Finale Night!

Last night was the season finale of Grey's as well as the SERIES Finale of THE OFFICE. 

Talk about emotional... I ate too much of my Celebrity Apprentice Ice cream and realized I watch too much tv. I also barely breathed during the Whole episode of Greys.

On another note:

I made a fantastic dinner. Everything was really good.. that rarely happens... theres always something that could use some tweaking but not this one. Sorry I don't have the page numbers.. I forgot my book at BB's house. 

Until Next time!

Chelsea Lou!

Porkchops and Plums

As I continue my adventure to cook through my copy of Glamour's 100 Recipes Every Woman Should Know I am going to try to do a better job at documenting it for your pleasure. 

On Thursday night I cooked for the Baking Bride and her hubby. Usually we would all sit down together for a meal like this but there were lots of activities to be completed before the big graduation weekend here in Starkville so we all ate separately. 

Here are the instant seduction pork-chops from the cookbook. This recipe taught me to make a "Pan" out of two layers of tin foil and use it to broil your pork and it doesn't take long at all... and an even shorter clean up!

I served the pork with a savory cranberry sauce that I made up on the go. 

I was just really craving a savory fruit sauce and cranberries and apples go great with pork. This doesn't have apples in it but it would be a nice addition. 

I will share my recipe in my next post.

The meal ended with this lovely dessert. A "Make New Friends Plum Cobbler" With fresh plums and a touch of cinnamon. It was quite yummy ... not nearly as rich as the peach, apple or berry cobblers I've made in the past, which is good... that means you don't feel nearly as guilty when you help yourself to a second helping!!!

That being said... I think we'd need to double the recipe if we had any more than 5 friends in attendance!

Thanks for Checking in!

Chels

I've been a cookin'

As you know I am on a journey to cook through a cookbook by the end of the year 2013 and I've been busy... I forget to post and keep you updated on my progress.. 

so I'll do a quick recap. 

The book is "100 Recipes Every Woman Should Know" by Cindi Leive and the Editors at Glamour Magazine. 

And I am about 12-13 recipes in. 

This stew was super yummy!

(Thanks to the Easter Bunny for my new stock pot!)

Each recipe is teaching me something new, whether it be a new cooking style or how to use an ingredient I've never had the pleasure of using before. I'm really enjoying each of the recipes and even if I'm not a huge fan of whatever it may be, I take notes on how to make it into something that I'd love!

Its also pushing me to come up with new side dishes and take time to think about how the whole meal will come together rather than just relying on some old staples. 

Here is a recipe for the Gluten-free cornbread that I made to go with the stew shown above. You can tell this was good cornbread because thats all that was left ... and there were only 3 of us eating... :) 

I'll try to be better at taking photos and posting reviews. I already have the next post's photos and a bonus recipe with it! 

Until tomorrow!

-Chelsea Lou

AAAHHH This CAKE!!

This Cake....

Look at it. It doesn't look like much.. but it was Oh So Good!!

It is called "Impress His Family Chardonnay Cake" and I didn't have a family to impress but it definitely impressed my small group and a couple of dear friends who I dropped off some of the leftovers to! It even got two smiley faces for its rating!

 Now I'm gonna have to try it as a gluten free recipe now.. I'll let you know how it goes.. and maybe post a tutorial?!? We shall see when we can find some leftover wine somewhere again!

This means I have four recipes completed out of my cookbook challenge and I can say I'm glad I chose this book! Everything has been pretty delicious so far (except for that michelada) and its forcing me to try new flavors and cook with ingredients I have never thought about cooking with before! 

I can't wait to cook again!

I will keep you updated!!

-Chels

I got started!!!

These past couple of weeks have been kind of CRAZY to say the least so the Goals I set for myself to complete in 2013 have gone to the back of my mind and I haven't been working hard to get them completed. 

But Last night... I Got started!

I got out my New Cookbook and decided I would just go ahead and just get after it. While flipping through the pages I noticed that some of the ingredients might get pricey, just like any fresh food, so I needed to coordinate my cooking with the grocery store specials to get the best bang for my buck. I remembered that Kroger had a pretty good deal on salmon this week so thats what I went with. 

  Along with the Bikini Season Baked Salmon I decided to make some Gingery Green Beans from the cook book as well as our favorite side dish roasted Sweet Potatoes. I won't share the recipes for everything because my friends over at Glamour might not appreciate it but I will share Ms. Melanie's roasted sweet potato recipe because I don't think she'll mind... she probably doesn't even remember she told me how to cook them over the phone at the prompting of her oldest son several years ago!

Look for a separate post this weekend on that!

This meal was GREAT!! It had some flavors that were a little fancier than our southern pallets are used to but it was really yummy, and it was a big ol' piece of fish! I was thinking last night on my way back to the dorm that I was amazed that I wasn't hungry or craving anything like I usually do on my ride back, which is FANTASTIC!! The only criticism was that the skin was really lemony on the salmon,  but I really think that that was just a personal "not a big fan of lemony flavor" thing of one of my tasters, because he sure did finish off that big ol' piece of fish.

So thats 2 of my 100 Recipes Every Woman Should Know.

Here comes number 3!

We aren't big drinkers but in this cookbook here there are several drink recipes and for the sake of completing the WHOLE cookbook I have to make and taste each of them, even if I don't drink it all , The point is to make it and Try it instead of just disregarding it because It doesn't sound like my cup of tea... So we went ahead and made the least delicious sounding drink to go ahead and get it over. So we did. I whipped up the Thanks for Helping Me Move Michelada. 

When I was reading the ingredients out to Sierra and we were pulling them out of the refrigerator she just laughed and said with disgust "This Can't Be good!" and while it wasn't as awful as we thought it would be, it wasn't one we'll put on our list to try again. I'm sure that with the right food in the right setting it would have been a little tastier but judging from the looks on these faces..

Now, While I was finishing up the meal Sierra asked me how I was going to keep track of what I had cooked and what I hadn't so I came up with the plan listed in the photo below so I can keep up with it and so when I go back to cook something from this book again I can remember what the likes/dislikes were and how I varied the recipe (like adding a little butter to the green beans) to make it fit our tastes a little more.. A little butter always makes it better!!

Also You'll see a lot of Ben's opinion. He is my bestie's husband and will be completely honest with me because he's more like a brother than anyone ever has been, also... he's a really horrible liar. He was amazed last night when we told him we could tell when he didn't like something we cooked. We all had a good laugh about it.

Well there you go. A little peak into my progress on achieving my goals and working toward checking off some of those things on my 30 before 30 list.

Until Next Time!!

Chels

My new Cookbook!

I found it!

The cookbook I will cook through as part of my 30 before 30 mission. 

Take a look:

So it looks like I'm going to have to shoot for around 2 recipes per week to be done by the end of the year, but that won't be too difficult to accomplish. 

I am probably going to start with the things that call for no sugar  or flour and go from there since I'm getting started back on my low-carb / gluten free way of life.

I'll try to post a photo of each recipe as I cook it along with our opinions of the dish and any variations I made to the recipe. I will not be posting the recipe for you because I'm sure the ladies and gentleman over at Glamor wouldn't appreciate that!

Also if you're feeling brave and would like to be a taster for me, just let me know! I'm sure we could arrange a dinner party! 

I've got to go plan my first meal!

Until Next time!!

Chels