Have a sweet tooth?

Then this puts it to the test! This tasty dense cake has a surprise ingredient - zucchini! Caramel Frosted Chocolate Chip Zucchini Sheet Cake(BBCL Val) has the familiar taste of a chocolate chip cookie, but in cake form with this wicked fudge-like frosting. The zucchini adds moistness but you would never know it was there. The frosting does set up very fast and needs to be spread on quickly, otherwise it could get messy.


Since I had leftover wonton wrappers from last week, I found a recipe that used almost all of the ones we had left. Unfortunetly for me it meant filling, egg washing, and pinching another 20 of them. This is a before shot.

Wonton Soup(CL) was easy enough, after filling the wontons of course. These are filled with a mixture of spinach, cooked chicken, toasted sesame oil, ginger, garlic and soy sauce. After watching the little pouches float up we portioned them off and I finished working on the side dish. Wheat Berry Salad with Orange Vinaigrette(CL). Nice tang from the orange since the wheat berries have a pretty neutral flavor. I did sub dried cranberries for the currants as we didn't have any and were out of raisins.

Wonton Soup Recipe

Wonton Soup(CL)

4 cups spinach leaves
3/4 cup cooked dark-meat chicken (about 1/2 pound skinless, boneless thighs)
1 tablespoon low-sodium soy sauce
3/4 teaspoon black pepper
3/4 teaspoon chopped peeled fresh ginger
3/4 teaspoon dark sesame oil
2 garlic cloves, chopped
1 teaspoon salt, divided
40 wonton wrappers
1 large egg white, lightly beaten
2 teaspoons cornstarch
8 cups Chicken Stock
Crushed red pepper (optional)

Place the first 7 ingredients in a food processor and add 1/2 teaspoon salt.
Pulse until just coarsely chopped.

Working with 1 wonton wrapper at a time *keep the others covered so they don't dry out, spoon about 1 teaspoon chicken mixture into center of each wrapper. Moisten edges of wrapper with egg white; bring 2 opposite corners to center, pinching points to seal. Bring remaining 2 corners to center, pinching points to seal. Pinch 4 edges together to seal.

Place the wonton on a baking sheet sprinkled with cornstarch. Repeat procedure with remaining wrappers, chicken mixture, and egg white. Then refrigerate them for 20 minutes.

Bring stock to a simmer over medium heat; add 1/2 teaspoon salt. Add wontons; cook 4 minutes or until wontons float to the top, stirring gently. Sprinkle with crushed red pepper.

What I will be using this week...

We got quite a bit of rain last night. It was nice since it cooled down some, but we pay for it today with high humidity. I finalized the menu for the week this morning and had to get quite a few groceries today. I was able to pick up a few fun ingredients - a couple of which are shown below. Stick around and see what we make from these!


Saffron



Netflix movie of the night is The Opposite of Sex starring Christinia Ricci and Lisa Kudrow. Another one I didn't hear of so who knows how this will turn out. It has Lyle Lovett in it so it could be awful!

Check us out tomorrow and find out what we created in the kitchen!

WCB 13 - Meet our kitty

Miss kitty decided she would like to be included in the Weekend Cat Blogging event that Clare over at Eat Stuff holds. She has been with us for 6 years after we rescued her from a shelter back in Minnesota. We never came up with a name for her and just called her "kitty!" This was taken after she had some fun playing in her catnip! She loves to harass the puppy dogs and can be frequently found taking naps in an old shoebox in the closet!

Lots of new recipes again this week. The total was right around 12 again. Dinner will be Chicken salads of course, as it is Saturday after all!

Tonight from Netflix we will be watching Election. No idea what this one is about - just that it is suppose to be a comedy. Looks like our big stack of untried recipes is slowly getting smaller, but don't get me wrong - it is still quite large! I'll be checking it out tonight and see what we can come up with for this week!

Spiced Edamame and Buttermilk muffin recipes

Buttermilk Chocolate Chip Muffins - Adapted from Epicurious
1 cup wheat bran
2/3 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
2/3 cup whole wheat flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/8 teaspoon salt
1 1/4 cups low-fat buttermilk
1/2 cup raw sugar crystals
1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce
1 large egg
1 1/2 tablespoons canola oil
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup Dark Chocolate Chips

Preheat oven to 350°.

Lightly spray a 12 cup muffin muffin pan with cooking spray. In a medium bowl, whisk the bran, flours, baking soda, and salt until well combined. Set aside.In another medium bowl, using a handheld eletric mixer set at high speed, beat the buttermilk, sugar, applesauce, egg, oil and vanilla until frothy, about two minutes. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients, and pour in the buttermilk mixture. Using a spoon - gently stir until the flour is moistened. Do not overmix - gently fold in chocolate chips or other add ins of your choice.

Divide the batter equally among the prepared muffin cups. Bake unti the tops spring back when pressed gently in the center, about 17-20 minutes. Do not overbake. Cool in the pan on a wire rack for 10 minutes before removing from the cups. Cool completely on a wire rack.

Roasted Chile-Spiced Edamame

(14-ounce) package frozen blanched shelled edamame (green soybeans), thawed
Cooking spray
1 tablespoon New Mexico red chile powder or chili powder
1 teaspoon onion powder
3/4 teaspoon sea salt
1/2 teaspoon ground ginger
1/2 teaspoon ground red pepper

Preheat oven to 350°.Arrange edamame in a single layer on a baking sheet, and coat with cooking spray. Combine chile powder and remaining ingredients. Sprinkle over edamame; toss to coat.Bake edamame at 350° for 60 to 90 minutes until crisp, stirring beans every 15 minutes.

Snow in phoenix!

*Looking for the Doughnut Cookie recipe? Scroll down just a little.

Well... snow-peas that is! Peanutty Noodles(CL) was our dinner tonight. Lots of snow peas, carrots, chicken and fettucini with a spicy peanut sauce is a definite repeater for us. This was suppose to be a side dish, but I added more veggies and the chicken to turn it into a main dish. Although the recipe ends up using a lot of dishes, I think it was well worth the effort to clean up.


Getting up early in the morning (usually at 4-5am... darn body alarm clock!) allows me to exercise and have some time in the kitchen to play around. I used that time today to make some more muffins. This time it was Buttermilk Chocolate Chip Bran Muffins (Adapated from Epicurious). I wanted to try this recipe because it is a good base for any type of mix-ins you would want to add. Dried fruits or nuts would be great to put in these. They are moist and very tender from the buttermilk. I decided to throw in some dark chocolate chips this time (hey, dark chocolate is good for you - right?!) The recipe called for using raw sugar crystals and I happened to buy some on a whim not too long ago. I really liked using the sugar and will use it more often!

Doughnut Cookie Recipe

Doughnut Cookie's - adapted from King Arthur Cookie Companion

Dough -

2 tbls canola oil
3 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
2 large eggs - room temperature
2 tsp vanilla extract
3/4 tsp salt
2 tsp baking powder
4 oz confectioners' sugar (1 cup)
10 1/2 oz all-purpose flour (2 1/2 cups)

Icing
4 oz confectioners' sugar (1 cup)
4 tsp milk
4 tsp light corn syrup
Your choice of food coloring

Directions - Dough

Beat oil, butter, eggs, vanilla, salt, baking powder, and sugar until smooth in a medium bowl. Add flour, beating until smooth. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and place in the refrigerator to chill for at least one hour.

Preheat oven to 350. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper.

Scoop the dough into 2 teaspoon sized balls. Roll the balls into ropes about 4 inches long and about 1/2 in diameter. Coil the ropes into round doughnut shapes, leaving a small hole in the middle.

Place the cookies on the baking sheets about 1 inch apart. Place in the oven and bake for about 18 minutes. They will have just a slight golden color on top - but will not be brown. Remove from the oven and transfer to a rack and cool completely before icing.

Directions - Icing

Place 1/4 cup confectioners' sugar into 4 tiny bowls. Add 1 tsp milk and 1 tsp corn syrup to each bowl. Stir until you have made a spreadable icing - add milk drop by drop until you reach the desired consistency. Tint the icing in each bowl a different color.

Dip the top of each cookie in one of the icings and place back on rack to let the frosting harden completely.

Yield: 42 cookies

New twist on Doughnuts

We will start off with dinner. Tonight was kind of a mis-match of appetizer recipes that i've had set aside for the longest time. I like to try them out before we use them for entertaining so we know what to expect.

So we just had these for dinner. The first recipe was Crispy Butternut Wontons with Spicy Tomato Sauce(CL). The only thing I didn't like about this was taking the time to fill each wonton wrapper. To help ease with the actual prep-time I baked off the butternut early in the morning to get that out of the way. The crunchy outside with the soft creamy inside really go well. The tomato sauce is a little different as it includes a strip of orange peel along with other herbs. The flavors meld well and I think you can do most of the prep work ahead of time so this is a winner.

Roasted Chile-Spiced Edamame(CL) was the second recipe. This was nice and easy as you just mix the spices with the edamame and roast for an hour or so. The chile spice mix has just the right kick to make these very addicting. The edamame are about half the size from how they started, but get pretty crunchy. Below both recipes are shown together.

The new twist on doughnuts is... Cookies! Doughnut Cookies(KACC) are fun bite sized cookies that were a little labor intensive but so worth it! The cookie itself reminds me of a cross between a thick butter cookie and a sugar cookie. It is dense but not overly dry. I enjoyed playing with the decorations and lots of ideas came forth to use for future holidays. I imagine these would ship well so they might make the christmas cookie list!

Brownie results

The brownies went over well today from what I gather. They were all gone in less than 2 hours. In general, most people preferred the cocoa style rather than the melted unsweetened chocolate. I just think the taste comes through better with the cocoa - i'ts more subtle.

Dinner this evening was fun and pretty healthy! We had Gnocchi with Broccoli Fontina Sauce(CL). Rather than using a pre-made gnocchi, I made my own and just weighed out the amount called for in the recipe. I also steamed the broccoli, rather than boiling with the Gnocchi, so we didn't loose some of the important nutrients! Other than making the Gnocchi - it's a very quick recipe with lots of flavor. I grated some additional parmesan on top and the finished dish was very good! Can't wait to have the leftovers.


Check back tomorrow to see what we are cookin up next!

Playing with Chocolate...

But let's talk about dinner first. Tonight we had Gruyère, Arugula, and Prosciutto-Stuffed Chicken Breasts(CL) with Mashed Honey-Roasted Sweet Potatoes(CL). The chicken took a little more time to do than I had set aside, but that's mainly because I was trying to do too many things at once! I butterflied the chicken before pounding and would do that again just to keep them even for stuffing. It's an extra step, but it worked well for me as there is quite a bit to stuff in them.

After a quick browning on the stove, I finished them in the oven while mashing the potatoes. Instead of boiling them, we roasted them in cubes per the recipe, and then mixed in butter with some honey. They are light, fluffy, and not overly sweet. Honey gave them a nice subtle flavor without overpowering them at all. A light drizzle of honey on top finished them off.


On to the chocolate... As tomorrow is Wednesday, I had a request for brownies for Jeff to bring to his office mates. I prefer fudgy brownies, but the request was for cakey style. I tested out two recipes (thanks for pointing them out Anna and Val!). The first was from the KA Cookie Companion and the other was from Fine Cooking. I used Dutch Cocoa in one and melted unsweetend chocolate in the other.I followed both recipes exactly as stated with one exception, adding in chocolate chips in both. The KA was made in a 9x13 while the Fine Cooking one was baked in a 8X8. I didn't want to halve the first mixture.

The KA Version was much taller, but the center took a little longer than I wanted to come out with no wetness on the tester. It also has a darker apperance with a more rich and deeper flavor than the Fine Cooking version. Both are unfrosted so we could compare the actual brownie. In the picture the FC brownie is on the left - KA on the right. They are very good for cakey brownies - I think I prefer the cocoa version though.

Lotsa Pasta...

Whew - it sure was a hot one today. The high showed 113 in the shade this afternoon. I tried to get the doggies to go outside but they had other plans... like staying inside the nice cool house!

Growing up, for as long as I can remember, I never ate pasta of *any* kind. I had some aversion to its texture and the last time I tried it I was around 10 and that was it for me. One bite and never again I told myself! A couple years ago, attempting to actually try and explore other food realms I decided it was about time I got over it and made a simple spaghetti with sauce. The first bite was pretty odd, but the more I ate it the more I thought to myself "why did I wait this long to try this?"

Tonight's dinner was Turkey-Spinach Lasagna(CL). I used homemade sauce instead of jarred but that was the only change I made. I started a little earlier than I normally would since it has a bit of prep time involved, but it was pretty simple. It's very flavorful and pretty light for a meat sauce with the turkey. Quite good!

Till tomorrow - the plan is for 2 new dishes for dinner and I will be baking 2 new bar-type recipes!

Looking ahead...

Woke up and got started on the grocery list for this week. The list seemed much longer than normal, but I think we just must be out of getting low on a few items. This next week has a good variety of things I plan on making. I have 5 new dinners planned out if everything goes well. Look to see what we do with this butternut squash on Thursday!



At safeway this morning, I surprised myself and the cashier when the register showed this.

Apparently we stumbled on a deal and they ended up paying us $1.53 to shop there today! First time that has ever happened to us! Some products ended up being free after using a coupon and they were running a deal that if you bought a certain number the store gave you money off as well. I could handle that happening more often!

DVD from Netflix tonight is the animated film Shark Tale.

Daily updates to continue so keep checking to see how this week turns out and find out what new items we make!

Wishing anyone in the path of Katrina to please try and stay safe!

Requested recipe - Chipotle Chicken Tortilla Soup(CL)

Chipotle Chicken Tortilla Soup

1 tablespoon canola oil
1 1/2 teaspoons bottled minced garlic (I used Fresh)
3/4 pound chicken breast tenders, cut into bite-sized pieces
1 teaspoon chipotle chile powder
1 teaspoon ground cumin
1 cup water
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 (14-ounce) can fat-free, less-sodium chicken broth
1 (14.5-ounce) can stewed tomatoes, undrained
1 cup crushed baked tortilla chips (I used closer to 1 1/2 cups)
1/4 cup chopped fresh cilantro
1 lime, cut into 4 wedges

Heat oil in a large saucepan over medium-high heat. Add minced garlic and chicken; sauté 2 minutes. Add chile powder and cumin; stir well. Add water, salt, broth, and tomatoes; bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer 5 minutes. Top with tortilla chips and cilantro, and serve with lime wedges.

Product Testing and Week in review

Going over my notes this morning we made 12 new recipes and one that was a common repeat for us. I think that is the most we have ever done in one week! Lots of variety and it was pretty fun!

We have been new product testers for a few years now. We have tested new food/drink products, pet products, and a couple household tool items. This weekend we are testing something new from Ben and Jerry's! What you see below is all we have to go by when we try them. Looks inviting huh! Nothing really telling us what they are until we taste it - which can be good and bad! So far this test has been pretty interesting. I can't say exactly what the product is yet, but should be able to give more information out soon!

Netflix came through again by getting the DVDs to us in time for the weekend. Love their turn around! We will be watching Collateral. We were going to see this in the theater, but passed after reading some of the reviews. It sounds like it's a better rental than paying $10 for a ticket. A lot of movies these days seem like that. Stay tuned as I'm going through the recipe piles and cookbooks to see what the menu for this week will be!

Spicy Soup and More from Small Batch Baking

Chipotle Chicken and Tortilla soup(CL) filled our bowls tonight for dinner. It's a very fast dish as the simmer time is only 5 minutes after you brown the diced chicken. Instead of throwing all the tortilla chips in, I kept some aside and added them as we ate for additional crunchy texture. They also helped to thicken it up some. This is a pretty spicy soup as the heat comes from chipotle chile powder.


The Small Batch Baking cookbook was calling to me today, so I opened it up and I happened to have all the ingredients that the recipe shown called for. Orange Tea Cakes with Honey Orange Glaze(SBB) was fun to make. They are tender, melt in your mouth, one bite (okay maybe two) cakes that have a sweet sticky glaze. They are baked in a mini muffin pan and when they come out of the oven you poke tiny holes in the top so the glaze you pour on can seep inside and run down the sides. This makes them very moist. I added a little orange zest to up the flavor some and would do so again. The recipe makes 8 so it's just the right amount for us.

Cookies and Pizza...

The recipe for dinner tonight I have had at the top of my to-try pile for awhile, but kept passing it by as I couldn't find an ingredient that I thought would be necessary. Turkish Turkey Pizza has a spicy yogurt base instead of a pizza sauce and is topped with a mix of fire roasted diced tomatoes and sauteed ground turkey breast. Cumin and allspice flavor the meat and tomato mixture with another interesting ingredient called Pomegranate Molasses. The recipe only called for 1 1/2 tsp but I used a heaping tablespoon as I wanted a bit more of the flavor to come through. I'm glad I made the change! The mixture is then divided between 4 whole wheat pitas and toasted in a very hot oven. We really enjoyed this and would make it again!


Cookies... so many different types that can be made. These are Vanilla Oat Cookies(BBCL). They are a lace type cookie being very thin and having a crisp outer edge while the center is still chewy. I used vanilla paste instead of vanilla extract as I find the flavor packs a bit more of a punch. With a short time to firm up the dough in the refrigerator the cookies come together pretty fast and are nice light snack.

Food from the East...

The muffins from yesterday must have turned out pretty good as not a single one came home. They kept well overnight and stayed very moist!

I was a little nervous making dinner for tonight as it was another "odd" type dish and heard a couple times "what is that and why is it going in?". Below is Middle Eastern burgers from E-W. I believe they are normally served on small pita bread but I wanted to use the homemade buns I had in the freezer. This mixture of ground beef, bulgur, garlic, prunes(!), and spices held their shape very well. When the meat hit the grill the intense aroma from the cumin along with the other herbs filled the kitchen. On top of the burgers is a smooth drained yogurt-garlic sauce. Letting the whey drip out from the yogurt for about an hour really thickened up the finished sauce. It's a very cool tasting compliment to the warm burger. I served seasoned and toasted pita chips on the side.

Banana Walnut-Crumb Muffin Recipe

For the muffin batter

1 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 large ripe bananas -- mashed with a fork
3/4 cup sugar
1 large egg -- well beaten
1/3 cup butter -- melted

For the Crumb Top

1/3 cup packed brown sugar
1 tablespoon flour
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1 tablespoon cold butter
1/4 cup finely chopped, toasted walnuts

Set oven to 375 degrees. Lightly spray a 12 cup muffin pan with cooking spray.

In a large bowl, combine all dry muffin ingredients (except for the sugar). In another bowl, combine the bananas, sugar, egg and melted butter; mix well, stir into the dry ingredients, only until moistened. Fill the muffin cups 3/4 cup full.

Crumb Topping: Combine brown sugar, flour, cinnamon; cut into butter until crumbly, add in the nuts. Sprinkle over muffins.

Bake 18-20 minutes, or until muffins test done. Cool in pan 10 minutes before removing to a wire rack. Mine took exactly 18 mins.

Wishing for double ovens…

I couldn’t decide what I wanted to make for Jeff to bring into the office tomorrow for the weekly hump day treats. I needed to use up some bananas and had some extra blueberries in the fridge so we went with Banana Walnut-Crumb Topped Muffins and Blueberry Coffee Cake Muffins(BC). We had a total of 30 muffins so I hope they are hungry! The Coffee Cake muffins took a little extra effort as the batter was pretty thick and had to divide them between 18 tins. I think they came out well, but I guess we’ll hear tomorrow!

Dinner tonight was interesting.Bowties with Broccoli Pesto(Culinary Cafe) was on tap. I have enjoyed playing with pesto but this was somewhat different as you blended in 1 lb(!) of crisp-tender broccoli into the mix of parmesan, garlic and olive oil. An added bit of flavor came from a little toasted sesame oil. I really didn't know if this was going to work as I was putting it together, as it seemed like a LOT of pesto for 4 servings. The intense broccoli flavor goes perfect with the al dente bowties. This mix suprised me as I thought it might be a tad overpowering but I think it came out much better than I expected. I did thin out the pesto with a little pasta water. Would make again and also think it might be good to bring for a picnic.

Orange Bran Flaxseed Muffin Recipe

Orange Bran Flax Muffins
1 cup oat bran
1 cup whole wheat pastry flour (WW flour is okay, but may be more dense)
1 cup flaxseed, ground
1 cup wheat bran<
1 cup Craisins (can use raisins)
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
2 oranges, whole (washed, quartered and seeded)
1 cup brown sugar
1 cup 1% milk
1 Tbsp Cider Vinegar
1/2 cup canola oil (If you sub applesauce - use 1 cup)
2 eggs
1 tsp. baking soda

In a large bowl, combine oat bran, flour, flaxseed, wheat bran, baking powder and salt. Set aside.

In a blender or food processor, combine oranges, brown sugar, milk, vinegar, oil, eggs and baking soda. Blend well until smooth. Pour orange mixture into dry ingredients. Mix until just moistened. Fill paper lined muffin tins almost to the top. Bake in 375 degree oven for 18 to 20 minutes or until wooden pick inserted in the center. Yields 18 muffins