Cocktails on a Stick (Peach Punch Pops)

It's finally cooled off now that I've made another kind of frozen dessert. The Peach Punch Pops are frozen, boozy iced tea. If you're familiar with general issues freezing liquor you'll understand why there's a lot of volume of non-alcoholic ingredients in these.
The mixture of peaches, iced tea, and bourbon was big enough that I had to blend it in two batches to get it all though my blender. Then, to further encourage freezing, the puree gets chilled before going into the popsicle molds. Patience...

Just Chillin'

I have 18 popsicle molds from the set I bought. I used 17 for this recipe. At least the molds are earning their keep.
The texture on these is definitely more slushy than non-alcoholic popsicles. I'm assuming that's a byproduct of the high bourbon content. They're definitely frozen cocktails on a stick.

Don't leave these out too long, they start to melt fast.

Difficulty Level: Medium
Will It Get Made Again? Probably not. I think I like peaches better baked than frozen. If you needed a sneaky way to delivery a boozy treat these would be on the list though; you will taste the bourbon as soon as you start eating them. These are more to my taste than the Cucumber Lime Yogurt Pops but not addictive.

Brine Baby Brine (One Pot Chicken)

This recipe has one of the shortest ingredient lists you can manage. Chicken, oil, salt, water. It's roast chicken that requires a little patience and some technique. It is delicious.
If you've never brined anything the concept is simple. Take the meat, stick it in salt bath, and wait. This chicken got to chill in my fridge overnight.

Brining is pretty much guaranteed to get you better flavor throughout the meat whenever you're willing to do the prep and wait.

The Alton technique being used to actually cook the bird was a new one to me. A multi-step dutch oven roast that starts with preheating the dutch oven along with regular oven. By heat I mean the oven is cranked to 550 F, which is as hot as a standard American kitchen oven goes. So you have a super hot cast iron pan that you dump the bird into. Seal it in both ovens. Wait 15 minutes, then take the lid off the dutch oven, baste the chicken in some of its own juices. Wait again this time with the dutch oven lid off, but the lid is still in the oven staying super hot. The third time you open open the regular oven it's to pull the bird out, then seal it into the dutch oven outside the regular oven again to finish cooking off of residual heat in the cast iron (there's plenty of heat to manage this). I would not ever do this recipe on a hot day. I could see doing it again on a frigid day.

The recommendation is to serve with it's juiced as a dip, it's good on it's own as well.

What you're left with is well seasoned, moist, roast chicken. The ingredient list is simple, the technique is kind of fussy but effective. Not recommended for anyone who fears working with hot pans.

Difficulty Level: Medium
Will It Get Made Again? If I want homemade chicken to shred for something this will probably be my go to recipe. I'm putting leftover chicken into sandwiches and pizza, but I could serve one of these to any group that wanted something simply prepared but good.

Open Sesame Noodles

Noodles + homemade peanut sauce. There are many versions of this. Including a different Alton version called Dan Dan Noodles*. This batch is enhanced with homemade pickles as a garnish. The sauce is your standard dump everything into the food processor and pulse technique.

The quickest pickles only need around 1/2 hour for flavor to soak in.

The recipe doesn't specify what kind of noodles to make with the sauce. I went with rice vermicelli, but after trying them I think it would work better with a wheat or egg noodle. Still good, and the pickles give a nice acidic complement to the sauce.

Voila.

Difficulty Level: Medium
Will It Get Made Again? Realistically I'm probably still in search of my perfect peanut sauce. There are endless variations and I haven't yet found my all-time favorite.

*I've made these, they're also good.

Frosting Sort of Hides Many Sins (Apple Spice Bundt Cake with Rum Glaze)

This cake was featured on Best Thing I Made in a recipe published here. The version in EveryDayCook is different mostly by being in grams rather than ounces. It's a classic style bundt cake with some non-traditional seasonings (Alton is a big fan of grains of paradise). All preparation mistakes were my own.
The thing I did wrong was to not flour the pan in addition to liberally greasing it. It stuck and came out in pieces. Here's the jigsawed cake with frosting glue, because the flavor is still fine.

Magazine Perfect? No. Good? Yes.

Difficulty Level: Medium
Will It Get Made Again? Probably not. This is a solid spice cake but it's not on my best of list. Whereas the Blueberry Pound Cake is.

Chocapocalpse Now (Chocapocalpse Cookies)

When step one is to melt a 1/2lb of chocolate to be mixed into the batter, and you'll be adding more chocolate after that, you know that there is a serious attempt to bring about the Chocapocalpse. These cookies contain 4 different kinds of chocolate, plus cocoa nibs for crunch. 

So. Much. Chocolate.

I've made cousins of this kind of cookie in the past, these Pecan Mudslides are an old favorite. These are even more intensely chocolaty than they are. They also have dough that's slightly more annoying to work with. Anything with that much melted chocolate in it needs to be thouroughly chilled, and then there's a sweet spot where it's pliable but not melting that's hard to reach when you're shaping the cookies. I persevered. They were delicious. 

Photo snapped in the brief window before they all disappeared into happy stomachs.

I took the entire batch (minus a few that had "quality tested") to a party. Every last one got eaten.

Difficulty Level: Medium High

Will It Get Made Again? If I need to feed chocoholics these would be a top contender to make. I can't see making them often, just on the quantity of chocolate they burn through (1lb all totaled up). My first love remains the Mudslides though.

Heavenly Orbs of Belgian Goodness?

I do actually like brussels sprouts. I still miss a snack that used to be on the menu at a local bar where they deep-fried brussels sprouts and tossed them bacon bits; my friends and I practically licked the plate after we'd eaten them. So I didn't hesitate to make an Alton Brown recipe where the sprouts get tossed with bacon, apples, and maple-mustard dressing. They were in season at the farmer's market so it seemed like a sign.

Sprouts still on the stalk (I was lazy and got the ones already off the stalk)

For all the hype though this isn't something that's going on my "heavenly" foods list. They're good, they're just not lick the pan good.

Belgian Goodness

Difficulty Level: Medium
Will It Get Made Again? Nah, the love isn't there.

The Mythical White Anchovies (Weeknight Spaghetti)

When I scanned the ingredient list for this recipe the thing that I'd never heard of was white anchovies. A little googling informed me that the difference between a regular anchovy and a white anchovy is pure processing. White anchovies have less salt involved in their curing process. White anchovies also turn out to be impossible to find in my city. The specialty Italian deli used to carry them (but stopped because they don't sell), Whole Foods didn't have them, none of the regular grocery stores had them... Reader, I substituted regular anchovies rather than order an entire container of the white ones over the internet in order to use 2. I do not think it made a significant difference.
I did however go to the trouble of making the herb infused olive oil that this recipe calls for; which means that I infused 16oz of olive oil with herbs so that I could use 3 tablespoons in the sauce. The rest is now in my freezer because herb infused olive oil apparently has a much higher risk of contamination than regular olive oil and anything that starts growing in there will be heat resistant (this is an actual warning from the book).

This how much leftover herb oil the recipe makes.

Once all the ingredients are on hand the spaghetti is actually very easy to through together. It's even pretty tasty.

Spaghetti with Non-White Anchovies

Difficulty Level: Medium (I would rate it easy without the oil)
Will It Get Made Again? I can see myself making versions of this. I'll likely try a batch with ground beef in the sauce because I really like spaghetti with meat sauce (actually I like vermicelli, it's rare for me to buy the thicker spaghetti noodles). What I'm unlikely to do is make more of the herb oil when I run out, I'd be more likely to just put some dried herbs in with the tomatoes while they simmer. The basic concept is sound, but the exact method is subject to change.