Pizza Crust

 Good Friday afternoon! Goodness, has it been BUSY! I'm trying to get used to the fact that it's NOT going to be any less so between now and 2013. AUGH! :D

Anyway. :D Today's recipe is for pizza crust, brought to you by 1001 Recipe.

First off, this recipe makes a lot of dough. I did it in my bread machine; I wanted to make a personal-sized pizza, so I formed five balls of dough out of the total. One, I pressed into the bottom of a pie plate, stretching it really thin. Wow, did it rise! I like to bake my crusts for a few minutes with no toppings, so it has a chance to get a little crunchy. I decided all I wanted was a "lovely cheese pizza", just for me. (Quick! What movie is that from??? :D ) So I put some bottled sauce and grated mozzarella with a tiny sprinkle of parmesan cheese on my partially-baked crust.

So, this is what it came out as. I'm a little undecided on whether I will make it again. As I've said before, I don't make bread dishes too often because of the spike in carbs. But I think I'll recommend it to you! :)

If I *do* make this again, I think I might add a bit of garlic powder, to give it a bit more taste. I like my crust to bring something to the party, too! :D

OK, I'm outta here. Life is CRAZY busy, as I said, but it's GOOD. God is so good to me! I love counting my blessings - I have so many. You're one of them! :)

Enjoy your weekend! Be BLESSED! And try something new. ;)

Lemon Pudding Cake

Happy Wednesday!

How are you today? Is it beautiful where you are? It is here; almost 80 degrees, the sun is shining, there's a light breeze, and the colors are still beautiful - but on their way out, which seems early. Oh, well. :D

Today's recipe is brought to you from Food and Wine, for this lemon pudding cake.

There's not a lot to say about this pretty little cake. I didn't have the correct size of ramekin, but it worked just fine in bigger ones. I'm going to give these a YES, PLEASE! - if for no other reason than they're easy and have usually-on-hand ingredients. :)

The cakes were good cold, too. Very lemony and bright! As you can see, I sprinkled powdered sugar on them - I mean, they ARE dessert, right? :D There's not a whole lot more to say about these. They're a basic little cake, and make a nice end to a meal!

OK, I'm outta here. :D As I said, it's a beautiful day, and I'm distracted by the beautiful trees in the back yard. :D Be BLESSED! Try something new, too. :D

Pancake Squares

Hello, Monday! Phew. Does anyone else want the world to stop spinning for maybe just a few hours?!?! :D Getting dragged along, trying to keep up.... :D

These will help you. Trust me. Yup, a definite YES, PLEASE! - from Kenn, too!!! :D The recipe comes from Big Red Kitchen, for Pancake Squares.

What attracted me to this recipe in the first place? TIME SAVING. I don't eat pancakes often, because there's just not much low carb about most of them. :D And I really don't like standing over the griddle, calling Kenn to breakfast to eat his hot while I still have to stand there making MINE.

That's the beauty of this recipe. Seriously. I did the happy dance the morning I made these! :D I popped the pan into the oven, put the bacon on, and did email while everything was working.

She even tells you to double this and bake it in a 13x9 pan - hello, company breakfast!!!!!!! Heck, you can even bake bacon. Happy day, no more having to stand in the kitchen and flip cakes while people you'd like to spend time with are in another room, eating.

And the good news? They're yummy! :) Oh, YES. And they reheat well in the microwave! We got two days' worth of breakfast from one recipe. We did micro sausage the second meal. I am a happy wife when I can make my husband happy with breakfast AND not have to make huge messes and use lots of time to do it. :D

Please let me know when you try this, because I KNOW you're gonna. :D BE BLESSED!!!!!!

Copycat: Cafe Rio's Chicken Tortilla Soup

It's FRIDAY! :) Are you ready for some weekend?!?!? :)

Today's recipe is for a copycat of a place I've never heard of, Cafe Rio. If you have one near you, what do you think of their food? Anyway. :D The website that brings you this recipe is the same as Wednesday's, Favorite Family Recipes - because that pico de gallo I reviewed Wednesday is in this soup!

This is one of the meals I made while my parents were visiting my sister. I don't think they'd like it much, but I may be wrong. Maybe it's just Dad who wouldn't like it. :D Because we did! It gets a YES, PLEASE! - except the leftovers, not so much.

This is an assembled soup, which made it nice because I could do prep work the day before - like making the pico, baking the chicken and freezing what I didn't want to use for another meal. And it's a healthy soup - lots of fresh vegetables, not too high in sodium, chicken.... It's pretty, too! :)

When I reheated the chicken to put into the soup bowls, I ladled in some broth - with all the spices, etc., in the broth, it gave the seasoning to the chicken I wanted. I added a little cumin to the chicken, too, but couldn't find any cayenne pepper in the grocery the day I went. That was the strangest thing...! And I didn't use any taco seasoning; Kenn doesn't like it, and I didn't want to buy a package that we weren't going to use all of it, anyway. :)

The tortilla strips absolutely made this soup. Well, for ME, anyway. :D I've never made them fresh before, and oooooooh, were they good just out of the oil and salted. :D I stored them in a paper bag, so it would absorb the extra oil and they would stay crispy.

This will probably be a soup I make when we have people over on the beach; I can get almost everything ready the day before, and keep the broth and beans in a crock pot while we're doing things on the beach. :) It's Kenn's idea of what food should be: fresh and flavorful.

And I'll make extra tortilla strips next time. ;)

OK, I'm outta here. Have a WONDERFUL day! Enjoy your weekend - and let me know if you try anything new!!

Pico de Gallo

Good Wednesday morning! Sorry I wasn't around Monday; between working too hard this weekend, and being sick, I just didn't feel like blogging. :D So!

With that being said, :D, here is Family Favorite Recipes' recipe for pico de gallo.

OK. I have to say this: this recipe is almost EXACTLY what I would use for a bruscetta topping - except the herb is cilantro, not basil, and it's got a jalapeno in it.

But it's GOOD. :) It's just amazing to me how similar Mexican and Italian can be sometimes. :) And it was part of a grander scheme of a recipe, so as an ingredient, it was good. We didn't eat it all, and I think it's because I was trying to squeeze in as much cooking as I could while my parents were gone. :D We ate WELL that week. LOL!

I'd say try it. I'd also say, if you're looking for a bruscetta topping, just change out the herb and don't worry about the jalapeno. :D So, it's going down in the history books as a YES, PLEASE. :D

OK, I'm outta here. Have a WONDERFUL day! Be BLESSED - and try something new!

Gingered Chicken Thighs

It's FRIDAY!!!! Have you had a good week? Got fun plans for this weekend? If you're in the Middle Tennessee area, come see me tomorrow night; I'm working at Lebanon's Cedar Grove Cemetery Walk!

Anyway. :) Today's recipe is another Taste of Home, for Gingered Chicken Thighs.

I have to tell you: it took me a LONG time to decide this one got a NO, THANK YOU from us. It wasn't BAD, but neither of us wanted to eat the leftovers. :)

Now, I will admit that I used lemon juice instead of orange juice, but that's not what did it for us, I don't think. The flavors were super strong, but good - at first. It just didn't sit right, and when smelling the leftovers, it was totally overwhelming. (Of course, I'm not feeling tiptop right now, anyway.... :D)

Do let me know if it intrigues you enough to try it! I'd love to know what you think. :)

OK, I'm outta here. Have a WONDERFUL weekend! BE BLESSED!!!

Beef Vegetable Soup

Welcome to Wednesday. :D Have you had a good week so far? I've got a doctor's appointment today. booooo, hisssssss. <sigh>

So, anyway. :D Today's recipe is for "steak soup" - aka vegetable beef :D - from Gimme Some Oven! :D I made this soup last Monday, when I opened up the stampin' studio for a free evening. The bread I shared on Monday was a nice accompaniment for this soup.

The soup got a definite YES, PLEASE! from everyone who tasted it. I used 4 cups of beef broth, then about 5 cups of water with a container of Knorr Homestyle Stock (it's condensed) and an envelope of Swanson Flavor Boost. The recipe includes Worchestershire sauce - a touch of brilliance, there. It's got so much "stuff" that I wouldn't think to add to the soup, and a little goes a long way to boosting the flavor and richness of the broth. As a matter of fact, when I made beef stew a couple of days later, I used some Worchestershire sauce in it, too. It was wonderful. :)

This soup was wonderfully hearty, and I have to admit I don't really like soups with tomatoes in them. I cut the amount of tomatoes I added in half from the recipe; I also used fire-roasted tomatoes, which I'd gotten as a freebie to try.  I thought, if you have to have tomatoes in the soup, they were pretty decent. :D And I ate two bowls of this soup. Unheard of for me. :D

OK, I'm outta here! Have a BLESSED day! And do try this soup! :D

ABM Whole Wheat Bread

Good Monday Morning! Did you have a good weekend? GOODNESS, mine was BUSY. And today's been busy, too! Crazy, man! :D

ANYWAY. Today, I'm bringing you one of those recipes that this time of year just begs for: bread. And my favorite kind: bread that can be made in my bread machine! :D This recipe comes to us from Food.com, for whole wheat bread.

This is a pretty healthy recipe! It doesn't use sugar; it uses honey. So, as far as a healthy bread recipe (as a diabetic, that's a bit of an oxymoron, but still... :D), this is a YES, PLEASE. But I would suggest upping the salt just a tiny bit.

It baked up really nice for being whole wheat; I do add vital wheat gluten to my bread machine recipes, tho, so that always helps. This had a nice crust on it - I did let it bake in the machine, just so I didn't have to mess with the oven. It was substantial enough when you bit into it to have a nice chew to it, too.

So, if you're looking for an easy, healthy bread machine recipe, go for this one. :)

Let me know if you try it, what YOU think!

OK, outta here. So much to do, so little time.... :D Have a WONDERFUL day! Be blessed!

Lemon Curd

Good Friday Morning!

How are you today? Can you believe we're already at the first Friday of October?

Fortunately, we can keep some of the sunshine going. :) This recipe for Lemon Curd comes from Crazy for Crust. (Great name, isn't it! :D)

Today's post is a cross-post; if you'd like to know how I did the fabric topper in less than 30 seconds, or the label with just three different punches, please go to Lori's Stamping Spot and check out today's post. :D

The reason I decided to make this lemon curd was that the marshmallow fluff left me with three egg yolks, and I'd been wanting to try my hand at curd-making for a while. I really love the stuff! (If you've never had Stonewall Kitchen products, I cannot recommend them enough! But that's another blog post! :D)

This is a definite YES, PLEASE! The recipe makes about 1/3 cup or so more than would fit into this jar. (Rats. :D) So you could easily get two jam jar-sized gifts from one batch. It took me TWO lemons. That's all. I have the rest of the bag left! I honestly don't see why you couldn't easily double or triple the recipe at once. I would recommend having SOMEONE to help you stir, though, especially if you have bad wrists. I kinda wish Kenn had been home when I decided to do this one, just for that reason! :D

Now, remember those English muffins I talked about Wednesday? Yup. That's what I wanted them for: to be the perfect excuse - er, um, vehicle! - to get this curd to my mouth in the morning. :D

It's a bright, tangy, wonderful burst of citrus. I might make the cookies sometime, but for now, I'm going to enjoy this lemon curd in a couple of different ways. ;) Keep an eye out!

Have a WONDERFUL weekend! Enjoy your time, and let me know if you try something new. :)

Healthy Life English Muffins

Happy Wednesday! :)  Are you having a good week?

I wanted to review these English muffins because, with some of the jams, jellies, conserves, preserves, and curds I'm making, there's just something about a toasted English muffin with those nooks and crannies filled with melted butter and fruit of some type. :) And THESE are great; I can have a whole muffin for a net carb total of only 15 - and still have carbs for the jelly or whatever. :)

So, these get a YES, PLEASE. They're relatively low in calories, if that matters to you. :) I don't like English muffin pizzas - never really have; there's something about the taste that I just don't like - but these would work well, if that's something your family likes.

OK, I'm outta here! :D So many reviews to write, so little time.... :D
Have a WONDERFUL day! Be BLESSED! And try something new!

S'mores Muffins

Good Monday Morning! And HAPPY OCTOBER!

How was your weekend? Did it go quickly? I swear! As photographers, our weekends are booked so often; they're much more full than I usually enjoy. :D And this one was no exception - but what would I give up?!? Nothin'. :D

Today's review is of another recipe from Taste of Home, for "I Want S'more Muffins". (Yes, I still roll my eyes at that name....)

If you saw my Facebook status last week, you already know my reaction to these. It's not just a YES, PLEASE! It's a OH, MY! YES, PLEASE! :D

The recipe only makes six muffins. And in my case, that's probably an EXCELLENT thing. :D My biggest recommendation is to eat them while they're still at least slightly warm - although they're still wonderful cold.

And if you drop one while trying to tip them out of the pan, it WILL explode on the floor. All over the floor.

Ask me how I know. :D

I think the homemade marshmallow fluff did, indeed, make a difference for me. It's not all hard the next day, and it didn't all melt away. As you can see, it's definitely a s'more. Although I didn't have milk chocolate chips, so I used semisweet. :)

OK, I'm outta here. Have a WONDERFUL day! Be BLESSED!!!!