Cinnamon and Chocolate Chip Waffles

I used to be pretty ambivalent about waffles.  I'm not a maple syrup fan, so that shaped my childhood dislike and to my recollection, my mother never owned a waffle iron.  One day I discovered the Waffleizer a food blogger dedicated to the art of answering the question "Will it waffle?".  Not going to lie, I was done in by the waffleizing of a cupcake.  A waffle iron I must have.  I haven't used my iron for anything extravagant since my purchase a month ago.  However, as I always do, I have been tweaking other people recipes and I think I am in love with this new version. 

These waffles are fluffy and crispy and flavorful and um, well, just plain good.

2 eggs separated
1 3/4 cup of buttermilk
1 cup whole wheat PASTRY flour
1 cup all purpose flour
1/4 cup of canola oil (I'll try melted butter next time)
2 tbsp brown sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
1 tsp of vanilla extract
generous sprinkling of cinnamon
pinch of salt
chocolate chips
Trader Joe's Cinnamon Sugar Grinder (Optional)

Place egg whites in mixer and mix until peaks stand up stiff
Place all additional ingredients except chocolate chips in a bowl and whisk.  Batter may be slightly lumpy.
Gently incorporate the egg whites.
Place some of the batter in the waffle iron and before closing sprinkle the batter generously with chocolate chips.
Cook according to manufacturer's directions.
(Shameless Plug:) Run a stick of butter lightly over the edges of the waffles as they come out of the oven and sprinkle them with the Trader Joe's Cinnamon Sugar Grinder.  OMG.

Die and go to heaven with happiness.  Bargain with Saint Peter at heaven's gate due to sin of gluttony. 

Whole Wheat Shortcake

I have been buying strawberries in bulk at Costco and tweaked a few recipes to create my own shortcake.  This is amazing with strawberries on top or plain, straight out of the oven.  

1 cup all purpose white flour
1 cup whole wheat PASTRY flour
1 tablespoon of baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup of sugar
1/3 cup of cold butter-cut into small cubes
3/4 cup of buttermilk

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Put all the ingredients except  butter and buttermilk into a food processor and mix briefly.  Toss in butter and mix until it looks like course crumbs.  Add buttermilk and mix just until it forms into a ball of dough.

Place dough on a  lightly floured surface and pat into a rectangle about an inch thick.  Cut with a pizza cutter or knife into three lines on the short side of the rectangle,  four lines on the long side.  (12 squares for the math impaired.)  Place the squares closely together onto a parchment paper lined cookie sheet. 

Once the oven is completely warm, place them in the oven for 14 minutes.  Separate the squares with a knife and if the middle is still a little doughy spread them apart on the cookie sheet and bake for three more minutes. 

Eat.  All of them.  Fast.  Before someone else does. 

Grilled Cheeses and Veggie Soup

After baconing out on bacon brunch, we were craving a little more nourishment for dinner.  Soup sounded good and I had plenty of veggies on hand to make it hearty.  Complemented with some grilled Halloumi cheese (dash of olive oil, lemon and oregano) and experimentally melted manchego cheese on top of some really garlicky bread, the soup tasted like a fresh minestrone, minus the noodles.

I sauted an onion and 6 celery stalks in 2 tablespoons of butter, pureed them in a food processor with a can of diced tomatoes.  Drizzled in a little olive oil, two minced cloves of garlic, 10-15 basil leaves, and some of the 32 ounces of chicken stock (or maybe veggie, I'm not sure which one I used).   After that combo was pureed well, I sauted a mixed veggie combo from Trader Joe's that includes radishes, carrots, celery, and broccoli then added a handful of shredded kale and small chopped mushrooms. 

I deglazed the pot with the rest of the chicken stock, added the tomato/basil/onion mixture, brought it to a boil, tossed in a can of green beans, a can of white cantenelli beans and peppered, salted, and a dash of cayenne peppered to taste.

The basil brought in a fresh garden taste, the tomatoes and onions and celery lent a thickness and heartiness, and the beans (both of them) a minestrone-ness.  Altogether it was a delicious, filling soup just right after all that bacon and chocolate. 

Chocolate Coated Candied Bacon

A family friend was having a birthday, so my sister cooked up a bacon brunch.  We REALLY like bacon, but the friend REALLY REALLY likes bacon.  So my sister did a spinach, cheese and bacon fritatta that burned on the bottom, we turned it into scrambled eggs and added more cheese and more bacon to the top.  She made chocolate chip muffins and potatoes with sweet onions that were broiled with bacon on top, a recipe I am stealing immediately.  We had too much food and absolutely fabulous company. 

But the pièce de résistance was the chocolate coated candied bacon.   Not to minimize any of the work or effort that my sister put into brunch, it was truly yummy; the chocolate bacon was just unexpectedly crave-able.  (I also chocolate covered Fritos, thanks to a Bon Appetit suggestion, also amazing.)

Given it was a bacon brunch I was attending, I thought I would bring over some sweet and spicy bacon.  Thanks to Scup's in the Harbor, a now closed restaurant in the Boston Harbor, I have intense cravings for their sweet and spicy bacon grilled cheese.  Occasionally I will try to recreate this heaven, generally using brown sugar and cayenne pepper.  Mid way through thinking out loud about sweet and spicy bacon I thought, "chocolate bacon!"  And my sister confirmed their friends had actually made it before.  Great, I'll bring some over. 

This morning I woke up early to work on my chocolate tempering (setting my actual temper on its edge), and thought, what if I candied the bacon with the sweet and spicy, then dip it in chocolate.  WHAT?!  Amazing. 

After cutting the bacon in half and cooking it to a light brown, I poured some white sugar (still out of brown sugar, even after two trips to the grocery store) into a wiped mostly clean bacon cooking pan and sprinkled come cayenne pepper on top.  I let the sugar melt completely and then added the bacon to the sugar.  The bacon caramelized gorgeously, and I stirred it around carefully making sure each piece was coated and not sticking to each other.  Once the sugar started bubbling I pulled it all out of the pan and laid it out on parchment paper.  Once cooled I dipped in in the chocolate. 

The candy-ness gave the bacon an exceptional crunch and toffee likeness, the cayenne gave an unexpected but not unwelcome, after burn.  The salty bacon and toffee-esque flavor went so well with the chocolate.   I have more bacon in my fridge.  I'm thinking it would be gluttonous to bust out anymore bacon today, but oh my goodness, I'm tempted. 

The Perfect Bite

The veggie diet is in the throws of failing and I don't even know if I care.  Between my husband giving up TV for lent (farewell Steven Cobert), my sister giving up shopping (what else are we supposed to do all day?), and my brother-in-law giving up eating out (unless someone else is paying, which basically means, unless I am paying), I feel like I am being punished.  I didn't volunteer for this! 

So in revolt I am eating whatever strikes my fancy.  Okay, I'm still eating a ton of veggies, but that's just because I always have.  Dinner included yellow zucchini and kale, lunch included, well, um...  Oh!  Lunch did include grapes and orange juice. 

Yesterday's lunch, the one that included grapes and orange juice, was a sublime flashback to the second best omelet I have ever had.  The first best was in India.  Yesterday's omelet turned into more of a scramble, so it doesn't count on the omelet rating scale, although it was D. Lish. Us. 

The second best omelet I have ever eaten was in Vietnam.  It was translated as eggs and pasta on the menu and when we received our meal it was an omelet with twirly pasta cooked into the egg part.  I've often remade this omelet at home to much success but only for myself because of the scornful looks bestowed upon me from others when I offer to toss pasta into their eggs.  Yesterday I simply told my husband I would make him some eggs for his toast. 

Into the pan went a cup of orzo, which had been mixed with sauted onions, mushrooms, garlic and basil.  Three eggs followed with a bit of milk.  Salt, pepper, more basil, shredded cheese... Did I mention it was delicious?  Even those of scornful gazes enjoyed their "eggs". 

 

Dinner that followed this lunch of champions was what I can only describe as a perfect bite.  Individually each item was good on its own.  Together it was perfect.  I grilled the yellow zucchini, added minced garlic to the mashed potatoes, braised some kale and cooked it briefly in a little orange/fig balsamic and then nuwaved the steak.  

My mother-in-law gave us the nuwave which works on frozen items with the speed of a microwave, even cooking of a convection oven and browning ability of a broiler.  When I topped the steaks with a sugar/coffee grinder mix from Trader Joe's, salt, cayanne pepper, pepper, adobo, mixed herbs, garlic powder, garlic salt, and a little extra brown sugar it gave them a spicy, sweet, salty crust that dreams are made of.  Perfection I tell you.  Perfection.  Although I admit I set the nuwave on three hours, instead of three minutes, so the steak in the picture is medium well.  Oops.

I think anyone who interferes with my DVR watching deserves the occasional overdone steak.  Isn't that right, Mister Scornful Glancer?

Man Your Cotti or it Might Get Eaten

Brian says my title is "cheesy".  Ha ha.
 
I found out late last night that I've been doing my cleanse the wrong way.  I'm supposed to take my probiotic pills on an empty stomach, then 15 minutes later take the fiber stuff.  I somehow managed to think I took the fiber first, waited 10 minutes then pills...  Could be a reasonable explanation as to why I haven't noticed it doing anything for the past two and a half weeks. 

A reasonable explanation could also explain why a person, such as, say, myself, could do a clease and a veggie challenge and still manage to GAIN weight.   I'm thinking it could be possibly because a meal composed of half veggies,  doesn't actually mean it has less calories.  I think a simple calorie count would probably be more effective then this stupid veggie trial.  Let's take a look at dinner.

Notice the broccoli chillen in the background.  I can't say much bad about that actually; it's simply broccoli, a splash of olive oil, dash of salt, three small cloves of garlic and a wishful thinking splash of lemon juice.  (That is, I would have added lemon juice, cause it would have been delicious but I didn't have any.)

Now how about a closer look at that manicotti.  A sauce loaded with half an onion, a bell pepper, a large can of diced tomatoes, a can of tomato sauce, 10 shredded basil leafs, 3 minced cloves of garlic, garlic powder, garlic salt, thyme, oregano, parsley, red pepper flakes, more garlic salt, a small dash of coriander and cinnamon, a small dash of rice wine vinegar and sugar (we were out of the usual red wine and honey), a little more basil and some salt.  Let me assure you, nothing bad was going on with that sauce.  It was delicious and reasonable nutritious.  Even the ricotta cheese was mixed with a quarter of an onion, 8 mushrooms,  and 2 ounces of spinach.

Of course, there remained the pasta shells.  Okay, not too bad.  And then...  The cheese on top.  You probably can't tell too well, as I demolished any beauty the pasta once held, but the entire top was covered in an extremely thick layer of bubbly brown mozzarella and provolone cheese.  To make matters worse I attempted to make garlic bread with the meal, but we had polished off last night's Safeway bread along with some greek cheese at lunch and the regular wheat bread was molding.  It's still a mystery as to what I bought at the grocery store yesterday, being as I'm out of bread, lemons, lemon juice, wine, and honey.  It's not a mystery why my waistline is expanding.

Roasted and Breaded

It may seem like I've been slacking lately, but again I blame it on the internet situation.  I also haven't figured out how to use blogger and upload a picture from my ipad at the same time.  Oh technology.  Anyways, I have been following the veggie challenge.  On my last trip, the one where I only had my ipad and the internet wasn't working well, I went to town on my own version of horiatiki salad.  

After chopping up four bell peppers and eating them for every meal (the first one of banana chocolate chip muffins, grapes, blueberries and clemintimes was fabulous, but left me hungry and eating half a box of sesame rice crackers.) I was getting bored with the bells.  To get creative I moved on to salads.

 

I've long been obsessed with salads that don't contain lettuce.  Don't get me wrong, I like lettuce too, in its place, but not much is better then a salad with a base of green beans or tomatoes.  Nothing made me happier then the lettuce-less greek salads in greece.  The horiatiki salads made of tomatoes, cucumbers, olives and feta?  Amazing!  My version included tomatoes, bell peppers, olives, feta and... wait for it... AVOCADO!  (No really, that deserves an exclaimation.)  I balanced those salads with my first bag of easter whopper egg chocolate candies.  Half veggies, my friend. 

Tonight after a sangria filled happy hour, I roasted asparagus and mushrooms, chopped up some watermelon and buttered some Safeway french bread.    That french bread was longingly craved while I was on the east coast eating bag after bag of "italian bread".  No, Safeway french bread isn't the most authenic of french breads, but that distinct smell and taste is soooo good!  (Yes, it also deserves an exclaimation.)  I topped it with Brummel and Brown's yogurt butter, the only fake butter I'll consume, and limited myself to only three slices.  As I type this I'm wondering if I ate enough watermelon to balance eating another slice of bread.  Hmmm...

It's Valentine's Day, stop judging me.  If I want chocolate in my banana muffins, this is the day to add it. 

I was watching my niece today and so we made some banana muffins.  This is the first time she has ever baked with me, so I left her watching the mixer as I added things willy nilly with no recipe or direction in mind.  Left over cinnamon sugar from the poptarts, a little white sugar, half a stick of butter, vanilla, two eggs, three whole unsmooched bananas popped right in, some kefir... I turned to get my flour, baking powder and baking soda and the niece had somehow managed to find a cup that she filled with batter and liberally shook into her mouth, and my chair...  In went the chocolate chips to the bowl, out of the bowl and into her mouth went the chocolate chips. 

She can be quite the hog sometimes.

I finally got them into the oven, hopefully limiting her raw egg consumption, and left her squashing the egg shells happily on the counter.  Next I heard her spitting.  Eggshells don't taste good, apparently.  The muffins,  however, turned out blissfully good.  The banana was in small chunks, instead of well incorporated, which made all the difference.  The chocolate chips where pure magic. 

I gave the niece a muffin still warm from the oven which left gooey chocolate on every towel I own, my sweater and the couch. 

But the pretty face was pretty content.  And that made it worth it. 

Mini Poptarts and Other Such Baked Goods

To possibly explain how unwell the veggie challenge is going, perhaps I should explain the contents of my fridge.  Beginning on Thursday I had quite a bit of butter chillin' in my fridge.  Monday, not quite enough to make even cookies.  Between Thursday and Sunday I had made Salted Bourbon Caramel Banana Cream Pie, Biscuits, Sprinkles Strawberry Cupcakes, Red Velvet Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting, Red Velvet Cake Pops (due to leaving out the eggs in the second batch of red velvet cupcakes), and Olive Oil Cake.  The honest truth is the biscuits, the second batch of red velvet cupcakes and the olive oil cake didn't turn out perfectly right, which isn't to say it wasn't consummed.

By Monday I had two kinds of left over frosting and caramel sauce in the fridge, along with plenty of bacon and a few ingrediants to make a salad.  I was making dinner for some friends who just had a baby and the bar was set pretty high.  I also needed a dessert for our small group.

I used some left over puff pastry to make "italian emanadas" (basically beef, tomatoes, rosemary, onions, garlic and wine, wrapped in a puff pastry) and I whipped up a batch of black beans with bacon and rice for the new baby friends.  Since puff pastry costs $10.99 at whole foods, and croissants are only $2.50 at safeway, I elected to use croissants for the "empanadas" for my sister and husband and niece and nephew.  Combined with a hodgepodge salad (I completely forgot the rice sitting on the stove), we had our dinner.

In the oven I made a batch of mini cinnamon sugar and nutella poptarts.  I just used pie crust and stuffed them with either nutella or a mix of pumpkin pie seasoning, brown sugar and flour.  They were simple, but rather addictive.

So yes, I did have a salad, but I had significantly more baked goods then healthy goods.  Tuesday is another day.  Hopefully I can get back on track.   At least I'll start out by walking my nephew to school.  It's a start... we'll see how it goes.

Shamoothy

I knew from the get go, if I did biscuits for breakfast, healthy wasn't going to happen.  If anything, they were going to get a huge dose of even more unhealthy by adding a scoop of sausage gravy.  My biscuits suffered from the fact that I don't have a pastry cutter and therefore the butter wasn't incorporated well; my little hockey pucks needed that gravy to become edible.  For every crowning achievement I have in baking, I also have a spectacular fail. 

While making the failing biscuits I whipped my fruit and veggie portions in a smoothie based on a recipe I found last night.  Jill's Flaxseed Shake included all sorts of healthy deliciousness, and looked good to boot.  I didn't follow her recipe exact; I did a handful of spinach, frozen strawberries, mangos, and blueberries, flaxseeds, wheatgerm, kefir, and orange juice.  I haven't been adding sweetener to my smoothies, but this one needed a dash of agave nectar.  It turned out great, with the minor detail of my blender barely being able to pulverize the fruit.  Two rounds in the blender smoothed it out eventually. 

Baked Egg in Avocado

Since Brian and the kids (Friday night niece and nephew sitting) don't like artichokes or avocados which is what I was craving, they got tortellini and vodka sauce and garlic bread with "colored stuff" on it, which my nephew was hesitant about.  But turns out basil and rosemary and thyme on garlic bread is GOOD!  What a shock.

Brian had emailed me a blog with a recipe for eggs baked in avocados, which looked divine.  After reading the comments from the others, I thought ahead and hollowed out enough room for my egg inside the avocado.  Which clearly my spatial vision isn't superb.  I don't know how familiar you are with raw eggs whites, but they are decidedly hard to separate.  It's all or nothing with them.  So putting half of a egg white and a yoke into my much too small avocado bowl proved to be quite the challenge.  

Top it off and my oven wasn't hot enough to bake the freaken egg, the slice of bacon that I fried up to crumble on top burnt to inedibility and set off the smoke alarm.  I also over cooked the artichokes, but as it turns out, I liked them that way.

Anyone who knows me knows about my bacon issues, but not quite as many people understand my love of artichokes.  Dipped in butter, dipped in mayo, dipped in green goddess dressing, grilled, fried, roman jewish ghetto style, steamed or boiled...  But my newest favorite is dipped in a mayo mixed with garlic, lemon juice, grainy mustard, salt, pepper and a dash of cayenne pepper.  Hom my gush, so good. 

Lavendar French Toast

I forgot to eat breakfast today.  I was too excited to start making the salted bourbon banana cream pie that I am making for dinner tonight, so I went straight to baking.  After completing a good portion of the pie, I definitely needed to eat.  We had some leftover sausage which I burnt, then i grabbed a huge bunch of cherries, grapes and blueberries.  While I was making some lavender french toast, I decided to make it a truly french affair by adding a little mixed green salad.  Fig and orange balsamic topped it off. 

Sometimes I even impress myself. 

Broccoli Sandwich

So you might be thinking I've been slacking over here, but the internet has let me down.  I made some Italian wedding soup on Monday, and to counter act the meatballs and orzo, I added double carrots, celery, and spinach.  I worked a redeye flight right after, so I didn't get to write about it but the next day I attempted to and the internet simply would not work.  Later that night I worked another redeye and had a bag packed full of salad, tomatoes, avocados, grapes, cherries, and blueberries.  Of course in Denver I managed to snag some McDonald's fries and a McDouble.  But half and half...  it happened.

Catching up on my Bon Appetit reading after the redeyes, I found a recipe for a broccoli sandwich.  It had a ton of garlic, red peppers, and a white bean spread.  Topped with melted cheese, the sandwich was stellar.  Even Brian agreed he would eat it again.  We added a small bowl of left over soup and a glass of white wine.  Is it okay to end every blog with "Yum"?  YUM!

Airplane Food

I generally pack my food when I fly with the intention of eating one hot meal a day.  Today I warmed up my remaining pasta with greens and beans and grabbed a handful of strawberries, thinking "Look at me sticking with it!" 

And then...

Being Superbowl Sunday we had our one day a year buffalo wing flavored pretzels.  I didn't try them last year, so this year, thinking they would gross me out a little, I busted open a bag.  Or two.  Or three.  Then my co-worker brought me over warm cookies.  I was so full of the junk food I didn't touch my apple or edamame.  Thus the balance was tipped.  Airplane food won, veggies lost. 

Bacon Wrapped Asparagus!

It totally counts!

One whole slab o asparagus, one whole slab o bacon.  Half Veggie!

It was our young professionals BBQ and I wanted to bring grilled veggies, but I didn't think many others would enjoy them as much as I would.  Then Brian had the fabulous idea to wrap them in bacon.  They caught on fire on the grill, burning the asparagus part, but it actually enhanced the flavor I thought.  I am a burnt toast fan, so maybe that's just me. 

Brought to you by Groupon

The only thing redeemable about what I ate today, aside from a Kefir smoothy without sugar, was a groupon we redeemed for pizza.  Friday nights are spent babysitting my niece and nephew.  Generally we bow to their wishes on Friday for picky people food and they get pasta or pizza.   

I did have some super good for you leftover pasta with white beans, collard greens, red leave lettuce, bok choy, and spinach in the fridge, but Brian had already eaten some for lunch and he was definitely voting for pizza too.  (I had my auntie's famous fried chicken for lunch, so I certainly can't brag about that.) We borrowed my sister's Groupon and off I went to fetch dinner.  We rarely have take out, so it was actually kinda nice to grab it and well, I wish I felt guilty, but i actually do not.  Wahoo!

A is for Amaranth

I read about amaranth probably a year ago in an article about grains from Bon Appetit Magazine.  I searched everywhere in Boston from Shaw's to Whole Foods, to Market Basket (don't laugh, hands down the best selection of gluten free products and Bob's Red Mill stuff I've ever come across).  I even ventured into Cambridge to search for it at a health food store, which turned out to be more of a GNC.

What was the allure of this grain?  It's not as though I was running out to buy chia seeds or farina or any other fad product.  What interested me about this one was the fact that you could pop it like popcorn.  What!?  Oh yes, given my love of popcorn, I had to try it.

I finally found it at the Whole Foods down my street in San Francisco.  Sigh.  I love you California.  Today's adventure in eating half of my meal as fruits and veggies was perfect for this grain.  I cooked it up like a porridge, put half a banana and a few strawberries on the bottom of my bowl, topped it with the amaranth, sprinkled a little brown sugar on it, a little pumpkin pie spice, some more strawberries and banana and some pecans.

First bite.  Everything I had read described it as nutty.  Maybe... If you mix that with a swampy grass flavor...  Not my favorite meal ever.  The brown sugar and cinnamon really complimented it well though, and if I had doused it in brown sugar I have no doubt I would have really liked it.

Let's just say that I won't be cooking it this way again.  I did however find a recipe where you pop it and add it to granola, so not all hope is lost.