Seriously the best chocolate chip cookies ever. This is for real cookie lovers. If you like your cookies gooey and boring, go buy some Toll House ready made dough and just eat it. But if your taste buds have grown beyond the kindergarten level, this is the recipe for you. These cookies are crispy yet buttery, and melt in your mouth after a satisfying crunch. It’s also the easiest baked good in the world to make, probably.

I would rotate the image 90 degrees, but it would take 20 minutes of waiting on my computer, so use the power of imagination to rotate it yourself!

• 1/2 stick of Crisco
• 1 stick of butter, softened
• 1 cup of white sugar
• 1/2 cup of packed brown sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp. of vanilla extract
• 2 1/4 cups of flour
• 1 tsp. baking soda
• 1 tsp. salt
• As many chocolate chips as you like

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Using an electric mixer, combine the Crisco and the butter.

Add the white and bown sugar. Mix some more.

Add in the 2 eggs and vanilla. Mix some more.

Add the flour, baking soda, and salt. Mix some more.

Add the chocolate chips. Mix some more. You might have to use a big spoon at this point.

Spoon little mounds of dough onto a cookie sheet. The size is up to you, but the right way to do is a moderately heaping spoonful.

Bake for 18-20 minutes or until gold brown, and closer to the brown than the golden.

-Alex Sciuto

Toll House Drizzle™ cookies burning in the Hell Fires.

First-off, imagine if I hadn’t been lazy and had posted this… wait this is the day after Thanksgiving. So this post-thanksgiving recipe is timely.

Is this a dessert? Or a side dish? I’m not sure, but we’ll find out soon, enough! It’s a straightforward pound cake, but with a little bit of a twist. My mom got this recipe from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, btw.

Ingredients:

• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
• 2 cups granuated sugar
• 2 cups cooked, mashed sweet potatoes (at least two sweet potatoes)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 4 eggs
• 1 cup sifted powdered sugar
• 5 teaspoons fresh orange juice
• 2 tablespoons grated orange zest

Preheat your oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour a ten-inch tube pan. Next mash your sweet potatoes. Quickly whipping up mashed sweet potatoes is easy. Microwave them for three to four minutes, peel them, then mash them with a fork. Easy!

Combine the dry ingredients and spices. It’s very important to combine the dry ingredients beforehand so that the spices and salt will be evenly distributed throughout the cake.

Cream the butter with the sugar (if you’re really unhealthy, like I am, then you eat some of this deliciousness), and then add the sweet potatoes and the vanilla mixing very well. Eat some of this too. Cause it’s also very tasty. Next beat in eggs, one at a time, making sure to incorporate the eggs completely. Finally, add in your combined dry ingredients, and mix until combined.

Plop the combination in the pan, and bake for an hour and ten minutes. While that bakes, combine the sifted powders sugar and the orange juice together to create a sweet glaze. When the cake is out of the oven and cooled, drizzle the glaze an sprinkle the orange zest. Voila!

TASTE TEST Very good! A disclaimer, we ran out of sweet potatoes so we substituted a cup of mashed pumpkin for a cup of sweet potato, but I didn’t really taste much pumpkin, so I don’t think the substitution made a huge difference. The most surprising aspect of the cake is its moistness. It is dense and wet. Some said that the cake could have been a bit sweeter, but I think its subdued sweetness went well with the sweet glaze. Too much of a good thing can be just too much sugar. But I wonder what would happen if instead of two cups of sweet potatoes, two cups of the syrupy sweet mashed potato casserole dish that is always at Thanksgiving and is often served with marshmellows was instead used. That would probably bring up the sweetness. In sum, a fun twist on pound cake that is even more moise and dense than a typical poundcake.

-Alex Sciuto

“It’s a great business. It’s not like being an oncologist of some shit like that. You know. Yeah, there’s nothing wrong with it at all. You’re never gonna get rich, but why would you need to. I don’t need to do a bunch of coke to be happy.” That’s a quote from a New York Diner Cook and owner who was videoed by the New York Times. It’s very funny, profane, and you learn how to make macaroni and cheese pancakes!

-Carolyn Frischer

Last night, I was blessed with the extremely good fortune of getting to travel to downtown Dundas to eat at Fermentations Wine Bar and Bistro, and it was the best meal I’ve had in Minnesota (that’s not saying much at all, I know.)

Getting to Fermentations was very easy and quick, and exposed just how little I’ve ever explored the greater-Northfield area. I don’t believe I’ve ever driven further south on highway 3 than Target and Cub Foods. To get to Fermentations, we had to double that southern distance, eventually taking a right. After winding through a few residential blocks, downtown Dundas revealed itself. Composed of a single half a street with two or three commercial-looking buildings, a parking lot, and a runned down stone ruin, downtown Dundas left a lot to be desired.

Notice the yellow sports car. Wealthy Dundans eat at Fermentations.

The restaurant is located in the right half of a small one-story repurposed building. While space was at a premium (I joked with my fellow reviewers, whom I had flown out from Manhattan, New York so that they could give their expert critique of the food, that the restaurant was tiny enough to be located in Midtown! We all laughed heartily at my wit.), the dining room was tastefully designed and furnished. Nothing to radical, just a combination of warm woods and modern fixtures.

But to the food. I started with the crab cakes appetizer. I was served five moderatlely large cakes circling a center of home-made tartar sauce. The portion was large enough to be a meal itself. I’m a big fan of crab cakes, and I try to have them everywhere I go. These tasted like the best of what I’ve had. They had the delicate texture of crab meat and weren’t too oily or too dry. But they really excelled in the seasoning. Very well balanced between the crab meat and the spices mixed with it. I wish I could have gotten an order to go.

The main course was delicious and very very fancy. I don’t too often go to really nice restaurants, but when I do get the chance, I remember them, and I’ll remember this plate of food. In the center were rice noodles (the menu called them Wassabe-infused rice noodles. I didn’t taste any spiciness from the noodles), surrounded by cuts of Marlin fish. Topping it all was very thinly sliced long ways and quickly cooked zucchini. All of this was on top of a layer of soysauce based sauce that had the feel of soysauce without the overbearing saltiness.

The Marlin was pan-seared for just a minute so that the outer layer of meat was cooked and the crust of sesame seeds were toasted while the majority of the center meat completely raw. I tasted very fishy, but very good. I was reminded of eating sushi, but all the flavors were much more muted and subdued. The soysauce not too salty. The fish, not as fishy.

The surprise of the night for me were the zucchini slices. As my mother knows very well, I don’t like zucchini, but I ate the entire portion I was served. The zucchini almost tasted like broad big noodles, and contrasted very well in texture to the softer rice noodles. I’m going to have to rethink my dislike of zucchini. It seems like everyone is just under cooking it! It sure seems to have a sweet spot like Asperagus: too raw and its crunchy and gross, too done and it’s chewy and soggy, but there’s a sweet spot inbetween.

All-in-all, a very enjoyable two hours spent eating at Fermentations. Maybe next time I’ll get wine! And thanks to Mr. and Mrs. Frischer for taking us there!

-Alex Sciuto