Ice-Cream Maker!

Adam got me a Cuisinart ice-cream maker for Christmas.



I tried it out for the first time last night. Peanut Butter Cup Ice Cream, using the recipe in the book that came with the machine.



Ingredients:
creamy peanut butter
sugar
whole milk
heavy cream
vanilla
peanut butter cups

Comments:
This ice-cream maker is cool. Just turn it on, add the ingredients, and come back 20-25 minutes later to ice cream. This recipe makes almost too much for the machine to handle, but it plugged through. It's very rich and you can't eat too much at one sitting. See that bowl up there? Only ate half of it... That's a good thing I suppose. It was very good and I put the leftovers in the freezer. We'll see how much it hardens when I go back for more later.

Tilapia Club Stacks

From Rachael Ray's cookbook, Just in Time



Ingredients:
bacon
tilapia
salt & pepper
flour
cornmeal
chili powder
coriander
dill
EVOO
lettuce
tomatoes
lemon

Comments:
I altered this recipe a bit, elminating the "salad" component and just stacking the lettuce and tomato separately. Adam doesn't like tomatoes so you can see there was a stack with the B and one without. I ended up not eating my stack. Tilapia is just too fishy for me. Luckily the fist turned out great so Adam had no problem eating the leftovers for lunch.

Roast Beef Tortilla Wraps

From Taste of Home Annual Recipes, 2006 (I can't find the recipe in their index...)



Ingredients:
cream cheese
mayo
cumin
salt
chili powder
cayenne pepper
tortillas
lettuce
red onion
roast beef
tomato

Comments:
Very simple, no cooking required recipe. The cream cheese mayo combo is pretty spicy if you follow the recipe amounts so be careful! I managed to be able to eat it all though.

Manicotti with Spicy Sausage

From Taste of Home Annual Recipes, 2006



Ingredients:
bulk sausage (I used plain old ground beef)
crushed tomatoes
marinara sauce
eggs
ricotta cheese
parmesan cheese
parsley
Italian seasoning
salt
garlic powder
pepper
manicotti shells
mozzarella cheese

Comments:
There are tons of these beef & cheese manicotti recipes out there. This is the first that I've tried in which you stuff the pasta uncooked. I'm not sure which I prefer. I always seem to get messy no matter what. This version also used ricotta cheese. I'm not too big of a fan of that. It's very good, but there's a lot of cheese in this recipe so be careful if you have lactose intolerance tendencies.

Random Cooking Pictures

The first "Adam's choice" dinner - steak and potatoes.


And my half-assed attempt at making bread. Totally cheated. Used frozen dough.

Mini Meatloaf

From "30 Minute Meals"



Ingredients:
ground beef
bread crumbs
milk
egg
grill seasoning blend
allspice
tomato paste
onion

Comments:
I just made the meatloaf part of her whole meal. Well, ok I added some potatoes and corn, but I didn't follow her recipe for those. Overall, an ok meatloaf recipe. Kind of bland though. I had to add ketchup...

BBQ Bacon Burgers

From Rachael Ray's newest cookbook, Just in Time



Ingredients:
EVOO
bacon
red onion
Worcestershire sauce
brown sugar
lime juice
tomato sauce
salt & pepper
ground beef
cumin
chili powder
steak seasoning
coriander
garlic

Comments:
This new cookbook has 15-, 30- and 60-minute meals and this is one of the 30-minute ones. It's pretty simple with the first part of the ingredients making a not altogether gross BBQ sauce and the second part making the burgers. I (stupidly) decided to use the indoor grill pan rather than letting Adam go to it with his man grll on the deck. The result? Grease everywhere, lots of smoke, and open windows for a while after the meal. Brrr. Anywho, they taste good and what more can you ask for than that?

M&M Sugar Cookies

From The M&Ms Website



Ingredients:
butter
sugar
eggs
vanilla
flour
baking soda
M&Ms

Comments:
I was very disappointed in how these turned out. They spread out a lot and became very dry and crumbly after they cooled. I've been using them in ice cream to kind of soften them up and make them less messy to eat. Next time I attempt M&M cookies I'm going to have to find a different recipe.

Meat Loaf Gyros

From Taste of Home Annual Recipes, 2007 (this is a subscriber only recipe again)



Ingredients:
egg
garlic
oregano
salt
pepper
ground lamb
ground beef
plain yogurt
cucumber
lemon juice
pitas
olive oil
tomato
onion

Comments:
Adam loves gyros but doesn't always get to the place downtown very often. I saw this recipe while browsing through the annual cookbook and thought it might be perfect. I was afraid it might be hard to get the lamb though. I managed to snag the last package at the grocery store but I would have been willing to go to a butcher shop for it if necessary I guess. The recipe itself is pretty easy - make a meatloaf, make the sauce, put it together on a pita with a tomato and onion slice. They were wonderful. I got perhaps the most enthusiastic response to a dish yet. He said it was almost dead on to the real thing. So, good job Sharon Rawlings of Tampa, Florida. You made Adam very happy.

Supper-Sized Egg Rolls

From "The Rachael Ray Show", November 9th, 2007



Ingredients:
canola oil
ground pork (I used turkey)
celery
mushroom caps (left 'em out)
cabbage
bean sprouts (I got alphalfa sprouts by mistake)
water chestnuts (also left out)
garlic
ginger
tamari (used plain old soy)
egg
phyllo dough (pfft, I used egg roll wrappers)
butter

Comments:
So obviously I changed the recipe a teensy bit from the original. I ended up with more normal sized eggrolls with a little less stuff in the middle. But they still tasted great. The recipe itself isn't difficult. It's a bit of prep before kind of throwing everything together though. And the phyllo dough is probably what makes the eggrolls "supper sized" since each sheet is about twice the size of your average eggroll wrapper. But maybe it's that baklava incident back when I did my Greek International Meal that summer but I just can't do the phyllo dough. So my eggrolls are smaller and less brown and crispy than Rachael's, but we still managed to eat them all so I'm not too worried about it.