New Orleans in Half a Day

Posted on March 27, 2016

So let me start off my saying… what a freaking 24 hours the hubs and myself have had. If I can give advice to anyone, it would be that you should never.. ever.. EVER… even if the price is awesome… fly with Allegiant Airways. Not only did we drive three hours to get to Pittsburgh, but upon arrival, got delayed, sat in the terminal for 2 hours and then were told our flight was cancelled. No apparent reason was given, and we were given a crappy $8 voucher for food (which is like… half a beer at an airport) and a hotel room for the night. We lost out on a whole 24 hours with my sister (who I only get to see twice a year), a corporate world vacation day, and all the money we had spent on a fancy hotel room. It all sucked. The whole situation. And in talking to the customer service line at the airport, they didn’t even know the flight was cancelled. I’ve never dealt with a more incompetent business.

That being said, lessoned learned with Allegiant. We did make the best of the whole situation and tried to remedy the night. Being an ex-Pittsburgh native, I got to show the hubs a little of the city I love. We got to go to the Andy Warhol Museum and a great restaurant called Butcher and the Rye. It did turn out ok in the end but we’re still bummed about what we missed.

We did make a lot of friends and comrades sharing in our misery at the airport. I’m pretty sure we all would have rented a bus and pulled a 16 hour drive today if they had cancelled our flight again. This picture says it all… we’re finally getting to board a plane.. the hubs still questioning whether we’re going to actually take off and me… happy that we’re on our way.

Buutttt we finally made it! 24 hours later then expected, but here! Kate picked us up at the airport with a list of restaurant suggestions in hand. These are moments when Yoder genes come out strong with our love of food and it’s wonderful! Now, I’ve been here three times and New Orleans is just one of those destinations that you look forward to your eating. Kate’s top pick and recommendation was K-Paul’s Louisiana Kitchen and man, I don’t know how anyone could be disappointed with a meal here. I’m seriously still in a delicious food coma. We had the most wonderful waitress named Sheila. She gave recommendations (Kate asked her to pick her favorites and surprise her with dinner), showed us how the chef wanted us to eat meals and made the whole dining experience amazing. Every time a new round of food came, forks were passed around with little bites of everyone’s dish. I’m pretty sure we would have licked the plates if it wasn’t frowned upon.

If you had a gun to my head, I still probably couldn’t decide what I liked the best here. The decision making process to even pick an item on the menu was hard enough. See this intense pondering?

K-Paul’s is this wonderful mix of a little bit eclectic and a little bit classy. It still has that Southern Charm too. I loved all these illustrated recipes both framed on the wall and on the tablecloths.

So what did you finally decide on you ask?? Here was our lineup:

Apps
- A bowl of rolls (yes, a bowl) with hot jalapeno cheese rolls, cornbread muffins and a sweet dessert muffin.
- Rabbit and Veggie Sausage with Creole Mustard Sauce
- Chicken and Andouille Gumbo
- Cajun Jambalaya

Main Course
- Blackened Stuffed Pork Chop Marchand de Vin
- Eggplant Pirogue with Seafood Atchafalaya
- BBQ Shrimp (and I honestly can’t remember the name of it but it came on a bed or rice, with sautéed veggies)

Our wonderful waitress, Sheila, showing us how the chef recommends eating these meals. She was without a doubt one of the best waitresses I’ve ever had in my life.

Dessert
- Sweet Potato Pecan Pie
- Custard Marie Crème Brûlée with a Praline Bottom
- Espresso

A few of you might ask, “Why the lemon rind?” Well, I have an answer for you on that. In America, serving Espresso with a lemon rind is often seen as a “classy addition” as well as a means to dampen it’s bitterness. It is served this way in North America and sometimes in France, but never in Italy. Outside of Italy, this is called an “Espresso Romano.” It actually does seriously alter the espresso flavor. I haven’t decided if I love it one way or another.

Dinner was followed by a good stroll through the French Quarter. Street performers, Pat O’Brians, people watching, and weddings.. yes, even weddings. I can’t escape them, even on vacation. What a lovely bride and groom though! I loved their umbrellas, especially the ring bearers lol.

Here’s some New Orleans trivia for you. Wedding and funerals typically have a “second line.” This refers to the brass brand parades held for these events. The “main line” or “first line” is the main section of the parade, or the members of the actual club with the parading permit as well as the brass band. Those who follow the band just to enjoy the music are called the “second line.” The second line’s style of traditional dance, in which participants walk and sometimes twirl a parasol or handkerchief in the air, is called “second lining.” (source: Wikipedia)

Pretty cool right? Pat O’Brian’s was, of course, a place we always stop (and the husband’s personal fav), so we swing by to grab drinks before we continued our walking tour of the Quarter.

We stumbled across a street performer we had seen the last time we were in New Orleans. This wonderful older gentleman who plays songs by request on various sized glasses. He even got Kate in on the action, letting her play one and showing us how you can ‘see’ the tone of the glass in the water. Certainly one of the more unique performers, but New Orleans is loaded with them. There is no city like it and being a photographer, walking around taking photos at night, is a dream.

Our journey continues tomorrow! We have high hopes that the rain will hold off and we’ll get to see one of the Easter Day parades here. Fingers crossed! I’ll then be taking a hiatus for a week, as we’ll be out of the country cruising. So clients, have no fear! I’ll get back to you as soon as I have internet access. Until then, cheers from The Big Easy. – Alysha

Alysha Yoder Photography (b) www.alyshayoderphotoblog.com

www.alyshayoderphoto.com (e) alyshayoderphoto@yahoo.com (p) 610.762.7810

Berries and Custard

Posted on March 20, 2016

This is certainly a VERY old school (80+ years) family favorite that I’m about to share with you this chilly Sunday. It’s so old that the recipe is in both grams and great grams cookbook as well as a recipe card. I guess gram’s REALLY didn’t want us to forget this one lol. She certainly had it memorized.

Now if you know anything about the large Pizor-Yoder (and now Bailey clan), our family… aunts, uncles, cousins, siblings all get together every Christmas (and really as often as we can) and pretty much cook, play cards, laugh, and have an all around good time. You’ll certainly see some fun blog posts around that time (definitely including some mojito recipes… yummm). Our family ALWAYS make this custard recipe whenever we’re together. It’s actually my great-grams ‘cornstarch recipe’ and is known by just about everyone. Anyone who ever tries it wants a copy of the recipe. I even remember making this for my sister’s host family in Scotland, so it’s been shared in multiple countries too! It’s a truly amazing dessert and is comprised of fresh, simple ingredients.

In the summer, we’d go pick fresh berries off our neighbor’s bushes or get peaches at the farmer’s market and serve them over this custard. When the custard’s still hot everything kind of melds together in a truly magical way. We always had the ongoing tapioca vs. no tapioca argument in my family, as we were always 50/50 split on the matter. Grams and mom also used this as a pie base or custard base, which is fairly easy to do. Here’s some tricks of the Pizor-Yoder custard trade:

Add 1 T of good cocoa to make chocolate custard
Add 1/2-1 cup of shredded coconut to make coconut custard
- Do both of the above with a tsp of almond extract to make Almond Joy
Add zest and juice of one lemon to custard, pour in baked pie crust. Add whipped eggs whites (meringue) to the top and bake for lemon meringue pie.
Add a cup of quick tapioca (or a cup of large pearl that have been soaked overnight) for tapioca custard.
We substituted coconut milk for regular milk before to make lactose free custard (also makes it a little more primal/paleo if you use coconut sugar instead of white sugar)
My grandpa’s favorite was always to put pitted cherries on the bottom of a baked pie crust, cover them with tapioca custard and have custard cherry pie.

It’s seriously one of the best base recipes that can also beautifully stand on it’s own or be whipped up into any manner of desserts. I have so many memories of gram’s stirring this on the stovetop for all the grandkids. This has always been a staple in our households, and hopefully it can become one in yours now too!

**Also, as a side note, the hubs and I are taking a little hiatus the next two weekends. I’ll be doing a little post on New Orleans next weekend but then we’ll be out of the country so a fun island post to follow soon! However, gram’s recipes will be postponed for our little break! Check back soon!

Old Fashioned Cornstarch Custard:

Now, we always double this recipe (cause the family can never get enough of this) but this will make roughly 3 cups of custard by itself so plan accordingly!

2 rounded T cornstarch
1 pint milk (2 cups)
pinch of salt
1/3 cup sugar (can add more or less to taste)
2 egg yolks
1.5 – 2 T of butter
1 tsp vanilla

Mix together cornstarch and sugar until combined well. Slowly add milk and mix well to ensure no clumping (with cornstarch). Separate eggs, add yolks and salt. Stir everything until combined well and place on stove at medium high heat. Continuously stir mixture to avoid scorching until mixture thickens. Once it thickens, add butter and vanilla. Remove from heat and still until well combined. My family can never wait for this to cool and pretty much eat it as soon as it doesn’t burn our mouths but feel free to cool and serve cold as well or make a pie! Enjoy!

Funny moment is always when Gizmo comes in and looks at us making food sitting on the floor. I’m pretty sure he thinks we’re nuts. Captured a little moment of that today.

Alysha Yoder Photography (b) www.alyshayoderphotoblog.com

www.alyshayoderphoto.com (e) alyshayoderphoto@yahoo.com (p) 610.762.7810

Strawberries and Cream

Posted on March 14, 2016

It’s curious, every time I sit down to write out a recipe, I spend a little time thinking about what grams would say. What memories would she remember about these recipes that I don’t? How did she create or find a recipe? I would say a good half of all the recipes in gram’s books are from friends, relatives, or other cookbooks and this one is no different. It’s on an old piece of type paper from 1978 from her friend Shirley MacKay. Gram’s binders are filled with torn out pages from magazines, recipe cards ‘from the kitchen of’ various friends, or jotted down notes from a restaurant she’d visited where she convinced a chef to share the recipe with her. Grams was funny like that. She could pretty much talk anyone into giving her a good recipe.

Today, with the dreary rain and all around blah mood, I couldn’t ask for a better day to make ice cream, right? Perfect comfort food (other than pizza of course). Now two things. One, this ice cream recipe is actually a ‘vanilla base.’I chose to make strawberry ice cream, as it’s one of my favorites and the berries at the store looked great. I can’t wait until summer when I can mix and match all sorts of fresh fruit. You could hypothetically add just about anything to this recipe though. For example:

Crushed up cookies = Cookies and cream
Almond extract and toasted pecans = Toast’y nuts
Coconut, crushed almonds & chocolate = Almond Joy
Blueberries and Lemons = Summer Fresh
Cookie dough and caramel = Serious awesomeness

It’s a great recipe for kids to experiment with different flavors too. And heck, if you’re just a HUGE vanilla ice cream fan (like my husband), feel free to keep it as is. You could even scrape some vanilla beans in it to give it a little extra boast.

Two, I received these hand-made pewter spoons that I’ve been oogling over for a while from a little Etsy shop CrosbyandTaylor. They’re just so stunning and have just the perfect rustic look I wanted. Seriously, isn’t this the most fantastic set? I love them. I couldn’t wait to photograph them this weekend.

Now, if this is your first time making ice cream at home, you should know that it’s not going to come out super firm and scoopable like the gallons you get at the store. Homemade ice cream is like soft serve. It’s freaking delicious, but if you’re looking for some hard scoopable ice cream, this is not what you’re looking for. You can also get it to the “soft serve consistency” and put it in the freezer if you’re a fan of the very scoop-able.

This is a fairly easy recipe in the sense that it’s a matter of mixing everything in a bowl. Ice cream recipes however are a little time consuming in the ‘waiting’ process. After everything is mixed, you will have to refrigerate for 2+ hours. Then place the mixture into the ice cream maker for around 20 minutes. Depending on if you have an ice cream maker or not, it might take longer (for my purposes below, I used my ice cream maker). If you don’t have one however, you can use a 1 lb coffee can and a 3 lb coffee can. This was not the method I used, but you can find a good little tutorial here (Ice Cream Can Method).

Now…. I know you’ve been anxiously awaiting this ice cream recipe, so without further ado, STRAWBERRY ICE CREAM (you know you’re just as excited as I am).

Vanilla Ice Cream Base:

**First place ice cream maker base in freeze overnight. It MUST be VERY cold and frozen before it will make ice cream.

3 eggs
1.5 cups white sugar
2 half pint cartons of heavy whipping cream (or 2 cups)
1.5 cups milk
1 pint carton of half and half (or 2 cups)
2.5-3 T of vanilla extract
Optional – 1 to 1.5 cups finely chopped Strawberries
Optional – 2 drop vanilla-nut flavoring

Beat eggs well. I also remove the little white ropes called the chalazae. They gross me out if I get a little white chunk in my ice cream. But for a little cooking trivia, the chalazae is what anchors the yolk to the egg shell and prevents it from bouncing around in there. Gradually add sugar and whisk until smooth and creamy. Slowly stir in remaining ingredients. Stir well until combined. Place in covered bowl in the fridge for 2+ hours. Once very cold, slowly pour into ice cream maker base. Be careful not to overflow. All ice cream makers are different so you may have some mixture left over. If so, just eat what’s frozen and add more. Enjoy!

**Also, two notes. First, a money saving note. If you have a membership to any club stores (Costco, BJ, Sam’s, etc.) get the half & half and whipping cream there. It is TREMENDOUSLY cheaper. Second, some people really don’t like cooking with raw eggs. To each their own. This can also be made in a sauce pan over the stove. Whisk it all together and continuously stir until boiling. Remove from heat and cool in fridge. This will take a LOT longer to cool for the ice cream machine but just gives you another option.