Seattle Challenge # 1: sugar-less...

 

I've decided it's time to make my first appearance.  From the west coast...I present my first challenge: a sugar-free/less remix!  Melissa challenged me to take a run of the mill recipe and cut the sugar.  So I did.  I chose muffins because they are versatile enough to taste good without sugar.  

I started with a basic recipe for Morning Glory Muffins.  The tweaking began as I rifled through the cupboards to see what I had on hand.  As you will learn, my style is to work with what I have, and since I'm not prone to planning ahead...I don't always have exactly what the recipe calls for.  Here's what I found:

For the dry ingredients, I followed the recipe, sans sugar:

 1 1/3 c. whole wheat pastry flour

1 1/2 tsp. baking soda

1/4 tsp. salt

1 tsp. cinnamon (a generous measure)

In lieu of 1/2 cup white sugar, I added 1/4 cup of honey, but kept the 1/4 cup of brown sugar.  I stuck with the wet ingredients for the most part:

2 eggs

2/3 c. vegetable oil

 1 tsp. vanilla

...and then I had fun.  I threw in about a 1/2 cup of grated carrot and 1 cup of peeled apple.  I chopped some unsweetened coconut flakes, a few walnuts, and  a handful of cranberries for a little texture and bit of sweet.  It looked something like this:

After about 30 minutes at 350 degrees...I had a sugar-less (as in less than more) muffin remix!

I now eagerly await my next challenge!
And to be honest, I'm excited to tackle the next one with more fervor and more sugar!  These muffins did not make it into the recipe box...next!

- Sylvia

challenge #1...food

it is well known among my friends and family that i enjoy cooking and baking.  of course, the real reason for this passion is because i love to eat!  i haven't met a food yet that i won't at least try once, i exercise for the express purpose of being able to eat what i want, and i've definitely planned more than one vacation around where and what i'm going to eat...ridiculous i know, but i have a sneaking suspicion that i'm not alone in this...

so, with the holidays just recently over, i was pleasantly surprised by my family with some great "foodie" gifts.  my newest pride and joy is my amazing kitchen aid mixer!  i have wanted one of these babies for the past few years, and my parents were so kind to give me one for christmas.  i love it!

isn't she a beaut?

another of my favorite gifts was the essential new york times cookbook.  i don't think i've ever had a cookbook like this one before.  the editor, amanda hesser, collected a vast amount of recipes that have been published in the new york times, some dating back to the late 1800s.  what i love about this cookbook is that hesser has included for each recipe some kind of background story; the history of recipe, how it came to be published in the times.  it's one of those cookbooks that is going to end up on your bedside table, not just in your kitchen.  so, sylvia challenged me to cook something using my christmas gifts.  i'm slightly intimidated...these are recipes that have made it into the new york times.  it's not going to be a recipe you find on the back of a can.  but i'm thinking this will be a good opportunity to expand my skill set.  so here's my plan:

1. i'm going to choose a recipe that has a technique or ingredient that i've never used before
2. i've got to use my kitchen aid to complete my recipe (i know, twisting my arm on this one...)
3. here's the extra fun part...i'm having a progressive dinner on saturday, for my birthday.  my creation is going to be for that dinner, so that hopefully lots of people get to enjoy it!

i'll keep you posted!
-m

the start

this is the start of something...hopefully...

first, some back story...
my sister-in-law, sylvia and i spent quite a bit of our christmas break together looking over the many (many!) blogs out there about crafting, cooking, baking, homemaking, all things for which we have a soft spot in our hearts.  ideally we probably pick a project to pool our talents on, and naturally master :)  slight problem there...well, actually a 3000 mile-wide problem.  sylvia and my brother live in seattle; me, virginia.    being technologically-savvy girls, we decided to set up a blog to document our adventures.  but the fun doesn't stop there!  each week, we won't be choosing our own adventure.  it's going to be like how those choose your own adventure stories were supposed to be, unless you were like me, and checked to see if you were going to die or not before reading on in the story.  so, each week sylvia is going to give me a challenge to complete, and vice versa, posting our experiences along the way.  i'm looking forward to sharing this experience with her, and (hopefully) building our domestic repertoires along the way!

next post from me:  challenge #1!