Wednesday, October 31, 2012

Trick or Treat



For Great Grandma and Meme.

Cheesy Garlic Bread

I found this on that website that shall 
remain nameless. 
Well, alright, 
Pintrest.

Basically you take an Italian loaf
cut it diagonally in both directions
so as to make diamonds across it. 
I think an extra pair of hands could be helpful
as the bread gets pretty wobbly
when you are making the second 
side of cuts.

Then you mix up 
6 T. of melted butter,
2T. olive oil, 
fresh minced garlic, 
dried minced onions, 
dijon mustard and
parsley 
and put it over top, getting down into
all those nooks and crannies you've created.
Then take a mix of shredded cheese and shove it all 
on, in, and over.
Wrap it all up in foil and bake for about 20 min. 

What's not to love?

Well, maybe not the dried minced onions and 
dijon mustard the recipe calls for
but that is easily remedied.
Next time.
Because there will be a next time. 
You hear me Christmas Eve?


Saturday, October 20, 2012

Maddies' Room

And a gramar lesson. 
Shanna congratulated me for proper
 use of an apostrophe.



It was a mistake.

BUT NOT THIS ROOM!
WooHoo!
Someone's been having too much fun!

Wednesday, October 17, 2012

Turkey Onesie

 Did I mention  Pintrest isn't just for recipes?
The best thing about making this myself is
that I could match the feathers to
the pants I found.

Here's hoping Maddie doesn't outgrow 
this before 
Thanksgiving!

Tuesday, October 16, 2012

Pumpkin Spice Bites


Another entry in my
"Can I Call You Pumpkin"
board.

These were really good but I was very surprised at 
the steps that were troublesome.
One might think forming the cups of cookie
would be difficult but given the right tools, they were
a piece of cake. 
Or cookie.
Finding the pumpkin cookie mix was a problem.
After three stores I decided sugar cookie mix
with a healthy dose of pumpkin pie spice would 
suffice. 
And it did.

Mixing pumpkin pudding (not hard to find)
with a cup of heavy cream proved to be an issue.
It turned to cement.
Immediately.
The recipe called for you to whisk it till smooth.
Can you see the folly in that?
And then it said to put it in the fridge so it 
could set up enough to pipe.

Set up enough to pipe was NOT a problem.
Piping cement pumpkin pudding
was.

But I persevered.
24 times.


Saturday, October 13, 2012

Donuts or Doughnuts

Either way, 
I baked them this morning.
It was wrong.
Donuts should be fried. 
In the evening. 
As a social event.
With wine.
And messy friends.

That is all.

Friday, October 12, 2012

Brisket Bowls

It's what Rachel Ray calls it but really, 
there should be a more descriptive name for it. 
But as I have already established, 
I don't have the recipe naming skill.

Apparently neither does Rachel.

But I digress. 
This was really good.
The recipe has you cook it in a dutch oven but
you really could do it in a slow cooker too. 

There is a little asian hint of flavor to it but
not overpowering.
You are supposed to serve it with a slice of 
lime that you drizzle over and believe it or not, 
it was really good.

I did change up one thing in the recipe.
You were supposed to line a bowl with rice
that you have added spinach and cilantro to, 
making it *green* and then spoon the meat and 
sauce into the middle of it. 
Hence the name. 
But we are on a rice moratorium at the moment.

Thank you Consumer's Reports. 
It seems there is arsenic in our rice.
The Chinese have found yet another way to
yank our chains. 
Remember the red dye/paint in kids toys?
Well, now it's arsenic. 
It's running off fields from the pesticides and 
into the rice patties.
Mike thinks we should get rice made in the 
USA.
Are there rice patties in the USA?

But I digress yet again.
I used mashed sweet potatoes. 
So far they are arsenic free. 
And maybe even grown in the USA.


Thursday, October 11, 2012

Pumpkin Cheesecake Cobbler

As you can see I could not wait
to try this before it's beauty shot.
What you can't see is that I burned my mouth
in the process.

I found the picture for this on 
Pintrest, 
but where I got the recipe is anyone's guess.
Here's the link:

As best I can tell it's a recipe site.
I think someone named Diane created it
and in this world of bloggers
being so concerned they get their credit, 
there.

Here's what I have to say about Diane's recipe;
while the ingredients make for a tasty
treat, her process is whack.
In my humble opinion.

The recipe calls for you to grease a pan
and then put canned pumpkin and evaporated milk in 
it and mix. Then add a dry cake mix and 
graham cracker crumbs and mix.
 Again. 
Not the easiest way to accomplish this task. 
Next time I'm using a bowl. 
Call me a renegade.
But here's the hardest part, 
next you mix softened cream cheese with powder
sugar, making in essence frosting/cheesecake
that you are supposed to *spread* over this
raw cake batter consistency layer in the pan.

Yeah, not gonna happen.
I made little blobs and dropped them all over.
Eh, not perfect.
I think next time I will try warming the cream cheese
and see if it gets thin enough to pour.

Oh, 
because there will be a next time.
As I said, 
her ingredients make for a tasty treat :o)

Sunday, October 7, 2012

Sweet and Spicy Sauce

Or glaze. 
Or something. 
It would seem the hardest part of creating
a recipe would be naming it.

You know how 
pork is the *other* white meat?
Well, I'm not a big chicken fan so in this house
pork is the white meat. 
My favorite cut is the tenderloin. 
America's Test Kitchen gave me the 
perfect way to cook it. 
I use an oven safe fry pan, 
brown the tenderloin on all sides
 on the stove top
and then put it in a 375 degree oven for  
about 25 minutes depending on 
the size of the tenderloin.
I check it for doneness by how much
give it has when I poke it with my tongs.
I like it a little pink in the middle.
Over done pork is the pits.

Pork tenderloin is a perfect vehicle for any 
sauce you want. 
We are big on teriyaki, BBQ
and a cranberry sauce.

I got creative the other night and came up with this:

It is:
1/2 cup apricot preserves
2 T. soy sauce
1 clove garlic, minced
2 t. fresh grated ginger
1/4 t. red pepper flakes

When I took the tenderloins out to rest
I deglazed the pan with a hit of chicken stock
then added the sauce components and
heated them through. 

PS, those potatoes tasted pretty good
dunked in the sauce too. 
Yum. 

Saturday, October 6, 2012

Pumpkin Cheesecake Trifles

In my effort to create all things 
pumpkin from Pintrest I submit
the Trifle.
Mini-ized.

This was so easy that it gets to be a 
keeper.
Here's the link to the recipe:

Here's where I went renegade:
the recipe calls for 
"Biscoff cookies",
yeah, I don't know what those are so I used 
ginger snaps.
Could be the same thing for all I know. 
Could GTS, but naw.
It also called for 
pumpkin pie spice.
I had a chai spice blend sitting around from
those chai cookies with the pumpkin kisses
and while I wasn't a fan of the cookies, the spice 
blend was pretty nice.

One thing I didn't do but will in the future is
to put a layer of the crushed cookies 
in the middle. 
It's just too far a distance to get down to 
that crunchy layer.

Here's the spice blend formula:
1 1/2 tsp. cardamom
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ginger
1/4 tsp. cloves
1/4 tsp. nutmeg


Thursday, October 4, 2012

Enchilada Pasta Casserole

Yep, Pintrest.
This was really good and not terribly difficult.
Maybe a little prep-pan intensive
but in the end worth it. 

I'm always on the look out for a good recipe
to take people and this one fits the bill.

And true to my last post,
here's the link:

Wednesday, October 3, 2012

There IS Value in Pintrest


There's a new movement out there
among Bloggers.
They are all up in arms that people are crediting
Pintrest with ideas.
They argue Pintrest does not create the idea,
Bloggers do.
Well, that is true, however, I was never
gonna find that recipe or craft idea on my own.
I don't have the time to cruise the internet *that* much.
I love Pintrest as a clearing house of good ideas.
So, I'm gonna tell you where I
 found that idea or recipe. 
Pintrest.
Give credit where credit is due. 
I do, however, and will continue to,
provide links to where the recipe etc. can be found. 
Because it's true, Pintrest didn't create it,
they just provided the vehicle to know the 
idea is out there.
And there is value in that.

 PS, can I tell you how many Blogs I have found
thanks to Pintrest?

Tuesday, October 2, 2012

Spiced Pumpkin Bread

I started out thinking I would make
Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Bread.
Sounds good, huh?

I saw it on Pintrest and when I went to the recipe
I found it was all in metric.
Not gonna happen. 
Did I mention it was 4:30 AM?
I'm not sure I've got what it takes to convert
measurements and temperatures 
at 4:30 PM, 
I can guarantee I
DON'T
have it at 4:30 AM. 

But I can 
GTS
any time of day and I came 
upon this recipe.

I had the presence of mind to peruse the
comment section.
It seemed unanimous that the 3 cups
of sugar was a little excessive.
So I cut it back to 2 1/4 cups.
There were suggestions of altering the spice
combination as well as adding
dried cranberries.
So I did both!
I left out the cloves and put in
cardamom instead
and added cranberries.
All thoughts of chocolate chips melted away.

I will say it is not overly 
pumpkin-y tasting
but it is very good.

Maybe next time swapping out the spices
for a chai spice blend?
Maybe some time I will get around to those
chocolate chips.