cooking tips

who knew I'd ever be giving cooking tips...

A lady I know was clamoring on at a birthday party about how she had made a toddler banana birthday cake for her son's birthday and because it was "the cake" and she therefore didn't taste it, she was unpleasantly surprised when it was pretty unappetizing to the adult palate.
So I suggested that whenever I am making a new recipe for a big cake for an event or whatever, I just reserve some of the batter and make a cupcake to bake and try to ensure I know what I am serving. This idea actually came from when I was baking challah regularly on my Fridays off, I would make some lachmaniot to give the kids and Eran before dinner. It made lots of sense to me - I had a little serving to try first of what was to be the star of the show...who doesn't taste their food before they serve it. How else would you know if it was acceptable? On the food shows Eran watches, they are always berating the chefs for not tasting the food when it comes out unappetizing!

Also, on a whim, I was cleaning out the refrigerator of dairy products that were reaching their expiration date. So I made a quiche with no milk (using egg beaters, sour cream and cottage cheese). I went for spinach as the veggie of choice since I hadn't had that in awhile [and I had 3 boxes of chopped spinach staring at me from the freezer, and I couldn't find the portabello mushrooms I wanted to use up.]
Since I like the lemon juice Eran adds to one of the spinach dishes that he makes, I added some fresh lemon juice to the quiche - I figured that without the milk, any extra liquid would be appropriate. It was an extra yummy flavorful surprise. Despite the runniness of the original quiche (I could've baked it longer I suppose, but the edges were burning) the flavors were spectacular. And I think it would have benefitted from having a crust to tie it all together. I'll try it that way next time.