What's He Cooking Now? ...and other stuff

Another update....sharing some news

2010-11-24T14:26:00.003-05:00

With one week left to go in the Weight Management class, we had a walk today since many people were off in preparation for the Thanksgiving holiday. Prior to the walk we were able to weigh in and give an update on the number of days that we worked out this week. I weighed in and was very happy with the number.

It wasn't until about midway through the walk that I realized just how much I've lost in these past 10 weeks. I'm officially down 20 lbs. Yup....20 freakin pounds. I'm pretty damned proud of myself too.

That's all for now. I'm going to be working out tomorrow morning and enjoying my Thanksgiving meal. Then back to watching what I'm eating and working out regularly over the weekend. One more week to go with this class. I'm so glad that I took the step and committed to this.

Update...no products

2010-11-22T10:47:00.003-05:00

I wanted to post a quick update on how the weight loss is coming along. Things are going in the right direction. This weight management class I've been attending is close to wrapping up and I have to say that I am very happy that I took part in it. I've known what I should and should not be doing for a while now, but this was the right push that I needed.

As of last week, I was down 17 pounds. I'm hoping for 3 more by next Wednesday, but if it doesn't happen, I'm quite alright with what I've accomplished. Everything just feels better (well, except for my feet which haven't seen this much running in years). Next Wednesday I will get my body fat and some circumference measurements taken which will really show me how much progress I've made.

I'm not sure how much I mentioned it before, but a big part of this class was food logging. That is, to write down everything that you eat and drink. It was really important for me to do because it made me accountable for how many calories I was consuming in a day. Also it was handy to use as a check that I am getting a well balanced supply of food (grains, veggies, fruits, milk, protein, etc). It's easy to forget some of these categories but its important that you keep them in your meals. Since the class is almost over and I don't see myself food logging for the rest of my life, I'm taking the last two weeks off. I'm still being mindful of what and how much I'm eating, I'm just not writing it down. So far I'm doing well. If I need to manage what I'm doing more stringently in the future, its a tool that I will go back to.

Speaking of tools, I wanted to mention the Panera website. I'm not sure how many of you eat at Panera, but I love the place. The only problem is that some of their products sound like they would be smart choices for someone watching their weight, but in reality they are not. This is where the website (and their new menus) come in handy. You can see the calorie count for just about everything they offer. In the store, the majority of the menu has the calories shown but online you can see everything (including the bakery). Its really useful and I encourage you to take a look at it and use it as needed.

Last week a few coworkers wanted to run out to Panera for coffee and a pastry (since many of us had a free one on our Panera Card). Prior to heading out, I looked over the website nutritional page and picked out a pastry that was lower in calories than most of the rest. Now, some might say, just don't have the pastry if you are watching calories... I somewhat agree, but also, don't restrict yourself so much that don't have a treat once in a while. Its good for the mind (even if not great for the body). I picked out a muffie (one of the muffin tops) which is about half the calories of the full muffin. I ate the whole thing found it to be quite satisfying. I know if I had gotten the whole muffin and cut it in half, I would have been satisfied and probably would have eaten the other half later in the day.

So, I guess the important thing I want to say is to use the tools out there to help you make decisions on what to eat and to keep track of what you are eating. Honestly, it helps.

Sometimes you need a pick-me-up....the 200 cal Pumpkin Spice Latte

2010-10-22T20:44:00.003-04:00

I was out running some errands tonight (mostly going to Trader Joes...more on that over the course of the week) and was just feeling kind of blah. Eating healthier is great; and I'm seeing and feeling the changes with my body, but it can also be a bit of a downer emotionally. Sure, its great to know that I've lost weight but I also miss some of the comfort foods that I haven't had in a month. I know...everything in moderation...but for now, having foods like ice cream and pasta or pizza would not be good for me. Someday I'll get back to them with a new mindset.

So, enough about that. Like I was saying, I was out running errands and feeling kind of blah when I remembered that I saw on the Starbucks website that there is a way to have a 200 calorie Pumpkin Spice Latte. For those of you who know me, you know that I love pretty much anything pumpkin and definitely love a pumpkin spice latte. It's practically a sign of Fall for me. In past years, I'd have one of these a week if not more often. Since I've been watching what I'm eating and drinking more closely I thought that this seasonal delight was off the menu.

But, that is not the case! According to the Starbucks Website, there is a way to make it happen. Now, this isn't something to do every day, but it is a nice treat once in a while. If you get a Tall made with skim milk and leave off the whipped cream the drink is only 200 calories. And, to be honest, I don't miss the whole milk or the whipped cream. The drink is just that good.

I finished the latte on my drive home and am feeling better. Its amazing how food can mess with our mental state as much as it can, but that's something to discussed on another post I think.

So, as a once in a while treat, its well worth the calories.

Update and New Product Discussion (Archer Farms Freeze Dried Strawberries)

2010-10-21T08:54:00.002-04:00

Like I said in my earlier post, I plan to keep up this blog with discussion on how my weight loss / getting in shape is coming along. At this week's weigh in, I was down another 2.5 lbs. I'm very happy with this number as it's around what is recommended for healthy reduction in weight. I'm pretty sure that I'm also building up some muscle mass but I won't know for certain until I have a body fat text next week.

When I started this, I had one of the trainers at the gym measure my body fat and take circumference measurements around my arms, chest, waist, and thigh. Next Wednesday will be 5 weeks so I figured it would be a good time for an update. I know that the waist and thigh sizes went down since I've been able to wear some jeans that were put away a few months ago for being too small. Major Win there!

So, onto new product discussion... I wish I had a picture but I forgot to take one before I threw out the package and I can't find one online. Google and the Target website aren't helping either. Anyway, these are just what they claim to be...freeze dried strawberries. The only thing listed on the ingredient list is strawberries so there are no extra chemicals or preservatives and no added sugar. They advertise the bag as 1 serving but I've been splitting it up among bowls of oatmeal, cups of yogurt, and a snack right out of the bag. The whole bag has only 90 calories and covers 3 servings for fruit (for those keeping track with the food pyramid daily intake recommendations).

I think the bag costs around $2.50 so it is a bit on the high side for its weight but I think its worth it. The strawberries retain their sweetness and color and will be a great way to add fruit to dishes in the middle of winter when the stuff at the grocery store tastes pretty bland. If you are trying to find it, the Target stores in my area have it located with the bags of trail mix.

No new food to report...mostly

2010-10-17T12:39:00.002-04:00

So, as I've been told by some of my friends, I haven't updated this blog in quite some time. To be honest, I haven't been cooking much stuff that I find really inspirational and worth posting. And there is a bit of a reason why I haven't been making things like that. If you look over the blog, there are a fair number of desserts or at least not overly healthy things. That's what I really enjoy making. Unfortunately, my body doesn't agree that these are what I should be eating. It took some time, but I finally admitted to myself that I should agree.

So I've been working out much more lately and being more mindful of what I'm eating (and most importantly how much I'm eating). I've been recording everything I eaten for the past 4 weeks and it has really been an eye opener on just how much I've been overeating. Now, I'm not starving myself nor denying myself anything, but I'm just having less. I've lost some weight which is great, but what's even better is that I feel better.

I'm going to continue with the food diary for at least another 6 weeks and see how things are looking then. I hope to maintain this blog a bit more over that time. It will be good for me to share my progress and talk about how things are going.

As the title said, I did want to mention at least something food related. In this month's issue of Everyday Food there is a recipe for Roasted Chicken and Butternut Squash Soup.

The first time I made it, I followed the recipe and it turned out wonderful. For the second batch, I added a roasted red pepper to mix and blended that up to add to the soup. It was a welcome addition. One of the great things about this soup (and most soups) is that its only around 200 calories for a 2 cup serving. Its also very hearty so you feel pretty full after eating it. Oh, and its pretty cheap to make since it uses bone in chicken thighs which are usually low prices and butternnut squash which is in season right now.

Grilled Pork Tenderloin

2010-03-12T12:57:00.002-05:00

No picture for this one. It wasn't overly attractive anyway, since it was just a salt and peppered grilled loin. It sure did taste great though.

Last night was about the first real nice evening we've had here in a long while. I had pork tenderloin that needed to be cooked. I couldn't resist grilling it. I wasn't feeling creative so I just dried off the tenderloin with some paper towels and salt and peppered the outside. I heated up the grill for a while under a medium high flame. After a quick scrape and an oiling of grates I put on the tenderloin and walked away for 30 minutes. After 30, I turned the tenderloin over and gave it another 10 minutes to cook.

I let it rest for a little while under foil and then sliced and ate. I probably should have made some side dish and made it into an actual meal but instead just ate the pork by itself. It was delicious.

Chicken Parmesan

2010-03-02T21:55:00.003-05:00

I was reminded that I haven't been posting on this blog in a long time (okay, 2 years) and that I should start again (thank you Justin). With that said, I present Chicken Parmesan. It was sort of a request. I think the actual request was for chicken fingers but I consider that more of a summery meal and not some hearty for winter so I decided that I would make chicken parmesan instead.

I started things the night before when I made the sauce. The sauce is one that was listed in Americas Test Kitchen magazine for a Chicago Style Deep Dish Pizza (which is worth making by the way, it was great). Its a really simple sauce consisting of onions, garlic, canned tomatoes, olive oil, basil, and a few extra basics. I was really amazed to the amount of flavor so such basic ingredients. After making the pizza I decided that this was my replacement for jarred pasta sauce. So when I decided to make chicken parmesan I went with this. This evening I just reheated the sauce from the day before. I wonder how well this sauce would freeze. I could see myself making a big batch of it and then freezing in smaller portions and using as needed.........

So today I flattened some chicken and breaded it using a basic flour, egg, breading method. For the breading I used some fresh garlic croutons that I ground in the food processor with some parmesan cheese. Once all the chicken was breaded I fried the pieces in some oil and then put them on a baking sheet in a heated oven. When all the chicken was in the oven, I ladled some sauce on each piece and put a piece of mozzarella cheese on top and let them sit in the oven a bit longer. This allowed the cheese to melt nicely.

To finish the meal I cooked off some spaghetti and made a simple salad with a balsamic vinaigrette (which is super easy to do, some day I will post my thoughts on vinaigrettes). And the picture above is what the final plate looked like. If there are any questions or requests for specifics on any portion of the dish, please comment.

Garden Fresh Corn

2009-08-24T21:07:00.003-04:00

My parents recently visited and brought some corn fresh from their garden. This evening was a "getting stuff done" kind of night so dinner was a mix of stuff here and there. Before I headed out to mow the lawn I was looking for a snack from the refrigerator and saw the corn. I decided to clean a few ears and quickly boil them. With a pot of water, a little salt, and about 10 minutes I had 3 ears of cooked garden fresh corn. I let it cool a little bit then ate it all. It was sweet, but not overly sweet and had a nice clean fresh taste. I still have a few ears and I plan on making something more substantial with them tomorrow night. I'll post the results.

Major Cooking Weekend

2007-11-05T13:34:00.000-05:00

Sorry, no pictures for this post, just lots of info on what I made this weekend.

Lets start with the Krispy Kreme Doughnut Bread Pudding. The recipe is available at Food Network, here. On Halloween, I helped run a charity event at work and we had some left over doughnuts so I took the box home with the plans of making the bread pudding. The doughnuts got a bit dry but I don't think that was any problem. The bread pudding is super simple, you just mix fruit cocktail with sweetened condensed milk then soak the doughnuts in that mixture. It all gets baked at 350 for an hour. There is also a rum sauce mentioned in the recipe, I didn't make that this time. All and all, it was super simple, tasted good, and was easy to make. Worth making again.

Next up is homemade apple butter. I would have never thought this would be so easy. My dad passed along the recipe to me, courtesy of the Akron Beacon Journal. The article and recipe are here. Since the article made it sound so easy, I had to give it a try. The only necessary equipment is a slow cooker (I have 2 sizes and I found the smaller one to be the perfect size for 1 batch). To begin, get 5 lbs of granny smith apples (you could probably substitute another variety as long as it is firm and tart) and peel and dice them. The size of the dice is up to you depending on how chunky you like your apple butter, bigger dices make chunkier butter. Put the apple pieces in the slow cooker and cover with 2 cups of granulated sugar and 1.5 teaspoons of cinnamon (you can adjust this depending on your taste for cinnamon). Turn on the slow cooker to low, put on the lid, and walk away for 10 hours (or if you are doing this late at night, go to bed). 10 hours later, come back the slow cooker and remove the lid; let the apples continue to cook for another hour; do no change the temperature, do not stir, just take off the lid and walk away for an hour. 1 hour later, come back to the pot and stir the apples. Once stirred, let them continue to cook for about another hour. Once the last hour is up, turn off the apple butter and let it cook. You are done. Yup, its that simple. The recipe is pretty spot on as to how much it makes, I got just about 6 cups of apple butter from my batch. If you like apple butter, give this a shot.

Up next is something that didn't quite turn out. A friend had told me about a sauce for meatballs (like when you are going to be serving them for a snack at a party). He said to mix equal amounts of Coca Cola and Grape Jelly with the meatballs and let them cook in the crock pot. I was a bit skeptical to try this one, it just seemed too odd, but I had picked up a bag of meatballs at the grocery store that morning and figured I would give it shot. Maybe I did something wrong, but I didn't find them all that good. The soda made for way too much liquid and meatballs got kind of soggy. Plus the grape jelly and the soda combined made the sauce too sweet for my tastes.

I also experimented with 2 different bar cookie recipes. I am trying to figure out what I will be making this year as gifts so I'm starting early and trying out new recipes. Both of these came from a cookbook that has "dessert in a jar" type recipes. Basically its one of those layer all the dry ingredients in the jar, then all the gift recipient has to do is add a few ingredients and bake. Both of these looks pretty simple on the recipient end, all that was needed was sweetened condensed milk. They were similar recipes, both had graham cracker crumbs, chocolate chips, nuts, coconut, and one had raisins. Each came out alright, but there was nothing that great about either one. I will continue looking for another thing to give.

And lastly, I got a great deal on some fresh basil. I used it to make a oil based dipping sauce for bread and pesto. I haven't tried either one yet, that's on the agenda for tonight. If they taste good, I will post an update letting everyone know what went in them.

If you have any questions about what was mentioned in this post, leave a comment or send me an email.

Lack of Inspiration

2007-10-19T14:55:00.000-04:00

Lately I've been in a slump. I haven't been cooking or baking all that much and the stuff I have been making hasn't been all that exciting. I think I'm lacking inspiration.

This was discussed while having dinner last night with a very long-time friend at Bonefish Grill. The final decision of the evening was that I should post a request to those who visit my site to submit ideas. It could be anywhere from a new recipe you are afraid to try, an idea for a recipe that you want to know if it will work, or to a review of something on the commercial market. I'm open to suggestions.

So, leave a comment, even an anonymous one, and let me know what you want to see posted here next.

Transformers Custom: Metrotitan

2007-08-09T18:49:00.001-04:00

Here is my first real custom figure, Metrotitan. A while back I was able to pick up an extra Cybertron Metroplex on clearance for $15. Since Metrotitan was a repaint of Metroplex back in the day, I wanted to do a similar repaint for this version. I know it isn't exactly like the original, but Cybertron Metroplex wasn't all that much like the original either. I tried to keep the basic colors, making sure that the head and arms were red, but knew that I wouldn't be able to keep everything the same. I still need to get some Decepticon stickers for him because right now he doesn't look all that much like a bad guy.

Let me know what you think.

Transformers Collection

2007-07-09T17:35:00.000-04:00

I know this is very off topic, but some people wanted to see my Transformers Collection so I decided to do a post here about it. This also allows me to put in lots of pictures. I will try my best to give a basic overview of what is in each picture. You can also click on the picture to see a larger copy.

Here is the best overview shot of the collection. Most everything is on these bookshelves or in the cases.

This is the view of the other side of the room. There is another IKEA case along with a table and a shelf that mostly holds Alternators.

Another overview shot.

This is the "Axalon" ship that I built last year for the Botcon Art Contest. On it are the pre-Beast Wars figures. Behind are the Transformers Race Track and the Hard Hero Unicron statue.

On these shelves are some Cybertron figures where I was trying to make a scene similar to how the series ended with supersized Starscream and his minions against the smaller Autobots. Below that are some Convention/Club Exclusives. There are some reissue Beast Wars figures on the top on the right. All my minicons are mostly here on these risers. Below the minicons are some Energon figures.

These shelves have the rest of the Energon line along with all of the Beast type figures. These includes Beasts from Beast Wars, Beast Machines, and Robots In Disguise.

These shelves have all of my Universe figures. I think I have mostly all of the figures released under Universe except for a few. I also have some still in their package which are not pictured.

Here is Armada and some larger figures. There is Unicron, Primus, Masterpiece Prime, and Galaxy Force Prime.

Here is my G1 Reissue collection.

The left side case is my G1 collection, the right is Cybertron.

Same as above, G1 on left, Cybertron on right.

Here are the Alternators along with some Titaniums and some Gobots are on the end.

These are my Classics Decepticons. These include this year's Botcon exclusives.

Here are the Classics Autobots. Alpha Trion is hopefully coming soon.

Movie Autobots. Not many here yet, I'm sure this will fill up soon.

Movie Decepticons. Same story as above, I know this shelf will fill up fast.

Here are my statues and busts. In the back are the Rhinox statue and the Insecticon statues. Also there is a Energon Ultra Magnus up there.

Nothing too exciting up here other than Unicron with some minicons around him.

Here is a store display spinner where I have some more minicons and most of the Legends of Cybertron figures. Cybertron Cryoscourge looks over them.

And thats about it. Thanks for looking.

Summer Fruit Tart

2007-07-08T10:52:00.001-04:00

This is a long overdue post. I made this tart back over Memorial Day for a cookout.

It's easy to make and was very well liked.

The base is store bought, ready to bake, sugar cookies. You just press the dough evenly into the bottom of a pan. I would suggest lining the pan with parchment paper so that its easier to remove. When baking the base, drop the suggested over temperature down about 15-20 degrees and let the cookie crust bake longer (another 5 minutes or so).

Once the base is done, let it fully cool. While it is cooling, mix a small package of instant cream cheese pudding with a pint of sour cream. Spread this mixture over the cooled crust. Then just top the tart with sliced fruit of your choice. I used strawberries, kiwi, blackberries, and red raspberries.

Its simple, quick, and makes a great summer dessert.

Review: Tostitos Flour Tortilla Chips

2007-04-16T14:32:00.000-04:00

One day last week I was running through Walmart and saw these on an endcap. I had heard about them and was interested in trying them so I picked up a bag. I believe they were $3, which I did find to be on the high side, since the bag is rather small.

The chips are also on the small side compared to what I consider regular tortilla chips. They are also considerably thicker. On the first bite I was certain that I had just wasted $3. Something didn't seem right. However, I couldn't resist eating another chip. Still, something seemed off. After finishing off a handful of chips I figured it out. These are not your regular tortilla chips.

They are alright on their own as a snack but I think these would be best used as a dipping chip. They are on the thick side and would not break under heavy dips. They are different and take some getting used to; but all and all they are pretty good.

Another thing that surprised me is that they are nearly identical to the Restaurant Style Tostitos in terms of nutritional stats. They have the same serving size, calories, fat, carbs, and protein which is odd since the Flour Tortilla Chips have a whole lot more ingredients.

Unless you want a chip thats significantly different than the standard tortilla chip, I would pass on these. Sorry Tostitos, they're alright, but not up my alley.

Holiday Foods

2007-02-04T18:48:00.000-05:00

Here are a few pictures of things I made over the holidays. I'm not going to go into much detail here, but I wanted to get these posted. If you have any questions about the stuff listed, leave a comment and I'll add more. Oh, and you can click on the picture to see it better.

Chocolate Streudle: I had some thick philo dough that had to get used so I made this. It was a bit crunchier than I would have liked. Great flavor.

Baklava: Great as always. This one I did on my own. The filling was walnuts I believe. I did make too much syrup so they were a bit stickier than usual.

Assorted Candies: Peppermint Bark, Chocolate Chews, Caramels, Chocolates, and Cashew Coconut Brittle: These were given out as Christmas gifts. This was the first time I made candies such as these. The peppermint bark and the brittle went over the best. I've been asked to make more brittle next year.

Fig and Walnut Tart: I saw this in a magazine and thought I would give it a try. It was good, a bit time consuming though. Everything was made from scratch. In the future, I would use the crust again but would pass on the figs and walnuts. Figs still are not my thing.

And I'm Back....Presenting Gingerbread Man-Cake

2007-01-31T10:57:00.001-05:00

Alright, I want to begin by apologizing for the lack of updates over the past month. Its been a busy time and I haven't done much creative cooking, thus I wasn't inspired to post. But now I'm back, and hopefully back to a more regular posting schedule. So I'm beginning today with what one of my coworkers called Gingerbread Man-Cake. She said that tasted like gingerbread and was thick and dense, hence the gingerbread and the man portions of the name. Actually, everyone who had some, thought that it was a type of gingerbread, even though it wasn't.

This all began with my wanting to bake something so I looked through the "baking" cupboard (I keep all my baking related ingredients in one cupboard) and found that I had 2 spice cake box mixes. I made that my starting point. I then assembled the other ingredients (see picture below).
It might be hard to see everything, so let me go through the list quickly. There are eggs, oil, cocoa, nutmeg, butterscotch chips, and chocolate chips. And I also used some water (about a cup I believe). I baked the cake in the tart pan seen the picture. The bottom lifts out; which was really good since the chips sunk to the bottom of the cake and stuck to the pan a little.

I sort of followed the directions for the cake mix. I put in the 3 eggs it called for and put in about 1/3 cup of oil. I say about since I just eyeballed it. If you've read my blog, you know my stance on box cake mixes, they are about impossible to mess up. I then added some water to thin down the batter and put in about a 1/2 teaspoon of ground nutmeg and probably 2 tablespoons of cocoa. The consistency was about right for a standard cake batter at this point so I stirred in the chips (which together were probably 1 and 1/2 cups worth).

Since I was using a very shallow pan and the batter almost filled it fully, I reduced my baking temperature to 320 F. It took significantly longer to bake, but it stayed relatively thin (it did rise above the pan but not by a great deal).

After it had cooled I cut the cake into wedges and put it on a tray that I took to work the next day. The cake went pretty quickly (and I noticed a few people going back for seconds).

Here is the final result:One note, I should have taken the picture in a different location. The background of the table is too close in color to the cake. Oh well.

And many cookies were made.....

2006-12-13T20:05:00.000-05:00

There is the assortment of cookies that I took to work this past Monday. Over the weekend my family and I made all of these treats. I helped with the making of many (except for the peanut butter and chocolate fudge which were made by my brother). I don't have pictures of every cookie, but here is a quick run down of what was made.

Cinnamon/Cherry Swirl Chip Cookies: Top of right side tray: My aunt made these before the rest of us made it to her house so I'm not sure of the name of these cookies or what all went in them, but they look nice and tasted good.

Peanut Butter Cookies (with Hershey's Kisses): The batter for these was also already made by the time we arrived, they followed the standard recipe.

Chocolate Graham Walnut Scotchies: Bottom of right tray: There were supposed to be oatmeal pecan scotchies, but after I already started making the batter I found out that my aunt did not have any oatmeal. After looking through her supplies I found a box of chocolate teddy grahams and figured that I could use those. I ground them up and put them in to replace the oats. Then since I had already changed the recipe and a lot of walnuts had already been chopped, I opted to use walnuts instead of pecans. Other than those changes, I pretty much followed the recipe. The chocolate flavor is very mild, the main flavor you taste is butterscotch.

Sugar Cutouts: My brother made the dough for these cookies a few weeks ago and froze it. It thawed nicely and was easy to roll out. My mom and grandmother did about all of the work on these, I only made the icing. I found a nice royal icing recipe but it was too thick so we thinned it down. Then that was a little thick too so we thinned it more. We shouldn't have thinned the second time, the icing on those cookies didn't get totally firm and were still sticky. That's something I will have to remember for next time.

Chocolate Raspberry Cream Cookies: The top right side of the right tray: I don't know where my mom got these baking chips from, but apparently Hershey's makes a raspberry cream filled chocolate baking bit. We just followed the recipe on the back of the package for these ones. Here is the recipe off Hershey's site. We went with the chocolate cookie variety. The cookie itself is alright but the texture is sort of dry; however, as soon as your tongue hits one of the raspberry cream bites you'll love it.

Fudge: As I mentioned before those were made by my brother. He's always been the one to make it, so I don't even try.

Peppermint Patties: These are hard to see, but they are in the upper middle next to the sugar cookies. These are a lot like the York peppermint pattie, but homemade. I mixed together baking powder, evaporated milk, and peppermint extract to make a dough. I rolled the dough into small disks and let them dry for a few hours. Once they were dry I melted some dark chocolate and shortening. I dipped the dried peppermint disks into the chocolate and set them on wax paper to dry. They have a nice flavor, the peppermint isn't too strong and the flavor of the chocolate comes through quite well.

Baklava: I saved this one for last. Every year we make baklava, my family is not Greek (or even remotely from that area of the world), but somehow making baklava became a family tradition. As usual we make 2 big trays and this year was no exception. However, we mixed things up a little this year and made 2 different types of baklava. We made one batch with walnuts and a lemon sugar syrup glaze and the other batch was made with pecans and a honey based glaze. If you only tried one of the batches I'm certain that you would enjoy it; however if you try them both, the pecan batch was the better of the two. Another interesting thing I wanted to mention about this year's baklava was that the philo dough (the very thin sheets of dough that make up the top and bottom of the baklava) came from the import store at the West Side Market. Up until now we had been using the stuff in the grocery store but had a difficult time with it last year since they changed the size of the sheets. While looking around the market one day earlier this year I saw the philo dough and made a note to go back and buy it from there. That was one of the best decisions I could make. The sheets held together quite well and didn't dry out easily. They were also much more affordable than that of at the grocery store.

Well, that's it for now. This coming weekend I have plans to make some candy type treats. I'll post more on that soon. If you have any questions about any of the cookies shown in this post, please leave a comment or drop me an email.

Apple Sweet Potato Pie

2006-11-13T14:25:00.000-05:00

This is a creation that I would like to call my own (well, with a little help from my father). The idea for this pie came from a recipe card that my dad picked up at the grocery store. It was for an apple and sweet potato casserole. He gave me the recipe and suggested that I make it. From looking at the ingredients, I figured that it would make a good pie. Apple Pie is good and Sweet Potato Pie is good, so combined it should be good.

I cheated on the pie crust, using ready made; but the rest was all homemade. I'm not going to go into the whole recipe here, but if anyone is interested, drop me an email or a comment and I will give you all the details.

This pie was actually made in 2 steps because I wasn't fully happy with the result after the first baking. After the first bake, I had basically made the casserole on the recipe card, but in a pie crust. It tasted much more like a side dish than a dessert.

On the suggestion of my father (who got to taste the pie during the first step), I rebaked the pie with a cinnamon-sugar syrup. I boiled some sugar, water, cinnamon, and nutmeg until thickened and poured the syrup over the pie. I then baked the pie for another hour at 300 C so that they syrup could soak in and the sweet potato would get more tender. The result above was from after the second bake.

If you don't like sweet potatoes, you will probably not like this pie (even after the second bake). But if you like them, then this is the pie for you.

Macaroni and Cheese Showdown

2006-11-13T13:49:00.000-05:00

This year I've been asked to make macaroni and cheese for the family Thanksgiving dinner. Those who regularly read my blog know that I don't like doing things in the same old way and this side dish would be no exception. I looked over the Food Network website and found 2 promising recipes. One was from Alton Brown and the other was from the show The Best Of. As a control to my experiment to find out which was the best, I also prepared to make a box of deluxe mac and cheese.

If you look at the recipes, you can see that a lot of different cheeses are necessary. Because of this, I started my day by making a trip to the West Side Market because I knew that I would be able to get all the cheeses I needed, in the portions that I needed, at a good price.

So there are all the ingredients I used to make the 3 batches of mac and cheese. There is a whole lot of cheeses (all shredded or chopped by hand except for the bag of sharp cheeder, there is a better sharp cheeder in the green bowl), onion, bread crumbs, salt, pepper, oil, mustard powder, macaroni, and the cheese packet (I use that term loosely).

To speed things along, I boiled all of the macaroni needed for the 3 batches at the same time. It was drained from the water and set aside. I made the easy deluxe batch first which only required that I mix the stuff in the pouch with the macaroni. I put into a baking dish and topped it with buttered bread crumbs. The other two recipes were fairly simple; the only unique thing they required was that a roux be made (which is easy, just follow the directions). These were also topped with bread crumbs and baked. The Alton Brown recipe called for panko bread crumbs and the other used regular bread crumbs.

Since I was tasting the sauces while I was making them, I already had a good idea in my head as to which one I preferred. But I didn't want to be the sole decider so I had my parents sample all 3 batches. They agreed with my choice.

The winner: The Best Of.... recipe.

We all found this one to have the best flavor. It had a very smooth texture and the cheeses blended well with each other. The one from Alton Brown wasn't bad, but just not as good as the winner. So that is the one that I will be making for Thanksgiving dinner.

Home Office a.k.a. Transformers Room

2006-11-09T09:27:00.000-05:00

Here is another from the "What's He Cooking UP Files..."

For the past month or so I've been working slowly on turning a storage room in my basement into a home office. My plan is that when I eventually go to sell this house I'm currently in, I'll be able to set up this room as an office and have the 3 bedrooms upstairs all staged as true bedrooms (which should help to sell the house). In the meantime, the true office will remain upstairs and the new office in the basement will be a place where I can display my Transformers collection.

I wish I had thought to take a few before pictures. The room was a dreary dark room. There was a single light in the center of the room, dark paneling (and closet doors) and a black linoleum floor. The ceiling was tiled but was old and yellowed. Since it was in the basement and there is little opportunity for natural light, I went very light in my choices of colors for the office.

After I cleared out the room (and ripped down the old ceiling, light, and closet doors), I went to Home Depot and went into debt buying everything I would need to put the room back together. I did fairly well on buying everything in one shot. I got almost everything I needed to put a new drop ceiling, 4 new light fixtures and all the wiring needed for them, 1 gallon of paint (I ended up needing 2), new mirrored closet doors, carpet off the big rolls, and all of the bits and pieces that would also be necessary.

The ceiling is a faux drop system called Ceiling Max. It uses the same tiles that a drop ceiling would, but instead of running wires to hold up the support bars, you screw the bars into your ceiling joists. It looked really easy and if two people are working together, it probably is. I put the ceiling up on my own and found it to be a bit of a challenge to hold the pieces up while screwing them in place.

When the ceiling was about halfway completed, I took the opportunity to put in the new light fixtures. I had to take the single light fixture and break it off into 4. To do so, I put a junction box where the original light was and then wired to the new lights. They got their own light boxes at each location. After the lights were in, I finished the ceiling (after running back to Home Depot and picking up a few extra pieces of grid).

The next step was to lay out and cut the carpet. I bought just a little more than I needed to cover the room so trimming was minimal. The most difficult part was trimming around the closet opening so that the floor of the closet was also carpeted. The closet doors went up soon after and other than having to have a replacement face piece at the top sent to me since the first one was scratched as was the one still in package at the store, they went up easily.

Oh, I then went out and bought all the molding for around the windows, the closet, and the baseboards. I borrowed my Dad's portable air compressor and brad nailer so that went up easily.

I found a good deal on the bookcases online at Staples. They were $25 each and since I ordered 3, I got free shipping. They were simple to assemble and by the last one I had gotten pretty good as pounding in the small nails that hold on the back panels. The display cases used to be up in my bedroom, but since pretty much everything was coming downstairs, I moved them down too.

I had thought for a long while about what to do for a desk and eventually settled on making my own folding table. At the woodworking store they have the folding legs and I got a piece of MDF from Lowes cut to the size I wanted. After attaching the legs, I draped some fabric over the table as a temporary covering. Eventually I will either router the ends of the mdf or trim them out and then paint the table top. I still have to make curtains, but I haven't decided on what fabric I want to use yet.

So that's the room. In the end, the most time consuming part has been setting up the Transformers. I've tried to keep series together for the most part and set up a few scenes. I'm happy with how they look.

Review: Pillsbury Gingerbread Dough Sheets

2006-11-08T10:00:00.000-05:00

I was at Super Walmart this past weekend and they had these on sale for $2. I figured that for $2, I would give them a try and post the review for my readers. According to the package, you get 2 dough sheets and 2 packages of icing. You provide your own cookie cutter. It says that you should be able to make 24 2" cookies.

Here is what you get when you open the package. Since it is gingerbread, used the appropriate cutter. The suggestion on the package was that you should take the extra dough that is too small to be cut and roll into balls, roll the balls in sugar, then flatten. I followed the directions fully.

I ended up getting 22 cookies. Had I planned the cutting a little better, I probably could have gotten one more gingerbread man and I could have made the rolled cookies a little smaller which would have given me the 2 dozen that the package states.

I baked the cookies for about 10 minutes. After they were cooled, I iced the cookies using the provided packs.

The icing packs were not the easiest to work with since they are small and cutting a round opening in them isn't that easy. I probably could have done a better job on the icing but it was already 9:30 on Sunday night and I wanted them done so I could go to bed.

Now for the review. For the price and the ease, these are well worth it. Granted, you could make a dough for much less, but it makes a mess and you still have to roll it out. The cookie was a bit more on the crisp side than what I prefer, but for gingerbread, it was alright. The rolled cookies were a little thicker and a bit softer and I liked those ones better. If you are one who makes gingerbread houses or ornaments, this dough would work very well for those purposes. You would probably have to buy a couple packs to get enough dough to make a decent sized house, but I think that it would be justified just for the fact that the dough sheets are a uniform thickness.

Actually, after writing that, I think I might try my hand at making a little gingerbread house this year. I haven't made one in years and that could be something to fun to do. If I make one, I'll be sure to post pictures.

Turned Pens, Bottle Stoppers, and Keychains

2006-10-23T15:24:00.000-04:00

Here is another of the "What's he cooking up....??" type posts.

This past summer I was introduced to wood turning of the pen and bottle stopper variety. Since then, I've been making all kinds of pens, bottle stoppers, and most recently keychains. I put together a small website showing off the stuff that I have made and some suggested prices. This site only shows the pieces that I have made, I may update it soon with pictures of my Dad's pieces.

This all started when I visited the Rockler store with plans to buy a gift card for my father. They had a demo for the wood turning so I tried it out and made bottle stopper. Here is my first bottle stopper.

I then went back the next weekend and made a pen. I don't have a photo of that one to share, but I keep it on my desk at work. The following weekend I got my Dad to come up and try out turning too. He also had a great time with it.

My Dad had been talking about getting a lathe for a while now and after he made a few pens he was convinced that he should get one. For Father's Day, my Mom, brother and I went together and got him a lathe and lots of accessories.

We started turning all kinds of pens and stoppers out of wood of different types. There are endless varieties and they all look different when finished. Sometime this summer, I found of a local source for pen kits and such, Berea Hardwoods. It was there, where I found all kinds of interesting acrylic blocks for turning.

Each time I went to the Hardwoods store I found more interesting things to try. Recently, I picked up some keychains. They have regular keychains and also ones that have a whistle in them. I've only made a few keychains, but here is what they look like. One interesting note, the chrome key chain in the top middle is made out of a baked polymer clay that I mixed together. It is a black and orange swirl.

If you want to see the other pens and bottle stoppers that I've made, check out my website.

I hope this diversion from food posts was alright with my readers. I wanted to let those who know me personally see what I've really been up to when I say that I've been making pens.

50th Birthday Cake (Take 2)

2006-10-20T13:17:00.000-04:00

Yesterday another coworker of mine turned 50. To celebrate, I was asked to make another cake. Since he is a chemist, I thought a "beaker" type cake would be appropriate. And as you can see in the image, the beaker is filled up to 50.

For simplicity (and lack of time) I used a box cake mix. And as usual, I added pudding powder to the batter. The cake itself is a vanilla cake. To make the beaker shape, I used an oval cake pan and made 4 cakes. I cut the cakes in half along the longest side of the oval and stacked them against each other on the board. To help hold them together, I put a chocolate mousse between the layers. The mousse was a "just-add-milk" mix but to make it thicker, I made it with heavy cream.

The icing was my typical butter cream. If you want more info on that, check out my previous cake posts.

The green "liquid" in the beaker is decorating sugar that I poured over the icing. It set in place once the cake was put into the fridge and the icing set.

To make the numbers and the information box on the beaker, I used melted chocolate. So that I would get everything even and written out nicely, I first got a piece of wax paper and cut it to the size of the cake. I then drew the numbers and the box on the wax paper. I flipped the wax paper over and wrote out everything in chocolate backwards (well, I traced over what I wrote on the other side). Once it was starting to set, I laid the wax paper over the cake (chocolate side down) and pressed the writing into the icing. Then when the paper was peeled off, the chocolate writing remained. The lines for the beaker were done by hand on the cake, so they are not as straight as they should be.

To finish it off and cover up the edges, I put some Mike & Ike candies around the cake. I thought they kind of looked like molecules or something. Actually, they remind me of the pills from Dr. Mario but that's not important here.

As usual, the cake went over well (even if it was confused for a football field for a little while). Pretty much everyone cleaned their plates off and birthday guy took the rest home to his family. He said this morning that they really liked it.

Showdown: Coffemate Pumpkin Spice Creamer vs. International Delight Pumpkin Pie Spice Creamer

2006-10-10T09:39:00.000-04:00

While walking towards the dairy section at the grocery store I was happily surprised to see the Coffee-mate Pumpkin Spice Creamer on an aisle end cooler. It was there along with other seasonal favorites like eggnog, peppermint, and gingerbread. I wasn't concerned about those other flavors (at least not until after Halloween is over), all that mattered was that there was one single pumpkin spice creamer left. I quickly snagged it. I then wandered over towards where the rest of the coffee creamers are and I saw that International Delight also had a pumpkin creamer. So as not to infringe on the Coffee-mate name, International Delight has named their creamer Pumpkin Pie Spice.

Since I'm a sucker for all things pumpkin, I bought them both. Then I decided a comparison between the two would be a great addition to the blog.

The best way to begin the comparison is to take a look at the nutritional values:
Both bottles are 16oz. and have a serving size of 1 tablespoon.
The International Delight creamer has 45 calories per serving, Coffee-mate has 35.
The International Delight creamer has 2 grams of fat per serving, Coffee-mate has 1.5.
The International Delight creamer has 7 carbs per serving, Coffee-mate has 5.
On a nutritional value standpoint, Coffee-mate wins out.

Now, I'll take a look at taste: I did my best to make my cup of coffee be the same for each serving (same type of coffee, same concentration, same amount of sugar, same amount of creamer, you get the point) because I wanted to be able to make a clear comparison. In the end, I found both to very good and fulfilling my taste for pumpkin coffee; however, I found that I preferred the Coffee-mate brand more so. The Coffee-mate creamer had a "spicy-er" bite than the International Delight creamer. I brought the creamers into work to get the opinion of my coworkers and they agreed that the Coffee-mate creamer had a stronger spice flavor. One reviewer found that the Coffee-mate creamer had too much spice and would prefer the International Delight.

As for price, the two were approximately the same, but at the time of purchase the Coffee-mate brand was on sale. I paid $1.97 for the International Delight creamer and $1.50 for the Coffee-mate creamer.

In the end, Coffee-mate Pumpkin Spice was my clear winner. It had the spicey bite I was looking for and its a little better nutritionally. The International Delight Pumpkin Pie Spice is good and if you couldn't find the Coffee-mate variety I would definitely recommend that you pick it up.

Beast Wars Axalon: Botcon 2006 Art Contest Entry

2006-10-03T09:53:00.000-04:00

I am branching out a bit here and am presenting a segment called “What’s He Cooking Up Now…” For the past few months, I’ve been working on a project to be presented at the annual Transformers Convention, BOTCON. Since this year’s theme and exclusive set was to be the cast of the Beast Wars, I set out to make a playset of their spaceship, the Axalon.

I knew going into this that I would not be able to make a “true” spaceship playset since the ship would have to be huge, so instead I planned to hit a few key elements and go for an overall feel to the display.

To begin, I started hitting up thrift shops, hoping to find enough bits and pieces that I thought would be usable. I ended up stumbling upon a plastic sled/snowmobile for $3 and a Power Rangers semi-truck for $1. These two pieces would make up the majority of the ship.

The snowmobile had its front “feet” removed and was cut in half along its circumference. The “feet” were also cut in half and they were attached to each side of the ship (as engines). The semi-truck was dismantled and luckily when two sides of the trailer were glued together, they were the exact size of the opening in the back of the snowmobile.

I wanted to add some more details to the front so I found some older Star Trek figures and scavenged 2 seats and a console. For the console, I scanned the original sticker into the computer and made a custom Transformers Beast Wars sticker instead. It had many elements that were present on the convention box set.

Now that the “bones” of the ship were in place, I started on the details and the paint. Landing gear was added to the front and back with some bolts and pvc pipe. Wing pieces were painted and added to the front (these came from a space ship toy that I found at the flea market for $3). A grab claw was added, it also came from the flea market space ship. On the floor portion of the back there was a raised circular portion that I thought looked like it could be the “holo” table from the show so I came up with a way to get the “Darksyde” ship to look like it was floating above the table. By the way, Darksyde is the name that the collectors club decided to call the ship of the Beast Wars Predacons.

By this point, everything was painted and I started playing around with the figures that would be used for the convention set. These figures were given different paint schemes for the set. Once I got to the convention, I opened up my set and placed those figures on the ship. When I saw the official figures on the Axalon, I was very happy with the final result.

Unfortunately, the Axalon did not win in the diorama category at the convention, but it did get many positive reactions from fans. I’m still puzzled by the pieces that did win, but alas, it was fun to build and seeing people’s reaction to the ship made it worthwhile.

Now that the convention is over, I should get back to cooking.

Pumpkin Bread Pudding

2006-09-24T12:01:00.000-04:00

The other day there was a box of old bread left in the break room at work. The note on the box said that the bread was free and could be used to make breadcrumbs or croutons. I had other plans.

Originally I had thought that I would make a french toast type of bread pudding but while I was at the grocery store I saw that pumpkin was on sale and I changed my mind. The process was really simple since I basically just followed the directions for pumpkin pie that is on the back of can of pumpkin. Instead of pouring the batter into pie crusts, it was poured over the bread.

Alright, lets get into this post. This is another step by step posting since people seemed to enjoy the last one.

As usual, I like to have all the ingredients out before I start. That way I know if I'm missing anything and can then make changes to the recipe beforehand. As you can see, there is a loaf of bread, some eggs, sugar, a can of pumpkin, 2 cans of evaporated milk, and some cinnamon and nutmeg (the nutmeg is whole, I grind it by hand because it tastes better that way).

As you can see, I have cut up the bread into about 1" size pieces and I combined the sugar and spices (well, I didn't stir them together before this picture was taken, but you get the idea). The next step is to add the eggs to the sugar mixture and stir well. Then you have to stir in the can of pumpkin and finally you stir in the two cans of evaporated milk.

Now that all the liquids are combined, you just need pour the wet mixture over the bread. Be sure to pour it evenly and not to put too much into the dish. The bread will soak up some of the batter, so just pour it slowly.

Now that everything is combined, you should let the dish sit for at least an hour in the refrigerator. This will allow the bread to soak up the pumpkin mixture. Once the mix has sat long enough, you can bake it. I baked the pudding at 325 C for approximately an hour. Just check it periodically to see if it is set in the middle.

And this is what you end up with. To serve, I just dished some of it into a bowl and added some whipped topping. It definitely tastes like pumpkin pie, but isn't as rich as the pie usually is. The bread makes it taste lighter than it really is. It was a good way to use up old bread and it tastes good.

La Bete Noire

2006-09-12T16:30:00.000-04:00

This dish was the cover feature of the September 2006 issue of Bon Appetit Magazine. A link to the recipe is here if you are interested. Also, if you click here you can see in image of the cover (at least until the new issue comes out).

I was invited to a Labor Day cookout and I wanted to make something unique so this is what I brought. I also brought some little smokies wrapped in bacon which were a real crowd pleaser (but they were nothing unique so thats about as much mention as they will get). When I saw the cover of the magazine on the rack I had to buy it. The chocolate "cake" looked very tempting. I had also never made anything like this before so I was up for the challenge.

If you clicked on the recipe you can see that the cake is flourless and uses very few ingredients. It was fairly simple to assemble but I do encourage that a bigger pot than you think necessary be used. I had a hard time stirring the eggs into the mix because I was close to spilling over the sides of the pot.

I found the recipe to be very straight forward and detailed. I can't think of any advice I can give to make it any better.

The final result was a very very rich chocolate dessert. Only a small slice is suggested because it is very rich. Some people at the party gave suggestions for another layer that is lighter and either flavored vanilla or coffee. When I make this again, I might try to change the recipe around a little to reflect such a change. I'll be sure to post the results.

50th Birthday Cake

2006-09-12T15:40:00.000-04:00

I was asked last week to make a birthday cake for a coworker for just turned 50. The above is what I came up with. I do have to admit, I searched around the internet and found something similar that I liked (and my boss liked) so I went with that design. The one online didn't have chocolate ghosts however.

This was a rush order so I didn't have a lot of time to prep everything so I relied on box cake mix and canned icing. Since I'm not a fan of doing exactly like the directions say, I decided that I would add some extra pudding to the cake mixes. I went to the store and picked up 2 cake mixes (dark chocolate and white), 2 packages of pudding (dark chocolate and cheesecake), and 2 tubs of white icing (I made 1/2 sheet marbled cake). I did a quick check in my head and I was confident that I had everything at home that I would need to make the cakes (eggs and oil). When I got home and prepped to bake the cake I realized that I was short half the eggs. It was already getting late and I knew that if I was going to get the cake done by Friday morning it had to be baked Wednesday night and then decorated on Thursday. So I thought about what I might be able to use to replace some of the eggs and I decided that heavy cream might do the trick. I mixed together the eggs that I had and the heavy cream and split that between the two batches.

The consistency of the batters were pretty similar to a standard cake so I went ahead and baked them. Although a bit on the heavy side, everything appeared normal after baking. After cooling a bit the cake was put into the refrigerator for the evening.

The next night I turned the cake onto a board and started decorating it. I cut two corners off the cake to make the tombstone shape and I tinted the icing grey (which is somewhat blue/purple) with black food coloring. For the writing and the ghosts I used melted chocolate. The writing was done directly on the cake whereas the ghosts were drawn out on wax paper and allowed to harden before being put on the cake. The "grass" around the edges of the cake is colored coconut.

The cake was a big success and I don't think anyone turned it down (nor left any on their plate). The cake was really dense but the mixture of the dark chocolate and cheesecake flavors made it so it wasn't too rich.

So the lessons learned from this cake were that heavy cream can sort of be used to replace a few eggs and that chocolate makes a great decorating medium.

And, I think my skills are getting better with each cake I make, but the writing still needs work.

Zucchini-Corn Bread

2006-08-29T10:27:00.000-04:00

Its been while since I posted so I decided that I would go ahead and make a comment about what I came up with this weekend. I had some zucchini that was soon to be past its prime and I didn't feel like making traditional zucchini bread so I got a little creative and made zucchini corn bread. Its was basically just corn bread that had shredded zucchini added to the batter (with a little bit of nutmeg). I reduced the amount of milk that I would normally have in the corn bread since zucchini is somewhat moist.

I think that it took a little longer than normal to bake, but I can't be certain since I did it in the toaster oven instead of the full sized oven. Most baking usually takes longer in the toaster oven.

It came out looking just like corn bread but with some green specks throughout. Flavor-wise, it was tasted like a normal corn bread (I think the nutmeg and zucchini added a little flavor, but no over powering flavors); but, it was very very moist. It wasn't soggy or undercooked, just moist.
For the most part, it was just like regular corn bread. So, I guess in the end I made the corn bread a little healthier by adding another vegetable to the mix.

Oh, sorry, no picture on this one. It's not all that exciting to look at anyway (its just corn bread).

Potato Salad

2006-08-07T19:48:00.000-04:00

Here is a quick note about a potato salad I made a few weeks ago for our annual branch picnic at work. The recipe came from Food Network (namely, Easy Entertaining) and can be found here. I changed the recipe a bit by using both yukon gold and red skin potatoes and by omitting the capers. I added fresh basil and some italian seasonings to replace the capers.

It was super easy. The only thing I would do differently is to cook the potatoes longer. They were still a little hard. The different greens added layers of flavor and made it a very unique potato salad. I think I will be trying it again soon, and I will post an update.

Zucchini Bread

2006-08-07T18:53:00.000-04:00

I'm actually going to do something different with this post. I had my camera sitting on the counter when I started making the zucchini bread so I took a couple pictures throughout the baking process.

The bread started with this recipe. I got out all the ingredients and made sure that I had enough of everything. As you can see, I had plenty of zucchini.

Before I could get things going I had to shred the zucchini. I took one of the bigger ones and cut in half; I scooped out all of the seeds. I then put it through the food processor. I made a whole lot of shredded zucchini. The recipe only called for 2 cups, I made about 7.

So, following the rest of the recipe, I mixed the wet ingredients together in one bowl and the dry in another.

All that was left was to mix everything together. Since I had shredded 7 cups of zucchini and didn't want to make 3 batches of bread, I put all the shredded zucchini into the batter. Now, some people might think was crazy, but I had faith that it would still come together alright. The zucchini isn't that wet of a vegetable and usually holds up okay when baked and I've always put extra in when making bread. Now, I haven't ever put in 3.5 times as much as called for, but I gave it a shot anyway.

After everything was mixed together really well, I added the chopped walnuts. The batter was divided between 2 silicone bread pans and put into the oven.

The recipe said to let them bake for an hour at 350 F. I'm pretty sure they took about an hour. I tested them with a kabob stick to check them for doneness and when the stick came out clean I pulled them out of the oven. Here is the final product:

I took one into work this morning and it was gone in no time flat. Everyone said that they thought it was delicious.

So, one quick question for the few people who read this blog regularly. Did you prefer this style of post? or do you like the old way, with one picture? Comment and let me know.

A quick note on Brining

2006-08-03T09:50:00.000-04:00

Unfortunately there isn't a picture to accompany this post but I felt it important to talk a bit about brining.

I have heard all about putting meat (pork/poultry) into a brine before cooking and how good the food will taste for a while now, but had yet to actually try it. I'm not sure what was holding me back but last night I went for it. I had 2 bone in pork chops that needed to be cooked and I wasn't in a hurry so I decided to give the brine a try.

I mixed warm water with salt, pepper, honey, and rosemary. Once all the salt and honey were dissolved into the water I added the pork chops. I closed up the container and put it in the refrigerator for a few hours. I then baked the pork chops until they were done (still slightly pink inside).

The original plan was to package up the chops (having one for lunch today and the other for dinner tonight) but after trying a little bite last night, I couldn't resist and ate a whole chop. It was the best pork chop I've ever had (at least as far as I can remember).

So, basically, be sure to brine your pork chops. I will try chicken next and let you all know how that turns out.

Bananas Foster Pancakes

2006-07-23T18:34:00.000-04:00

This Saturday morning I was in the mood for pancakes. I also didn't want just plain syrup. I looked around the kitchen and spotted some bananas that were just ripe. Then the idea to make Bananas Foster Pancakes popped into my head.

I put one banana into the pancake batter and cooked up the pancakes like normal. While I was making the pancakes I melted some butter and brown sugar in a small sauce pan. I added a little water to make a good syrup consistency. I cut up a banana (on an angle because it looks better that way) and put the banana slices into the syrup. I let them cook until they got nice and tender (which only took a couple minutes).

I plated up the pancakes with the bananas and syrup on top and sprinkled everything with a little powdered sugar for decoration.

They were really good. I'm sure that I could make a much better sauce but I wanted to eat quickly and was only able to use what was available in the house. Had I had some cream I think I would have added that to the sugar/butter mix instead of water and made a sweet creamy sauce (like melted ice cream maybe).

Surf and Turf (sort of): Pepperoni Beef Balachi and Penne Pesto Scallops

2006-07-20T19:35:00.000-04:00

So here is another Giant Eagle buy. I was over on the East side visiting with my cousin and her husband on the way back I stopped at the new Giant Eagle overlooking Valley View. The store is in a new shopping strip that looks like it will have some nice places there once everything gets opened. So anyway, back to the food. I was walking through the butcher area and some other people were buying some of the Balachi. This drew my attention to the meat and since it looked really good I got one myself. Also, just behind me, they had the bay scallops on sale. Originally I didn't plan on having both of these the same night, but I forgot that I had a work dinner last night and I had cook the balachi tonight. So anyway, I made both.

The balachi only needed to be baked. It went into a 350 degree oven for about 30 minutes and it was done. For the scallops I first cooked them in some olive oil with salt and pepper until they started to turn translucent. Then I added about a half cup of store bought pesto and a whole lot of frozen and fresh basil to the pan. I let everything cook together until the penne was done. The penne then went into the pan with the scallops and everything was tossed together.

From start to finish the meal took about 30 minutes. If I had been trying hard, I could have definitely had it done in under 30. Rachel Ray might just be in for a little competition.

Bacon Wrapped Turkey Medallion and Pan Cooked Potatoes

2006-07-20T19:15:00.000-04:00

The main piece of this dish is the bacon wrapped turkey medallion. I picked these up at Sam's Club a while back because they looked pretty good and were reasonably priced. This is actually my second attempt to cook one of the medallions. The first attempt went quite badly since I did not thaw the medallion before cooking. Now, don't start yelling at me for not thawing the thing, I was certain that I should have; however, the package stated on how quick cooking they were and it never mentioned the need for thawing. Before I cooked the first one, I looked all over the bag and never saw the word thaw, so I took a chance and followed the directions instead of going with my gut feeling. Needless to say, the first one was burnt on the outside and frozen within.

So for the second try, I let the medallion thaw in the fridge while I was at work. They come individually wrapped so it is easy to make one at a time. They give a couple different cooking options and I opted for pan cooking. All I had to do was put a little oil in the pan and put it over medium high heat, add the medallion and cook for about 8 minutes on each side, the drop down the heat until the temperature probe pops out. Yup, you read it right, these little medallions come with little pop up timers like a full sized turkey.

When the turkey was almost done (well browned on both sides but the timer hadn't popped out), I added some red skin potatoes to the pan. I seasoned them with salt and pepper and dill (I believe, its one of the fresh herbs on my windowsill).

This time, the meal was quite good. The turkey was really moist and the potatoes were good too. I don't remember the price off hand, but I think the medallions ended up being less than a dollar each and for that price, its a real bargain.

Banana-Corn Bread??? Hmmmmm......

2006-07-10T20:08:00.000-04:00

I'm probably going to get yelled at by my mother for posting this, but I couldn't resist. This is what happens when a store puts the wrong mix in a box.

A few weeks ago when my parents were visiting we ran up to Trader Joes. My mom picked up a Banana Bread mix, among other things. Then the next weekend when I was visiting she decided that she would whip up the banana bread since she had some extra bananas that were about to go bad.

If I remember correctly, the rest of us were out of the house when she was putting the bread together so she didn't have anyone to give her a second opinion, but when she opened the bag from the banana bread box, she said that it sort of looked like corn bread. She saw little bits that looked almost like corn, but since it was a banana bread mix she thought that maybe they were dried banana chunks. So she proceeded with making the "banana bread" and added a couple bananas to the mix. Then when putting it into the pan to bake, she again thought that it looked a lot like corn bread, but the box was clearly banana bread.

While it was baking she filled us in on the story. I came in to verify that the box was truly banana bread, which it was.

When it came out of the oven, it was obvious that banana bread was not in the box, due to the fact that you can see bits of corn on the top.

Strangely, it wasn't half bad. It wasn't all that great, but having bananas in corn bread didn't make it terrible either.

So advice for the future: always check your mixes before adding other things to them.
And my words for Trader Joes, please put the right mix in the right box.

Bordeaux Wine Steak and Grilled Corn on the Cob

2006-07-10T19:53:00.000-04:00

So one might think that the most important part of this post would be the steak, WRONG!! (to quote Lex Luthor). Its all about the grilled corn on the cob.

The steak was purchased from Giant Eagle. Giant Eagle has slightly redeemed itself from the seafood incident last month with this marinated steak. It wasn't too expensive and had a great taste. It was pretty tender too.

But like I said, the important thing is the corn. The grilled corn is a technique that I learned from my Dad (I don't know where he got it from, but prior to his cooking corn this way, we always boiled it). The flavor of the grilled corn is far better than that of boiled.

To grill corn, you first need to soak the ears (husk and all). Just take the whole thing of corn and submerge it in water for at least 30 minutes. The husk will soak up the water and then as the corn boils, it will steam it from the inside. Once fully soaked, put the corn (still in the husk) on a preheated medium flame grill (if you are using charcoal, I guess just try to get a steady heat, not searing though). Let the corn cook for about 15-20 minutes then turn it over and continue cooking for another 15 minutes. Once the time is up, remove the corn from the grill and let it cool for a few minutes.

Now, here is where the beauty of grilling corn in the husk comes out. Once the corn is cool enough to touch, peal off most of the husk until only one or two leaves remain. Then break off the stem end (it should crack off pretty easily) and then just pull on the fibers at the other end. If you did everything right, when you pull the fibers the rest of the husk and all the fibers should come right out.

And there you have it, fully cooked, grilled corn on the cob. And although a little hot on your hands, shucking the corn couldn't be easier.

Chicken Tenders (Take 2)

2006-06-14T09:55:00.000-04:00

Somethings taste better reheated after sitting in the refrigerator overnight (chili, lasagna, etc.) but who would have thought that chicken tenders also fit into that category. On Sunday night I caught an episode of Ham on the Street on Food Network. The subject of this episode was guilty pleasures. Among the deep fried brownie (and everything else you can think of) and the twinkie tiramisu type dish, the host showed off a recipe for healthier chicken tenders.

They looked good on the tv and seemed really simple so I gave them a try. The secret to making them healthier than normal chicken tenders was that these are not fried. Instead you are to dip the chicken strips into a spiced light mayo and then into panko bread crumbs (panko are the type used for tempura, also known as Japanese bread crumbs). You then bake the strips at 350C until done.

When first baked the tenders had great flavor and were fully cooked (but not dry inside) but they were not that crunchy. They just didn't get all that browned on the outside. I was afraid to leave them in the oven longer because I didn't want them to dry out. So I ate a few that night and put the rest in the refrigerator.

Then last night, I cranked up the toaster oven to about 400 C and laid the chicken tenders out on the mini baking sheet. I baked them in the toaster over for about 15 minutes. At this point they were getting browned and crispy. What was great was that they still had the same flavor as the night before and were still moist inside. I think dipping the strips in the mayo helped them stay moist.

The recipe that was shown on the show used curry powder, salt, and pepper for the spices in the mayo. I used worchester sauce, salt, pepper, garlic powder, and onion powder. I think the spices are really where you can get creative and try different combinations. If you don't go overboard with any one spice, you should get tastey chicken tenders when you are done.

Tropical Muffins

2006-06-12T12:54:00.000-04:00

So what do you get when you have 4 very ripe bananas and a pineapple cake mix? Well, I don't know, but if you add in a can of mandarin oranges, you get Tropical Muffins!

I had 4 bananas that were very very ripe and it was at the point where I either make something with them or I toss them. Not one to waste, I thought about making some banana muffins. But also one to take a somewhat lazy approach, I went looking for cake mixes. Since I've been eating healthier lately, I haven't been buying any mixes so all that was left in the cabinet was a pineapple mix. At that point I thought that banana and pineapple would go well enough together, but that something it still needed something else. Upon opening another cabinet, I found a can of mandarin oranges. Then I thought some more about it and came the conclusion that if I didn't add any nuts to the muffins they would just be uniced cupcakes. Thankfully I keep a bag of walnuts in the freezer (they stay fresh longer that way).

Everything was now set. I prepared to make Pineapple-orange-banana walnut muffins. The cake mix called for 3 eggs, 1/2 cup of oil (I think), and a cup of water. Since the oranges were packed in about a cup of light syrup, I omitted the water. And I knew that bananas and such were great for keeping things moist, so I also omitted the oil. The batter came together like normal cake/muffin batter consistency.

To make getting the batter into the cups easier, I used an ice cream scoop. Its a great idea for anytime that you have to get a lot of equal sized portions out quick. The muffins only took 20 minutes to bake at 350 C. I probably could have left in the oven a little longer and gotten the tops more browned, but this way they were extra moist.

I brought them into work this morning (letting my fitness class get first dibs). There were about 30 muffins on the tray and between a few people at the gym and my coworkers in my building they were all gone in under an hour. I've gotten lots of compliments so far, so I guess they came out really well.

Kolachki from Rudy's Strudel and Bakery

2006-06-02T11:10:00.000-04:00

Since it was a very nice night last evening, I walked to the comic book store. It wasn't that long of a walk, 15-20 minutes, and it felt good. While heading towards the shop I came across Rudy's Bakery. The bakery is right near the comic book shop and although I had seen the sign many times before, I never read the whole thing to see that it was a bakery. After buying my comics, I made a quick stop into Rudy's.

Its a small place, but very nice. They have some tables set up in case you wanted to eat your treats there and they have a few display cases showing off everything. I couldn't decide between all the choices so I opted for a variety of Kolachki. Rudy's makes kolachki in raspberry, apricot, pineapple, cheese, nut, and prune flavors. I bought a dozen (2 of each) for $2.75.

Rudy's also has a wide variety of cakes, strudels, breads, and cookies. They also make traditional polish foods like pierogies (I'll have to try them sometime) and stuffed cabbage.

I tried a few of the kolachki last night and each one was great. They were very fresh and the dough was tender and flakey. I brought the extras into work this morning to share. Everyone agreed on how good they were. I picked up a copy of their menu and I will be sure to try more of their offerings. If you are ever over in Parma on Ridge Rd. look for the maroon sign for Rudy's. I'm pretty sure you will like whatever you get.

Shrimp and Scallop Skewers

2006-06-01T11:49:00.000-04:00

I apologize again for the lack of a picture. I was all set to take a picture of the skewers on the grill last night and quickly realized that I left my digital camera at work. If I pick more of these up, I will take a picture later.

I was at Giant Eagle the other night and while looking at the frozen shrimp section saw a package of shrimp and scallop skewers. They had 3 varieties, a plain version, a garlic/butter version, and a garlic and spice (I think) version. After looking at the nutritional stats, I picked up a bag of the plain variety. The other ones were not all that bad, but they were pretty high in sodium. I think the pack was on sale for $4.99 (but that could be the regular price, I'm not 100% sure). In the pack, there were 5 skewers which they say are 2.5 servings. From the size of the shrimp and scallops, I think 2 skewers would work as a serving.

The package had a few different cooking options, but the quickest and I think easiest of the 3 was to grill them. I had let them thaw during the day and they were ready to go by dinner. Since it was just shrimp and scallops, they took no time to cook on the grill. I think the package said 2 minutes per side.

They had a really good taste. The scallops were still tender and the shrimp was cooked perfectly. I could have used these to make a fancy plated meal, but I just pulled everything off the skewers and chowed down. These aren't bad for the price. I'm sure that I could get the shrimp and bay scallops from the fish counter and put them on my own skewers for less money, but for the convenience (and since I was only making 5 skewers), these are a great.

If you see them at the grocery store, give them a try. If you try one of the other varieties, let me know what you think of them.

Alton Brown's Protein Bars

2006-05-23T10:27:00.000-04:00

Sorry that is no picture for this post. I didn't think about taking any pictures until after the bars all wrapped up.

Since I'm doing this muscle conditioning class at the gym and am trying to eat foods that are better for me, I was looking for a good "energy" bar that I could make myself. I had remembered seeing Alton Brown once making protein bars on Good Eats so I went to the Food Network Website and found the recipe. There were a few parts of the recipe that were unclear but after checking out the reviews on the recipe I figured everything out. Also, I remembered on the show that they gave the nutritional information, but that information isn't on the recipe page. The reviews had that info as well.

To make the bars begins with a bit of a monetary investment. Finding the protein powder, oat bran, wheat germ, and all the dried fruits in small quantities required by the recipe proved difficult. Luckily I already had protein powder and natural peanut butter on hand. The oat bran and wheat germ were not that expensive and I figured that if the bars didn't work, I could use them for other dishes. The dried fruit was the most difficult to find until my last trip to Trader Joe's where I saw a mixed dried fruit variety of raisins, blueberries, cranberries in a 1.5 cup bag. It would be perfect; I figured that cranberries would be close enough to cherries. I already had some dried apricots so I was basically ready to go.

I followed the directions as written and was a little worried once everything was combined. It didn't look the most appealing. But it had great reviews and was from Mr. Brown so I had faith that it would turn out okay. Since a specific internal temperature was stated in the recipe, I popped my digital thermometer into the batter and set the alarm for 205 F. It did take longer than the 35 minutes suggested in the recipe (I think it was about 45-50 minutes). If I wouldn't have had the thermometer the bars probably wouldn't have been fully cooked.

Once they were out of the oven, I let the bars cool completely then cut them up into the 24 servings suggested by the recipe. They cut easily and the bars stayed together.

Unlike other protein bars these have great flavor. Pretty much all you taste is the fruit and a hint of peanut butter. It's texture is similar to that of a fruit cake, but much better. I will definitely be making more of these. I want to experiment a little with different fruits or maybe no fruit at all. I also have an idea for a slightly less healthy chocolate bar. We'll see how things work out.

Trader Joe's Cranberry Almond Stuffed Chicken Breast

2006-05-19T10:09:00.000-04:00

I took the easy way out last night and made this for dinner. Both the chicken breast and the green beans came out of the freezer. I picked up the stuffed chicken breast a few weeks ago at Trader Joe's for $2.99. If I had tried to make this from scratch I probably could have made it for less, but since I'm just cooking for myself, this is easier and more economical. The chicken with the stuffing is vacuum sealed then frozen so it looks like it would keep for a while in the freezer.

Once thawed, I cooked the chicken in the toaster oven for about 45 minutes. I used a digital thermometer to make sure that the internal temperature was over 165 F before taking it out. The package says that the chicken should only take about 25 minutes in an oven, so I think the extra time was a result of using the toaster oven and that the inside of the stuffing probably wasn't fully thawed. The green beans went directly from a box in the freezer to a bowl in the microwave. 5 minutes later, they were done.

I was a bit worried about how the chicken would turn out since I had to cook it longer than the package said, but it was still very moist. The stuffing had great flavor and was seasoned very well.

For its simplicity alone I would buy another of these stuffed chicken breasts. It had great flavor, is actually not that bad for you, and was easy to prepare. If you're out at Trader Joe's, give it a try sometime (but you might want to let it thaw in the fridge for a day, instead of doing the one hour quick thaw that is suggested on the package).

Black Bean Lime Chili

2006-05-12T11:09:00.000-04:00

I got this recipe from the Food Network Website. Here is the link if you are interested in making it yourself.

This is a really quick and easy soup to put together. For the most part I followed the recipe but instead of chopping the onion and peppers by hand I used my food processor. For me, that worked great since I'm not a big fan of chunks of onion or pepper and the processor really diced them up fine. Just like the chicken salad I posted previously, this chili used canned breast meat chicken. For the time saving aspect, its well worth the price. From beginning to end, including taking time to cut the vegies and such, this dish took less than 30 minutes.

One word of caution however, I would not use as much cilantro and lime juice as the recipe recommends. I like both, but in the quantity called for the chili ended up tasting too much lime and cilantro (they both really overpowered the other flavors).

Chicken-Avocado Salad Pita

2006-05-10T10:03:00.000-04:00

So here's another short and simple meal. It took less than 5 minutes from start to finish.

I wanted a way to get some high protein and healthy fats into a quick and easy sandwich and this is what I came up with. For this particular batch I used "chicken in a can" (which isn't all that bad) and some fresh avocado. To be honest, the avocado could be a little fresher (it was still pretty firm) but it worked. I mixed up the chicken and avocado with some mayonnaise and some salt and pepper and put it all in a pita.

That sandwich tasted pretty good but I thought that I could probably make it better. For the second try I used grilled chicken breast which I cut up into small chunks and a fresher avocado. I also put some fresh spinach on the sandwich. This was a major improvement (but it does take extra time to cook the chicken, unless you have leftovers which you can use). Unfortunately I don't have a picture of the second batch.

I recommend everyone to try this even if they think that they don't like avocado. I used to think that I hated avocado but I recently realized that I hated bad guacamole, not avocado. So, just give it a try!

Baby Shower Carrot Cake

2006-05-03T15:10:00.000-04:00

Alright, I'm not going to say much about this one since its basically the same carrot cake that I made back on Easter. This time the cake is much larger and twice as thick. There is additional cream cheese icing in between the cake layers.

I posted this because I mostly just wanted to show it off since this is probably my most professional looking cake so far. My handwriting isn't great, and its even worse when I'm writing with icing so I decided to use only decorations. I think it came out looking really nice. The mom-to-be really appreciated the cake and everyone commented on how good it was.

Bacon Onion and Cheese Torte

2006-04-30T14:34:00.000-04:00

This morning I was watching Food Network and Giada was making a Pancetta and Parmesan Torte. While I was watching I thought that I should make something similar and use my new torte dish that I got for my birthday.

Originally I was going to try to make the same torte which Giada had made, but once I got to the grocery store and saw that I would have to buy much larger portions of pancetta and parmesan then I needed, I opted to go with bacon and a blend of italian cheeses. I also decided to add a sauted onion and some garlic to the other ingredients of parsley, salt, pepper, and cream. For the cream, I wanted to make this a little healthier so I used 1/2 cup of half and half (in place of the 2/3 cup heavy cream) and 1/2 cup skim milk (in place of the 1/2 cup whole milk).

The trick to making this torte super easy is that the base is a store bought pie crust. In a smaller sized torte pan the crust would have come up to the top edge, but my dish is pretty big and the pie crust just fit. Everything worked out alright since the amount of filling was also meant for a smaller dish so it wasn't too thick either.

Even with the reduction of fat in the liquids, the torte came out perfectly. The flavors are all very mild and blend well together. I cooked the onions and garlic over very low heat for about 10 minutes and that really took away their bite. I'm usually not a fan of onions but these came out very soft and slightly sweet.

I think this would also work really well in an individual size, served with a salad, or even smaller sized as an appetizer. I'll be keeping this recipe on file.

Carrot Cake and Bellinis

2006-04-17T14:34:00.000-04:00

So although it wasn't my plan to be making any desserts any time soon, I was asked by my Mom to make her Signature Carrot Cake. She got the recipe for this cake back in 1992 and has been making it often since then. The cake is from a restaurant called Egg Castle which went out of business years ago. I know that the article was from 1992 because my mom got the recipe from the newspaper and she still has the original article (I made myself a copy of the article this weekend).

So this past Saturday when we started baking, my mom got busy with other stuff so I ended up putting it together myself. In the end, I had some extra icing so I decided to do a little decorating too. If anyone wants the recipe for this cake, email me; I might be willing to share.

The inset picture is when we cut the cake at Easter dinner at my Aunt and Uncle's place. This year my Aunt had everyone over and we had all the usual Easter foods (ham, eggs, etc.).

And also for Easter, I brought the makings for Bellinis.

A bellini is a drink which is typically made from peach juice and sparkling wine. For my take on a bellini I made a punch by combining peach, orange, and pear juice. I wanted this drink to be available non-alcoholic too so I also had lemon-lime soda available in place of the sparkling wine. For the wine I served Prosecco. The punch was well liked and very refreshing.

Shrimp with Broccoli, Cauliflower, and Chive

2006-04-12T10:06:00.000-04:00

Its time I got back to preparing dishes of a healthier sort. Today I present Shrimp with Broccoli and Cauliflower in a lemon-butter Chive sauce.

The simplicity of this meal is that the vegetables and the sauce come packaged together. Bird's Eye recently introduced a new line of frozen vegetables called The Herb Garden Collection. If you click on that link you can find out about other varieties. I've tried them all but for the green beans and the mushrooms and liked every variety. Each box of vegies comes with a little packet of seasoning that adds great flavor to the vegetables. Its suggested that you cook the vegetables in the microwave (they tend to take about 6 minutes) and then add the seasonings at the end.

For my dish I quickly thawed precooked, frozen, deveined shrimp (which I pulled the tails off) and added them to the vegetables in their last minute of being microwaved. I did this to just get a little warmth to the shrimp. All that was left was to mix it all together with the seasoning packet. To finish off the plate I cut a slice of whole wheat bread into wedges which I ended up using to make little shrimp sandwiches of a sort.

I'm not sure about the nutritional stats right now, but I know that this was a healthy mix of protein, carbs, and a little fat; and best of all, it tasted great. By the way, I made a larger portion than would be normal. I used 1 box of vegetables and about 27 shrimp which split in half would be enough for two to share (I would probably serve with some brown rice on the side instead of the bread in that case).

Birthday Party = Lots of Food

2006-04-03T14:07:00.000-04:00

Saturday, April 1st, was my 25th birthday and my uncle's 55th. To celebrate I invited the whole family up to my house. The plan for the party was a casual get together with lots of good food and good drinks. I think I succeeded.

The food plan was to have a wide variety of appetizers. There were simple snacks like chips and vegetables (with homemade dips) and then slightly more elaborate hot foods. The vegetables were all purchased fresh from the West Side Market on Friday morning and I washed, cut, blanched (the ones that required it), and arranged them all. The hot foods consisted of skewered chicken (with either a Thai peanut sauce or an Italian basalmic sauce), mini hamburgers, sausage cheese balls, savory parmesan bites, and mini-new potato bites. A few of the foods have links to the Kraft Foods website where I got a lot of my inspiration. The plan for the vegie tray was in my America's Test Kitchen cookbook (which is highly recommended!) and the skewered chicken and mini-burgers were my own creations.

Everyone really liked the mini-burgers and they were the first food to run out. To make the burgers I used an 80/20 beef to which I added some French onion soup mix and some bacon fat (the bacon was required for the potato bites and bacon fat adds a lot of flavor so I figured why not splurge). I cooked the small burgers on the griddle until they were mostly done then placed each patty on a brown-and-serve roll that had been cut in half and topped with colby cheese. The burgers were then tossed into the oven to finish cooking and let the buns brown up. The end result was some really tasty little burgers.

The chicken was fairly simple too. I cut up breast meat into strips and marinated them in either the peanut sauce or the balsamic sauce. The peanut sauce had peanut butter, peanut oil, water, ginger, sesame seeds, soy sauce, and a few other spices. The balsamic sauce was a combination of balsamic vinegar, olive oil, water, salt, pepper, rosemary, and spices. Both batches of chicken marinated overnight. In an ideal case I would have grilled the chicken but since I was making a lot and didn't have the time to stand by the grill I baked the skewered chicken. Everyone seemed to really enjoy these too.

There was a wide variety of drinks for the party but the one that stood out the most was a new rum by Bacardi. It called Ciclon and is infused with Agave Tequila and Lime. When I saw it at the store it looked interesting so I picked up the bottle. And as it turns out, it tastes really good. I thought it was best mixed with a lemon lime soda but my dad preferred it as a shot. He was encouraging others to give it a try too.

And I almost forgot to mention the cake. As I continue to master my skills at cake baking I made this cake. The whole cake was iced in buttercream icing and then I colored a bit of the icing blue for decoration. The border around the cake came out looking nice but my hand writing with icing needs major work. One evening I should put together a small batch of icing and just practice writing. But, back to the cake; the cake is half chocolate and half vanilla and was filled with vanilla pudding (the cooked variety, not instant). The pan I used was an 11x14" pan which I think is a half-sheet size. Everyone enjoyed it and many went back for seconds (or thirds).

By the end of the evening very little food (and Ciclon) remained. There was one piece of the parmesan bites and some vegetables left as well as some cake. I was wore out, but it was worth it. I think everyone had a fun time and that was my goal.

Homemade pierogies (just not made in my home)

2006-03-26T20:43:00.000-05:00

I wanted to post at least something this weekend so I thought that I would show another batch of homemade pierogies. This batch comes from a lady who regularly visits my Dad's work and makes the pierogies as a side business (I think...). He had ordered both potato and cheese and potato and onion and had forgotten which color twist tie corresponded to which type; but luckily for me, he gave me a dozen potato and cheese.

Like the previous ones (see back in November), these ones do not need boiled and are just pan fried with some butter.

I feel bad posting this since all I did was fry them in the butter, but I knew that I wanted to have some sort of an update this week. These are right up there with the ones that I helped make previously, but I preferred the fillings in the earlier ones.

Be sure to check back next week when I should have a lot to talk about. I'm throwing a birthday party for me and my uncle (both born on April 1st) and I plan on making most of the food (and the cake) from scratch. Wish me luck!

Why there hasn't been an update in over a week...

2006-03-19T19:26:00.000-05:00

Sorry for the lack of any postings this past week. I've was in Germany from 3/9-3/15 then came down with a head cold. This past weekend I spent part of the time in Pittsburgh at Ikea and the rest of the weekend assembling the stuff I purchased at said Ikea.

I'm hoping to get around to making some tasty meals this week and will be sure to post as soon as I can.

Thanks for stopping by.

Super Dark Chocolate Chocolate Vanilla 3-Layer Cake

2006-03-05T17:37:00.000-05:00

Be sure to click on the picture to view it better.

So today I set out on an ambitious task. I was to make a 3 layer cake, chocolate ganache in between the layers, and homemade vanilla frosting. Other than a lack of good decorating skills for a 3 layer cake, I'm very pleased with the results.

The cake came together really well. I cheated and used a dark chocolate boxed cake mix (actually 2 boxes worth). When I was mixing the batter I sifted the cake mix. I don't know for sure if it make a difference but the batter came out very smooth (no lumps) and all 3 cake layers baked really evenly.

I had never made my own icing other than cream cheese icing before so I was a little worried about how it would turn out. To my surprise it was pretty easy. I do have to admit, if I didn't have the kitchenaid mixer it would be a very difficult task (and I would never do it). The icing consists of butter, powdered sugar, heavy cream, vanilla, and a little salt.

To go in between the cake layers I made a really simple ganache by mixing melted dark chocolate, vanilla, and cream together. When it had cooled it thickened and I spread that between the cakes.

And now came the hard part. I shouldn't have made bottom 2 layers so close in size to each other (the bottom layer is 10" and the middle is 9") or I should have made just one size and did a double layer. Icing those two layers and making them actually look like different layers was pretty much impossible. Once I had everything coated in the vanilla icing, I wasn't really happy with how the cake looked so I opened a tub of store bought icing and used that to decorate the cake. Although the decorating didn't go the best I'm still really proud of the cake.

I will be taking it to work tomorrow and I will post a comment to let you know if it was liked or not.

Is this Chili better??

2006-03-05T17:29:00.000-05:00

I had a comment from Rob about the last chili that I presented here. He said that it looked too much like spaghetti sauce and not enough like chili. So, here is another batch that really looks like chili. I didn't do anything special to it and there are only 4 ingredients (minus spices). I browned some ground turkey with a lot of spices and then added it to light kidney beans, dark kidney beans, and diced tomatoes in the crock pot. Its been cooking for most of the day and smells great.

On another note, I wanted to make a comment on how easy it is to make your own chip dip. I had some company over this past weekend and I had planned on making grilled sandwiches and then just snacking on some chips. When I was asked for dip I knew that I didn't have any in the fridge so I whipped some up with sour cream and spices. I took about a cup of sour cream and added onion powder, salt, pepper, and Greek spice mix. I just mixed that all together and let it sit for a little bit and that's it. Instant chip dip.

Banana Muffins (from a cake mix)

2006-03-01T14:58:00.000-05:00

So what do you do when you have new silicone bakeware and 3 "soon-to-be-overripe" bananas? You make banana muffins.

I had the option of looking up a recipe for banana bread and measuring ingredients and such or I could just find a cake mix in the cupboard that was pretty neutral towards banana and use that. I chose the latter. Cake mixes just make things so much easier to not mess up and for the most part, measurements aren't all that necessary.

I started by pre-heating my oven to 350 degrees and lined up the new bakeware on some cookie sheets. The big 9x9" probably wouldn't need to be put on a baking sheet but it makes it easier to move into and out of the oven. I peeled the 3 bananas and put them in the mixing bowl. While those were being mixed into a mush, I chopped about a cup worth of walnuts. To the mashed bananas I added 3 eggs and maybe a 1/4 cup of oil (I just poured a little bit into the bowl). I then added the whole bag of cake mix and about a cup of water to bowl a little at a time letting them mix in before adding more. The consistency looked right once everything was combined so I let the mixer run for a couple minutes then added the chopped walnuts and just stirred those in.

The batter was spooned into the mini-muffin pans and the bigger muffin cups and the left over went into the square pan. They all went into the oven and baked for about 20 minutes (the mini-muffins came out earlier than the rest).

The muffins came out very moist and had a lot of banana flavor. The mini-muffins turned out to be a lot like those Hostess Mini-Muffins, but much more natural tasting.

For something that I whipped up really quickly and on a whim these turned out really well. And unlike the lasagna, most of these came to work with me today so I won't be eating them for the next week.

Chicken and Spinach Lasagna

2006-03-01T14:38:00.000-05:00

It was a pretty hectic weekend so I didn't get a chance to go to the grocery store until Monday night. While shopping I was also thinking about what would be good for dinner and I got a craving for lasagna. So along with my other groceries, I picked up some noodles and cheese (ricotta and shredded cheeses) and I assumed that I had all the other necessary ingredients at home. When I got home I realized that I the only meat I had was frozen chicken tenders (I thought that I had some ground beef or turkey or something) and I also saw that there was a bag of spinach in the bottom of the refrigerator so I decided to go with it and make Chicken/Spinach Lasagna.

I began by wilting the spinach in a frying pan. Once that was taken care of, I cut up the chicken tenders and cooked those in the same pan with a little oil until the chicken was starting to brown. In the meantime I started hard cooking a couple eggs. When the chicken was done I added a jar of vodka sauce (its basically a marinara with cream), some canned crushed tomatoes, and the spinach back into the pan and let everything warm the whole way though. I also added a raw egg to the ricotta cheese.

Since the lasagna noodles were the "no-boil" type, I was now ready to go to assemble the dish. I layered the sauce, noodles, ricotta, chopped egg, and cheeses about 3 times until I reached the top of the baking dish. I then topped it all with some more cheese and covered the dish with foil and put it in the over. It baked for about 45 minutes at 350 degrees and it was smelling really tastey. I then removed the foil and turned on the broiler to get the cheese to brown quickly. It only took a couple minutes under the broiler to get nice and brown.

And that was it. Its been really good. I made this lasagna Monday night and it has been lunch and dinner since then. Since I'm the only one eating it, I think it will last until tomorrow night. One of the best things about the leftovers is that it seems to taste even better each day since all the flavors have time to meld together. Yum!

Pork in Barbecue-Wine Sauce

2006-02-27T10:35:00.000-05:00

Sorry that there is no picture for this one; I made it this past weekend at my parent's house. Since Sunday was going to be a very hectic day I decided that slow cooker cooking would be the best way to go to get dinner started. I looked through their freezer and found some pork "steaks" and then went looking for a cooking liquid. One thing I've learned about slow cooking is that beef (beef with a good amount of fat on it) cooks well without much extra liquid but that pork needs a cooking liquid (otherwise its very dry and there is no flavor).

While looking the cabinets the only thing I could find that looked like it would work okay was barbecue sauce. I'm not a big fan of the sauce myself so I came up with a way to water it down and add more flavor (wine!). My original thought was to use a dry red wine but all that was available in the house were sweet whites and a semi-dry chardonnay. Since the chardonnay was the driest wine in the house and also the least expensive bottle I opted to use that. So into the slow cooker went a small can of tomato sauce, about 3/4 ths of a bottle of barbecue sauce, a half bottle of chardonnay, some salt, pepper, and cinnamon (it adds another hint of flavor) and a bit of water (maybe a half cup). I wisked that all together and put in the pork. The meat cooked for about 7 hours on low and when it was done it was nice and tender and full of flavor. It a slight barbecue taste and was slightly sweet. It was quite different than what we were used to.

Everyone liked it well and its something that I will keep to make again. I think next time I would rather use a dry red wine so maybe I will try that sometime soon. I'll be sure to post a picture next time too.

Review: Ready to Eat (Microwaved) Green Beans

2006-02-23T09:37:00.000-05:00

So I saw in these advertised in the grocery circular and decided that I would give them a shot. It turns out that they are pretty good. The green beans are pre-washed (the bag says triple washed) and to cook them you only need to pierce the bag and microwave for 5 minutes. I added the slivered almonds and some kosher salt to mine since they were a little bland right out of the package.

The color on the beans was amazing. They remained bright green throughout the cooking process and present really well. And what's even better is that they were actually cooked the whole way through and still green. Usually at restaurants the bright green beans have only been blanched and are too crunchy for my tastes, that wasn't the case here.

All and all, they're pretty good. I grew up eating canned green beans and for the difference in price (these were on sale for $2.50 whereas you can get a can of canned beans on sale for about 50 cents) I will probably continue eating the canned ones for everyday meals, but if I'm making a fancier meal or having people over for dinner, I will pick up these ones. They look great on the plate and taste well too.

Super Simple Pot Roast

2006-02-23T09:20:00.000-05:00

Alright, I want to start by saying that the picture does not do this meal justice. I just wanted to get that out there.

So I'm calling this Super Simple Pot Roast since the amount of effort required to put this together is close to nill. For the cookware you'll only need a slow cooker and a frying pan and some tongs or a big fork to flip the roast and transfer it to the slow cooker. The ingredients for this dish are: a roast (I just bought what was on sale, mine was about 2.5 lbs in size, make sure that you don't buy a roast bigger than your slow cooker), a bag of frozen stew vegetables (the one I got had potatoes, carrots, celery, and onions), and some salt and pepper. Yea, that's it, 4 ingredients since the vegies all come together in a bag (which only costs a $1 at the grocery store). It's a budget friendly meal too.

To put it all together first put the vegies in the bottom of the slow cooker and turn the thing on (either high or low depending on how long you have for the meal to cook, if you are going to let it cook all day, use low, if you want it ready in about 4 hours, use high). After you have the vegies in the cooker, put your frying pan on the stove and get it nice and hot. Your going to be searing the sides of the roast. Open the roast and salt and pepper one side. Once the pan is hot, put the seasoned side down in the pan and season the top side. Don't touch the roast for at least a few minutes. If you try to pull the roast away from the pan too soon it will stick to the pan, you'll know when its ready to be turned when it is easy to flip. Once flipped, brown the other side for a few minutes. Once the roast is browned (depending on the shape of your roast you might want to do all 4 sides, might was pretty flat so I just did the top and bottom) transfer it to the slow cooker. Put the lid on the cooker and let everything cook down.

As the roast cooks its juices will drip down in the vegetables giving them great flavor.

Hours later..... your roast is done and ready to eat. If you like your vegetables a little more firm then I would suggest adding more fresh (not frozen) vegies to the slow cooker about an hour to an hour and a half before you plan to eat. That give plenty of time for the vegetables to get tender but not too soft.

Kitchen Makeover

2006-02-13T10:20:00.000-05:00

As you can see from the picture and the title of this post this isn't a food entry, but since this is what I did this weekend instead of cooking I decided to show it off. You can click on the picture to see a larger version if you would like.

The main purpose of this mini-makeover was to remove the border that was in the kitchen when I first bought the house. I'm sure for some people its a nice border, but it doesn't suit my tastes at all. In addition to that, I was sick of seeing the purple-pink color that was beneath the border. When I decided to get rid of those, I also chose to remove the ceiling fan (which I believe the motor was almost shot and I was afraid to leave it on since it would make a strange grinding sound) and the kitchen ceiling light (not pictured).

So last week I started clearing out the kitchen and dining area and began removing the border. The upper portion came off easily since it was attached to the white portion of the wall (which was just primer) but the lower portion which went over the paint could not be peeled off. I ended up borrowing a steamer last weekend and used that to remove most of the paper. On Friday night I patched some holes in the wall and cleared out the rest of the kitchen. Then the real fun began on Saturday.

I woke up still sick on Saturday morning (I had a headcold start Friday morning and its still sticking around) but I started working on the kitchen anyway. I sanded down all the placed I had patched and then primed all the walls, doing a second coat of primer over the purplish color. I then headed off to Lowes to buy my paint and trim. I looked at lighting there but didn't find anything that seemed quite right. When I got home I got right to painting and a few hours later had all the walls painted. The brown color goes around the entire kitchen below the chair rail line. The upper portions are two different colors (the front wall is a slightly darker color than the rest of the walls). At this point I took a rest for a while both to let all the paint fully dry and myself to recuperate. Later in the evening I started measuring and cutting the chair rail and baseboards and began putting some of that up. Thanks to Liquid Nails, I was able to do this on my own. I stuck the molding up and then put a couple finish nails in there to secure it. I only had one tube of the stuff on hand so I ran to Home Depot to get more and check out their lights. When I got back, I did a little more I was getting pretty tired so I stopped about halfway though.

On Sunday morning I finished the molding and put the refrigerator back in its cubby and put the cabinets back up (which had to be removed to get the refrigerator out). I then went back to Home Depot and bought the lights. Although I had looked at these ones last night I wasn't sure they were the ones I wanted then but when I looked at them a second time they seemed right. Then after a stop at the grocery store I was back home and installing the new lights. Once the lights were up I cleaned up the kitchen and put everything back.

The kitchen feels a whole lot warmer now. And I am really glad to see that border go. My house is now border free which is a very good thing.

Crock-Pot Chili w/ Venison

2006-02-01T18:49:00.000-05:00

Earlier this week I was chatting with my friend Rob about the benefits of slow-cooking. From this conversation I got a craving for some chili. And since my Dad had given me a couple small venison steaks and since I've never used it in chili before I decided to give it a try.

I used my usual technique of first browning the meat in a sauce pan and then adding it and all the other ingredients to the crock pot (along with spices). My typical mix is some beans, corn, and tomatoes but you can add other ingredients based off your liking (and most importantly, what's in your pantry). So I got everything in the slow cooker and left for work. When I came home this evening I was greeted to the smell of delicious chili.

To go along with my meal (since I was out of crackers) I made a little pasta. While cooking the pasta I remembered that this past weekend I picked up some frozen fresh basil at Trader Joes. They have these little ice cube tray looking things with a teaspoon of chopped herbs per cube. I think there are 3 different herbs to choose from. Since the pack of 20 little cubes was less than $2 I added it to the cart. So tonight I took out one of the cubes and added it to the cooked pasta; it thawed instantly. I then spooned some chili on top of the pasta along with a little cheese and my meal was made.

I like how the chili turned out but what really made the meal was the basil on the pasta. It added so much flavor and really balanced out well with the spiciness of the chili. As for the venison, there was a slightly different flavor than the usual beef chili, but really, if you didn't know it was venison, it would be hard to tell.

Orange Creamsicle Kick (a drink for grown-ups only)

2006-01-24T18:59:00.000-05:00

To begin, let me apologize for the lack of a picture. I thought that since this is just an orange liquid in a glass, a picture really wouldn't be necessary.

Not too long ago I was introduced to the combination of Red Bull and Vodka. It takes some getting used to, but after a few sips I found it to be rather good. I've thought about making myself one here at the house, but the only Vodka I have on hand is vanilla flavored and I haven't found much to go with it.

So, this past Sunday while I was looking around at Target I ran across some Jone's Soda Orange Energy drink. It appeared to be very similar to Red Bull but flavored orange. And that is when the light-bulb clicked on in my head and the Orange Creamsicle Kick was created.

Later that evening I mixed my Vanilla Vodka together with the Orange Energy drink and enjoyed. The vanilla vodka is somewhat smooth on its own and mixed with the orange it became even smoother. I didn't make the drink all that strong and I could barely taste the alcohol since the orange and vanilla went so well together.

Since it came out tasting so good, I think I will need to go back to Target and pick up some more of the energy drink. If you try this, please comment to let me know what you think.

Meatloaf and Fingerling Potatoes

2006-01-23T10:48:00.000-05:00

This isn't my Grandma's meatloaf nor is it my Mother's (which are both really really good), but it turned out alright. I used a combination of meats (veal, pork, and beef) which is something that neither of them do but I've seen done on television. The flavor is good, but not quite what I consider real meatloaf. I really need to pay more attention when my mom makes her's and see if there is something that mine is missing. Oh, and yes, the meatloaf is small. Since its just me I made a small one so I wouldn't have to eat it for the rest of the week.

I've seen these potatoes around before but never tried them. I baked them with some olive oil, garlic, and kosher salt. I got the potatoes at the West Side Market which I went to this past Saturday. I really need to keep going there and trying new things. This was only my second time to the market and I didn't go with a plan of what to buy so I was pretty overwhelmed. I only ended up buying some sourdough bread, kosher salt, and the potatoes. Next time I will buy more.

Overnight Oatmeal

2006-01-17T10:30:00.000-05:00

There is no picture associated with this post since the topic is oatmeal and I don't know how to present a good picture of oatmeal. There isn't really anything special about oatmeal and it usually doesn't look all that appealing anyway. But I thought that I should share my attempt to follow an Alton Brown recipe for Overnight Oatmeal.

The key to this recipe is Steel Cut Oats. I had not heard about them before I found this recipe and from what I've seen since they are not carried in every grocery store (even though Quaker makes them). My mom found some at a Marc's store.

The other key to the recipe is a crock pot slow cooker. The idea is to start the oatmeal on the low setting just before going to bed and when you wake up you will have oatmeal all ready to go. The steel cut oats are much more coarse than the rolled oats and they can withstand such long cooking times without turning to mush.

For my first attempt I added a large handful of mixed dried fruit. Some of the dried fruits (raisins, cranberries, blueberries) were all good when cooked; some others like pineapple and papaya (I think that's what it was) didn't turn out too well.

All and all, I liked this method. Once I finish off what I made Sunday night (by the way, the recipe makes a pretty big batch), I will try it again. I plan to use fresh apples and cinnamon this time. I'll post a comment to give the update.

Homemade Fettucini with Spinach/Broccoli Sauce

2006-01-13T09:49:00.000-05:00

After seeing my posts about the periogis, my brother decided to get me a manual pasta roller for Christmas. This week I opened it up and tried to make some fresh pasta. The first attempt was on Tuesday night but what I didn't take into account was the fact that the first batch would have to sacrificed to clean out the machine (removing oils and such). Last night I decided I would give it another try.

The dough is one of the most simple things ever. Its just one cup of flour to one egg with some water to get it to come together. The dough is pretty dry and just barely sticks together at the beginning but after working it through the rollers a bunch of times it came together to a really workable consistency.

Since I was all out of jar pasta sauce (and all the fixings to make homemade) I decided to try something new. I found a can of cream of broccoli soup in the cabinet and thought that it mixed with milk, spinach, and garlic might be good. In the end, it was alright, but the condensed soup was too salty for my tastes. I tried some of the pasta without the sauce and it was excellent.

I'm going to have to make more soon.

Herbed Brie en Croute and Sausage Bites

2006-01-09T09:48:00.000-05:00

I was invited to a dinner party this past weekend and was asked to bring an appetizer or a dessert. After having a Brie en Croute over the holidays I wanted to try to make one on my own and figured this would be the perfect opportunity to do so. Since the package of puff pastry contains two sheets and only one was needed for the brie I looked around and found a recipe for the Sausage Bites.

The Brie en Croute that I had at Christmas was done in a way to make it more sweet. It was cooked with walnuts and cinnamon and I think some sugar. For the one I made I decided to go more savory. I found this recipe on the Campbell's website which included parsley and almonds. I changed it slightly by using an herbed brie (since the grocery store was out of plain). It came out really well and wasn't hard to put together. My only problem was that the flavor of the parsley didn't blend that well with the rest of the ingredients. When I make this again I will substitute something else for the parsley.

And then since I had the extra puff pastry, I hunted around until I found this recipe for the Sausage Bites. Since the only ingredients were puffed pastry and sausage I decided to give it a try. These were really simple although a little messy. Everyone was a little hesitant to try these until they found out that the center was Bob Evan's breakfast sausage. After that they went rather quickly.

I was very happy with how both of these turned out even with the parsley issue. The only change I would make in the future is to not use parsley. There is a good chance that I will make these again.

Power of the Ori

2006-01-09T09:41:00.000-05:00

So today I show my true nerdiness in the form of a drink. For the Stargate SG-1 and Atlantis Winter Season kick-off, I came up with this drink. Its a combination of blue curacao, sprite, and blavod (black vodka). The new villain for SG-1 are these guys called the Ori and so far their energy attacks have been blue so this seemed fitting.

what's neat about this drink is that the 3 liquids separate if they are poured in slowing on top of each other. This leads to a really cool looking drink. For actual consumption I suggest that it be stirred before drinking otherwise you would be drinking the blavod straight up in the first few sips.

This drink looked nice and it had a good taste.

Chocolate Walnut Strudel

2006-01-03T14:05:00.000-05:00

My mom bought some puff pastery for the cookie making party and we ran out of time to do anything with it so when I came down for Christmas, I made this strudel.

I was looking for easy recipes with puff pastry and found this one on the Kraft website. To make, you roll out the pastry then spread it with melted chocolate and walnuts. Then your roll up the dough, coat with an egg wash, and bake. Once cooked just sprinkly with powdered sugar. Its very rich and very tasty.

As a note to the readers of this blog. I'm planning to shift the focus of the upcoming posts to healthier foods. Although I see nothing wrong with enjoying sweets in moderation, I have been eating too many while I make these (and the waistline shows). Desserts will come back on special occasions and I'm sure if I am still up to this next winter there will many cookies and sweets again. I'm still planning to bring new and exciting dishes (just ones with less sugar and fat).

Christmas Eve (almost) Dinner

2006-01-03T13:51:00.000-05:00

Each year my family gets together with my Aunt and Uncle for a Christmas dinner. We usually try to have the dinner on Christmas Eve, but due to their work schedules, we celebrated the day before Christmas Eve.

The dinner this year was excellent. The menu was salad with a raspberry vinaigrette, standing rib roast, a potato casserole, roasted winter vegetables, and bread. And plenty of wine. My aunt prepared most of the meal with my brother contributing the potato casserole and I contributed the roasted winter vegetables. Everything was delicious (especially the rib roast).

The roasted vegetables included butternut squash, carrots, turnips, parsnips, and yams. They were baked in an italian dressing and parmesan cheese. I was slightly disappointed with them since even after a long bake some of the vegetables were still rather hard (the carrots mostly). The vegetable flavor was really good, but I would have been happier had they been easier to eat.

For dessert we had my Aunt's famous rum cake. As a neat fact, she said that she has been making this same cake for the last 30 years as an anniversary tradition for her and my uncle. I really enjoyed this dessert, but everyone says that my already being slightly intoxicated led me to like it even more. I recorded the recipe into my cell phone as a voice memo (which I still need to copy down). When the right occasion calls for it, I will try my hand at the rum cake.

Annual Cookie Making Day

2005-12-19T09:10:00.000-05:00

For the past few years my family and I have been getting together sometime before Christmas to spend part of a day making a bunch of cookies. This year there were actually two cookie days but I missed the first one since I was making periogis (which I really enjoyed); I was determined to be at the second party. As usual we had the party at my Aunt's house since she has a large kitchen with a double oven.

We typically have a few ideas of what will be made with each person bringing the ingredients they would need for what they would like to make. My brother had been on a big sugar cookie kick earlier this week and he brought some already chilled dough which was a major time saver. I had planned on making the carrot cake cookies again (but this time as a double batch with carrot cake and spice cake mixed together). My cousin and her fiance were to make the chocolate chip cookies and my mom had got together the ingredients for the baklava, molasses cookies, and the no-bakes.

We started around 11 and baked until about 3. Everything went smoothly with only a few cookies getting over-browned and some slightly mashed during the transfer from baking sheet to cooling rack.

What puzzled me the most is that there were 5 cookie sheets (if not more), and I basically only had one to work with. My brother and cousin took the other sheets for their cookies. So, as usual, I was stuck with one cookie sheet and my Silpat.

So the run down of what we made and quantities were about:
Sugar Cookies, 8 dozen
Chocolate Chip, 6 dozen
Molasses, 4 dozen
Carrot Cake, 4 dozen
No-Bake, 3 dozen
Baklava, 12 dozen pieces (between the 3 batches we made)

Everything came out really well and everyone got a lot to take back with them. I brought most of mine into work to share and everyone has been enjoying them. If you want to know the recipe for any of the above, send me an email or post a comment and I will get you the info.

Merry Christmas everyone!

And it became Fruitcake Biscotti...

2005-12-16T08:59:00.000-05:00

The original plan was to make fruit cake cookies. I didn't have a recipe for fruit cake cookies and my plan was use a basic cookie base and add some fruit and nuts to it. The results are shown on the left side of the above image. Once the cookies were deemed a failure, I attempted to salvage the leftover dough and make biscotti. This almost worked, but then I overbaked the biscotti. The general comments from the people who have ate the biscotti say that the flavor is really good but they are way too dry.

I'm not too happy about how this turned out and I questioned if I should post it or not. In the end I think its important to admit your mistakes and learn from them. I'm not giving up the fruit cake cookie and will try again. Or maybe I will just try to perfect the fruit cake biscotti instead.

Rocky Road Chocolate Bark

2005-12-15T09:26:00.000-05:00

Yesterday afternoon I was debating over what to make for this morning, the choices were Rocky Road Chocolate Bark or Jello Cookies(raspberry flavored). Obviously the chocolate bark won.

This was also a good way to use up extra chocolate that I had around the house. Using the double boiler method I melted down some baking chocolate, a little leftover milk chocolate from Easter (good pure chocolate lasts forever), and some semi-sweet chocolate chips. They were all melted together I stirred in crushed graham cracker, peanuts, and mini marshmallows. I poured the mixture onto the Silpat which was on a cookie sheet and spread it all out to a smooth layer (as smooth as I could).

At this point it could have been done but I wasn't happy with the thickness of the chocolate and I figured that it wouldn't set up well enough so I melted down some more chocolate chips and spread this over the first layer. The melted chocolate filled in all around the marshmallows and it was all a pretty even layer now.

I then put everything in the refrigerator for about an hour to set. Once it was set I lifted the bark off the Silpat and broke it into bite sized pieces.

They're really good.

Pistachio Biscotti

2005-12-14T09:25:00.000-05:00

Since we had our Holiday Lunch outing yesterday at the Cheesecake Factory, I decided that today's cookie would have to be something not as sweet as the previous two days. I was looking around the Food Network site and came across the recipe for Pistachio Biscotti. It looked simple enough and I decided to give it a shot.

I haven't made biscotti in a while but from what I remember they were easy to make and really well liked. This batch of biscotti went the same way.

Making biscotti is almost the same as making cookies except instead of shaping the individual pieces before baking you bake a long log (for lack of a better term) of dough. After its done baking you have to let the log cool for a bit then you cut it into the individual servings. These slices are then laid back onto the cookie sheet and baked again. In the end you have a very dry cookie that's great for dipping in coffee.

Everyone enjoyed these biscotti and they went quickly. I will probably try to alter the recipe by using different nuts and maybe adding dried fruit in the future.

Red Velvet Bites

2005-12-13T08:40:00.000-05:00

The week of sweet treats continues. Today's treat is what I am calling Red Velvet Bites. They are basically everything you love about a red velvet cake, in the form of a cookie. The recipe starts with a red velvet cake mix (its the theme I'm going with right now) that is made into a cookie batter with eggs, oil, and butter, and for an extra kick, I added some semi-sweet baking chocolate.

When I came up with the plan to make these cookies, I was going to roll the dough into balls and coat them with powdered sugar before baking (so that they would have a crackled top); but while making the dough I realized that I didn't have any gloves and I was not about to roll these by hand (my hands would have been stained for days). So instead I baked them as a drop cookie and coated them with powdered sugar afterwards.

They give a bit of a surprise on the first bite since most people do not expect a chocolate taste from a red and white cookie. They are unique and fun for the holiday.

Carrot Cake Cookies

2005-12-12T08:31:00.000-05:00

Last night I decided that I should make some more cookies and I have been thinking about how I could another cake mix. I searched through my cupboards and found that I had a couple carrot cake mixes (along with a red velvet and a spice cake mix). The abundance of carrot cake mix persuaded me to make carrot cake cookies.

The recipe was very simple, 1 stick of butter (softened, really softened), 2 eggs, 1/2 cup of chopped walnuts, and 1 carrot cake mix. I mixed them all together in the stand mixer (I would not try this by hand since the dough is pretty stiff). I spooned the dough onto the cookie sheet in about teaspoon sized globs and baked them for approximately 12 minutes at 350 degrees C. Once out of the oven I transferred them to a cooling rack. Once fully cooled I iced the cookies with cream cheese icing. And that was it.

They are interesting little cookies. Eating one is like having a couple bites of carrot cake. I don't know if I will be making these again (it depends on the feedback I get from my coworkers). However, I think I might try to make something with that Red Velvet cake. I'll be sure to post what I come up with.

2-Layer Bars (there are really only 2 layers)

2005-12-08T09:52:00.000-05:00

Before I get into the review, I want to comment on the name of this treat. I found this recipe on the Kraft Food's site and it was named "4 layer bars." But in reality, there are only 2 layers. There is the base layer and a layer of marshmallows, m&m's, and peanuts. Apparently Kraft thought that 4 layer bars sounded more impressive (which it does, but its not really accurate).

Anyway, back to the review.

If you have read my other posts, you know about my love for boxed cake mix. This recipe uses a yellow cake mix for the base layer. An egg and 1 stick of melted butter are added to the cake mix, its all stirred up and poured into a 9 x 13 pan and baked. Once the base layer is done, marshmallows, m&m's, and peanuts are poured over the top and its baked another few minutes to melt the marshmallows.

And that's it. It is super easy. Everyone at work enjoyed them, so they must be good.

If you try to make this, I do have one suggestion. When you go to cut the bars, spray some nonstick cooking spray on the knife, otherwise the marshmallow sticks and makes a big mess.

Sour Cream Chocolate Chip Cookies

2005-12-06T08:44:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I was in the mood to make some cookies so I went searching around the Kraft website. I found this recipe which had ingredients that I had on hand. I was surprised to see a cookie recipe that used sour cream so I decided to give it a try.

I didn't have any issues with the recipe and the cookies came out great. The cookies are really moist and soft (thanks to the sour cream). The picture on the Kraft page shows lots of nuts and chocolate chips popping out of the cookies which leads me to believe that they put extra in those ones. I followed the recipe and you can see from the picture that they are not overly chocolately. I think I will add extra chocolate chips next time.

My family is planning a cookie party the weekend before Christmas and I will be making these again. I will post an update to let everyone know how the second batch turns out.

Pierogies!!!

2005-12-06T08:28:00.000-05:00

This past weekend I went to my first ever pierogi making party. Even though I had to drive 2 hours to get to the festivities (which for me is quite a challenge), I am had a great time. My friend Naladahc has posted a recap of the party on his blog (just click on his name).

We made 4 different types of pierogies: potato and cheese, kapusta (a polish sweet and sour kraut), beef and dill, and some blueberry dessert ones. Nala had made all of the fillings prior to the start of the party (except for the blueberry which was canned pie filling).

We started by making the dough which consists of flour, salt, egg, water, and sour cream. The dough was then rolled out with the help of a pasta roller. We tried rolling some by hand but got much better consistency with the pasta maker. Once rolled out rather thin we cut the dough in circles and handed them off to be stuffed. I got the rolling technique down pretty well so I mostly worked on that. Once all the dough was rolled out everyone went to help fill.

After the pierogies were filled and sealed they were boiled for about 5 minutes then quickly frozen. Of course we had to try some to make sure that they tasted good so we pan fried them in butter and onions.

So far I've tried all 4 combinations and they are all great.

It was a very time consuming project but wasn't that difficult. I might even try to make some on my own if I can get my hands on a pasta roller.

Pumpkin Pie Bars

2005-11-28T09:01:00.000-05:00

I know that I said that I was not going to be making pumpkin stuff for a while but the Thanksgiving holiday inspired me to give this recipe a try. It came from the most recent Kraft Food and Family Magazine. The recipe is here. I think that there might be an error in the recipe however. If you only bake it for the required 25 minutes the inner portions of the pan do not get cooked. A baking time of 45 minutes is more appropriate.

I will also admit to making a mistake in my bars. The recipe calls for 3/4 cup of sugar (1/4 goes in the top and bottom mixture and 1/2 goes in the middle). I didn't read far enough ahead and put all 3/4 in the top and bottom mixture. To make up for this I only put a 1/4 cup of sugar in the middle. Other than being a little on the sweet side I do not think that it caused any real trouble.

It wasn't a hard recipe to follow and it didn't use any pre-made ingredients (which is often the case with this magazine). With baking time included it took about an hour and a half from start to finish which isn't too bad. I think if I would make this again I would make the bottom a little thinner and add that to the top. I think that would make a more even bar.

Pineapple-Coconut Cake

2005-11-21T10:23:00.000-05:00

A few weeks ago I picked up a pineapple cake mix since it was on sale and it was new (at least I don't recalling seeing it before). This was an actual pineapple cake mix, not a pineapple upside-down cake mix (even though the box says that you can make an upside-down cake from this mix).

Last night I was looking through my cupboards to decide what to make and I saw the cake mix and thought that I would give it a try. But since I do not like to make just a plain cake I kept searching the cupboards and ran across a can of coconut milk and a can of crushed pineapple. The coconut milk was purchased months ago for a future Thai meal that never happened and as for the pineapple, I don't even remember buying it. So getting back to the cake. I looked at the ingredient list on the box and decided I would substitute the 1 cup of water with 1 cup of coconut milk. Oil and eggs were also required for the cake and I did not adjust those.

The cake baked up well in 2 9" pans. I've lately been using the "non-stick sprayed parchment paper in the bottom of the pan" method and that has made removing the cake from the pan so easy.

I decided that the cake should also be iced with Cool Whip since a light icing seemed the most appropriate. But this time I made sure to let the cakes fully cool before icing (unlike the peppermint cake). For the icing in between the cake layers I mixed the Cool Whip with the crushed pineapple. Once iced all over I sprinkled some toasted coconut over the top.

I'm really happy with this one. It's a very "light" cake as compared to the "Peppermint Dreams" cake of a few posts ago and that's a good thing since its almost Thanksgiving.

There wasn't much by way of a recipe for this one other than substituting coconut milk for water but if you want more details on how I made the cake just let me know.

Popcorn Chicken Bites

2005-11-15T18:38:00.000-05:00

I've been wanting to make these for a while now. I saw Rachel Ray make them on her 30 Minute Meals show and I thought I should give them a try. Who would have thought that you can make popcorn chicken bites with just chicken and instant pancake mix. Yes, you read correctly, the only ingredients were chicken and pancake mix (oh, and some water). I'm not a fan of the "just add water" mixes since the pancakes are typically really bland; however, this is a great use for the instant batter.

Like I said earlier, its just two ingredients. First heat your oil (you want a decent sized pan so the chicken has room to cook). Then you mix the pancake powder with water (a little less than you would with pancakes since you want the batter sort of thick) in a bowl and cut the chicken into bite sized pieces. Toss the chicken in the batter and coat it evenly. Then in small batches fry the chicken bites. They take a few minutes to cook.

To complete the meal I paired the chicken bites with some curly fries. It isn't the healthiest of meals, but it was tasty (and simple!). Mine was about a 15 minute meal! Yum!

Peppermint-Dreams Cake

2005-11-13T17:00:00.000-05:00

Holiday cooking has begun. I recently got the newest issue of Kraft Food and Family Magazine and a cake very similar to this one was on the cover. I was inspired to give it a try.

If you've read my other cake posts you will know that I like to make cakes that use a box mix to start. This is another of those. To "doctor up" this one, pudding, sour cream, chocolate, and peppermint candy is added. The icing is cool whip.

If I hadn't been in a hurry, you would have seen that the cake was actually cut into 4 layers and cool whip was in between each. In my haste, I did not let the cakes fully cool before I put in the filling and it melted into the cakes (not that it was a bad thing in the end, but it would have looked much more impressive with all 4 layers showing).

The cake is one of the tastiest chocolate cakes I've had in a long time. Its super chocolately and really really moist. I'm not the happiest with the cool whip icing so I would suggest using real icing instead. And possibly doing a peppermint cream in between the layers since the mint flavor was a little too subtle for my tastes.

My Take on Shepherd's Pie

2005-11-07T10:07:00.000-05:00

I had a beef roast that needed to be cooked. On Thursday night I put the roast into the crock pot with some chicken stock (I didn't have any other stock) and half a bottle of Italian salad dressing (it did seem like a strange combination at the time, but I went with it anyway). I let this cook for about 4 hours on the high setting. At the end of the evening, the meat was not very tender and I still didn't know exactly what I wanted to do with it, so I put it into the fridge for the night. Then on Friday morning I pulled the crock out of the fridge and let the crock pot do its thing on low all day. Late Friday night, I still wasn't sure what I wanted to do with the meat (it was rather tender by now), so again, into the fridge it went for the night. Then on Saturday morning, I started heating up the roast again (still on low) and that's when I decided I would try to make a shepherd's pie.

I looked through my cabinets and found a can of green beans and some instant mashed potatoes. I had considered using other vegetables had I had them on hand, but since my choices were green beans or corn, I figured the beans would work best. To begin, I drained the liquid from the crock pot and started cooking it down with some flour and butter to make gravy. I put the meat in a glass baking dish and topped it with some cheese and then the can of green beans (drained). I then poured some of the gravy over the dish. I next made a big batch of instant potatoes and spread it over the meat and beans. I then covered the dish with foil and put into the fridge since I had to be leaving soon and would not have time to let it bake.

I had planned on having it for dinner on Saturday night, but I had a large lunch and wasn't hungry in the evening. So it remained in the fridge until Sunday morning. I baked it, covered with foil, for about 45 minutes at 325 degrees. I then removed the foil, put some butter on the potatoes and continued to bake it for another 15 minutes uncovered.

I had also reserved some of the gravy so I could pour it over the dish when it was served.

The picture above does not do this dish justice. It was one of the best non-dessert dishes that I've made in a long while. Even though I was full, I went back for more (it was that good). I don't know if it was due to the fact that the meat cooked for 3 days or that the dish sat for a day before being baked or that it contained some of my favorite foods or a combination of all 3, but this meal was great and definitely something I will do again.

Double Crusted Quiche

2005-11-04T08:52:00.000-05:00

This again is a case of necessity/frugality leading to invention. I had a surplus of eggs and a box of pie crusts about to go bad and I didn't want to throw them out. I also didn't want to make another dessert. The simplest thing I could think of was to make another quiche. I don't know why people these are a fancy food. Quiche is one of the most simple breakfast type foods that I know how to make.

So anyway, this one has ground pork and broccoli. Since I put a top on it, I skipped the cheese. I figured there was more than enough fat in the double crusts and that cheese would not be necessary. I don't recall all the spices I used when cooking the pork but I know there was salt, pepper, onion powder, and I think basil and some other stuff. I basically went through the spice drawer and put in a bit of everything that I think sounded good. I also did an egg wash on the top on the top crust.

I baked it at 350 degrees for approximately an hour at which point the crust was golden brown. I stuck a knife in the center and no liquid seeped out which was my indicator that it was done.

Its good. I will probably have it for dinner this evening and continue snacking on it over the weekend.

Chocolate-Orange Cake

2005-11-04T08:29:00.000-05:00

I admit, I cheated on this one. I was at Marc's last night (if you do not know about Marc's, its a discount/closeout chain in Ohio) and I saw this in their closeouts section. My Mom had picked up one of the other varieties a few weeks ago (oatmeal cookies) and those were good so I thought I would give this one a try. And it was only $1.88 so I figured I could spare the money to give it a try.

Other than the mix, the only ingredients necessary were melted butter and water. If someone messed up this recipe, they have serious issues.

It wasn't bad. Its definitely orange and chocolate and very dense. A couple little slices and some whipped topping made a nice treat. If you have a Marc's around you, take a look in the closeout section for these mixes. There are about 5 or 6 varieties and they come packaged in fabric pouches.

Pumpkin Cake

2005-10-31T09:05:00.000-05:00

For my parent's 30th Anniversary I made them this cake. Like me, they are both big fans of pumpkin. I also made them a batch of the pumpkin cookies which I reviewed previously.

I got this cake recipe from the Kraft Foods website. I was doing a search for pumpkin recipes and when I saw this cake I knew that I had to give it a shot. If you click on the link, you will notice that the cake was supposed to be 4 layers and as you can see from the picture above, mine is only 2. I think that they used smaller cake pans since my layers did not come out thick enough to cut in half. And since I didn't have multiple layers I decided to put the whipped filling on top along with the caramel and pecans (I also toasted the pecans, the recipe didn't call for this but I think that they taste better toasted).

This was another of the "uses a boxed cake mix as a base" recipes that I love. These type of cake recipes are great because they make the preparation quick and easy. The creamy filling for the cake was a combination of cream cheese, pumpkin, powdered sugar, and cool whip; and it would make an excellent fruit and cookie dip on its own.

This cake was a true winner. This recipe takes top honors for my October posts.

As a side note, since this is now the end of October, I'm going to be putting a hold on the pumpkin theme at least until Thanksgiving. I haven't decided what I will bring to the family dinner, but its highly likely that it will contain pumpkin. I also need to take a short break from desserts at least until closer to Christmas.

Pumpkin Cookies

2005-10-24T09:33:00.000-04:00

Continuing on the pumpkin-fest, presented today are pumpkin cookies. The batch actually made 3 dozen cookies but I took the photo while the rest were still in the oven. I got this recipe from the Libby Company who makes the canned pumpkin. At some point last year I requested their pumpkin mini-cookbook and dug it out last night to get this recipe. The whole process took about an hour since I only have one cookie sheet and one silpat (**christmas gift hint**), but I was talking on the telephone a majority of that time so it didn't seem as long.

The cookies are sweet but not overly so. I brought them into work this morning and shared them with my coworkers. One said that they reminded her of a scone and the more I think about it, I agree. These cookies are pretty similar in flavor the pumpkin scones at Starbucks.

I expected a recipe from the Libby cookbook to turn out well and these met that expectation. This recipe is a definite keeper.

Review: Coffee-Mate Pumpkin Spice Creamer

2005-10-19T10:20:00.000-04:00

No longer am I tied to Starbucks to get my Pumpkin Spice coffee kick since Coffee-Mate introduced their new seasonal creamers. Along with Pumpkin Spice, Coffee-Mate also offers Peppermint and Gingerbread flavors. I am only going to discuss the Pumpkin Spice today since I think its too early to be thinking about peppermint and gingerbread (check back after Halloween, I will probably be in the Christmas mood after that.)

I will admit, this is not the same as the Pumpkin Spice Latte that I usually get, but it is a close second. There is a lot of pumpkin, cinnamon, and nutmeg flavor in the creamer. With a little sugar and a strong brewed of coffee, it makes a very nice drink. And with the fact that it was less than $2 for a bottle that has at least 15 generous servings, it is a great deal. If you like pumpkin spice coffee you need to try this creamer.

As of today Coffee-Mate does not show it on their website, so it might not have hit all the grocery stores yet. Just keep your eyes open for it. Its worth it.

Pumpkin Soup w/ Pumpkin Cornbread

2005-10-19T09:55:00.000-04:00

I was in a pumpkin mood last night. To better put that, I was in the mood for pumpkin last night. As I said in earlier posts pumpkin a great fall flavor and I will use it as often as I can.

Last night's creations were a simple pumpkin soup and pumpkin-pecan cornbread.

The original recipe for the soup called for a can of condensed cream of potato soup. I was hoping to find a low-sodium variety and when I could not, I substituted it for cream of chicken. As a side note, I'm not monitoring my sodium but I think you should always be aware of how much you are ingesting. The rest of the soup consisted of pumpkin, cream, seasonings, and water. I added more seasonings than the original recipe called for since I knew that the reduction in sodium would reduce the flavor. The soup then simmered for about 30 minutes. Its a creamy soup and doesn't have much texture but does have a good flavor. I wouldn't serve it for a main dish, but as a side it would be great.

The pumpkin-pecan cornbread muffins were made from scratch; it too was a simple recipe. Flour, corn meal, leavening, and salt are mixed with pumpkin, brown sugar, oil, and eggs until blended then chopped pecans are folded in. Then the muffins are baked until they look done. Although a bit dry, the cornbread had great flavor. I tend to like my cornbread a little sweeter so in the next batch I will probably increase the amount of brown sugar and possible dust the surface of the muffins with sugar before baking.

Peach Cookie Cobbler

2005-10-17T07:55:00.000-04:00

I've been waiting to make this dessert for a while now. My original plan was to make individual cobblers in my onion soup bowls (these are the same shape and size as mine but a different color), but I saw that they were not oven safe. So instead I made the cobbler in an 8"x8" dish.

The thing that makes this cobbler unique and simple is that the topping is ready-made sugar cookie dough. If you wanted to make it even easier you could use canned fruit. I cooked down 2 bags of frozen peaches with a little sugar until the peaches were warmed through and a slight syrup had formed. The peaches were poured into the baking the dish and I rolled out the dough so it would cover the top of the dish. All that was left was to put the dough on top of the peaches and put the dish in the oven. I think it took about 40 minutes to bake (I kept checking until the top was golden brown.)

I served the cobbler with whipped topping but ice cream would make a great compliment as well.

Spinach Bread

2005-10-17T07:54:00.000-04:00

I was in a bread baking mood this weekend and since the first batch did not work out as planned, I'm glad I made this one as well. This is a basic white bread with chopped spinach baked within. I found this recipe off the foodtv website and since I had a large bag of fresh spinach I thought I would give it a try.

The original recipe directed that it be done by hand. I used my stand mixer which made it pretty simple. The only out of the ordinary process was that you first have to wilt the spinach and that the water you used to wilt the spinach goes into the mix.

This dough rose very well and very quickly (verifying the fact that I did indeed kill of the yeast in the previous recipe and not that my yeast was dead to begin with.) I baked it in a silicone loaf pan which is why it looks wider than a typical bread loaf. [I didn't even think about this fact until my cousin questioned what pan I used to get a loaf that was wide.]

This bread turned out really well. There is a slight spinach flavor to the bread (if I remake this, I would add more spinach the recipe called for.)

it ended up being breadsticks. . .

2005-10-17T07:53:00.000-04:00

My original plan was for this to be a loaf of white bread. However during the yeast proofing process I believe my water was too hot and I killed off the yeast. The dough came together rather well but would not rise. Since I didn't want to throw the dough away I stretched it onto a cookie sheet and rubbed it with olive oil, italian seasoning, and parmesan cheese. Then I baked it until it looked done (I honestly don't remember how long it was in the oven).

They aren't the best breadsticks but they are alright.

I learned my lesson about the temperature of the water thankfully before I started the next loaf of bread.

Review: McCormick Skillet Paste, Teriyaki Style

2005-10-12T08:54:00.000-04:00

As you can see from the title, this post is a review of McCormick's new skillet pastes. In the newspaper a few weeks ago there were coupons for the paste and since the grocery store had them on sale, it was practically free. I chose to go with teriyaki over the other flavors of sweet and sour, barbecue, or country herb.

I followed the 3 step instructions on the back of the paste packet (and made some rice) and came up with the meal seen above. Since the sodium counts in the paste were on the high side I used only half of the packet and I found there to be plenty of sauce.

As for flavor I thought the sauce was pretty good. It's about equal to take out quality teriyaki. My cut of beef wasn't the highest quality and the quick cooking time didn't allow for much tenderizing; so I suggest in the future to cut the beef into smaller pieces before cooking or get a more tender cut to begin with.

It was good, it was quick. I would make it again.

And yes, that is real steam in the picture.

Pumpkin Waffles with Apple Cider Syrup

2005-10-11T08:44:00.000-04:00

Fall is definitely here and with that comes food involving pumpkins and apples. These are some of the best reasons to enjoy fall. The leaves turning and cooler weather are nice, but pumpkin and apple are what really make fall great.

Last year around this time I made lots of pumpkin pancakes, but with the gift of the Belgian Waffle maker, I decided to try pumpkin waffles this time around. Since getting the waffle iron I have tried about all of the mixes and I think the best one for plain waffles is by Krusteaz (some day I will post about "Trader Joe's Chocolate Chocolate Chip Pancake and Waffle Mix").

The side of the Krusteaz box had a recipe for apple waffles and I used that for the basis of the pumpkin waffles. In their recipe they used applesauce so I in turn used canned pumpkin and added fresh grated nutmeg and cinnamon for extra flavor.

On their own, the waffles were great, but what's a waffle without syrup. If I had real maple syrup on hand I probably would have used that; since I did not, I decided to make a syrup out of apple cider (it seemed appropriate for the waffles). In a small sauce pan I boiled apple cider and sugar for about 10 minutes until it had cooked down and thickened. Once cooled it thickened to a syrup consistency. I didn't add any spices but if I make this again I'm going to add cinnamon I think.

These waffles were great. This morning I reheated one in the toaster oven and it was just as good. I also thought that a pumpkin butter and whipped cream mix would make a good topping. I might try that the next time around. I'll be sure to post the results.

Chicken Tenders

2005-10-06T07:36:00.000-04:00

I get an email about once a week from Kraft where they give a few recipes and advertise one of their products. In this week's email the main recipe was chicken tenders with Shake and Bake. The recipe was simple and the chicken tenders looked mighty tasty. I already had the chicken but no Shake and Bake mix; so in my avoidance of going to the grocery store twice in one week and my desire to make things homemade whenever I can, I made my own Shake and Bake coating mix.

I looked up the ingredients of Shake and Bake on the Kraft website and saw that is was basically just flour and spices. I took it a step further and used dried bread and seasons that I made into a semi-powder in the food processor. I have a little 1 cup processor that worked great for this. To get the dried bread I put a few slices of bread into the toaster oven for about 45 minutes at 200 degrees. The spices I used were pepper, garlic salt, onion powder, and paprika.

And just like Shake and Bake all that I needed to do was put the chicken strips in a bag with the coating mix and shake. I baked the tenders for about 30 minutes in the toaster oven set at 350 degrees. The chicken tenders came out perfectly. The seasonings blended together really well and the coating stuck to the chicken (past attempts to bread chicken had resulted in a pile of breading and a bare chicken piece).

Although there is no picture, I also made some Mrs. T's mini-perogies to go with my meal. Instead of pan frying them after boiling, I too put them in the toaster oven. I gave them a quick spray with non-stick cooking spray and then seasoned them with a little salt and pepper. The baked perogies had the crispness of pan frying but without the extra butter and oil.

Both of these are recipes I will use again. The homemade coating mix was so easy to do and much cheaper than any store bought mix. Plus this way I was able to adjust the spices to my liking. I am already thinking about altering the spices to include more italian seasonings and using it for a chicken parmesan meal. I'll be sure to post the results.

Checker-Board Cake

2005-10-03T07:33:00.000-04:00

Before I get into talking about the cake, I would like to point out the fact that I do not have any decent cake tray and had to use a cookie sheet to transport the cake. I'm sure a nice cake carrier or even a cake stand would make this dessert look even better. I think I could have really cleaned up the sides as well if I had the proper equipment. If anyone feels inclined to provide me with such a stand/carrier, I would greatly appreciate it.

As you can see, the cake has a checker-board pattern; the flavors are yellow and carrot. The main purpose of this cake was to try out the checker-board kit, so I took the easy way out and used box cake mixes. I got the kit from my mom which she got for turning in the points from Pillsbury products (thanks Mom!). If you want to see what it looks like, I found it on Amazon.com. My advice to anyone using such a kit, pour slowly. I made quite a mess on the counter by pouring too much batter into the pan and having it overflow.

To finish off the cake I made some pudding to go in between the layers and iced the cake with a canned butter cream icing. I had one slice so I could take the picture and then brought the rest into work. I predict that it will all be gone by mid-morning.

For the right occasion this is a neat cake. Its a little extra work, but I think the results justify the effort.

Pork Roast with Potatoes

2005-09-30T13:55:00.000-04:00

I'm not overly pleased with this meal, but I'm posting it anyway. There wasn't anything wrong with it, but there wasn't anything great about it either. It's basically just a meat and potatoes dinner.

The pork and potatoes were cooked in the crock pot and I experimented with the cooking liquid. Typically I would use just water and seasonings, but since I had a surplus of jarred applesauce and apples and pork go well together I thought that I would see how cooking a roast in applesauce would go. As it turns out, you can't really tell. No loss no gain. I think next time I will try chunks of apple.

I put the roast into the crock pot with applesauce and seasonings in the morning before I left for work. It cooked all day on the low temperature setting. When I got home I scrubbed and cut the extra "garden fresh" potatoes (those not used in the making of soup) and added them to the crock. I let this continue cooking for about another hour.

It was very simple and for that, I have to give it credit. Its a very hands-off meal and some days you just feel like meat and potatoes. Its definitely something I will make again, but I think I will wait until the thermometer drops a bit lower before giving it a repeat.

Rustic Potato Soup

2005-09-28T08:54:00.000-04:00

I want to begin this entry by thanking my father for the suggestion to make potato soup. He said that when he was a kid his parents would make a big pot of potato soup from time to time and that he really enjoyed it. Unfortunately, I wont be able to give him any of this soup since I won't be seeing him for at least another week; but he can read this post and see the picture and maybe I will make another batch at his house sometime soon.

Yesterday morning I went grocery shopping and since I had planned on making soup I remembered to buy a leek. But, I forgot to get any milk product thicker than skim. That evening when I started looking up recipe ideas I found that about all needed either heavy cream or half and half or some other thick milk product. After becoming frustrated with the lack of usable recipes (and I was not going back to the grocery store) I decided to just start cooking and see where things went.

I began by browning chopped leek in butter in a big stock pot. Once the leeks were cooked, I added 2 cans of chicken broth (low sodium), some chopped garlic, and a bunch of seasonings (parsley flakes, bay leaves, black pepper, and some other stuff that I will have to look up). I let this come to a boil and then added half of the potatoes. These potatoes were scrubbed and cut into small pieces with the skin still intact. The stock pot was then reduced to a simmer.

In another pot I boiled the rest of the potatoes (they were peeled) in water. Once these were fully cooked, the water was drained off and they were mashed. I then added the mashed potatoes to the stock pot.

At this point the soup looked alright, but still lacked any kind of creaminess. I then remembered that I had some powdered milk and thought that it might do the trick. I slowly added the powdered milk to the simmering soup (stirring the whole time) until I was happy with the consistency. At that point I let the soup simmer for about 45 minutes so that all the potatoes were cooked and that was it.

This was my first time making potato soup and I'm very happy with the outcome. My original plan was not to make rustic-style soup, but that's how it came out and I'm alright with that.

Beef and Brocolli Quiche

2005-09-22T10:53:00.000-04:00

If you thought Taco Lasagna was easy, this dish was even easier. It makes a great breakfast dish, but could be served at any meal. It reheats well both in the microwave or oven. Some may say that I cheated by using a ready made pie crust, but I don't care. They are not that expensive and are a great time saver; and they come in their own pan.

Since I had planned on making this the day after the Taco Lasagna, I cooked up the beef for both dishes at once and took out enough for the quiche before adding the taco seasoning. If you haven't read about Taco Lasagna, I suggest you give it a look.

The rest of the dish is cooked broccoli florets (I'm not big on stems), eggs, a little milk, and cheese. Depending on how you like your crust you can prebake. I tend to like a more flaky crust so I prebaked mine. If you like it softer, you can skip that step. In a mixing bowl I combined eggs and milk (making sure everything was well blended) and added in the beef, broccoli, and a handful of cheddar cheese.

This mixture was poured into the crust, a little more cheese was sprinkled on top, and it was tossed into the oven. The baking time was about an hour. You have to make sure that its fully cooked in the center so you have to keep an eye on it and take it out when its done. If it starts to get too browned on top, just put a piece of foil over the dish.

I think the only hard part about making a quiche is making sure that it is cooked the whole way. Other than that, its so simple.

Taco Lasagna

2005-09-22T10:36:00.000-04:00

If you haven't figured it out yet, I like cooking simple things; this falls into that category. Instead of pasta like traditional lasagna, I opted for flour tortillas which cooked up really well and absorbed the extra liquid from the salsa. Since I baked the lasagna in an 8" x 8" dish, I cut the tortillas in half and let them overlap in the middle. The longest part of the prep was cooking the ground beef. I added taco seasoning to the browning meat for extra flavor.

All that was left was to layer the tortillas, beef, salsa (your favorite jar variety works fine), and cheese(I used a shredded mexican blend) in the dish and repeat. My dish was deep enough to allow 4 series of layers. Then I just had to toss it into the oven for about an hour and it was done. The only recommendation I would make for the future is to add a layer of refried beans. It wasn't necessary (and I didn't have any in the cupboards), but I think that it would be a welcome addition.