• Corn, one ear’s worth, freshly removed from the cob
• Chickpeas, one can’s worth, drained
• Capers, about a tablespoon
• Cilantro, fresh, about a quarter cup
• Chopped roasted red peppers, miniature, about 4
• Chopped pea shoots, about a cup’s worth

Thusly mixed, I dressed the bowl with about a tablespoon of good curry powder and three or four tablespoons’ worth of jalapeno mustard. Some extra kosher salt got added to taste after everything was gently folded together.

I put it onto flatbread, on a bed of fresh spinach. Delicious. Today, I added slices of fresh tomato from our farmers’ market. Even better!

Makes about six half-cup servings. Per serving: Fat: 1.2g; Carbohydrates: 17.4g; Calories: 118.0; Protein: 6.7g.

This time around, though, I am loving my almond butter. Maranatha brand, for the win!

I do wish, though, that I had a greater variety of butters available to me locally. I don’t often order foods online without being completely convinced, without any doubt, that I’m going to love what I get, and since I had that bad experience, I’m a bit wary; I’d much rather get a small jar to sample, then move on to larger amounts, but that’s not as cost-effective when it comes to mail order. Enthusiastic endorsements from other folks – real people, not paid ads – go a long way toward making me feel more confident.

“Free” also works wonders.

Clare, then, is speaking my language! Maybe she’s speaking yours, too? She’s hosting a giveaway for a nut butter company that’s…well, hey! Looks like I could actually get their products in person without driving too far! Maybe if I win, and the sample hooks me, I’ll be making a few extra car trips a month…

Anyway, go comment, but if you click through to there from here and you win, I want to hear your opinion, too!

I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me that pancakes can be like oatmeal. I know quite well how to top a bowl of oats and create a huge variety of concoctions, from pumpkin pie to peanut butter and jelly. But pancakes (ooh, and probably waffles, too!) can be just as versatile, in much the same way! The only crucial key is making sure you keep the right balance between wet and dry ingredients, and the sky’s the limit!

So I took out our trusty copy of The Joy of Cooking and found the base pancake recipe…

Dry ingredients: 1.5 cups flour, 3 tablespoons sugar, 1.75 tablespoons baking powder, 1 teaspoon salt.
Wet ingredients: 1.5 cups milk (I used skim), 3 tablespoons melted butter, 2 eggs, 0.5 teaspoon vanilla.

So far, so good. Keeping in mind the idea of “mix your own,” I separated the sifted-together dry ingredients into three separate bowls (Eric wasn’t home tonight, so this was just to be for me and my kids). Then I added equal amounts of the mixed-together liquids to each bowl.

At this point, after stirring wet into dry, Gabe’s bowl was ready to go, since he didn’t want anything in his actual pancakes. Sam wanted chopped bananas and dates, so I added those to his bowl and let them rest in the liquids while I cooked Gabe’s pancakes (Joy suggested that step). After the fruit had rested in the milk for a bit, I stirred his and cooked them.

My bowl was more interesting. To my bowl, I added: 1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder, 1 tablespoon Kahlua, a splash of extra vanilla, and, after stirring the rest, two tablespoons of part-skim ricotta cheese. I wanted the ricotta to stay mostly unmixed, so that I could mimic the separate cheese layer in a dish of tiramisu.

Then I cooked.

They look like chocolate pancakes, and they’re delicious. But the best part…

See that hunk of ricotta? Soft, creamy BLISS.

So! Go forth and make your own pancakes! The world is your oyster! I’m glad I started with these. (Oh, and – yeah, one-third of the recipe from Joy is quite the caloric hit. It made six good-sized pancakes. You probably don’t need all six…but I won’t tell on you if you don’t tell on me!)

Per tiramisu pancake (plain and banana-date pancakes are different!) – Fat: 3g; Carbohydrates: 14g; Calories: 96; Protein: 3g.

The base: bulgur. What a nice little grain! It can be used interchangeably with couscous, but it’s got so much more going for it: B vitamins, iron, lots of fiber. Fewer calories and less fat than brown rice, and over four times the folate! What’s not to love? Oh, yeah, and then there’s the fact that cooking it really just entails adding hot water (an equal amount to the dry bulgur being prepared; I used a cup of each) and letting it stand for thirty minutes or so. (I added some vegan bouillon to my hot water.)

The veggies: in this case, chopped zucchini, carrots, fennel, and garlic, all sautéed in a tablespoon of olive oil and seasoned with salt and pepper. Also present are a handful of sun-dried tomatoes, a can of artichoke hearts, and a can of kidney beans (rinsed). After sautéing the first vegetables, I combined them all and set them to chill in the fridge alongside the soaked bulgur.

The sauce: for this, we can thank Emily, who fired the shot heard ’round the food-blogging world. I may be a Johnny-Come-Lately to the party, but I’m glad I showed up in time to hit the refreshment table! For my ABU, I combined half a cup of chunky almond butter with a full cup of unsweetened vanilla Almond Breeze. I didn’t add any sweetener, since I felt that the vanilla in the almond milk was just enough sweetness to match the vegetables in the rest of the dish.

I made all the parts earlier this afternoon, so by the time I came back to them, everything was nice and cold in the refrigerator. I layered them into my bowl, took a bite…and melted. Or reconstituted, perhaps; this is a perfect meal for a warm summer day, or perhaps merely one where you’ve managed to work up a sweat with cleaning in preparation for a parental visit!

Serves 6. Per serving – Fat: 14g; Carbohydrates: 46g; Calories: 364; Protein: 15g.

This is a very simple soup, and one that comes together very quickly and with few ingredients. There are really only two primary ingredients, outside of the liquids, and one secondary one. Grab some carrots, grab some parsnips, and get to peeling, chopping, and shredding. You want to wind up with about five or six cups, total, but the exact proportions won’t matter much in the end. I used a food processor for this. Along with the carrots and parsnips, you want to shred a hunk of ginger with the mix; how much you put in depends on how much “bite” you want, but I used about an inch-long piece.

Pretty, no? Very bright.

Put all that into a largish pot, along with two cups of broth. I’m experimenting at the moment (what else is new?), so I used a vegetarian bouillon with chicken flavoring. Mix it together and bring it to a boil before reducing the heat to a simmer; keep it there long enough to soften the vegetables. It shouldn’t take long – about thirty minutes – but my obviously mutant carrots refused to soften until I added in some extra salt. Take it off the heat and let it cool a touch, just enough so it doesn’t explode when you…

Make sure to make Tim Allen-style grunts as you blend the everliving heck out of the mixture. In retrospect, perhaps I should have done more grunting, because despite my blender’s best efforts, it wound up not being as smooth as I would have liked. Or maybe I just need a new blender…yeah, that’s the ticket!

Put it back in the pot after it’s nice and smooth, and stir in about half a cup of cream or evaporated milk – something thick, anyway. I used evaporated milk.

Warm it back up a bit, and season to taste. I used plain old salt and pepper, so the ginger could shine through.

Serve either warm or chilled. I initially went with chilled, but since the texture isn’t perfect for my tastes, I think I prefer this particular batch warm. Next time, I’ll get it more smooth, because the taste of the chilled soup is phenomenal! Light, sweet, gentle – soul-soothing.

Serves 4. Per serving – Fat: 3.8g; Carbohydrates: 32.1g; Calories: 176.6; Protein: 4.9g.

He liked doing this quite a bit, though I think he got a bit mixed up about the difference between a review and a commercial. He’d love to do it again, so I may try to get his opinion – Live! From our kitchen! – on any new products or recipes on which he cares to give his opinion.

Well, the violin went back to the store today (long story there), and I knew that I might not have another chance soon, so I crossed my fingers, took both my kids’ hands firmly in mine, and crossed the street to check it out.

We wound up with this assortment:

I’m really happy with our little initial collection, from the few tastes I’ve had, but…well, what with Sam’s excited jumping and discussion of the sweets, and Gabe’s refusal to stand still, and my subsequent inability to take in the heavy accent of the woman behind the counter, I’m at a loss to know exactly what we got. I know the orange things on the right are either Jalebi or Jaangiri, but I don’t know that there’s a way to differentiate between the two visually (they’re variations of each other with subtly different ingredients). As for the others, I have no real idea, despite my Googling.

Anybody want to help me out?

“Hello, friends! I’m Mr. Spaghetti Squash! And the lady in front of me clearly has either too much free time, or else children who will need to be coaxed into trying new things! Ahem!”

“This…may end badly for me.”

“Okay, I’ve had holes poked all over me, and now – oh, this is hot! I’d say about 400 degrees!” (Yes, I had to narrate this way the whole time for my four-year-old son. Maybe it’ll sink in, though, and my future daughter-in-law will be immensely grateful for a husband who loves to cook? )

An hour later…

“Let me tell you about the day I’ve had. Couldn’t possibly get worse, though, I suppose.”

“I WAS WRONG.”

“AUUUUUUUUUUUGH!”

“Better. Much better, in fact. I feel free! And I’ve been adorned with a few tablespoons of toasted pine nuts, half a cup of seasoned bread crumbs, and some salt and pepper.”

“Like my new look? One cup of marinara sauce and a cup of mozzarella cheese, and I’m a whole new squash.”

And after being covered in foil and going back into the 400-degree oven for ten minutes, then doing five more without the foil:

“How ya like me now?”

Mmmmmmm.

Nutritional info will depend on the size of your squash, but for mine, which filled a 9×11 casserole, and on which I put Sargento Reduced Fat cheese, and which made 6 really big servings: Fat: 6.0g; Carbohydrates: 30.2g; Calories: 201.3; Protein: 9.2g.

(Can I just take a moment here to say that I am completely won over by this cookbook? If you had been debating getting it, do it. Whether you’re vegetarian, vegan, or omnivorous, understand that when it comes to delicious vegetable presentations, vegetarians and vegans have it going on!)

I yanked the mushrooms from their box, scrubbed and stemmed them, and got set to prepare. Into a pie plate, I mixed the marinade: half a cup of “cooking wine” (pshhht; I used a good cabernet sauvignon, under the rule that you should never, ever cook with a wine that you wouldn’t drink), a tablespoon of olive oil (man, I’m almost out!), two tablespoons each of balsamic vinegar and tamari soy sauce (yes, you can tell the difference), and two minced cloves of garlic.

Is that not pretty?

The mushrooms went into the marinade. I didn’t have the full-sized portobellos that the book suggested, so I used twelve baby mushrooms instead of the two large or 4 small ones in the actual recipe. They lay on their backs, and I filled each cavity with the marinade and let them drink it up for twenty minutes.

Then I covered the pie plate with foil and baked them for 30 minutes at 400 degrees. After that, the foil came off, they got flipped to their bellies, and they roasted like that for another 10 minutes.

Yeah, don’t even waste these guys on the kids. They just won’t appreciate them. (This is what you tell yourself repeatedly as you hoard every last one…maybe grudgingly letting your partner have a few. )

Made 12 mushrooms. Per mushroom, allowing for extra marinade on top – Fat: 1.2g; Carbohydrates: 1.5g; Calories:24.5; Protein: 0.7g.