BANANA MANIA

 I've been on a banana kick.

I just love bananas!

This morning I made banana pancakes!

They were delicious.

banana pancakes

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 bananas sliced
• 2/3 cup milk (use soy or other non-dairy milk to make it vegan)
• 1/8 tsp cinnamon
• 1/8 tsp allspice
• 3/4 cup flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 tbsp sugar

Directions:

1. mix dry ingredients in bowl.
2. put milk and 2/3 of banana in blender. Blend until smooth.
3. Pour wet ingredients into dry ingredients. Mix until just barely incorporated. Should still be a little lumpy.
4. add in rest of sliced bananas.
5. cook on medium in a well oiled skillet.

The angels eat this for every meal.

This is the most heavenly dessert known to man.

It is a banoffee pie, aka heaven in food form.

Mona, Chris and I shared this delight at the Cornish Pasty Co. It is a very yummy restaurant. I highly recommend it. Anywhoo, their description of this delicacy is,

"Crisp graham cracker crust, homemade caramel. Fresh whipped cream and bananas."

God bless the soul who conceived this dish. The guy who made it at the restaurant said his name was Stevo. I like him.

Spinach Quesadillas

Easy to make, didn't take much time, really yummy.

Ingredients:

• tortillas
• shredded cheddar cheese
• spinach
• onions (chopped, sauteed)
• salsa (optional)

Directions:

1. grease pan
2. add tortilla
3. add shredded cheddar cheese
4. spread the rest of the ingredients out on top of the cheese
5. add more cheese
6. top with another tortilla and turn over to cook other side.
7. slice into wedges and serve with salsa over the top

Note: I burned my top tortilla a bit, so keep an eye on the heat while your tortilla is in the pan.

I topped off the tortilla with some of the homemade salsa from Saturday.

Portobello Fajitas con homemade salsa

Ingredients:

• 2 tbsp olive oil
• 1 red onion, sliced
• 1 red bell pepper, sliced
• 4 large portobello mushrooms, stems removed and caps cut into strips
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tbsp chilli powder
• 1/4 tsp cayenne
• homemade or your favorite salsa to taste

STEPS:

First cook the onions and peppers in olive oil until soft (5min on medium heat)

add mushrooms (3min)
then add spices and cook 3-5 additional minutes.

roll vegetables into tortilla

add salsa

enjoy!

Millennium French Toast

This morning my friend Erica and I made Millennium French toast.

This recipe is one that I got from my dad. The story about this recipe goes all the way back to the year 2000. It was the first day of the new millennium and to celebrate my dad found this recipe somewhere and made that first morning. He called it "Millennium French Toast". Basically, you make the French toast and then you put cream cheese and strawberry jam on the bread and make it into a sandwich.

I have since shared the idea with many of my friends, and everyone has loved it so far.

Erica enjoying her breakfast

Today was special because it's the first time I've used my new "The Joy of Cooking" cookbook! I got it as a Christmas gift from my friend Andrew Gaul.

The recipe we used is as follows:


Ingredients:

• 2/3 cup milk
• 4 eggs
• 2 tbsp sugar (we used white sugar)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 6 slices (at least) of French bread
• BUTTER (yum)
• cinnamon 
• nutmeg
• cream cheese
• strawberry jam/jelly/preserves

Really we didn't follow the quantities in the recipe at all... It was more like, "Lets add some of this, and some of that!" We did use the ingredients list as reference. I found that we hadn't added enough cinnamon to the mix, and next time I might add a bit more.

spread while still warm

Steps:

1. mix eggs, milk, cinnamon, sugar, vanilla, nutmeg, and salt in big bowl
2. soak the bread in the mixture on both sides one slice at a time
3. in a well buttered pan over medium low heat, brown the bread.
4. for Millennium French toast, it is best to spread the cream cheese and strawberry jam while the bread is still hot.

Kinda like a sandwich, but much better!

LOTS OF LOVE AND CREATIVITY

Tonight Kathryn and I made double chocolate chip cookies at Nora Reyes' house.

We only had one egg, so as a former vegan, Kathryn suggested we use a banana as an egg replacement.











After the first batch of cookies came out of the oven, I had the idea of adding berries to the mix.

THEN Nora had the brilliant idea to add cocoa to the mix. I thought she said "coco" (the word in Spanish for coconut), so she put some of that in there too.

So as a result we had double chocolate banana berry coconut cookies.

SO GOOD.

yummm.

Also, on Thursday morning we made "eggs in the hole" for breakfast. I made the hole into the shape of a heart. I call it "love in the hole"!

Love in the hole

OH MY WHAT?

My friend Dee posted this on her facebook. I thought I'd share it.
10 cooking points to anyone who finds me the recipe and leaves it in the comments.

UPDATE:
found the recipe, and the nutrition facts here (click for link).

Tonight's Disaster: Quiche

Mama decided we [meaning me and sister] would make quiche for dinner using leftover ham.
Sister doesn't eat ham, so we made a mushroom and onion quiche for her.

What follows are the recipes I used for each quiche. I followed a half hand-written and half typed recipe. Following someone else's recipe is HARD. :-(


I forgot a few things in each recipe, so we'll see how they turn out. Quiches are in the oven as we speak.

Veggie Quiche (sister helped me make this one)

• two Portabella mushrooms sliced small
• 2/3 of a white onion chopped
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup milk
• 1/4 teaspoon dried mustard
• salt and pepper to taste
• cheddar cheese shredded
• mozzarella cheese shredded
• pre-made pie crust in tin

1. saute onions till almost caramelized
2. sautee mushrooms
3. place in bottom of pie crust
4. add handful of each cheese
5. mix salt, pepper, milk, eggs and mustard in bowl
6. pour over solid ingredients.
7. cook for 40 min @ 375F

NOTE: we had way too much liquid for the quiche, and it spilled everywhere as we were trying to get it into the oven. Also, forgot flour in this quiche.

Ham & Cheese Quiche

• small pieces of leftover ham (enough to cover the bottom of a pie tin)
• 2 eggs
• 2/3 cup milk
• 1 tbs flour
• cheddar cheese (shredded)
• mozzarella cheese (shredded)
• pre-made pie crust in tin

I was in a hurry when I made this so I totally forgot a lot of ingredients (oops).

1. put ham and a handful of each cheese in pie tin
2. mix it around
3. put eggs, flour, milk in bowl
4. pour over dry ingredients
5. put in oven at 375F for 40 min

So if I had an ideal ingredient list it would look like this

• whatever you want to fill it with (veggies, ham, ect.)
• about 1.5 cups shredded cheese (any combo of cheddar, mozzarella, colby ect)
• 2 eggs
• 2/3 cup milk
• 1/4 tsp dried mustard
• 1 tbsp flour
• salt and pepper
• pie crust

I'll let you know how they turn out...


UPDATE:
So I guess tonight's dinner wasn't a disaster at all! Both quiches came out fine, although the veggie one was a tiny bit watery. Not bad enough to affect the deliciousness. Pictures coming soon.

DECISION

Happy New Year!
I've decided this blog will be dedicated to my food creations.

Take the poll to the right.