Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls; Pumpkin Cinnamon Streusel Buns

Day 19 of cooking from THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT and I made some Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls (Pumpkin Cinnamon Streusel Buns as they're called in the cookbook). I was a little unsure about these since I already have a Pumpkin Cinnamon Roll recipe that I've learned to master, and I make a regular cinnamon roll frequently that I've been making for years that my family think are the best ever (they're biased, however). Here's what we thought of these cinnamon rolls...

PUMPKIN-CINNAMON STREUSEL BUNS (Pumpkin Cinnamon Rolls), good, but need just a tad of tweaking...

Surprisingly, these were actually pretty good cinnamon rolls. My hubby was convinced you could not make a "light" version of a cinnamon roll, but lo and behold, this recipe passed the test, even by him. He still prefers my cinnamon rolls, but these cinnamon rolls were acceptable, even to him.

Just a couple edits that should be noted...

The recipe tells you to cut the dough into 12 slices and place in a 9-inch square pan, however, 12 rolls don't fit proportionately in a 9" square pan so I used an 8-inch by 11-inch pan and had them 4x3 in the pan and it worked just fine.

The recipe says to cook them at 375 degrees for 20 minutes, but they needed to go longer. I cooked them at 375 degrees for 25 minutes, and they were still slightly doughy. 30 minutes would probably be more adequate. My usual cinnamon rolls get cooked at 350 degrees for 30 minutes.

And the icing measurements were not appropriate. The book says to use 1 Tbsp water, but it was nowhere near a drizzle consistency, not even a spreadable consistency, it was still dry clumps. I had to add an extra tablespoon to get it to a thick drizzle. I didn't think it was going to be enough icing, but it was just the right amount.

I served these to our Bed and Breakfast guests this morning as well and they all disappeared, so they went over well with the guests also.

Overall, these were a good cinnamon roll and I would make them again if I needed to make a light version.

35 recipes down, 512 more to go.

Lemon Chicken, Layered Chocolate Pudding Dessert

Day 18 of cooking from THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT and I made 2 dishes today... a Lemon Chicken, and a Layered Chocolate Pudding Dessert. Here's what we thought of them...

BAKED CHICKEN WITH LEMON, delicious all around (one of our favorites)...

Everyone loved this chicken. My hubby even said it's one of his top favorites so far, along with the Pan Seared Scallops on Linguine with Tomato-Cream Sauce. The recipe has you soak the chicken in a brine for 8 hours or overnight, saying the uniform salting produces a very moist bird. And we all agree, the chicken was extremely moist. I thought the chicken was slightly salty, which would make sense from it soaking in the brine, but the lemon flavor really was an interesting twist I wouldn't have thought of doing. We all enjoyed it very much, and loved how moist and juicy it was. A definite keeper that we'll make again. And it's really quite easy to make.

OUTRAGEOUS WARM DOUBLE-CHOCOLATE PUDDING, good, rich, chocolate dessert...

For this recipe being "light", which it truly was, at only 257 calories and 7 grams of fat per serving, it was really a good chocolate dessert, that really did seem rich and decadent.

I've made a couple things out of this cookbook that call for fat free evaporated milk, and the other 2 dishes weren't that great, especially the Lasagna Chicken Florentine (our least favorite so far), but it works great with this recipe, especially since you're adding chocolate to it. How can you go wrong with chocolate, and dark chocolate at that? And you use an egg substitute, but we couldn't tell at all. It really was rich and decadent. Not as good as the real thing (not light), but for a substitute when you need to cut calories and fat, this is a definite winner!

This dish has 2 layers to it, so it takes time to make, about 2 hours from start to finish (nearly 1 1/2 hours is baking time). I took a picture after we'd had a few bites so you can see the layers. And the fat free whipped topping is definitely missing the richness of real freshly whipped cream, but it was ok.

This recipe is supposed to be served hot from the oven. We ate it after it has set about 20 minutes because it was done about the same time our dinner was done. It was good "warm", not sure it would have made much difference being "hot". I have taken the extras and put them in the fridge and I'll serve those cold, like a chocolate creme brulee. I think they'll be good. We'll find out when I serve them tomorrow. Will post a follow up to this blog after we've tried them cold.

All in all, a good chocolate dessert, definitely worthy of making again.

34 recipes down, 513 more to go.

Macadamia Cranberry Cookies

Day 17 of cooking from THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT and I made one of the cookies in the cookbook. I made some Macadamia Cranberry Cookies. Here's our thoughts on these cookies...

MACADAMIA BUTTER COOKIES WITH DRIED CRANBERRIES, good flavor, but dry...

These cookies had a wonderful flavor to them, but were dry. I could tell when I made the dough that there was no way it was going to stick together to roll into balls, so I added a few teaspoons of water. It still needed a bit more, or maybe a bit more macadamia butter.

It was interesting to use macadamia "butter". It was really easy to make, just put the macadamia nuts in a food processor and grind them until they're the consistency of butter. I think that's what made the flavor of these cookies so good. Maybe I'll add more macadamia nuts next time around.

I also needed to cook the cookies for an additional 1 1/2 minutes, which happens frequently with the high altitude where I live.

Also, instead of rolling the balls in sugar like you do for peanut butter cookies, you dip just the tops in sugar, and it was plenty sweet enough, but obviously much less sugar.

Overall, we liked these cookies, but they needed to be a little more moist. I will probably tweak on the recipe and make them again, the flavors were very good. I served them at our Bed and Breakfast Inn today. I'll know tomorrow when I chat with the guests how they liked them.

32 recipes down, 515 more to go (looking forward to getting below 500 in another week or two).

Spinach and Chicken Lasagna; Lasagna Chicken Florentine

Today was day 16 of cooking from THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT. Since I'm cooking dinners for my daughter and her hubby as well as for us, I'm trying to keep the dishes simple in flavor this week, without much spice or acids, since she just had a baby and doesn't need that for her or the baby.

Tonight we made Lasagna Chicken Florentine (or Spinach and Chicken Lasagna as we called it). Here's our take on this dinner...

LASAGNA-CHICKEN FLORENTINE, not so good...

None of us really liked this recipe. The sauce was the culprit we're pretty sure, which was made from fat-free evaporated milk. No cheese was in the actual lasagna either, except for a small amount sprinkled on the top during the last 5 minutes of baking. Maybe a little cheese in the layers would have helped the flavor a bit.

One thing I've noticed about some of the recipes in this cookbook, they're not always accurate in their amounts. I had a hard time getting the sauce to thicken. The recipe said it would take about 3 minutes. After 15 minutes and it not getting thick, I added more flour to the sauce mixture, almost double what it called for (which isn't much, called for 3 Tbsp. and we had to use about 5 Tbsp.) to get it to thicken. In reality, it should have been a little thicker than it ended up being, but it was ok.

On a positive note, however, it was an easy recipe to make. Using oven-ready lasagna noodles was a treat and made it easy. And they weren't any more expensive than regular lasagna noodles since they were on sale.

Overall, we didn't care for this recipe and won't make it again :(

And if you're wondering about the brown spots on the salad, it's the balsamic vinaigrette dressing, not bad spinach ;)

31 recipes down, 516 more to go.

Oven Fried Chicken

Well, I haven't posted for the past several days. It's been a whirlwind week around here. My 50th birthday was on Friday and my husband and kids planned a surprise party for me. Most of my family flew in from around the country and surprised me. And the birthday party extended to a birthday weekend celebration. I couldn't have asked for a better present, having nearly all of my direct family here.

My dear hubby decided to make one of my favorite breakfasts for me... Scrambled Eggs Benedict in Puffed Pastry Shells, along with Creamy Hash Browns, Canadian Bacon, and cantaloupe, for my birthday celebration. Here's a picture of his fantastic job. You will notice that my meal is plated beautifully on a plate he heated and garnished with a rosemary sprig. Everyone else had to help themselves from the buffet table and use paper plates. I was definitely spoiled in many ways :)

Then, while most of the family family were still here, my 9 months pregnant daughter went into labor and had her baby Monday morning. It was the icing on the cake of a fabulous weekend! Being a proud Grandma, I just can't resist showing our new granddaughter off to you.

Now, back to our cookbook blog from THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT (nothing compared to this beautiful little angel here). My Mom is still here enjoying her Great Granddaughter, so she and I made dinner together tonight. We made Oven Fried Chicken Thighs with Mustard-Buttermilk Sauce. Here's what we all thought of it...

OVEN-FRIED CHICKEN THIGHS WITH MUSTARD-BUTTERMILK SAUCE, a keeper (one of our favorites)!

This was a really easy dish to make, and it was really good as well. The chicken was really moist on the inside, and had a slight crisp on the outside. There was no oil used to cook it, so I was surprised it could crisp up even a little bit. And the mustard buttermilk sauce was excellent. You dipped the chicken in some of the sauce and then into bread crumbs with Parmesan cheese (wasn't enough though, we had to just about double the bread crumbs and Parmesan cheese mixture), and then baked it. The remaining sauce was warmed right before serving and drizzled over the chicken. The flavors were great. My hubby thought the sauce was honey mustard dressing we'd made and put it on his salad, which was really a good idea, though it would probably have been better cold. But, the sauce can also be doubled as salad dressing we found out.

Overall, a good recipe that everyone enjoyed and would love to eat again.

30 recipes down, 517 more to go.

Banana Pudding, Pork Tenderloin Medallions, Mozzarella Tomato & Basil Couscous

Today was day 14 of cooking from THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT and I made Fresh Mozzarella, Tomato, and Basil Couscous Salad; Pork Medallions with Olive-Caper Sauce; and Banana Pudding. Overall good, but it's all relative to people's personal tastes, likes and dislikes. Read on for our thoughts...

FRESH MOZZARELLA, TOMATO, AND BASIL COUSCOUS SALAD, good, not sure that it was the appropriate side for the pork dish though...

I have never had couscous before, have been a little afraid of it for some reason, but my fears have been laid to rest. This was a good salad, and everyone liked it. I used the leftover buffalo mozzarella from last night's pizza in this, and would probably have liked more mozzarella in the salad. The flavors blended well together, and were mild, nothing was overpowering. This was a cold salad and would have been better served with something other than the pork medallions, but it was good, nonetheless.

PORK MEDALLIONS WITH OLIVE-CAPER SAUCE, excellent pork, the olives and capers were either hit or miss...

This dish I personally loved! However, if you don't like olives or capers, as some people in my family don't like, the dish may not be a favorite. The kalamata olives and capers were added in the last 4 minutes of simmering, so they didn't overpower the flavor of the pork. The pork tenderloin was delicious and very tender, everyone loved the pork, even if they scraped off the olives and capers ;) This was definitely a dish I would make again. Hubby's comment about it was it was good, but not one of his favorites, which is his polite way of saying "you don't have to make this one again". I think if it didn't have the olives and capers he would have been fine with it. As for me, and the rest of the family, we all loved it just the way it was. I recommend this recipe, and it was really easy to make :)

BANANA PUDDING, a winner for everyone...

This recipe was good, but I think it would have been better served cold. The recipe says it can be served warm or cold, and I ended up making it this afternoon so it was still warm when we served it. I made the mistake of buying mini vanilla wafers instead of regular sized vanilla wafers, and didn't realize it until I went to create this dish. I don't think I put enough vanilla wafers on the bottom and middle of the dish, and it could have used more. But other than that, everyone was as directed. When we scooped into the pudding to serve it, the pudding/custard was oozing water, but after we scooped out the first serving, it seemed to evaporate or get dissolved, but went away for some reason. Maybe if the pudding were cold it wouldn't have had the watery consistency to it. At any rate, it was still very good and everyone enjoyed it. And the meringue on top really gave it a nice flavor as well. My hubby even said we could make this in small individual dishes and serve it to our Bed and Breakfast guests, which I probably will, but cold, which will be nice because I can make the pudding itself the day before and just add the meringue and brown the top in the morning. Definitely a keeper recipe for sure.

29 recipes down, 518 more to go (it doesn't seem like the number to go is really moving much, this will be a long project, hope I can finish in a year!)

Whole Wheat Pizza Dough (Bufalina Pizza), Tomato Basil Soup, Field Green Salad

Today was day 13 of cooking from THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT. My parents are here visiting so I got to cook for them as well as my daughter and son in law. I had planned a 4-course dinner with dessert, but by the time we got back from picking them up from the airport and stopping at the grocery store we didn't get home until after 5:00 so I ended up skipping dessert for tonight. We'll save that for tomorrow.

Today I made a Field Salad with Roasted Leeks, Mushrooms, and Feta; Tomato Basil Soup; and Whole Wheat Pizza (Bufalina Pizza, more about that later on).

FIELD SALAD WITH ROASTED LEEKS, MUSHROOMS, AND FETA, a good salad...

This salad was easy to make. You actually roasted the sliced leeks in a tiny amount of olive oil in the oven to brown them. I had a problem with some of them burning and others not browning. Stirring them halfway through the roasting process would have been a good idea. However, they really added a good flavor to the salad. And my Dad, who is not a spinach fan, liked this salad, and didn't realize there was spinach in the salad until I told him. The salad has spinach and arugula in it, as well as mushrooms, leeks, and feta cheese (the picture shown here does not include the feta, I forgot to add it to the salad bowl, so we added it to our plates after we dished it up). I did have a problem finding the dressing the recipe called for. It called for light dill-mustard dressing, which I could not find anywhere. I ended up using a honey-mustard dressing and adding some dill weed to it. It more more heavy on the honey mustard and less of the dill. Wish I could have found the appropriate dressing so I could have tasted it how it was meant, but it was a good salad, and my daughter's favorite of the 3 dishes I served.

TOMATO-BASIL SOUP, a good homemade tomato soup with good flavors...

Almost everyone liked this soup. My daughter is not much of a tomato soup fan so this wasn't her favorite dish. My Dad, who says tomato soup is his favorite soup, liked it a lot. The recipe calls for low sodium tomato juice. I could find tomato juice butn ot low sodium tomato juice. The only thing I could find that was low sodium was V-8 juice. Since V-8 juice is more tomato than any over vegetable, that's what I ended up using. The flavor of the basil isn't overpowering. There is cream cheese in this, and try as I might, I could not get all the tiny little pieces to melt, so my picture is not as pretty as the picture in the cookbook. But this is a good tomato basil soup recipe.

WHOLE WHEAT PIZZA DOUGH (Bufalina Pizza, as I made), a hit with everyone!

The recipe in the cookbook is for Whole Wheat Pizza Dough, just the dough. You can make whatever you want for the pizza itself. There are not instructions in the cookbook on what to do with the dough, how to cook it, what to top it with, etc. There is another recipe in the cookbook for Caramelized Onion Pizza with Gorgonzola and Arugula, which uses this dough, and I'll make that another day in the future.

I made the Bufalina pizza for my husband. We went to Italy this past summer and when we were in Venice we ordered Bufalina pizza (Buffalo pizza). It was the best pizza and best mozzarella cheese we'd ever had. We liked it so much we went back the next day to get it again for lunch. It didn't turn out so well the 2nd time. Long story short... different cook, different pizza. Same ingredients, but you're going to get it however that particular cook decides it should be served, and it was not the same as the previous day. It was good, but not nearly as good since it was prepared completely different.

A little information on what Buffalo mozzarella is... it is mozzarella cheese made from water buffalo milk rather than cow milk, and is officially called Mozzarella di Bufala. It is pictured here, and is softer than regular mozzarella that we've had here in America. When the pizza was cooking the mozzarella was oozing a bit of juices and making the top seem watery, but it ended up evaporating through the cooking process.

Anyway, when my hubby was at Costco the other day he found the Buffalo Mozzarella cheese, imported from Italy, and bought it. I tried to replicate the pizza like we had it in Venice. It had the crust, tomato sauce, whole basil leaves, sliced tomato and the buffalo mozzarella. It was good. We really liked the flavor of the mozzarella, and it is by far the best mozzarella you can ever get. Everyone liked it, and it was a big hit with everyone.

As for the whole wheat pizza dough recipe in the cookbook, it was good. I have another pizza dough recipe that I usually make that we really like (not whole wheat, however), so I was interested to try this one. The crust is more of a medium crust, not thin, but not really thick either. I think I'd make it a little more on the thin side next time. But it was good, definitely worth the little effort it took to make it.

Overall, it was a good dinner, with great company!

26 recipes down, 521 more to go.

Blueberry Crisp Recipe, Berry Crisp Recipe

Today was day 12 of cooking from THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT and I just went with a dessert tonight.  The dish today was a blueberry crisp recipe, but I made a triple berry crisp recipe instead. Here's our thoughts on this recipe...

BLUEBERRY CRISP a la MODE... EXCELLENT (one of our favorites)!!!!!!

I think this is my favorite recipe that I've made so far. After doing a number of recipes in this cookbook exactly as directed, there's been a lot of them that I would have tweaked on or changed slightly, so I decided today I'm just going to take the recipes from the cookbook and tweak on them and change them up a little to suit our family and our likes or dislikes. So, with that in mind, I decided to not just do "blueberries, but make it a triple berry crisp. I used blueberries, blackberries and raspberries, and it was absolutely delicious! I'm sure it would have been just as good with just blueberries, but I happened to have the three berries on hand so used them, and I'm glad I did.

The other thing I tweaked on was that it was supposed to be baked in an 11 x 7-inch baking dish. I put it in three small pie dishes, which serve 2 each. I thought the portions were perfect. My hubby and I split one, and my daughter and son-in-law split one, and we have an extra one for tomorrow.

Also, the recipe calls for low fat frozen yogurt to put on top. I had vanilla ice cream on hand and just used that instead. I know it's not "light", but just wanted to use what I had. Not sure that it ended up being a "light" version of the crisp since I didn't use yogurt, but it sure was worth every calorie! I will definitely keep this recipe and make it again, and will probably make it for my Bed and Breakfast guests as their dessert course sometime.

23 recipes down, 524 more to go.

Seafood Fettuccine

Today was day 11 of cooking from THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT. My oldest daughter saw my post when I made Pan Seared Scallops on Linguine with Tomato-Cream Sauce and said she wanted me to make it for her. I said I'd make it for her the next time she came to visit. She and her family are visiting this weekend, and since there are other scallop with pasta recipes in this cookbook I thought I'd try out one of the others on the family tonight, so made the Seafood Fettuccine recipe tonight. Here's our thoughts on this recipe...

SEAFOOD FETTUCCINE, pros and cons...

This recipe called for shrimp, sea scallops, and lump crabmeat. The shrimp and scallops were great in the recipe, but the crab meat was not, it was really fishy. That could have been just the crab meat we bought, who knows, but we are not fans of our fish and seafood being "fishy", which often comes from it not being fresh. It also came out very "soupy". The recipe calls for 2 cups of half and half, but it was way too much and made the dish more soup like than sauce or cream like. I think 1 cup of half and half would have been sufficient. 

And the portion sizes were just right. The recipe said it serves 8, which at first we thought was not going to be enough for 6 of us, especially since my hubby likes to eat at least 4 portions of pasta, minimum, just for himself. But we all had our fill, and then some, and there was still some leftover. So it truly would have served 8 people with just the right size portions.

With the exception of the crab meat being fishy, the dish was good. Not sure I'd make it again. We liked the Pan Seared Scallops on Linguine with Tomato-Cream Sauce better than this dish.

And another comment made by my husband after he went shopping yesterday for groceries and took note of the cost of everything... this book is called "Cooking Light", not "Cooking Cheap". It's expensive for many of these recipes! The dish tonight cost about $40 to make. Since it served 8 people it works out to $5 per person, but still, it's expensive to cook like this every day. Most of the time I'm just cooking for 2 so I cut the recipes down to appropriate sizes. But still, these dishes are not cheap!

22 recipes down, 525 more to go.

Baked Macaroni and Cheese, Italian Meatloaf

Today was day 10 cooking from THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT. We are babysitting our 2 grandsons for the weekend, ages 3 and almost 2, and since they're kids, I needed to do kid friendly recipes. I made a classic baked macaroni and cheese, and an Italian meat loaf, knowing the boys like both of these dishes. Here's how they turned out...

ITALIAN MEAT LOAF WITH FRESH BASIL AND PROVOLONE, excellent!

I wasn't sure how this was going to over over with the boys, since it did have some fancy ingredients in it... sun dried tomatoes and fresh basil, but both boys ate it, which I was happy about. Everyone else that was here tried it as well, including our two daughters and their husbands. Everyone absolutely loved it. The fresh basil in the recipe really made the Italian flavor stand out. I really do love cooking with fresh herbs and ingredients, they make a big difference in recipes. And my husband is a huge sun dried tomato fan, and he liked it quite a bit as well. Everyone said this is a definite keeper recipe, and there is no tweaking that needs to be done with it. An easy recipe that everyone liked.

CLASSIC TWO CHEESE MACARONI (Baked Macaroni and Cheese), how can you go wrong with macaroni and cheese?! There are three macaroni and cheese recipes in this cookbook, and I went with this one as it's the simplest of all three recipes, and I figured simple for the kids would be better. The flavors were excellent. Ok, I have to admit I'm one of those people that grew up eating the box mix macaroni and cheese, and I'm used to the super creamy mac & cheese. I've only had baked macaroni and cheese a couple other times before this, and both times I thought the dishes were dry. I thought maybe they just needed a little more milk or cheese or something. But this recipe was pretty much like that as well, not as creamy and wet as the boxed macaroni and cheese is. If I could get this a little wetter it would have been perfect. For a simple classic dish, it was good, especially the flavors. One thing I could find, however, was "light" Velveeta cheese, which the recipe calls for. We could only find regular Velveeta, so I'm not sure this really was a "light" version. However, everyone liked it. I'm looking forward to trying the other two macaroni and cheese dishes in this cookbook in the future.

21 recipes down, 526 more to go.

Caramel Chocolate Brownies, Easy Chocolate Caramel Brownies

Today is day 9 of cooking from THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT I decided to do just one recipe today, but make it a good one (hopefully). I made Caramel Chocolate Brownies (Easy Chocolate Caramel Brownies as the cookbook calls it). Here's our take on these brownies...

EASY CHOCOLATE CARAMEL BROWNIES (Chocolate Caramel Brownies is what we're calling them), most definitely definitely delicious!

Ok, these were petty easy. There still were several steps to making them, but they really were easy. I probably only spent about 20 minutes total on the actual work of making them, plus the bake time.

The recipe called for reduced fat chocolate baking chips, but I couldn't find any, even after going to 2 different stores, so I just used regular chocolate chips. There's only 1/2 cup in the recipe, so the difference in calories and fat per serving was pretty minimal.

The recipe said to spray with cooking spray and flour the bottom only of the baking pan, but because there's caramel in here, it stuck to the sides of the pan and I had to use a knife to really scrape out the sides. Next time I'd probably spray the sides of the pan as well, and just spray and flour the bottom of the pan.

The recipe says to spread 2/3 of the batter on the bottom of the pan, and it would be thin. Because the batter was so stiff, it would be difficult to "spread" it out across the whole pan, I ended up dropping small amounts all throughout the bottom and spreading it out that way, which made it a little easier to spread along the bottom of the pan.

I think they were cooked slightly too long as well. Next time I'll reduce the final baking time by 5 minutes and I think they'll come out a little softer. They're soft in the middle, but the edges and tops are harder. The recipe says to put the pieces in the microwave for 10 seconds to soften them if you want softer brownies. We ate them while they were still slightly warm (the best way to eat brownies I think), so they were still soft on the inside, but hard around the edges.

However, the flavor of these brownies were very good. We all agreed we liked them a lot and could definitely make them again. I'm going to be serving them to by bed and breakfast guests this afternoon as well. They'll probably never know they're a "light" brownie!

Finally, the recipe says to cut these into 36 pieces, which we feel are much too small, so I cut them into 24 pieces. Yes, we know, more calories and fat, but hey, being a lighter version, it's ok, right?!

19 recipes down, 528 more to go.

Mushroom and Swiss Burgers, Garlic Fries

Day 8 of cooking from THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT was a comfort food meal of burgers and fries (Mary, this meal's for you, being simple folk that we are!!!). They were good, but there's still a bit of a learning curve and adjustments that need to be made to recipes. Here's our take on these 2 dishes...

SMOTHERED BURGERS (Mushroom & Swiss Burgers as we called them), good burgers, but I used too much meat...

The recipe called for 1 lb of ground chuck, which you're supposed to use for 4 servings. I couldn't find ground chuck so used ground sirloin. The meat was good and really juicy. I made the mistake of thinking the 1 pound of meat I has was for 2 portions since I cut almost all the recipes down to 2 serving sizes, and only made 2 burgers out of the one pound of meat. They were really big burgers (of course, each burger was 1/2 pound). They took longer to cook, and were really big burgers. Not a problem with my hubby however, as he ate his entire burger. I ate half of mine and that was plenty. The meat is definitely meant for 4 servings, not 2. However, the burgers were really good and tasty, definitely ones we'd make again, with the right portion size.

GARLIC FRIES, good flavor, but were really overcooked...

We really liked the flavor of these fries, but the cooking time was much too long on these. The fries were cut shoestring size (1/4-inch-thick-strips), and were supposed to bake at 400 degrees for a total of 50 minutes, which was much too long. I think 35-40 minutes would have been more appropriate. I was distracted doing other things and didn't check the fries sooner, so they ended up getting way too overcooked and were very overdone. What we did like about these was the fact that they most definitely DO crisp up in the oven when they're baked. And after they're baked you toss them in a pan with a little butter, garlic, fresh parsley and Parmesan cheese. That really added a good flavor to them. I will definitely make these again, and watch the cooking time on them next time to make sure they don't burn. This is a keeper recipe.

18 recipes down, 529 more to go.

Caesar Potato Salad, Chicken with Rosemary Sauce

Today completes my first week of cooking from THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT. I made a Caesar Potato Salad and Chicken with Rosemary Sauce tonight. Here's our thoughts on these dishes...

CAESAR POTATO SALAD, robust flavors!

The dressing in this salad was really strong, and a bit too much of it for my liking. I think if I had marinated the potatoes in it longer (I only had about 1/2 hour of marinading time) the dressing may have been able to absorb a little more into the potatoes and not been so strong, and so much of it, on the actual salad. I would have also liked more lettuce in the salad. I added a little more than what the recipe called for, but would have liked even more. I think shredded Parmesan cheese would also be better than the shaved pieces. It was good, but could have been a little milder. Maybe next time I'd add a little less anchovy paste (yes, you read right... anchovy paste, which is what makes it "Caesar", it has 1 tsp. in the recipe), and a little less balsamic vinegar as well might have toned the flavors down a little bit.

CHICKEN WITH ROSEMARY SAUCE, also good, and worthy of making again...

This recipe was pretty easy to make. It seemed a little on the salty side, but maybe I sprinkled a little too much salt on the chicken breasts before I cooked them. The chicken also took about twice as long to cook as the recipe said, and the sauce cooked down too much. I added an extra tablespoon of chicken broth at the end to bring some of the sauce back, which may have also accounted for the slightly salty flavor, even though it was low sodium chicken broth.

Brian liked both of these recipes. He agreed the chicken was a little too salty, but he liked the flavors, and it was his suggestion to cut down on the balsamic vinegar and the anchovy paste next time, a good suggestion I think I'll try.

16 recipes down, 531 more to go.

Jalapeno Corn Bread, Corn Pie, Tomato Salsa

Today was day 6 of cooking from "THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT". I made a Buttercrust Corn Pie with Fresh Tomato Salsa, and Jalapeno Corn Bread. I didn't think these would be a hit, especially with my hubby because I knew he didn't like some of the ingredients, but I wanted to keep the recipe true to how it was written. Here's what we thought, and what I might do to tweak on it a little...

BUTTERCRUST CORN PIE WITH FRESH TOMATO SALSA, pie was ok, salsa was good...

I didn't think this would go over well with my hubby as he doesn't usually like corn cooked in things, and really hates olives. There's not very much olives in the pie, only 2 tablespoons, so I didn't tell him, but of course you can see them in the pie. His first word after his first bite was "olives", so I knew he didn't care for it. But that's a personal taste preference, I personally like olives and couldn't really taste them in the pie at all. I tasted corn more than anything. The crust, however, was dry and crumbly and didn't hold up at all. It needed more butter in the crust mixture. It calls for 3 Tbsp, but should have probably been 4 Tbsp. instead. When you ate the pie with the salsa, however, it was very good. Hubby probably won't have any more of the pie, so I'll end up eating the rest of it. The salsa, however, he really liked. It was made with lemon juice, but I think lime juice would be a better substitute. We've been to Mexico a few times and they don't use lemons or lemon juice, they use lime. I think I'll use lime juice next time. I may also add a little cilantro to the salsa as well next time. It was a good fresh tomato salsa, however.

JALAPENO CORN BREAD, this was good...

When I first made the batter for this bread and poured it in the pan I thought it was too dry and stiff, and though I still think it was a little dry, it wasn't nearly as dry as I thought it would be, it actually turned out pretty good, just slightly on the dry side. I didn't think my hubby would like this bread either because he doesn't like whole corn in his corn bread. However, he liked it and said it was a good savory corn bread that I could make again. I was pleasantly surprised that he liked it. It was a savory corn bread, not a sweet bread. I liked the flavors of the jalapenos and red peppers in the corn bread, and you could taste the cumin in it as well, which was a nice touch. Instead of using canned whole corn, I may use creamed corn instead to add a little extra moisture to the cornbread next time. Though there are almost 1/2 cup of jalapenos in the corn bread, it was mild and it wasn't spicy. Will probably make this recipe again as a side the next time I make a Mexican dish, it was good.

One thing I have noticed about most of the recipes I've cooked out of this cookbook... it's a LOT of work and VERY time consuming. These are not easy recipes and have a lot of prep work involved. For these recipes, however, I bought fresh jalapenos and roasted, peeled, and seeded them, which took about 45 minutes. It takes me about 2 hours or so to prepare dinner every day, which is not really something I have extra time for owning and operating a Bed and Breakfast Inn. But, we're eating good, healthy dinners. If you're looking for quick and easy meals to prepare, this cookbook is not for you. If you're looking for a lighter version of good food, there's some good recipes in here. Will keep at it.

14 recipes down, 533 more to go.

Baked Potato Soup, Beer Cheese Bread

Today was Day 5 of cooking from "THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT". My daughter asked what I was making for dinner tonight, and when I told her the recipes I was going to make she said "no, not that, what else?" So I told her what I'd be making tomorrow and she wanted me to make that instead, so I switched today & tomorrow's dinners for her. Then to top it off, my son, who lives an hour and a half away in college showed up to surprise me for the afternoon and evening, so he was home for dinner too. Instead of 2 of us at the table for dinner we had 5, which was wonderful. I love having my family around and miss those times when the kids were growing up when we always had dinner together and had many lively conversations around the table together. When we get together now we still have those conversations where we talk about anything and everything, laugh, and share joys and trials of life. I think dinners together are SO very important, and no matter how busy we are we should always take time to share meals together. Anyway, on to the food... today's dinner was Baked Potato Soup and Beer Cheese Bread. I was looking forward to trying both of these recipes since I absolutely love carbs, potatoes, cheese, and bread.

BAKED POTATO SOUP, a good, hardy meal with lots of flavor...

We all liked this dish, though it was a bit heavy, even though it was "lighter" than a typical baked potato soup recipe. I ended up adding an extra potato to the recipe because I didn't think it had enough potato flavor for me. The toppings really made a huge difference in making it really taste like "baked potato". I have another potato-cheese soup recipe that I make that I think the family likes better than this one. But it's a tasty recipe and quite filling.

BEER CHEESE BREAD, a hit with everyone...

I had a little trouble with the bread at the beginning, which I will probably tweak on a bit when I make it again in the future (I WILL make this recipe again and tweak on it since everyone liked it so much). I make breads and cinnamon rolls and can tell by the feel and texture of the dough if it's going to work or not, and when I added the 2nd amount of flour as described in the recipe, it was too tough and I knew it wouldn't turn out right. It didn't rise quite as much as it should have and was a bit more dense, rather than lighter. Next time I make it I will only add 1 cup of flour in the second addition of flour instead of the 1 1/2 cups of flour the recipe calls for, and gradually add in more if I need it. Too much flour made the bread a little denser than it should have been. The recipe called for it being light and it wasn't. But I think that can be an easy fix next time around by decreasing the flour a little bit. However, the family didn't care about the density and loved the flavor and ate 2/3 of the loaf of bread (that says it will serve 16!). This is a keeper recipe and I'm sure will be fantastic with just a little tweaking.

12 recipes down, 535 more to go!

If you're wondering about the recipes, I can't post them all because of copyright laws, but I will share 1 recipe a month as our favorite of the month. However, you can buy the cookbook here.

Beef with Rosemary Mushroom Sauce, Onion & Horseradish Potatoes

Day 4 of cooking from "THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT" produced 2 dishes... Beef with Rosemary-Mushroom Sauce and Caramelized Onion & Horseradish Mashed Potatoes.

Ok, so the picture doesn't look that great, I know, it looks a bit sloppy, I wasn't happy about how I plated and photographed this. I was cooking this for my daughter and son in law, and my daughter had to be out the door in less than 15 minutes so I was in a hurry to finish making this meal, and getting it served on time. So sorry about the sloppy presentation and picture.

BEEF WITH ROSEMARY-MUSHROOM SAUCE, good, but not sure about the sweetness of the sauce...

Everyone seemed to like it, but the sauce almost seemed a little sweet, which may have been from the balsamic vinegar in it, but there was only 1 tsp. in the sauce, so not much. I did, however, in my hurry to get this dish served, forget to add the garlic to the sauce when I was cooking it, which I'm sure made a difference in the flavor. There is red wine in the sauce as well, and the flavor may depend on the type of wine you use too, I'm sure. Everyone liked the sauce with the meat, however. I was excited to use to a new grill pan I bought to cook the steak on. It worked great, don't know why I never bought one before, even had the pretty little grill lines on the meat before we cut it, I was pleased with myself about that. I'd probably make this dish again, but experiment a little bit with the sauce, first try adding the garlic and see if that does the trick. Also serving them with a plain mashed potato instead of the sweet onion potato may have been better, as the sauce will flavor the potatoes.

CARAMELIZED ONION & HORSERADISH MASHED POTATOES, loved these, but may not have been the right potatoes to serve with this particular meat dish...

We all really liked these potatoes, especially the sweetness of the caramelized onion in them. I wasn't sure I was going to like the Dijon mustard and horseradish flavors in the potatoes, but it really worked. I used sweet onions, but regular onions would have worked fine too. Serving them with this particular meat dish made it all seem a little bit too sweet, though. I'd make these again, but would serve them with something without a sauce probably.

10 recipes down, 537 more to go!

Gingersnap Scones, Scallops with Linguine, Gingerbread with Lemon Glaze

Day 3 of Cooking from "THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT" and I made Gingersnap Scones with Espresso Glaze for breakfast this morning, Pan-Seared Scallops on Linguine with Tomato-Cream Sauce for dinner, and Warm Gingerbread with Lemon Glaze.

GINGERSNAP SCONES WITH ESPRESSO GLAZE, good but needs a tiny bit of tweaking...
I changed the recipe just a little. The recipe called for the dough to be rolled out to a 10-inch circle and cut into 10 scones. I thought they would be a bit on the thin side if I did that, so I rolled the dough into an 8-inch circle and cut it into 8 scones. I liked the size of the scones. The texture of the scones was good, not as dry as scones normally are, and we liked that about these scones. The glaze was much too thick and not of a "drizzle" consistency, so I needed to add additional water to it to thin it enough to drizzle on the scones. We liked the flavor of the icing. The scones themselves were not sweet and the icing helped with that. I didn't really care for the walnut on top, so I only put the walnut (for garnish, really) on half the scones. We served these to our guests in our Bed and Breakfast Inn, Rocky Mountain Lodge & Cabins, this morning, and they were a hit. I'd make this recipe again, the same way I made them this time, but without the walnuts.

PAN-SEARED SCALLOPS ON LINGUINE WITH TOMATO-CREAM SAUCE, Brian said a 10 on a scale of 1-10 (obviously one of our favorites)...

Since Brian can never get enough pasta, and loves scallops, I thought I'd make this recipe for him. He loved it and said I could make this recipe as much as I wanted and he'd eat it over and over again. The only variation I made on this recipe was that I used whole wheat linguine instead of regular linguine. Part of the recipe was a little unclear; it called for 1 1/2 cups hot cooked linguine, but it did not tell you how many ounces of dry pasta to cook. I cooked about 6 1/2 ounces of dry pasta, which I think was more than 1 1/2 cups, but Brian says you can never have too much pasta. The recipe said to cook the scallops for 2 minutes on each side, but the scallops did not look done on the sides so I cooked them for 3 minutes on each side, and they were done perfectly. Chef Gordon Ramsey would not have reason to throw these scallops out for being raw or overcooked (in my humble opinion). The portions seemed to be large, but that could be because I had a little more pasta than the recipe called for, but there were a lot of scallops too. So far, this has been Brian's absolute favorite recipe.

WARM GINGERBREAD WITH LEMON GLAZE, good, but needed more glaze...
I have another gingerbread with lemon sauce recipe that I make every year for Christmas, it's Brian's favorite Christmas dessert. I didn't make it this year because I wanted to make plum pudding instead (which took a month to prep and make) for a novelty. We'll be going back to gingerbread next year. Anyway, this recipe was up against my gingerbread recipe, and although this recipe was good, we still prefer my standby recipe. We liked the bites with the lemon glaze through the cake, but thought the gingerbread itself lacked a little flavor and the bites that didn't have the glaze throughout it was a little dry. The flavor of the lemon glaze was delicious, however, there was a lot of fresh squeezed lemon juice in it. We like my other recipe where you serve warm lemon sauce over the cake. And the frozen reduced-fat whipped topping does not stand a chance against home made real whipped cream.

Man, you'd think I was a food critic the way I talk about these recipes, sheesh! We ARE enjoying eating them. I don't think Brian likes the clean up afterwards though ;)

8 recipes down, 539 more to go.

Until tomorrow...

Champagne Feta Risotto, Artichoke Stuffed Chicken Breasts

Today was day two of cooking from my "THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT" cookbook. Today I made two recipes, a Champagne Feta Risotto, and Chicken Breasts Stuffed with Artichokes, Lemon and Goat Cheese.

The picture is not very flattering, and the white risotto, and white chicken on the white plate doesn't do a whole lot for contrast either. I actually added parsley and lemon just for a little color on the plate. Here's the synopsis of these dishes...

CHAMPAGNE-FETA RISOTTO, we loved it...

This was my first time cooking risotto. I've seen this cooked on cooking shows a lot and have wanted to try it, so this was a great opportunity. We're not big on champagne around here and don't drink it, but I used it in the recipe as directed and we loved the flavor it added to the risotto. You boil it down until the liquid is absorbed, so all you end up with is the flavor. I needed to add more liquid though because when the rice was still crunchy a bit when the liquid was absorbed. We live at 7,500 feet and altitude can wreak havoc on recipes sometimes, and I usually do have to add extra liquid to rice when I cook it, and it was the same in this case. I tasted the risotto while it was cooking and throughout the process and found that I liked it a little better without the feta in it. Overall, it was delicious and we both decided we love risotto! This recipe is a keeper, I may skip the feta next time, however.

CHICKEN BREASTS STUFFED WITH ARTICHOKES, LEMON, AND GOAT CHEESE, good flavor, but they were overcooked and a little dry...

I've never been good at the whole pounding the chicken out, stuffing it and rolling it up thing. They usually turn out to be a mess and I have a hard time getting them to look pretty once they're rolled up, and tucking in the edges so nothing comes out... forget it! I think I used too much stuffing, but I did the amount according to the directions. Maybe a little less stuffing next time. Also, according to the directions you're supposed to cook the chicken in a hot pan on the stove for 3 minutes on each side, then put the whole pan in the oven and bake them for an additional 15 minutes. I think that 10-12 minutes would have been better, and turning them over halfway through is highly advisable as the side of the chicken that was down was very over cooked on the edge and tough to cut through the edge. The flavors, however, were good. Brian liked them and I thought they were just "ok". Not sure I'd make this one again.

I was going to make a dessert tonight as well, but it's been a long, busy day and I'm pooped. After this I'm off to bed, and it's only 8:35 pm! Will make a dessert tomorrow (I hope)...

Au Revoir!

Carrot Ginger Soup, Onion Bread Pudding, Spinach Pear Salad

So, today was my first day cooking out of "THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT". I made 3 recipes tonight... Spinach-Pear Salad, Carrot-Ginger Soup, and Onion Bread Pudding (a meatless main dish according to the cookbook category). Since I was just cooking for 2 of us, I cut all the recipes in half. Here are my comments on all of the recipes...

The SPINACH PEAR SALAD was my favorite...

This was super easy to make, and took less than 10 minutes from start to finish, including making the dressing. I made the dressing while the other dishes were cooking and let it rest to allow the flavors to blend. I thought it had too much dressing so when I plated the salad I didn't add the rest of the dressing from bowl. I loved the flavors of the pears when you ate them with the salad, and they went well with the dressing. But, the recipe was supposed to include red onion pieces and I forgot to add them at the end. Since I'm not a big fan of raw onions I was ok with forgetting them, but it make the recipe not 100% accurate. I would definitely  make this recipe again, and Brian like it as well.

The CARROT-GINGER SOUP, it was good, but a LOT of work...

This soup took an hour of prep work, and then an hour of simmer time, and then a few more minutes at the end to add the final ingredients and puree the soup. The thing I hated the most was having to make ginger juice from ginger root... a total pain... peel the ginger, dice it up, put it in the food processor with some water and puree it. Because it was such a small amount you had to keep stopping every couple pulses and scrape down the sides. Then once you got it pureed you had to put it in a cheesecloth and squeeze out the juices to get ginger juice. The results, however, were absolutely tremendous and the flavors were delicious. It was very good and we liked it quite a bit, but I'm not sure it was worth all the work and effort. But, I guess all good things come at a price, right?

ONION BREAD PUDDING, Brian's favorite...

This was a really easy recipe to make, it only took about 15 minutes of prep time and 25 minutes to bake.

I made these in 2 small individual pie dishes and thought the portions were still a little big, even though according to the recipe this amount would serve two. Brian ate all of his and I ate about two thirds of mine. I really liked the onion flavor on this and thought a little more onion on top would have been nicer. The onions were sweet onions so the flavor was really nice. And there was also some Gruyere cheese in it as well, which I really love. I would definitely make this again, and add a little more onion to it.

We also had some Beringer Chenin Blanc white wine with this meal. We are not wine connoisseurs by any means, and really don't know how to pair wines with our foods, but hopefully we'll learn a little bit. We can usually tell if it should be a red or white wine, but that's about as far as our expertise goes. When we go to our favorite Restaurant, the Black Bear Restaurant in Green Mountain Falls, we usually split a wine pairing with our Chef's Table and we love it when a good glass of wine compliments a meal, but we just don't know how to do that. This was probably the first time we actually 'guessed' right! The Chenin Blanc went perfectly with this meal, we were pleasantly surprised.

So, 3 recipes down, 544 more to go. Will be back tomorrow night with results from tomorrow's dinner.

Bon Appetit!

About the Cookbook Blogger

My name is Debbie Reynolds, and I LOVE to cook and eat! I didn't always know how to cook, but I have always love to eat! I grew up in a family where my Mom was always cooking great home made meals for our family, and entertaining family and friends, but I never learned how to cook until after I got married.

When I got married someone gave me a Betty Crocker cookbook for my bridal shower and I learned how to cook from that cookbook. To this day I ALWAYS give a cookbook to brides for their bridal showers.

I was a stay at home wife, and once we had children, a stay at home Mom. We were pretty broke when we first got married and our grocery budget was $5.00 per week for the two of us. Needless to say we didn't eat gourmet meals back then! We got government food boxes once a month which consisted of dried pinto beans, rice, powdered milk, blocks of American cheese (like Velveeta I remember thinking), canned shredded pork, and lard. There was probably a little bit more in there but I can't remember, it's been so long ago. I'd get the grocery ads for the week and find out what was on sale and plan out my menu for the week according to what was on sale and what I could create around those items. I lived in Arizona at the time and learned to make tortillas and Mexican food, and you could really stretch your food on that $5.00 per week. I remember eating a lot of burritos and beans.

Little by little as our grocery budget would grow I'd splurge and buy different ingredients and experiment with the recipes in that Betty Crocker cookbook. I discovered then how much I loved cooking and trying new recipes, and trying to be creative and change up the recipes in the cookbook.

My Betty Crocker cookbook is quite worn out, the binding is gone, pages have stuck together and torn, but it's still in my pantry and I still refer back to that cookbook from time to time. My cookbook collection has also grown to several hundred cookbooks over the years (to my husband's dismay). Not only do I collect cookbooks, but I have boxes of cooking magazines as well. I just can't help myself. I flip through cookbooks whenever I'm at the grocery store or Sam's Club or Wal-Mart, and if I see several recipes in a cookbook that I want to try I get the cookbook or magazine. My family give me a hard time about how many cookbooks and magazines I have and I swear I'm going to use them all (at least some recipes in each cookbook) over the course of my lifetime.

Several years ago we bought a Bed and Breakfast Inn, Rocky Mountain Lodge & Cabins, in Cascade, Colorado, and I have the wonderful opportunity of cooking for our many guests. We serve a gourmet 3-course breakfast to our guests each morning. I enjoy finding new recipes and trying out new foods on our guests. I love to serve breakfasts that you don't make at home every day. My philosophy is you're on vacation, you're my guest, and I'm going to spoil you, starting with breakfast!

I often look through my cookbooks and watch TV cooking shows to get new ideas. I've been inspired lately to start using my cookbooks more. There's no way I'll be able to go through every recipe in every cookbook, so I'm just going to pick one cookbook at a time and start cooking my way through them.

The first decision was to decide which of the hundreds of cookbooks I have I want to start with. I went into my pantry this morning and glanced through some of the titles and decided to go with THE BEST OF COOKING LIGHT. There are lots of other cookbooks I could have chosen, but I figured if I'm going to be cooking on a regular basis again I shouldn't start with a cookbook that would cause us to gain tons of weight right off the bat. And I think a gym membership is in the plans as well.

We're empty nesters now and I don't always cook everyday for just my hubby and myself. I'll cook breakfast for the B&B guests, and by the time dinner time rolls around I've had a busy day and I'm pooped and don't have the energy for cooking a nice home made fancy dinner.

However, I'm going to get back to my planning menus days (I do plan breakfast menus for the B&B) and start cooking some good dinners, salads, lunches, desserts, etc. There are breakfast and dessert recipes that I'm sure will make their way to the B&B for our guests to enjoy as well.

Now, off to the grocery store... first dishes will be made tomorrow.