b-b-b-brinner

Love, love, a thousand times love our weekly Americorps Potlucks.

Particularly awesome theme this week: BREAKFAST FOR DINNER! BRINNER!

In the fruit category, Erin made some serious fruit smoothies (I failed to get a good picture of this. Picture pineapple juice, vanilla yogurt, and frozen peaches and berries. SO good).

Also in the fruit category, the OTHER Erin (one of our site supervisors and a seriously awesome “boss”) made fruit salad, which was served in Erin and Carolyn’s awesome bowl which I call The Giant Mug.

 

Everyone else went out to get ingredients and made their dishes the night of. Since Erin and Carolyn’s kitchen is… I’m gonna say less than 50 square feet, it was rawther crowded and supremely sweaty.

I, adorably, kept squeezing in to take pictures. GOD I am annoying.

Carolyn made hashbrowns.

To be more accurate, I’m going to say Carolyn made some butter with a side of potatoes and onions.

Carolyn does extraordinary things with potatoes. Typically, I ask her to marry me at various points throughout these potlucks. This week, it was right around now:

They were really, really, REALLY good.

Meanwhile, Steve was whippin’ up some awesome huevos rancheros (shown here mid process, with the all-important cheese being sprinkled on).

Steve is great because he loves Sriracha as much as I do. There was no Sriracha scrimping.

They were REALLY good.

My contribution came from my freezer- Cooking Light’s freezer cinnamon fruit rolls. Nice, although I did a blend of regular and oat flour and I think the whole wheat weight meant they didn’t expand as much.

But they sure tasted good!

However, it was pretty unanimously agreed upon that the big hit of the evening was Kyle’s CREPES.

It began with a legit Family Recipe, which included eggs, flour, and the apparently untraditional ingredient of powdered sugar.

    

Kyle had mentioned early in training that he was into cooking and had actually thought about culinary school but then hadn’t mentioned much since then (I mean, Kyle just doesn’t talk that much. Unless he’s quoting Wedding Crashers, his preferred method of communication).

But man. Put him in front of a stove and it is seriously impressive.

Batter was whisked. Pan was buttered. Batter was ladled into hot pan. Batter was swirled.

It was masterful to behold.

Kyle: “Want to give one of these a try?”
Me: “… Yes?”

I ladled. I swirled. I watched.

Me: “May I be vulnerable for a moment?”
Kyle: “… Yes?”
Me: “I am not a confident pancake flipper.”

However, CREPES ARE EASIER! THEY REALLY ARE! They’re so thin that by the time the bottom is cooked, the top is almost cooked too.

The easiest thing apparently is to just stick a spatula under an edge, then peel it up with your fingers to look underneath. If it’s browning nicely, stick the whole spatula underneath and it’s pleasantly firm and flips beautifully.

Here is my creation:

Yay beautiful crepe!

We ended up just doing a fill-your-own affair. Kyle demonstrated the ham and cheese:

I decided to just pile some of the fruit salad on top of mine, which was SCRUMPSH. Later on I had one with cheese and the powdered sugar in the batter *totally* worked with the Swiss. GOD those crepes were good.

It was a seriously good meal.This is only a fraction of what I ate.

Will be trying to eat some vegetables for the next few days :D