Blue Cheese Cole Slaw

Ever have something not turn out quite as you'd expected, and then later you re-read the recipe and realize you did something wrong? That's kind of what happened with this cole slaw for me.

Don't get me wrong--it was DELICIOUS, but the flavor overpowered every other part of the meal. Just now, while typing this recipe, I figured out why.

Ingredients:

2 cups cabbage (shredded) PLUS 1 carrot (shredded) OR 1 bag of pre-shredded cole slaw mix
1/4 cup mayonnaise (low fat is fine)
1/4 cup sour cream (low fat is fine)
2 tablespoons grainy mustard
Juice of 1 lemon
salt and pepper to taste
1/4 cup blue cheese (crumbled) I think this is where I messed up. I could have sworn the recipe called for 4 oz of blue cheese, and so I figured 5 would just be extra good. I think I basically quadrupled the blue cheese. Start with less--you can add more if it needs more blue cheese flavor!
1 handful parsley (chopped) I left this out

Combine the mayo, sour cream, mustard, lemon juice, salt, and pepper in a large bowl. Add the carrots/cabbage and mix to coat. Taste and add more blue cheese/salt/pepper/lemon juice as needed.

Cover and let mellow in the fridge for a few hours.

So, yeah, mine was good, but it would be even better (and palatable for those who don't LOVE blue cheese) if you used the correct amount.

If you like blue cheese, though, this is for you, and it would be awesome on a buffalo-flavored pulled chicken sandwich/wrap.

Jalapeno Cheese Corn Muffins

I recently had some jalapeno cheese corn muffins at California Cafe, and they were GOOD. I went online in search of the recipe, and while I didn't find it, I did find these.

They aren't quite as good as the ones at CA Cafe, but they were tasty. The Big Geek didn't like all the "stuff" in them and said he'd rather just have plain cornbread. I think he's crazy and these are delicious. They aren't hot, so even the little geeks enjoyed them.

Ingerdients:

1 1/2 cups yellow cornmeal
2 Tbsp sugar
2 Tbsp baking powder
1 1/2 Tbsp flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup fresh corn, scraped from the cob, OR 1 cup creamed corn (I used creamed corn)
1 1/4 cups buttermilk
3/4 cup minced onion
1/2 cup melted butter
1 cup grated Cheddar or Monterey Jack cheese
4 oz diced Jalapeno (remove seeds/membrane unless you want it hot) OR 1/4 cup minced canned Jalapeno chiles (I used fresh)

Preheat oven to 425 and grease 12 large muffin cups

Stir together cornmeal through salt. Add corn, buttermilk, onion, and butter. Mix thoroughly until mixture is moist and creamy (it kind of puffs up).

Combine cheese and chiles and mix into batter.

Pour into 12 prepared muffin cups and bake 20-25 minutes.

Tres Leches Cake

Happy Cinco de Mayo! My daughter's playgroup had a party today, and I knew I wanted to take a tres leches cake. My BFF has talked about making this for years, so I had her send me her recipe. I was delighted to find out how incredibly easy it is.

You need:
1 box butter yellow cake mix, plus ingredients called for on mix (stick of butter, water, eggs)
1 can sweetened condensed milk
2 cans evaporated milk
1 pint light cream (although I didn't find light cream and ended up just getting whipping cream)
2/3 cup karo syrup
2/3 cup sugar
3 egg whites
1 tsp vanilla

Step 1: Make the cake according to the package directions. Here's a tip about butter yellow mixes: mix the batter for as long as the box says (in my case, 4 minutes). It really does make a difference in the texture of the cake. Use a 9 x 13 baking pan, and allow to cool completely.

Step 2: When cake is cool, puncture all over with a fork. Combine the milks in a bowl, then slowly pour all over the cake. Cover and refrigerate overnight or for at least 4 hours so that the milk really soaks in.

Step 3: Heat the karo syrup and sugar on medium-low heat until sugar is combined. While that's heating (stir occasionally), whip 3 egg whites until soft peaks form. When sugar is melted into Karo syrup, stir, add vanilla and stir to combine. SLOWLY pour the syrup mixture into your egg whites, beating them the entire time. When all of syrup has been combined with egg whites, you should have stiff peaks. Cover top of cake and refrigerate for another hour. OR, if you want, you could use whipped topping, but the meringue is really the way to go.

Serve with a spoon and enjoy! This is not low fat or low calorie, but it tastes REALLY good. :)

Crock Pot Potato Ham Chowder

This is a great way to use leftover ham or even the bone from a bone-in ham. It's quick to toss together and you toss it into the crock pot and walk away. There is a bit to do at the end, but it's worth it. :)

Ingredients:
3 1/2 cups diced potatoes
1/2 cup chopped celery
1/2 cup diced onion
3 1/4 cups ham (or however much you have, or just toss in the ham bone assuming there's still meat on it)
3 1/4 cups water or chicken broth
6 chicken bullion cubes (or 3 if you use broth--I used "better than bullion" vegetable base)
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp pepper
5 Tbsp flour
5 Tbsp butter
2 cups milk (I use fat free, but it doesn't matter)

Spray crock pot with cooking spray and stir potatoes through pepper into the crockpot. Cook on low for 6-8 hours. If you use a ham bone, about 30 minutes before serving remove the bone, cut away ham from it, dice it, and stir ham back into crock pot. About 20 minutes before serving, melt butter in a saucepan, add flour and gradually add milk, stirring constantly over medium heat until thick. Stir mixture into crockpot. Let cook 15-20 minutes more.

Especially good served with some sharp cheddar cheese, chives, and crumbled bacon, but very tasty just as it is.

Crock Pot Chicken Stock

I love making chicken stock in the crock pot, because you take what would otherwise be garbage and turn it into something you'd have to pay for normally. It's also absurdly easy and makes your house smell really good.

The blog Nourishing Days has some really good tips for making stock here. What was new to me was the addition of vinegar (it works, and you can't taste it) plus using cold water and letting everything sit for about an hour before turning on the slow cooker. Also, the idea of hanging onto vegetable scraps in a ziploc in your freezer and to use in your stock is inspired. I literally take a chicken carcass and veggie scraps that would otherwise just be trash and turn it into a staple I'd buy regularly anyhow. I feel like I'm making money in my crock pot!

What do I do with the chicken stock? In addition to using it as a great base for soups, I use it to make risotto, the absurdly easy cheesy chicken and rice recipe I posted a while back. It's required for my favorite chicken pot pie recipe, and for quick coq au vin. Or this fabulous lemon chicken (the last time we got lemon chicken at a restaurant both The Big Geek and I thought of this and wished we were eating it instead.)

Or sometimes I just use it to cook rice, cous cous, or quinoa to give it more flavor.

At any rate, it's easy, delicious, and free--so you may as well try it.

Cake Pops--first attempt

I'm sure most of you have seen bakerella's blog. If you haven't, you really should check it out. And she makes these adorable cake pops. I mean, seriously. Could they be any cuter? Well, maybe these could. Or these. Or these.
But anyway.
I was under no delusions that I'd end up making something like this. But I did think I could manage a round-ish cake pop with some green-tinted candy coating for a St. Patrick's Day party tomorrow.

I should point out that I don't generally use those candy melt things. If I did, I might have consulted someone with more knowledge in this area before trying this.

I think I did two things wrong:
1. I made the cake the "vegan" way, with a can of soda instead of eggs, oil, water, etc. I did this because someone at the party is allergic to eggs, and it's easy. But I think perhaps that changes the texture of the cake enough to make the balls too soft, even after a few hours in the freezer.

2. I had no clue what I was doing with the candy melts, so I was having to add shortening, etc. to fix the consistency. I expected to be able to dip and be done, but that is not the way this worked for me at all. It was too thick, and more than one cake pop lost it's "pop" because of it. In the end, I found that spreading on the candy coating worked best.
I got a few good ones,


and a few not-so-good ones.
They'll all taste fine. But I don't know if I'll do cake pops again. Cake balls, sure. Pops? We'll see.

WW Creamed Spinach

I'm trying to lose a significant amount of weight, and so am trying to cook more healthy food. (Not sure exactly how Crunken Chicken fits into that, but it is delicious, and I use organic ketchup with no HFCS, so hey, it's healthy, right???) I like creamed spinach, but the last time I made it there was quite a bit of cheese in it.

So I decided to try this WW recipe. As a whole, it wasn't bad. I think it could be improved, but we'll discuss that later.

Ingredients:

2 bags washed spinach, steamed, squeezed dry, and chopped
1/4 cup low fat cottage cheese
1/4 cup nonfat milk
1 tbsp parmesan cheese
1 small garlic clove, minced

Combine cottege cheese, milk, parmesan cheese, garlic, and 1/4 the cooked spinach in a food processor and process until creamy (or in a bowl and use an immersion blender, or you could do this in a regular blender). Place remaining spinach in a skillet over medium heat, add blended mixture, and stir. Cook until heated through.

That's it--pretty easy and not bad tasting.

I would change:

1. (not really a change, but) Make sure you press as much water out of the spinach as possible so that this is not watery.

2. Maybe up the cottage cheese a bit or just cut back on the amount of milk. I really think you could just leave the milk out altogether.

3. I probably used 1 1/2 tbsp of parmesan cheese (I just grabbed some I didn't get out a measuring spoon).

That's about it. Most of my changes focus on making this more creamy and less watery. The flavor was really good, though. Be aware that b/c you process some of the spinach with the cheese, this will be brighter green than normal creamed spinach.