Christmas Poke Cake

Wild Butters: You'll Hide Them Away

When I was introduced to the incredible nut butters of Wild Squirrel, I had no idea that the two founders of the company--Erika and Keeley--would go on to launch successful bids on both the ABC program Shark Tank as well as on Kickstarter. When I contacted them to let them know that several foodies had told me they had developed serious addictions to their product, they sent me a batch of them personally and promptly got me addicted as well.

The products are now known as Wild Friends Nut Butters, but they are just as good. In a recent sampling, the group particularly liked the Cinnamon Raisin, which makes a bagel (yes, even a Cinnamon Raisin bagel) even better. The Vanilla Espresso, the Honey Pretzel, and the Chocolate Coconut make yogurt parfaits richer and can even be eaten straight from the jar when the mean reds or the throbbing blues hit you.

Wild Squirrel products are available on Amazon (and well-priced) and you can also order directly from the company at  http://wildfriendsfoods.com/

Wild Friends now offers single-serving packets and a new flavor, Sesame Cranberry, which I'm anxious to try.

On the Facebook page for Intrepid Foodie, I'll be offering some testimonials from the foodies, so you can get a clearer idea of how unique these products are.

For the record, here is a photograph of Erika and Keeley, the two University of Oregon students who dreamed up these butters.

And here's their story:

This all began one dreary Sunday at the University of Oregon. The two of us were in our college apartment, scraping the bottom of yet another jar of peanut butter. With no more peanut butter and a surplus of celery, we were faced with a familiar conundrum. However, neither of us wanted to ride our bike in the pouring rain to the store to buy more.

Luckily, we had a bag of raw peanuts, a brand new food processor, and two squirrelly little minds. It didn’t take long before we had created our first batch of homemade peanut butter. However, as creative chefs, we were not content with leaving our freshly made peanut butter to be just plain or crunchy. So we set to adding every conceivable ingredient from our pantry. We sprinkled in cinnamon, raisins, chocolate chips, coffee, coconut… the list went on and on.

After extensive sampling, we decided our product was simply too good to keep to ourselves, so we brought a few jars over to our friends. They loved it, and encouraged us to make a website to sell our tasty creations.

A few days after making our website, we discovered that talkative and enthusiastic friends make word of mouth a powerful marketing tool! We were immediately kept busy with constant orders from friends, family, and fellow students.

We launched in local grocery stores in November, and almost a year later we are in over 150 stores and growing every day!

We have big dreams for our little company. Check out our blog, listen to our podcast, or follow Wild Friends Nut Butter on Facebook or Twitter to see what’s happening next!

Tell the Intrepid Foodie how you like the butters.

The Karo Kid Was No Friend of Mine

But this is a killer recipe. Serve with chilled Coca-Colas into which have been poured salted peanuts.

Comatose Cakes with the Delectable Carrie Nye

Gorgeous Carrie Nye, enjoying yogurt and a cigarette, in The Group (1966).

Carrie Nye was a talented actress, seeped in the Delta of Mississippi, carved to perfection at Stephens College and the Yale School of Drama, and marinated in the city of Manhattan, which she ruled with great style.

To be in her company was to hear many stories, all told in that voice that was inevitably compared to Tallulah Bankhead, and to be educated--on the proper manner of making biscuits; on the ideal venue for mail-order ham; how to sneak cigarettes into the Metropolitan Opera; where to eat the best lamb with the perfect mint jelly (it was the Hotel Carlyle, where I worked, and Carrie would lure me from my post to join her).

Carrie and I had a dream of writing cookbooks that would address the concerns that faced us: cooking while intoxicated and cooking for friends who belonged to a religion that had some seriously finicky requirements. We had an epiphany.

The first cookbook we tried and discarded combined elements of classic Jewish cooking with Chinese cooking tips passed to Carrie by her friend Craig Claiborne of the New York Times. We were going to call it "The Dharma of Derma," but we never collected more than eight or nine recipes (and fewer takers of our cooked items). We then looked downward, so to speak, and decided to find a way to bring all that we knew of Cajun cuisine and combine it with the high standards and historical offerings of Joan Nathan: We were going to call it "Jew with a Roux," but editors thought it was a humor book. Carrie Nye was not amused, even though the copy was hilarious. Nonetheless, our Kosher Gumbo is pretty damned good.

The book to which we always returned--both in spirit and consumed by spirits--was "Cooking For One While Drunk," which we then modified to "Cooking While Drunk," and it was full of recipes, created by us and sent to us by others, that one could make while under the influence. We categorized the recipes not by degree of difficulty, as Gourmet magazine liked to do: We categorized ours by degree of intoxication: Mildly Drunk; Seriously Sloshed; Jolly Juiced; Comatose.

I had found a recipe for Caramel Custard from the Asphodel Plantation that was deceptively easy and remarkably delicious, and that was our second entry. (Our first was the Air Sandwich, which was for the Seriously Sloshed and the Comatose, and was simply two pieces of bread slapped together---but not too loud.)

One of our favorite recipes is the Lemon-Lime Ice Box Cake, which is delicious, easy, and very calming to those who awake and need the sugar and the carbs that take the edge off of a night on the town. Carrie and I also loved that it required items from the cupboard that reminded us of our own childhoods: Jell-O, Dream Whip.

This recipe was concocted in my kitchen and in Carrie's hell-red kitchen that boasted a fake Blackglama ad featuring her face and body. (It had been used in an episode of Hart to Hart, in which she starred.)

It works every time, but I would suggest that the first time you try this, you be only Mildly Drunk. These things take time.

Lemon-Lime Ice Box Cake

Lemon cake mix

1 small box lime Jell-O

1 cup hot water

1 small package instant Jell-O lemon pudding

1 package Dream Whip

1 cup cold milk

Prepare lemon cake according to directions on box, then let cool. Gently poke holes all over the top of the cake with the end of a wooden spoon. Mix lime Jell-O with one cup of hot water and pour evenly all over cake.

Have a cigarette or another gin-and-tonic.

Mix one small package instant Jell-O lemon pudding with one package of Dream Whip and one cup of cold milk. Mix in mixer until thick. (By hand is best. You can use a mixer, but don't use a Cuisinart: It wakes up the house and can destroy your mix.) Spread this over cake like icing. Chill. Watch a movie like Notorious with Cary Grant and Ingrid Bergman while sipping a pitcher of Sangria.

Serve.

This is also very good for a hangover breakfast. Or any breakfast. Or any time, for that matter. 

When poking your cake, you may be tempted to take out your hostilities. Don't: It will mar the cake, and then where will you be? Take out your hostilities on the least attractive of your house guests--never on the food.

Granola: The Sweet Staff of Life

Many of my friends share an addiction--to granola. They serve it over yogurt; they pour it into batters; they eat by the fistful. Granola is used as a dessert, as comfort food, as energy for an athletic event.

A survey was commissioned last fall by my publisher, and we asked over 500 foodies about granola (among other things), and I'm going to be trying all of them, and writing about them.

Do you have a favorite granola? Do you have a favorite means of using it?

Let me know at intrepidfoodienyc@gmail.com.

We can lick this addiction together.