My Urban Pantry

belated valentine treat

March 4, 2012Leave a comment

we didn’t manage to get this one made for Valentine’s Day although that had been the original plan. It is a riff on the dessert we had from Cafe TuTuTango a week or so earlier. I picked up Na’an bread and some bananas. I preheated the oven to about 425 degrees and quickly doused the bread under the running faucet. I tossed the bread on the rack for 3 minutes and then pulled it out. I placed it on a cookie sheet for the remaining cooktime. I sliced a banana on top and sprinkled some large grain sugar crystals on top. Then I broke out my kitchen torch and bruleed the sugar and then sprinkled with cinnamon. I put the whole thing back in the oven for 4 more minutes. After I pulled it out I liberally swirled on Stonewall Kitchens Maple Honey Caramel and dolloped on some whipped cream. It was a perfect treat to share. Happy Valentines Day!

takes two to tango

February 19, 2012Leave a comment


Matt and Katies duck salad 🙂

or eight as the case may be. Last weekend we celebrated our brother in law’s birthday with a trip to Cafe TuTuTango. It is billed as a Spanish artist’s loft where food and drink and the spirit of cooperation and collaboration are shared as you share small plates (not tapas but sort of) of somewhat ethnic flair. There were eight of us at the table and menu choices were made to ensure tastes were made in an extreme variety of flavors. We each started on our own item and then passed the other bites around the table. It worked well until we accidently accepted someone else’s (thanks and so sorry Matt and Katie) Duck Confit Salad thinking it was ours. It was probably my favorite flavor of the night and only somewhat diminished by the fact that we didn’t order it (although we thought we did!) Confitted duck on top of greens with goat cheese, pine nuts and arugula on top of caramelized onion flatbread fits exactly with my favorite flavor profile of deeply savory mixed with sweetness. Other noteworthy items included chickpea falafel with pineapple tahini, picadillo beef and manchego empanadas with cilanhtro cream and the winner of the night, banana caramel flatbread with walnut ice cream which we will definitely try to recreate at home.

creamy potato soup with bacon vinaigrette

February 14, 2012Leave a comment

it had me at bacon vinaigrette. A creamy potato soup with hardly any fat, tons of flavor and topped with a brisk bacony onion bite. Saw it on one of the blogs I read that aggregates the best recipe creations if their readers and compiles them. Nothing wrong with onions if you both eat them. Happy Valentines Day!

pasta e patate

February 5, 2012Leave a comment

we have been going strong with our eating less and healthier regimen started on Dec 8. Workdays are easy with the regimen of it all. Weekends tend towards a little more challenge. There are things to do, places to go, people to see, food to eat out, et al. We have had two extra-caloric kind of dinners this weekend-last night fish n chips and tonight a dish we recently saw on tv by David Rocco. He is a Canadian Italian who cooks in Florence in a sort of homecooking rustic hot Italian kind of way. He really reminds me of my Italian friend Danny (Daniele) which totally freaks me out and pleases me. Their mannerisms are so similar it’s eerie-I guess it’s an Italian thing. Anyhow, we crave David Rocco’s pasta on a semi regular basis. It’s really amazing. So, tonight we tried pasta e patate. A boiled not quite soup concoction with a soup base of carrots, onion, celery and prosciutto filled up with broken spaghetti and bites of potato and nubbins of pecorino romano. It was warmly dense and packed with flavor. We decided it didn’t really pass the guests for dinner test (we wouldn’t serve it to guests) due to a little bit of noodley tomatoey chin action but it was a great dinner at home. I did manage to eat only a 6th of those 4-6 servings and reduced the oil to 1 1/2 T at the beginning which was just fine. By the way, the eating healthier is beginning to pay off too!

winter summerland

February 4, 2012Leave a comment

our friends and family in Denver are living through a massive snowstorm this weekend – from most accounts I’ve heard two or three feet of snow. It was probably in the balmy mid to upper seventies in Orlando today. We had a birthday party for Landen where he rode a new bike in the street with Scott running in no shoes so you know it was warm. Afterward we headed to downtown Disney for some fish and chips for dinner and then decided it was a perfect night to mini-golf. So, we headed to Disney’s Winter Summerland. Charming with two courses, one through sand and one through snow both decorated a la Disney for Christmas and frolicking Santas. We chose the sand course and had a great time navigating through sand dunes and surf boards, past ‘elfstream’ trailers and melting snowmen. Good for a warm winter eve.