Foo Fighters' New Single "Rope"

This morning was the world premier of the Foo Fighters' new single called "Rope" off their album Wasting Light that's dropping April 12th. When caught the end of it this morning on the radio I could definitely tell the song was by them, but so far I'm undecided about whether I like the track or not. Though I like it better than "Wheels"

They have a website specifically set up to listen to the song here, but I've found that it doesn't always work.

For a slightly poorer quality check out this video from YouTube


One thing I'm not particularly loving about this song is that I can't really tell what Dave Grohl is saying except in the chorus, and I haven't really found the lyrics yest to figure it out. Here's the chorus if you can't make it out though

Give me some rope I'm coming loose
I'm hanging on you
Give me some rope I'm coming loose
I'm pulling for you now
Give me some rope I'm coming out of my head into the clear when you go I come loose

~emy

Experimental Baking: S'mores Cupcakes

So I needed to bring something in for the Superbowl Party at work and since the graham cracker cupcakes turned out so well with the key lime, I decided to mix it up and do them with chocolate instead. Same recipe as before, except I actually put a mini marshmallow in the center before baking the mini-cupcakes. I wouldn't bother with this because the marshmallow melted and kind of baked out in the process. It didn't seem to add any flavor, maybe it was slightly sweeter, but the difference was minimal in taste and bake time.

Instead of traditional frosting I dipped them twice in chocolate ganache, letting the ganache set up some between dippings. I probably wouldn't have had to double dip if I left the ganache cool down so it could get thicker before dipping, but I was impatient.

Here's the ganache:

It was pretty simple to make here's the recipe I used:
9 oz of chocolate chips (1 1/8 cups)
1 cup heavy cream

Heat the heavy cream until it just start to boil, then pour it over the chocolate chips and whisk until the mixture is smooth.

Here are how my s'mores cupcakes turned out looking:





I used one marshmallow on top as decoration, but I think I'll put more on next time so it's closer to the actually s'more ratio of ingredients.

I also had one ganache casualty, it still tasted good though:


~emy

Sing by My Chemical Romance

I really like the new song that My Chemical Romance has out right now - from this post title you've probably realized it's called "Sing". I'm kind of surprised I like this song because I really did not like their other hit "Helena". The music video for "Sing" is kind of random, it's like a mini-movie, but I guess it could be worse - check it out below.

One bad thing about this song is that they did it on the latest episode of Glee (what it here and it makes me like the song a little less. And while I do enjoy watching Glee, I don't think they pull of rock n' roll songs very well - especially when one of the girls is singing part of the lead. I don't want to subject you to it, via my blog, but feel free to find the Glee version of "Sing" on your own.

On a side note hope you like the design redo of the blog. With Blogger making it easy to use one of your own pictures as a background, I had to jump at the opportunity. Mine is a close up I took of the Tiffany Glass mural known as "The Dream Garden" located in Philly.

~emy

Experimental Baking: Key Lime Cupcakes

Yea, so I was pretty bored this weekend since all my friends went skiing, and since I don't ski I decides to bake!

I saw this recipe for s'more like cupcakes on Bakerella, but since I'm not a big chocolate fan, and didn't have any coco powder I decided to go with a straight graham cracker cupcake. So here's the recipe I ended up using:

Graham Cracker Cupcakes: makes 7-9?? Bake @ 350 degrees F
3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cups sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 cup (more or less I think I was at 7/8 of a cup) graham cracker crumbs
1/2 cup milk
1 egg
1 teaspoons vanilla
1/4 cup oil

I say the recipe makes 7-9 for the following reasons:

1. I ran out of the regular size cupcake papers and ended up with 6 regular and 5 mini cupcakes, and I don't know the mini cupcake to cupcake conversion rate
   
2. I had read that graham cracker cupcakes don't tend to rise as much and filled them 3/4 of the way - but they definitely ended up rising!

Check out the pictures:

Mini Cupcakes


Regular Sized Cupcakes


Notice the rise


Finished Graham Cracker Cupcakes!


So if you were paying attention, this post was called Key lime Cupcakes and you're probably thinking "where's the lime?!". Well if you know anything about key lime pie or custards, you normally have to use egg yolks to make them with. This wasn't an option because I wasn't going to bake a filling in it so I tried making this Eggless Lemon Curd Recipe, but with key lime juice instead. This failed miserably as the curd didn't set up at all - so I ended up folding in the liquid mixture into beaten cream cheese and cool whip, which worked out pretty well. I can't really say I have a recipe for this - I kinda just went by taste.

I found this old pumpkin carving tool, which was great for hollowing out the centers


Filled with the frosting-ish mixture


Frosted, using my handy cut end zip lock bag


Ta-Da!


Tips on Making These:

1. I think the finer the graham cracker the better, because then it's more like flour and the flavor is more distributed. I tried using the food processor at first to crush the crackers, but that didn't work out so well. The blender was a much better method
2. Bake time was given around 15min for the s'more cupcakes. I think my regular sized ones too 18-21 min and my mini ones too 12-15min. It's hard to say because I kept opening the oven to check
3. The frosting has a better texture if it's chilled. After mixing it was more liquidy. It tasted fine, but the leftovers cupcakes I put in the fridge and the filling/frosting was better when it was firmer.

~emy

Pageants With Talent

Who watched Miss America this weekend even thought there was NFL Playoff football this weekend?!?

Well if you haven't figured it out - I did. I like Miss America better than Miss USA because it has the talent portion, which adds a whole other level to the competition. You actually need to be good at something else besides looking pretty and being on top of current events... unless your Miss Delaware. Granted she did look very nice in swimsuit and evening gown, and I didn't see if she made it to the interview round, but I think she either need to work on her talent or pick a new one.

Check out her rehearsal (the live show was pretty much the same, except it was more obvious that she didn't point her toes). And for all you non-dancers out there, this performance is not that good:


This is what a dance talent should look more like what Miss Missouri is doing in her rehearsal:


Also just because I couldn't believe this was her talent Miss Arkansas (she was a better singer than some of the top 10 who just sang for their talent:


~emy

New-ish Catchy Bruno Mars Tune

Grenade is Bruno Mars' newest song to hit the radio waves and it's pretty freaking catchy.


At first I just changed the station, but then I was forced to listen to the song because I wasn't able to change it safely at times. Then I found myself singing the chorus with incorrect lyrics after that: "i'll jump on a grenade for you!" <-- not actually in the song. I think this Billboard Studio Session is better, though it doesn't get stuck in my head after listening to it:

happy listening

~emy

Danny Woodhead Working Undercover-ish at Modell's

First of all I had no idea that there were Modell's Sporting Goods store in Massachusetts because:

1. I've never seen one in Mass ( I really thought they were only in NY and CT)
   
2. I'm surrounded by Sports Authority, Olympia, City Sports etc so there's no need to go to a Modell's

But anyways NE Patriots new up and coming running back Danny Woodhead went undercover in a local Modell's to try to entice people to buy his jersey - and of course it was caught on tape:

Okay, so I guess he wasn't really undercover because he wasn't in disguise, but he did deny being himself. I honestly don't think I would have recognize him if I was in that store - maybe next season, or now that I've seen this video. Woodhead definitely seems like a cool guy since he can poke fun at himself, and I think it was pretty impressive that he sold 14 of his jerseys/tees in an hour - so keep up the good work Danny in the store and on the field!

~emy

Eco-Friendly Bouquets

So I'm definitely into browsing Etsy.com when I get bored because I want to see what pretty or weird things all of those crafters out there are creating. Recently I found these awesome eco-friendly bouquets made out of origami flowers - done by Whether Paperworks. She actually uses antique books and magazines as one of her mediums. My personal favorite is this Tiffany's themed one:



It's really beautifully made, but being an arts-and-crafts kind if girl I had to figure out if I could potentially make one of these myself, or if it would be a hopeless endeavor (like me trying to knit). I pretty much had no idea where to start - but by browsing Etsy some more I discovered out the flowers are called kusudama and then found this tutorial from Folding Trees. And here's what I ended up with:




It's a little rough, but what do you expect with post-it notes and scotch tape? It was a lot easier than I thought it would be especially with the instructions - but I can still understand why people might charge do much for the final product because it can definitely take a lot of time cutting the paper and getting the folds crisp so it looks clean. But if you have the patience to do it yourself ( for a wedding to replace real flowers) you'll be saving the environment and money!

Also, on a side note, post-its are not perfectly square (what's with that?!?!) - that also made my kusudama messier.

~emy