Leftover Lasagna Soup

On Sunday for dinner I made a small tray of lasagna for D, the boys, and I. It was pretty good, but after eating leftovers for lunch 3 days in a row, I was pretty much over it. I started looking online for ways to use up leftover lasagna. There were a few things here and there...stuff it into peppers, chop it up and toss it with a salad...but nothing was really speaking to me. The only promising idea I could find was to turn it into soup. I found a couple of recipes, but none of them were quite right for what I had on hand. I decided to just figure it out on my own.

I cooked some minced garlic and red chili peppers in about a tablespoon of olive oil. I had about a quarter of an 8x8 tray of lasagna leftover as well as a bit of potato left from scooping it out for potato skins. I threw them together in the food processor with a half of a can of diced tomatoes until they were blended into a thick...well...goop. Then I added that to the pot with the garlic and peppers and the rest of the diced tomatoes and poured in a can of chicken broth. I didn't feel like it had enough tomato, so I added in a small can of tomato sauce. I also added a bit of white wine...why not? I seasoned it with oregano, parsley, salt, and red and black pepper and cooked it on medium until it was heated through.




I was a little nervous about feeding it to D. After all, it was a little weird. It tasted pretty good though, so I served it up with some mixed veggies and garlic bread. He said it was good, so I think it was a successful dish. He isn't usually one to hide the truth when he doesn't like something I make.

Experimenting in the kitchen is fun. :) I had the leftovers today for lunch with a big delicious salad. It totally it the spot.

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Cookies and Cream Cheesecake Cupcakes

 Make these.  If you like cheesecake, Oreos, or anything in a cupcake wrapper; go make these right now.  I originally saw this recipe on Pinterest, and I knew I had to make them for my birthday week.  I plan on there being two cheesecakes this week.  This one is for tonight's Bible study group.  The other will be on Saturday (when I turn 30!) I haven't decided if I'm making the second one, or if we are all going to the cheesecake factory.

Anyway, back to these cupcakes.  The are adapted from a Martha Stewert Recipe, and a million food bloggers have made them.  (Seriously, look it up.) I used a halved recipe for them, subbed Greek yogurt for sour cream after reading a suggestion by Pink Parsley, and added more Oreos than originally called for.

 The original recipe says it makes 30 cupcakes.  I cut it in half and still got 18.

• 28 Oreos - 18 left whole, and 10 coarsely chopped
• 2 8oz packages cream cheese, room temperature
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 large eggs, lightly beaten
• 1/2 cup Greek yogurt (or sour cream)
• pinch of salt

Preheat the oven to 275 degrees.  Line muffin tins with paper liners, and place 1 Oreo in the bottom of each cup.

With an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat the cream cheese until smooth, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed.  Gradually add the sugar, and beat until smooth.  Beat in the vanilla, then drizzle in the eggs.  When well combined, mix in the sour cream and salt.  Stir in the chopped cookies by hand.

Divide the batter evenly among the muffin tins, filling each one almost to the top.  Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until the filling is just set.  Most of the versions of this I read said about 22 minutes, but I found that mine took more like 30 minutes to set. 

Transfer the tins to wire racks to cool completely, then refrigerate (in tins) at least 4 hours.  Remove from tins just before serving.

I also added an Oreo Whipped Cream to mine. The following recipe I came up with made just enough for my 18 cupcakes.

8 oz of Heavy Whipping Cream
1/4 tsp Vanilla
1 TBS Powdered Sugar
3 Crushed Oreos

Pour whipping cream into the bowl of a stand mixer.  Begin mixing on high for a minute.  Add in vanilla and powdered sugar, and continue to beat on high until it thickens into a a whipped cream.  Gently fold in crushed Oreos.

I let mine refrigerate overnight, and then scooped it into a plastic zip top bag with a tip cut off the end, and piped it onto my cupcakes.  It was delicious!

Hummus Pizza and Acorn Squash Fries

 As I said before, I'm always trying to come up with yummy, creative, but low calorie meal ideas.  I especially like it if I can find several ways to use the same ingredients.  After all, if I have a bell pepper in my fridge, it won't last forever.  Tonight I made a sort of flatbread pizza with acorn squash fries.  For Christmas I got the book Robin Takes 5 by Robin Miller.  It's all recipes containing 5 ingredients of fewer.  One of her recipes was for a Greek pizza.  I have kind of altered her idea to fit my own tastes and what I had in my kitchen.

Here is what I used for mine.  This serves 1 (1 person who is eating smallish meals), obviously, you could make more.
For the Flatbread:
1/2 Flat-Outs Sun Dried Tomato Flatbread
1 Tbsp Sabra Basil Pesto Hummus
2 Tbsp Publix Tomato Basil Feta
1 Tbsp Shredded Mozzarella
1 Sliced Garlic Clove (Roasted)
2 Tbsp Chopped Red Peppers (Roasted)
Cooking Spray (I used olive oil spray)

Preheat the oven to 425.  Spray a pizza pan with olive oil cooking spray.  (You could also use a cookie sheet, but the flatbread won't get as crispy.  Spread the hummus over the flatbread, sprinkle the cheeses over the hummus, and top with the roasted red peppers and roasted sliced garlic.  (I roasted these with the squash fries for about 10 minutes, and then took them out to put on the pizza.)  Bake for about 7 minutes or until the cheese is melted.  Watch that you don't burn the edges of your flatbread.  It cooks fast!

For the Acorn (You could also use butternut squash.  I chose acorn because I am the only one eating it, and it's smaller) Squash Fries
1/4th Acorn Squash (Peeled and seeds removed and sliced into as close as possible to "fry" shape.)
Caribbean Jerk Seasoning to taste (or whatever seasoning floats your boat.  I like Jerk seasoning on almost everything.)
Salt to taste
Cooking Spray

For these, preheat the oven to 425. Spray the roasting pan with olive oil and spread the squash slices over it.  Sprinkle on a little salt.  Bake about 7 to 8 minutes on one side, then turn them over and bake on the other side for another 7 minutes or so.  They should be browned on the outside, but soft in the middle.  As soon as they come out of the oven, I like to sprinkle on a little Jerk seasoning.

As a second side, I sliced half a banana and sprinkled it with cinnamon.  Yum! And my whole meal was under 300 calories.

 

I guess I kind of got my wish about not working.  Normally on Mondays, I go into work at 10.  However I got a text saying I wasn't needed today until noon.  When I got there at noon, I was told that we would be combining classes right after nap, and I'd be going home because we had so few children today.  So I ended up working a 3.5 hour day, and 2 hours and 15 minutes of that were spent in a room full of sleeping children!

I stopped at the grocery store on the way home to pick up food for tomorrow night's Bible study dinner.  I am planning on making The Pioneer Woman's Cajun Chicken Pasta.  I really hope it comes out tasting as good as that picture makes it look! 

Egginess

I am trying very hard to count calories and lose some weight.  I worked really hard to lose weight several years ago, and in the past year or so, I've started putting a bit of it back on.  I can't let myself go down that road.  I worked too hard! So anyway, I've been trying to come up with some yummy, satisfying, and reasonably healthy meal options.  Somewhere I saw a recipe similar to this, and thought it sounded pretty good.  Yesterday I tried out a version of it.  It is super simple and quite tasty and versatile.  I took an oven safe ramekin, sprayed it with some EVOO, cracked an egg into it, and added some toppings.  My grocery store makes their own brand of tomato basil feta which I got on sale recently.  I sprinkled a tablespoon of that over the egg and added some chopped tomato.  I made another one for myself for dinner last night and added some chili pepper and green onion to it.  Then I baked it until the white part of the egg was set.  I would really like to figure out what temp and time to do it at to get it so the white is set but the yolk is still runny.  I love me some runny egg yolk. :D  I toasted up a piece of flatbread to eat with the egg.  It was yumminess! 

Cheeeeeeeesecake!

Several weeks ago, I was asked to make a peanut butter cheesecake for a friend's birthday.  After much searching through recipes, I finally decided to go with this one.  Let me assure you that it was an excellent choice.  As with most good cheesecake, it wasn't cheap or quick to make, but it was worth every penny and minute I put into it. (The birthday boy seemed to enjoy it as well!) It has an Oreo crust covered with a layer of chocolate fudge and peanut butter cup pieces, a thick and rich peanut butter cheesecake filling, chocolate ganache spooned over the top, and finished off with some peanut butter icing and a peanut butter cup.  If you are a fan of cheesecake, peanut butter, and chocolate, I'd say this is definitely one you should try out!

PIE !

On Tuesday, I made my very first pie.  Well, I should say, my very first, totally from scratch, successful fruit pie.  Pie crusts have always scared me.  I think I might have made one years ago that was a failure, but for the most part I have avoided them.  I'm not sure why, really.  I think that maybe my mom always talked about how difficult it was to get them right, so I kind of just assumed I couldn't do it.  I like making things from scratch, especially when I'm baking.  Cutting corners in my desserts is not really my thing.  I've used pre-made pie crusts a few times, but I've mostly just stayed away from pie because I didn't want to make something that wasn't really mine.
  
Anyway, for my Bible study group on Tuesday, I was responsible for dessert.  I was going to make a peach cobbler, but the peaches at the grocery store weren't ready to eat.  Blueberries were on sale and looked good, so I figured I'd just do a blueberry cobbler instead.  I looked at recipes for a long time, but didn't come up with anything that really looked or sounded all that great to me.  I'm not exactly sure what led me to think of pie, but somehow my mind when there.  Most of the recipes I found called for the berries to be cooked down before adding to the pie, but that wasn't what I was going for.  I was using fresh berries, and I wanted them to be as close to fresh and whole as possible.  I finally found this recipe to use for the filling.  Since I was apprehensive about the crust, I decided to look for a step by step instructional recipe.  I ended up using the all butter recipe from this site.  It actually turned out to not be that difficult.  I think the real trick was using the frozen butter.

I think my pie turned out pretty good.  I had fun with the little hearts, and I like the way it looks.  David said it tasted "spectacular."  I'm pretty sure I can trust him.  He never minds telling me when he doesn't like something I make.  I like that about him.  It makes the compliments so much more worth getting when you know someone really means them.

I think I'm going to have to make more pies.  I have, however, come to the conclusion that I need a bigger food processor if I'm going to do so.  I wonder if I can hold out for Christmas...

Salted Caramel Tarts

So far, having my sister living here has been kind of fun. Last night we made fish tacos and salted caramel tarts together. For the tarts we used this recipe.
The recipe itself is not all the great as it lacks in detail, however, the tarts turned out pretty good. One weird thing about the recipe is that it says to serve it warm and does not mention chilling the completed tart. We were making the tarts for today, so ours needed to be chilled. I am not sure how you could have eaten them without chilling them though. They would have been a runny mess (unless our substitution of half and half instead if cream made the caramel more runny than it should have been.)


We used a few broken pieces of dark chocolate candy that we had on hand and mixed it with some semi-sweet chunks and chips.


We ended up making two 10 inch tarts and one 4 inch tart.


The 4 inch tart came out of the fridge this morning for testing and was very yummy.


This picture was taken this morning of the chilled tart. The funky spot is from where the foil stuck to it. I can't say it is an attractive dessert, but it sure does taste good!

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Fresh Ginger Cookies

 I just wanted to do a quick post to share this recipe for ginger cookies with you all. They are made with fresh ginger, and they far surpass the Betty Crocker gingersnap recipe I shared sometime last year.  The only things I changed in this recipe were using whole wheat flour that I sifted twice and making the cookies slightly smaller than what was called for.  Honestly, you can't even tell they were made with whole wheat flour.  These might be my new favorite cookies!  I will tell you, the ginger flavor is very strong in them, so if you aren't a huge fan of ginger these may not be for you.  Personally, I can't get enough of them!

Whole Wheat Acorn Squash Muffins

Sunday afternoon, while walking through the produce section of the grocery store, I was overcome with the urge to bring home a winter squash.  It may not feel like fall outside here, but that doesn't stop me from wanting to pretend and eat fall foods! I picked out a nice Golden Acorn Squash, and took it home with me.

I was going to be spending the afternoon in the kitchen making potato soup, so I figured I'd look up a recipe to make use of my squash.  I really want to try out this one, but I knew I didn't have the time for a yeast bread.  Eventually I came across this recipe for Acorn Squash Muffins.   I wanted to use whole wheat flour instead of white because, well, that's just the kind of girl I am.  I also was a bit disappointed by the lack of fall-ish seasoning in it, so I added a bit of that to the mix.  Then, as I combined the ingredients I discovered that it was FAR too dry.  I couldn't even get all the flour to work into the mixture.  I had something of a looming disaster on my hands.  I recalled seeing a comment on a squash bread recipe elsewhere about someone adding Chai concentrate to their bread, and I thought, "Hey, why not?  It's a mess anyway!"  Well, my friends, they turned out pretty good!  I took them with me to my Bible study group that night, and have been told that they were pretty tasty.   So, I'm going to write down my version of the recipe for you in case you ever care to try them.

2 1/2 cups sifted whole wheat four
2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt

1 tsp. pumpkin pie spice
2 eggs, beaten slightly
1 cup mashed acorn squash
1 Tbsp. margarine
1 cup sugar

1/2 cup liquid chai concentrate (Or somewhere around that.  I just added it in at the end until the batter was wet enough to incorporate the flour.)

 

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Grease or line muffin pans. Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and pumpkin pie spice in large mixing bowl and mix. Add eggs, mashed squash, butter, sugar, and chai and beat until mixed - the batter should not be smooth. Fill muffin cups almost to the top by spooning in batter. Bake for about 15 minutes or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean. Remove from the oven and serve warm.

Sorry I didn't get any pictures this time.  I never thought they would turn out, so it didn't really occur to me to take pictures until it was too late.  My mom wants me to make them for her, so I'll try to take some pictures then and add them to the post.  

Lemon Ginger Muffins

I found this recipe the other night on Simply Recipes., and I just knew that I had to try it. I'm a huge fan of ginger, but I'd never actually used fresh ginger before. I was very excited to try this out. As I cannot seem to ever follow a recipe strictly (whether by accident or by design), I did make some changes. They were minor. I'll include them here in green.

(Mini) Lemon Ginger Muffins Recipe


Ingredients

3 cups of all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup 1/2-inch cubes of peeled, fresh ginger
1 large lemon (I ended up needing about 1.5 lemons to get enough zest)
1 cup sugar -divided into 1/4 cup and 3/4 cup

10 Tbsp unsalted butter (1 1/4 stick), softened
2 large eggs
1 1/2 cup plain yogurt (I used half plain yogurt and half vanilla yogurt. I'd like to tell you that this was an inspiration that came to me, but the truth is, I just accidentally didn't buy enough of the plain and happened to have the vanilla already in my fridge. I liked the way it turned out though!)

Glaze
2 Tbsp fresh lemon juice
1 cup confectioner's sugar (powdered sugar)
(I added a little cinnamon to the mixture. I will also say that I don't think this glaze is fabulous or really worthy of the muffins. It tasted a little too powdered sugary for my taste. I kind of think I like the muffins best plain.)

Method,

1 Adjust the oven rack to the middle-lower part of the oven. Preheat oven to 375°F.

2 Whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt and set aside.

3 Using a vegetable peeler, peel off the lemon zest from one large lemon (avoid the white pith). Coarsely chop the zest. You should have approximately 1/4 cup of chopped lemon zest. Add this zest, the cubed fresh ginger, and 1/4 cup of sugar to a food processor. Pulse until a paste forms.

4 In a large mixing bowl, cream butter and remaining 3/4 cup of sugar together, beating until fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, beating until incorporated after each one. Beat in the lemon zest and ginger paste.

5 Beat in one half of the dry ingredients until just incorporated. Beat in one third of the yogurt. Beat in half of the remaining dry ingredients. Beat in a second third of the yogurt. Beat in the remaining dry ingredients and then the remaining yogurt. Again be careful to beat until just incorporated. Do not over beat.

6 Use a standard 12-muffin muffin pan. (I used mini muffin tins. 1 3/4" x 3/4" size) Coat each muffin cup lightly with olive oil, grapeseed oil, or a little melted butter using a pastry brush. (Used cooking spray...worked fine) Distribute the muffin dough equally among the cups. Bake until muffins are golden brown, about 25 to 30 minutes (My mini muffins came out perfectly at 12 minutes). Test with a long toothpick (we use a thin bamboo skewer) (<-not my note. I used a toothpick) to make sure the center of the muffins are done. Set on wire rack to cool.

7 While the muffins are cooling, in a bowl, whisk together the powdered sugar and lemon juice for the glaze. Add more lemon juice if necessary. While the muffins are still a bit warm, use a pastry brush to brush the glaze over each muffin. The muffins will absorb some of the glaze, so you add more glaze to each muffin if you like. (Since I wasn't crazy about the glaze, I didn't add it to the muffins. I left it in a separate container for people to spoon on as they wished).

Makes 12 muffins. (I got 69 mini muffins out of this recipe)

I found these muffins to be delicious, light, and almost creamy in texture. I will certainly be making them again!

ETA: No, I do not own enough muffin tins to make 69 muffins. I own enough to make 24 mini muffins at a time. I just made them in shifts.

Fruit Tarts

It has been entirely too long since I've been able to post a new recipe that I've tried, but I have one tonight. I volunteered to make a dessert for my parents' small group Bible study that meets at our house every other week. I was looking at recipes online this afternoon, when the idea of a fruit tart popped into my head. I found a Paula Dean recipe for one, and decided to try it out. It was YUM, and everyone seemed to love it. The recipe is for one, but I doubled it to make two. I also did not have tart pans, so I had to make do with smaller pie pans. It made the crust much thicker, but I really liked it that way. Also, the cook time for the crusts was at least doubled for mine. It also took me far longer than 2 minutes to get the glaze to thicken...not sure why. I think my favorite part of it was arranging all the fruit on them. It was like a little art project. :D

Baking With My Favorite Little Helper

It's December! Christmas is nearly here! It's kind of hard to believe. Even with all the counting down I've been doing, it still seems like it kind of snuck up on me.

Today, after church, we met up with my sister and her family for lunch. I mentioned to my nephew that he should come home with me, and he looked at his mom and said, "MOM! I want to go with LAUREN!" So naturally, I brought him home. I had promised to make a dessert for my mom for her Bible study, so my nephew and I made ginger cupcakes with lemon spice buttercream frosting together. He was a much better helper than I expected him to be. He helped with measuring, pouring, stirring, and almost anything else I asked him to do. He really seemed to enjoy it. The only part he didn't want anything to do with was using the mixer. He doesn't like loud noises, so whenever I would turn it on, he would run into the other room and cover his ears.

Here is the recipe if anyone is interested. I believe the cake recipe came from a Laura Ingles Wilder cookbook. The frosting is from Southern living with a variation of my own.

Ginger Cake

1 cup sugar
1 cup brown sugar dissolved in 1/2 cup of hot water
2/3 cup butter or margarine
1 cup milk
2 eggs
1 tsp each of baking soda, ginger, cinnamon, and cloves
3 cups flour

- Sift dry ingredients and set aside
- Cream sugar and butter. Mix in brown sugar mixture, eggs, and milk
- Stir in dry ingredients
- Pour in 9 x 13 inch baking pan (I did cupcakes instead)
- Bake at 350 degrees for 35-40 minutes (The cupcakes only took 20-25 minutes)

Lemon Spice Buttercream Frosting

1 1/2 cups butter or margarine, softened
4 cups sifted powdered sugar
2 Tablespoons lemon juice (the recipe calls for orange, but I like the way lemon compliments the ginger cake)
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground cloves

- Cream butter at medium speed of an electric mixer
- Gradually ad sugar, beating until light and fluffy
- Add lemon juice and spices
- Beat until spreading consistency


After we finished the cupcakes, we decided to make Minty Snowmen. With this one, he mostly just watched. He is not a big fan of getting his hands into stuff. He did enjoy eating them though. ;) Mine are not as well done as the ones in the picture on the recipe, but I did enjoy making the little Superman one...and yes, I know the colors are off on the S shield. I also got a little bored of the snowmen and decided to make a Christmas tree.

Nothing...

Not one word. It has been nearly 5 days, and I still have not heard back from these people. It seems inconsiderate to me. I spent nearly 8 hours in my car to visit them. I paid for the gas to get there. I don't know if you have noticed, but gas isn't cheap! I understand if they don't want to hire me, but it would be nice if they'd at least tell me so! It's very frustrating. I emailed them as soon as I got home. I thanked them for having me in their home. I told them I was still interested in the job. And still, nothing.

I'm done ranting about this now. I don't want this blog to be a place where I come to whine and complain. That's not who I want to be. I don't even think I want the job anymore anyway.

I talked with my mom last night about the choir thing. We both thought that since this is something that has been on my heart for so long, I should pursue it. I'm not sure where to go from here, but starting next week (when I get back from Disney), I am going to talk to some homeschool moms that I know as well as some people more experienced with getting these kinds of things up and running. I may also end up crawling back to the preschool and begging for a part time job. I need money, and frankly, I need to be doing something useful with my time. Enough is enough.

On to other things...

I made dinner for my family last night. I did the pistachio crusted chicken again. It has been a hit with everyone who has had it. I'm rather proud of it as it's just something simple I concocted while trying to copy something I had eaten elsewhere. :D I also made whole wheat biscuits, homemade cranberry sauce, and oven "fried" potatoes to go with it. Sorry, no pictures this time. I picked up the latest Rachael Ray at the grocery store yesterday and found a few more recipes I want to try. If I do, I may post those at a later date.

Bread and Cute Kids

Shhh! Enter quietly tonight. My nephew is sleeping on his little bed on the floor in my room. My mom and dad picked the kids up after their Bible study tonight and brought them back to our house. Now really, is that precious or what?
Poor little guy is in need of a bath, but by the time he got here tonight it was really too late to bother with that.

It seems that another possible job has fallen through. They were supposed to call me today, but they never did. They also haven't returned the email I sent them on Thursday. I really do believe that the right job is going to come along, but it's SO hard to wait for it!

I made some pumpkin bread tonight. This recipe is from Nancy Creech's Cooking For One, so it makes a pretty small loaf.

I wasn't sure how I felt about the idea of putting the curry powder in the bread, but I like how it turned out. It gave it a very different, yet subtle, flavor.



Middle Eastern Pumpkin Bread
1 mini loaf



1 Cup unbleached, all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 tsp curry powder
1 egg, slightly beaten
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup cooked, mashed pumpkin
2 TBS water
1/4 cup butter, softened
1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans (I loathe nuts in bread, so I left this out)



Preheat oven to 350 degrees F
Grease and flour a mini-loaf pan (6"x3-1/4"x2") (I don't have one, so I used small loaf shaped muffin tins) or a straight-sided baking dish of 2 cup capacity.
Mix flour, baking soda, salt, and curry powder.
In a separate bowl, combine the beaten egg with the brown sugar, then add the pumpkin, water, and soft butter.
Pour the liquid ingredients into the flour mixture, add the nuts, and stir until well mixed.
Pour the batter into the greased and floured loaf pan and bake for 50-60 minutes, or until a knife inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean (because mine were smaller they only took about 30 minutes to cook).
remove from the pan and cool on a rack.

God is Faithful - Even When I am Faithless

Yesterday I found out that the job I though I might be getting is probably not going to work out. I spent the afternoon getting angry with my mom over stupid stuff, pouting, whining, worrying, and scouring the internet for a job. I just knew that I was going to be unemployed forever...that there was nothing out there for me. I'm sure God was shaking his head and sighing in exasperation over my lack of faith. He must love me though, because later that night he restored my faith. Last night I received emails about three different positions. This morning I talked to one family's previous nanny on the phone (she was the one doing the interviewing). The job actually sounds pretty good. Of course, this one could fall through too, but it is good to know that there are still jobs out there. I will find a great job, and I believe it will happen soon.

Alabama hasn't been as bad as I originally made it out to be. The weather has been beautiful and I've actually been having a pretty good time. Yesterday we went out on the lake in the boat. My parents own 1,000 feet of lake front property, but because it is so hilly and the trees so dense, you can't see the lake from the house. It was nice to be able to see more of the property from the water. I have only seen the small, cleared area where the house is. I'm not fond enough of spiders and ticks to venture into the woods for exploration (I feel fairly certain that this brings into question my pirate status).






Last night I made dinner for the family, and I'm proud to sat that it was a success. I love to cook for myself, but making food for other people always makes me nervous. I made creamy parsley and pistachio fettuccine (well, we didn't have fettuccine on hand so I actually used spaghetti noodles) and pistachio crusted chicken. I didn't have a recipe for the chicken. It was something I had eaten at a restaurant at The Grove when I was in LA. I had been wanting to try to make it ever since. I didn't measure anything, so I can't give you an exact recipe, but basically I chopped shelled pistachios in the food processor (enough to coat the amount of chicken you are preparing), put the nuts in a zip-lock bag with some black pepper, put the chicken in and shook it up to coat it. I then baked the chicken (I like my chicken absurdly well done, so I won't presume to tell you how long to cook yours. Any chicken recipe can give you a general idea of how to properly bake chicken).

Easy Doughnuts

Just a quick post to share a recipe and some pictures with you. In honor of being in cooler weather, I decided to make a fall treat of apple cider and doughnuts for my family after dinner last night. They turned out really good and were a hit with the whole family.

The recipe is adapted from one I found at divinerecipes.com.

I would have used the recipe from the site, but my mom does not like nutmeg and we didn't have vegetable oil. Since I can't tell you how the original recipe tastes, I'll give you my version.

Doughnuts
Peanut Oil (This is simply the only oil I had on hand, but I've used it for doughnuts before and I like the way they turn out.)
2 cups Bisquick
2 Tbl sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 egg
1/4 cup milk
1/4 tsp cinnamon

Sugar Coating
1/2 cup sugar
1 tsp cinnamon (I actually did not measure these at all. I'm pretty sure that my mixture had more than a tsp of cinnamon in it. It was probably closer to a tablespoon. Just make it how you like it. You could also use powdered sugar or a glaze of some kind. Be creative. Cinnamon sugar doughnuts are my favorite, so that's what I made.)

Pour 3 to 4 inches of oil into a deep-fat fryer. Heat to 375 degrees (I don't have a thermometer, but on my stove dial it was around 4 or medium low).

Mix Bisquick, sugar, vanilla, egg, milk, cinnamon and nutmeg until smooth. Smooth into ball on floured, cloth-covered board. Knead 10 times. Roll 1/4-inch thick.

Cut with floured doughnut cutter. (I don't have a doughnut cutter, so I used a small glass and shaped the hole with my fingers.


Slide doughnuts, a few at a time, into oil. Fry until golden, about 30 seconds on each side. (The doughnut should float on the top of the oil when you set it in. If it sinks and doesn't come right back it, it needs to get hotter. Be careful though, if you get the temp too high, the doughnuts will cook too fast on the outside, but will be raw in the middle.)


Drain on paper towels. Eat plain or use sugar coating.


I coated them by putting the sugar mixture in a bowl and tossing the doughnuts in it.
They are best served while they are still a bit hot. However, we had the leftovers this morning for breakfast, and they were still great. I just heated them in the microwave for about 15 seconds.

Soot and Cheesecake, An Unlikely Combination

Today I finally made that Pumpkin Swirl Cheesecake. Very tasty. I love the taste of pumpkin pie, but I'm not a big fan of the texture. Turning pumpkin pie into cheesecake totally solves that problem for me. (Plus, it tastes like cheesecake, so way better then pumpkin pie could ever aspire to be. ;) On mine I like to take a add a little whipped cream, caramel sauce, and crumbled gingersnaps to the top. I think it turns out prettier. After-all, presentation is so important! Don't you think? I tried to get a good picture of the end result, but they kept coming out blurry. Don't bother clicking on it to see the larger picture. It just gets worse! What can I say? My sister is the photographer in the family.

This morning I had the pleasant experience of waking up to find my white carpet black with soot or smoke or something. Apparently I need to get cleaner burning candles. I'm not sure how I'm going to get it all up. We found a tip online about using rubbing alcohol. It's helping, but it's going to take forever to get it all up, and the rubbing alcohol isn't going to take care of all of it. Also, being asphyxiated by rubbing alcohol isn't exactly my idea of a good time. If anyone has any experience with this, PLEASE give me some advise!

Tomorrow, after church, I'm heading to Alabama for a week with my mom and dad. They own some property up there, and I have never seen it. I haven't wanted to take time off work to go, but now that I'm doing nothing it seemed like the opportune time. I'm not sure how that is going to be, but I figured it will be better than sitting around here doing nothing all week. I don't know how much time I will get on the internet while I'm there, so I have no idea how long it will be before I update. I know you all will be weeping bitter tears over my absence. OK, maybe not.

See you all on the flip side!

Betty Crocker Gingersnaps

For those of you who have never seen or tasted a gingersnap and have asked for the recipe, here it is. This one comes out of the Betty Crocker Cookbook. There are many gingersnap recipes out there, and probably lots of them are better than this one. This is the only one I have tried though, so it's the one I'll give you.

1 cup packed brown sugar
3/4 cup shortening
1/4 cup molasses
1 large egg
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour*
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/4 teaspoon salt
Granulated sugar

1. Heat oven to 375 degrees F.
2. Beat brown sugar, shortening, molasses, and egg in large bowl with electric mixer on medium speed, or mix with spoon. Stir in remaining ingredients except granulated sugar.
3. Lightly grease cookie sheet with shortening or spray with cooking spray.
4. Shape dough by rounded teaspoonfuls into balls. Dip tops into granulated sugar. Place balls, sugared side up, about 3 inches apart on cookie sheet.
5. Bake 10 to 12 minutes or just until set. Immediately remove from cookie sheet to wire rack.

*If using self-rising flour, decrease baking soda to 1 teaspoon and omit salt.
- makes about 4 dozen

I find that if, about halfway through baking, I press the cookies down with a fork so they have fork lines across the top they come out looking prettier and flatter. Otherwise mine tend to come out looking like a little mound. They taste the same, but they don't look as nice (to me). The picture has some of the ones I pressed down and some of the ones that I did not. The picture was taken after lots of the cookies had been gobbled up by my family.

The Pirate Says, "ARRRRRRR!"

I had an offer today from a family with two girls who wanted a live-in nanny/housekeeper for $250 a week. What kind of person is willing or even able to work a full time job for $250 a week? I cannot believe how many families out there want a full time nanny to practically raise their children for them for almost nothing. Do they really not realize what an important job the nanny is doing? Do they not understand that even a live-in nanny has bills to pay and would like to be able to save for the future? I understand that people do not want their entire paycheck to go to paying for childcare, but at the same time shouldn't their child(ren) be their number 1 priority? If they cannot afford to hire a nanny, why don't they put their kids in daycare or stay home with them? Sorry for the rant. It's just that I've seen so many positions like this out there, and it frustrates me to no end. Sometimes I think I should just do something else, but I have no idea what.

In other news, yesterday I made a caramel apple layer cake. I'm pretty sure it is my new favorite cake. It was so yummy! So far, I think that every recipe I have tried from Everyday with Rachael Ray has been a hit. This was certainly no exception. I've been holding on to the recipe for almost a year, but I had never had an opportunity to make it. Last night I needed to make a dessert for my parent's home Bible study group. I was originally going to make a pumpkin swirl cheesecake (another amazing Everyday with Rachael Ray recipe), but I realized I didn't have enough time to let it chill. I remembered that I had been holding on to this cake recipe from the same issue, and I decided to try it out instead.

(Click the picture for the recipe)



For the frosting I added a pkg of cream cheese. It did make it a bit runnier (also could have been that it was very humid in the house) but I think it was worth it. I will be working on ways to make it less runny. Any thoughts? I tried adding more powdered sugar, but this just left me with more frosting than I could use and didn't help with the consistency. It wasn't too bad though. I once made a lemon cream cheese frosting that was so runny it just fell right off the cake onto the cake plate. It was dreadful (tasted good though). This one stayed on the cake for the most part. Of course, you could just follow the recipe and make it without the cream cheese, but I love cream cheese frosting.

Filling My Days

Another long day in the life of an unemployed PirateDiva. I was supposed to meet my friend for a Bible Study this morning at 10:30, but I woke up late and didn't make it there until 10:40. I know, only 10 minutes late, but I am the kind of person who is ALWAYS early for everything. I hate to be kept waiting, and so I hate making other people wait for me. The Bible study time was great. It is nice to be able to meet with another Christian woman to encourage each other, keep each other accountable, and discuss both the mundane details of our lives and the spiritual issues with which we struggle. Also, she is a good friend, and we always just have a good time being together.

After our study, I dropped some things off at the Goodwill and went home. I admit that I spent most of the afternoon pacing the house, bored out of my mind. Relaxation is great, but I need something to do. My room is clean, my bathroom is clean, my laundry is done, and my mom didn't really seem to need my help with anything. I searched for jobs online for awhile and then ended up taking a nap for about an hour and a half. I really need to find a job...

I made dinner for my family tonight. I enjoy cooking, and I needed something to do anyway. I tried out a few recipes from my Rachael Ray magazine. I had about 15 temper tantrums (thankfully no one was in the room) and several near disasters in the process, but everything turned out well. I made apricot-balsamic glazed chicken, peach pattycakes, and a fruity salad (not a fruit salad, a veggie salad with lots of fruit in it).

Click the pictures for recipes.
I did not make the beets with the chicken. I'm not into beets. ;)

Apricot-Balsamic Glazed Chicken



Peach Pattycakes


Both of these recipes are very tasty. I recommend them.