Raspberry Cheesecake w/White Chocolate

     My wife really likes the raspberry swirl cheesecake from Olive Garden. Thus challenging me to create it. I did not quite get the "swirl" part right, but the flavor was there. Or everyone enjoyed this dish. I don't like cheesecake so I had to search for a recipe on the internet. I did however make two sauces from scratch for the dish, Chocolate & Raspberry Syrup. Very simple to make, but does involve a lot of whisking. 

     The cheesecake I did adapt by adding some chunks of white chocolate to the mix. After pouring the cheesecake into the pan I swirled in some of the raspberry syrup. All though in hind sight I believe I should have done this in stages, pour some cheesecake batter then swirl in some syrup and repeat. Only the top layer got the swirl with the way I did it.

     The syrup recipe was actually taken from Alton Brown's "Good Eats" cooking show. He did this for chocolate syrup, but I found out you can substitute anything for the cocoa powder and mix it up. Now there is another small change depending on the fruit you are using. The water amount in the recipe will need to be decreased for some fruits due to their high level of juice. But man is it great. What are some of your cheesecake recipes? Enjoy! 

Oreo Delight!

     To mix things up I decided to do a dessert this time. I've been seeing a lot of banana pudding lately. So I figured why not give it shot, but instead of bananas (which I do not like) why not use something I and pretty much everyone else likes Oreo's. So I decided to do a Oreo Pudding that I am just simply calling Oreo Delight.  

     So after a simple summer dinner of skillet potatoes, corn on the cob & steak,

I made up some whip cream to finish off the dessert and served. Man was this good. The different textures and each flavor just coming at you one at a time. I loved it. I did not do it in one big container but did it in individual cups. It was so rich that most of us couldn't finish it in one sitting.

     Nothing of this one is hard, or very time consuming. My 4 year old helped me with making this dessert the entire time. I think I would like to try this with some chocolate & vanilla pudding next time. What do you think? Enjoy!

Summer Burger Tour: Stowaway's

    Well on the way back to the station I noticed a stowaway, left over sirloin bacon burgers, so I decided to use the extra for breakfast. Thus the breakfast burger is born. I made the patties thinner so as not to overpower everything else. Using cheddar cheese again, & swapped out the buns for toast. No need for a sausage patty or extra bacon (all though the extra bacon would make it that much better). If you have a runny yoke then all the better because you can dip the burger into it, making it that much more enjoyable.
     This is one stow away that ended up paying for the trip.

Summer Burger Tour (stop 3): Sirloin Bacon Burger

     Thanks for taking the Summer Burger Tour with us this year. Our final stop the sirloin bacon burger. Now I am not talking about a sirloin burger topped with bacon, no no. I am talking about a freshly ground sirloin mixed with ground bacon. Topped with some mild cheddar cheese and you have the true all american burger right here!
     One of my brother in-laws was here for it along with some friends of ours. While grinding and mixing up the meat,my brother in-law, Beau walked into the kitchen and smelt the meat and said "I think I will have 2 or 3 of those, that smells good." I replied that he most likely will only eat one because these burgers are not small, plus I do portion these meals so there isn't always seconds. With the amount of people we had over for this one (only 5 more than normal) I way more meat than I should have. Guess how many he ate? It was not 2 or 3, in fact it was so filling he could not even finish the last 2 (small) bites he had left of the first one.
     I also had a compliment of having the "best burger I have ever eaten!" Now that was cool. Not sure if it is the best but I am sure if people try this they will let me know. Once again I used Red Robin seasoning for consistency purposes. Because it is 4th of July weekend I used the traditional sesame seed bun though. For the recipe though I will not be able to post specific amounts due to the fact that the seasoning was to taste. Please make any adjustments & let me know how it turns out if you try this one. Thanks for taking the tour with us this summer. Enjoy!

Summer Burger Tour (stop 2): Turkey Burger

     Choo Choo! welcome to Turkey Station! This is the second stop in our line. After the veggie burger I must say this was way better on the texture front. It still wasn't a good ol' American beef burger but man was this one good.
     This was the first time I have ever had a turkey burger, so I was pleasantly surprised of how it turned out. I would give this meal an overall B+ to an A. Only 2 of the 5 of us where effected by the texture, but not enough to make the grade lower. I wasn't expecting a flavor/texture of a real burger so I wasn't as tough in the grading. All of us where surprised though at how good it tasted. I will definitely make this one again with ease. My local store didn't have ciabatta bread this time, so I used some potato buns. I used a different cheese combo on this stop also, going with muenster & cheddar cheese. This combo I have done with just plain old grilled cheese and have always liked it. I figured it would compliment the turkey meat and I was right, I highly suggest it.  
     I will post the recipe on the recipe page because I don't feel the need to tinker with it. Please feel free to change it up if you choose to try this yourself. If you do please leave a comment saying what you changed and how it all turned out.  If you want to email pictures. I might just post those also. Thanks you and enjoy!
     Next stop S.B. Station (sirloin & bacon). 

Summer Burger Tour (stop 1): Vegetarian Burger

   
     In the spirit of the summer I have decided to do a burger tour. First stop was a vegetarian burger. Well overall this was not a full success, but not a failure either. Here is how it went down.
     My cousin suggested doing a vegetarian dish, so with her help and a lot of research I decided on doing a burger.  I thought it would be a good way to start in the world of vegetarian food. There are so many wonderful sounding dishes out there in the vegetarian world that it took me months to decide.
     Ok back to my burger, the taste was there but the texture was a total failure for me.  The recipe will not be posted due to it not being right yet, but once I figure it out you know it will be up there. It was a chickpea based burger. I used ciabatta bread instead of regular buns. This was a awesome change. Overall I would have given this meal a C+ that can be up to an A easily when I can figure out the texture problem.
     Next week for stop 2 on the summer burger tour is a turkey burger. 

Name Change

Ok, so I found out that the athomegourmet.com is already taken. This begs the question of changing the name of the blog or not. I have a question poll on Facebook. Please go there and vote for your favorite. If you don't like the choices please feel free to suggest a name of your own.

Thanks,

Christian