German Chocolate Brownies

Life in the Mochi household has been rather hectic recently. I've started an accelerated program for veterinary technicians as well as two other classes at another location, seized the opportunity to do some dog-sitting this past week, and consequently ate a lot of El Pollo Loco while feeling it wasn't worth it. I've never been good at stress and juggling so many things at once, and this blog is definitely taking a hit.

No worries, I've got some projects in the works, like umeshu/ichigoshu, and the long-awaited shiso katsuo ninniku recipe!

In the meantime, here's a quick recipe for all your summer hangouts. I made them for Mother's Day at my mom's request, but they would be a great addition for Memorial Day, the Fourth of July, or any picnic or barbeque celebration. My grandpa and I both love german chocolate cake, but sometimes life is too crazy to commit to making a huge multi-layered cake, so this is a fast fix with the same flavors. The other nice thing is both the topping and the brownies can be made several days in advance.

You can even take the brownies, top them with a scoop of vanilla ice cream, and pour the topping over it, warm, for an amazing brownie sundae.

Smoked Salmon Crostini

I don't do a lot of entertaining, but when I do, it usually consists of finger foods and tea sandwiches. I love tea parties. Even more than tea parties, I love salmon.

My mother has always championed the healthiness of sustainably farmed salmon, and she served it so much my brother and I would complain as teenagers. Yes, we were spoiled brats. Now, being a terribly poor early-20's girl with her own place, I dream of salmon yet rarely buy it. So when I threw my party recently as mentioned in the previous post, I used it as an excuse to gorge on smoked salmon.

Like my caprese skewers, this is more about assembly than any other cooking skill. I've made these before, but this time I worked a little more on presentation and made roses out of the cucumber. It's a really quick step, but obviously they taste great either way.

As an alternative to crostini, you could even just take plain white bread, cut into squares without the crust, lightly butter to keep them from getting soggy, and make attractive open-faced tea sandwiches instead!