A Girl's Gotta Eat!

Greetings, all! I don't have a new recipe for you tonight, but I wanted to get one more post up before the drawing for a FREE cookbook tomorrow. Instead, I'm coming to you for inspiration. What recipe have you been wanting to try, but just haven't gotten around to yet? Maybe you've been too busy. Maybe its ingredient list is a mile long and you're just a bit intimidated. Whatever the reason...post your idea in my comments section below, and I'll choose one or two to try in the coming weeks. I look forward to hearing from you!

Truth be told, muffins are up there as one of my favorite things both to make and to eat. There's something about a warm muffin fresh from the oven, split open and enjoyed with a cold glass of milk or a hot cup of coffee that just can't be beat. Several months ago I spotted a recipe for Chocolate Hazelnut Muffins that I knew I had to try. Since we had a cooler day today, and because Mike was busy studying, I decided it was well past time to whip up some of these bad boys. The recipe may sound difficult and decadent, but in truth falls only in the latter category. There's not even a need to bust out your mixer, because everything is stirred together by hand. And because you melt the butter, you don't even have to plan ahead and set butter out to soften. This was my kind of recipe. Now, my plan is to take them to the office tomorrow, so one batch would simply not be enough. I made up a second batch and made some regular-size muffins and some mini muffins. Other that a lit

With Mike having today off for President’s Day (I, sadly, did not), he decided he would pick a new recipe to try so dinner would be ready for me when I got home. I arrived to the delightful smell of pork chops and apples cooking on the stove…yummy indeed. He found the recipe for Pork Chops with Apples and Garlic Smashed Potatoes in an issue of our Food Network Magazine , and the only thing that was a little different was that our pan sauce didn’t get quite as dark as the photo in the magazine. We chalk that up to using a nonstick skillet instead of the recommended cast iron. He said it wasn’t difficult to make, and it was very enjoyable. The only thing I might do a little different is to cook the apples just a little less. The flavor was great, but the texture might have been a bit better with a little crunchiness left in the fruit. Overall, though, it's another keeper (as is the husband who made it)!

Here’s one of our favorite stand-by dinners: Stuffed Bell Peppers. With the price of bell peppers rising (along with most other grocery items) they have become more of a special dinner, so I was extremely excited to see them on sale this week. You can use green bell peppers, but the red, orange, and yellow have a slightly sweeter flavor that I enjoy, and many times they seem bigger than the green ones. It’s pretty much whatever you prefer. I did originally look at recipes, but after getting a general idea of what we wanted, the following is the “recipe” Mike and I more or less created to suit our tastes. Stuffed Bell Peppers 4 large bell peppers 1 (7-ounce) package Zatarain’s Black Beans and Rice mix 1 (11-ounce) can corn 1 cup (about) shredded Cheddar cheese 4 slices white American cheese Salsa Cut off the tops of the bell peppers; discard the seeds and membranes. Chop the tasty part of the tops (not the stems), if desired. Boil the peppers for about 5 minutes or until softened; dr

Snow is coating everything in sight, so it's time to hunker down and have some grilled cheese sandwiches. This time, though, I'm borrowing an idea from a fellow blogger ( http://www.grilledshane.com/ ) who specializes in all things grilled cheese. Tonight it's all about homemade Beer Bread and melted aged Cheddar. The aged Cheddar was something else we recently picked up from the farmers' market from JD Country Milk , and the beer bread is just about the easiest thing you'll ever make. Fresh from the oven   Easy Beer Bread 3 cups self-rising flour 1/2 cup sugar 1 (12-ounce) beer ( something cheap is perfectly fine ) 3 to 4 tablespoons butter, melted Sift the flour and sugar together in a bowl ( do NOT skip this step ). Stir in the beer until moistened. Spoon into a 5 by 7 loaf pan and bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes. Remove from the oven. Pour the butter over the top while the bread is still in the pan. Let cool slightly, then remove from the pan.

A few days ago, I posted a recipe for a super-simple, super-scrumptious Butternut Squash Soup. Unaware of how many squash to buy for that particular dish, I bought 2 and ended up needing only 1. And so, here is Butternut Squash Soup, take 2. I know, I could make myriad other recipes with my squash, but it’s cold and rainy, and who doesn’t love soup on a cold and rainy day? This time I went for a more “gourmet” soup, Creamy Butternut Squash and Ginger-Apple Soup from ** Starfish Café: Changing Lives One Recipe at a Time . The basics are the same: Sauté some onion in butter. Add squash and broth, and purée everything when tender. The “gourmet” part of this comes in the addition of apples, cinnamon, nutmeg, saffron, and yogurt. Yummy indeed. Now, before you rush out to buy the ingredients and notice that saffron is crazy expensive, let me tell you something—saffron is crazy expensive. Don’t feel like you have to add it. Many recipes I read encourage using turmeric in place of saffron (

No new recipe today, folks (that will come tomorrow). Instead, I'm introducing a month-long "game," if you will. Here's the deal: 1. During the month of February, be sure to not only visit my blog, but to also post comments on my blog posts. 2. For every comment you make on my blog, you will have an entry in a drawing I'm holding. 3. On March 1st, I will choose one name from the hat. The winner will receive a free copy of Recipes Worth Sharing , a fantastic cookbook valued at $24.95 that I use often (remember the shrimp and grits I made?). That's all you have to do. The more comments you make, the more chances you have at winning. I will limit it to one Comment per blog post so we don't have people posting one word at a time or something equally crazy. Please use your best judgement. I hope you're as excited about this as I am. After all, who doesn't love FREE stuff?!

This one is short and sweet. I picked up some butternut squash while at the night market this past Friday (if you haven't been, you should definitely check it out). I read recipes using fresh butternut squash all the time, but had never attempted anything using it myself. Mike and I love the Campbell's V-8 Butternut Squash soup (the soups that come in the green boxes), so I decided to try my hand at making my own. We started simple... Every month in our Food Network Magazine, there is a booklet with 50 themed recipes, such as "50 Things to Do with a Jar of Pasta Sauce," "50 Egg Dishes," "50 Game Day Dips," and the one I used tonight, "50 Easy Soups." I love many things about the magazine itself, but this particular feature is probably my favorite. The soup was indeed easy, and quite delicious. The hardest part is cutting up the squash. We Googled butternut squash cutting tips and came across a very helpful fellow blogger with tips and