It's been a while..

Yes, yes it has been a long time since I've come to update or post pictures or an episode. Not a peep. Bad, bad, bad me! Please accept my deepest and most sincere apology! 

Now that we've gotten that out of the way I have sooo much to share about school and life and most of all FOOD!! Although my semester is almost over I've been taking pictures galore and I have tons to tell you about. Then there's Thanksgiving cakes and pies and Christmas is right around the corner. I've started making cheesecakes of various sizes and flavors and I can't wait to share the recipes with you. I have new product collaborations coming up in the near future, because I am surrounded by intelligent, wildly creative people and it's about time we all start working together to bring the world beauty in all it's forms.

So I'm ending this year with a bang and starting 2012 with a great big KA-BOOM!! More recipes. products and sharing. Simply Sinful is taking over so get ready.

Until next time my luvlies, remember,

Make Life Delicious!

Michelle

Simply Sinful in Australia!!

All the world’s a Stage!

Stage (pronounced like the word mirage)::Staging is when a cook or chef works briefly, for free, in another chef's kitchen to learn and be exposed to new techniques and cuisines. A stage normally is used to see how a new chef or cook can adapt to the current environment in the kitchen. When a future chef is seeking an internship, often the stage is the next step after the interview.

Now that we’ve got all that out of the way…I had the opportunity last night to stage in the pastry kitchen at Spago Beverly Hills.

But wait! How did I accomplish this you ask?? Welllll Last Saturday I got to work an event at LA Live for  Los Angeles Food and Wine. What event you ask?? It was Decadence! LA’s sweetest afterparty! It was all desserts, pastries and chocolates. I was in heaven! And if that wasn’t enough I had the honor and privilege to work with the woman who hosted the entire event Ms. Sherry Yard, the High Priestess of Pastry  for Wolfgang Puck!!  She and her staff were wonderful and I had a blast! It didn’t hurt that ?uestlove was the DJ and it was a full blown party when they opened the doors! This event was $125.00 to get into and I got to check it out for nothing AND meet a lot of cool celebrity chefs! Duff Goldman, Zac Young and Lincoln Carson to name a few. I was exhausted after the event but it was well worth the energy. I got Chef Sherry’s number and it took me 3 days to work up the nerver to call her and the rest is history!

 Now back to last night. I was absolutely terrified going in but once I got there it was great. and not difficult at all. They started me out dicing strawberries and juicing lemons. Easy work I know but I did it with a smile on my face. I was in Wolfgang Puck’s kitchen! If they had asked me to babysit boiling water I would have done it! After I got finished with the fruit I got to assemble little date cakes and make toffee sauce…I was thrilled! All the while I was watching the other pastry chefs assemble cakes for birthdays and whip up bases for sorbets and ice cream. I asked as many questions as I could and made sure I paid close attention to the all of the instructions I was given. It paid off when I was allowed to help plate desserts for a large party and then, I was moved up to the line to plate individual desserts for patrons in the restaurant.! Buy the end of the night I was plating desserts by myself and calling tickets.! Wooooo Hoooo!! I killed it all and I’m ready for more. Patiently awaiting the call back and in the meantime I’ll just keep reliving this night in my dreams. Well back to the mundane, stay tuned and until next time remember,

Make Life Delicious!

Michelle

Simply Sinful Dining episode 3

Bread!

As you all know( if you’ve been paying attention) I’m back at school. I’m in introduction to baking which basically means we make a little of everything dessert or bread related under the sun. It’s so exciting! I love love love to bake! I thought it was just desserts but it’s bread too. Oh bread, I’ve been so unfair to you in the past. Turning my nose up at you at dinner tables and say “oh no I don’t eat bread like that, I don’t really like it” This class has made a liar out of me. A happy, slightly worried liar. First the happy. Fresh baked bread is so so very good. so good in fact that I don’t mind eating it at all. I enjoy it. immensely, which brings me to the worried part. I’m not anti carb but I’m pretty sure consuming large amounts of freshly baked breads is detrimental to the waistline. I’m learning a new kind of self control. Wish me luck.

With all the new things I’m learning to make and master my head is brimming with ideas for new items on my menu. My first project will be a cinnamon roll made with brioche dough.

Brioche.., quite simply some of the best bread I’ve ever eaten. It’s rich and buttery and yeasty and I know it’ll go very well in a cinnamon roll. Traditionally it doesn’t but I think this small improvement will be welcome. I made brioche loaves in class and wow oh wow., with some cinnamon and sugar it can only get better. 

I’ve also made French bread. Hand rolled baguettes! And again I'd like to say that before this class I DID NOT eat bread by itself, but I ate this one. And it was goooood!

And Cinnamon rolls

Pizza dough with yummy toppings (my classmates kinda swooped in and devoured it, note the pizza cutter)

As the weeks go by I’ll be sharing my class work with you and some of the projects I’ve been inspired to make at home. I hope you enjoy because I sure am!

Until next time remember,

Make Life delicious!

Michelle

SImply Sinful Dining Episode 2

School and Mexican food

Celebration!! I’ve survived my first week back at school. I’m in my second semester of Professional Baking and I love my teacher. She is very thorough and patient. I look forward to learning from her. I’ve already learned so many new things that I’m really excited about trying out at home. Making croissants and crème caramel (flan) are on the top of my list.  Yum!

In addition to starting back to school my friend and I threw our 2^nd annual get together to encourage our friends not to forget to actually interact face to face in the time of texts, emails and twitter. It went over perfectly! Everything was easy and effortless. We went with a Mexican themed menu and I was in charge of the food. I made Carne Asada, Grilled chicken thighs, Spanish rice, Pico de Gallo, salsa Verde and sangria, or as my friend dubbed it, The Sangria of Happiness!

The menu was really easy to prepare and the prep wasn’t bad at all. I started the night before chopping onions, tomatoes, garlic, jalapenos, green onions and cilantro. I also juiced limes and tangerines and peel tomatillos.  After I got every thing chopped, juiced and peeled I started putting together the Pico de Gallo with the tomatoes, onions, and cilantro and lime juice. I wanted all those flavors to marry overnight. Then I went ahead and lightly season the meat for the Carne Asada. I don’t use a marinade for the steak, I like to taste the meat and let the other condiments compliment its natural flavor.  For the chicken I mixed lime and tangerine juices and pour it over the chicken after I sprinkled it with a mixture of sea salt, cracked black pepper, whole cumin and ground arbol chilies. I put both into the refrigerator, clean up and was done. The next morning all I had to do was roast the tomatillos and jalapenos for the salsa Verde and the grill off the meats. I was done in about an hour and a half. I roasted the veggies first and then did the meats. Once I had the meats into to oven to keep them above 210 degrees I started on the salsa Verde. I took removed the stems and skin from the jalapeños. It was easy since I had roasted them on the grill. I just chopped the stems off and ran the whole pepper under cold water. The skin came right off. Then I just tossed all the peppers into the blender with the tomatillos, some chopped onion, whole garlic cloves, chopped tomato, and cilantro and lime juice. I puréed it all together with a tiny bit of sea salt in the end. This salsa Verde was sooooooo good with the carne asada! The flavors complimented each other very nicely. The last thing I did was make the Spanish rice. I sautéed some chopped onions and garlic until the were tender, then I added some instant rice and sautéed the rice until it was a little toasted. I added chicken broth to the rice and let it simmer until almost all of the broth was absorbed the added fresh tomatoes, cilantro, green onion and lime juice. I finished it with some sea salt and all done! I made the sangria right before the get together started using red wine, orange juice and honey liquor poured over ice in a punch bowl. I sliced oranges, limes and lemons and added then to the punch bowl in the end. The Sangria of Happiness was born!!

All in all this week was great! Even showing up for an extremely early morning class on Friday and finding out the class I registered for doesn’t actually start until October turned out well!  J

I hope all of you take some time to have good times with good friends and great food like I did. Thanks for welcoming me into your lives and taking the time to allow me to share mine with you. Until next time remember…

Make Life Delicious!

Michelle

Simply Sinful Dining episode 1.

Simply Sinful Dining Fashion Show Special

Simply Sinful Dining Trailer

Simply Sinful Dining Promo for His and Hers Fits anniversary celebration

Wait...what's this on my plate?

Simplicity in food. What’s happening to it? I’m all for trying new things but this is getting ridiculous. It’s like everyone is competing to come up with the most outrageous food combinations. And people are flocking en mass to try bacon sundaes and goat cheese flavored cupcakes. What about simple traditional food? What about the foods we grew up with? Slowly they are being phased out, being replaced by ‘new twists on old favorites’. But they are old favorites for a reason. Why change them? I grew up in southern California, specifically Los Angeles so my old favorites are quite broad. Parts of my family are from the south. so I grew up eating soul food. But Los Angeles is such a melting pot I also grew up eating Belizean food, Mexican food, El Salvadorian food and much much more. The exposure to so many different cultures has allowed me to be able to cook a variety of multicultural meals throughout my life and now I’m teaching my children simple traditional recipes from all over the world. I will stop a complete stranger in a grocery store to ask them how they would prepare a certain meat or vegetable that is not common to my culture and guess what? I have never ever met anyone unwilling to educate me on their culture thus helping me make it part of mine. There would be no new twists without the old favorites. The old favorites are the basis for our experimentation. I for one will continue to pay homage to the to the food I grew up with and keep making it better without deviating too much from the original recipe. The quality of food we have available now can take a regular hamburger to new heights without having to change it too much. High quality beef, homemade buns and mayonnaise, farm fresh produce and locally made cheese makes for one of the best burgers out there and it’s still a burger. I’m not against change, not at all. Change is exciting. Change is groundbreaking. Change is how we thrive. But history is just as important. I understand the need for progress and evolution in everything in the world but I truly believe we need to preserve our culinary history. And so I will continue to preserve mine and I encourage you to do the same. Thanks for taking the time to ‘listen’ to my rant….lol. I’ll get off my soapbox now. Stay tuned for more rantings and feel free to add your thoughts. Until next time remember…

Make Life Delicious

Michelle

Welcome to my world

Hello and welcome to Simply Sinful Dining! My name is Michelle and this is my very first ever blog. I love to cook. I love to bake. I love to write....sooo..Here I am. I've been cooking since I was about 9. I learned by watching my mother, grandmother and especially my great grandmother, Big Mama, cook and by asking questions. No fancy cooking classes for me..Lol. My memories of cooking with Big Mama are where I get my love of cooking and baking. Whenever the family drove out to visit her and my great grandfather in Riverside she would cook so much food and bake so many cakes and pies. The entire family would gain weight in the one week we were there every time. Southern fried chicken, greens picked from her garden outside, hot water cornbread, homemade pound cakes, sweet potato pies and ice cream. Summer’s there were magical. When I started cooking for my family I wanted them to be transported back to those times. I wanted my children to be able to put tastes and textures with the stories my family and I tell them about visiting Big Mama’s house and all the wonderful food we had. One of the biggest compliments anyone has ever given was from my youngest aunt before she passed. She told me that when she bit into my lemon pound cake she was immediately taken back to Big Mama’s house when we’d be in the kitchen in the middle of the night sneaking pieces of pound cake while everyone else slept. I was touched and continued to make even better tasting pound cake as the years went by. I’ve used what I learned as a child as the basis of how I cook and bake now. Now I make EVERYTHING. And if I haven’t tried it I will attempt it at least once. I love watching cooking shows and experimenting with new things. I always have ideas new for dishes and desserts. And thankfully I have no shortage of guinea pigs in all my loved ones. So far the consensus is “Mmmmm it was good”. Got to love them.  They were very helpful to be when I was perfecting my dessert recipes for my business. I’ve bake up a batch of lemon bars or brownies and then send out a mass text for tasters to everyone I know. First come, first served. I have never had leftovers. Ever. Some of these tasters have become regular customers. I love them all and appreciate them so much.

Now I’m enrolled in school for Professional Baking. I figured that since I spent over a decade doing something practical I’d try doing something I love. Going back to school at my age was terrifying and exhilarating at the same time. I survived my first semester and came out of it with A’s in all my classes. I’m also building a customer base to start my own business. Big thangs happenin!!

Thank you so much for taking the time to read my blog. Stay tuned and I promise, if nothing else, it’ll be interesting ;).

Make Life Delicious,

Michelle