It’s Impossible Not To Love Mission: Food

Posted by Correen in Articles, Interviews | 7 comments

From her love of cardamom to gerbera daisy and lots of points in between my instant connection to what Victoria is doing over at her blog, Mission: Food, made lots more sense. I’m ever grateful to Priscilla from She’s Cookin’ for hookin’ us up! I ask each of the bloggers to try to keep their answers 3 to 6 sentences, when Victoria returned her’s she said, “I can be a bit verbose on occasion, but I tried to wrangle it in”, I’m totally fine with that, read on and you will be too.

Love, love your bread pudding club and as you say, it is so versatile. Talk to us about your delicious mission. Out of the entries you have received can you pick your top three favorites?

Oh, bread pudding. How do I love thee? Let me count the ways… I love that bread pudding takes something unusable (stale, leftover bread) and makes it delicious, luscious, and comforting. I love that given its basic components (bread, eggs, and dairy), it’s pretty cheap to put together, and can literally be transformed into any flavor profile you want! I’ve made bread pudding with everything from beets to purple sweet potatoes. My goal is to take this classic dessert and give it a modern revival (kind of like cupcakes and pies have seen in recent years). Some of my favorite contributions from other readers thus far include Foodiva’s Vanilla Rooibos with Coconut and Macadamia Bread Pudding and White Chocolate Cream Sauce and her Hot Buttered Molasses Bread Pudding Muffins, along with Cinnamon Spice and Everything Nice’s Cinnamon Raisin Bagel French Toast Bread Pudding.

Who is Victoria from Mission: Food?

Victoria is a dreamer. She has always marched to the beat of her own drummer. Outside of the foodie world, she loves sharks, traveling, gerbera daisies, Disney everything, pigs, film (some favorites include Jaws, The Godfather Parts 1 and 2, Amadeus, and anything by Scorsese, Hitchcock, or David Lynch), and her adorable 2 1/2 year old nephew

Interesting that you spotlight tea in your Tea’s Me series. I have lots and lots of supersweet memories of tea with my grandma’s. What is it about tea that you love the most?

Well first of all, I’m always amazed that all these different kinds of tea come from one type of leaf. The only thing that makes them different is that they are picked from different places, at different stages of growth, and treated differently after they’ve been picked. Even wine comes from different varieties of grapes, but all kinds of tea come from the same type of plant! What I enjoy the most is the experience of kicking back with a cup of tea, either alone or with company, and just enjoying the fragrance and flavor of this wonderful and healthy beverage. I grew up drinking tea as well, and there’s definitely a comfort factor there. I wish more people would trade in their coffee for tea!

What a proud moment…to produce and post your first video. Watching it for the first time I thought wow! that gal is a natural. Tell us about the experience, from start to finish.

Thank you so much! I had wanted to do a video for a while, but finding the time to make one, and someone to record it for me, always seemed like a challenge. When I first made the Tipsy Cherry Scones, we were all so impressed by them that I knew this should be the topic of my first video. They were THAT good! About a week later, I asked my sister to tape it for me, and I mise en placed all of my ingredients and was ready to make the scones on camera. I was very nervous, though, because if I messed anything up I wouldn’t have another take to get it right! We only had one camera angle and one set of ingredients prepped. Fortunately it came out well, and I’m hoping in the future to make more videos, and maybe even get more angles. I love being in front of the camera and would be thrilled if I got my own show someday too!

Pick one herb or spice and talk to us about the funky cool aspects and why we should use it in our kitchen.

One of my favorite spices is cardamom! Did you know that cardamom is the third most expensive spice in the world, after saffron and vanilla? It needs to be hand-picked and is referred to as “queen of the spices” in India. Regardless of its price, I love it for both sweet and savory uses (it’s great when a single spice has such versatility). It is a frequent component of spice mixtures such as garam masala and ras el hanout. It’s great with various fruits such as mangoes, peaches, and apples, like in this simple apple crostata or with sweet potatoes as I’ve done in my purple sweet potato bread pudding with cardamom whipped cream. It’s used a lot in Indian cuisine both on its own and as part of spice mixtures. Explore this spice and introduce it to your kitchen if you haven’t already!

Mission: Food is a testament to its tagline, “nothing is impossible.” An exploration of Victoria’s culinary adventures in and out of the kitchen, every day is a learning experience where Victoria pushes herself to try new things, be creative, fearless, and live and love every day one meal at a time.

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