Circle of Sisters was a hit, Halloween, not so much ...

Hey there! Well, Saturday I headed out to the Circle of Sisters Expo here in NYC. This is my third year doing a cooking demonstration there and each time it gets better. This time around I did an easy menu that is perfect for this time of year. Click for the links to my Proscuitto-Wrapped Beef Cubes with Mustard Pan Sauce and Parmesan-Herbed Orzo. I also shared a recipe of mine from the new season of Cooking for Real, my Simple Sauteed Mustard Greens. That recipe will be available as soon as the episode it appears in airs on Food Network. Ha! "Appears in", the food is totally the star! I call that episode Borrowing from the South and it isn't even up on my episode page yet, so it was a real sneak peek for all the attendees. A big hello to Charles! He comments on the blog and it was our second time meeting, I turned around after it was all over and he was gone! Charles, thanks for coming, wish we could've chatted longer and maybe walked around a bit! Here's one shot of some people that came to hang out while I cooked, for real :-) ...I said hi to anyone that wanted to chat and then made room for the next cooking demonstration with Chef Jeff Henderson ...He's busy working with a movie production team on his life story. I think I heard someone say that Will Smith is playing him in the movie, I may be wrong, but a movie is in the works no less. Pretty cool story he has, Google and Bing away if you don't already know :-).

Then Saturday night I decided to go out to one of my favorite places in Brooklyn, Tanoreen. I actually featured something from their menu on Best Thing I Ever Ate: Nutty. It's this crazy good dessert called Knafeh and it's hard to describe, you just really have to try it. It's gooey cheese that's baked in a buttered and shredded fillo dough shell, then doused with a sweet syrup of orange blossoms and more then sprinkled with pistachio nuts. There's so much more to it and if you can find it locally, I say make an RSVP! If not, NYC is great in the fall, especially Brooklyn :-). Anyway, here's my piece ...Before that, I struggled through eating and not eating all of my dinner so I could actually fit in the Knafeh for dessert. It's hard and I promised myself next time I was just going to do it ... order dinner backwards. Ever do that? Anyway, we also got some vegetarian kibbie balls that are becoming another favorite of mine ...They are crunchy on the outside (looks and tastes like a wheat germ mixture) then the inside is moist and the greens taste almost southern with a nice lemon kick and there's chunks of walnuts here and there, very good. See the cute Halloween candle in the back ground? I like when restaurants do cute little things like that for holidays.

Well, dinner was great and the next day, yesterday, Sunday :-) ... I bought some candy, set up the lights, left the porch light on. Then I set up shop and waited for trick-or-treaters ... and waited ... and waited ... No one showed ... last year, I think maybe one person did. What was I thinking? I now have two huge bucket loads of treats to deal with. Any suggestions? Maybe I can find a charity that gives out food or something. I can't humanly eat all that candy!

Ok, just wanted to share a bit ... I have to get back to work. It's been a productive Monday of transferring recipes from my notebook to my laptop. I have a week or so until I reach my personal goal of having all my Season 9 menus typed up so I can turn them into the network. We tape in January, what a way to kick off the year and what a way to kick off the week with plenty of admin work. Actually, I'm about to take a break from typing to get in the kitchen to bake some cinnamon buns. I haven't shared my recipe yet on Cooking for Real, so I decided to make some to get all my amounts measured. I'll write in my journal, transfer that information to my laptop and include the recipe in the pitch for my next season of shows ... easy, sticky, cinnamon buns anyone? Hope your Monday is scootin' along ...

P.S. Thanks to everyone following me on Twitter, I'll start tweeting right after I relaunch my website, hang on and tell a friend :-) @SunnyAnderson .... no spaces, hyphens or underscores :-)