Molho branco com Conceição

Melt 2 Tbs margarine
Add some chopped onion
Add 1 Tbs flour
Add milk.
Add more water or milk if too thick.
Add some generic fish or vegetable seasoning.
Add some parmesan
Stir.

There's your white sauce.

Season your raw tilapia with lime, salt and garlic.
Fry it lightly in a pan with some oil. (Not deep fry).

Pour half the white sauce in the bottom of a 9x13. Place the tilapia organizedly on the sauce.
Cover the tilapia with slices of potato.
Cover the potato and tilapia with white sauce.
Sprinkle with parmesan.
Bake for 30 minutes or until cooked.

Mom's pasghetii sauce

So apparently the key to avoiding the vinegary tomato concentrate flavor in your spaghetti sauce is to use real tomatoes.  An unlimited amount.

Oil (olive, vegetable..)
1 large onion, finely chopped
1 and a quarter green pepper, almost as finely chopped
7 small tomatoes (or however many you want/can use) coarsely chopped
Some ground beef
680 grams of tomato sauce
Garlic powder,
Italian seasoning.

Heat up some oil in a saucepan. Sauté finely chopped onions. Add chopped green pepper. Sauté. Add coarsely chopped tomatoes. This will release a juice that will give a better flavor to the sauce.
Cook for 10 minutes or so to let the flavors jive.
Add cooked ground beef.
Add two bags of tomato sauce (340 g each).
Cook.
Add garlic powder and Italian seasoning to taste. Yum.

Buon appetito!
(Or however you say it in Italian. Buon appetite?)

Pudim com Conceição

Recipe:
1 tetrapak of leite condesado
1 same amount of tetrapak of milk
3 eggs

Blend the crap out of it in a blender.

In the forma for pudim, put about
10 Tbs of sugar.
Melt it on the stove, in the pan. Get that caramel-y brown syrup, and spoon it onto the walls of the pan.

Pour your pudim batter in the pan: bake for like an hour.

Delish. Note: avoid using a ridge-y bundt cake pan. The pudding comes out, but it looks real sloppy. Deliiicious, though.

Bonus photo: a memory of simple tapioca: filled with leite condensado and coco ralado.

*Leite condensado tapioca*

Tutu de feijão and farofa com banana with Conceição

1. Have pre-cooked beans on hand.
2. Fry the crap out of some sliced calabresa/chorizo sausage, adding onion to the grease in the frying pan.
3. Fry minced garlic in some oil in medium saucepan,
4. Cut up some onion, tomato and green pepper. Add to fried garlic.
5. Put pre-cooked beans in with the seasonings and veggies.
6.Cook thoroughly.
7. Mix farinha de mandioca with a bit of water and stir thoroughly into the beans and bean broth.
8. Add calabresa, and voilà! Your tutu is ready!

Microwave risotto!

In microwaveable bowl:
1. Microwave small amount of butter.
2. Microwave chopped up veggies (for in risotto) mixed into the butter.
3. Microwave broth until it's around boiling. (Ergo the need for a microwaveable bowl)
4. Pour in half the amount of rice as broth you used, and microwave to the death!

Voilà, risotto in le microwave!

(Abbreviated recipe inspired by recipe given me by my Blackhawk parents, les Sheridans.)

Heavenly cinnabon cinnamon rolls

Ah yes. French yeast.. French fresh yeast.

The block-y kind.
I got confused and thought the yeast was bad, because I: stored it in the freezer, instead of the fridge, and expected there to be foam when the yeast was placed in warm milk, like what happens at home with active dry yeast:

Once someone assured me that fresh yeast does not react that way, you just have to trust that it will make the dough rise when the time comes, I set out to make my long-desired cinnamon rolls on a fateful Saturday morning...

Cinnabon Cinnamon Rolls (clone from Treasury of Top Secret Recipes)

ROLLS

1 ¼ ounce package active dry yeast (1 T)                               1 t. salt

1 c warm milk                                                                     2 eggs

½ c sugar                                                                              4 c flour 

                                                                                                                 1/3 c melted margarine

FILLING

1 c packed brown sugar                                                 1/3 c softened margarine

2 ½ T cinnamon

ICING   

½ margarine or butter, softened                                               ¼ c  cream cheese

1 ½ c powdered sugar                                                    ½ t vanilla

1/8 t salt

1.       For the rolls, dissolve the yeast in the warm milk in a large bowl.

2.       Mix together the sugar, margarine, salt, and eggs. Add flour and mix well.

3.       Knead the dough into a large ball, using your hands dusted lightly with flour. Put in a bowl,  cover, and let rise in a warm place about 1 hour, or until the dough has doubled in size.

4.       Roll the dough out on a lightly floured surface. Roll the dough flat until it is approximately 21 inches long and 16 inches wide. It should be about ¼ inch thick.

5.       Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

6.       For the filling, combine the brown sugar and cinnamon in a bowl. Spread the softened margarine evenly over the surface of the dough, and then sprinkle the cinnamon and sugar evenly over the surface.

7.       Working carefully from the top (a 21 inch side), roll the dough down to the bottom edge.

8.       Cut the rolled dough into 1 ¾ inch slices and place 6 at a time, evenly spaced, in a lightly greased baking pan. Let the rolls rise again until double in size (about 30 minutes). Bake for 10-15 minutes, or until light brown on top

9.       While the rolls bake, combine the icing ingredients. Beat well with an electric mixer until fluffy.

10.   When the rolls come out of the oven, coat each generously with icing.

11.   Makes 12 rolls.

Recipe typed out courtesy of my MOMMA. :) from the book

To be purchased here

That's all for now! :)

More things I have tried

 Recipe from here.
 Instead of using the shortening he recommends, I used margarine. This... gave it a kind of delicious but kind of a reminder that there is margarine in it.. Good and bad, depending on how your conscience works. 

 I made overnight coffee, good for cold coffee!

Yummy, all ready for my passport picture!

 
  Babysat and made bubble snakes!

 
Made chocolate chip cookies, of course.

I made honey-oat bread à la Subway.. 

I made honey-oat bread à la Subway.. 

The Subway-inspired feast.. Yesssssssss.

( And I helped prepare this chicken (here it is unbaked!)

I also made a cheesecake (out of a box.......) which was really good! And I made brigadeiros, that I totally overcooked into chocolate caramels, oops. But after the second day, they had moistened up, and the texture was PERFECT. They were delicious!