Twenty-seven years young
27. Wow. Here are a few pictures from a dinner where I ate way too much and had a lot of laughs.
Brian
Tina, Kelly & Merlin
Wolfe
An amazing chocolate cake courtesy of Brian. So good!
Everyone at Kenny’s Woodfire Grill
Ouch, that hurt, but looked really good.
Zucchini Bread version 2.0
I’ve never had zucchini bread but have heard that it’s pretty good so I went to AllRecipes.com and found Mom’s Zucchini Bread which had a 5 star rating. Unfortunately, the first attempt was a complete disaster. I believe in the old saying, “If you can read, you can cook” and apparently used 3 cups of powdered sugar instead of flour. About half way through my first try, the kitchen smelled really good but when I opened up the oven, something was definitely not right!
My second attempt at this recipe was much better! I believe that it’s safe to say I don’t think I’ll ever mistake powdered sugar for flour again.
Ingredients
• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 3 eggs
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 2 1/4 cups white sugar
• 3 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 2 cups grated zucchini
• 1 cup chopped walnuts
Directions
1. Grease and flour two 8 x 4 inch pans. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F
2. Sift flour, salt, baking powder, soda, and cinnamon together in a bowl.
3. Beat eggs, oil, vanilla, and sugar together in a large bowl. Add sifted ingredients to the creamed mixture, and beat well. Stir in zucchini and nuts until well combined. Pour batter into prepared pans.
4. Bake for 40 to 60 minutes, or until tester inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool in pan on rack for 20 minutes. Remove bread from pan, and completely cool.
More Rice, More Power, You Know….
Today is my wonderful friend Jewya’s birthday! Here are a little walk down memory lane:
I Just Ate This • Cherry Almond Smoothie
• ½ cup of Silk Pure Almond Unsweetened Almond Milk
• 1 packet of Justin’s All-Natural Maple Almond Butter
• ½ cup of dark unsweetened cherries
I Just Ate This • Baked Avo Fries & Beefless Tips in Rice
Y’all. Both of these dishes are SUPER easy, delish and healthy… trust me. If it’s not easy and tasty, I don’t even bother.
Baked Avocado Fries
Ingredients
- • 3 ripe (but not overripe) avocados
- • ½ cup all-purpose flour
- • Salt and black pepper
- • 2 eggs – see Notes for substitute to veganize
- • 1½ cups panko breadcrumbs
- • 1 Tbsp butter or margarine, melted
- • ½ tsp garlic powder
- • ½ tsp onion powder
- • ½ tsp paprika
- • ½ tsp salt
- • ¼ tsp freshly ground black pepper
- • Cooking spray
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 450 F. Line a baking sheet with foil and place a wire rack on the sheet. Set aside.
- Slice avocados lengthwise – for three avocados, you’ll get 20-22 fries.
- Set up three bowls in an “assembly line”. In the first bowl, place the ½ cup of flour and add a pinch of salt and a few grinds of black pepper.
- Crack the eggs into the middle bowl and beat lightly.
- In the last bowl, combine the panko and melted butter and mix with your fingers to coat. Add garlic powder, onion powder, paprika, salt, and pepper and stir to combine.
- Dredge each avocado slice through the flour, and then the beaten egg. Coat thoroughly with the panko and place on the wire rack. Spray lightly with cooking spray.
- Bake for 20-25 minutes, until panko is lightly browned. Cool for about ten minutes and serve with dipping sauce of choice.
Beefless Tips & Rice
I am obsessed with my rice cooker and Mahatma’s Jasmine Rice.. I eat it all the time. For one serving, I just put ¼ cup of rice and ¾ cup of water in the rice cooker. While that is going, simply sauté Gardein’s Beefless Tips. Once the Tips are done, the rice probably is too… mix them together and for extra flavor, add either some peanut sauce or a really good soy honey garlic sauce.