on cooking and entertaining

{photo credit: me}

perhaps it was because i started reading bread and wine and was inspired to get busy in the kitchen, but this past weekend, i totally had people over to my apartment and cooked for them. on two different occasions. what? okaaay. yeah!

here's the deal. i'm not a total kitchen virgin, but these are the basic building blocks i'm working with: i know how to boil water, melt butter in the microwave and heat up a can of progresso. {yeesh}. it's not because i can't cook. it's because soup is so much easier and cheaper than making a meal from scratch.

unfortunately, watery chicken noodle soup does nothing to impress guests. like, not a thing. what does impress them? pesto pasta with seared brats. cinnamon raisin french toast. red pepper and avocado scramble. gourmet pigs in a blanket with feta and caramelized onions. go big or go home.

{photo credit: me}

on friday evening, my friend micah come over and we hustled in the kitchen, me making one pot pasta, him cooking the brats and concocting gin-basil smashes. as soon as i served up the plates, i grabbed my phone to take a picture of our delicious meal and promptly dropped it face down in the pesto. that will teach me to think twice about instagramming a meal.

{photo credit: me}

on sunday morning, my friends sarah and sarah came over for brunch. they are roommates and besties and they share the same name. they're cute. while they sat at the bar drinking starbucks, i soaked sticks of cinnamon raisin bread in milky, custardy liquid and then dropped them into a hot skillet, one by one. while they sizzled in the heat, into another skillet i poured eggs, avocado, red pepper and feta crumbles. i managed to keep watch on both skillets without setting any food on fire. sweet freaking success.

{photo credit: me}

sunday evening i went to a super bowl party and needed a snack to bring. my go-to party food is always a dessert as i'm a baker before i'm a cook, but i wanted to go a different route for this party. my co-worker gave me the idea to do a fancy twist on pigs in a blanket, and i ran with it. it was my favorite thing i made all weekend. holy crap these babies were good. i highly recommend making them for your next party or even a before-dinner appetizer. i went with savory flavors with this batch, but you could really go a million different ways with your filling choices.

ingredients:

pillsbury crescent rolls (i used 4 mini packages as they were out of the larger packages)
1-2 sweet onions, chopped and caramelized
feta crumbles
1 package nathan's beef cocktail franks
1 package of bacon

preparation:

caramelize your onion on the stovetop while you cook your bacon. you don't want your bacon to be super crispy as you will eventually be wrapping it around your cocktail frank. i baked mine in the oven for 10 minutes, and it was perfect.

when onions are caramelized and bacon is cooked, roll out one of the pillsbury crescents and on the wider end, spoon onions and feta. on the smaller triangle end, place bacon wrapped frank and start rolling the dough around it. roll down to the wider end where the onions and feta are. you won't get a perfect roll as the filling will start making things a little messy, but that's fine. just pinch the dough closed here and there.

once all crescent rolls are filled and rolled, place them "messy" side down on a baking sheet and spray the tops with pam. sprinkle sesame seeds on top and bake in oven at 375 degrees for 10 minutes.

holy flavors, batman. i tried one before i brought them to the party, and i'm glad i did because there weren't any left at the end of the night. disaster averted.

it was a full weekend on many levels. full from all the food i ate and full from the friends i spent time with. do you guys have any good recipes you've made lately? do you lean more towards sweet or savory dishes?

and that's all she wrote. er, ate.