Running Chick

I felt like baking tonight, but didn’t feel like going to the grocery store to get a bunch of ingredients.  So, I rummaged around in my larder and found I had everything needed to make chewy chocolate cookies. Yummy! The recipe below makes about 4 dozen cookies, but I only made two sheets worth and froze the rest of the dough to use at a later time.

Chewy Chocolate Cookies (courtesy of Martha Stewart) Makes about 4 dozen 2 cups all-purpose flour 3/4 cup cocoa powder 1 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 1/4 cups (2 sticks plus 4 tablespoons) unsalted butter at room temperature 2 teaspoons vanilla extract 2 cups granulated sugar 2 large eggs Additional granualted sugar for dipping In a large bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda and salt. Set aside. Using an electric mixer, beat the butter and vanilla on medium speed until creamy. Scrape down the bowl and add the sugar and eggs. Beat until the mixture is light and fluffy. Reduce the mixer speed to low and gradually stir in the dry ingredients until the dough is just combined and there are no dry pockets. Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate until firm, about one hour. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Scoop the dough by level teaspoonfuls and roll each portion into a smooth ball. Dip the top of each ball into the granulated sugar. Place the dough balls onto baking sheets about 1 1/2 inches apart. Bake one sheet at a time, rotating sheet halfway through, until the cookies are set but still soft in the center, about 8-10 minutes. Let the cookies cool on the baking sheet for five minutes before transferring them to a wire rack to cool completely. Goes great with beer or wine!

Yummy and fairly low-cal, the key to this dish is to use the right lettuce. After several failed attempts using cabbage (learned that you have to steam it first), bib (too floppy), and iceberg (couldn’t get a decent leaf from the head), I finally found success with butter lettuce.  The leaves turned out to be the perfect little cups.  I also made some brown rice to serve under (or over) the meat.

Ingredients

• Butter lettuce leaves (rinsed & dried)
• 1 lb ground turkey
• 1 T oil
• 1 large onion, chopped
• 2 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 T soy sauce
• 1/4 cup hoisin sauce
• 1 T vinegar
• Asian chili pepper sauce (optional, to taste)
• 1 bunch green onions (chopped)
• 2 T sesame oil

 

Directions

1.  Brown ground turkey over medium-high heat with 1T oil.  When fully cooked, drain & remove from pan.

2. Using the same pan, add onions & stir fry for 1-2 minutes.  Add garlic, soy sauce, hoisin sauce, vinegar & chili pepper sauce.  Stir to mix.  Add green onions & sesame oil.  Add sauce mixture to ground turkey, mix well.

3. Add a spoonful of the meat mixture into the center of each leaf, wrap like a burrito and enjoy!

And just like that, vacation is over and it's back to the daily grind. I finished up painting on mid-week (looks great!) and then when I was removing the tape from the trim, half of the paint came off with it. Noooooo! I think it was because the original paint on the trim was oil-based and I used latex. Anyway, I quickly realized that all the trim had to be scraped, sanded and primed before I could do any repainting. Damn you, oil-based paint! **shakes fist** I pouted for a couple of days, then started scraping. And scraping. And scraping. It's a good arm workout, but since I'm only using my right hand, I'm going to have a right arm like Popeye and a left arm like Olive Oyle. I finally finished up tonight. Tomorrow is another trip to the paint sore for primer then taping and priming. If all goes well, I should be done with all painting by Sunday and I can move everything back and stop living out of three rooms. We had several friends over for a post-Thanksgiving Thangsgiving over the weekend and it was our first time brining a turkey. It turned out really, really well and brining will probably be the standard for turkeys cooked at my house from now on. Behold the pictures. Yes, that it a cat litter bucket that you see. It worked great!