There's always a reason to eat in this damn city. Most people in the country are trying to work off the holiday pounds or are just getting back into a normal life routine, but in New Orleans today, we're celebrating Twelfth Night, which marks the end of Christmas and the beginning of Carnival. Which means king cake. And more booze. Oh, dear.
Of all the "party" holidays, Mardi Gras is hands down my favorite. On Halloween there's too much pressure to find the perfect costume and mine usually sucks. On New Year's Eve you're expected to do something amazing with all of your closest friends that will set off the New Year right, but I mostly find myself celebrating by finishing my second bottle of wine and watching fireworks with whoever didn't go home for the holidays. Which is super fun, but not quite *watching the ball drop in NYC while being fed caviar from David Beckham himself* fun.
Mardi Gras is different, though. You don't have ...
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![New Year's Eve Tart [ Chocolate + Salted Caramel]](https://images.squarespace-cdn.com/content/v1/5451b54de4b0d0c075728ccb/1434034478027-93STSWLB9WKI18MHSNK3/image-asset.jpeg)
I put butter in ice cream because I simultaneously hate & love myself. It's complicated.
This week I finished my second-to-last EVER semester of college and I *finally* learned how to tie a neck tie. So, in honor of getting one step closer to being an unemployed, poor and probably sad college graduate who can look cute in a tie,I get to eat as many of these buttery-pistachio-cold-figgy things as I want, damn it. I'll need the extra calories for this long, cold New Orleans winter, anyway (just kidding its hot and muggy outside right now and its really messing up my Christmas spirit).
I chose to put figs in this ice cream because they are a Christmas thing, but it wasn't until literally yesterday that I looked into why they are a Christmas thing. They're in season in the summer, but it's December. I don't know, its just weird. Yes, I know the song that goes "something, something, figgy pudding" is like a Christmas anthem but I wanted to know WHY. Well, surprise, surprise...
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This recipe is super simple and so is this post.
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This is one of those cakes you should bring to a party and casually place in front of everyone and say something like "Oh, it was easy, I do this stuff all the time *hair flip*." I would go into grand detail about why this cake made me so happy, but I think the title kind of sums it up. For those of you who aren't familiar with Grand Marnier, its the fancy orange liqueur that gets put into your top shelf margarita when you have the extra cash to spend on getting drunk in style. It goes shockingly well with the goat cheese buttercream, which may or may not be the real star...
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I'm all about the standard Thanksgiving fare. Give me turkey and gravy, different kinds of stuffing, cranberry sauce, etc. I love it all, and will eat it until I feel adequately gluttonous. This year, though, I thought it would be fun to mix things up a bit. These cookies were my attempt at doing so. No one cried, or yelled, or told me I wasn't American because I put corn into a cookie. There were no screams of "socialist!" or comments about how my liberal views of appropriate tThanksgiving cuisine were ruining traditional family values. So, that was cool.
Quick profile of these cookies...
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