Cracka-Lacka

I like to bake cookies mostly. Why???
Oh, because I love to eat the dough.
But today, I baked crackers. With some inspiration from
Kath and her husband over at Katheats.com, I started
throwin ingredients into a bowl. I ended up with red quinoa,
almond slices, pepitas, sunflower seeds, salt, pepper, and
flax seeds. I toasted all of these and then cooled them. To
this I added whole wheat flour, vital wheat gluten (for higher
protein, that was silly...nobody wants glutenous crackers!!),
olive oil, honey, and water.
Some of them got fresh rosemary and basil in their
dough. Some of them got topped off with delicious
pecorino romano.
They are high fiber, high protein, high MUFA fabu
little treats!

What Next???

This here is
Christ
mas Eve dessert. I somehow managed to not get a photo of the inside of the cake. WAH WAH. I love love love the way the outside looks. It is a knockoff of the Chocolate Pepper mint Stick Marsh mallow Fantasy Cake from CulinaryConcoctionsbyPeabody.com
I made it with part whole grain flour, and less sugar, part splenda. It was delicious, but you should never ever try to make seven minute (or marshmallow) frosting with reduced sugar. It just doesn't create the same billowy effect. I kind of knew that going in to the experiment, but if you know me, I am pretty stubborn, and I had a "I will make this work" mentality that December day.
If you haven't checked out Peabody's website...go there (but only if you've got a few hours to kill!)

Blogging Hiatus, New Post, Old Food

I am certain there must be some statistic regarding the amount of time a food blogger blogs. For example, 1 in 5 food bloggers post three times then forget all about their endeavor.
So...
the last time I posted was in November. November!!! That's a third of a year that's gone by! Time flies. F.L.I.E.S.
My lack of posting was not for the lack of things to post. Other things have simply found my time. Here, this lovely Saturday
afternoon, I will play a little bit of catch up.

This is a whole wheat german chocolate cake I made for my mom's birthday in December. It was disappointing, honestly. The wheatiness overshadowed the other flavors.
Sorry Mom.

Looks good though, right?
Note to self: play around with recipes in spare time...not for people's birthdays.

Okay. Okay. Salt City...SAVORIES!

• It may be once in a blue moon that you get one of these posts. Why? I tend to eat the same things most days, no reason to take pictures of big bowls of vegetables, little bowls (sometimes huge) of cottage cheese, grilled chicken, turkey breast, etc. That being said, this night I made:

Veggie stuffed spring rolls with two dipping sauces. One mildish, one uber spicy.

Lettuce wraps with onion, chicken, water chestnut, and cilantro filling.

That little bowl is spicy coconut brown rice.

In case you hadn't figured it out for yourself...I L.O.V.E. veggies. I love spice. I should eat more whole grains. Grains in general really. Let's dub them carbomohydrates. I've somehow let myself become "scared" of them since society went insane with their Atkins Approach or whatever it has been dubbed.

Pizza, say you?

OOoooh, I'm sorry. You thought you were getting savories.
Alas...

FRUIT PIZZAS! These lovelies consist of a sugar cookie base (made with oat flour), a sweetened cream cheese, and all sorts of fresh fruit.

They really are an easy dessert option. They are, however, somewhat time consuming. I am a bit of a perfectionist and don't appreciate when fruit pieces become oddly shaped/sized, or I'm out of whack on my fruit placement. The second pizza got off kilter too long before I realized it, and the fruit had happily settled into the cream cheese...I didn't de and reconstruct this day.

Rainy Saturday Concocting

There are many things I am grateful for. Among them?? Rain. Saturday afternoons. Sales on Baking Ingredients. Coffee. Cooking shows. All five at the same time. The sale is the critical point here. Normally, I would not buy marshmallows unless I needed them for something specific. For some reason, though, they called out to me among the chocolate chips, coconut flakes, bags o' nuts, et cetera. GOOD THING! What came of these gelatinous little confections?? Why, s'mores, of course. Afterall, no one likes "raw" marshmallows.

So I began by creating a cookie base. There were no eggs in the house, and I realized this a little too late in the game. Having no intentions of going to the store, I decided to make do. I wanted it to be graham crackery (duh), and not too sweet. Here's what I came up with...

Graham Cracker Cookies

1 c. salted almonds, pretty finely ground (I used my magic bullet)

2 graham cracker sheets, finely ground (again, the magic bullet, bless it)

1 c. dark brown sugar

3/4 c. white whole wheat flour

1 t. baking powder

1/2 c. softened butter (one stick)

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Lightly spray (PAM) a mini-muffin pan (mine has 32 spots). Whisk together everything but the butter. Add the butter and incorporate with your hands. The dough will come together into one nice ball. Set out some parchment paper, and roll the dough into two foot long logs. Slice the logs into 16 pieces each. Place the slices into your greased muffin pan. Bake for 12 minutes. Let the cookies cool for a good ten-ish minutes before you take them out.

After the cookies were cool, I couldn't decide if I wanted sandwich cookies, open-facers, or something resembling a moonpie. I decided to go the sandwich route. I melted a couple cups of mini marshmallows over medium high heat, stirring constantly. I wanted the toasty flavor of a campfire s'more, so I waited until the marshmallow began to brown slightly. When this happened, I began spooning the marshmallow onto some of the graham cookie bases. AHHH! Worst idea ever. So I did that to fifteen of them before I gave up. I topped six of those fifteen with six un-marshmallowed cookies. Six sandwiches was all I was up for this afternoon.

So with the nine remaining marshmallowed, and seventeen remaining unmarshmallowed cookie bases, I decided to take the broiler route. I topped all of the cookies with 4 marshmallows, and put them under a broiler on medium heat. I stood there and watched cause I knew those suckers would brown up quick, I'm no stranger to marshmallow roasting!

Then I simply set all my marshmallowed cookies back on the parchment paper, melted a cup of milk chocolate chips, and drizzled away.

They are devilish little things. I simply could not help myself from snagging another...and another...and...you get the picture.