Oh Happy Day!

While at Sunflower Market with a friend the other night (yep, I force friends to go with me so I can convert them), I got some really great news: Vegas is getting 3 more Sunflower Markets next year! WOOOHOOO! Soon you may be able to share in the joys of having your very own in-your-area(ish) Sunflower Market. Let the happy dances commence.

Three Bean and Corn Salad with Salsa Vinaigrette

If you invite me to a potluck barbecue, chances are I'm bringing this. I love it because it's easy, it's healthy, and it's so good. The original recipe came from a chef on the Today show a few years ago, but I've made a couple of changes.

1 can each kidney beans, Great Northern beans, and black beans, drained and thoroughly rinsed
1 cup frozen corn kernels, thawed
3 green onions, chopped
1 bell pepper (any color), seeded and chopped
1/3 cup canola oil
1/4 cup tomato salsa
2 to 3 tablespoons cider vinegar
1 teaspoon crushed garlic
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
Salt and pepper to taste
1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro

1. In a bowl, combine all the beans with the corn, green onions and bell pepper. Mix well.

2. In a small bowl*, whisk together the oil, salsa, vinegar, garlic and cumin. Season with salt and pepper.

3. Pour the dressing over the bean mixture and stir to mix. Let stand for about 30 minutes to allow the flavors to combine.

4. Just before serving, garnish with cilantro.

*I put all of the dressing ingredients into a jar, put the lid on and shake it up- especially if I'm making this ahead of time or taking it somewhere, since I can just leave it in the jar until I'm ready to use it.

Seriously?

So, I was in the Mart of the Wal persuasion today, picking up a few things, and I found myself in the refrigerated section of the produce aisle looking for shredded carrots. I did not find shredded carrots, but you know what I did find? Pre-sliced onions. Who on earth buys a pre-sliced onion? Especially at two or three bucks a pop? Who is that supremely lazy or knife-challenged? One might argue that it is not much different from shredded carrots, but I would. Shredding carrots is a pain in my butt. I have no fancy food processor which shreds them for me, and so my options are really to cut them into tiny matchsticks or grate them on my box grater, thus not producing a substantial enough section of carrot to truly be a shred. But slicing an onion? Takes about ten seconds, a minute if you truly suck at it. I posed the "who buys a pre-sliced onion" question to the hubs at dinner, and here's what we came up with: If you own no knives and are on your way to a barbeque in which you are expected to bring sliced onions for topping burgers and the person who is hosting the barbeque also has no knives and you can't afford to spring for a knife, you might buy a pre-sliced onion. Or if you have no fingers. Or hands. Or arms.

Mmmm.... Cake.

For my daughter's birthday, I decided to be A Real Mom and make a cake. In all honesty, I decided to do it because A. I'm cheap and B. last year we got cupcakes from a bakery and I was totally pissed about the crapola decorating job they did that was SO NOT WHAT I ASKED FOR. So, this year, I would do it myself. Let me first say this: I am a good baker, as we have established in previous posts. But, I rarely make cake and I don't think I've ever decorated one before. So, naturally, I decided to take it on the day before my daughter's birthday party. Because that makes sense.

My daughter's party was on a Saturday. So, mid-morning Friday I decided to bake the cake so it would have ample time to cool before I decorated it. I pulled out the boxes of cake mix, prepped my pan, mixed everything up, poured it into the pan, and sent it happily into the oven. About 40 minutes later, I pulled out a lovely, huge and delicious-smelling cake. I let it cool for a little while, then attempted to remove it from the pan. I reached into my bag o' cooking-show-learned tricks and put a sheet pan on top of the cake before inverting it. Then I tried to lift off the pan. The cake was not moving. Hijinx ensued, and this is what happened to the cake:



Apparently, simply greasing the pan is not enough if you hope to actually take the cake out of the pan. You know, like for serving it. Mary called just then, and she was able to school me in cake making/decorating 101. She informed me that if one hopes to remove a cake from a pan, after greasing and flouring a pan one should line the bottom of the pan with parchment paper. So, I ran back to the store for cake mixes #3 & 4, came home and started over. Mary knows her stuff- this time it worked like a charm!

After a few hours of cooling, it was time for me to attempt the cake decorating. My toddler couldn't decide between a flower cake and a Funshine Bear cake, so I made a flower cake and stuck a couple of Care Bear figurines on it the next day.


SO much better than what the bakery did last year!


This is art.


Highly edible, delicious art.


Let's just be honest: I rock at cake decorating.

Easiest Dessert EVER.

And it's delicious, too!

Here's what you do:

BUY: 1 Angel Food Cake bar
1 carton of Cool-Whip
1 bag of frozen berries (I like the mixed berries, but it's really your choice)


When it's time for dessert, pour the frozen berries into a small saucepan. Add a little fruit juice (or fruit-flavored juice, whatever you have on hand will work), a spoonful of sugar, put the pot on the stove and crank the burner up to medium-high. Stir it a little and then let it do its thing. The fruit will break down and start to get all bubbly. Add a little cornstarch, stir it in, drop the heat to medium-low-ish and let it do its thing again. Now, slice the angel food cake bar, putting one slice in each person's bowl. Go back to the fruit sauce. If it's thick enough for you, pour it over the angel food cake. If it's not, add some more cornstarch, stir it in and give it a minute to thicken up. Once you've poured the fruit compote-y-ness over the cake, top with Cool-Whip. Viola! You're done!

I made this up about a year and a half ago and everyone I've served it to just oohs and ahhs over it. (I'm sure plenty of other people have come up with it before me, but that's when I figured it out.) There's roughly 82,000 variations on this, it takes about ten minutes, and it's delicious. I think I'm in love.

Favorite Finds

Don't you love when you try a new thing and it instantly becomes a favorite thing? I know I do. Here are some of my newest favorite foods:






Quaker Simple Harvest Multigrain Hot Cereal
This has been out for a few months, and while I wanted to try it, the price tag scared me away. But one day, I was at Smith's and it was on sale for $1.99 (it's usually over $4.00), and I had a $1.00 off coupon, and lo and behold, the goods were mine. My favorite is the Vanilla, Almond and Honey. When you open the microwave the smell hits you, it's just intoxicating. I could sit and smell it all day. Eating it is even better.




Flat Earth Baked Veggie Crisps
I discovered these about a year ago, and have tried almost every flavor. Thus far, my favorites are Tangy Tomato Ranch and Wild Berry Patch (the sweet flavors are dusted with sugar instead of salt). They're a great alternative to regular chips, and if you ask me, they taste a lot better. Bonus? Every ounce has a half-serving of fruits or vegetables. If you haven't tried these yet, you should. Go to their website, and you can get a bag for free.




Orville Redenbacher Natural Simply Salted Popcorn
I'm an anomaly when it comes to popcorn. I don't like butter on it. And I HATE movie theater butter. It. Is. Gross. I've been looking for a plain or salt-only microwavable popcorn for a long time. Newman's Own makes one, but none of the stores by me carry it on a regular basis, and it's kind of expensive for microwave popcorn. But now Orville has come to my rescue with their Natural line and its Simply Salted Popcorn. The lack of unpronouncable chemicals is good and all, but I was excited that someone had heard my silent pleas for a butterless popcorn. I can hear you all saying "Popcorn without butter, but with salt? Sounds dry." Nope. Not dry. Palm oil solves that problem- without a heavy flavor. Even my movie-theater-butter-addicted husband loved this. Seriously. Good. Stuff.

I Owe It All to Rachael Ray.

Really, I do. When I was really, really stupid about food, Rachael Ray took me by the hand, led me to the kitchen and said, "Really, it's not that scary. Let me show you." Okay, maybe she didn't ACTUALLY take me by the hand, but she very figuratively did.

When I realized how much I needed to learn to cook, I turned on the Food Network and got very, very scared. Here were all these people making fancy, fancy stuff with ingredients I'd never heard of. (Lest we forget, I knew not what a green onion was, so things like polenta and risotto were way beyond my reach.) Then I found Rachael Ray. "Hey," I thought, "She reminds me of every best friend I've had since I was about 15. I think I can speak her language." And then she started making burgers. Burgers! I know burgers! I can do burgers! That's when I knew we would be friends for life, if only in a one-sided, through-the-TV sort of way. Like all good friends, we've had our ups and downs, me and Rach. Sometimes I wanted to throw something through the TV and tell her to stop being so persistently HAPPY all the time. Couldn't she see that I was in a mood and she was annoying me? Then I realized, that no, she can't, and her job kind of depends on her being happy, and eventually we'd make up. Sometimes I strayed from her down-to-earth food to covet the more gourmet offerings of the other chefs. But I always came back. She had me at hello.

It was Rachael Ray who taught me about formulas vs. recipes, and even emboldended me to create my own recipes. Before her, I was amazed at the powerful recipe-creating powers of all those cookbook people. Now, while still amazed, I understand that it's actually easier than I imagined. With Rachael's persistent encouragement, and her daily reminders that no one is going to come to my house and inspect my chopping methods, cooking has become less of a mystery and more of a hobby. Someday, I hope I can run into her in the grocery store so I can say, "Look! Look at my cart! I have ingredients in here! Ingredients to make meals because I know how to cook, and you helped!" At which point she will probably be a bit scared and walk away at a quickened pace, and the tables will have turned and I will be the happy one, yelling after her down the aisle, "Wait! I have to tell you about my meatloaf recipe! I made it up! All by myself! Aren't you proud of me? Rachael? Hello?"