasted the squash seeds and they were delicious! Just preheat your oven to 275 degrees, place seeds on tin foil and top with salt and olive oil (we used truffle oil) to taste. Put the seeds in the oven and bake for about 15 mins!

Zara Fall 2010

Zara's been killing me lately, their stuff for this Fall is amazing! Here are a few things I want/my favorite items:

Images from Zara.