June 19, 2013 by stmears

Dulce de Leche Cheesecake

That’s a lie. It doesn’t really taste anything like cheesecake. But, large chunks of heaven in your mouth? Oh yeah. The best part is (that’s another lie, there’s lots of “bests” about this cake), the more days that pass the better it tastes. Originally, I wasn’t too crazy about it. It was very keylimey and I’m not a huge fan of keylime. Now? Now I could eat the rest of it that’s sitting in the pan and be upset there wasn’t more.

There’s four layers to this thing. Each one is awesome in it’s own way. I super love it because the crust is very graham cracker tasting and would go awesome as a pie crust. The de leche sauce, I could make crackers out of the crust and dip them in the de leche sauce and be super happy with just that. The recipe creator lady doesn’t lie, though. The sauce takes forever to reduce down, but totally worth it. The “cheesecake” part was my least favorite. The day it was made, and the day after, it was heavy on the lime and cashew taste. While it wasn’t bad, per se, it just wasn’t great. Again, after a few days those mellow out big time and the result is just awesomeness. The final layer is chocolate. And, it’s chocolate. Can’t go wrong there.

http://swisspaleo.ch/dulce-de-leche-cheesecake-bars-oh-my/

June 19, 2013 by stmears

I fail at waffles.

Epically. I was never great with them in the first place, but throw in funky ingredients and I’m a goner. Twice I’ve tried and twice they went horribly wrong. The first time, they tasted horrible. Ugh. Just, bad. I looked around off and on for a different recipe and finally settled on one that I was excited about making (side note: it was one of the main reasons I was so excited about getting my food processor and it took me weeks to use it for the actual waffle recipe). So, yesterday I decided I was going to give it another go. The first one came out great. Not the greatest of presentations, but it held together and tasted pretty darn good. Then, I tried to make a second one. Then a third. Those, those did not turn out so well. I don’t know what the crap happened, but it ended it mass failure. At least I got to eat the one good one.

Yesterday, I realized that I missed biscuits. Granted, it was only after hearing someone telling me they had biscuits and gravy for breakfast that I realized it, but still, I realized! So, off to the internet I went. I found this one that looked easy enough so I made them this morning.

While they aren’t bad, and in fact are pretty decent, they lack any sweetness. After a dab of butter and a dollop of honey, I think I may have found my biscuit replacement. You know, come to think of it, they remind me of cornbread in the texture….random thought. Now if I can figure out how to make gravy…

Other random thought, I take crappy food porn pics.

June 17, 2013 by stmears

This just happened.

Here’s what happens when it’s raining and you can’t go to the pool.

June 5, 2013 by stmears

Here’s a whole lotta pictures.

Last Friday, Oliver graduated kindergarten. That freaks me out a little. Not a whole lot, but mostly because I refuse to think about it too much.

This was walking into his last day of class. It’s a little blurry because, well, we were walking. Colin noticed the camera…

I finally got him to be still long enough to get a good shot.

And then, Colin noticed the camera….

Here are the ceremony pics. I’d write something about each one, but eh…I’m lazy. The one where he’s excitedly waving is when he spotted Gramme. The one with the blurry Gramme, yup, Colin again.

Mom took the kids after lunch so Alan and I had date day. Which had some Macy’s shopping in there. They had a food processor on sale that I have borderline rabidly been wanting. So, I got it. I love it. I’ve only used it once. But! I do plan on using it quite a lot. For real. They made the donuts so much easier to make, and with better batter consistency.

I did end up making this recipe. Naturally, I changed a few things (not as much honey, coconut oil instead of butter in the batter, coconut milk instead of almond milk. For the streusel, I used butter, brown sugar, honey and coconut flour.), but the consensus was it was a really good cake. At first, I wasn’t sure if I actually liked it so I just kept eating. After a substantial portion of a corner, I came to the conclusion that it was pretty damned tasty. I had to walk away. The other conclusion I came to is I need much better almond flour. I’ve remedied that situation today by ordering some blanched. Hopefully, it’s as good as the recommendations say it is.

On Monday Oliver made his very first batch of pancakes. This is him tasting them.

They tasted really good and he was quite pleased with himself. To the point where all he could talk about yesterday was how he was going to make pancakes and sell them in the Walgreens parking lot.

And since I don’t have enough pictures or spontaneous purchases, here are some of the new dog we got yesterday from the SPCA. I really wanted a playmate for the dog we already have, but so far, she’s good with sitting on one of us and/or sleeping. Best part, I have yet to hear her make any noise except for snoring or whining because she wanted out of her crate.