"Coulda, Woulda, Shouda"

This past Friday my dad and I met up with our friends, Anita and Howard for Jasmine Thai. This is one of my favorite restaurants in Indianapolis, the food is amazing and the atmosphere is so very cool. We started out with Thai iced coffee and Thai iced tea (orange), I am not a coffee drinker, I prefer tea, but this coffee is not bitter, but sweet and cool and delicious. We skipped appetizers and ordered so much food. We all had our favorites and Dad and I had been planning what to eat all day. 

Dinner started with one of my new favorites Tom Tom Yum soup with lemongrass, straw mushrooms, and shrimp. Then came Pad Thai, a stir fried noodle dish with tofu, peanuts, chicken and bean sprouts and Masaman Curry, a brown curry with potatoes, beef, carrots and pineapple.  It is a mildly spicy dish and you can request each dish as spicy as you wish.

We also ate a Thai omelet with peas, ground meat, carrots all tucked into the omelet with a red sauce.  This is my dad's favorite. It is a such a great flavor, so unique and so delicious,  all in an omelet. Anita also had really good papaya salad with Green and orange papaya with tomatoes and carrots and nuts with lime.  It was so fresh and similar to a sweet coleslaw. 

Dessert was the perfect end to a great meal. I have only had dessert at Jasmine Thai once but it has always been great. We all shared sweet coconut sticky rice with mango and sesame seeds. We also ate fried bananas in phylo dough with ice cream and toasted coconut.

Dinner was so good and we still had a show to go to, Patti LuPone in "Coulda, Woulda, Shoulda" at Clows Memorial Hall in Indianapolis.  Ok, I am sorry to admit, I didn't know who Patti LuPone was before seeing her in concert.  I really was surprised to see and recognize her from Will and Grace, Ugly Betty and other TV shows I have watched.  The Will and Grace episode is "Bully Wolly", where Jack is trying to get Patti LuPone's hair sample for his  growing collection of famous women's hair.  The concert was wonderful and I am so glad we went. We al enjoyed the concert and everyones favorite song was Medowlark from The Bakers Wife.

Anita, Howard, and Dad before the concert. We all had a great time. The concert was the hit of the evening, after dinner. Patti LuPone's music is available at ITunes.

Warned and Changed

I have seen the light, my ways will change... 

Everyone who knows me knows my weakness for sweets. My  Achilles' heel  is cupcakes. I have never really been a chocolate girl, I prefer white cake or almond cake and white vanilla icing is always my favorite. 

 But thanks to Deb from Smitten Kitchen.com, chocolate has definitely hit my favorites list. Move out of the way white and cake... homemade oreos have knocked you out of the park. Deb's easy homemade oreos recipe from Retro Desserts, Wayne Brachman, are spectacularly easy and delicious. I made these on Wednesday, last week and they didn't survive past Thursday afternoon. Thanks Deb!

Homemade Oreos

Makes 25 to 30 sandwich cookies

For the chocolate wafers:

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

1 /2 cup unsweetened Dutch process cocoa

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 to 1 1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup plus 2 tablespoons (1 1/4 sticks) room-temperature, unsalted butter

1 large egg

For the filling:

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) room-temperature unsalted butter

1/4 cup vegetable shorting

2 cups sifted confectioner's sugar

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Set two racks in the middle of the oven. Preheat to 375 F. 

In the food processor or bowl of and electric mixer, thoroughly mix the flour, cocoa, baking soda and powder, sugar and salt. while pulsing, or on low speed, add the butter and then the egg. Continue processing or mixing until the dough comes together in a mass. 

Take rounded teaspoons of batter and place on a parchment paper-lined baking sheet approximately two inches apart. With moistened hands, slightly flatten the dough. Bake for 9 minutes, rotating once for even baking. Set baking sheets on a rack to cool.

To make the cream, place butter and shortening in a mixing bowl, at low speed, gradually to beat in the sugar and vanilla. Turn the mixer on high and bead for 2 to  3 minutes until filling is light and fluffy.  To assemble the cookies, in a pastry bag with a 1/2 inch, round tip, ( I used a sandwich baggie with a small hole cut at one corner) pipe teaspoon-sized blobs of cream into the center of one cookie. Place another cookie, equal in size to the first, on top of the cream. Dunk generously in a large glass of milk. Yum!

 Note: I only used  1 cup of sugar for the cookies, the cream filling is very sweet so the cookies don't need to be super sweet.

P.S. Dad, don't worry, I am will still eat and enjoy chocolate! After all, I am your kid.