A Favorite Cookbook

I’ve always loved cooking. Some of my fondest childhood memories are of helping my mom cook dinner or bake cookies. By the time I was 11 or 12, I was making spaghetti and bean burritos on my own. By my late teens, I had the basics of cooking down. When I left home, I wanted to expand my cooking repertoire and lucky for me, I worked at a bookstore where I could buy bargain cookbook for under $2. I bought several fancy books that were simply too hard. When I would look through the recipes, I wouldn’t understand the directions (what’s a bain marie?) or I wouldn’t know what the ingredients were or where to find them (What are kaffir lime leaves?). Luck for me, I stumbled on a great cookbook that was perfect for my cooking skills and allowed me to make meals that were not too hard, but looked impressive and tasted delicious! What is this wonderful book? Better Homes and Gardens America’s Best-Loved Community Recipes Volume II. I later purchased volume I and still continue to use both cookbooks frequently. They have step-by-step instructions, pictures of every dish, and recipes from all categories. I believe they are out of print, but I just checked amazon.com and they are still available for purchase. After using these cookbooks and several other intermediate level recipe books, I was eventually able to tackle the difficult books as well!

Greek Pizza

Pitas (I buy whole wheat when I can)
Olive oil
Minced garlic
Spinach
Feta
Cooked chicken
Sliced peperoncinis
Greek olives, pitted and halved
Sun dried tomatoes
Freshly ground black pepper

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Brush the tops of the pitas with olive oil and sprinkle desired amount and combination of the next 9 ingredients. Bake pitas for 10 minutes.

*Easy gourmet tip: fresh ground black pepper. It tastes so much better than pre-ground pepper!

Fancify Your Food!

You may be a gourmet mom, but your kids aren’t too sure about unfamiliar foods. The trick is to present new foods in a familiar way or familiar foods in a new way. Here are a few examples.

Welsh Rabbit: This is the British version of an open faced, grilled cheese sandwich. I have no idea why it’s called “rabbit,” but the name makes it more fun. Here is a link to a few recipes on allrecipes.com, one of my favorite recipe sites:

http://allrecipes.com/Search/Recipes.aspx?WithTerm=welsh%20rabbit

Sweet potato French fries: they are delicious and more nutritious than typical French fries. You can make them from scratch, or buy them in the frozen food section. In the grocery store I shop at, they are located in the organic food isle.

Crepes: make your kids some delicious dessert crepes, then have them try a dinner version.

Cheddar cheese risotto: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=114320079
(See my recipe review from March 2010).

Peanut Butter and Jelly Panini: Use your fancy sandwich press to make a familiar treat. I prefer grilled pb&j!

Use a variety of cheeses: Instead of using the same old cheddar or American (which isn’t really cheese, but a “processed cheese food”) cheese on your kids sandwiches; give them something different like Swiss or provolone. Instead of mozzarella string cheese, look for mini Babybel cheeses in the deli section.
http://www.mini-babybel.com/products/mini-babybel/

Use a variety of pasta: Don’t just use the same old macaroni and spaghetti noodles; make rotini and cheese or substitute angel hair or linguini in your spaghetti and meatball recipe.

Go on a new fruits and vegetable hunt: When I was in 4th or 5th grade, I took cooking in 4H. One of the assignments was to go to the produce section and find fruit that I had never tried before. My mom and I found something called an ‘ugly fruit,’ which was a scary looking, wrinkled citrus fruit. I was a little nervous to try it, but it was delicious! The fact that I remember this project 20 years later says it all.

Dress up your food: One of my daughter and my favorite books is Fancy Nancy. There’s a line in the book where she says, “Sandwiches definitely taste better when you stick in frilly toothpicks,” and it’s true! Cut your sandwiches into small squares stick in a frilly toothpick. Practice your cutting skills by julienne-ing your kids’ carrots. Start using garnishes. Serve juice in elegant glasses. The fancy possibilities are endless!

Peppermint Sun Tea

Peppermint herbal sun tea (which technically isn't tea, but tisane)is a great way to hydrate during the summer months. It is cool, refreshing, and won't dehydrate you like caffeinated beverages will. In fact, I recently asked my doctor and she said that drinking unsweetened herbal tea counts towards your daily glasses of water.


You will need:

1 gallon ice tea jar (I found mine at the grocery store for $5)
4-5 bags of peppermint herbal tea
1 gallon of water


Fill your ice tea jar with cool water, put tea bags in the jar, and set out on the porch in full sun for the day. I prefer my tea without sweetener, but you can add sugar or honey if desired. It would be best to add sweetener while the tea is still warm so that it will fully dissolve. Pour over ice and store the rest in the refrigerator.

Moosewood Restaurant Book of Desserts

Every gourmet mom needs a fabulous dessert cookbook that never fails to impress. My favorite dessert cookbook is the Moosewood Restaurant Book of Desserts. I’ve made a large number of the recipes from this 400 page book and have come to rely on it to consistently impress. Most times that I’m taking a dish to a large gathering, I make sure to bring something that I’ve made before, but with this cookbook, I know that anything I make will be beautiful, impressive, and most importantly DELICIOUS! I highly recommend buying this cookbook!

Yogurt Monkey Tails

The cook at the school I work at makes this summertime treat. It's easy to make, kids (and adults) love it, and as a bonus it's healthy too!

bananas
1 container strawberry or vanilla yogurt
sprinkles (optional)
popsicle sticks

Cut desired number of bananas in half. Insert a popsicle stick. Lay on wax paper on a baking sheet and place in the freezer. When completely frozen, dip each banana in yogurt until coated. Add sprinkles and place back in the freezer until yogurt is frozen.

5 Easy Time Savers

Use pre-minced garlic. Freshly minced garlic tastes better, but takes a long time to prepare (although I got a very nifty kitchen gadget that makes it a lot easier). You can find pre-minced garlic in the produce isle in a jar, or if you use a lot of it like I do, you can buy it at Costco.

Don’t peel your potatoes. Whether you are mashing them or making hash browns, don’t bother peeling the potatoes, there are a lot of extra vitamins in the peel and it will cut more than a few minutes out of your prep time. If anyone says anything, just tell them they are “homestyle”

Use an apple corer/slicer. This is a great time saver when the kids (or I) want a quick, healthy snack. Make sure you get a heavy duty one that is all one piece. I use mine all of the time and the cheap ones break easily and can cause injury when they do. It’s worth an extra $5!

Use canned beans. When a recipe calls for dried beans, I usually use them, but if I’m in a hurry and don’t want to go through the 12 hour process of soaking and cooking them, I will just buy canned beans. This skips several hours preparation!

Heat the water in the tap before you put it in the pot to boil. If you are boiling water, wait a few extra seconds for it to heat up in the tap before adding it to the pan. The already warm water will come to a boil faster!