Coffee cup gingerbread houses

Teeny tiny gingerbread house that sits on the side of your cup. For a mere $20 each ... Wait, you lost me. For about $2 of ingredients and a used fizzy drink can I made my own.

I started with an existing recipe and made a number of modifications. This is way too much dough for a batch of mini houses unless you have a crowd to help you put them together and decorate. If you just want a dozen or so houses, halve or even third the quantities. Or, as I did, make some ninjabread people too. (Inspired by this comic strip.)

Hatch chiles for beginners 1: prep them up

It's nearly chile season again, so the last few packages in the freezer are fair game. And since I was writing elsewhere about the happy-making experience of having Hatch chiles fresh roasted, I thought I'd also write about how to prepare and use them.

Strictly speaking it's optional to remove the seeds. I do, though, as they can taste bitter and at the best of times don't add much to a dish other than heat. To peel and seed half-thawed chiles is pretty quick once you get in the rhythm. Here are two ways.

If you're finicky about that kind of thing or if your chiles are spicy, you may like to wear gloves while you do this.

1 Under running water

Easier, but it does use a lot of water and it does also lose some of the flavour ... good for beginners, though.

• Hold the chile by the stem end with one hand. 
• Under water, pull the skin off with the other hand. 
• Use your fingers to pull the stem end off
• Split the chile lengthwise with your fingers
• Hold it by the pointy end and open it out into a wedge. Wash away the seeds, removing bits of membrane if you can without breaking the whole chile. 

2 With water at hand for rinsing

A bit messier, goes fast once you've got the knack. Basically it's a similar  process, but you're going to keep one hand clean as you only use it to hold the chile by one end. The other will get covered in blackened bits of chile skin, juices, and seeds. Dip or rinse your hand in water when it gets too grubby to do the job.

• Hold the chile by the stem end with one hand. 
• Use your other hand almost like a squeegee to scrape the skin off
• Use your fingers to pull the stem end off
• Split the chile lengthwise with your fingers
• Hold it by the pointy end and open it out into a wedge. 
• Squeegee away the seeds by running the flesh of the chile between two fingers. Pick away large bits of membrane if you can without breaking the whole chile. 

Substitutions

If you aren't fortunate enough to have these specific peppers in your area, you can use other peeled and roasted green chiles or even regular bell peppers (I'd go with red rather than green there). The flavour will be different but probably still pretty nice. Hatch chiles are a vegetable rather than a condiment, so if you're substituting some other capsicum, choose accordingly. Maybe not ghost peppers, for instance.

Coming up: Hatch chile recipes for beginners.

Get the most juice from a lime

Limes are different from lemons, and if you cut them straight through the middle into quarters, they are hard to juice by hand, e.g. for a cocktail or a guacamole. (Pretty slices and segments are another story. This is just for juicing.)

This is how I do it. It's kind of like rough cutting an apple into pieces around the core. I'm not a huge fan of food porn step by step photos, but this is much easier to show than to tell, so I put 3 photos below.

Full credit for this should go to something I once read on the internet. If that was yours, then a) I bow down before you and b) please let me know so I can credit you. 

Cut a lime to get the most juice

What I'm calling the 'core' is the bit between the stem and the blossom end, runs vertically down through the fruit, and is full of connective tissue and fibre.

1. Cut a slice straight through the lime but to one side of the core. Put this slice aside and continue. 
2. Take the bigger 'half' and put it cut side up. Again, cut straight down to one side of the core. You have two pieces plus the one you already set aside.
3. Take the bigger of the two pieces and yet again cut straight down to one side of the core. 

You should have 4 pieces

• 1 flat slice (from step 1)
• 2 matching-but-opposite sort of wedges
• 1 thick segment with the core

Now juice away!

step 1 

step 2

step 3