BethNH's Profile

From: , NH USA

Joined: December 16th, 2010

About me: I've been cooking and baking since I was a child and collecting cookbooks almost that long. Years ago, I lost my entire collection in a flood and I've been slowly building it back up. I cook for my husband and three sons who are not very adventurous eaters. We're on the go a lot with sports and school schedules. I love to bake and my boys and their friends appreciate all manner of baked goods.

Favorite cookbook: King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion


Latest review:

April 1st, 2017

Ginger Pork Meatballs with Cilantro and Fish Sauce from Dinner: Changing the Game

These meatballs and the dipping sauce were to die for delicious. Although there was a lot of chopping the recipe was easy to follow. Everyone loved it and we will definitely make this again. read more >


recipe reviews (265)
book reviews (8)
useful review votes (161)

BethNH's Reviews


Search Reviews:

265 recipes reviewed. Showing 51 to 100Sort by: Book Title | Date | Rating | Recipe Title

The Pasta Revolution

By Editors at America's Test Kitchen, Editors at America's Test Kitchen
Boston Common Press - 2012

My son went through this cookbook last night to choose a new pasta recipe for a pre-meet dinner. I turned down the first recipe that involved American cheese and pickles. And, while this recipe wouldn't have jumped out at me, I didn't want to turn him down twice.

This is a super simple weeknight meal that is all cooked in one pan. It's basically hamburger and tomato sauce with tex-mex spices and pasta. It's later put in the oven to melt the cheese on top.

Everyone ate big helpings and it was surprisingly good for such low effort.

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The America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook, Heavy-Duty Revised Edition

By America's Test Kitchen, Daniel J. Van Ackere, Carl Tremblay
America's Test Kitchen - 2006

1st January 2011 (edited: 3rd July 2011)

Skillet Ziti with Chicken and Broccoli

Very easy, one pot meal. Lots of flavor - just a bit of spice. The sauce covered the ziti really well and the chicken stayed moist.

Next time I'd add the broccoli closer to the end as I like my veggies with more crunch.

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Cook's Country
(May, 2012)

 

It's too hot to use the oven and too rainy to grill outside.

This mac and cheese is made entirely in one skillet. First, sliced kielbasa is browned and then removed to a paper towel lined plate. Then the fresh breadcrumbs are browned in the grease left behind. Those are then removed.

A mixture of water and evaporated milk is brought to a boil before the macaroni is added to the skillet. Once the macaroni is cooked it is taken off the heat and shredded cheese is added. Finally, the kielbasa is stirred in and the bread crumbs are put on top.

This is a 30 minute meal that can really be cooked in 30 minutes. It was delicious and my macaroni and cheese fans really liked it. Best of all, there is very little mess to clean.

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The King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion: The Essential Cookie Cookbook

By King Arthur Flour
Countryman Press - 2004

6th January 2012 (edited: 6th January 2012)

Sinfully Rich Chocolate Crunch Bars

These are two stage bars. First an oatmeal, sugar, corn syrup base is baked. Then melted chocolate is poured over this cooled base and nuts are sprinkled on top.

My issues all came after the bars were finished. Even in a non- stick pan that was well greased, these bars did not want to come out of the pan. Cutting through the hardened chocolate and the very chewy oatmeal base was very difficult.

These bars should definitely have been baked on an aluminum foil sleeve parchment paper. I just about ruined my favorite jelly roll pan trying to get these out.

The bars themselves are very rich - not crunchy at all. The base is moist and chewy and very, very sweet. I'd probably like them more if I hadn't had to wrestle with them.

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The Cook's Illustrated Cookbook: 2,000 Recipes from 20 Years of America's Most Trusted Cooking Magazine

By Editors at Cook's Illustrated Magazine
Cook's Illustrated - 2011

Simple broiled asparagus. Young, tender asparagus are tossed with olive oil, salt and pepper and then put under the broiler for about 8 minutes. They were perfectly cooked in the amount of time the other dishes needed to rest.

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Cook's Country
(Oct/Nov, 2013)

 

A fantastic week night meal that is much more than the sum of its parts.

A delicious sauce is made with orange juice, zest, garlic, soy, sesame oil, red pepper flakes and honey. Then the sliced flank steak is cooked in part of the sauce until it evaporates and the meat caramelizes. The meat is then removed from the pan and the snap peas are added along with the rest of the sauce. Finally, the meat is added back with the veggies.

We served this over white rice and there was just the right amount of sauce left over to spoon over the rice. There was just the right amount of spice and lots of flavor.

Everyone enjoyed this and asked for it to be cooked again.

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Lucky Peach Presents 101 Easy Asian Recipes

By Peter Meehan, the editors of Lucky Peach
Clarkson Potter - 2015

30th September 2016

Sichuan Pork Ragu

I cooked this on at night after a longish day at work when I didn't particularly care to cook dinner. It was very simple to pull together and was very quick. There was a lot of flavor and a good amount of heat that snuck up on you.

The recipe reminded me of the Dan Dan noodles fro the Chinese Takeout Cookbook but was easier.

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The Chinese Takeout Cookbook: Quick and Easy Dishes to Prepare at Home

By Diana Kuan
Ballantine Books - 2012

19th November 2014

Sichuan Dry-Fried Beef

Excellent! Full of flavor and just the right amount of spice. Plenty hot but not so hot as to make my middle son break out in a sweat. The beef was very tender.

The whole meal comes together in the time it takes to make a pot of rice. A perfect week night meal.

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Website: King Arthur Flour

www.kingarthurflour.com
 

Trying to use up the bad of self rising flour I bought on a lark. These pancakes are certainly just as easy to make as Bisquick but they're nothing special. We like our pancakes a bit thicker and sturdier - these are on the thin side and rather floppy.

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Cook's Country
(May, 2013)

 

It takes longer to preheat the oven than it does to make these biscuits.

The secret ingredient is .... mayonnaise. Really. While this does not make for a flaky biscuit, it does make moist and tender ones that are very good to serve with a meal.

The dough for these biscuits is very sticky and is dropped onto parchment paper. I used my muffin scoop and greased it well and it worked perfectly to scoop out 12 lovely biscuits.

If you're already got your hands full with other dishes in a meal, these biscuits are easy and delicious.

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The King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion: The Essential Cookie Cookbook

By King Arthur Flour
Countryman Press - 2004

A homemade version of the Girl Scout cookie Do-Si-Dos.

This is a peanut butter-oatmeal drop cookie made with peanut butter, flour and oats which is then sandwiched with a filling made of peanut butter, honey and confectioner's sugar.

This is WAY better than the boxed Girl Scout version and, sadly, way more addictive.

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The Cook's Illustrated Cookbook: 2,000 Recipes from 20 Years of America's Most Trusted Cooking Magazine

By Editors at Cook's Illustrated Magazine
Cook's Illustrated - 2011

8th April 2012

Scalloped Potatoes

Excellent! Sliced potatoes are simmered on the stove top with onions, spices, chicken stock and cream until the potatoes are fork tender. Only then are the potatoes put in a gratin dish, covered with cheese and put in the oven.

I made this in my small Dutch oven which meant it was a one pot dish. Cooking on the stove top sped up the process and ensured the potatoes were cooked through and tender before putting them in the oven to get brown and bubbly. This makes for a much quicker side dish.

These were loved by one and all.

useful (1)  


The King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion: The Essential Cookie Cookbook

By King Arthur Flour
Countryman Press - 2004

29th April 2011 (edited: 4th July 2011)

Ruth Wakefield's Chocolate Chip Cookie Bars

Just like the classic toll house cookie but in bar form.

These are perfect for when you just don't have the time to bake sheets of cookies. You can whip these together, pop them in the oven, and go about your busy day while they cool.

Just don't over bake them or they'll be very dry.

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Food in Jars: Preserving in Small Batches Year-Round

By Marisa McClellan
Running Press - 2012

22nd June 2012

Rosemary Salt

What a great idea for preserving some of the bounty from the garden!

Sea salt and chopped rosemary leaves are mixed and then baked in a low oven to dry the leaves and prevent the salt from clumping. The rosemary infused salt is then stored in half pint canning jars which are perfect for gift giving or adding to one's spice shelf.

This will be perfect rubbed over roasted or grilled chicken.

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The King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion: The Essential Cookie Cookbook

By King Arthur Flour
Countryman Press - 2004

1st May 2011 (edited: 4th July 2011)

Rocky Road Bars

Essentially a fudgy brownie with mini marshmallows and chocolate chips on top.

The bars are very moist and chocolatey. Although the marshmallows give a nice Rocky Road flavor, they make cutting the bars pretty difficult. I'd recommend baking these in a foil lined pan so that the entire thing can be removed for cutting.

**The cooking time in the cookbook is wrong - the bars should be baked for 22 minutes before adding the toppings.

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Cook This Now: 120 Easy and Delectable Dishes You Can't Wait to Make

By Melissa Clark
Hyperion - 2011

This dish has so many ingredients in it to add flavor to the chicken. Unfortunately, although the chicken was very good, none of the flavors stood out for us. I didn't taste any ginger, cilantro, or jalapeno in the finished dish. We were disappointed that there was no heat.

I took the advice of reviewers on EYB and cooked the chicken for only 30 minutes - even then it may have been a bit over cooked. That being said, the chicken stayed very moist and we all enjoyed it.

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Emeril's There's a Chef in My Soup! Recipes for the Kid in Everyone

By Emeril Lagasse, Charles Yuen, Charles Yuen
HarperCollins - 2002

My son convinced me to buy one of those cast iron corn stick pans just so we could try this recipe. He got the pan for Christmas and we made the recipe soon afterward.

We were sorely disappointed. These are nasty corn dogs. Corn muffin batter + hot doges does not equal corn dogs. Perhaps corn dogs should only be fried.

The boys ate a few but we ended up throwing most of them away. At least the pan is good for making cornbread sticks.

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The Quick Recipe (The Best Recipe Series)

By Editors of Cook's Illustrated Magazine
Cook's Illustrated - 2003

11th August 2013

Refried Black Beans

This is an exceedingly simple recipe for refried beans.

Canned beans are pureed in the food processor. They are then added to a pan in which diced slab bacon has been rendered. In addition to the bacon there are onions, garlic and spices. The beans thickened in the pan while the rest of dinner was cooked.

The beans had a very pronounced bacon flavor and, while they were quite good, I was the only person in the family who liked them. It would have been good to know ahead of time that no one cares for refried beans.

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How To Cook Everything: Simple Recipes for Great Food

By Mark Bittman, Alan Witschonke
Wiley - 2006

19th March 2011 (edited: 3rd July 2011)

Quick and Easy Waffles

My husband is generally the waffle maker in our family and he's always used Bisquick for his waffles. This morning, however, there was no Bisquick and I suggested we just make our own.

I quickly skimmed a couple of books but this recipe required no special ingredients (not even buttermilk) and so it was chosen. The batter came together in no time and didn't need to rest before being used.

The recipe produced eight large waffles. The waffles were a little dense but had a nice crisp exterior. The taste was delicious and all three boys loved them.

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The Cook's Illustrated Cookbook: 2,000 Recipes from 20 Years of America's Most Trusted Cooking Magazine

By Editors at Cook's Illustrated Magazine
Cook's Illustrated - 2011

These have to be the easiest biscuits ever.

Remembering that I had some heavy cream in the fridge that needed to be used up, I did a quick search for cream biscuits. The dough comes together in about 2 minutes - including gathering ingredients and measuring flour. Basically, the cream is added to the dry ingredients. This is mixed and then kneaded for 30 seconds before patting out the dough to be cut.

20 minutes total time gave us delicious, surprisingly flaky biscuits for dinner.

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Disney's Family Cookbook: 250 Irresistible Recipes for You and Your Kids

By Deanna Cook, Experts At Familyfun Magazine
Disney Editions - 1996

31st December 2010 (edited: 3rd July 2011)

Quick and Easy Banana Bread

Written by Mollie Katzen and first published in Parents magazine in November 1995, this has been my go to recipe for banana bread for over 15 years.

This recipe, which is easily doubled, makes a moist delicious loaf of bread.

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The King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion: The Essential Cookie Cookbook

By King Arthur Flour
Countryman Press - 2004

16th October 2013

Pumpkin Whoopie Pies

We have a friend who, despite all odds, is celebrating his birthday today. Jim LOVES whoopie pies more than anything so it seemed fitting I shoudl bake some for his birthday.

These Pumpkin whoopie pies seemed like the perfect thing for a mid October baking session. They are flavored with molasses, cloves, ginger and cinnamon and are a beautiful orange color once baked. They are a bit more moist than chocolate whoopie pies and I would recommend baking on parchment paper.

I chose to make the more typical shortening and fluff filling as opposed the the cream cheese filling as I didn't want to have to refrigerate them. I substituted maple extract for vanilla to complete the fall flavors.

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Website: Buns In My Oven

bunsinmyoven.com
 

20th October 2011

Pumpkin Streusel Muffins

This recipe was adapted from a Taste of Home recipe. I chose to link to this recipe because I followed these adaptations and not the original.

The taste of pumpkin is synonymous with fall in New England and is one of my oldest son's favorite flavors. When looking for pumpkin muffins to bring to a concession stand, I ran across these lovelies with the streusel topping.

I doubled the recipe because it seems rather silly to use 2/3 cup of pumpkin. Doubling the recipe gave me 24 good sized muffins. The muffins rose nicely and have a nice texture. They are quite good but good definitely use more spice - I'd add more next time. The streusel topping is just okay. It also should probably have had spice added to it.

My youngest son served as the taste tester and he pronounced them very good. As the rest of the muffins will be served at a concession stand to starving cross country runners, I'm sure they'll be very welcomed.

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Pillsbury: The Complete Book of Baking

By Editor
Viking - 1993

26th October 2011

Pumpkin Pound Cake

Perfect fall dessert!

This pound cake is baked in a bundt pan. It is very rich - as all pound cakes are - and wonderfully moist but not at all heavy. The pumpkin flavor and spices are subtle but noticeable which made the cake a hit with the pumpkin fans and non-fans in my family.

This was so easy to make that I'll be sure to make it again.

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Desperation Entertaining!

By Beverly Mills, Alicia Ross
Workman Publishing Company - 2002

30th June 2012

Poppy Seed Dressing

My husband suggested Spinach Salad for dinner and I decided we needed a homemade poppy seed dressing to top it. Normally, I use a mayonnaise based dressing that I got from my mother-in-law, but it's really much too sweet.

A trip to the coop got me some poppy seeds and a quick search with EatYourBooks found this recipe for me. I was surprised that there weren't more recipes for poppy seed dressing in my numerous cookbooks. The other recipes I found used raw egg which I wasn't too keen on.

This dressing comes together nicely in a blender and is sweetened by honey rather than sugar and flavored with onion powder and dry mustard. It's got a bit of a kick and is rather sweet - just like poppy seed dressing should be.

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The King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion: The Essential Cookie Cookbook

By King Arthur Flour
Countryman Press - 2004

8th January 2013

Pizzelle

King Arthur Flour never disappoints. I got a new pizzelle maker for Christmas and knew that this would be my go-to resource for recipes.

The dough itself is super simple to make using only a bowl and a spoon. I used vanilla extract because my children aren't fond of anise. To form the pizzelles I used my Tablespoon cookie scoop.

This pizzelle maker is super fast - 30 seconds per batch - so I had to work fast. In less than 15 minutes I had 30 beautiful pizzelles. They are thin, crispy and delicious.

I'll have to work on my technique to get the dough in just the right place on the plates but I don't really care if the cookies are perfectly shaped for my family.

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How To Cook Everything: Simple Recipes for Great Food

By Mark Bittman, Alan Witschonke
Wiley - 2006

23rd December 2011

Pizza Dough

I made this dough with my KitchenAide and despite Bittman's warnings, it has no problem handling the dough. The dough came together quite nicely. I let it knead for about 5 minutes and left it to rise in the room with the wood stove.

It rolled out quite nicely with very little pull back.

I'd use this again.

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The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Recipes from an Accidental Country Girl

By Ree Drummond
William Morrow Cookbooks - 2009

6th August 2011

Pizza crust

I'll have to try this again before I'm certain of the rating. This dough just seemed too loose and oily to me. It rose nicely but it was still too oily.

It was able to be rolled out easily and made a nice calzone dough but I prefer a dough that doesn't have quite as much oil.

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Joy the Baker Cookbook: 100 Simple and Comforting Recipes

By Joy Wilson
Hyperion - 2012

6th January 2013

Perfect Kettle Corn

My oldest son is a big fan of kettle corn but it never occurred to me to make it at home (perhaps because I'm not a fan of pop corn).

This afternoon, however, with the cold wind blowing and all the boys home playing video games, I thought I'd make them a homemade snack.

The recipe was clear and easy to follow. The snack came together in minutes. The popcorn was very good - a nice balance of sweet and salty - but, despite my best efforts, there was some burned sugar and a few burned kernels on the bottom of the pot. The mess was easy to clean after a quick soak in hot water.

The boys all pronounced the kettle corn very good and, even I had to admit it was pretty good

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Pillsbury: The Complete Book of Baking

By Editor
Viking - 1993

11th September 2011

Perfect Apple Pie

I couldn't really tell you whether or not this is the perfect apple pie but I can tell you that it's awfully good. This is the first recipe for apple pie I ever tried and I've been making it for years. It has just the right amount of sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg for our tastes.

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More Make It Fast, Cook It Slow: 200 Brand-New, Budget-Friendly, Slow-Cooker Recipes

By Stephanie O'Dea
Hyperion - 2010

7th September 2011

Peperoncinci Beef Sandwiches

Super simple recipe that would be great to throw in before work. We decided to have this over rice instead of sandwiches and everyone said they'd eat it again. It's hard to beat a two ingredient dinner on a night when everyone gets home late from sports practices.

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Baking Sheet
(Winter, 2010)

 

27th April 2012

Peanut Butter Squares

These no bake squares have a peanut butter, graham cracker, butter, confectioner's sugar base and a chocolate topping. The base is pressed into a pan and the melted chocolate is poured over the top.

Although it came together quickly, once the chocolate hard hardened, the bars were a mess when I tried to cut them to take them out of the pan. The peanut butter base was simply too crumbly and fell apart. Perhaps I didn't have enough peanut butter but I used my scale to be sure to have the correct amount.

I wouldn't make these again.

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The King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion: The Essential Cookie Cookbook

By King Arthur Flour
Countryman Press - 2004

15th April 2011 (edited: 4th July 2011)

Peanut Butter Smoothies

It's a peanut butter brownie!

Very moist peanut butter bars with chocolate chips in the batter. The top is nice and crackly like a fudgy brownie. Strong but not overwhelming peanut butter flavor.

Very easy to make with only common pantry ingredients.

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Website: All Recipes

allrecipes.com
 

19th July 2012 (edited: 6th January 2013)

Peanut Butter Chip Chocolate Cookies

After buying a bag of peanut butter chips on a whim, I decided to bake some chocolate cookies with peanut butter chips.

This recipe is wonderful. Nice chocolate flavor. Plenty of peanut butter chips. A perfect marriage of chocolate and peanut butter.

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23rd September 2011 (edited: 23rd September 2011)

Peanut Butter Chews

Perfect little round peanut butter cookies without the normal criss cross normally associated with them.

I was worried about these cookies as I scooped them onto the cookie sheets. Using a Tablespoon cookie scoop, I portioned out this very moist batter. I was worried the cookies would just spread out to a melted peanut butter mess.

Instead the cookies firm up nicely into nice round cookies. The cookies are soft and a bit chewy - not crunchy like regular peanut butter cookies - due to the addition of corn syrup.

A very nice cookie!

Check out the link to the cookie recipe on the King Arthur Flour website.

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America's Test Kitchen
(, 2010)

 

22nd February 2012

Peanut Butter Blondies

Needing to bake something for a middle school potluck dessert using only ingredients in my pantry proved difficult. Thankfully, I had all the ingredients for these peanut butter blondies on hand.

Basically, a peanut butter bar cookie, these are made with peanut butter, butter, flour, eggs, and chocolate chips. They're spread in a 9x13 pan and baked.

Although I checked the blondies at the short end of the baking time, they would probably have been better had they been baked about 5 minutes less. Nonetheless, they have good peanut butter flavor and were super easy to make. They should go over well with the middle school crowd.

Next time, I'd make these in a smaller pan to get thicker blondies as that's my personal preference.

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The Essential New York Times Cookbook: Classic Recipes for a New Century

By Amanda Hesser
W. W. Norton & Company - 2010

27th June 2013

Pasta with Vodka

Very simple week night meal.

My youngest son requested pasta for dinner after summer running. My oldest doesn't really care for tomato sauce and I didn't want to make Alfredo.

This sauce was terribly simple to make. Just a few ingredients simmered together on the stove while the pasta cooks. Although there are tomatoes in the sauce, the sauce does not taste like tomatoes and my oldest liked it a lot.

There was the right amount of sauce to coat one pound of penne and, although there was both cream and parmesan in it, the sauce did not feel heavy.

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The Complete Cooking For Two Cookbook

By Editors at America's Test Kitchen
Boston Common Press - 2014

19th February 2017

Parmesan-Crusted Asparagus

Asparagus coated in parmesan and panko roasted in the oven. Delightful! The recipe instructs one to poke holes in the asparagus, sprinkle with salt, and leave to drain on paper towels. At the end of the 30 minutes I didn't see any moisture on the paper towels so I'd skip this step in the future. These are so good they just might convince that person who thinks they don't like asparagus to give them a try.

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Website: Martha Stewart

www.marthastewart.com
 

7th November 2012

Paprika Roast Chicken

After finding FIVE bottles of paprika in my pantry, it was clear I needed to find some recipes to use it up. A friend recommended this recipe.

It's a pretty basic recipe - using only chicken, paprika, salt, pepper and olive oil. Although the chicken was delicious, it didn't taste much different than any other roast chicken. It certainly looked nice, however, and perhaps that is the point.

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The America's Test Kitchen Family Cookbook, Heavy-Duty Revised Edition

By America's Test Kitchen, Daniel J. Van Ackere, Carl Tremblay
America's Test Kitchen - 2006

20th August 2011 (edited: 27th August 2011)

Pancakes

These are very good buttermilk pancakes. The recipe comes together quickly and is enough for 16 good sized pancakes.

As usual, I did not have buttermilk in the house and used sour milk. The pancakes don't rise as much as my boys prefer and they were a little more floppy than they like but they tasted delicious.

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This dish takes only as long to prepare as whatever you choose to serve with it. I served orecchiette. While the pasta boiled I shelled the shrimp and made the sauce.

Shrimp take only 2-3 minutes to cook and then the sauce is added. The sauce is wonderfully sweet and spicy due to the hoisin and ginger.

Delicious and super fast dinner!

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The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook

By Ina Garten, Martha Stewart
Clarkson Potter - 1999

1st January 2012

Pan-fried onion dip

There's not much to say that hasn't been said.

I cut the butter and oil in half which worked out fine. I also used low fat sour cream and lite mayonnaise and the dip was plenty rich.

If you're going to be in the kitchen anyway and can watch the onions for 30 minutes, there's just no reason to use onion dip from an envelope.

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The America's Test Kitchen Quick Family Cookbook: A Faster, Smarter Way to Cook Everything from America's Most Trusted Test Kitchen

By America's Test Kitchen, Daniel J. Van Ackere, Carl Tremblay
America's Test Kitchen - 2012

19th March 2015

Pad Thai

This recipe is not authentic nor does it claim to be. In fact, it didn't taste like any Pad Thai I've ever been served.

That being said, it was a good noodle dish. We all enjoyed the mix of noodles, shrimp and sauce and we'd happily eat it again.

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Website: Food.com

www.food.com
 

3rd August 2011 (edited: 3rd August 2011)

Orzo Pilaf

My mother made orzo rice pilaf at least weekly while I was growing up. I was pretty shocked when I searched eatyourbooks to find that none of my cookbooks had a recipe for rice pilaf that included orzo as I thought it was pretty standard.

This recipe from food.com is much like my mother would make pilaf. I followed the recipe exactly except for subbing butter for margarine and cutting the amount in half. A full stick of butter would have made very greasy rice. The recipe does not call for any spices so is pretty bland and benefits from the addition of some salt and pepper.

The recipe was only marginally more work than using the Near East pilaf in a box and had no mystery ingredients in it. We all liked it very much and I'm sure to be making this often.

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The King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion: The Essential Cookie Cookbook

By King Arthur Flour
Countryman Press - 2004

This cookbook often gives numerous variations on a single cookie recipe. In this case, there are soft molasses cookies, crisp molasses cookies, and on-the-fence molasses cookies. The texture of these cookies is described as "bendy" - neither crisp nor soft.

While the taste of these cookies is everything you'd expect from a molasses cookie, I can't say they are "bendy". They are crunchy. They don't shatter when you bite them but they do crunch and make crumbs.

They are spicy and delicious and the perfect cookie for a chilly fall evening.

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8th December 2011

On-The-Fence Brownies

And the perfect brownie search continues ...

I thought these brownies held real promise - a mix between a fudgy and cakey brownie. I baked them in a 9x9 pan instead of the 13x9 pan called for because I know I like my brownies thick.

This recipe calls for dutch process cocoa and I guess I can now officially say, after many tries, I don't care for dutch process cocoa. The chocolate is too "dark" tasting for my boys and the brownies are just not sweet enough tasting for me. They're also missing that nice shiny crust on top.

They taste fine - in fact, I'm sure others would love them. They're chocolatey and moist. Fudgy and cakey. They're just not what I'm looking for.

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Top Secret Restaurant Recipes

By Todd Wilbur
GuildAmerica Books - 1997

A very nice fettucini alfredo! Alfredo is a simple recipe that I've managed to mess up more than once.

The sauce didn't thicken quite as much as I would have liked but I probably could have let it simmer longer. I also added twice as much parmesan cheese because the amount called for seemed skimpy. In the end, however it had a very nice flavor with no grit (which has been my problem in the past).

Served over a pound of linguine, this served our family of five nicely. The recipe claims that this serves 2 to 3 as an entree which would be WAY too much food.

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Brittles, Barks, and Bonbons

By Charity Ferreira
Chronicle Books - 2008

8th December 2011 (edited: 25th December 2011)

Old-Fashioned Peanut Brittle

I imagine this peanut brittle is very good but I've now burned the sugar base two times. The first time was completely my fault as I left the room while the sugar was boiling. The second time, I should have trusted my instincts more than the thermometer as by the time the sugar reached 135 it was too dark.

I'll try again another time making sure to remove the sugar from the heat when the thermometer approaches 130.

Edited to add: The third time was the charm. I took the sugar off the heat once it was just a little lighter than peanut brittle ought to be (the vanilla makes it a bit darker). The peanut brittle was delicious and I successfully made three batches to give away as gifts.

I'm keeping my review at 3 stars because the peanut brittle is good but the recipe itself is faulty. If you keep cooking to 135 you will definitely burn the sugar.

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The Bon Appetit Cookbook: Fast Easy Fresh

By Barbara Fairchild
Wiley - 2008

Simple muffin recipe (though aren't they all?) made with every day ingredients. I didn't include the pecans because my boys don't care for nuts. They have a nice mocha flavor - not too strong on the coffee.

Enjoyed by everyone.

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The King Arthur Flour Cookie Companion: The Essential Cookie Cookbook

By King Arthur Flour
Countryman Press - 2004

2nd October 2011

Mocha Mudslides

Perfect combination of chocolate and coffee flavor!

I made these cookies for my coffee loving middle son. The cookies get the coffee flavor from espresso and the chocolate flavor from cocoa and chocolate chips. The cookie is moist and chewy with great mocha flavor.

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