Failed Cinnabonrolls and Canned Tomatoes

OH, failed Cinnabonrolls! Yesterday, Jordan and I volunteered to bring dinner to a local family that is in the middle of a family emergency. We wanted to bring something for breakfast, as well, and chose cinnamon rolls. The recipe gets 5 stars out of some 3,000 reviews and boasts tasting identical to Cinnabon brand cinnamon rolls (hence the Cinnabonrolls). I will be the first to say that if a recipe boasts a big talk like that and doesn't follow through, I will NEVER make the recipe again, regardless of how delicious it might be. I'm pretty sure Jordan feels the same way. Well, these Cinnabonrolls did NOT taste like Cinnabon in the very least. The worst part was how the cinnamon filling hardened to rocks on contact with saliva. They were tasty but not anywhere near Cinnabon quality.

Jordan and I have an inside joke but I'm about to go public on her with it. Canned tomatoes. We constantly joke each other about the use of canned tomatoes in Italian food and whether they make the food substandard. Of course, neither of us believe that. We both know Italians that use canned tomatoes. It's purely a cost and time-effective method to cooking that just wasn't available in the "good old days" of our great-great-grandparents. I think our jesting confuses some people, though, especially when we choose a public forum to pick on each other. It's nice to have met someone who was raised with the same, "I pick on you because we're friends" mindset that I was raised with. If my Dad doesn't make fun of you, he doesn't like you. Plain and simple. I guess the same goes for me. I take a minute to be sure I won't make someone cry with my joking, as I recognize not everyone was raised the same way, but if I know you well and I haven't cracked at least one joke, I probably don't like you. Then again, I might crack MANY jokes at your expense if I despise you. You'll know the difference.

Nostalgia, Shopping and Yummy Food

I remember my getting my very first cookbook. It was in 9th grade and I got it as part of the curriculum for the Home Economics class I had to take. I think that might have been the beginning of my addiction to cooking and baking. Part of the class required hosting a dinner party, a tea and a brunch as well as learning and being tested on table etiquette (i.e. where the water glass goes in relation to the dinner plate and which fork is used for salad as opposed to shrimp). I haven't touched the cookbook in a long time in favor of newer, glossier and less-worn cookbooks but I recently came back to it out of pure nostalgia while looking for a dessert recipe. I've been craving lemon and my husband has been craving anything rich and decadent, since he lacked anything halfway decent while deployed. Tonight, we settled on lemon pudding. I'll be honest, I've always shied away from traditional custards and puddings due to a fear of scrambled eggs floating in a thickened, sweetened milk sauce. Cooking show hosts always stress carefully adding the hot liquid to the eggs to avoid cooking the eggs. Most likely due to the fear induced by these strong warnings, I managed. If you've never made a custard or pudding before, I'd suggest having a friend or family member their to help you, especially if you're as nervous as I felt. Definitely don't plan on multi-tasking since the saucepan needs constant attention and stirring while cooking. Without further adieu:

Lemon Pudding
Recipe adapted from Betty Crocker's New Cookbook: Everything You Need To Know To Cook
1/3 cup of sugar
4 TBS flour
1/8 tsp salt

2 cups of milk

2 TBS lemon zest
2 TBS lemon juice
2 large egg yolks
2 TBS butter, softened
2 tsp lemon extract (optional)

Lightly beat the two egg yolks in a medium bowl. In a medium saucepan, stir together sugar, flour, salt and lemon zest. Slowly whisk in milk, cooking on medium heat until mixture boils and thickens, stirring constantly. Stir in lemon juice. Boil and stir constantly for 1 minute. Very slowly and carefully, whisk half of the milk mixture into the bowl of egg yolks. Whisk the egg yolk mixture back into the saucepan with the remaining milk mixture. Boil and stir constantly for 1 minute. Remove from heat and stir in butter and lemon extract. Pour into a bowl or dessert dishes, cover and refrigerate until serving.

I, personally, thought the pudding had a wonderfully light lemon flavor without the lemon extract but Luke wanted something a little stronger. You could also add more lemon zest instead of extract for a heavier lemon flavor.

I recently decided that I will no longer write up a meal plan each week based on what I feel like eating but, instead, will use the grocery store websites and coupons to determine what is discounted or on sale and will make meal plans based entirely around those items. This week, Luke and I ended up buying only 1 item that wasn't discounted or on sale! I was excited. I need to get better at couponing but I managed to get two weeks worth of food for what it usually costs us in groceries each week. AND we impulse-shopped a few items (read: Luke impulse shopped. It's okay, he was deployed, deprived and what he wanted was on sale anyway). Thanks to our local grocer, I was able to try my hand at Carrot Soup. There was a  pretty amazing sale on carrots and College Inn brand chicken broth this week and I had some fresh dill leftover from a few weeks ago (I was on a dill-kick prior to the lemon kick and bought and froze a ton of fresh dill). Normally, I'd suggest homemade chicken broth for any soup recipe but I used my last container a few weeks ago when I was sick. Also lucky enough, the grocer had an awesome sale on whole roaster chickens so I bought one to double for dinner AND chicken stock! Anyway, back to the carrot soup. I'm not actually a huge fan of carrots but this soup changed my mind entirely. I'm so glad I still have more carrots and broth so I can make it again in the next two weeks, the next time adding a few more carrots.

Dilled Carrot Soup

Recipe adapted from the 2006 Edition Taste of Home Cookbook
4 cups Chicken Broth (I suggest College Inn brand)

6 carrots, peeled and cut into chunks

4 TBS lemon juice, divided

3 TBS dill, chopped and divided
1/2 cup heavy cream
Black pepper, to taste

Combine the carrots, 2 TBS dill, 2 TBS lemon juice and chicken broth in a medium saucepan and bring to boil over medium heat. Cover and simmer until carrots are tender enough to be pureed. Remove from heat and puree carrots (we used an immersion (hand) blender but you can also use a food processor or standing blender). Return saucepan to medium heat, stir in cream, remaining dill and lemon juice. Cover and simmer 10-15 minutes. Add black pepper to taste and serve.

I'm a big fan of the brightness of the dill and the clean flavor the lemon adds. The soup tastes very mildly of carrot so I definitely plan to make it again using a few more carrots next time. If you want a strong carrot flavor, I'd suggest cutting the amount of lemon juice in half and adding 2-3 more carrots, though I haven't yet tested this theory.

Now, go eat!

ReUnited!

My husband is home!!! YAY! I'm so glad our first deployment was a short deployment. I cannot express how glad I am that Luke is finally back here with me. It's kind of weird to not have Luke here to talk to about everything at the end of the day. The car ride home from the airport was pretty awkward but, as soon as we got home, things felt right again. I think the car ride was only awkward because my driving the car was very out of the ordinary for us. Luke hates sitting passenger. Anyway, he's home and I'm happy. It's been wonderful to have someone here to eat my cooking. I'm not sure what he was fed over there but it couldn't have been good. I say that mostly because he tells me it wasn't good but also because I've never seen the boy inhale so much in one sitting than he has at each meal this week. He's actually been eating himself sick. I don't mind the compliment to my cooking.
I may or may not have said this in this blog before but I love baking. I bake anytime I feel any extreme emotion, whether it's happy, sad, frustrated, excited... You get the point. Of course, I wanted to bake something this week. THEN we went to Bath and Body Works and they were having a wallflower sale. I found this delicious smell, "Creamy Nutmeg." I'm a nutmeg fanatic. I put it in almost everything. It has such a universal scent and flavor, it can go in savory dishes or sweet. I had to plug it in as soon as we got home. My diningroom and kitchen are filled with the amazing aroma of baked-sweet-nutmeg which only added to my desire to bake. I caved last night and made vanilla cupcakes with a light lemon frosting. The cupcakes are vegan but you'd never know. They are HEAVENLY! I took the recipe out of a vegan cookbook I own and tweaked it after realizing I didn't have some ingredients (I know! ME out of baking ingredients?!?! What has the world come to?).

Vanilla Cupcakes (makes 6 cupcakes)
Recipe adapted from 1,000 Vegan Recipes by Robin Robertson

3/4 cup Very Vanilla Soy Milk

1 1/2 tsp apple cider vinegar
1 1/4 cups All Purpose flour
1 tsp Baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
3/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup canola oil
1 1/2 tsp pure vanilla
Preheat oven to 350 and prep a 6 cup muffin pan.
In a small bowl combine soy milk and apple cider vinegar. In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. In a large bowl, combine sugar, oil and vanilla. Mix in soy milk mixture. Mix in flour mixture (it will be thick). Bake until toothpick inserted into cupcake comes out clean (about 25 minutes). The end result is a moist and dense cupcake.

I also have a few bananas sitting on the counter, ripening for banana bread. I couldn't find my bread pans (it turned out they were sitting exactly where they should have been and where I'd searched 3 or 4 times) so I made muffins instead. I've never made banana bread before so I decided I should probably look up a recipe. I found a basic one and decided it was horrible but didn't want to keep looking so I decided to wing it and see if I could manage. Guess what? I DID! The banana muffins came out light and fluffy, perfect for a snack.

Banana Muffins (makes 12 muffins)

Recipe by Deborah Schiefer

4 bananas, mashed

1 egg, beaten

5 TBS unsalted butter, melted

1 tsp Vanilla extract

3/4 cup sugar

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp nutmeg

1 1/2 cups All Purpose flour

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and spray or line a 12-cup muffin pan.

Mix together the bananas, egg, butter, vanilla and sugar. In a separate bowl, mix all dry ingredients. Combine the banana mixture with the dry ingredients. Pour into muffin tins and bake for about 20 minutes until a toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean. Remove to wire rack to cool (or eat them warm with butter).

The last recipe I'm posting today is for Spicy Beef and Broccoli. Luke and I decided that we wanted to eat "take-out" tonight without having to order or go somewhere. Besides, restaurant Beef and Broccoli almost always has a sweet sauce and I'm not a huge fan. I also don't tend to like the texture of the low-quality beef and I've been really excited lately for making home-versions of restaurant meals so we started with this one. It came out SO well! The broccoli stayed crisp and the meat tasted (and felt) like beef. The sauce wasn't overly sticky (due, in large part, to the fact that it wasn't sugary) and I could control just how much sauce made it to the plate.

Spicy Beef and Broccoli (feeds 2-3)

Recipe by Deborah Schiefer

1 sirloin steak, thin sliced against the grain

4 cups heads of broccoli florets

1/2 red onion, thin sliced

Sauce:

1/4 cup rice wine vinegar

1/2 cup Low Sodium soy sauce

2-3 TBS Sriracha (you can omit this if you don't like spicy food)

5 garlic cloves, minced (you can also use less garlic for less spice)

1 cup water

Whisk all ingredients for sauce in a bowl. Pour just enough sauce into a frying pan or wok to coat the bottom of the pan. Brown the steak slices in the sauce. Drain sauce and replace pan. Add broccoli and onions to pan and pour in remaining sauce. Toss broccoli and beef to coat with sauce. Cover and let steam for 5-10 minutes, until broccoli has reached desired tenderness, stirring occasionally.

You may need to add water if the sauce steams out. Once the broccoli was cooked, I transferred the beef and broccoli to another plate using a slotted spatula so our dinner wouldn't be swimming in sauce.

Luke and I both decided we definitely prefer my version of beef and broccoli to anything we've eaten outside of the house. The best part was we knew exactly what went into our dinner (no MSG! Yay). Oh, and we still have leftovers. I made fried rice with it but I switched up my recipe and it didn't work so we'll save that for another day when I can post a pretty picture to go with my original recipe.

Stop reading and go make your dinner or cupcakes or banana muffins. Go! Now!

Healthy Eating Done Right

Part of Jordan's Christmas gifts this year was a gift card to Williams and Sonoma. We both live in apartments and cannot have a personal grill so she's been salivating over the All-Clad Indoor Electric Grill for more than a year now and was finally able to get it. The ordeal was crazy, drawn out and ridiculous due to the customer service representatives at the Williams and Sonoma catalog end of the company. After finally leaving the local store with her grill in hand (really, in arms. That thing is huge), we decided to celebrated with some delicious, grilled vegetables and made a short trip to Whole Foods.

So many people these days have lost the joy of cooking vegetables, opting for overly seasoned and flavored or canned for the flavor of the veggie, itself. The most additional flavor I like to give to my veggies would be olive oil and mild spices but today, after craving veggies so badly, we opted for the deliciousness that nature offers, adding only the smokiness from the grill.

The process couldn't have been any simpler than it was. We chose to keep it simple with red bell peppers, grape tomatoes, garlic, cremini mushrooms and purple onion. When washing your mushrooms, don't leave them in water for too long as they absorb water and lose flavor. The best way to wash them is to use a damp paper towel and wipe each clean but sometimes that just isn't the best option for your time frame. Many cooks say it won't hurt anything to rinse them as long as you do so quickly. Snip the top off your garlic clove and cut it in half for a faster grill time. The softer the garlic is when removed from the grill, the milder the flavor. We cleaned our bell peppers and onions, cut them in quarters in grill those that way. No olive oil, no seasonings, no marinades and no spices. It was absolutely delicious, flavorful, colorful and smelled wonderful. The grill worked amazingly and I would definitely recommend it, especially since it's on sale right now for about 2/3 the normal price. It has a large grill surface and would work well cooking for just one or two or for feeding company. This was my first experience with anything Williams and Sonoma and I definitely approve.

We added to our dinner a small baguette that we sliced and served with olive oil seasoned with dried rosemary, garlic powder, salt and fresh cracked pepper and a simple tomato salad. For the dipping oil and bread, be sure to allow the seasonings to rest in the oil for a few minutes for the flavors to mingle. The longer the oil rests, the more flavorful it will be. As for the tomato salad, I'm not really sure you could even call it a salad. We bought a few heirloom tomatoes and chunked up some delicious parmesan cheese and drizzled it all over with basil infused olive oil.

On a side note, you'll need to bear with our photos for a little while. Jordan's camera kicked the bucket and I left my camera in North Carolina so we are currently using Jordan's Android phone to take photos of the food we make.

That's all for now. Peace out, hommiiiiiiiieeee!

Happy New Year!

Is 2010 really coming to a close already?!?! Oh. My. Geez. It seems like we've barely started the year. I found myself wondering, two days ago, if it was really 2011 that I would be signing on checks after tonight. Well, Jordan and I created this blog and we've barely used it at all in the last few months. Let's hope 2011 brings us diligence in keeping in touch with the techonological world (outside of Skype and Facebook. We're pretty good at staying connected there).
I don't know about the rest of you but I, personally, don't do New Year's Resolutions. There's this whole psychological thing about wanting to break rules and so many people create resolutions as if they are guidelines, or rules, for the new year. I don't enjoy setting myself up for failure. I've never met someone who actually keeps their resolutions. Sure, there are things I'd like to accomplish but I refuse to hold myself to some silly standard just because it's expected.
Enough of that, no one wants to read my prattling about my views on New Year's resolutions. Have a Happy New Year! Jordan and I both wish you the best in the upcoming year! If you are the type to make resolutions, good luck in your endeavors!

Turkey Day Catch-Up

I know, I know, we just posted one of these last night but we're playing a little catch-up here and it was too late to write too much last night. Besides, we can't exactly leave out the turkey from Thanksgiving and it would be weird to not have it posted at least by the end of 2010! At first, I'd wondered if the turkey should even go up on the blog. I mean, we are horribly late posting the recipe, but it can be easily changed over to be used in a chicken and some people eat turkey all year round, right? So without further adieu, the turkey (with a few other recipes).

Thanksgiving 2010 Turkey Awesomeness (feeds 15)

1 (20 lb) turkey

3 lemons, zested and quartered with the zest separated

2 onions, quartered

10 garlic cloves

3-5 sprigs fresh rosemary

3-5 sprigs fresh thyme

1 TBS dried rosemary

1 TBS dried thyme

2 tsp fresh cracked pepper

2 tsp ground sea salt

Combine all dry herbs with the salt, pepper and lemon zest in a small bowl. Remove the gizzard bag and neck from the inside of the turkey. Squeeze the lemons into the inside of the turkey and leave them in the cavity with the onions, garlic cloves and fresh herbs. Rub the turkey skin with the dried herb and lemon zest combination. Cook in oven according to turkey packaging directions. In the last hour and a half of roasting, use turkey juices to baste turkey for a golden brown skin.

Of course, you can't just have turkey on Thanksgiving but, due to the size of the group we were feeding, we opted for a slightly simpler approach and decided to soup up some boxed and canned foods. We did, however, make homemade potatoes and homemade cranberry sauce with a really awesome souped up stuffing. I really wish cranberries were sold for longer than a few months every year. I'm sure it's not one of those fruits that are easy to grow in a greenhouse, like oranges, but I'd much prefer cranberries to oranges, year round. For now, I'll have to settle for for cranberry juice throughout the year and wait until November to eat cranberry sauce.

Cranberry Sauce

1 (1 lb) pag of cranberries

1 1/2 cups water

1-2 cups sugar (depending on how sweet you like your berries)

1 tsp nutmeg

1 tsp cinnamon

1/4-1/2 tsp cloves

Boil all ingredients together on the stove until the berries have split and the liquid has thickened. Remove from heat and allow to cool. Refrigerate at least 2 hours before serving.

Loaded Mashed Potatoes (feeds 15)

2 lbs baby red potatoes

2 lbs russet potatoes

5-8 garlic cloves

1 cup sour cream

1 cup heavy whipping cream

1 cup shredded cheddar cheese, divided

1/2 cup chopped scallions

1/2 cup crumbled bacon

Salt and pepper, to taste

Wash, peel and cube potatoes. Boil, with garlic, until a fork easily pierces through potatoes chunks. Drain and place in a sturdy mixing bowl. Using an electric mixer, beat potatoes and garlic with sour cream, heavy cream, 3/4 cup shredded cheddar cheese, salt, pepper, scallions and bacon, reserving just enough of the scallions and bacon to garnish. Once well blended, top with remaining cheese, bacon and scallions.

Souped Up Stuffing

2 (14 oz) stuffing

3 sprigs fresh sage, torn

1 onion, chopped

3 celery stalks, chopped

2 (14.5 oz) can turkey gravy

1 TBS olive oil

Sautee onion, celery and about a quarter of the sage in olive oil until onion becomes translucent. Place stuffing in a baking dish and stir in the sauteed onion mixture with remaining sage. Pour the canned gravy into a bowl and add one can of water, mix well. Pour over stuffing, mix well and bake according to stuffing packaging directions.

In other news, the New Year means a ton of post-holiday crash dieters. Not so much fun for Jordan and I, as all of our food will soon be disappearing off the shelves of the local grocery stores. With husbands gone, our diet consists primarily of Healthy Choice meals with the occasional home-cooked meal. Thank God for stores like Whole Foods! I'm already looking forward to the end of February and March when the "Biggest Loser" competitions will be over and when people fall off the New Year bandwagon so I can shop cheap at Wal-mart again, visiting Whole Foods only occasionally for the special home-cooked dinner. I must admit, though, it's been so long since I've been in a real grocery store, I do kind of look forward to visiting Whole Foods.

Chocolate Makes the World a Better Place

It's been a while since our last post but, due to the hour, I'll be making this a short post. Jordan and I have been ALL over the place the last few months with holiday preparation but that doesn't mean we haven't had time to cook. Actually, holidays gave us reason to cook more than usual. We managed a full Thanksgiving meal for 15 people and Christmas Eve dinner for 11. You might think we're crazy, and on Thanksgiving, we kind of were, but Christmas Eve was fairly easy due to the nature of the meal. Christmas Eve was almost entirely a one-man show, cooking simple Italian and splurging on the sauce. Some people are entirely opposed to the idea of Italian cooking, though it isn't nearly as terrifying as one may assume. To make it less intimidating, we'll start with an easy Faux-talian lasagna recipe.

Easy, Cheesy Faux-talian Lasagna (feeds 4-6)

2 lbs lasanga pasta*

2 lbs mild or hot ground Italian sausage

1 (16 oz) container ricotta cheese
2 eggs
1 cup Italian bread crumbs
3 jars pasta sauce (I personally like Bertolli brand Vidallia Onion, Arrabbiata or Olive Oil and Garlic)
1 (4 cup) bag shredded Italian cheese blend
Dried basil, as needed (optional)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and boil the lasagna according to packaging directions. Do NOT drain or the noodles will stick together. Mix the egg, ricotta and bread crumbs in a small bowl and brown and drain the sausage. Coat the bottom of a deep dish lasanga pan with pasta sauce. After the lasagna has cooked to just before al dente remove from heat. Line the bottom of the pan with lasagna noodles, drop spoonfuls of ricotta mixture onto the pasta and spread evenly. Sprinkle over with sausage and pour sauce over before repeating the layering process. When the pan has about 1 inch of room left, sprinkle with half of the cheese, basil and remaining sausage. Cover with tinfoil and bake at 350 degrees for 30 minutes. Remove from oven, top with remaining cheese and return to oven WITHOUT the tinfoil for another 30 minutes. Allow to rest 10 minutes before slicing and serving.
*I suggest making more pasta than you'll actually need only because I refuse to use the pieces that are horribly broken and mangled. Also, there's a chance some of your noodles will stick together so I like to have extra so I don't have to peel it apart. If you don't mind using broken pieces, 1 lb is usually plenty, depending on the depth of your pan.

Now, mostly for pure excitement at FINALLY perfecting a recipe, I'm going to add a picture of my cupcakes. I can give you the recipe for the "frosting" but, unless I have a child that inherits my love for baking, the cupcake recipe with follow me to the grave. Okay, that's a bit drastic, but I DO need to keep it TOP SECRET in case I have my own bakery one day. Not in case, for when I have my own bakery one day. Anyway, the "frosting."

Raspberry Cream Frosting (basically whipped cream)

1 pint whipping cream

1 1/2 tsp raspberry extract

1 stick (1/2 butter), softened*

powdered sugar, to taste

Beat butter on medium speed until creamy. Add in raspberry extract and beat until well incorporated. Slowly add in whipping cream, beating on slow speed, until ripples begin to form in the cream. Add powdered sugar to taste and increase speed to medium. Beat until stiff peaks form.

*Omit for whipped cream 

Well, that's all folks. I'm going to FINALLY get some sleep!