No, I haven’t fallen off the face of the earth…it’s just midterm week.

Here’s a short list of things that will be coming soon:

• Porkfest. I know, I feature pork more than any other meat. It’s mostly because there was a giant sale on pork loin, and I’ve been trying to deplete the 10+ lbs of pork in my freezer before buying other meats. Anyways, I have a friend who really loves pork, and I agreed to make her a meal featuring no less than 4 kinds of pork (and perhaps more!) if she started a blahg about it. She did: Porkblogger. Read it. Love it.
• More Tiny Foods. I want to make another (different) Tiny Breakfast, as well as a Mini Lunch, a Little Dinner, and some Ittybitty Desserts.
• Soups. Once upon a time, I promised my friend FlyerAsh that I’d figure out how to make homemade Funyuns. That hasn’t happened yet (successfully, anyhow), but in the meantime, I’m going to feature some soup recipes that she recco’s.
• Armenian food. More shish, losh, sarma, and eech than your nene can shake a pabooj at!
• More Office Barista. I was about to abandon that idea because I cannot seem to take a decent photo of a cup of coffee, but you’d be amazed how many people search for office-kitchen beverage recipes. Or possibly just one person who really doesn’t know what to do with the fancy coffee maker, I’m not sure.
• Something really geeky that involves fondant. I’m still figuring out how to get the fondant to be the exact color I want, but once I finish that whole trial-and-error process, there’s something extra fun (and a little bit nerdy) in the works.

Oh yeah, and at some point I’m going to bake bread. I got a copy of Artisan Bread in Five Minutes a Day and I’m anxious to see how that will turn out. I suspect it will be either hilarious or tragic.

Plain sugar cookies are boring. Plus, I seem to really enjoy making two-toned foods. So…chocolate-striped sugar cookies!

Excuse the photo quality. My usual camera’s battery died this morning, so I had to resort to the backup, and I am sans photo-editing software at work.

The Recipe:
Striped Sugar Cookies

2 sticks unsalted butter
3 eggs
2 ½ cups sugar
3 ½ cups flour
1 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla extract
3 tbsp cocoa powder

Do This
Cream butter, sugar, vanilla and eggs in a large mixing bowl. Gradually add in the flour and baking powder, until the resulting dough is thick and thoroughly blended. Divide the dough in half. Wrap one portion in plastic and set aside. Add 3 tbsp of cocoa powder to the other portion of dough, and knead until the cocoa is blended evenly into the dough. Wrap this portion in plastic as well, and place both the chocolate dough and the regular dough in the refrigerator. Allow the dough to chill for several hours, or just forget about it overnight.
Preheat the oven to 375 degrees.
Unwrap the cookie dough, and break off pieces of dough slightly smaller than your fist. I have a pretty average-sized fist, and I ended up with 8 pieces of chocolate dough and 9 pieces of plain. I was hoping for equal amounts, but it appears that I wasn’t too precise when I halved the dough in the first place.
Roll out each ball of dough to approximately ¼” thickness. If you chilled it overnight, it might be difficult to work with at first, but a little bit of kneading will bring the dough back to a workable temperature. Try to roll each piece to the same shape and dimensions – this will make the next step much easier.

Stack the dough, alternating chocolate and plain pieces. Use a knife to slice the dough vertically in segments of about ¼”. Pushing directly downward will cause the stripes to bend, so use a sawing motion.

Lightly roll out each segment. It helps to place a piece of plastic wrap between the rolling pin and the dough – less mess! Grab a cookie cutter (or the top of a glass, if you don’t have cookie cutters) and cut out as many cookies as you can for each slice of striped dough. Carefully place the cut out circles on a baking sheet, and bake for 8-10 minutes. You’ll want to watch the cookies while they’re baking (or at least for the final 3 minutes or so) to make sure that you remove them from the oven before the plain-dough stripes turn brown.

Some notes:

If you want perfect, straight stripes, there are two things (that I didn’t do) that you can do to make that happen. (1) Actually roll out each piece of dough to the same thickness. Mine were mostly consistent, but I didn’t measure or anything, and judging by the final result, there were some pieces that were rolled out a bit thicker than others. (2) Don’t press down on the stack of dough when you slice off the striped pieces. This makes the stripes bend a bit, and pushing down on the stack doesn’t really do much to help the slicing process, anyhow.

If you’re more creative than I am, you’ll probably be able to find something fun to do with the little bits of dough that are left after each cookie-cutting. I was feeling a little bit lazy, so I just mixed the dough very gently, rolled it out again, and made marble-y cookies. Per Amberance’s suggestion, I might make chessboard cookies in the future.

This recipe yields a LOT of cookies. Well, a lot for me – at least 3 dozen. I’m not sure how this happened, because I halved my usual sugar cookie recipe. I suspect that it’s because I’ve only ever made sugar cookies in bulk.

I’m just testing out a new look for the site. I’m trying to decide if I prefer the white background or the darker one. White seems more standard, and looks very clean, but I feel like the dark grey makes the images “pop” a little more. At some point, I’ll get around to coding some custom CSS for this thing, but I’m going with default WordPress themes for now because I’m lazy.

Thoughts? Criticism? Bacon?

Update: back to the old layout for now.

Happy Cinco de Mayo, everyone!

Click to zoom in on the yummy frozen margarita. Ignore the salt on the rim…that was an accident.

The Recipe:
(Strawberry Frozen) Margaritas

6 oz tequila (we used Cuervo because that’s what we had, but if you have better tequila, go for it!)
4 oz Triple Sec
1 oz lime juice
1 oz lemon juice
coarse salt (optional)
1 bag (12 oz) frozen strawberries (optional)
ice

Do This
Set the ice, strawberries, and salt aside, and mix the liquids first - this way, if someone wants a plain margarita, you can accommodate them while taking minimal extra steps. More time to enjoy your margaritas! Pour a 3 : 2 : 1 ratio of tequila, triple sec, and lime/lemon juice (the amounts called for above yield 3 large frozen margaritas or 4-6 smaller ones) into a shaker, over ice. Go James Bond style and shake it, don’t stir (yeah, I know, it’s not a martini, but have some fun with it, eh?).
If you’re making standard margaritas, wet the top of a margarita glass and press it into a saucer full of coarse salt. If you’re feeling fancy schmancy and want to buy margarita salt in one of those special tins made expressly for salting the rim of a glass, that works too. Carefully pour the margarita into the glass, and add a few ice cubes if desired.
If you want the pretty, blended strawberry kind, fill your blender halfway with ice cubes and crush them on medium-low speed to make some room for the other ingredients. Add the entire bag of frozen strawberries, and pour the margarita mix from the shaker over the strawberries and ice. If your blender isn’t very big, you may have to take some intermediate steps, like blending down the ice and strawberries before adding the liquid. Hit the “puree” button (or your favorite blender setting) and blend until you have a nice, frozen treat. If you get overzealous and over-blend into a soupy liquid, just add a bit more ice to get the texture right. Serve in a margarita glass. Optional: rim the glass with coarse salt (like we did by accident) or sugar. Garnish with a lime.

Remember to enjoy your margaritas responsibly, and only if you’re of the appropriate age for adult beverages!

The Recipe:
Gringo Tacos

1 lb ground beef
1 package soft corn tortillas
2 medium-sized tomatoes
1 onion
lettuce
shredded cheese
chili powder
black pepper
garlic salt
2 tbsp cooking oil
1/4 cup sugar
Yucatan Sunshine hot sauce, or your favorite brand

Do This
Chop lettuce, onion, and tomatoes into small bits (for topping finished tacos) and set aside.
Lightly coat the bottom of a large frying pan with cooking oil, and place over medium heat. Put the ground beef in this pan, and cook until the meat is browned. Drain most of the liquid from the pan, and return to the stove. Gradually add in the sugar and hot sauce, and stir.
Add in the rest of the spices as follows: start with 1 tbsp of chili powder, 1 tbsp of garlic salt, and 2 tbsp of black pepper, and add in 1/2 tbsp increments to taste. I ended up with 3 tbsp black pepper, 2 tbsp chili powder, and 1 1/2 tbsp garlic salt, but your favorite combo may be different. The meat should be both sweet and spicy, but not overwhelmingly so - you want it to still taste like beef.
Warm the tortillas in the oven for a few minutes. Spoon beef into each tortilla, and top with shredded cheese and chopped veggies.

I have no idea how authentic this particular taco recipe is, but it tastes pretty good! Plus, it’s more fun to season the beef myself than to cheat and use the flavor packet that came with the tortillas.

I’m a huge fan of Arrested Development. I was very sad when the series ended, and I bought the dvd set because the show really never gets old for me. Recently, I’ve been watching it with my roommate (because it’s kind of wrong that she lives with me and hasn’t seen it yet. COME ON!), and the Bluth frozen bananas inspired me to make some cookies. I briefly considered making cornballs, but I didn’t want to suffer severe burns.

So…without further ado: chocolate covered banana shortbread cookies that won’t make you sick and kill you!

This is one of my favorite food photos yet. Click to zoom in on the cookies!

The Recipe:
Bluth Chocolate Banana Shortbread Cookies
2 cups flour
1 stick butter (I used salted because I ran out of unsalted, oops!)
1/2 cup Nanners Foster sauce or 1 more stick of butter
1/2 cup powdered sugar
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/3 cup mashed bananas
semi-sweet chocolate chips
cocktail peanuts (optional)

Do This
Peel a banana and cut it up into small slices. Microwave it for about 30 seconds, then mash the now-soft bananas with a fork. Alternately, use a very ripe banana and skip the microwaving. I refuse to do this because I have an aversion to expired foods, and won’t let bananas last in my kitchen long enough to turn brown on the outside. This is why you will never see a banana bread recipe on this site.
Preheat the oven to 350.
Melt the butter and transfer it to a large mixing bowl. Add the vanilla extract and the ‘Nanners Foster sauce, and whisk in the powdered sugar until well-blended. Add the salt and baking powder, and gradually stir in the flour until you have a thick, caramel-colored dough. Use a fork to mash the bananas into the dough.
Grab two large pieces of plastic wrap, and sandwich the dough in between them. Roll it out to about 1/2″ thickness and place in the refrigerator to chill for about half an hour.
Remove the dough from the fridge. Place a piece of freezer paper over a cutting board, grab a hunk of dough, and cover it with a second piece of freezer paper. Roll the dough into a large rectangle-ish shape about 1/4″ thick. Remove the top piece of freezer paper, and use a knife to cut the dough into rectangles about one inch wide and two inches long. Place the rectangles onto a baking sheet.
Bake the cookies for 7-10 minutes, or until the dough is puffed up and the edges are a golden brown color. Overbaking (or rolling the dough too thin) will result in extra-crunchy (burnt) cookies that do not taste like shortbread. They resemble dried banana chips.
Repeat this process with the rest of the dough.
Allow the cookies to cool completely. They’re very soft fresh out of the oven, and soft cookies are not conducive to slathering with melty chocolate! You can taste-test a few when they’re still warm, though. Mmmm, bananas!

Steve Holt: Maybe we should work together. I mean, we don’t even know the recipe.
George Michael: Oh, there’s no recipe. You just freeze the bananas, and then dip them in the–
Steve Holt: Dip it in the what? Dip it in the what?

While the cookies are cooling, put a handful of cocktail peanuts in a plastic baggie (or two, if you’re feeling extra cautious) and crush them using the blunt object of your choice. If I owned a meat mallet, I probably would have used that, but I don’t, so I opted for the bottom of a saucepan.
Either using a double-boiler or the microwave, melt a handful of semi-sweet chocolate chips. Cover a baking sheet with aluminum foil. Grab a teaspoon and use it to spread the melty chocolate over the cookies, then place the cookies on the foil-covered baking sheet. Or, if you want more chocolate, dip the entire cookie instead of just coating the top. Sprinkle crushed peanuts onto the cookies while the chocolate is still warm.

Maeby: It tasted like a foot. Which I didn’t really mind, but I’m pretty sure I said “no nuts.”

Or don’t add nuts, they’re totally optional. When the baking sheet is full, move it to the fridge to allow the chocolate to harden.

The shortbread cookie recipe is loosely based on the Hearst Castle recipe I found over at 101 Cookbooks. I’ve never made shortbread before, so my modifications were totally a gamble. Lucky for me, they worked out!

The recipe calls for 1/2 cup of the sauce from my Bananas (Almost) Foster recipe, which means you have an excuse to make that. Just kidding! I actually ran out of butter while I was making this, and the banana sauce seemed to be a perfect substitute. If you don’t want to make the ‘Nanners Foster, substitute for 1 stick of butter, but you’ll lost a bit of that flavor. Plus, despite what kindergarten taught us, it’s a lot of fun to play with matches.

Gob: Give me a “GOB.”
George Michael: GOB!
Gob: No, I didn’t mean for you to yell my name at me. It’s what I call a double-dipped banana with everything on it.

I also made a “GOB special” (2 cookies, stacked and smothered in the remaining chocolate and nuts):

Click to zoom in on a banana cookie that GOB would approve of. It won’t chip your teeth like a candy apple.

One of my favorite things about living in Chicago is the abundance of restaurants. I love dining out almost as much as cooking, and the Second City is definitely a first class foodie town; one day, when I’m not a poor student anymore, I’m going to go lose my mind at Alinea, Charlie Trotter’s, and the rest.

This story has a point, I swear. A few weeks ago, I was lucky enough to score an invite to the opening party for Zed451. One of the “Harvest Table” features which ended up on every single one of my plates was the red wine poached pears with balsamic reduction. I kinda went nuts over these pears. They’re so simple, but the pear-wine-vinegar combo is excellent. One of the best things about an opening event is that the restaurant staff is more than excited to tell you about their creations. Even though I didn’t exactly get the recipe for those pears handed to me, I got a few hints - albeit vague ones. I decided to try (possibly in vain) to reverse-engineer the recipe and recreate it in my own kitchen. Here’s what I came up with:

Ehh, so maybe these aren’t the most photogenic pears in the world. I think if I didn’t know any better, I’d be convinced that these are photos of fish.Click on the image to zoom in on the fish pears.

In the photos? I think the pears look like fish…tuna with soy sauce, perhaps? In real life? Not so much. I turned the flash on for one of the pictures, and the contrast between the red and white is a bit more apparent.

Brighter poached pears: the flash photo. Click to zoom in on the glowy pears.

Yep, this is what I was peeling pears for (see yesterday’s post). I’ve never poached anything before, but I love poached pears and thought it was a good idea to try this out for myself. Plus, the magic internet is a great resource for learning things: Cookery Online has a definition of poaching.

The Recipe:
Poached Pears with Balsamic Vinegar Sauce
3 medium-sized pears, peeled and cored
1 1/2 cups red wine (I used Yellowtail Shiraz-Cabernet because it was on sale for $5!)
1 cup apple juice
juice of 1/2 lemon
2 tbsp granulated sugar
1 cup balsamic vinegar
1 tbsp brown sugar
1/4 tsp vanilla
2 tbsp butter
optional: Argo Tea Orange Passion Tea

Do This
Peel and core the pears, and slice off the top and bottom. Place them in a medium-sized bowl, and pour apple juice and lemon juice over top. Let the pears soak for a while - mine did for about half an hour.
Pour the red wine into a saucepan large enough to hold the pears. Turn the heat to high, and when the wine starts bubbling, add in the granulated sugar and the apple/lemon juice mixture that the pears have been soaking in. Allow the liquid to reach a boil, then turn the heat down to medium-low. It’s not quite a bouquet garni, but I plopped a tea strainer filled with Argo Tea’s Orange Passion tea into the poaching liquid for a minute or so while it was on its way to boiling. The tea probably didn’t steep, but the poaching liquid did take on a nice fragrance. Place the pears in the saucepan, small-end down. Cover the pan and hang out for 10-15 minutes. You can drink the rest of the wine if you want.

The pears are two-toned for a moment. Reminds me of those cupcakes!

My pears were extra-firm, so I let them hang out in the poaching liquid for 15 minutes, flipped them, then let them simmer for 20 more minutes with the wider side down before I turned the heat off. Put the pears back in the medium-sized bowl, and carefully pour the poaching liquid over top. Cover the bowl with a lid (or with aluminum foil if you don’t have a lid) and place in the refrigerator. When I transferred them to the bowl to refrigerate, they were soft enough that I could pick them up with a fork without having to stab at them, but not so soft that they fell apart. Allow the pears to refrigerate for several hours.
For the balsamic reduction: pour 1 cup of balsamic vinegar into a small saucepan with 1/4 tsp of vanilla. Bring to a boil, then lower the heat to medium.
**This is the part that I’m not 100% a fan of, but I gave it a try anyhow. It’s optional. Add 1/4 cup of the poaching liquid to the balsamic reduction.**
Cook until the liquid has been reduced to about 1/3 of a cup, then add a tablespoon of brown sugar and stir until dissolved. Remove from heat.
Slice up 2 tbsp of butter and place in a small bowl. Pour the balsamic reduction over top, and stir until the butter is melted and incorporated into the sauce. Place in the refrigerator. When ready to serve, stir until the solids have blended back into the sauce and it has a texture similar to light maple syrup.
Remove the pears from the poaching liquid and slice into small pieces. The outside will be a dark red, while the inside will be white or light pink. Drizzle with the balsamic sauce and serve.

A few important notes about these pears:

These aren’t the same pears as the ones at Zed451. Repeat: not the same. I thought I was going to replicate them, but ended up with something very different. Also, I left out the crumbled blue cheese because…blue cheese freaks me out crumbled gorgonzola cheese, because I thought it was blue cheese, and blue cheese freaks me out. They’re still tasty, and I believe Bob Ross would call this a “happy accident.”

This recipe is not final, and is going to be tweaked. I just wanted to post it now because (a) I like the photos, (b) it’s not terrible as-is, and (c) maybe someone who knows Zed451’s recipe will find this and forward the actual recipe to me (Eh? Eh? The email addy is therecklesschef AT gmail DOT com). Eventually, I’ll poach pears again, and maybe by then I’ll have figured out some new tricks.

I tried the pears with the sauce right after the sauce was made. My immediate thought before tasting them was “wow, this is going to be so sour.” It was. Overnight in the fridge, soaking in the poaching liquid, did wonders for the pears. The texture is flawless (crisp but not crunchy) and the flavor is much better. The time the reduction spent chilling in the fridge (in a tupperware container) initially worried me, because the butter had solidified and separated, but a quick stir brought the sauce back to a good consistency.

The pears are very tangy, and definitely meant to be consumed in small quantities, but I’m a fan. 

As for the plating? I’m still figuring that part out. I need to either stop moving the plate around so much during the photography part, or settle on a thicker sauce.

My knife skills are…not as fancy as they could be. Also, I don’t own a good set of knives yet. Using a paring knife to peel a pear? Not gonna happen.

I’ll stick to using the vegetable peeler. It does the job just fine.

[I also found a video clip on the magic internet of someone peeling a prickly pear in a way that looked far too simple. I watched the clip without sound and thought it was a regular pear. This is why we always listen to the sound on instructional video clips!]
 

This recipe happened via special request from The Boyfriend. We were watching Top Chef Chicago* last week, and were both disappointed when a sea bass and chorizo dish happened instead of Polish sausage in beer. Quelle travesty!

And so…Polish sausage? Meet beer:

In all fairness, this photo is misleading: I didn’t use Shiner Blonde for cooking the sausages, it’s just a tasty beer I was sipping while I made this! Click to enlarge the photo.

I wasn’t 100% sure where I was going with this, except that I remembered the judges on Top Chef saying “steam in beer” several times. Okay. I can do that. Here’s what else happened:

The Recipe:
Beer Soaked Polish Sausage

1 package (16 oz) Polish sausage, kielbasa, or your favorite sausage
1 can light beer (I used Busch)
2 large potatoes
Bertman Original Ball Park Mustard, or your favorite brown mustard
cooking oil
salt
pepper
garlic salt
butter or margarine
milk

Do This
Remove the Polish sausage from the package. Slice it into six equally-sized pieces (I cut mine in half at the horseshoe-shaped bend, then cut each half into thirds) and slice each of these pieces in half crosswise. You’ll end up with twelve pieces of sausage, each with a skin side and an inside-side.
Pour a few tablespoons of cooking oil into a large sauté pan - you want enough oil to lightly coat the bottom, but no more. Place the sausages, skin-side down, into the pan and turn the burner to medium heat. Cook until the skin turns a medium-dark reddish brown (how’s that for a color?) and flip so that the sausages are now all skin-side up. Cook for a few more minutes - because of the shape, the sausages will most likely not brown evenly, but when the middle is mostly browned, turn off the heat and remove the sausages from the pan.
Drain the cooking oil from the pan and wipe it clean. Replace the sausages in the pan (skin-side down again), shake a bit - 1 to 3 shakes each - of salt, pepper, and garlic salt over the sausages, and pour the entire can of beer over the sausages. Turn the burner to medium-high heat, and cover the pan with a lid. Hang out for a few minutes; this part takes a little while.
Now is a great time to start some water boiling for the mashed potatoes. Do that, and peel the potatoes while the water heats up. Slice each potato into small chunks - I like to cut mine into eighths - and put them in the pot when the water starts boiling. Leave uncovered (unless you’re a fan of constantly checking to make sure the pot doesn’t boil over) and let the potatoes hang out in the boiling water until they are soft enough that they are not resistant to a fork.
Check on your sausages. The beer should be bubbling all over the place, and steaming delicious beer-y flavor into the sausage. It doesn’t matter if you use cheap beer - I used Busch (don’t judge, it was left in the fridge from a month ago when some friends brought over random cases of cheap beer) and it didn’t have a negative impact on the flavor of the sausage. Save your expensive beer for drinking with the meal.

Click on the image to take a closer look at the sausages enjoying some beer.

Move the sausages around in the pan with a fork or spatula. This is especially important if the pan or stove is slanty or uneven. Just sayin’.
After the sausages have been steaming for 20-25 minutes, flip them over. Shake in a little bit more pepper/salt/garlic salt, and re-cover the pan.
Check on your potatoes. When they are soft enough that poking them not-so-gently with a fork causes them to break apart, turn off the burner, remove the potatoes from the stove, and drain the water out. Place the potatoes in a bowl, add a few (between 2 and 6, depending how healthy/unhealthy you’re feeling) tablespoons of butter or margarine, and mash away. Add in a glug or two of milk to make the potatoes creamier, and add salt and pepper to taste (and minced garlic or garlic paste if you’re feeling fancy).
Cheater’s potatoes: if you started them late or if your potatoes just do not want to boil, drain the water out and transfer the potatoes to a microwave-safe bowl. Microwave for 6-7 minutes, and they should be much softer, albeit less moist and a little bit guilty of shortcutting.
After the sausages have steamed for another 20-25 minutes (and you’ve been checking in on them and moving them around in the pan this time, too) and the potatoes are all boiled and mashed, turn the stove off and drain the beer from the pan. Serve the sausages over the mashed potatoes, topped with your favorite brown mustard. It’s not mandatory to use Bertman Original Ball Park Mustard, but you get extra credit for it because it’s delicious.

This isn’t the most attractive dinner, but it sure is tasty! Click on the photo to zoom in.

A note on the mustard (this one’s for you, Boyfriend!): Bertman Original Ball Park Mustard, once served at Cleveland Municipal Stadium (the largest man-made freshwater reef in the world), is the official mustard of Jacobs Field, or Progressive Field, or whatever they call it now, and it is a very delicious brown mustard. I was skeptical before trying it, but have since determined that it is acceptable to eat with a spoon if you do not have Polish sausage handy.

Ideally, we would have made some sauerkraut to go with this. It didn’t happen because we got too impatient at the grocery store and didn’t want to look for the sauerkraut**, but next time? That’s happening.

*I’m hopelessly addicted to this show because (a) it’s about food and (b) parts of it were filmed in/near my neighborhood. Also? I just realized today that recipes used in the show are posted on the Top Chef website, which is kinda amazing.
**And also because for some ridiculous reason, I was under the (wrong) impression that sauerkraut was horseradish. It’s not, and I am embarrassed that I ever thought that.

Breakfast is the most important meal of the day. But what if you’re not super hungry?

Ta-da! It’s Tiny Breakfast! Everything on this plate can fit on one fork. Magic!

The fork is for scale. Click to zoom in and make the breakfast bigger than it is in real life! Clockwise from top left: Tiny Breakfast Sausages, Tiny Pancakes, Tiny Omelette, Tiny Hash Browns.

The Recipe

Tiny Breakfast

1 egg
1/2 cup flour
1 tbsp butter
3/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 cup + 1 tbsp milk
2 tbsp Sprite (or other lemon-lime soda)
1/4 tsp vanilla
1 slice American cheese
1 onion
1 small potato
breakfast sausage (I used Bob Evans’ brand, the kind that comes in a tube)
maple syrup
salt & pepper

Do This
Crack the egg into a bowl and beat gently with a fork. Set aside 1/4 of the beaten egg.
In a small bowl, mix 1/2 cup flour, 3/4 tsp baking powder, 1/8 tsp salt, 1 1/2 tsp butter, 1/4 tsp vanilla, 1/4 of the egg, and 2 tbsp of Sprite. This is your pancake batter - it should be thick but bubbly, and all of the dry ingredients should be dissolved.
Peel the onion and the potato. Cut a small slice from each, and reserve for later (3-4 servings of a complete Tiny Breakfast require one 1/4″ ring of onion and 1/8 of a small potato) - you can save the rest and make Normal Sized Hash Browns if you like. Chop the onion and potato into the smallest bits you can. Also, take the slice of cheese out of its wrapper and chop it into small bits.

Click to zoom in on the little bits of cheese and onion!

Open the breakfast sausage package and pinch off a small piece of sausage. Roll tiny (larger than a pomegranate seed, smaller than a blueberry) balls of sausage and flatten into little patties.
Your prep work is done! Hooray!

Grab a small frying pan. Turn the burner to medium heat.
Tiny Pancakes: using a regular teaspoon (not the measuring kind - the tapered end of the flatware variety works to your advantage), spoon tiny dollops of batter (no bigger than a nickel) into the pan. When the edges start to turn golden brown, flip them with a spatula and cook for another minute or so. Transfer to a plate to cool, cover in maple syrup, and put a Tiny Butter Pat on top.

Six pancakes in a pan at once! Click to zoom in.

Tiny Omelettes: pour a tablespoon of milk into the beaten egg, and whip with a fork. Put a bit of butter (less than a tsp) into the frying pan, and when it is melted/bubbling, spoon the whipped egg into the pan. It should spread out, but not much more than 2-3 inches wide (if it’s bigger, you’re using too much egg!). When it’s cooked to the point that the egg is opaque, flip it over with a spatula. While the other side cooks, put little bits of onion and cheese on top. Use the spatula to fold the omelette in half. Cook for a few more seconds (until the cheese melts) and transfer to a plate. Sprinkle with salt or pepper if desired.
Tiny Breakfast Sausages: place the tiny sausage patties into the frying pan. Allow them to cook for a few minutes on medium heat, until one side is browned. Flip over and cook until each patty is brown on both sides. If the patties are resistant to browning even after several minutes, pressing down on them with the spatula tends to help.
Tiny Hash Browns: put a teaspoon of butter into the frying pan. When the butter is melted and bubbling, place the bits of potato and onion into the pan. Season with salt and pepper, and use the spatula to flip the potatoes and onions occasionally. When the Tiny Hash Browns have reached a rich brown color, transfer them to a paper towel and pat out some of the butter.
Enjoy your Tiny Breakfast on a small saucer - or on a dinner plate if you want to feel like a giant!

My first excursion into Tiny Food was very fun! There was a bit of trial and error, especially with the Tiny Omelette (it’s not easy getting the egg to spread out where you want it…I might try using a cookie cutter for “boundaries” next time), but everything tasted just as good as its normal sized counterpart. I also learned that I need to invest in some better knives, because my onion and potato bits could have been a little bit smaller.

Future Tiny Breakfasts might include Tiny French Toast, Tiny Fruit Salad, and Tiny Bacon.

Sometimes, I get cravings for certain foods - burgers, pancakes, pie, omelettes, sweet potato fries. The direct result of these cravings is that I seek out the food in question and devour it instantly. On occasion, I stop to take pictures of it, and it ends up as a post on this blahg.

Sometimes, I get cravings for all of those foods.

The solution? Miniature versions of all of them!

I’ve split this up into four separate posts - breakfast, lunch, dinner, and dessert. I’ll add links to this post as the photos/recipes are uploaded, and then keep this post up as a handy little anchor for all of the tiny foods.

Tiny Breakfast: Tiny Pancakes, Tiny Omelette, Tiny Breakfast Sausages, and Tiny Hash Browns.

Up next: Mini Lunch!

I’m not the only person who’s been intrigued by the concept of feeling like a giant - Not Martha (one of my favorite people on the whole internet) went through a Tiny Food phase and made tiny pies, tiny cupcakes, and tiny donuts. Callahan Catering features an entire hors d’oeuvre menu of fancy ittybitty treats. Craftster chick hercuteness inspired my micro-sized cheeseburger with her World’s Smallest Burger. Seen any other wee treats? Made your own? Let’s see ‘em!