Madeleine Patisserie

A sweet cherry tomato Danish

This is the best Danish I’ve eaten, EVER. When I saw it in the bakery I thought - sweet, really? Tomatoes are fruit after all so what the heck I’ll give it a try. I managed to snap a photo to share with everyone before I gobbled it up for breakfast this morning. What I love about all the pastries I get here is that they are so fresh. The pastry is made just perfectly tender and flaky, not overwhelmingly buttery and overall just subtly sweet. It’s almost what I would imagine a true pastry to taste like in France! (not that I’ve ever been there). The center of this Danish had a light sweet creamy cheese topping, and every bite the tomatoes burst in my mouth. MMMMMMMMM

The only other item I’ve had here is the chocolate pistachio croissants (another all time best), but what I should get next time are the French Macarons, supposedly one of the best in the city. Check it out the next time you’re in Chelsea!

Madeleine Patisserie
128 W 23rd St (between 6th and 7th avenues)

Happy Halloween!

Roasty Toasty Cauliflower Soup

It's soup season! I'm new to homemade soup making, it's pretty easy so should be experimenting with more soon. I love soup because it's a simple way to eat lots of vegetables. Cauliflower is high in Vitamin C, K and Folate among other nutrients.

For this soup you will need:

1 Cauliflower, cut into 1" pieces
1 Yukon gold potato, cut into smaller pieces similar in size to the cauliflower florets
2 Garlic Cloves, smashed
1 Shallot, minced
1 T Extra Virgin Olive Oil
Salt and Pepper
Additional spices to flavor the cauliflower (such as an italian blend, rosemary, parsley, paprika, a pinch of Cayenne)
2 C Vegetable Broth
1 C Soy Milk
makes about 5 servings

Toss everything together except for the broth and milk. Bake in the oven at 350 degrees for 25-35 minutes, your kitchen will smell amazing. Once the veggies are tender, dump everything into a pot along with the vegetable broth and soy milk and simmer for 20 minutes. Use an immersion blender or hand mixer until smooth. Be careful, it can get messy (I splattered)!


Top off the soup with toasted almonds and parmesan cheese. I know this looks like gruel, but it's de-licious!

iSi Whipped Cream Maker

Matt surprised me recently with my new FAVORITE kitchen tool!

I am a fan of Redi-whip, but fresh whipped cream tastes sooo much better (and you don't get any artificial flavors/ingredients). Sometimes you just get lazy having to take out a hand mixer so after reading great reviews on this I was sold.

Agave sweetened whipped cream, Chocolate whipped cream, Hazelnut whipped cream, Peanut Butter whipped cream....the experimentation list goes on. Yummmmmmmmm.

Brussles, no fussles Part II

I love those baby brussle sprouts...

I picked off all the sprouts from the stem (easily done by grabbing onto the sprout and giving a quick pull left then right) and separated the baby sized ones and large ones to ensure equal cooking in the pan.

I know people always talk about how good brussle sprouts are for you, but I had no idea how good they REALLY were for you! Read all about it here. Health benefits range from reducing risks to certain cancers, birth defects, skin improvement, the list goes on.

This is 'no fussles' because it's a quick recipe that can be done in about 5 minutes (not including prep time). Since I am on a brussle sprouts kick right now and they are perfectly in season until spring, I will probably be cooking these up often as an easy side dish for dinner.

I referenced Heidi Swanson's recipe. Instead of putting freshly grated cheese on top as she did, once the sprouts were done cooking I poured roughly a 1/2 cup of maple syrup in to quickly heat it up in all the cooking flavors/juices of the pan and added a little bit of butter. Other recipes I found cooked a little bit of brown sugar with it too so I may try that next time, but it was still tasty none the less. I prefer this recipe because it doesn't really appeal to me to boil the sprouts, plus this version seems much quicker and the caramelization that occurs on the sprouts adds a nice texture and flavor.


My new favorite veggie

Say Cheese!

A few weekends ago I had the opportunity to volunteer for Open House NY. I was placed in heaven aka: a
cheese shop, Murray's to be exact, a cheese shop that's been around the village dating back to the 40's!

Toward the end of my shift I was able to tour their 'caves' which was fascinating seeing the different chambers of how they age the cheese- mold, bacteria, injections...doesn't it sound so appealing? My cheese guide said she eats a HALF POUND of cheese a day!




We had to wear these awesome hair nets entering the cave and also had to rub our shoes on an anti-bacterial solution as to not create an imbalance in the chambers.



Smell ya later!

Brussles, no fussles Part I

Believe it or not, I only had brussle sprouts for the first time the other weekend having dinner at Little Giant in the lower east side. They were gooooood. So good, that at a produce stand over the weekend in Long Island I picked up a few of these crazy lookin trees! I tried to replicate what I ate at the restaurant (maple syrup roasted brussle sprouts), more to follow soon!

When I don't cook

(picture of leftovers)

Cream of mushroom soup + a splash of soy milk + a fistful of spices + egg noodles + best store bought meatless balls = quick yummy dinner.

Trader Joe's Meatless Balls sweded by Matt. Nuff sed.