Noom: Elephant Dialogues--Negotiation

Negotiating with your elephant:
🐘: HUNGRY! 😟
🏇: Good morning Elephant. We just had breakfast
🐘: STILL HUNGRY! 😟
🏇: Are you still upset about just getting a bite of enchiladas?
🐘: Barely a bit. Enchiladas are SOOOO good! 😋
🕵️‍♂️: There is craving
🏇: Let’s get some water. Maybe you're thirsty?
🐘: Thirsty for ENCHILADAS! 😋
🏇: Very funny. How about some gum. That will give your mouth something to do.
🐘: 😶
🏇: That’s a good elephant. Now let's go for a walk
🐘: 🚶‍♀️

Peach Coffee Cake

Christmas Day I wanted to make coffee cake. Flipping though the King Arthur Flour Whole Grain Baking cookbook I saw a recipe for peach coffee cake that tempted me.

I didn't follow the recipe, but started with it.

I heated some dried cranberries in some orange liqueur  then added a large can of peaches, drained and coarsely diced.

In a bowl I sifted together

• 2 1/2 Cup white whole wheat flour
• 1 tsp salt
• 1 tsp baking soda

In the mixer I creamed together:

• 1 cube butter (1/2 cup)
• 1 cup toasted sugar
• 1 large egg
• 2 tsp vanilla extract

I set at the ready:

• 1 cup whole milk (recipe called for buttermilk)

Added and mixed until combined 1/3 of the dry mix and 1/3 cup of the milk in turns.

Then folded in the Peach mixture just until mixed in.

Poured this into buttered 9x13 casserole dish. 

Topped with mixture of:

• 2 tbs butter
• 1/2 cup toasted sugar
• 1 Tbs sweet spice mixture (in this case cinnamon, nutmeg, allspice, grains of paradise, cubebs)
• 1 drop sweet orange essential oil

Bake at 250 for 35 mins, then cool 20 mins on wire rack. 

Ended up with a fragrant, moist cake. 

Instant fruioatmeal flambé

We had some packets of instant oatmeal that were getting a little dated, so I decided it would be good to use them up, and replace them in out pantry. But the idea of plain oatmeal wasn't cutting it for me so fresh from the local Hollywood liquor, I thought what could be better on a chilly day than some instant fruioatmeal flambé? 

We had apples from our tree that needed processing, so I ran them through our peeler, corer, slicer and started three apples sautéing in 2 Tbs of butter in a large skillet, while a kettle heated the water for the oatmeal. To the apples, I added a couple Tbs of brown sugar, some cherry flavored craisens, and some walnuts. Our apples don't put off a lot of juice, so when the pan got dry I'd add a couple tablespoons at a time of apple syrup. (Unfiltered apple juice reduced in a large pot for a long time until is thickens). When the apples were just about ready, I put on some orange liqueur and vodka over medium heat and turned the apples up to high heat. Once the liqueur started to bubble and the apples were good and bubbling (without burning!) I added the liqueur to the pan and let it catch flame and cook for a moment. Then stirring the plan and adding a little more apple syrup and turning off the heat, I mixed up the oatmeal and hot water from the kettle. Mixed the two mixes together and placed servings in bowls. I deglazed the apple pan with milk that was poured over the fruiotmeal, and served.

Spring scramble: sausage potato spinach

My lady asked for potatoes and sausage. This is what I came up with. 

This time I pulled out my cast iron. I like the way it turned out. I often make something similar in stainless steel. So, to your own liking I suppose.

Steam quartered potatoes until tender.
Fry up sausage, chopped green onion in butter and bacon drippings. Add chopped apple, prepared potatoes, roasted carrots (previously frozen).
Set the oven on low heat 150º-200º F and put tortillas on an oven safe plate with another upside down on top as a cover.

French bread pudding

I got this recipe from my good friend Dawn who says it is a combination of ones she found in The Good Housekeeping Illustrated Book of Desserts and one from a Better Homes & Gardens recipe.

Apple Bacon German Pancake

Another take on one of my favorite breakfast foods, the german pancake, but this time with bacon!

Vorax Egg Muffin

A friend brought us some sourdough English muffins from the Bay Area. So, we had to come up with some special way to enjoy them. I had some leftover lunchmeat and cheese so I decided to make a breakfast sandwich.

This is not gluten-free, vegetarian, locavore, paleo, low-carb, low-fat, or raw food. But it is quite tasty and satisfying. And maybe every once in a while, life should just be tasty and satisfying.

First assemble the ingredients. Then realize you forgot the turkey after you took the picture. I had some nice pastrami from Grocery Outlet that were the ends from large deli rolls.

Pancakes with almond meal

I like incorporating a lot of almond meal in my cooking. I have tried waffles with almond meal in place of flour and they didn't hold together very well.

This time thought I'd try pancakes with half the flour replaced with almond meal. This worked well in terms of texture, browning, and flavor. The one problem was that they were quite tricky to flip without them tearing and breaking up.

They browned up nicely.

To top them, I mixed up some butter, maple syrup, and a little pomegranate syrup. This tasted nice, but I needed to warm the butter a little to get it to blend better.

Next time: I wonder if I made the batter a little thinner if that would make them easier or harder to flip. I think part of the problem was that the inside was staying too tender to hold together.  It also seemed to work a little better to make three smaller cakes rather than one large one at a time. 

Gluten free Caramel Apple German Pancake

I got a suggestion from Stacy that the Thick German Pancake might work well in a gluten free form. Coming on the heels of the Caramel sauce experiment, I decided to do a double experiment: Gluten free Caramel Apple German Pancake.

Apple Sausage Thick German Pancakes

Yet another variation on the Thick German Pancake this morning.

I had a bag of apples that I got to make a first attempt at Apple Cabbage Stew for the Skyrim party (more on this in a later post). So I got to thinking about making a traditional Apple German Pancake. But then I remembered having some breakfast sausage links in the freezer. And then I remembered how much I like apples and sausage together.

To wit, Apple Sausage Thick German Pancakes!

Winter Squash German Pancake

In the continuing saga of "things to cook with winter squash" I experimented with a roasted butternut squash German pancake.

For the topping I took some chunks of roasted butternut squash from the freezer and sauteed them in butter, brown sugar and a little fine spices. Then otherwise followed the recipe for the Thick German Pancake from The Best Recipe cookbook.

I thought they were tasty and passed my "qualified breakfast food" filter fine. Not as sweet as a pumpkin pie. I think I will do this again, but I'm not sure it will become a regular.

Apple Butter Thick German Pancake

When a Thin German Pancake just won't cut it, it is time to break out the thick german pancake.

The original recipe called for apples browned in butter and brown sugar.  I often make them with peaches. We don't have any apples at the moment, but do have the memories of applies ensconced as apple butter. So, with a healthy dose of "What could happen?" opened the apple butter and this is what happened ....

Thin German Pancake

I make two different dishes that are each called a German Pancake, but are quite different. One is a thick cake, baked with fruit in the bottom and flipped when served. That is not what I am talking about today. Today I am talking about the thin cake that I used to love to get at Elmer's before a good friend gave me a lovely kit with the ingredients and a recipe so I could make one myself.

These are similar to the ones I blogged about in muffin tins last year.

Experimental semi-paleo Waffle recipe

Having tried a recipe for almond meal waffles that were only partially successful (didn't hold together well, and didn't have quite the right mouth feel), I decided to experiment today. My dear wife got me Cooking for Geeks and The Science of Good Food for my birthday, both of which I consulted for waffle wisdom. I also googled around a little.
My plan was to try half wheat flour / half almond meal, leaven by whipping the egg whites and yolks (seperately) and a pinch of baking soda / powder,  use bacon drippings for the fat and salt, and experiment a little with the liquid. When beating the egg whites I added a teaspoon of sugar per a suggestion I found online.
So, this is what I ended up with...

Waffles Vorax:

Hakuna Frittata

I got hooked on frittate when we got our first CSA and they supplied a recipe for a "Greens Frittata" (which itself was adapted from Antipasti by Joyce Goldstein) that became one of my goto recipes. It reminded me of the "Use it up quiche" from the Tightwad Gazette.  I adapted it in several ways.

Peach Oven German Pancake

During the remodel I was in the market for things I could cook in my micro-convection oven. 

One thing that looked promising was a German Apple Pancake recipe I found in The Best Recipe cookbook. The only problem was that it required cooking the apples for 10 minutes in a skillet and I didn't have ready access to a stove. 

Bacon Pancakes

Bacon Pancake

I saw a picture on Facebook of someone pouring pancake batter over a strip of bacon on a griddle. I knew I had to try this.

I decided to go for a more traditional round pancake so I cut the (precooked and frozen) bacon strips in half and put them side by side. Not much more to say about it than that, other than they were very tasty.

Two Bacon Pancakes: Twice as good!

German Pancakes in muffin tins

Sharon found a neat idea for making german pancakes in muffin tins then filling them with a fruit sauce. I basically used a half recipe for german pancake except with the butter (melted) mixed into the batter and poured into greased muffin tins. Made nine from the half recipe (3 eggs).

For the topping I mixed some home-made jam with frozen peaches and a little lemon juice in a saucepan and heated until the peaches were warmed through.

Very tasty and makes a nice looking single serving with other stuff, or group a bunch together for a hearty breakfast.

Lemon Currant Syrup

For pancakes, waffles, and the like, I like to make quick fruity syrups. One combination that Sharon mentioned she liked was made by combining in a microwave-proof cup

• One dollop of Lemon Curd
• One dollop of Black Currant preserves
• One capful of lemon juice

A dollop probably works out to 2-3 Tbs -- (literally a heaping soupspoon in my case).

Nuke and stir alternately until it was hot and well blended (took a couple three 11-second bursts). 

Apply liberally to your target of choice -- in this case sourdough waffles made like my sourdough pancakes with the addition of 1 Tbs of olive oil. 

Fruioatmeal

On a chilly morning I like to make fruioatmeal (pronounced FROHT-meel) which is my name for oatmeal made with fruit and nut meal.