Firstly Happy Valentine’s Day -I hope everyone had or is having a nice day!
So my vacation was amazing even though I had a sore throat for most of it and ended up coming home with strep throat; never had that before and it sucked! I would do it all again, minus the throat issue.
My job on the boat was galley cook; I think that is what it is called. I had 2 gas burners and an oven, a small sink and limited counter space. I was definitely glad I planned ahead of time. We rented a condo a few days in front of our sailing adventure and I had brought with me quite a bit of provisions. So I cooked up some breakfast sausage, Sweet Italian sausage; crumbled and in links, and a pound or so of bacon. I thought by doing this on land I would not have to stink up the boat. Well it ended up being just a plain ole good idea. We had limited water, limited propane and damn that kitchen was small. I never turned on the oven just so you know. We did have zucchini bread and pear bread but I brought them from my freezer from home.
We didn’t eat on board all the time but when we did have meals, I felt they were pretty darn good. We had spaghetti and sausage one night, I made a frittata for one of our breakfasts. We had a white wine and garlic penne pasta one night. Oh I forgot to mention we also had a BBQ charcoal grill off the back of the boat. While it sounds really cool, I knew it would be kind of a pain but we are here; it is there and we all wanted to grill the beef tenderloins I was making for dinner.
Let’s just say I was right, it was a pain lighting the BBQ; we did get it lit though and it was ready to go but I ended up cooking them in a fry pan on the stove; and if anyone is say diving near Marina Cay off of Scrubb Island; there is a grill rack on the ocean floor somewhere in the middle of all the mooring balls.
I must have missed cooking and baking or this ridiculously cold weather has sparked a fire under me. I have been doing nothing but cooking. Last weekend I made 2 different kinds of chili, I had meatballs and sauce on the stove top and make buffalo wings and 7 layer Mexican dip. mostly for the Superbowl; which wasn’t very super in my opinion.
This weekend I have 4 new recipes I want to make. Hopefully they taste as good as they sound. As I am typing this this morning I have a Banana’s Foster Buckle in the oven. It looked amazing and smells awesome, It should be done in a bit YUM!
Cake
4 TBS unsalted butter at room temperature
1 cup sugar
1 large egg
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup milk
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp kosher salt
Preheat oven to 350’F grease a 9×9 baking dish; line with parchment grease the paper – I only had waxed paper and was a pain but did the job. If you leave an over hang it help with removal of the bread.
In a large bowl or your mixer, add the butter and sugar combine. Add the egg, vanilla and milk and stir till combined. Add flour, baking powder, and salt and mix until fully combined, it will be a thick batter.
Banana’s Foster
4 TBS unsalted butter
1/4 cup dark brown sugar
3-4 banana’s cut up
2 TBS dark rum
In a large skillet over medium-high heat, add butter and sugar, melt and stir together. add the bananas and cook until caramelized.
pour the rum and while being careful; catch a flame using one of those long handled lighter. Let the bananas and caramel flambe. Remove from the heat and let cool a bit.
Pour the batter into the prepared baking dish, placed slightly cooled bananas foster on top and push them down a bit into the batter.
Bake for about 50 minutes; until golden brown. Serve with vanilla ice cream.
It is delicious and tastes best with some vanilla Ice Cream – Who doesn’t love an excuse to eat ice cream in the morning. I read somewhere that Sylvester Stallone eats a pint of ice cream every morning, his logic is so he can burn it off all day. I’ll buy that!
Recipe adapted by Cooking at Clark Towers from Carla Hall the Chew