Happy New Year!!!

One day I was sitting here thinking of the menu for our New Year's Eve Party and realized how many years it has been since we started.  Can you believe it has been 14 years since our first our first New Year's Ever party.  I can remember that night all to well.  My oldest son had a incident with the tabletop warm mist vaporizer.  He was fine but scared the heck out of me.

We also incorporate my Mother-In-Law's birthday into the NYE party, since she was born on NY day.  This year I made my Mother-In-Law a checker board birthday cake.  I saw this beautiful cake in a catalog and thinking I can make that.  What I didn't want to do is pay $70 to order it.  I set out on my mission to make this cake. 

I used one white cake mix and a devil's food cake mix.  I found a recipe for a white frosting from Amada's Cookin'.  I made the chocolate mousse from scratch and can not find the recipe I used. 

White Frosting
1 cup vegetable shortening (not butter flavored)
4 1/2 cups sifted powdered sugar
4 tablespoons milk
1 1/2 teaspoons clear vanilla
1/2 teaspoon lemon extract

To Make the Frosting:

Beat shortening and extracts until creamy, about 1-2 minutes on medium speed. Slowly add 2 cups of the powdered sugar, then 2 tablespoons of milk, 2 more cups of powdered sugar, then the remaining milk and any additional powdered sugar that may be needed.
Put 1/3 of the frosting into a separate bowl and tint it with a small amount of yellow paste food coloring. Frost in between the layers yellow and the sides and top of cake white. Decorate with green tinted coconut and jelly beans on top.

Once I had the cake frosted I decorated it with shaved white chocolate and mini chocolate chips. 

Let me just say, if you are using a new recipe test it out first.  The frosting was very good, but the chocolate did not stick very well to it.  I should have used a buttercream or whipped cream frosting instead.  I was not happy with the way my cake looked.

Here is my sorry looking cake..

The inside:

I promise I will do better next year! lol

What happened???

I wish I had an excuse as to why I haven't blogged any recipes in almost a year.  It's not like I starved my family.  Nothing exciting happened in the past year. hmm...

Let's see my last couple of post said something about dieting.  Ha!  Ya, right.  Actually, I was behaving for a while and eating healthier meals.  I had lost 10 pounds for a while.  I think once I came back from Key West it went down hill from there.  Those 10 pounds I lost found me again... ugh...

Anyway, I will try to do better at posting the recipes I have try.

Spice Rubbed Chicken Fingers with Cilantro Dipping Sauce

This is the first of many South Beach Diet recipes I will be posting.  The spices on the chicken has a mellow heat to it.  As for the "dipping sauce," it dances around on your tongue with the heat from the serrano pepper and the bite from the cilantro.  The parsley gives it a mellow cool fresh flaver.  Does that make sense???  As you can see from the photo I had mine with just steamed broccoli.  When I make dinner for my guys I do serve a starch/carb, ie potato, rice or pasta.

Spice Rubbed Chicken Fingers with Cilantro Dipping Sauce

•1/2 teaspoon chili powder

•1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

•1/8 teaspoon salt

•1/2 pound chicken breast tenders

•1/4 cup cilantro sprigs

•2 tablespoons parsley sprigs

•2 tablespoons blanched slivered almonds

•1/2 clove garlic

•1/2 serrano chile pepper, seeded (wear plastic gloves when handling)

•1/16 teaspoon salt
•1 tablespoon lime juice
•1 tablespoon extra-virgin olive oil
•1 tablespoon water
•Sprig cilantro, for garnish

Instructions

Coat a grill rack or broiler-pan rack with cooking spray. Preheat the grill or broiler.

In a cup, combine the chili powder, cumin, and salt. Cut two 1/2"-deep slashes in each side of the chicken tenders. Rub the spice mixture over the chicken, pressing it into the slits. Place the chicken in a baking pan and coat completely with cooking spray. Let stand for 10 minutes.

In a food processor, combine the cilantro, parsley, almonds, garlic, chile pepper, and salt. Process until chopped. While the processor is running, add the lime juice and oil through the feed tube, stopping the machine once or twice to scrape down the sides of the container, until the sauce is smooth. Pour the sauce into a bowl. Stir in the water, cover, and chill until ready to serve.

Place the chicken on the prepared rack and grill or broil 6" from the heat, turning several times, for 15 minutes or until a thermometer inserted in the thickest portion registers 170°F and the juices run clear. Serve with the sauce and garnish with the cilantro.

New Year, New Me (well hopefully)

Happy New Year everyone!  Sorry it is a little late.  The holidays around here was a little busy.  We had my mother-in-law, sister-in-law and her kids here for Thanksgiving.  Then the following week my best friend from Michigan, Melissa, came out for a quick visit.  We met up with our good friend Donna from Myrtle Beach.  We had a great time at a wonderful restaurant in Dedham MA, called One Bistro.  Oh yummo is all I can say.  Two weeks after visiting with Melissa and Donna, my parents came to NH for Christmas.  We enjoyed having them, even though it was a bitterly cold week of weather.  They probably won't be coming back during the winter ever again. lol.  After my parents left preperations for our annual New Year's Eve get together got started.  So any way, I'm sure everyone has a busy holiday season.  I just can not believe I have not posted anything since last September. 

Now on to the new me... I have been going to my local gym five days a week since November.  It wasn't until about 1.5 weeks ago I realized I needed to step up my game plan.  I found myself at home practically binging on the snacks I buy the kids for school.  Well geez, no wonder I haven't lost any weight.  So I decided to go back to the South Beach Diet in addition to stepping up my exercise regimen.  So my new friend at the gym is this Arc Trainer.  Man I love this machine.  It gets your Heart Rate up to where it should be.  You can feel it working your thigh and butt muscles.  I remember the first time I worked out on it I could only do about 7 minutes and that is on the manual setting.  Now I am doing 50 minutes on it at the weight loss level.  Since starting the South Beach Diet and upping my time on the Arc Trainer I have lost 3 pounds.  So it does show that exercising and eating healthy goes hand in hand. 

From now on any of the recipes I post will more than likely be a South Beach Diet recipe or a low-fat recipe. 

I hope everyone has a Healthy and Safe New Year!

Baked Kibbee, Tahini & Tabouleh

I am so grateful that I found a man who likes to eat different things.  I was one of those people who would eat the basic foods.  After I met Steve I started to eat different foods, well it took a while to muster up the courage but I did it. 

One day he brought me to a restaurant (hole in the wall type) to get something to eat.  I ordered a sandwich with fries.  Steve ordered a Lebanese plate.  I looked at him with that expression on my face as "what the heck is that?"  I did try it but wasn't too keen on it at first.  Years later I tried it again and loved it. 

One day I decided to make my own Kibbee at home.  It came out bland and a bit dry.  I said I would leave it up the real cooks to make it. 

Well this past weekend I decided to make it again (don't know what made me do it but I did).  I found a recipe on-line and gave it a go.  My local grocery store did not have ground lamb so I used all beef.  The kibbee came out moist and tasty.  I was so happy. 

A little note:  Note sure if this helped with the moistness of the kibbee, but I used some of the bulgar that I had soaking in water for the tabouleh.

Baked Lebanese Kibbee

1 pound (500 g) lean ground beef or lamb

1/2 cup fine- to medium-grade bulgar (crushed wheat)

1 medium onion, finely chopped

2 tablespoons pine nuts or walnuts

2 tablespoons dried parsley

2 tablespoons water

1 tablespoon peanut oil

1/2 teaspoon dried mint

1/4 teaspoon ground allspice

1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Combine the meat, bulgar, onion, water, parsley, mint, allspice,

pepper, and cinnamon in a food processor. Process until doughy.

Preheat oven to 350F (175C). Lightly oil an 8 inch square baking

dish or a 9 inch round baking dish. Pat half of the meat mixture

into the pan. Sprinkle the nuts over the top. Then cover with the

remaining meat. While still in the pan, cut the kibbe into 1 1/2

inch square or diamond shapes. Brush the peanut oil over the top.

Bake for 30 to 35 minutes, or until firm and browned well. Serve

the kibbe from the pan or invert it onto a platter.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I did make the Tahini & Tabouleh.  I used the recipe for Tahini from a previous post.  I love making Tahini.

I have made Tabouleh in the past and it was okay.  This time I really enjoyed it. 

Tabouleh

Ingredients:

•2 bunches of fresh parsley (1 1/2 cup chopped, with stems discarded)
•2 tablespoons of fresh mint, chopped
•I medium onion, finely chopped
•6 medium tomatoes, diced
•1 tablespoon salt
•1/2 teaspoon black pepper
•1/2 cup bulghur, medium grade
•6 tablespoons lemon juice
•6 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil

Preparation:

Soak bulghur in cold water for 1 1/2 to 2 hours until soft.

Squeeze out excess water from bulghur using hands or paper towel.

Combine all ingredients, except for salt, pepper, lemon juice, and olive oil.

Line serving bowl with grape leaves or romaine lettuce, and add salad.

Sprinkle olive oil, lemon juice, salt and pepper on top.

Serve immediately or chill in refrigerator for 2 hours before serving.

Chicken Cordon Blue Bread Bowl

I found this recipe in a Cuisine At Home magazine.  Unfortunately I do not have this magazine right now to post the recipe (I lent it to my sister-in-law).

It was a tasty recipe but there was something that was off.  It could have been our taste buds but not really sure.  I loved the idea of making a bread bowl for dinner (my boys love the ones from Dominos Pizza).

I will post the recipe as soon as I get the magazine back.  In the meantime you can stare at the picture I took of it... lol...

Kathleen King's Double Chocolate Almond Cookies

I love chocolate cookies, especially if there are chocolate chips in there...  I was watching an episode of Barefoot Contessa on the Food Network and she had a guest on by the name of Kathleen King. 

I knew I had to make these cookies!!!

Kathleen King's Double Chocolate Almond Cookies

Ingredients

2 1/3 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 cup Dutch-processed cocoa powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 teaspoon salt

1 1/4 cups (2 1/2 sticks) salted butter, softened to room temperature

1 cup sugar

1 cup firmly packed dark or light brown sugar

1 large egg

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 cup white chocolate chips

1 1/2 cups semisweet chocolate chips

1 cup almonds, chopped

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.

In a medium bowl, combine the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt.

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment cream the butter and sugars. Add the egg and vanilla and mix together. Add the flour mixture and continue mixing until just combined.

Add the chocolates and almonds and mix until combined. Using two tablespoons or a small ice cream scoop, drop the dough two inches apart on sheet pans lined with parchment. Bake for 15 minutes.

Cool the cookies on the cookie sheets. The cookies should be very soft when they are removed from the oven. They will firm up as they cool.