Repeat

I haven't blogged in a while...again.  Sorry.  The last time I baked, I made this awesome banana bread.  I made it just in time for my brother to come home from college so he actually got to taste my creation.  He loved it so much he wanted me to bake another loaf for him to take back to BG.  Today was the first day that the bananas were really ripe enough and it was also the first time I had off this weekend so I could actually bake it.  The day, however, was filled with decorating the outside of our house, watching the Browns almost blow another win, and putting up our Christmas tree; not baking.  I was so excited that my whole family was home to decorate the tree that I completely forgot about baking another loaf of banana bread.  After we had put all the ornaments on the tree and watched two Christmas movies I finally remembered the bread.  I figured I could get up early and bake it before Kev left for school, but my insomnia crept in and I decided I could bake it tonight.  Like I said in my previous post it isn't very hard to make it just takes over an hour to bake.  So it is now 2:35am EST and I am still up.  I did bake banana bread that smelled so delicious, so I hope my brother appreciates the time I took to bake it; he most likely won't oh well.  Today I did not bake something new, but I am extremely happy that my creations have tasted good enough that people have wanted me to cook/bake them again.  Although this is a repeat I felt like it warranted a blog post because its a big accomplishment to make something good enough that it is requested again.  I am so proud how far I have come in the past two months.  I hope that I can continue to learn how to be the best cook ever, like Betty Crocker.

My blog posts will probably be more sporadic now because I am working a lot, but I will not give up on my goal of completing the cookbook!

Worst Blogger Ever

I haven't made anything since last Thursday, which is an epic fail on my part, and I said I would make something epic this weekend....yeah that didn't happen.  I personally blame the Cleveland Browns for losing their game on purpose and putting me in a horrible mood which prevented me from cooking.  Anyway I was going to bake something yesterday and then I got caught up in work and law school apps so that didn't happen.  Today though I got up and told myself: "You will not let Matt Giffhorn down, he has wanted you to cook/blog for like 3 days now."  So for my friend I actually decided to make something.   I made banana bread today because I had perfectly ripe/overly ripe bananas.  The recipe was fairly easy.  I actually looked up the banana bread recipe on Betty Crocker online and the cookbook recipe was way easier for a change. I had to mix flour, sugar, brown sugar, baking powder, salt, vegetable oil, and mashed bananas.  I could have added nuts, but not everyone in my family eats nuts and I am not about to eat an entire loaf of bread by myself so I decided against that direction.  It took actually a long time to bake the bread.  The recipe said it would take between 50-60 minutes, but I cooked it for like 70-75 minutes.  I was nervous that I had to bake it so much longer than the recipe called for, but the bread did not burn and turned out really tasty.  It was perfect banana bread.  I am really happy with the outcome and I predict that the bread won't last long in my house.

Now I have to plans for my next meal, maybe I will make something to help my inevitable Thursday morning hangover.

Mmmmm Tasty Stuffed Shells

I finally got back into my cooking kick today and honestly I missed cooking and blogging.  I took a long break from cooking for various reasons.  I went to Chicago last weekend, didn't sleep and drank way too much, so I basically died all day Monday.  Feeling like death and all prevented me from cooking, I seriously didn't get out of bed until like noon and even after that I laid around all day.  Wow I sound like a complete waste of space, but to make up for my total uselessness Monday, I worked on Tuesday and Wednesday.  Each day I worked at times that really prevented me from finding a recipe and completing it.  I guess I could have tried harder, but I felt like I was being productive enough those two days.  That brings me to today, Thursday, which has been a cook or end it day.  I knew if I didn't start up my cooking again today I would probably not follow through with my project, which would be so sad and awful because it is like my baby.  Okay so today I told my parents I would cook dinner since I was available all day (no work or hungover-ness woohoo).  I decided to go back to the whole modern Betty Crocker recipe idea.  I get really bored with the recipes in the Betty Crocker cookbook, one because they are old and boring and two because they are sooo bland.  I end up tweaking them to the way I want and I really just wanted to make a good dinner tonight.  I decided to make stuffed shells because we had chicken twice this week, steak one night, and I really hate pork.  I found a recipe that called for ground beef, chive and onion cream cheese, six cheese italian cheese and parmesan cheese mixed together and stuffed into jumbo shells.  I baked the shells and covered in tomato basil sauce.  The shells smelled so great before they were even done baking.  I am happy to report I have not lost my magic touch.  I really think I have found my calling in life.  I enjoy cooking and forgetting about the ass muffins and corn-dogs, I have actually done pretty well.  I would definitely make these stuffed shells again and I would gladly give anyone the recipe that wants it.

Tomorrow I will hopefully have some creation to blog about, but I can't make any promises because again I work at an awkward time.  I will make it up to my faithful readers this weekend by cooking something so epic it blows everyone's minds.  

Yummy baking!!

Complete and Total Slacker

Sorry that I am such a slacker and haven't posted in a week.  I have no idea where the past seven days have gone.  Tonight I am cooking dinner so I will actually have something to blog about....

No worries, more coming soooooonnn!!!

The New Betty Crocker

I have to say that I lost some of my confidence yesterday with the corn-dogs, therefore today I had to do something I had never tried before.  Today I decided to go to Betty Crocker's website and look up a modern recipe.  I thought this was a good idea just so I could compare how her cooking has evolved.  I found a recipe that did not stretch my cooking abilities, but I did find significant differences in her cake recipes now as opposed to her cake recipes from the cookbook I am using.  Her online recipe called from Bisquick, which by the way is made by Ms. Betty herself.  I should have known that her current recipes would call for ingredients made by the Betty Crocker label.  The cakes I have made in the past call for flour, baking powder, and salt.  The recipe I made to today was far less work and I think that took some of the fun out of it.  I used Bisquick, sugar and cinnamon for the cake mix.  I then mixed in cut up apples to the mixture.  The apple cake tasted really great and it filled my house with the most pleasant smell (thank god!).  I am still disappointed, maybe Betty Crocker updated recipes for busy people who don't have all day to work over the stove, but I want a challenge.  This was not a challenging at all.  It was actually the quickest recipe I have made to date.  The prep work took almost no time and really I didn't mix very many ingredients together.   I guess I should be happy that I made something that tastes/smells good after my failure yesterday, but I just expected more.  I am glad that I looked up new recipes online because I think it gives my blog a new twist; I will just have to find a great main dish to make.  I probably won't try an online recipe again for a while, but it was interesting to see how Betty has changed.

I most likely won't be cooking/baking anything again until Monday because I am traveling to Chicago for the weekend.  I can't wait to tackle more challenging things next week!

Absolutely Disgusting....

Today I succeeded in making something even more disgusting than my ass muffins...corn-dogs blahhhh.  Okay thinking about them right now is making me sick to my stomach and the lingering smell of hot oil makes me want to vomit.  This was one of the worst decisions in my short cooking life.  One might ask, why even make corn-dogs?  My only answer is that there are so many hotdog recipes in the Betty Crocker cookbook I just had to try one.  Looking at all of the recipes this was the only recipe that I had all of the ingredients for.  My other options for today were hotdog kabobs or bacon wrapped hotdogs filled with cheese. I really thought my best option was the corn-dog recipe, boy was I wrong.  The mixture had flour, salt, baking powder, shortening, one egg, and milk.  I then covered a hotdog in the mixture and fried it.  It took about 6 minutes to cook and didn't look too bad when I took it out of the oil.  One bite later I was sick.  The corn-dog tasted awful, like oil and nastiness.  I don't even know how to describe the taste of what I put in my mouth.  It was definitely way worse than the honey muffins I made a couple of weeks ago.  I did not take a picture because honestly it was not pretty to look at.  If only I could insert a smell here I would have everyone smell the awful oil smell that has taken over my entire downstairs (sorry parents).  This was definitely one of the worst things I have ever cooked, period.  I will never be making these awful wieners again.  Note to Betty Crocker please exclude all hotdog recipes from your next addition of this cookbook.  There isn't one hotdog recipe that sounds appealing especially after making that sad excuse for a corn-dog.

I might go back to baking after this, the corn-dog was really that bad.

I Succeeded in Making the Chicken Crepes!!!!

Yesterday I didn't know how to make chicken for my chicken crepes recipe and Betty Crocker was absolutely no help.  In her cookbook it says, cook chicken, that is it.  I am trying to learn how to cook, so with no instructions or directions on the actual cooking aspect, I was stuck.   After consulting the internet and my parents I figure out a few ways to cook the chicken for my meal.  I ended up baking the chicken which took forever so I am glad I started early.  The meal had two different aspects to it; crepes and filling. I made the crepes, which were pretty easy.  The crepes ingredients included flour, salt, baking powder, milk and eggs.  I made the crepes first and kept them warm until I was finished making the chicken filling.  I then had to chop apples, onions and the chicken I cooked earlier.  I had to make gravy which consisted of melted butter, flour, salt and chicken broth.  After the gravy thickened I added the chopped apple, onion and chicken.  This mixture heated up for a while, then I served it over the crepes.

This was pretty epic for me because it had been a long time since my last actual meal.  I got stuck in a baking rut because it was easy and tonight I really pushed myself.  I would definitely make this again and I wouldn't change anything.  I would make more crepes because I had left over filling.  Tomorrow I will hopefully make another dinner that can top this one.   Also I am going to try to pick a recipe that actually has instructions because sorry Betty I don't know how to cook everything.

Finished Product!

No Cooking Today

Okay so I did not cook anything today, but I felt the need to blog about it anyway.  Today I planned on making chicken crepes.  They sounded delicious, homemade crepes filled with chicken, apples, gravy, etc. Well I took chicken out this morning to defrost and at 5:00pm the chicken was still pretty frozen.  Besides the whole frozen chicken thing, I also did not plan on how I was actually going to cook the chicken (serious blonde moment).   So it was almost 6:00pm, I had frozen chicken, and no way to quickly cook it.  I had to abandon my dream of chicken crepes for tonight.  It was really disappointing because I even ran out to the store today to buy apples and chicken broth.  Oh and I promised my family I would make dinner which ended up being a lie and we had to pull something together.  Overall I was a complete failure today, but the whole reason I started this cooking thing was to learn.  Lesson learned for today, plan my meals better, like figuring out how to cook chicken before starting the recipe.

Tomorrow I will not let the chicken defeat me!

Betty Crocker Thinks She Knows How To Make Chinese Food

I am a day late blogging about what I cooked yesterday and for that I apologize.  Yesterday I decided to try something new, a rice dish.  The most appealing dish was fried rice.  I did not really think anything of the dish when I was making it, then someone brought up the fact that Betty Crocker should be teaching people to make pies and not dabble in Chinese food.  I would actually have to agree with this person, Betty Crocker is good at things like cakes, pies, some meat dishes, but fried rice is definitely not her forte.  The recipe at certain points tasted very good, but in the end was a mushy mess.  The fried rice was fairly easy to make.  The hardest part was chopping up the onion because for some reason looking at an onion makes my eyes water.  Getting through the chopping part was a challenge, but I succeeded.  I had to cook the onion and other vegetables with some oil on the stove.  After cooking the veggies for a few minutes I added cooked white rice and soy sauce.  I really wish the recipe ended there because the rice at this point tasted great.  It was full of flavor, and kind of crispy just how fried rice should be.  After the rice cooked for a while I then had to add 3 beaten eggs; this ruined my rice.  The egg did not cook well and made my rice very mushy.  I thought if I cooked it longer it would not be so mushy because maybe the egg would harden; that was not the case.  The rice ended up tasting more like egg than anything else and just was not very good.  I was a little disappointed because it had started off tasting so great.  I guess next time I make this rice I would just forgo the whole egg step.  At least I tried something new and made something that was actually a challenge (unlike the sub sandwich I made the day before).  

I think Betty Crocker should stick to things she is good at like making all American meals instead of making ethnic meals taste like mush.

Easy Day

Today my goal was to literally find the easiest thing to make in the cookbook and I have to say I succeed.  I have to work today which is awesome because I need money, but it also cuts into the time I have to cook.  I decided to look through the cookbook and I found my next conquest, a sub sandwich.  Yes in the Betty Crocker cookbook in addition to recipes for baking bread from scratch and making homemade noodles there is a "recipe" for a sub sandwich.  The "recipe" was hilarious; it said use bread, whatever lunch meat you like, lettuce, mustard, onion, salt and pepper.  The recipe also gave another option if you don't like mustard, use oil and vinegar.  I just cannot believe that making a sandwich is a recipe in the cookbook.  I really cannot complain though because I succeeded in making something even though I did not have much time today.  For those who want the exact recipe seriously make a sandwich that you like, you do not need a recipe.  Also for those who love pictures of my creations I did not waste my time taking a picture, watch a subway commercial its the exact same thing.

Quick Pic

Oh here is a picture for me eating guacamole....mmmmmm sooo delicious

Mmmmm Guacamole

I started earlier than usual today, but I have a lot to do today so it was either start earlier or don't make anything at all.  Today I made guacamole because I had a taste for it and I got a great deal on avocados, which are quite possible my favorite thing in the entire world.  I think I make pretty good guacamole on my own, but I had to follow the Betty Crocker recipe this time.  To be honest there was not much difference in taste, but I still like my own recipe better.  The Betty Crocker recipe included avocados, salt, pepper, tomato, onion and lemon juice.  The key to good guacamole is using avocados that are perfectly ripe.  Lucky I bought the avocados a few days ago so they were soft, but not mushy and had the best taste.  It was probably a bad idea to make something that I was craving so badly because I have eaten almost the entire dip already.  The good news is I still have more avocados so I can always make more.

If you want to make really good guacamole, don't follow Betty Crocker's recipe, follow mine...
2-3 ripe avocados
lemon pepper
garlic salt
tablespoon of salsa
tablespoon of sour cream
hot sauce

I personally hate sour cream, but honestly since you put so little in the mix you cannot taste it.  The sour cream really just gives the guacamole a creamier texture.  With the lemon pepper and garlic salt I season to taste; usually a couple shakes of both, no need to be exact.  For the hot sauce you can put in as little or as much as you want.  I tend to like my guacamole on the spicier side, so I add a lot.

Lesson learned from this cooking day... Betty Crocker's recipe was okay, mine is way better, ha.

Silver White Cake

Okay so like I said earlier today, I was in Tennessee this weekend with my cousins partying like crazy for Halloween, so I did not have time to blog.  I am stuck in this baking rut; I baked again today.  I really like baking because I love sweet things, but I think I need an extended break.  Today's adventure was baking a silver white cake with white mountain frosting.  The cake was pretty simple and came out really great.   The frosting did not fair as well which was disappointing because it took a long time to make.

To make the frosting I had to heat sugar, corn syrup, and water until it was boiling and hardened in cold water.  I then had to beat egg whites until "stiff peaks formed."  Yes the recipe calls for stiff peaks more than once which was quite entertaining.  I beat the eggs, boiled the sugar, and then mixed the two together until again, stiff peaks formed.  This took almost as long as it took to make the cake.  I had to add lemon juice for the exact type of frosting I was making and I was really looking forward to a lemon cake.  Alas the frosting was pretty bland and for fear of ruining an entire yellow cake I only frosted about 1/4 of the cake.

View Picture:

I will probably use store bought chocolate frosting for the rest of the cake, which is not cheating because I made frosting.  I even tried the nasty frosting on the cake so I think I deserve to enjoy at least some of it. 
Fair warning for tomorrow, I am going to the Cavaliers game so if I don't have time to cook something or I don't have time to blog about it don't be upset.  Somehow I will make it up to all of my faithful readers.

Sorry For Lack for Cooking

So I haven't posted in a few days, sorry I was in Tennessee celebrating Halloween with my cousins.  I started back up again today so no worries....more coming soon!