Why My Kitchen Is Illegal

Many years ago, I learned that the road less traveled was often the better one, even if the journey is bound to be rough. And starting a business is no exception.

There are many things I want Cooking At Home to be: informative, inspiring, and--legal.

Initial response to yesterday's announcement has been overwhelmingly positive and while I'm eager to begin receiving orders, a bit of legal research this evening revealed that I can't. Not yet.

Because....

My kitchen is illegal.

Yes, illegal. It doesn't even need to be inspected. We have two major violations that simply cannot be ignored.

Their names are Darby and Chutney. Sadly, the third in this picture--Lily--recently passed away. Yes, indoor pets make your kitchen illegal.

Suddenly, I'm kitchenless.

I've begun searching for a local, legal kitchen which I can rent once a week for meal preparation, but leads are few and far between.

But fear not! While I search for some great kitchen space--stainlesss steel, here I come!--I am moving forward and beginning to schedule private, in-home cooking classes.

Cooking At (Your) Home offers home cooks of all skill levels the unique experience of learning a new recipe, skill, or technique in the comfort of your own kitchen. Delicious recipes. Fresh ingredients. And a great opportunity to make mealtime memorable again, whether it's an intimate dinner for two, a girls' night in, or a unique one-on-one experience designed to take your home cooking to the next level.

And remember, what happens in the kitchen stays in the kitchen! Look for this month's "menu" of classes soon.

In the meantime, thank you for 'Cooking At Home'!

Too Many Ideas!

I know. I know.

"Where is the bread recipe?"

I know.

The simple answer is this. I've been ruminating. Lately, I've had several inspiring ideas for not only this blog, but the Cooking At Home brand, and while I attempt to find a balance between work-life-work, the bread recipe will have to wait. It's photographed--and quite lovely--but nevertheless, it's not ready.

So what are these ideas, you ask? Many things. An e-book. A very special cookbook. And what I'm most excited about--a home delivery service.

The truth is that I love cooking and baking far more than I do writing about it. Few things make me happier than donning my apron and flipping on my under-cabinet lighting (a ritual I have when things are about to get messy).

This month, I'm unveiling a brand new menu with select items available for advanced ordering. A sampling of my favorite things--savory and sweet--made fresh, with simple ingredients, and always delivered. This menu will be tested in select neighborhoods and businesses in the Shelby, NC, area. And I hope I make it to your neighborhood soon!

While I put the finishing touches on the menu, and fine tune the logistics behind it, I invite you to check out my favorite online recipe collection--www.tastykitchen.com. It is my go-to resource when the tried and true recipes in my own collection need a little spicing up.

It was created by one of my favorite bloggers (and home cooks!), Ree Drummond, otherwise known as "Pioneer Woman." While only online for just over a year, it has exploded with user-submitted content at a breakneck pace. Add your own, or do what I do--drool. A lot.

Until then, thank you for 'Cooking At Home'!

Diabetic Friendly Banana Nut Bread

I made a Greek pasta salad this evening with egg noodles. It's been that kind of day. But my hands smell like garlic and butter, so all is right with the world. Before you ask, yes, Sara Lee was kicked to the curb this weekend by my baking two gorgeous bread loaves. The only reason why that recipe has not been shared yet is because it was only as I was pulling my loaves from the oven that I realized that I hadn't photographed a single step. And when yeast is involved, step-by-step photographs are very, very, very helpful.

But, onward and upward. We go through a lot of bananas in our home, or "bannies," as my toddler refers to them. But we were all a little slow to tackle the last bunch that made it home from the grocery store. Rather than toss these overripe beauties, I made banana bread. It's a winner everytime.

Here are the necessary players: butter, sugar, a lonely egg, vanilla, oat bran cereal, flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, really, really, really ripe bananas, and walnuts.

With a recipe that prominently features fruit, it's almost like the ingredients are smiling back at you.

Because we have diabetic needs in mind, you could substitute the butter for lite margarine, and also use a sugar substitute. I use Splenda for this recipe, but there are several readily available options at your grocery store.

Oat bran cereal may be the hardest ingredient to find. It's always on the top shelf of the cereal aisle. Be sure to read the "fine print" and make sure you pick up oat bran. This gives the bread a great texture, in addition to adding a significant amount of fiber. 

Mix together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

 Cream together the butter and sugar.

Add the one lonely egg and vanilla extract and mix well.

Realize that you still had your dough hook on your mixer from baking two very gorgeous, fluffy loaves of bread earlier in the day and switch it out for a more appropriate attachment. Ah, that's better.

Add the oat bran cereal and mix until combined.

Mash those really, really, really ripe bananas. There are many ways to mash bananas, but I took a short cut, threw them into the measuring cup and took a fork to them. That way I can measure as a mash. Or is it whistle while I work?

This can really be very therapeutic after a long day.

Add part of the flour mixture to the batter.

Add part of the mashed bananas to the batter. Continue alternating--flour--bananas--flour--bananas. Mix well after each addition. And smell this batter, too! Adding the bananas introduces a wonderful aroma.

Admire your well-mixed batter, or scrape down the side of the bowl, as needed, to ensure the batter is mixed well.

The last addition is some chopped walnuts. What is banana nut bread without the nuts, after all?

Pour the batter into a greased loaf pan and bake in a 350-degree oven. 



After 1 hour, you'll have a gorgeous loaf of banana nut bread. Remove it from the pan and allow it to cool on a cooling rack. This is great out of the oven, toasted, or even cold.

While I'm a huge fan of banana nut bread regardless of the recipe behind it, I really do enjoy making this from time to time because it is diabetic friendly, if appropriate substitutions are made. A diabetic diet is one of the healthiest ways to eat, and does not have to mean the elimination of all carbohydrates--savory or sweet--from the menu. In fact, I'm such a huge proponent of diabetic food principles that I have several diabetic cookbooks in my cupboard, a few of which I frequent often.

No matter your health preferences, you can't go wrong with this recipe.

Diabetic Friendly Banana Nut Bread

From the Type II Diabetes Cookbook

Prep: 20 minutes  |  Bake: 60 minutes  | Servings: Depends on how you slice it

Ingredients

1/4 c. butter or lite margarine

1/2 c. sugar (up to 1/4 c. sugar substitute may be used)

1 egg

1 tsp. vanilla extract

1 c. oat bran cereal

1 1/2 c. flour

2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/2 tsp. salt

1 1/2 c. mashed bananas

1/2 c. chopped walnuts

Instructions

Preheat your oven to 350-degrees.

Cream together the butter and sugar. Add the egg and vanilla extract and mix until combined. Add the oat bran cereal and continue to mix. In a separate bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. In separate bowl, mash the bananas. Add part of the flour mixture to the batter. Add part of the mashed bananas to the batter. Continue alternating between adding flour and adding bananas until completely mixed. Stir in chopped walnuts.

Pour the batter into a greased loaf pan. Bake 60 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Remove the bread from the pan and allow it to cook on a cooling rack.

Enjoy!

Better Than Sara Lee. Really!

I have a secret I am compelled to share with you. I bake my own bread. And it's really good. Still don't believe me? My husband loves my bread. And tonight he announced that--are you sitting?--my bread is better than Sara Lee. To understand the significance of this comment, you must understand that for the duration of our marriage, he has asked...no, insisted...no, demanded, that I buy classic Sara Lee white bread.

When Sara Lee unveiled its whole wheat white bread, I tried purchasing that instead, only to have my healthful concerns met with a lot of groaning. He swore it tasted different, although I couldn't tell the difference. I'm a whole wheat, high fiber kind of girl. White bread is white bread.

When I first started baking my own bread, my husband was doubtful. I don't blame him. However, he's since converted. It's a dense, soft, but toothsome loaf that is as beautiful to look at as it is delicious, especially as bruchetta topped with insalata pomodoro. When I gave away a loaf to my best friend, my husband was vocally dismayed. It was "his bread" after all.

Well, we ran out of homebaked bread. Sara Lee made it back into our kitchen once more.

And tonight, as we were making BLTs for dinner (I know, so not glamourous for a Friday night), I was complaining left and right about how thin the slices were, how they couldn't hold up to being buttered and grilled without collapsing like an over-roasted marshmellow. "My bread would have performed so much better than this," I exclaimed!

That's when it happened.

"Your bread is better than Sara Lee."

Victory!

So, in addition to recharging my camera battery, fresh baked bread is on this weekend's to-do list, with the recipe to follow soon. You'll be amazed at just how easy it is.

The Results of Torte-ure

I have good news and I have bad news.

The good news is that Dorie Greenspan's Fold-Over Pear Torte exceeded my greatest expectations. I think I swooned when I pulled it out of the oven. And was brought to tears when I pulled the torte from the pan to reveal the most beautiful "tall, golden, roly-poly dessert" that I've ever made.

The bad news is that I didn't get a picture of the torte out of the pan.

Or on the cake plate.

Or sliced.

Or with a dollop of the homemade whipped cream that I had beat into submission.

Because my camera took a swan dive--figuratively speaking, anyway.

And because I had but minutes before my guests arrived.

And because I arrived home to the chirping of an equally ill-fated smoke detector battery.

And because our cat left a hairball in the baby's room.

It was a rough evening. Thankfully, I was in the company of 14 sisters who think I can do no wrong.

The torte was perfect in every way. A decadent blend of pears, apricots, walnuts, and cream. And because the recipe is indeed two pages, single-spaced, and because I don't think any kitchen is complete without Dorie's cookbook, or any of her cookbooks, I am going to insist you buy it if you want the recipe.

No, really, it's the least I can do.

Fold-over Pear Torte-ure

By and large, I don't do well on less than three hours of sleep and will rarely subject myself to the torture that is functioning in normal society the day after. However, desperate times often call for desperate measures and so here I am waiting for my second Fold-Over Pear Torte of this long, long evening to come out of the oven.

This isn't just any pear torte. It's Dorie Greenspan's Fold-Over Pear Torte. This means that it will smell, look, and taste...perfect, even if the recipe is two pages long, single spaced, and without pictures.

Yes, I am baking a sight-unseen recipe which I plan to serve to 14 very special houseguests tomorrow evening. And it is only for them that I would subject myself to this torte-ure.

Will it live up to all that I imagine it to be? Only time will tell. And most of it will be spent ingesting as much caffeine as I can find.

Derailed

Am I the only home cook whose passionate drives often get derailed by...well, life? While the holidays are usually marked by gluttony and overspending, ours were marked by sniffles, sneezes, and stomach flus.

Not exactly condusive to culinary genius.

Not that I am a culinary genius. Far from it, actually. I just love to cook. And I love sharing that passion with others, especially my daughter who went to bed tonight covered head to toe in a fine dusting of flour and well past her bedtime because we were baking bread and I know of no better reason to let the flour fly.

Cooking at home is a passion, because my family is a passion. I cook and bake and pile high dirty mixing bowls, measuring spoons, baking sheets, and skillets because at the end of the day, I want my family to eat well. But more than that, I want memories of family dinners to include tiny fingers zealously poking holes in pizza dough, teaspoons of garlic salt poured on the kitchen floor by unsteady little hands, my husband racing to open a nearby window because I burnt something...again, and sitting down together to eat a meal together that we prepared together.

Does it get any better than that?

I recently shared with someone that it was my desire to teach cooking classes, to which she responded, with great surprise, "You're good enough to teach classes?"

Considerably embarassed by this response, I stewed in a warm broth of self-doubt for several weeks. I contemplated abandoning the project, and tried convincing myself that no one in the South would want or need a cooking class. This is the stomping grounds of Paula Deen, afterall. Great cooking seems to be genetically programmed around here.

But you know what's missing? Passion. A desire to cook at home not just because it's healthier and economical, but because it's fun and messy and good. Really, really good. Especially when you do it with friends and family.

So no, I'm not good enough to teach classes. My technique is rough. My success rate is marginal. I'm far from neat, clean, and tidy when flour's involved. But I have a really good time in the kitchen and I firmly believe that you can, too.

Will you join me?