Wheat!

We recently bought one of these:

Love it! We love adding whole wheat to our foods (I even snuck it in brownies and you couldn't tell!). My favorite thing so far were some delicious chocolate chip zucchini muffins that I substituted wheat flour for white, they were so good I had to text Adam that he should come home from work and eat some; yeah he did, SIX of them!

Here's the recipe

(Original Link here to Allrecipes where I got it)

INGREDIENTS

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour (I used all whole wheat)
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1/4 cup milk
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 cup shredded zucchini (I also shredded one apple and added it, it made them super moist!)
• 1/4 cup miniature semisweet chocolate chips
• 1/4 cup chopped walnuts ( I didn't have any nuts so I left them out)

DIRECTIONS

1. In a bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. Combine the egg, oil, milk, lemon juice and vanilla; mix well. Stir into dry ingredients just until moistened. Fold in zucchini, chocolate chips and walnuts. Fill greased or paper-lined muffin cups two-thirds full. Bake at 350 degrees F for 20-25 minutes or until muffins test done.

I don't have any pictures; but trust me they were TASTY!

I do have some pictures of my first attempt at bread though!

Sweet Potatoes!

We've become slightly obsessed with Sweet Potatoes lately. And while I love them, I can't just eat a baked sweet potato every night so I've had to come up with some other ways to use the big guys (mostly because Adam buys whole boxes at a time at Costco). I wanted to share some of our favorites:


My absolute favorite is this Roasted Sweet Potatoes with Pecans and Spiced Maple Syrup from Ask Aida on the Food Network. I was so excited when I happened to watch her make these I just had to give it a try. We LOVE them... I remember the first time after we made them Adam said I had to make them again so here it is:

ROASTED SWEET POTATOES WITH PECANS AND SPICED MAPLE SYRUP
Ingredients
2/3 cup roughly chopped pecans
3 pounds sweet potatoes, cut into large dice (I like to peel them, but Aida left the peels on)
Salt and pepper
2 tablespoons vegatable oil
4 tablespoons unsalted butter
3 tablespoons maple syrup
1/4 teaspoon cayenne pepper

Directions
1. Heat oven to 450 degrees F and arrange rack in the middle.
2. While oven heats, place pecans on a baking sheet to toast until they smell nutty and are slightly darker, about 5 minutes. Remove from oven and set aside.
3. Place sweet potatoes on a baking sheet, drizzle with oil. Season well with salt and freshly ground black pepper, and toss to coat. Roast until golden brown and tender when pierced with a knife, about 40 to 45 minutes.
4. Meanwhile, melt butter in a small saucepan over medium heat. When it foams, stir in maple syrup and cayenne and let cook briefly, about 1 minute. Serve sweet potatoes with a drizzle of maple butter and a scattering of pecans.

Before I continue on Adam wants me to make sure I tell you all of the health benefits from Sweet Potatoes... he likes to inform me pretty much every time we eat them (except he can't tell me them now except that "all I know is they are healthy"). OK so moving on.

When I am feeling like we need to eat up the sweet potatoes before they go bad or I just want to try something different; I take a couple of sweet potatoes, boil them, mash them, and throw em in the fridge till I am ready to create magic with them (if you make your own baby food you could just make some extra to use in these recipes). So here are two other recipes we like to use mashed sweet potatoes with... one very healthy, one well, maybe not so much.

I got this next recipe of off Allrecipes.com and here's the link to the original as I can't take the credit for it. They have no sugar in them, well until you put syrup on top, but they are very yummy. I'm also posting this for Alisa because she thought this would be good to feed Brycen - I'm sure any little one would love to snack on these!

SWEET POTATO PANCAKES

INGREDIENTS
3/4 pound sweet potatoes
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2 eggs, beaten
1 1/2 cups milk
1/4 cup butter, melted

DIRECTIONS
1. Place sweet potatoes in a medium saucepan of boiling water, and cook until tender but firm, about 15 minutes. Drain, and immediately immerse in cold water to loosen skins. Drain, remove skins, chop, and mash. (or use the ones you pre-prepared in the fridge)
2. In a medium bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, salt, and nutmeg. Mix mashed sweet potatoes, eggs, milk and butter in a separate medium bowl. Blend sweet potato mixture into the flour mixture to form a batter.
3. Preheat a lightly greased griddle over medium-high heat. Drop batter mixture onto the prepared griddle by heaping tablespoonfuls, and cook until golden brown, turning once with a spatula when the surface begins to bubble.

Make sure you don't over beat these, just like any other pancake batter. I also don't use nutmeg, I use cinnamon instead (more or less to taste), and I like my pancakes a little flatter so I add a little more milk if the batter is too thick. Oh and 1 normal sweet potato is about 3/4 to 1 lb, I just usually scoop out a cup or so of my already mashed sweet potatoes from the fridge when we make these. It makes enough batter for the two of us to eat on twice.

And here is the last one to use up those mashed sweet potatoes; Sweet Potato Bread. This bread is along the lines of Zucchini Bread and its just moist and yummy. I got this one of Allrecipes.com as well and here is the link to the original.

SWEET POTATO BREAD

INGREDIENTS
1 1/2 cups white sugar
1/2 cup vegetable oil
2 eggs
1 3/4 cups sifted all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/3 cup water
1 cup cooked and mashed sweet potatoes
1/2 cup chopped pecans

DIRECTIONS
1. Combine sugar and oil; beat well. Add eggs and beat. Combine flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg. Stir flour mixture into egg mixture alternately with water. Stir in sweet potatoes and chopped nuts.
2. Pour batter into greased 9x5 inch loaf pan (or 2 small loaf pans). Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) for about one hour.

My tip and this may be obvious to all of you, but I just recently learned this. If the top is getting too brown but the inside isn't done, cover the top with foil to keep it from burning. I made this bread earlier this week and after cooking for 45 minutes I covered with foil, and then at just over 1 hour, I shut the oven off but left the bread in for an additional 10-15 minutes to let the inside keep cooking and it turned out awesome.

I hope you enjoy some new ways to use sweet potatoes, or maybe to try them for the first time!

Thankful

Most of you know that I love to cook, and more than that I love sharing my creations with others. Over the years there have been some particularly recipes that I've grown especially attached to, as have many of my friends and roommates. So today I am sharing what is probably my most popular food - Jewish Sweet Bread (or as called by some of my friends, sweet Jew bread).

I love this recipe. I love the taste of it and I love the reaction of people who eat it. First though let me give you some background on this recipe. I've now been making it for well over 10 years and I first learned it at my very first enrichment meeting. I was still in Young Woman's, but they invited all of us to a Super Saturday of sorts. I remember standing in the kitchen at the church while the Mairs' demonstrated how to make the bread (I can still remember Nicole discussing with her Mom whether the salt was really important or not). I think I walked away with a loaf of it to go home and bake and it was delicious! I started making it more often once I got to college and I've never stopped since! Out of all the things I make, I think this is Adam's favorite (or at least it was when we were dating, he may have changed now). So here's a recent picture of the glorious creation and the recipe. I hope you and your families enjoy it as much as we do!

1 pkg Yeast

1 1/4 C Warm Water

Mix together and let sit for 5 to 10 minutes till yeast is mixed through the water.

In the mean time mix together:

1 tsp Salt

1/4 C Sugar

1/4 C Oil

2 eggs

Once this is mixed, start adding flour (total of approximately 4 1/2 Cups) alternating with water/yeast mixture. Kneed the dough on a flour surface (or in a Kitchenaid), adding extra flour as needed until the dough is not too sticky. Put in a greased bowl, cover and let rise double (usually about 1 1/2 to 2 hours depending on how warm or humid it is - I don't recommend leaving the dough anywhere near a running dishwasher or wash machine)

Punch down and divide dough in half. Divide each half into three parts and braid. Place on a cookie sheet and let rise again. Melt 1 cube of butter and brush half of it on before baking. Bake at 375 for 15-20 minutes. Spread remaining butter on after baking. If you manage to have leftovers wrap in foil or store in an air tight container. ENJOY!