I've had fun cooking with Tanya this week and enjoying one of the major components Rachel Ray was missing in her 365 - yummy sweets! Here's what I've been cooking this week:
Yummmmm! I served this with the home made corn dogs (see below). I used the veggies she calls for- sweet potatoes, purple onion, and yellow squash. I forgot the asparagus, which is sad because I love asparagus, and used red potatoes because I couldn't find the new potatoes. This was wonderful- ISH even ate it! And that says a lot because he doesn't like anything that's even remotely healthy and (previously) without exception will not knowingly eat an onion.
I'm going to change this to One Dish and a bowl Cinnamon Swirl. She says in her notes that she truly only uses one dish but you need a bowl to mix the yummy cinnamon goodness (and apparently one bigger than the one I used because I made a good size mess. Oops). I do like how you butter the dish and then put the flour and dry ingredients in to mix up so the dish is buttered and floured already! What a great trick. I had run out of canola oil so I had to use the veggie oil and haven't purchased the "unbleached" flour she calls for so I'm still using the bleached and thus less healthy flour I've always used. But I'm sure the unbleached part wouldn't make this too much healthier- I mean it does have 6 TBSP of melted butter in it. ISH loved this so much his comment was "I wish everything was made out of this cinnamon swirl, except Jesus ... but then He wouldn't be in heaven and then we could do bad things because it wouldn't make Him sad because he'd be made of cinnamon swirl." I think that means he liked it. I served this with scrambled eggs, bacon, and some fresh spinach (you know, to make me feel like it was at least somewhat of a healthy dinner).
LK made this for me because I was trying to wrap up some work and thus it was made without the 1/2 tsp of hot sauce (wimp). He used butter instead of canola oil (she gives you the option). These were very fluffy- more like omelets, and I say that as positive because I don't normally like scrambled eggs but these were good. LK said the hard part is I don't think she expects you to cook enough for 4 at one time. But he did and I think it turned out well, so quadruple the recipe as needed.
Tanya has tried her hardest to make corn dogs healthy. Unfortunately, ISH caught wind of what I was making for dinner and with all the cuteness he could muster begged for "cheesy wennie corn dogs." Saying no really wasn't an option. So I used the completely unhealthy cheese hot dogs- but ISH's petition was a good one. Those cheesy wennies were excellent as corn dogs. I don't think I did the whole "tall jar" thing right because once I'd covered the first few hot dogs I couldn't get the batter all over the remaining dogs (I think I need her to come and give me a tutorial on this method especially since I actually got one hot dog stuck in the tall container I was using. Yes, I am that talented). So I emptied the remaining batter into a shallow bowl and rolled the remaining dogs around in that. Her note about wiping off the water from the dogs before putting them in the batter is spot on. I didn't do it with some and while cooking the batter didn't really stick. We had these with the roasted veggies. It felt like great "Welcome" to summer meal- just add baseball!
I need to ask about this one. It calls for 9 TBSP of olive oil to cook the veggies in as well as topping with 1 stick butter. But when I was done cooking it there was a lot of olive oil at the bottom of the casserole dish. Now- it could be as a result of any of the following variations to the actual recipe that I made. She calls for 2 mushrooms but I had about 5 I need to use up and she calls for 1/4 c celery but I used probably about 3/4 to 1 cup because, like the mushies, I needed to use them. But I would think that would use up more of the oil than leave too much. Here is one that could have done it- I didn't use raw chicken. I had just about a whole chicken left over from the bacon roasted chicken I made last week for my girlfriends, so I cut that cut and used it (and the bacon) instead of the whole chicken cut up that she calls for. Since the chicken was already cooked I didn't cook the casserole for the full 3- 3 1/2 hours. I cooked it closer to 2. My guess is that had I had raw chicken and cooked it for 3 hours more of the oil would have been gone. I also didn't have 2 cups of milk (I need to go to the grocery store) so having long ago learned the valuable lesson that ranch dressing cannot work as a milk substitute when cooking a casserole, I used 1 cup of milk, 1/2 a cup of evaporated milk and 1/2 cup of water. I really tasted pretty good though. I served it with sauteed spinach (one of my favorite veggies)
An elder at a church where LK and I use to attend once said he though the reasons more marriages end in divorce today compared to his generation was the invention of instant pudding. I don't know if he's right or not but I can see how serving your hubby this yummy treat could keep him happy. My first round with this I apparently misinterrupted the boil calls for. She warns not to let it boil too much or the cornstarch will breakdown and I think I errored on the side of too cautious (there's a first time for everything) because the pudding never set- like 5 hours later never set. But when I dumped the not-setting pudding back into the pan and really let the boil happen it set up almost immediately. I topped it with whipped cream and chocolate sprinkles (both of which I had on hand). I can see this one becoming a staple around these parts.
Check back next week my foodie friends as I try my hand at using Tanya's recipes to make Geo's 7th!!! birthday cake (he wants a rainbow starwars cake. Really. Rainbow colored.)
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