Recipes

*Banana-Nut Bread
*Banana-Chocolate, Chocolate-Chip Pancakes
*Macaroni Grill's Scaloppine di Pollo
*Pampered Chef's Quick Chocolate Cherry Cake
*Pampered Chef's Quick Pumpkin Spice Cake
*Pampered Chef's Asian Lettuce Rolls

Baking & Cooking Tips

***I don't keep buttermilk on hand, instead I use a  substitution of milk & lemon juice.  It has worked every time.  For example: 1 c. buttermilk = 1 c. milk + 1 tbs. lemon juice.  Make what you need, instead of buying it & throwing the rest away.
***Cookie-cutters are good for more than making cookies.  Try cutting bread, sliced cheese, sliced lunch-meats, and sliced fruit into cute shapes, too.

A family favorite...Banana-Nut Bread

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One of my family's favorites is a Betty Crocker recipe for banana bread.  This recipe is from the very first cook-book I have ever owned.  It is the same recipe that the link takes you to.  The pages of my cook-book are splattered and beaten up, but surprisingly, the cover & binding are still in pretty good shape.  I will probably keep it forever.  Even when I was younger, I remember using my mother's Betty Crocker cook-book, which I'm sure she still has and uses, too.  

Banana-Chocolate, Chocolate-Chip Pancakes

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These are a real treat!  Super easy and yummy!  To make these I started with the directions on the back of my package of Krusteaz Pancake Mix for the larger batch (18-21 four-inch pancakes) which uses 3 cups of their mix.  Instead of using 2 cups of water, I used 1 1/2 cups and 1/2 cup chocolate syrup.  I also cut up a large banana (or two small ones) into little pieces and mixed it into the batter.  (That makes it healthier, right?!?  LOL.  Plus, you could add some nuts for protein, too.)  Then, I just poured the batter onto my griddle and cooked *slightly* larger pancakes. When they were finished, I topped them with a little butter, syrup, and whip cream.  My kids were thrilled!  Plus, it was a special "breakfast for dinner" since my husband was at a class that evening.  They liked them so much, they have been asking me to these pancakes again.  There may have been left-overs, but they were gone the next morning.  

Home-cooked breakfast

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Cute & simple.  Whole grain toast, eggs, turkey-sausage, and French toast.  For that extra little something, cut out the centers of bread slices with cookie-cutters.  If you don't have any around, a drinking glass will work just fine.  Place the bread "frames" on the griddle.  You can butter them first if you prefer.  Then, crack eggs into the center of toast on the griddle, season, & cook until they are done the way you like.  The French toast was made using the centers of bread slices that were cut out.  My French toast egg-batter is made from egg substitute, dash of vanilla, dash of cinnamon, a little milk, and a splash of vanilla coffee creamer.  Occasionally, I zest a little orange rind into it, too. Whisk it all together, quickly coat both sides of bread, and place on the griddle.  Top the French toast with whatever you like.

Chicken Scallopini

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My husband loves me and wanted to make something special for me around Valentine's.  Not only does he bring me flowers randomly, or as he says, "just because," but he knows many of my favorite foods.  So, one of the special, sweet things he does every so often is cook something I absolutely love.  I think my all-time favorite recipe that he makes is from CDKitchen.com and called "Macaroni Grill's Scaloppine di Pollo".  Usually he serves it over angel hair pasta, but this time he substituted thin spaghetti noodles.  It was still great, but angel hair (or cappellini pasta) is my favorite.  Oh, and we never garnish it with parsley.  Just a personal preference.  This recipe serves quite a few and it does take a decent amount of prep work, so you may not want to reduce it.  Instead, think about making enough for an extra meal; batch-cooking & freezing portions of it, or plan to serve a larger group dinner - this recipe is great!

Quick Chocolate Cherry Cake or Pumpkin Spice Cake

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These are such quick and easy recipes from one of my favorite  cookbooks from The Pampered Chef, All The Best: From Our Kitchens to Yours (2003, page 123).  The Quick Chocolate Cherry Cake variation (pictured on the far left) is listed below their Quick Pumpkin Spice Cake (pictured above, on the right) recipe.  Once the batter is prepared and placed in the oiled stoneware baking dish, it only takes 14 minutes to bake in the microwave.  Of course, the cake needs to stay in there for another 10 before you flip it onto a serving plate and let it cool.   

Asian Lettuce Rolls

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My kids have called these "salad boats" for years, but the real recipe I use is entitled, Asian Lettuce Rolls from my copy of The Pampered Chef's Cookbook, All the Best (2003, p. 52).  It's a simple recipe that can be tweaked easily enough.  I can't always find Boston (or bib lettuce), so I use Romaine just as often as not.  When I don't have fresh garlic or ginger, I have substituted ground seasonings, which have worked well enough for our palettes.  My family also enjoys having additional soy sauce for dipping & using less of the sweet & sour sauce.  As you can see from my picture, sometimes I leave the veggies out of the chicken-noodle mixture...unfortunately, not all my kids love peppers & green onions as much as I do.