Try it!

Hello all,

I am a novice cook and even more novice baker. I am messy in the kitchen and I LIKE IT! Ryan doesn't however. Ryan is a wonderful baker-- he makes half a dozen loaves of bread in and evening and is very clean and efficient. I admire his talent. I want to become a better cook/baker also, so I can feed my family good food too. So, I made it a personal goal to try to make something out of Ryan's mothers cookbook, or something completely new I have never even considered making. Doing this at least once a week on my days off-- if I am home. Last week we were gone so that didn't pan out well, but other than that I have tried to make quite a few things already, and most of them I was completely and pleasantly surprised at the turnout. Here are the things I have tried:

The Cheesecake Nibbles-- which you can get the recipe in an earlier post here.

Apple Cake with Apple syrup- Yum!

I tried Holly's pot roast in our convection oven, I thought its was --okay. I had picked a tough piece of meat to try, but the convection oven made it much more tender, the veggies didn't cook very well and had to stick them in the microwave.... its was okay though. I will have to try again sometime.

Stir fry made with tofu. I have never done anything with or even ate tofu (knowingly) before. It actually turned out great. The Woman's Day magazine also gave some great sauces to make with it and different ideas for add ins. I have made it twice now with a different sauce and different veggies. The sweet and sour sauce was excellent, last night we tried the peanut sauce-- I liked it at first but after some time the sauce made me want to vomit in my mouth a little. Ryan wants to have it again however. Ryan doesn't like peppers or mushrooms, so that limits some of my options, but I realized there are a lot more veggies out there that would work great. We'll see what we try next time.

Banana Bread-- I have tried this twice now with our convection oven and it is not turning out right. It still tastes good, but either the sides are close to burnt or the inside is gooey.... Maybe the third time will be a charm. I am going to try it in normal bake mode and not convection mode. See if that helps.

Pumpkin Cheesecake-- We went Olive Garden when we went to Omaha this last weekend . It's a must-stop anytime we are near one on our travels. We ate way too much food and couldn't get dessert-- which was a delectable Pumpkin Cheesecake. So, Ryan mentioned that that could be my food project this week. So currently it is sitting in the fridge chilling. That was the only complaint so far, I can't taste it after its done baking... Grrrrr.. (that was my stomach growling by the way). Ryan is even more disappointed, he was wanting to dive into it last night, I had to hold him back! I will hopefully post a pic of my newest project, and if its worth it, I will include the recipe.

Oh yeah I got Way to much pumpkin puree so i am also making pumpkin bars with cream cheese frosting tonight.

I am enjoying this baking stuff SO much. I never cared for it before, I love it with this plan that I have to try something new. That way you don't get stuck in a rut of the same food and you find new favorites to try more often. I encourage you all to try this sometime, I love getting a random magazine and trying one recipe, my favorite magazine right now is Woman's Day, I have gotten 3 recipes out of already. Good stuff!

I would love to try one of your favorite recipes too. Just leave the recipe in a comment!!!

Cindy