Cooking Class

My birthday was in September and for my present my awesome sister-in-law got me a "Girls Night Out" cooking class at a place here in Omaha called Classy Gourmet. It was so much fun and my friend from interior design school named Michele came with me! We drank wine, talked with other ladies, and made some really good food. There was one recipe that I learned that I must share with you...It's called Roasted Grape and Mascarpone Bruschetta. I was by far the best thing made there that night and guess what? I'm going to share it with you...

ROASTED GRAPE AND MASCARPONE BRUSCHETTA

16 baguette slices (about 1/2 inch thick)

1 large garlic clove, halved

8 ounces of mascarpone cheese, room temperature

2 T chopped walnuts

48 red seedless grapes, halved

freshly ground pepper to taste

2 T of honey

DIRECTIONS:

Toast bread slices; lightly rub each slice with cut sides of garlic halves. Spread each bread slice with mascarpone; sprinkle with walnuts and top each with 6 grape halves. Sprinkle with ground pepper and drizzle with honey (you can put as much as you want really). Broil then until warm and grapes are slightly bursting.

Believe me they are so amazing and easy, you'll be making them for company this holiday season.

Since the class I took was called "Girls Night Out"we also made something called Chocolate Purses but you can call them Yummy Chocolate Morsels....

YUMMY CHOCOLATE MORSELS

1 sheet puff pastry

32 ounces chocolate chips

2 egg whites

2 T water

2 T sugar

DIRECTIONS:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

Cut pastry sheet into 32 squares; Place 1 ounce of chocolate chips in center of each square and bring each end up to center to create little bundles and twist gently. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper. Mix egg whites and water together, brush each bundle with mixture and sprinkle with sugar. Bake for 10-12 minutes or until pastry is crisp. Let stand for 5 minutes, move to a plate.

NOTE: You can put whatever you want inside of them, maybe caramel, coconut, or or all 3? Then if you want you can also sprinkle them with brown sugar. Play with this recipe.

The Classy Gourmet unfortunately taught it's last class this past Saturday so I can't take anymore classes but it was super fun!! Thanks Jaclyn!

I wanted to share a few interesting things that I've learned and that little light bulb went on in my mind, you know what I mean.

1) Brown sugar is simply granulated sugar and molasses!! Who would of thought? Maybe you already knew that but I was shocked whenever I saw it on Food Network.

2) If you don't have mascarpone cheese or you can't find it in the stores you can make your own with cream cheese, sour cream and whipping cream.

3) You can make caesar dressing without using anchovy paste when you combine: 1 egg yolk, 1/2 C garlic infused oil, 1/4 C lemon juice, 1 T worcestershire sauce, and salt & pepper to taste in a food processor until smooth.

I hope you find these things helpful : )

ENJOY!!!!!!

LINKS FOR THE ABOVE INFORMATION:

http://judyskitchen.blogspot.com/2007/11/mascarpone-substitute.html

http://www.ehow.com/how_2210561_make-brown-sugar.html