I made chili tonight, with red beans and jalapeno chicken sausage. It tasted great.
To go along with it, I made baked tortilla chips: I cut fresh corn tortillas into wedges, brushed them with oil, sprinkled on a bit of salt and baked them in a 350 oven. Crunchy and delicious.
I also made cupcakes. Why? Because when I was cleaning out the fridge I found some eggs that were nearing the end of their freshness, and cupcakes seemed like a good way to use them. I recently bought a mini muffin pan, so I used the devil’s food cake recipe from How to Cook Everything and just baked them for a shorter period–about 14 minutes.
In one bowl you beat together butter, sugar, egg yolks and vanilla.
Then you add a combination of flour, baking soda and salt, alternately with buttermilk, sour cream or yogurt. I used yogurt here.
You beat the egg whites until they form soft peaks–maybe a minute with my mixture.
Then fold that into the chocolate mixture, et voila.
The little cupcakes take about 14 minutes to bake. I was more careful not to overfill the cups than I am with standard-sized cupcakes, so I had to do a partial second batch. I made 40 wee cupcakes in all.
I made cream cheese frosting: butter, cream cheese, powdered sugar and vanilla. Sifting the powdered sugar takes a bit of time, but once that step is done it could hardly be easier.
I think some of these are going to have to go in to work.