Memorial Day and Lemon Bars

Memorial Day weekend is a time when the men and women who have died in battle fighting for our country are meant to be honored. How do we as Americans honor them? By calling up friends for BBQ and stuffing our faces with delicious food, naturally. Not that this is a bad thing, I mean I'm sure the people who have died in battle are pleased that we celebrate their bravery with food. Food is one of the few things people easily bond over and it certainly makes people happy (a little fat too, but hey who cares, right?). The three day weekend lifts people's spirits and the gathering of friends is also a delight. So for the Memorial Day BBQ I was invited to I decided to make dessert. Which sweet treat do I happen to have up my sleeve?
Lemon Bars. Wonderful, sweet, tart, devour-able lemon bars. Lemon is clean and lemon is sour, lemon is my favorite thing for a near-summer time dessert and Ina Garten happens to have the perfect recipe for lemon bars.
Now I have made these lemon bars before but instead of using normal lemons, I used ones of the meyer variety. What is a meyer lemon? It is a citrus fruit that originated in China and is thought to be a cross between either a normal or mandarin orange. It is not tart and has a mellower flavor that is quite enjoyable. While I loved my meyer lemon bars, today I felt a typical lemon was the way to go.
I would love to say I stopped there,  but I couldn't help myself.
I turned the lemon bars into lemon-raspberry bars.
I know, I know, I should have just kept it simple but I mean, lemon-raspberry bars, can you say "YUM"? Unless you don't like raspberry... or lemon bars... in that case though, you're just not human.
 Seriously though, if you don't like raspberry you can use any kind of berry you want. I think blackberry, strawberry, or blueberry would work beautifully but if you want to branch out the berry field, try cherries! Cherry lemon bars would be delicious now that I think about. Maybe I'll try them. I'll keep you posted.
Okay, back on track here, back to my lemon-raspberry bars. I started off by making a raspberry sauce on the stove that I let cool in the fridge while I made the dough for the crust. I used raspberries because they are the frozen fruit I had in my freezer. If wondering how I made the sauce, here's my guidelines from when I made customizable cheesecake. Once the sauce was made and the crust was par-baking in the oven, I began the lemon filling; which I may or may not have added way more than two tablespoons of lemon zest to. It won't hurt them, zest to your liking. I followed the lemon bar recipe exactly (minus the whole extra zest thing, "whoops") because Ina knows what she's talking about and I didn't need to doctor it. Once the filling was ready to be baked, I grabbed my raspberry sauce and dotted it all around in the filling. I took my spoon, though in hindsight a knife would have made it prettier, and marbled it throughout all the lemon filling and then into the oven they went.
Ina says to let them cool and serve at room temperature but I disagree. Lemon bars are at their best when their cold so I let my sit in the fridge for a couple hours before serving. Once nice and cold, dust with powdered sugar and cut into whatever shape your heart desires if wish to.

I had planned to make them prettier but even though I thoroughly greased my pan, the crust still stuck a little bit. Luckily, they still taste fantastic. 

Have a great Memorial Day weekend!

-Madison

Mother's Day Dinner

High school has been a crazy series of events lately and my time has been consumed by school, sorry for the lack of posts.
Finally, I got a chance to cook. The occasion? Mother's Day.
I told my mom I was going to get her a gift and I was sorry I had not had a chance to get one yet, she stopped me there and told me the perfect gift would be for me to cook her dinner. All she wanted was a home cooked meal, how simple was that? After all, food tastes the best when made with love. This is how my mom's favorite foods became the perfect gift.
The menu she requested consisted of chicken picatta and a salad coated in a homemade poppy seed dressing. I added in some fresh green beans on the side that were cooked with merely some shallots and garlic. Did I forget to blanch them before sauteing them in butter like I meant to do? Possibly. Were they a little extra crunchy? Yes, but they did taste good.
The chicken picatta however was fantastic, per usual. The recipe for this chicken picatta is courtesy of Giada de Laurentiis but I make a couple changes to the recipe. Giada does not serve her chicken picatta with pasta, but what is Italian food without pasta? That is why I double the recipe for the pan sauce that is made after pan frying the lightly dredged chicken. I toss the pasta in the sauce and serve the chicken on the bed of deliciousness. I also make another change to the sauce other than doubling it, I sub a little bit of the chicken stock the recipe calls for with white wine. Why? White wine and chicken work beautifully together and the flavor you get when cooking wine down is outstanding. I also use nearly half a cup of capers instead of the quarter cup the recipe says to use since capers are the secret star of the dish. These little changes to the recipe make the chicken picatta what my mom says is the best chicken picatta she's ever had and that is saying a lot. I won't mention the number of times I had to make the dish before I could even get her to say it was good.
The salad requires (yes, requires) boston leaf lettuce. The velvet texture of the leaves is addicting and simply cannot be left out. The salad dressing the lettuce is tossed in is homemade and can easily be sipped with a straw (kidding, slightly). I got the recipe courtesy of my boyfriend's mom and I can say my mom is forever grateful to her for it. I am too but no one loves this poppy seed dressing like my mom does. The recipe, posted at the bottom, is super easy and is made in a blender. Homemade salad dressing is no where near difficult, don't be afraid to make it. It is actually one of the simplest things to make in the kitchen, in most cases. It's even a little healthier than the bottled stuff if you choose for it be since you have control over what and how much of everything goes in it.
The last few touches to the salad are segments of grapefruit and diced avocado. It sounds weird but it is so good. Don't doubt it. Eat it.
My mom's mother's day gift ended up looking a little like this...

Was it the prettiest plate ever? No. Was it the tastiest gift ever? My mom would say so. 

Happy Mother's Day!

-Madison

Poppy Seed Dressing Recipe
Ingredients:

• 1 garlic clove
• 1 small shallot
• 1/4 cup champagne vinegar
• 1 cup mayonnaise
• 1 cup buttermilk
• 1/2 cup honey 
• 1/8 cup poppy seeds
• salt and pepper

Instructions:

• Blend garlic, shallot, and champagne vinegar together. Add mayonnaise, buttermilk, and honey and blend.
• Stir in poppy seeds. 
• Season with salt and pepper.