Raspberry Deliciousness

Alice-Grace wanted to make raspberry ice-cream:

Frozen raspberries
Milk
Ice cubes

But she forgot to add any sugar and the raspberries were a little tart, so we added it in later with more milk and it turned into a raspberry milk shake. It was still really good.

I got my blender because a friend said that it did a good job of chopping up raspberry seeds, but that doesn't happen with this blender. I was picking seeds out of my teeth all night. I guess it's time to get some cheese cloth or something.

Homemade Microwave Popcorn

My kids love microwave popcorn, but I hate all the crazy chemicals in it. It just tastes weird. If I'm going to eat cancer-corn, I at least want to eat it in a movie theater, not in my own home. So here's a recipe for homemade microwave popcorn:

1/4 cup popcorn kernels
1 tsp olive oil
Salt

Put popcorn kernels, olive oil and salt in a regular brown paper lunch bag. Fold over the top and seal with a piece of Scotch tape. Microwave on high for about 2 minutes. Done!

The original recipe called for 1/2 tablespoon of olive oil, but it soaks all through the bag and makes a mess. Of course, after we pop ours, we cover it with melted butter just to make sure it's not healthy. Yum, yum!

Soup -- Hold the Froth

Today we made Bacon Cheddar Potato Soup. We mixed the ingredients in the blender, but didn't heat it up in the blender. This way it wouldn't get all aerated.

Bacon Cheddar Potato Soup
Milk
Potatoes, baked
Cheddar cheese
Onion
Dill
Rosemary
Salt
Bacon, cooked and crumbled

It was delicious. Nigel commented that it was faster to make this soup from scratch than it was to mix up the dehydrated potato soup mix we had in the cupboard. It was way yummier, too.

Though I do have a big burn mark on my arm from cooking the bacon. Stupid bacon.

Ah, Ice-Cream

Today I came home from work and my daughter had made a big batch of vanilla ice-cream. It was delicious. Thank you, new blender.

Soup Froth?

After letting our new blender take a break over the weekend, I decided to dive in full-force today. For dinner we had:

Cheddar Broccoli Soup
Milk
Cheddar cheese
Broccoli
Onion
Poultry seasoning

And for dessert we had:

Orange Sorbet
Oranges
Carrots
Sugar
Ice

I decided to use the blender's cookbook suggestion of blending the soup for a really long time to heat it up in the blender. It did heat up and everything was blended beautifully and it tasted really good -- but the texture was beyond strange. All that blending whipped in all kinds of air and it was like eating soupy foam. Not pleasant. Note to self: mix and then heat in the microwave.

The orange sorbet was good -- more icy than smooth -- but the kids liked it. They didn't even notice that I snuck some carrots in there. Maybe I need smaller ice-cubes -- I have not been satisfied with the texture I'm getting on my iced desserts.

Healthy Slushie?

So Nigel is getting creative and he made another grape slushie, but this time he added some real grapes to it.

Grapes
Grape Kool-Aid
Sugar
Water
Ice

It was pretty yummy!

Polka-Dot Smoothies?

Alice-Grace decided to use her creative skills with the new blender. After school, she made a smoothie with:

Grapes
Orange
Banana
Apple sauce
Carrots
Water
Ice

I liked the addition of the carrots. Why she used canned apple sauce instead of the fresh apples I had in the fridge, I don't know. There were little bits of grape skin throughout the thick smoothie, so it looked like it had polka-dots! Very cute.

We had breakfast for dinner, so I used the blender to grind up some wheat into flour for our waffles. It's so nice to be able to grind up exactly what I need and it only takes one minute and doesn't make a mess. The waffles were super yummy, too.

I didn't use the blender to mix up the waffle batter, though. I made that mistake with the brownies and it was just about impossible to get the batter out. I just used the blender to grind the wheat and then mixed everything by hand in a bowl. Much easier.

Smoothies & Slushies

Today Nigel was having fun with our new blender.

For an after-school snack he made a delicious smoothie with:

Canned peaches*
Banana
Frozen strawberries
Plain yogurt
Milk
Ice
Orange-honey

It was very tasty! Then for a late-night snack he made a slushie with:

Grape Kool-Aid
Sugar
Ice

It turned out better than anything you can get at 7-11! Yummy.

*Nigel wanted me to let everyone know that he rinsed off the canned peaches before putting them in the smoothie so that there was no high-fructose corn syrup on them. Me -- I buy high-fructose corn syrup and add it to food. I'm so bad.

Blender Fun

Today we really gave our new blender a workout. For an after school snack, Frances made:

Green Smoothie
oranges
strawberries
bananas
apples
fresh spinach leaves
ice cubes

It was so good she had to make two batches. I feel so healthy!

Then for dessert after dinner I made:

Brownie Bites
whole wheat flour (I ground the wheat myself in the blender)
regular flour
cocoa powder
eggs
sugar (only 1/2 cup -- my normal brownie recipe calls for four times as much!)
a can of black beans (instead of butter)
vanilla

Though you couldn't taste the beans, you could taste the whole wheat flour and lack of sugar. They were pretty good, though -- especially when you topped them with...

Vanilla Ice Cream
half and half (only one cup to make five cups of ice cream)
sugar
powdered milk (I love recipes where I can finally use up my powdered milk)
vanilla
ice cubes (four cups!)

This was surprisingly good -- especially since it was mostly ice and very little cream. It did melt quickly, though. We're looking forward to making some delicious sorbets with this new blender.

Oscillating October

Today I got a new blender. My old one could barely mix chocolate milk and we lost the lid (which made for an exciting time when we did use it). Plus, I'm sick of throwing out all the uneaten fruits and vegetables in my fridge -- so this month I'm trying to be more healthy with all types of fun blender recipes.

Our first experiment:

Double Berry Smoothie
frozen strawberries
frozen blackberries
apples (leftover from a Happy Meal from McDonald's)
a pinch of sugar
water

This was actually really good. Nigel especially enjoyed it (I had to tell him NOT to get the berry smoothie from McDonald's since I had frozen berries at home and wanted to try out my new blender). It was a little thick for my taste, so maybe more water next time.