Meyer Lemon & Blackberry Bread Pudding

Not everything I make comes out well. Here's a perfect example. After making homemade brioche, drying & toasting it and then adding the cream/egg custard it turns out the brioche was just too fresh to soak up the custard. I ended up with a bread-custard pudding. The berries and meyer lemon addition were wonderful. I'll try this again but next time I'll use very old bread, not brioche that I made specifically for the bread pudding. Did I mention that we ate it anyway...

Apple Upside Down Cake

Here's an apple upside-down cake that was better than it looked. It reminded me of mom's pineapple upside-down cake that she made with canned pineapple rings and cherries with Bisquick. This recipe has a much better cake, thanks to lots of butter, and the apples have soaked up that wonderful brown sugar glaze. I used the Cooks Illustrated recipe with Granny Smith apples.

Seared Black Cod on Sun Dried Tomato w/Spinich Risotto

It's been awhile since I last posted and it feels like I haven't been cooking in about that long. Well, I'm back and loving my new home in Santa Barbara. I've checked out the local fish and prepared a fresh caught Black Cod over risotto for my first foray into photo blogging again. Here it is in all it's glory. The fish was delicious but was very oily, hope it's all that super good for you Omega 3 oil. Over risotto was OK but next time I'll prepare it differently. The original recipe called for a basil pesto over top, but I don't have a food processor or blender so I improvised with a gremolata alla Osso Buco and the bright lemon flavors were an added plus to the oily taste of the fish. Enjoy!