Warning: Acorn EXPERIMENT in progress!!!

Acorn Squish Pancakes
So my thoughts were.... I like potato pancakes I wonder if the same can be done for one of my new favorite friends the acorn squish!



Cooking with the Scientific Method!!- Cause I'm a big science dork!

Question- Can my acorn squash be made into an amazing pancake like creature??
Background/Research- Squish is delicious... and I like pancakes, and I know how to make latkes and potato cakes...
-Most squishes have a decent amount of starch, it should hold well together.
Hypothosis-If I add enough flour and eggs to my cooked and mashed squish it will hold together in a hot pan and will taste delicious!
Experiment-

1. Microwave squish til tender and come out of skin uncovered to release moisture
2. Mash squish and grate onion into the mash
3. Add 3/4 cup flour and 1/4 cup egg beater
4. Add salt, garlic powder, and nutmeg.
5. Heat a pan rubbed with OO
6. Glop (Glop is a technical term of course) a spoonful or two and spread it out to make it round
7. Wait til the Glop firms up and starts to brown
8. Flip and plate
9. EAT

Anaylsis- Great gold color, Smells great, Tasty, not as firm in the middle as I'd like though. Consistancy is really lacking and is still kinda fibrious and stringy.
Flavor 7.5/10, Consistancy 5/10 Apperence 8/10 Smell 8.5/10= Overall 7.25/10
Results/Suggestions- Squish needs more cooking to pull the liquid out and needs to be put in a food processor with the onion to get the consistancy right.

What?! My acorn squish pancakes/fritters didn't turn out bad but not great.... hmmm...

So I had a conversation with myself...

• HOW TO MAKE THEM GREAT?!?!?
• Top them with SHRIMP!!!
• (Shrimp can be 'not bad but great' still... How to make the shrimp great!??!!)
• Add hot sauces!!!
• ... K... but even tasty RedHot and Cholula don't make things GREAT... they are good... but would you really say GREAT??? hmm?
• Ohhhh screw it!! Add garlic and butter... anything is GREAT soaked in garlic and butter...
• Yup... that will work

Soooo I gave a few garlic cloves a rough smash and chop and cooked it in a pan with water* and RedHot til soft. Then tossed in a bunch of shrimp and butter for flavor! Let the sauce cook down and the shrimp get pink and firm.

 * This method has alot of flavor without have the extreme amount of butter that other scampi like methods have!

Baconed, Fish and Chicks

Tooooo good not to share!

My camera is on vacation right now... I went to see my parents and it decided to stay with them! Or I left it on accident...

Tonight playing in the kitchen I made some awesome fish and chicks! Chick Peas that is! I love when I dump things together recipe comes out sooo well!

Bad phone picture... sad sad sad ... cause it was AWESOME

Baconed Fish and Chicks
1 tbsp Olive Oil
1 can chick peas/garbanzo beans
1/2 can diced tomatoes in juice
1 tbsp Real Bacon Bits
3-5 oz tilapia or other white fish
Thyme, salt, garlic, butter

Rub down a small baking dish with OO. Drain your chick peas and add them, add undrained  tomatoes, bacon and a sprinkle of spices. Mix well.
Add your tilapia or other white fish on top and put it in the oven at 375 til the fish breaks easily.

I like to wait til the fish is almost done then rub the top of it with butter for extra flavor!

Tale of 2 Thighs!

If you ask someone what their favorite part of the chicken is I bet they say a breast, thigh, wing, or leg. BUT THEY ARE LYING!!!!

Most people enjoy the skin the most they just don't want to think about it. Why do we love on the bone fried chicken? Cause its a piece of chicken with the skin dolled up with flour and fried! Good roast chicken? Cause its been cooked til the skin is crispy and melted its fatty flavor into the meat. Same thing goes for the perfect bird at Thanksgiving no matter if he is fried, roasted, or smoked.

Two recipes I love to make that utilize the fatty, skin covered, dark meat of my all-so-loved chicken quarter!

Roast Chicken, Peachy-Keen and Black Bean

Chop half an onion, a few cloves of garlic, and half a really ripe peach and add it in to a olive oil rubbed baking dish lined with foil or a ceramic dish like my treasured Le Creuset bakeware. Black beans cook up wonderfully but they back on and stick horribly.

Add in a whole can of black beans and a 1/3 cup of chicken broth. Rub your chicken thigh down with EVOO, salt, pepper, thyme, and a little cayenne if you want some heat.

I never time how long to bake things since I rarely make things exactly the same every time. I also use what ever cut of meat I have on hand and that can make things tricky. I have a cheap (yet reliable ) meat thermometer that I trust. I cook this dish til the chicken skin is thin and crispy and juices run clear. 

The flavor the chicken gives the black beans is wonderful! I had this with a favorite Oklahoma Red Wheat beer! 

If you wanted to make this a dish for two just throw another quarter in there and make a light side. There is enough black beans for two people.

Butter-Nut-Squish Your Chicken!

I love butternut squash! In the grocery store they are seriously expensive but worth it. At a farmers market I usually get them for less than .75 cents a pound which is dollars below the super markets. BETTER yet sometimes my dad will grow them then I get all I want!

Butternuts can be hard and slippery and a pain in the @$$ to peel but there is an 'easy' way that works pretty well.

Use a veggie peeler to peel the whole thing then cut it in half seperating the long part from the ball part at the end. Then cut those pieces in half the long way. Use a spoon to scrape the seeds out of the ball part just like you would a pumpkin on Halloween.

Cube your entire butternut, quarter a medium onion, and put on an oiled, RIMED, pan or cookie sheet with a chicken quarter or two. The bigger and more chicken the more flavor.

Bake at 375-400 depending on if you have a hot oven or if you like to play with it alot. If you're patient 375 should work just fine. If you're like me ... turn it to 400 and check on it and stir at least once.

Butternut roasted with chicken is wonderful by itself with no help but it can also be turned into a wonderful soup just as easy.

SOUP
You can chop your onions or pull them out if you don't like big chunks. But i like big chunks! Some squash might look burnt and the onions might look a little fried but with so much fat and carbs they are really just caramelized into wonderful food!

Wait til your chicken cools til you can handle it. Then, pull the meat and put it in a pot with the squash and onions.

Add chicken broth and squish your squash until its the right consistency of soup you like. If you like traditional butternut squash soup, put the whole lot in a blender and add broth til a desired consistency appears. I LIKE IT CHUNKY!!! This soup is wonderful just like it is BUT for a tastebud shocker or to really impress people add a half a tsp of cumin and a squeeze of lime and its a whole different ball game. Just as wonderful though.

To Kill a CluckingBird.... (Not for the faint of heart... or people with pet chickens)

I'M NOT GOING TO KILL A CHICKEN!!!!!!!!

Yes, by being a consumer of chicken meat I am, in part, responsible for the death of lots and lots of TASTY chickens.... And so are you.. Just sayin....

I'm going to take apart a chicken...

If you live by yourself like I do and you enjoy cooking a variety of chicken pieces you can either... 

• Cook a whole chicken and have left overs...
• Buy a scary scary bag of mutilated "Chicken parts"
• Or buy a whole chicken, to your standard of quality, and cut the thing up! 

I find buying a whole chicken and cutting it up gives you more of a say on how the meat is cut and a  better variety of quality of chicken to choose from over the Grab-Bag-O-Chicken-Parts. I like getting a local bird that has had the opportunity to run around a lil... Cause they taste better!

If you've ever boiled a chicken for soup, been used as slave labor for church dinners,or eaten a whole chicken by yourself (not judging...) You probably know your way around the basic meat and bones of a chicken. This won't be too hard.

You need to be working on a surface that doesn't move, that you don't mind bleaching, and working with a bird that is completely thawed if it was ever frozen!

Remove any organs, heart, liver, what ever that really brown long thing is..... From the cavity and wash the bird with cool water til water runs clear.

To take the bird apart you need to either be really comfortable with a VERY sharp knife (like my 8inch slicer) or use shears. They do make poultery shears made for cutting through bone that are very sturdy. You don't want a blade (knife or on scissors ) that will bend on you or is dull. Its a slippery,slimy, gross bird, if you don't have a good hold on it you don't want a bad blade.

 I remove the wings and neck for stock. Some people use the organs also but they make the stock a little to dark and .... well organ tasting for my .. taste.

Pull the wing out and feel for the joint connecting it to the breast. I like to cut down the wing a little leaving more meat on the breast. Just go slow and cut the meat and skin back away from the joint it you are unsure.

This is what the breast will look like with the wing removed at the joint. It's pretty far back in there and takes some cutting. Wings are the hardest to remove so the hard part is over.

Removing the neck is rather easy since it is nothing but lots of little joints. Push back the skin, pull the neck away from the chicken and push your knife straight through it. Little graphic.. I know...

Next and last, are the thigh and leg pieces or together a "chicken quarter." Flip the chicken over and cut the skin that covers the thigh meat and joint

Keep trimming the skin and pulling the leg and thigh away from the breast. Feel for the joint connecting the thigh and breast. It will be small for how much muscle is there.

Slicing the meat away from the breast then is very straight forward. I cut as much as I can away with the thigh. Trimming skin between the breast and thigh should usually favor the breast because it drys out easier but depending on what you are making you might want more skin on the quarter, like for grilling.

This is where I leave my chicken as far as carving goes. A few more common cuts include removing leg and thigh and separating the wing pieces. You can also remove the breast meat by cutting against the bone. If you are stuffing breast I recommend this over using already separated pieces because of a very sad day with chopped up white meat I couldn't stuff as planned. 

 Now bleach your boards and cabinet tops! Chicken is gross... but Ohhh so tasty!

Curse of the teeeeny-tiny GRAIN! Dunt Dunt DUNNNNNN!

I spent 3 weeks in Colorado and the food scene out there is a foodies dream. Every little town has a little shop that has homemade, organic, local, special something out there and every coffee shop does too.

Typical convo:
-"Would you like to try our breakfast burrtios?"
-"Hmm What's in it?"
-"Farm fresh brown eggs, homemade elk chorizo, local sharp cheddar, organic red skin potatos, in a full lard homemade tortilla, and any of that you want"  (Pointing to a homemade salsa bar)
-"*SLLLLUUURRRP!* YES PLEASE!"
-"Would you like a cup of Durango roast coffee with local honey and half-n-half? Or a piece of homemade pie to go?"
-"Am I dead? Is this heaven? Will you adopt me?!?!"

While out there, a little old lady told me that women of my 'age (early twenties) and generation need natural sources of iron and calcium and not taking those evil man made supplements.' And since I totally agree and the fact that this lady look like she had never been told 'No' in her life.... I ended up buy half a pound of a very fine grain that was only a few bucks.

Amaranth

Its a teeny tiny grain the size of poppy seed that the Ancient Central and South American empires thrived on.. Then the Spanish came... outlawed it and killed everybody off.. THE END.. Sad...

The Spanish didn't like the grain because the Aztecs considered it holy and used it in human sacrifice rituals.  Mixing it with honey and human blood making little figures out of it, then eating it. EWWWWW!

The grain is said to be CURSED to make sick any descendants of the Spanish that outlawed it.

Almost extinct, the grain has made a serious recovery in the last few years once it was recognized as a SUPER GRAIN. Loaded with butt-kicking calcium, iron, fiber, protein, magnesium and 3 essential amino acids that corn, wheat, rice and potatoes don't even have. .25 cup of amaranth has a crazy %60 percent of you daily iron! No wonder it was given to people as a cure for 'laziness' and woman after their 'monthly time' or pregnancy! Developing treatments for anemia without modern medicine!! That's amazing!

Cooking this stuff up...
No one seem to have any real instructions. Alot of 'boil it' and 'pop it and mix with honey' ... Ok How am I supposed to do that?!?!

Boiling it like couscous with about the same 1:2 grain to water ratio seems to work well. I added a little cut chicken sausage and it was really great. The consistency takes some getting used to and its kinda like oatmeal in that you feel like you have to chew but it doesn't do much and you don't really need to.

I next tried 'popping' it. I had no idea what to expect. BUT it really does pop! In to tiny little white popcorn looking beads. I tried a few methods without alot of success. Adding oil just made all the little seeds jump from the pan!

Oil burns, dry burns, water doesn't work at all.

I went for half popped half toasted and then added honey. Cooked it down slightly then poured it out on some parchment and let it cool. Instead of forming a little person to eat I went with a round ball and had it with my coffee.

Very toasty, not crazy sweet, and ultimately really good. It reminded me of some middle-eastern desserts made with sesame seeds. I'm thinking of a shortbread cookie with a thin honey and toasted amaranth mixture poured over for something different at Christmas. The little old lady in Colorado suggested toasting them and sprinkling them on salads which sounds great!

Kinda-Caribbean-Shrimp Lettuce Not-So-Wraps

GREAT FORTUNE THIS MORNING!

Do you ever look around your kitchen and get inspired by just whatcha got! Or realize you have everything for a favorite recipe without trying?! I LOVE homemade BBQ of any kind. My mother used to make BBQ chicken and Thighs in an electric skillet growing up and its still a huge favorite of mine. The range of GOOD BBQ in the culinary world is crazy wide from Sweet-celery seed-saturated KC BBQ to Spicy-smokey- Texas Pit. All ranges of fruity, sugary, smoky, vinegary, salty, spicy etc.

At the store today fresh shrimp were on super-duper sale! (Scary buying sea food in middle of the Mid-West but you have to take chances for good food) I had half of a REALLY GOOD pineapple at home and a ton of great peaches. FRUITY BBQ SHIRMP ON.... ON... on... ummm.... Sandwich? On a stick? Just on a fork out of the pan?..( it has happened before). How about the romaine hearts I have!?! Ohhhh with red peppers.. maybe some kinda cool, thick dressing ** This is what I sound like inside my head, or if the dog is on the floor sometimes out-loud to him**

I shelled and tailed (those might be technical terms.. they might be mine... not sure) 15 medium sized shrimp and set them aside. I like to do any meat prep before anything gets going then clean and set it aside so I'm not having to wash my hands and board all the time. 

Next I smashed and diced two BIG cloves of garlic, Sliced a small red onion, half a ripe peach, and an inch thick round of pineapple (core and skin removed). I like my fruit in big chucks. This all goes into a skillet with 1/2 a tbsp of EVOO. Cook on Med-High until it gets brown and starts to fall apart.

Then to make it saucy! I always have canned tomato products in the pantry (paste, sauce, diced, stewed) but today to my amazement I was clean out... Didn't even have ketchup! So I put a handful (1/2 cup)of cherry tomatoes in my mini-chopper and made my own puree. Add some light brown sugar, balsamic, apple cider vinegar, yellow mustard, and a squeeze of half a lime.

While your shrimp cook let's make up a thick creamy FAT FREE sauce. I love Fage yogurt but in this mayo could work to. (I'm anti-mayo by personal opinion). A 1/3 of a cup of fage in a bowl with a sprinkle of Cayenne pepper, Thyme, and Garlic Salt makes a wonderful tasty thick spread.

I picked the biggest, blemish free leaves off of my head of romaine and they weren't that big... so instead of wraps they will be not-so-wraps. I topped the leaves with thin sliced red bell peppers and our thick and creamy thyme spread. There is enough shrimp to top 4 leaves really heavy.

When your shrimp are cooked through and the sauce as thick or saucy as you like it, add your shrimp to your leaves and dig right in! I dug in so quick I forgot to take a finished picture til after my side of roasted cauliflower was done.

Kinda-Caribbean-Shrimp Lettuce Not-So-Wraps   350 calories for ENTIRE recipe. NOM NOM NOM
Filling 

15 medium sized shrimp
1 inch round fresh pineapple
half a peach
Small red onion
2 cloves of garlic
1 tbsp brown sugar
1/2 cup cherry tomatos (before blending) blended
about a tbsp of Balsamic, Apple cider vinegar, yellow or honey mustard, and lime juice.
Spread
1/3 cup Fage greek yogurt, Cayenne pepper, thyme, and garlic salt.
Lettuce leaves and sliced red bell peppers.

Sweeeett Ohhhh-taaaa-sssss

Balsamic-Honey Oatmeal with Cranberries 189 calories!

• 2 tbsp balsamic vinegar
• 1/2 tbsp honey
• 1/3 cup halved cranberries
• 1 cup water
• 1/4 tsp vanilla 

 Making Oatmeal

Add the vinegar and honey to the pan and simmer slowly til slightly thickened. It will burn if you aren't careful so don't walk away from it!!!

Chop and add your cranberries and water. I like biting through big pieces of tart cranberry but if you aren't up to that shock put them in a food processor for a bit! 

Boil the cranberries for a bit to flavor up the water before adding your oats







Add your oats and stir stir stir. Scraping the sides and bottom of the pan keeps your oats creamy and awesome!

Your oats will be a lovely dark red! This is a really low cal filling amazing breakfast! OR.. poor it hot over some full fat ice cream! I topped mine with a dollop of Cool Whip Free and it was amazing!

This is a single serve recipe but its really easy to multiply for multiple people or people who wanna pig out on oats!! (Which is totally acceptable) If you want the oats sweeter add a tsp or two of brown sugar to the vinegar and honey when you add the water.

Oohhhh-Ta-sssss!

 I love oats, they are like the fruit of the fields. You can bake with 'em, boil 'em, make oatmeal cookies, granola with oats, oatmeal, rolled oats, quick oats, sweet oats, savory oats, use 'em in meatballs...  Sorry Forrest Gump moment...

I've always thought maple and brown sugar when I think oatmeal. Mainly because that is what my mother always ate. Now I've discovered the AWESOMENESS that is Old Fashion Rolled Oats. If you cook them 2x as long with 2x the liquid you get a HUGE bowl of yum for a baseline of 150 calories.

I usually spike my oats with any fresh fruit I have around the house. One of my favorite oat-concoctions was oats, fresh pineapple, unsweetened coconut milk, and dash of almond extract! Anything goes into oatmeal and its so cheap and quick that if you don't like it just pitch it and start over!

For Lunch: Savory  White Cheddar Oats with Turkey, Caramelized Onions
 

• 1/2 a medium onion
• 1/8 cup pecans
• 2-3 ounces chopped turkey
• 1 1/2 cups chicken broth
• 1/2 Old Fashioned Rolled Oats
• 1 tbsp dry  white cheddar soup mix 
• 1 tsp parsley

I am very very calorie conscious when I cook for myself and I'm always looking for new ways to cut fat out without cutting flavor. WHICH IS HARD! Because fat carried flavor! Fat absorbs salt and spices and sugar and keeps it on your tongue longer than its thinner water like cousins (broth, vinegar.. etc) (Its why light blue cheese will never taste good, sad but true!)One way to cut out fat is using non-stick pans and broth to caramelize onions instead of insane amounts of oil like most recipes would have you do.

I boil onions in a small amount of water and let them boil dry and caramelize slightly, add a few tablespoons of water and stir letting the onions unstick. Keep letting the onions burn and add water to unstick until you get the right amount of brown that you want.

Instead of water using broth, vinegar, wine, rum, etc gives the onions more flavor but it will also make them burn quicker so you'll need to watch more closely.

A shake of the Hooded- Moose or two makes salty caramelly onions. (Pepper doesn't have his hood up lol)

If I wasn't putting them in my oatmeal and they were headed to the top of a pizza or a sandwich I would add a spray or drizzle of the OO to give them more flavor.

I weigh everything if I'm counting calories. This is a few ounces of turkey breast that I'll chop and add to my onions and broth

Just keep stirring, Just keep stirring, Just keep stirring, Just keep stirring, Just keep stirring,Just keep stirring, Just keep stirring,Just keep stirring, Just keep stirring,Just keep stirring, Just keep stirring.

Simple things!

My favorite foods are the simple things! Sticky short-grain brown cooked in broth, fatty slow, roasted meat, pungent cheeses, and really great bread... (If you say .. yeah...I eat bread.. sandwiches and toast... then you've never had great bread)

My banner is an example of one of my favorites lately. (I'm very fickle with my whims and favorites) Perfectly pouched egg over pan browned zucchini with fresh clove of crushed garlic. Sprinkle with sea salt and its 100 calories of love!
I love the color of yolk! Soo golden yellow and taste like butter! Especially my fresh brown eggs that come from the farmers market from the little old guy with the beard and overalls! Just who you expect to buy fresh eggs and radishes from!

 I'm very proud of my poached eggs! It took some practice and experimenting before I figured out the right temperature. Instructions say the water needs to bubble but not boil, put salt, put vinegar, use a plastic bag, pour it in with a measuring cup, etc... Crazy people trying to make things complicated. 

How to:

To poach an egg use a non-stick pan, heat water until bubbles get 2-4 mm across, wack you egg really good on something so its good and cracked, then get close to the water (without burning yourself) and slowly crack the egg straight into the water in the middle of the pan. Let the egg cook for a few minutes without the water boiling any harder. Use a slotted spoon to scoop it out! Little salt or some herbs, over brown rice or veggies, on toast or pasta. YUM YUM YUM