Powered by Diet Dr Thunder … I need a trash can!
I started drinking Dr Pepper as a kid. At some point I switched to diet. This year I tried the Walmart knockoff, Dr Thunder. I actually like it better. If you’re a foodie, you should give it a try. It has a spicy flavor that reminds me of Moroccan food. After I posted this, I checked my spice cabinet to see exactly what the flavor is like. It is hints of fennel seeds, cardamom seeds, and cinnamon.
Now, I’m going to throw all these cans away!
Read MoreChocolate Covered Peppers
The Mayans and Aztecs were two of the earliest consumers of chocolate, but unlike Europeans who followed, they didn’t sweeten their chocolate drinks. They peppered them with hot chili peppers.
Keeping that in mind, makes the idea of chocolate covered peppers not such a crazy idea. If you’re looking for a really unique gift idea and you’ve got someone who loves chocolate and can’t get enough pepper, spicing up your gift-giving with some gourmet chocolate covered jalapeños is an option this Christmas.
They come in 1 and 2 pound packages. You can select a combination of milk, white and dark chocolates or choose solid milk chocolate, solid dark chocolate or solid white chocolate. You’re not limited to jalapeños. The Chocolate Covered Company will also dip colorful sweet peppers in chocolate.
A pound of all milk chocolate covered jalapeños sells for $63.90.
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Evernote Apps to Help Remember People (Evernote Hello) and Meals (Evernote Food)
I tell myself I’m disorganized because I’m creative and I’m male. Maybe my right-braininess is to blame or maybe it’s something else. I try all kinds of productivity Apps to organize my life and my stuff, but every App I try seems to be designed by left-brained list makers. I would love to partner with a developer to create an organization App designed for creatives, but that’s really not the point of this piece. Just putting that out there! 
Evernote almost works for me. Out of every tool I’ve tried, I like Evernote best, and I LOVE that they’re tackling new Apps that improve life. Today there are two new Apps I’m looking forward to trying, Hello and Food.
Hello tackles the problem some of us have with remembering names when we meet people at events. I’ve used an App where I’ve explained that I’m bad with names and asked if I could take a photo. That process seemed a little awkward to me. Hello handles it in a way that makes it kind of cool. Hand your phone to the person you meet, they hold the phone up to their face and the App automatically takes four photos that string together to create a mini animation of the person’s face.
Here’s a video so you can see for yourself…
Hello is free in the App Store. I had to search for Evernote Hello to find it. After testing the App, the feature I wanted to see most was the light face animation. I went back and read the Evernote blog post about Hello again, and it looks like that’s a feature coming soon?
Then there’s Evernote Food, an App designed to help us remember as much about a meal as we want to capture. You can capture photos of food, drinks, dining companions and recipes. Give the meal a title and it’s there for you to remember anytime you want to look reminisce.
Here’s how Food works …
During the years I produced GeekBrief.TV, I had a lot of great meals with interesting people. It would be so cool to have them captured like this. I’m looking forward to capturing even more awesome breakfasts, lunches and dinners with this App in the future!
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Barramundi Sauteed in Lemon Butter and Caper Sauce
Barramundi is a fish we first had when we went to Queensland, Australia for the Best Job in the World contest last year. It’s considered by some foodies to be the “next big fish”
in terms of popularity. Barramundi is a white, hearty fish that seems unique in taste and texture. If I’ve ever come close to thinking a fish could taste like chicken, it’s with this one.
Barramundi is farm-raised in the United States and is starting to show up regularly in the frozen section. I got mine at a Kroger, and I’ve also gotten it at Wal-Mart.
Since the filets are thin, and it kind of has the taste and texture of chicken, it’s a good substitute for chicken or veal with a picatta sauce. I adapted my recipe from a couple others to make a single serving.
I gently sauteed the garlic in butter for 2 minutes and then squeezed in the juice of half a lemon. I added a little salt and a little pepper and remove the skillet from burner.
Each side of the filet needs to be coated lightly with olive oil. You could brush it on, but I used one of those olive oil pumps.
In the butter sauce, I pan fried one side of the filet on high for 3 minutes and then I flipped it and cooked it for about a minute-and-a-half more until it was cooked through. I plated the fish and added heavy-cream to the pan. I mixed that all up and then poured what I wanted on top of the filet. I then added capers (after taking this photo) and salted and peppered like I like it.
It was good, y’all!
Read MoreJulia Child’s Boeuf Bourguignon Shopping List
I love making Julia Child’s Boeuf Bourguignon, but it takes time to read through the three recipes involved in the dish to pull out exactly what I need from the grocery store. For the recipe itself, you’ll need the book, Mastering the Art of French Cooking.
If you google something and don’t find and adequate result, it becomes your mission to put it online. I couldn’t find a simple shopping list for Julia Child’s Boeuf Bourguignon, so here it is:
- Bottle of Burgundy or other full-bodied young red wine
- 6-ounce chunk of bacon
- Olive Oil
- 3 lbs. lean stewing beef
- 1 Carrot
- 1 Onion
- 18-24 Pearl Onions
- 2 Cloves of garlic
- 1 lb. quartered fresh mushrooms
- parsley
- Thyme
- Bay leaf
- Salt
- Pepper
- Flour
- 3 Cups of brown beef stock
- Tomato paste
- Paper towels
- Cheesecloth
Bon Appétit
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