The Adventures Begin: Macaroni and Brie, Pickled Beets and Eggs

So I spent most of the day today cooking. Why? Because I could. Because I love cooking. Boiling, baking, slicing, dicing... Ok, so I've never been a big fan of making cookies, but in general, I like to cook when I'm sad, happy, frustrated, bored... Cooking makes me calm and happy. Sometimes I think I've missed my calling in life, that I should just open my own little cafe and cook forever.

Anyways, in the middle of my culinary hurricane, I realized that I happened to have "Julie and Julia" from the video store! Hurrah! I must say, I enjoyed the movie quite a bit. And it ended with me thinking, "Now why can't I do that?" Not necessarily cook through Julia Childs' cookbook (especially since I only have "The French Chef Cookbook" and not the original "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" two-volume series). But why can't I write a blog about doing what I love to do: cooking! It would hopefully serve the dual purpose of giving me a blog topic that I will continually have new material for and give me yet another excuse to cook. Whether or not anyone will read it...  So here goes...


Today I started with making Macaroni and Brie with Crab. Brie, for those of you who don't know, is a mild soft cheese of French origin. I happened to buy a bit too much for my French classes' snack, and I also happened to have this recipe sitting around waiting to be tried. What a coincidence! It wasn't particularly difficult, and it turned out to be delicious! The only thing better than mac 'n' cheese is gourmet mac 'n' cheese! I'm not so sure I'm a fan of the crab in it. The sweetness clashed too much, but to each his own. (I must apologize that I do not have pictures today. Everything was packed up and put away by the time I decided to type. I will try to have pictures of the num-nums from now on.)

Macaroni and Brie with Crab
1 lb medium pasta
5 T butter
1 m sweet onion, sliced
1/3 c flour
3/4 t salt
1/2 t pepper
3 c milk
1 lb Brie, chopped
2-6oz cans of crab meat
bread crumbs (optional)

Preheat oven to 350F.  Cook pasta and drain.  In skillet, heat butter.  Cook onion until tender.  Add flour, salt, and pepper.  Cook and stir one minute.  Add milk.  Cook and stir until slightly thickened and bubbly.  Gradually add chopped Brie.  Cook and stir over medium heat until Brie is melted.  Stir cheese mixture into pasta.  Fold in crab.  Sprinkle with bread crumbs, if desired.  Bake in sprayed dish 20-25 minutes.


Adventure #2 for the day was my second batch of pickled beets and eggs as requested by my boyfriend.  I don't really use a recipe for this, as it's rather simple.  I boil about a dozen eggs and let them cool.  Then cut the tops off of about 4 lbs fresh beets and boil them 30 minutes until you can stick a fork in them.  After they cool, the skin should pop right off.  Slice the beets, peel the eggs, and mix them together in a large container (preferably glass, as we'll see later).  Take about 5 cups of the beet juice, 4 1/2 cups of sugar, and 3 1/4 cups of cider vinegar (and a stick or two of cinnamon if you like) and bring it to a boil.  Pour it right over the eggs and beets.  (This is where the glass comes in handy, because the heat will warp the plastic containers.)  Chill it for at least 4 hours, and you're good to go!!  Just a word of warning:  Fresh beets turn your whole world pink and purple!!!!!


That's all for now, folks.  The dog is begging for attention.  But I have a long weekend, so I may be back tomorrow with more fun stories from the kitchen.  I have some homemade yogurt in the works!