Kim Shook

Ce'nedra – love the prawn pizza! I do a white pizza with shrimp and horseradish and ricotta, but I like the idea of all the juiciness of the garlic butter! Percyn – the crust on that chicken cordon bleu is amazing! David – your beef and polenta is gorgeous! Thanks so much for posting the directions, too! I’ll be trying that this winter! tkassum – welcome! Lovely brunch! Dinner tonight: Mr. Kim made some Tonton ginger Japanese dressing and marinade marinated chicken breasts the other night. I used the leftovers tonight to make a stir fry with some snow peas. Really good. I also did some “A Taste of Thai” microwave peanut noodles – they were ok, not great.

Awesome! That looks so amazing! Since I had a dish made with peppered honey at one of our favorite restaurants, I've been addicted to the combination of pepper and sweet. Kerry - what kind of fruitcake is that? Looks good! Some more Christmas cooking: Crystal Candy. Just a fanciful name for hard candy – cinnamon and wintergreen.

Thanks so much, y'all, for the kind words! Here you go: Iced Almonds. I'll start posting the link to my recipes, if you think I should. I considered doing it, but thought it might be a bit pushy .

Rob – that cake sounds scrumptious and I, too, am enamored of your balls . I agree with Erin, that there’s a little too much going on – I’d just lose the tuiles. Everything else looks and sounds wonderful. That perfect layer of pomegranate bavarain has me feeling so incredibly inadequate . Joe – so cute! My office would lose their minds at those hamburgers! Some chocolate chip cookies that I made: I got the recipe from a friend on cookskorner.com. It’s a CI recipe (not sure whether it’s an online or magazine recipe). The flavor is wonderful – very complex. You brown the butter and use dark brown sugar. Mine were flatter and spread out more than I would have liked (and more than his were), but that always seems to happen to me. I also made these: Iced almonds. So rich – toasty, caramel-y, crisp almond goodness.

That is one gorgeous loaf! This bread is my regular, go-to white bread. It is NOT what most people think of when they hear 'white bread' - there is nothing 'Wonder-ish' about it!

Prawn – those are just lovely, gorgeous meals! Thanks for sharing them with us! Dinner tonight: London broil sandwiches w/ caramelized onions and cheese on foccacia rolls and butter beans.

Breakfast this morning was very ordinary, but very satisfying: Fried eggs, biscuits and sausage. That's ginger marmalade on one of the biscuits and cinnamon apple jelly on the other. Both were good, but the cinnamon apple jelly was amazing!

Ilana - ganache with cherries and almonds ! That sounds wonderful! What are you going to do with it? More Christmas cooking – Almost the Best Peanut Butter Cookies w/ and w/out Kisses: another version: this one drizzled with chocolate.

Bruce – the garlic broccoli looks and sound delicious. I’ll be trying that method since we are in high broccoli season now! Matthew – everything looks wonderful, but that bread knocked my socks off – well done!!! Ce'nedra – love the buns! Percyn – lovely burger and the addition of the egg is perfect! I would have loved to see some breakfast thread-style egg porn, though ! Dinner last night: London Broil, tiny roasted potatoes, Southern green beans and garlic cheese bread. Confession: I didn't cook the meat. It is a Costco item that is already cooked and you just heat it up . Mr. Kim likes these a lot and they are tasty, if a bit tough (though, no tougher than the eye of round roast).

This is one of our favorites: Autumn Fruit Salad - Fall fruits, crunchy almonds and a spicy, creamy dressing.

Randi – oh, my, goodness!!! Those look just perfect – gooey, rich, pillowy and crunchy all at once! Must look for that issue! More cooking ahead for Christmas: Puppy Peanut Butter Cookies for the dogs in our lives. Otis liked them a lot !

Randi – I love your maple leaves! That platter is lovely! And I’m going to use your doily decoration on my Christmas sweets platters – I never think of them and they are so pretty. I’ve started stocking the freezer for Christmas! Cherry Almond Dark Chocolate Fudge: Mr. Kim’s favorite. This was a surprise for him last year and he loves it. This year, the surprise is going to be a dark chocolate and candied ginger fudge. Reese’s Cup Fudge: My Aunt San’s Fudge: Just a simple and creamy milk chocolate/marshmallow fudge. Classic and perfect.

Dinner on Halloween: A chicken pot pie that I made using some of the leftover savory bread pudding as it’s topping. It was the perfect topping – I’m really glad that I thought of it. Bite:

Thank you all for your compliments and ideas on better ‘glue’ to use. I’ll note that on my recipe for when I do these next year. dystopiandreamgirl – that cake is an absolute dream . I’m not sure I’ve ever seen anything that I’d rather be able to make. Marmish – the eyeball cake is a hoot! I know that was popular! Cake I made for a birthday at work today: Side view: It was, by request, the Crunchy Milk Choc–PB Layer Cake that I’ve made before. It was cute, and delicious, of course, but my lettering skills are seriously crappy! Plus my icing was too thin.

Rob! Those are SO cute! Did you use chocolate chips for the eyes? ← Yep, the mini ones. Thanks, everyone - I think they'd make a great kids project. But the frosting is a problem - anyone have an idea about using Royal icing instead??

Rob - those cinnamon rolls are just gorgeous. It's 8am here and that's exactly what I want. The tasting menu stuff is pretty cool, too . My daughter really wants us to try marshmallows in January and ones like yours are what I'd like to eventually master! I put these together for our little friends for Halloween: Just chocolate wafers, marshmallows, Reeses Cups and Kisses. Close up: I used canned frosting to 'glue' the stuff together and it's not terribly 'gluey'. Do you think that Royal frosting would work better to glue all the different things together? I ended up having to refrigerate them to firm up the frosting.

Heels, edges, crusts for me too. I love the edge pan and wish someone would come up with a doughnut pizza with crusts on either end!

Kim, After all of your great photos and the recommendations of many here, I have purchased and received my first order of Benton's Bacon. Yesterday I made bacon, fried eggs, toast and sliced grape tomatoes for my MIL, brother and myself AND a BLT for my husband (the only way he appreciates bacon....can you believe it?????). The bacon was very thick and smokey but I found it a bit salty. It was greatly enjoyed but there are situations that I would appreciate less saltiness. Do you think that it may have been just that batch? Would blanching it first remove some of that saltiness?? Thanks, Donna ← Donna - It is salty - we never need salt on our eggs when I serve them with Benton's . I don't think that it would hurt a bit to blanch it. You do that with country ham and the bacon is very close to that in flavor, I think. Try it with one or two pieces and then see what you think. We gave it to our dads for Father's day and they both thought that it was too salty and Mr. Kim's dad said that they prefer supermarket bacon ... ... I can see finding it too salty - but can you imagine preferring the taste (or lack thereof ) of supermarket bacon now that you've tasted Benton's? We don't even buy Neuske's anymore, which we used to love.

Not sure if you celebrate Christmas but, if so, those plates come in very handy on Christmas morning. Seems like the grownups are always sitting around sleepy-eyed watching the youngsters tear through the gifts. Those plates are perfect for holding a 'little something' like coffee cake or toast while balancing a cup of coffee or juice. ← I never would have thought of that! What a great idea. Now I have to figure out where they are !

Scrambled eggs w/ chives and Gruyere, Benton's bacon, tots and the coffee cake that Maggie describes in her wonderful essay in The Daily Gullet: I've been looking at my recent pictures, and I need to make some ham or sausage soon - we've been eating a lot of bacon.

The wonderful coffee cake that Maggie describes in "Swans and Streudel": I was reading about it this morning and 45 minutes later I was pulling this coffee cake out of the oven. So easy and really, really good!

Ohhhh....must have this recipe..can you please share? ← French Onion Bread Pudding.

Maggie - I just found this and read it about 30 minutes ago. The coffee cake is in my oven right now. I got the coffee pot ready, too. So all I have to do when Mr. Kim and Jessica stumble down the stairs is hit the button and put the coffee cake and butter on on table. What a lovely vignette you gave us. I can just picture your mother and those ladies. I have a set of those luncheon plates and cups somewhere. My grandmother gave them to me - she worked and didn't 'lunch'. I was born in the wrong decade, because I kept them in my kitchen cabinets for years (even through college!) thinking the occasion to use them would surely come up. Sadder, but wiser, they are now somewhere in a forgotten corner of one of the attics. ETA: Delectable!!!!

Shaya – those buns are gorgeous! I have that book and can’t wait to have some time to play with it! MiFi – that sausage meal is just a beautiful fall dinner! My dad and stepmom were in town last night on their way to Florida. Dinner started with pimento cheese, crackers and pickles: Short ribs with caramelized onions: This was so delicious - I used my recipe for lamb shanks with caramelized onions, with some adjustments for the short ribs. Marlene’s bleu cheese dressing with iceberg wedges: Brussels sprouts with pancetta: Marlene’s crispy smashed potatoes: French onion bread pudding: So incredible! When I made it before, we liked it a lot, but thought it would be even better with gravy. Well, with the sauce for the short ribs, it was really over the top delicious! Thanks again to lucylou for the recipe! For dessert, I decided on peanut butter pie: very simple and good and one of the only desserts that my dad will eat (sans chocolate for him).

Dessert last night was peanut butter pie: Plain and good. I melted some PB and swirled it into the filling and topped with roasted, salted peanuts. I just love that shot of salty with something sweet. This was made especially for my dad, the dessert hater. He loved it – he likes precisely two desserts now – this pie and coconut cream pie. Served for everyone but Daddy: