Breakfast! Strawberry banana smoothie ice cream.

Had a time of getting it all to blend in the blender. I think I should have waited to add the fresh banana to the last minute.

It’s just frozen strawberries and banana with an added fresh banana and ice. That’s it.

My bananas are not ripe yet, but I like them kinda on the green side. I know the -best- is the spotted bananas, but I kind of like the less sweet just-turned-green. The spotted ones are too sweet for me.

I did use packaged frozen strawberries and bananas. No sugar or anything else it looks like added. (Don’t tell anyone that it’s not organic. )

I think a raw food diet would be rather yummy! I could eat this all day.

It’s actually pretty good.

Lately when I’m proud of my culinary arts, I pull out the camera and snap a few photos.

Let’s face it, I’m not a genius when it comes to taking photos.

Lately though, I’ve been eating a lot of raisins, bananas and fruit juice. It’s not as much fun as baking a nice batch of Nutella Icing Covered Shortbread Cookies like above.

Not the same experience, I guess.

You know when diets suck? It’s when you really miss the cooking experience. I still cook, but I don’t nearly spend as much time with it as I used to. Instead of thinking of clever ways to “cheat” and make clever brownies that are almost brownies except there’s zucchini and applesauce and pickles cleverly hidden inside, I just assume skip it and indulge every once in a while.

Homemade bread made by the Cajun’s mom. She calls it honey bread, and it does have that hint of honey throughout it. Love those breads. I was telling the Cajun how we may never buy bread again, we’ll just go get some from her.

Two sliced hard-boiled eggs. I didn’t want to mix it in with the mayo. For some reason, slicing it seemed like a great idea.

A tablespoon of Kraft’s Mayo, the one with Olive Oil in it.

Two leaves of romaine lettuce.

A tablespoon of bacon bits.

I think you all can tell how to make a sandwich. I’ll leave how to layer it to you.

It’s a yummy type of pie with pecans and chocolate chips and a gooey middle type of texture. If you bake it too long, I think it becomes a cookie, but that isn’t too bad either.

This pie serves eight people (average pie size).

Ingredients:
1/2 cup butter, melted
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup flour
2 eggs, beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla
3/4 cup chocolate chips
3/4 cup pecans or 3/4 cup walnuts

This pie is easy peasy to make. Simply stir up the ingredients and viola. Pie filling is ready. It’ll make a liquefied cookie batter type. Just pour it into some pie crust and then bake at 350 for 45 minutes, or until brown on top.

There might be ‘bubbles’. When those turn a darker brown than the rest of the ‘cookie’ around it. You know it’s very done.

There are some great additional recipes out there that involve Karo Syrup and Bourbon. I haven’t tried those yet, but it’s tempting.

For the crust, you can use your own recipe. This is the one I used for this one.

1 cup Gold Medal® all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup plus 1 tablespoon shortening
2 to 3 tablespoons cold water

Mix flour and 1/2 teaspoon salt.

When that’s mixed, add shortening, and cut into the mix. You can use a mixer, but I just used a fork. Kind of mash the stuff into the flour and mix around until it starts to crumble into peas.

Add one tablespoon of water at a time until the flour is acting more like pastry and you can separate the dough from the bowl. Add what you need, of course, one tablespoon at a time, until it looks right.

Use a rolling pin and just smooth it out on a flat surface, thickly, just to be able to put it in the fridge. It should be refrigerated for 45 minutes or so. You want the dough firm and cold.If you leave it in there longer than 45 minutes though it may be hard to shape the dough so you might need to let it set.

When it’s ready, take it out and roll on a flat surface using floured rolling pin, etc. Roll until it’s about two inches larger than the nine inch pie pan. When it’s ready, drape it into the pie pan and mold to the pan. Flute as you would like. I was using my two thumbs pressing them together along the crust. You might want to use a fork or something fancier.

I managed to use all of the dough, I just folded it in over itself and it still came out great. I might add sugar to it next time. It was OK but I think it needed a little sugar to make it a sweet pie.

Also works with Milk Chocolate chips. Or mix and match nuts and different types of chips.

I’ve talked with service people at my hosting company, they say it is not.

After questioning my ability to see, I figured out something: I’m being blocked from my own website, either my computer or my ISP is doing so.

Which is WIERD.

I guess I should have paid more attention to the whole “save the Internet” campaigns. You know the ones that would stop ISP providers from providing service to websites in an unfair way.

So right now I am working from an open wifi connection in my neighborhood (sorry, neighbors!) for a second to just let readers know… it wasn’t me being a lazy bum this time. : ) For once.

Also recently in, new flavors fro Nutrisystem. Here’s a photo.

I hate to say this, Nutrisystem. I love many of the foods, but I’m questioning the logic behind buttered popcorn. Sure it’s easy and it tastes good, but popcorn was on the free food list of things to eat (one cup, under so many calories, I forget, it’s in the back of the booklet or on the Nutrisystem website).

Nutrisystem, I love it, but how you managed to fit 140 calories and 7 grams of fat into popcorn is beyond what I can phathom.

Oh Nutrisystem, such a tease.

Anyway there included is scrambled eggs with veggies, a peanut butter and jelly bar (odd looking but tastes good) and Italian wedding soup (I’ve never had before but tastes like good soup to me.

Anyway, will write again tomorrow from school where the internet use isn’t exactly illegal. (Thanks to the neighbors, whom I have met, and will have to explain at some point why open wifi isn’t exactly a good thing.)

If you don’t have a rice cooker or microwave rice pot, boiling rice on the stove can be an alternative. However, boiling rice is also tricky.

“The rice is unforgiving,” says the Cajun. “Not enough water, or the wrong method can mean unfinished, unedible rice.”

To Rinse or Not

This is a debatable topic for many. Some people rinse the rice. Some don’t.

This is an area where it will be your choice. Some recipes may call for rice to be rinsed so be sure to follow your recipe if you’re unsure.

If you do rinse, make sure you rinse until there is considerably less “white cloud” in the water.

Rice to Water Ratio

For every one part of rice, there should be about one and a half parts of water.

For example, if there’s one cup of rice, you should use one and one half cups of water.

Cooking on the Stove

Cook the rice uncovered. While steamers and other cookers are constantly covered, cooking on the stove this way will require cooking uncovered, initially.

Cook at Medium High heat until boiling.

Reduce Heat

After there’s a rolling boil, reduce the heat and cover.

Reduce the heat to about medium low.

Cover, but leave a crack so that some steam is allowed to escape.

Check Rice

At some point, the rice will look to be cooked, and there are “holes” where it looks like the rice is uneven.

At this stage, it is time to cover the rice and let it steam in it’s own water for a while. Turn the heat to low.

Leave It Alone

For the next 15 to 20 minutes walk away from your rice. Don’t lift the lid to check.

Once the rice has had time to steam, open the lid and fluff.

Serve or Cook

It’s done! Eat.

If you are planning to stir fry the rice, remember to chill the rice for at least 24 hours before frying.

Yes, that required caps. Because there’s a lot of new things coming out from Nutrisystem.

They finally told me. Now I get to blab. About time.

part one!

Nutrisystem will now be letting people on the core plan pick from the select menu. They’ve incorporated them together!

From their press release:
The new Nutrisystem 28-day program will now include one-third frozen foods and two-thirds of pantry foods. Additionally, the program previously cost $399 per month and it will now cost $299, including an additional free week of pantry foods, a gourmet money back guarantee and free shipping. The New Nutrisystem® Select® Plan, available only in the Continental U.S., can be purchased by calling the Nutrisystem hotline 1-800-891-3215 or logging onto www.nutrisystem.com.

part two!

New Items on the menu from Nutrisystem Select!

Garden Vegetable Omelet, Margherita Pizza, Roasted Vegetable Pizza, Asian Style Beef, Roasted Turkey Medallions, and Orange Crème Bar

The New Nutrisystem Select program includes:

· Free 24 hour, seven days a week phone access to nutrition support and counseling from the Nutrisystem team of registered dieticians as well as weight loss counselors

· Free membership and access to online tools, tips and community support on Nutrisystem.com

· Savings of hundreds of dollars compared to other weight loss programs

· New – Gourmet Guarantee – money back if not completely satisfied

· New – First seven days free

· New – Transition plans to help keep you on track after reaching your goal weight

· Available for Women, Men, Silver and people with type 2 diabetes who want to lose weight via Nutrisystem D

· Nutrisystem is delivered right to the customer’s door, and free shipping is included with Auto Delivery – there’s never any center visits or calorie or carb counting required

Nutrisystem now also has a YouTube location.

This is wonderful news for anyone who has enjoyed Nutrisystem and wanted to try the frozen items but didn’t want to pay the money. It’s all included in 2011. So you get the same food as the Select people, but without paying the added costs.

I think that and the new items on the menu will be a wonderful addition to the Nutrisystem plan. I know many are enjoying the frozen items. I know I’ve loved it!

Lower costs. New foods. Is anyone else excited? What else could be coming from Nutrisystem?

I wish to thank Nutrisystem for sending all the many yummy foods listed here and in previous posts. Learn more about Nutrisystem at their website, on Facebook or through Twitter. I highly recommend signing up for Nutrisystem. The website is free to join so you can learn all about it before making a commitment.

Hi cooks and foodies!

Would anyone happen to know about baking with those silicone inserts?

I find that when I bake with mine, the baked goods come out with a funny taste.

The first time I did it, I thought I did something to the batter. Maybe I didn’t rinse the soap out of the bowl or off the mixing spoon.

Now I’ve tried it a few times, and it has the same strange taste, leaving on my muffins and so forth.

Is anyone else having this problem? I’m about to ditch them for traditional metal.

If you get a weird taste when it comes to silicone items you bake with, raise your hand.

I wish there was more variety with this, because I believe that could be a good thing. The packaging is a little big though. I don’t have that big of a freezer so I hope they’ll reconsider the packaging a bit so it’s able to fit. More the dinners that are so huge.

That’s not a big problem I guess, but Those dinner boxes are big. Thank goodness the other items, lunch and desserts, etc., are small.

I’ve had a terrible cold this past week, and the week before was finals for college. Hopefully getting the yucky stuff out of the way before Christmas so that can be most enjoyable.

But imagine how delighted I was when there were lots of yummy apples and cucumbers and so on available at a Christmas party I went to. It was great to fill up on those (with a nibble of cheese and a little dip). Plus, going with the Cajun, I was able to just take a bite of his desserts without indulging in the entire thing.

Considering I’ve got lovely chocolate ice cream treats to snack on around Christmas, I certainly don’t feel depraved at all, even while dieting.

So I’m looking for a Christmas treat idea involving Nutrisystem foods. I’ll report back on anything I find, but if anyone reading has suggestions, let me know.

News:
New contest coming… I think Tomorrow.

Nutrisystem front: Losing more weight! Yeay! Plus I’m on the Nutrisystem Select program now, which means that I get frozen delights along with the usual core plan (shelf stable) foods.

I like the variety. Again, some things you love, others you don’t so I’m hoping there will be some selections next time I order. One thing I have noticed though, that the selection is limited for frozen items.

BTW, I heard there was a sercret buzzing around the Nutrisystem forums. Something happening in January. I’m not allowed to say what it is!

Actually, I don’t know what it is. They won’t tell me because they know I’ll blab it to everyone the moment I find out.

So rumors are there’s going to be new food selections, or better recipes or something. Those are the rumors. I don’t know if they are true or what is going on.

I’ll be happy to find out.

By the way, the ice cream on Nutrisystem is sinful. I was eating it as a snack one day and I was just licking the last off the spoon and thought… “This just can’t be health food. Come on. Ice cream and chocolate syrup.”

Feel good naughty food. Whoda thunk.

Anyway, have you managed to scrimp your way past the holidays without over eating? I managed to sit with family and eat lots of fruit and veggie dishes, limiting the meat and cake and desserts. Not perfect, but that’s OK. The next day you get back on track.

Back to ice cream and chocolate muffins.