Product Extraordinaire: A better butter

A few weeks ago, Skip reviewed PB & Co's "The Heat is On," a peanut butter better used for Thai chicken and other savory dishes rather than PB&J. Around this same time, I ordered some of PB Loco's Sumatra Cinnamon and Raisin peanut butter. PB Loco - a largely online business, unless you live somewhere like Scottsdale, AZ - offers flavors such as CoCo Banana (I'll take a dozen! and a spoon!) and Asian Curry Spice (For Savory Dish Use Only). The Sumatra Cinnamon seemed like a safe choice, and ended up being as delicious as it was versatile. The texture was creamy, the raisins were plump, and the cinnamon was delightfully aromatic. It was great on sandwiches, with apples, out of the jar - I enjoyed eating it too much to try to make cookies or muffins, but I can only imagine that it would improve such things.

Because I was on such a Cinnamon-Raisin peanut butter high after my PB Loco experience (their motto is peanutbutterlicious! who doesn't love that?), I picked up some of Peanut Butter & Co.'s Cinnamon Raisin Swirl at the grocery store. I mean, even if it didn't live up to PB Loco's high standards, it couldn't actually be bad, right?

I haven't had other flavors of PB & Co. butter, so I can't say if this is true for all of its flavors, but this is a GRAINY peanut butter. I don't know if this is because of their use of evaporated cane juice as opposed to refined sugar, but I have never had peanut butter with this much grain going on. (And this is from a girl who regularly eats almond butter, the grainiest of the grainy butters.) Plus the raisins were hard and the cinnamon was much milder than I would have liked.

That said, I still ate it...and I found myself craving the PB & Co. butter at odd hours of the day. I did get used to the grainyness, and I could see how some would find it more natural-seeming and therefore more appealing. But I like my butters smooth & flavorful, so I'm sticking with PB Loco.

Thanks to Bizzy Grl over at Flickr for the beautiful pb shot.

Product Extraordinaire: Tastes like burning

Those guys at Peanut Butter & Co. aren't kidding about this stuff: The Heat is On tastes seriously spicy. If I weren't so masochistic, I doubt I'd ever have gotten to the point where The Heat made it into peanut noodles, or especially a (wait for it) hamburger.

The standard, classic pb&j is a no-go with The Heat. I tried it with raspberry jam. It's ok, laugh at me. Wtf was I thinking? The incredible spiciness paired with the jam was awful in every way. Unfortunately for me, I kept trying it: once with sliced apples and raspberry jam, also no good; once with sliced bananas (no jam, thank God), predictably bad.

So there I was with this nearly-full jar of mouth-melting, nearly unusable stuff that I couldn't get myself to toss out (reasoning: I made a bad decision and I should suffer the full brunt of the consequences). After weeks of hearing me complain about how I'd ruined another sandwich, my worldly roommate (ex-roommate, tear) recommended spicy peanut noodles. Perfect.

Chicken satay with spicy peanut noodles. [see note]. Fantastic. I omitted the extra cayenne pepper and the recipe came out smooth and pleasantly spicy. If only I'd thought of The Heat as an ingredient rather than a condiment sooner.

The jar sat untouched for another few weeks until I found a recipe for spicy peanut butter hamburgers on the PB&Co. website. Even with the recent savory success with the satay, I thought the beef/peanut butter combination was crazy but worth a shot [see note]. The pan fried [boo!] burgers were really something else. The extra fat from the peanut butter and actual butter butter made them quite juicy, and all the better when topped with Gouda.

Certainly got my $6 out of it. And an adventure. Two adventures. Ok, a lot of excitement though most of it was of the "this tastes like burning. Why am I still eating this?" variety.


Notes: - For obvious reasons, I omitted parts of both recipes since there was no need for chutney or pork.
- Recipe for spicy peanut butter hamburger no longer online, but it is available in their cookbook.

Product Extraordinaire: Ginger Spread

At the cheese shop where I work, we sell lots of gourmet products. While everyone else takes home boatloads of cheese, my lactose intolerance leads me to bring home loads of burnt fig jam, graham crackers, and membrillo.

While I've enjoyed my fair share of these and other impulse buys, Ginger People brand ginger spread has been the best investment, since it has lasted awhile and I keep finding new ways to incorporate it into my cooking.

First of all, it's not a jam. Putting this on a PB&J would lead to more sinus-clearing than you're normally used to from Welch's, so I wouldn't recommend doing that. But this lovely product is perfect for the pantry, because if you're like me, you never have fresh ginger around when you need it. Ginger spread solves the problem, as it comes in a BIG jar, you only use teaspoons at a time, and it lasts forever - but not in a "loaded with preservatives" kind of way, since its only ingredients are ginger & cane sugar. The spread is thick and slightly sweet, with a grainy texture that reminds you of its natural-ocity. It's perfect for incorporating into dressings or marinades, jazzing up some stir fry, making some zingy scones, or whisking with some yogurt & rice vinegar to make a dressing for your makeshift Quinoa Waldorf salad (inspired by this gem from Epicurious).

But the possibilities are endless: ginger cupcake frosting, ginger burgers, ginger applesauce, ginger-tinis....mmm.

Technorati Tags: Cooking, Ginger