Well, it's been about five months since my last post. Really not much has changed since then :) This month I have had some time to enjoy cooking and have tried a bunch of new recipes. Some reports on the latest attempts in case you're looking for something fun for your kitchen:
1) Roasted red pepper hummus : I did change a couple things from the original...only did like 1/3 or 1/2 cup of red pepper instead of the whole jar and more like 2 Tbsp of the tahini. I also add a little of the liquid from the bean jar. I've been eating a batch a week of this stuff with my veggies in my lunch. Also great with tortilla chips or on tacos. I make it in my mini chopper/processor. I find that it chops up the beans better than my blender.
2) Peanut butter granola : I like to make little yogurt parfaits with berries, yogurt, and granola. I love that crunch :) Well granola is not very cheap (and I am) and the boxed kind tends to have ingredients I don't really need in my granola. So I thought I'd try out making my own. I like the flavor of this one, but it's not quite as crunch as I would like. I don't know if that's the recipe of if cooking longer would make crunchier. Still tasty...had a big bowl of it this morning for breakfast. I think I may try this one next time.
3) Garbanzo bean blondies : I just made these. They are currently cooling on the stove and smell fantastic and look like regular brownie type desserts. I haven't tasted it yet though.... (Update: Just tried these...and...they taste AWESOME!! Not gonna lie, kinda shocked.)
4) Brown rice : Ok I know, brown rice isn't exactly a new thing. But up until this week I made pretty bad brown rice. I saw this "recipe" and made it twice this week: 1 1/3 c. brown rice, 2 1/3 c. water, salt; combine in 1.5 qt casserole, cover, and bake at 375 degrees for 50 minutes. Take out of oven and let sit for 10 minutes covered before fluffing. Turns out perfect!
5) Lime chicken tacos : I make a lot of crock pot chicken tacos. Normally I just dump the salsa and taco seasoning in there with some frozen chicken and call it good. This recipe had 1 lb chicken breasts, 3 T. lime juice, and 1 T. chili powder in the crockpot until 30 minutes before eating. Then shred the chicken and add 1/2 cup salsa and 1/2 frozen corn (I put mine through the chopper first). Let everything mingle for 30 minutes and serve. I liked this better than my usual chicken. Not quite as liquidy at the end and some nice flavor. With the corn chopped up, you really didn't notice it texture-wise but it was nice for the flavor.
6) Honey garlic chicken stir fry : This one was from a Taste of Home Busy Family cookbook. In a skilled I cooked chicken with some soy sauce and honey and garlic, then removed it and sauteed some frozen veggies in the same liquid until warm and then added the chicken back in. This got served with some of my brown rice :) The honey and soy were nice together and it was pretty easy. Brad picked around most of the veggies, but seemed to like the chicken and rice.
I've instituted mandatory rating of all new dishes to see which ones stay and which ones go (Brad asked if he could just give everything a 5). I have a bunch of new recipes planned on this months menu plan so I'm writing down our rating for each one on a scale of 1-10 so at the end of the month I can remember what was worth making again.
