Yeah, but what's in it?

My beautiful babies are pickytarians. Aside from peanut butter sandwiches, apples, cereal bars (must be from a package), pasta with sprinkle cheese (parmesan) and carrots (these just to get dessert), and a sprinkling of choices from the dried fruit and nut categories, they turn their noses up at most things. Rice?! How can you not like plain rice?! With a pat of butter sliding across the top, just beginning to melt into the plump little granules?!

Now, as babies, many interesting textures and tastes crossed their burgeoning palates. They ate tofu, peas, oranges to the point we were buying those giant Costco bags once a week, pickles and calamari ceviche, tentacles and all.

I figured I could get a healthy, homemade cereal bar into them over the years. Nope. Too gooey, too hard, not the right shape. Ugh.

But, I may have found something in this new cookbook I'm plowing through, testing recipes for the first Clark County Cookbook Club. The Smitten Kitchen has so far pulled off a few tasty treats my kids will eat, including these almond and date breakfast bars. They like dates, they like almonds, so I gave it a whirl in my KitchenAid. I switched the almond butter in half the batch to peanut butter to please one twin. They still asked what's in it, and peered at it from all sides before taking the teensiest of bites, but they ate the whole square. Thank goodness they cut into nice little squares or they may have been rejected before the first crumb hit their mouths! Ugh! Just eat!

Ktichen Sink Calzone Saves Saturday Night Pie Night

In preparing for the first ever Clark County Cookbook Club, I've been loading up on tips and tricks from the "Smitten Kitchen." 

After spending two hours at "Disney's Frozen on Ice," and 90 minutes in Saturday night Strip traffic, I wasn't feeling like a princess pizza or salad, which is what we'd planned.  But then I had an inspired moment!

I've been reading Deb Perelman's latest cookbook (yes, people do that, read cookbooks for their flavorful content, and her's is stuffed with humorous anecdotes). She has a tips and trick section that is actually quite good, even for someone with years of amateur cooking experience under their belt.

Standing in front of the fridge, hand on hip, taste buds bored, I spotted a tub of ricotta in the back. I'd bought it on sale for 3/4 the regular price and put a few in the freezer. This poor guy was meant to be used around New Year's, but was pushed to the back due to a Pinterest baking binge.

I pulled all the usual suspects for pizza making from each bin and corner of the fridge - pepperoni, leftover canned mushrooms, the last leaves of spinach from the Costco crate I like to buy and a few other things. 

Not pictured, a gorgeous, thick sauce perfect for dipping. We always have a cup of sauce left over, which we save until it begs us to throw it away. Loved that I used so many orphaned ingredients for our Kitchen Sink Calzone. And now I can see the back of my fridge!

Turned out great, even with a wheat crust dough that I wobbled on about the bake temp. I didn't add an egg, but did put a swipe of garlic infused olive oil over the top with a dusting of Parmesan while it was cooking. Took only a few minutes and we can stuff it with anything. It's our Kitchen Sink Calzone.

Pinterest Win! And a New Year's Surprise

New Year's Eve, the hubby decides he doesn't want paella, or lobster mac and cheese, but this Pinterest post pie:

So I'll be trying a new recipe on New Year's Eve? Ok. Challenge accepted.

Worried it would be dry. Worried it would take hours to put all those little rigatonis in the springform pan I hoped I could dig out from my new organization system that is just as bad as last year's new organization system. What I didn't worry about, and should have, was that we'd have unexpected company coming to stay the night, with fur friends in tow!

No worries, I love to feed people, but now the pressure was on!

Got off to a good start by remembering that I was boiling pasta and put down the vacuum just in time to take the tiny tubes off the stove and plunge into cold water. Putting them in neat little rows was kind of enjoyable, and only took a few minutes. Until my newly-minted 6-year-old decided she was so grown up now that she needed to help. Adult prep time = 3 minutes. Child prep time = 5 minutes plus breaks to discuss different pasta shapes and how they look like logs.

Simmered the sauce for hours and poured it on after the ricotta and egg mixture. Tip: shake that ricotta into the pan like you're mad your lovely husband invited friends to stay the night New Year's Eve, and then took a nap.

The cheese floated down into each tiny tube. The lovely little suckers stood up like good little soldiers and soaked up all the moisture from the sauce to turn out perfectly tender.

Sauce on the side is a big thing in our family, and it worked out really well. This was one of our best New Year's Eves ever,  a fantastic time with friends we hadn't seen in years, and we got a clean house out of it to boot!

Happy New Year! May your year be as lovely as you wish and better than expected!