TWD- Skip

I had to skip this weeks. And I just realized last weeks post was still in "saved draft" mode. I did make the double chocolate cupcakes. I even rolled them in pecans that I chopped myself. They were good, you can ask my husband :)
The reuguela just isn't going to fit into my time slot for this week because we've been dealing with a busted shower all day. So I skip. I don't want to. But I have to :) I will probably make these for the potluck this weekend though because they look like they are amazing. And everyone I've seen on Foodgawker, looks like they are fun to make.

TWD- Pumpkin Muffins

This is my own twist on the pumpkin muffins. I made them with extra pumpkin and half the butter. I also put a pumpkin spice glaze on the top with toasted pecans. The texture is a little funny but the pumpkin taste just shines through. I also used two egg whites and one whole egg to cut back on fat content :) I have made these before, and I love the recipe. Good stuff with some honey butter :)
Much to my disappointment, I had to throw these puppies away after I was done taking this picture. Why? We have had a problem with moths lately, specifically their larva in my kitchen. I didn't realize until I was sprinkling on the pecans that they had gotten into my pecan pieces as well. So not only had I sprinkled them on, but I had also baked them in. So this would have been a disaster in the making. Problem also ended up, I am now out of pumpkin and no car for the day :) And since I actually MADE the muffins, I wasn't going to not post. So here they are. Tainted as they may be... my muffins.

Lenox Biscotti (TWD)

So I gotta tell ya, this is my first time making biscotti, and I think I did o.k. with it. It isn't nearly as time consuming as I thought it would be and the results were a lot cleaner than I thought it would be as well. I enjoyed a cookie with a glass of spice tea and pretended that the weather outside was not 80 degrees and the AC was not on :)

What am I going to do with 2 dozen biscotti? Well, for one I hear they freeze well, and two I think some people from church or a certain sister and future brother in law may enjoy eating them as well :)

So here's the picture above is the result of my first Tuesday with Dorie and if you want to join the TWD club, you need to do it before October 31st! Visit the link for more details and rules :) Next week is pumpkin muffins! Sounds tasty.

I may roast my own pumpkin for that...

Foodie much?

So, this is a blog feature I've seen on a few peoples blogs and thought I would do it myself. Because I consider myself a foodie. Heres the deal. The ones in bold are the ones I've tried, the ones that aren't are the ones I haven't.

1) Copy this list into your site, including the instructions!
2) Bold all of the foods you’ve eaten!
3) Cross out any of them that you’d never ever eat.
4) Consider anything that is not bold or crossed out your “To Do” List.

Savory list first:

1. New York pizza
2. Hoppin’ John
3. New Mexico green chile
4. Homemade buttermilk biscuits
5. Tasso
6. Whole Maine lobster
7. Calabash-style shrimp and hushpuppies
8. Kansas City barbecue ribs
9. Hot glazed Krispy Kreme
10. San Diego fish tacos
11. Cheese curds
12. Key lime pie
13. Philly cheese steak
14. Memphis pork barbecue sandwich
15. Lowcountry boil
16. Huckleberry pie
17. New England clam chowder
18. Boiled peanuts
19. Buffalo burger
20. Eggs Benedict
21. Pastrami on rye
22. Corned beef and cabbage
23. Pancakes with maple syrup
24. Everything bagel with cream cheese and tomato
25. Thin Mints (preferably frozen)
26. Frito pie
27. Potato knish with mustard
28. Silver Queen corn on the cob
29. Soft pretzel from a street cart
30. Fresh-picked blueberries
31. Sourwood honey
32. State fair funnel cake
33. Chesapeake crab cakes
34. Candied yams
35. Oyster dressing
36. Snow cone or snowball
37. Wild Alaskan salmon
38. Sautéed morels
39. Persimmon pudding
40. General Tso’s Chicken
41. Frozen custard
42. Italian sausage with peppers and onions on a hoagie bun
43. Chili dog
44. Buffalo wings with blue cheese
45. Spam musubi
46. Saltwater taffy
47. Fluffernutter sandwich on Wonder Bread
48. Black and white cookie
49. Frybread
50. BLT with thick-cut applewood bacon
51. Baked beans
52. Pumpkin pie
53. Collards with vinegar and Tabasco
54. Tex-Mex fajitas with skirt steak and sautéed peppers
55. Fried green tomatoes
56. Succotash
57. Shrimp and grits
58. Hot water cornbread
59. Barbecue chicken pizza with red onions
60. Chicken fried steak
61. Carnitas burrito
62. Apple butter
63. Geoduck
64. Soft-serve ice cream cone dipped in chocolate shell (especially Dairy Queen)
65. Pecan pie
66. Catfish supper at a church or fire station
67. Oysters Rockefeller
68. Homemade cranberry sauce
69. Pimiento cheese
70. MoonPie washed down with R.C. Cola
71. Pickled watermelon rind
72. Cracker Jacks at the ball game
73. Smithfield ham
74. Meatloaf and mashed potato blue plate special at diner
75. Chicken and waffles
76. Po’Boy
77. Green bean casserole with French’s fried onions
78. Stuffed sopaipillas (for the record, SOPAPILLAS ARE NOT SUPPOSED TO BE STUFFED)
79. Turducken
80. Shad roe on toast
81. Sweet potato casserole with or without marshmallows
82. Cioppino
83. New York cheesecake
84. Pan-fried river trout
85. Jambalaya
86. North Carolina pig pickin’
87. California rolls
88. Burgoo
89. Penuche fudge
90. Fried peanut butter and banana sandwich (the Elvis)
91. Scrapple or livermush
92. Elk medallions in red wine reduction
93. Muscadine grapes
94. Cheeseburger at backyard barbecue
95. Open-face turkey sandwich
96. Chicago deep dish pizza
97. Cobb salad
98. Peach pie a la mode
99. Macaroni and cheese with Tillamook sharp cheddar
100. Root beer float

Sweets:

1. Red Velvet Cake
2. Princess Torte
3. Whoopie Pie
4. Apple Pie either topped or baked with sharp cheddar
5. Beignet
6. Baklava
7. Black and white cookie
8. Seven Layer Bar (also known as the Magic Bar or Hello Dolly bars)
9. Fried Fruit pie (sometimes called hand pies)
10. Kringle
11. Just-fried (still hot) doughnut
12. Scone with clotted cream
13. Betty, Grunt, Slump, Buckle or Pandowdy
14. Halvah
15. Macarons
16. Banana pudding with nilla wafers
17. Bubble tea (with tapioca “pearls”)
18. Dixie Cup I am assuming this is the ice cream
19. Rice Krispie treats
20. Alfajores
21. Blondies
22. Croquembouche
23. Girl Scout cookies
24. Moon cake
25. Candy Apple
26. Baked Alaska
27. Brooklyn Egg Cream
28. Nanaimo bar
29. Baba au rhum
30. King Cake
31. Sachertorte
32. Pavlova
33. Tres Leches Cake
34. Trifle
35. Shoofly Pie
36. Key Lime Pie (made with real key lime)
37. Panna Cotta
38. New York Cheesecake
39. Napoleon / mille-fueille
40. Russian Tea Cake / Mexican Wedding Cake
41. Anzac biscuits
42. Pizzelle
43. Kolache
44. Buckeyes
45. Malasadas
46. Moon Pie
47. Dutch baby
48. Boston Cream Pie
49. Homemade chocolate chip cookies
50. Pralines
51. Gooey butter cake
52. Rusks
53. Daifuku
54. Green tea cake or cookies
55. Cupcakes from a cupcake shop
56. Crème brûlée
57. Some sort of deep fried fair food (twinkie, candy bar, cupcake,oreos)
58. Yellow cake with chocolate frosting
59. Jelly Roll
60. Pop Tarts
61. Charlotte Russe
62. An “upside down” dessert (Pineapple upside down cake or Tarte Tatin)
63. Hummingbird Cake
64. Jell-O from a mold
65. Black forest cake
66. Mock Apple Pie (Ritz Cracker Pie)(nasty... sorry... I hate this thing)
67. Kulfi
68. Linzer torte
69. Churro
70. Stollen
71. Angel Food Cake
72. Mincemeat pie
73. Concha
74. Opera Cake
75. Sfogliatelle / Lobster tail
76. Pain au chocolat
77. A piece of Gingerbread House
78. Cassata
79. Cannoli
80. Rainbow cookies
81. Religieuse
82. Petits fours
83. Chocolate Souffle
84. Bienenstich (Bee Sting Cake)
85. Rugelach
86. Hamenstashen
87. Homemade marshmallows
88. Rigo Janci
89. Pie or cake made with candy bar flavors (Snickers pie, Reeses pie, etc)
90. Divinity
91. Coke or Cola cake
92. Gateau Basque
93. S’mores
94. Figgy Pudding
95. Bananas foster or other flaming dessert
96. Joe Froggers
97. Sables
98. Millionaire’s Shortbread
99. Animal crackers
100. Basbousa

Yes, I am quite possibly one of the biggest foodies you will ever meet but I will NOT eat scrapple. I know what it is. I have eaten Spam... but I hate that junk.

I love food. Which is my biggest vice I think. Oh well :) I guess thats why I'm becoming a dietitian. More for myself... so I know what I'm putting into my body.

Have a good one :)

Day 2

Pizza Rolls
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I'm a cheater. Yes I am. I buy my pizza dough from Sams Club. I haven't done it in a year because you get that much. I got 20 balls of frozen pizza dough (they make 16inch pizzas) for 15 dollars. And for 2 of us, one ball feeds us for at least 2 meals. I also use it to make pizza to take places because I can leave it out on Sunday morning before services and its thawed by the time I get home and all I have to do is roll it out, top it, and bake it.

So my pizza dough for this came from the freezer.

Pizza Rolls:

Thawed and risen pizza dough
1 bag of white chicken
3/4 cup of pizza sauce
1/2 cup of chopped fresh mozzarella
1/2 cup of 2% mixed pizza cheese
1 small can of mushrooms

Preheat oven to 375 and grease a 9 inch cake pan or an 8x8 pan.

On a well floured counter roll out your pizza dough until you have a nice rectangle type shape (doesn't have to be perfect). The longest side of the dough should be parallel to you. About half an inch from the side of the dough closest to you, spoon and spread 1/4 cup of the sauce in a line about an inch wide and the entire length of dough. Spread chicken over the sauce, fold the dough up and over the chicken and roll just like you would a cinnamon roll. On the next open section of the dough, spread another 1/4 cup of sauce and the fresh mozzarella. Fold up and over and roll (it's kinda hard with it being so heavy but it worked for me). On the last section, spread the rest of the sauce, half of the can of mushrooms and the rest of the cheese. Fold and roll.
Using a pastry cutter or really sharp knife, Cut in 2 inch sections and CAREFULLY place rolls in prepared pan, you might want to add a little olive oil to the outside of the rolls because they will cook together. Just enough that they will pull apart, don't overdo it, you don't want fried pizza rolls.

Bake in the oven for aprox. 35 minutes. Check after 20 because I think my oven is running a little cool.

Remove from oven and place on cooling rack for about 10 minutes. Dump out on a large plate and pull apart. It will be hot so maybe use a pie server or butter knife. Serve with salad :)

They got two thumbs up from my hubby.

Day 1

Grilled Buffalo BBQ Chicken Sandwich

4 pieces of thicker sliced bread (I used French, you can use Italian)
2 TBS of low fat butter or non-hydrogenated spread
1 bag of diced, cooked, chicken breast (white meat)
1/4 cup of hot sauce
2 TBS of BBQ sauce
2 TBS of low fat sour cream
2 TBS of low fat blue cheese


Butter one side of every slice of bread, set aside.
Preheat skillet over Medium heat.
In a small bowl combine chicken, hot sauce and BBQ sauce. Mix until coated. Set aside.
In another small bowl, combine sour cream and blue cheese. Set aside.
Place two slices of bread butter side down in pre-heated skillet. Place half of the chicken mixture in the middle of the bread, leaving some room around the edges.
On the remaining two slices of bread, spread blue cheese mixture on the opposite side of the butter. Place cheese spread side down on the chicken mixture. Press the sandwich down with your turner and hold. Flip. Brown both sides fairly well. I used a weight to put on top of the sandwiches so it flattened them like a Panini.
eat. Enjoy.
Serve with a side of fresh fruit and maybe some baked lays :)

And what's dinner without dessert? ;)
















Lemon Meringue Cookies

4 egg whites**
1/4 tsp of cream of tarter
1/4 cup of sugar
1 TBS of lemon zest

Lemon curd

Preheat oven to 250
Line two cookie sheets with parchment paper.
In a clean, dry, bowl whip egg whites until foamy. Add cream of tarter and beat until soft peaks form (dairy queen curl when you pull your beater straight up). Add sugar and beat on high until whites are stiff (mountains with high peaks) and glossy. With a clean, dry, spatula FOLD in lemon zest.

Using two small spoons, dollup meringue mixture on prepared cookie sheets. It should make about 24 smaller cookies. About the size of a dollar coin with the height double of a Hershey kiss. Using one of the spoons make a dent in the top.

Place in the oven for 90 minutes.

I use a prepared lemon curd because I had a coupon. You can make your own.

After you remove the cookies from the oven and place them on a cooling rack, use about 1 tsp of lemon curd per cookie.

Eat. Enjoy.

Pictures will come later.

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** Save your yolks in the fridge for up to about 4 days. You can use them to thicken puddings and certain pie fillings.

And I clarify that you need to use a clean dry bowl because one ounce of anything other than egg whites means your eggs will not whip up properly

Experiments with Chicken

Over the course of the next couple of days my blog will consist of ideas for at least 3 different dinners to feed 2 adults coming from one rotisserie chicken.

First, prep for the chicken.

-Buy the chicken from your favorite Deli counter. Mine comes from Wal Mart.

-Bring it home, pull it out of the container and put it on a cooling rack over a cookie sheet. Let it cool for about 30 minutes, or until you can dig your CLEAN hands in without burning yourself. Do NOT throw out the container that the chicken came in, do not dump out the juice.

-Take as much of the meat off the bones as possible. Put dark meat in one bowl and white meat in the other. If you don't get it all off, don't fret. Put all of the bones, skin and fat in the container that it originally came from. Go rinse off your cooling rack and cookie sheet so the drippings wont get stuck to it.

-Put the meat in the fridge until completely cool. While waiting for the meat to cool, put the bones, skin and fat in a stock pot. Cover with water and bring to a boil. Reduce to simmer and let it simmer with your choice of herbs for about an hour in a covered stock pot. Turn off heat.
Strain out the bones, skin and fat with a slotted spoon. Discard in the trash. While the stock is still hot, beat an egg white and dump into the stock. The white will cook and float to the top and pick up any extra pieces of bone or gristle floating around as well as fat. Remove the egg white with a slotted spoon and discard. Let the stock cool for a while on the stove.

-After chicken is cooled, remove from fridge and dice the respective colors of chicken. Nothing I am making will require larger pieces of chicken. If you have a scale, measure out 2 ounces per person per meal and place the chicken for each meal in a Ziploc bag and place back in the fridge. If you don't, it's about a cup of chicken per meal. Not per person per meal...

-Ladle the chicken stock out into smaller containers. I use the knock off Ziploc containers from either Kroger or Wal-mart. I keep one in the fridge and the rest in the freezer. I should mention that I put plastic wrap under the top of the containers I put into the freezer. It helps keep freezer burn off my stock. I usually get 4-6 cups of stock off of a chicken. It should be enough to make a few pots of soup over the coming months :)

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Dinner tonight:
Grilled BBQ Buffalo chicken sandwich with low fat blue cheese spread.

Recipe to come later.