Horchata de Arroz

Despite being white and murky, horchata has no milk. It is pronounced as "or-chat-ta" or "hor-cha-ta" if you want this marriage to work.

Ingredients

• 1c white rice
  
• 1.5c water
  
• yet another 1.5c water
  
• 1/4tsp cinnamon
  
• like, 3tbsp sugar
  
• a little bit of vanilla
  

Put the rice and 1.5c water in a blender with the cinnamon. Put the blender in the refrigerator. For maybe 12 hours. Nobody said this would a quick recipe.

Th next morning, blend the liquid until smooth, 2-3 minutes. Strain it through a cheesecloth. Add the sugar and vanilla and the remaining water. Enjoy.

Thoughts: This nigh impossible to strain at the end. I don't know how best to deal with that. I recommend decanting it a couple times and THEN straining it. It was a mess. Anyway, it was a LITTLE watery for me - I assume it's not traditional, but I wonder if it would be good with milk instead of water, at least at the end. The flavor was pretty good, though, aside from the wateriness. If I made it again, I would blend it for longer, probably before I even chill it. I might use milk, too. And more cinnamon. Some recipes use almonds, too, which might be good (even better: use almond milk?). Anyway, if you don't like it you can just use it to make oatmeal, and it works pretty well.

Disaster Index: 3/10

Blondies

Ingredients

• 2 sticks of butter
• 2c flour
• 2tsp baking powder
• .75tsp salt
• 2c dark brown sugar
• 2 eggs, lightly beaten with
• 2tsp vanilla extract
• ~1c dark chocolate chips

In a bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, salt, and chocolate chips. In a separate bowl, combine the eggs and vanilla. In a sauce pan over medium heat, melt the butter. After it melts, keep it on the heat. It will froth up a lot, then the froth will subside and it will start to darken. As soon as it starts to darken, take the butter off the heat and add the brown sugar. Stir vigorously. Add about a tablespoon of water and stir well. Let the mixture sit a little bit to cool (or stir it to cool it faster). Then temper the eggs and stir them in. Whisk together until pretty smooth. Then pour in the dry ingredients and fold together. It will form a very sticky batter. Pour into a 9x13 baking pan. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes at 350 degrees, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

Thoughts: 2c is WAY more sugar than it needed, I believe. The batter was REALLY overpowering. But when they baked, the sweetness was quite diminished to tolerable levels. Don't get me wrong - they taste GREAT - but I still think I would use about 1/2 as much sugar next time. Otherwise, the flavor is fantastic, and the texture is great.

Update: I made this with 1.25 sticks of butter, 1c sugar, and 1tsp salt. The flavor is phenomenal, but the texture is a little more cake-y? Maybe this is what the butter was for? Unclear. Hm.

Disaster Index: 1/10

The Fat Elvis Sandwich

Okay, so we changed one ingredient.

Ingredients

• 2 slices of bread (we used whole grain, you're supposed to use Hawaiian.)
  
• 3 slices thick cut bacon, cooked and patted dry
  
• peanut butter
  
• 1 banana, sliced and grilled (possibly in bacon fat) until caramelized on both sides.
  

Cook bacon and banana as instructed above. Put peanut butter on the sandwich, followed by bacon and then bananas. Put the sandwich back on the griddle and toast lightly. Serve.

Thoughts: Not much needs to be said about this. Claire put a lot of peanut butter on, which, she evinced, drowned out the bacon flavor too much. In the future, she would use more bacon (or less peanut butter). I thought it could use a spot of jelly or possibly honey, though that might be fixed by using hawaiian bread.

Also this was FANTASTIC. Although I would say it has an artery disaster index of more like 3-7/10, depending on how you make it / whether you fry EVERYTHING in bacon fat (including the sandwich) or nothing.

Disaster Index: 1/10