Friday, September 28, 2012

A Hit and a Miss

I recently made two very promising recipes that I found on Pinterest.  One was a definite Thumbs Up from everyone and the other one was a big fat miss.

Let’s start with the Hit!

Four ingredients, Woo Hoo!

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Chicken is the missing fourth ingredient.  I only thought to take pictures after no one cried at dinner, so the chicken was already in its finished, yummy state.

The recipe calls for a 1/2 cup of mayo (I used light and it was fine), a 1/4 cup of shredded parmesan cheese, and a sprinkling of bread crumbs.  Mix together the mayo and cheese (and to be honest, I just eyeballed my amounts), spread it onto chicken breast cutlets (I thought I had cutlets, but there must have been a package of tenders mixed in, because I ended up with those instead…they worked out just fine), and then lightly sprinkle some bread crumbs on top.  Spread the mayo mixture on pretty lightly as it does not melt into the chicken, and a little goes a long way.

Bake, uncovered at 425 degrees for about 25 minutes.

Here were the tenders that were leftover:

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Next time I will increase my cheese amount and put them under the broiler for a couple of minutes to get it nice and toasty on top.

This was very creamy with a nice sharp touch from the cheese, and the chicken wound up super moist.  I will definitely be making this again.

Up next…my miss.

I love cauliflower, but no one else does, so when I saw a recipe for mashed cauliflower, I knew I’d be making it just for me.  The blogger who posted the original recipe said it was even more delicious than regular mashed potatoes, so I thought I’d give it a whirl. 

I microwaved cauliflower with some butter and milk and then threw the cooked mixture into my food processor with some cheese and salt and pepper to grind/mash it all up.  Here’s what I got:

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It looks totes delish, but I’m here to tell you that it was grainy and tasted nothing like mashed potatoes.  Which is fine!  I like cauliflower!  But I didn’t like this.  Here is the blogpost I borrowed my recipe from if you’d like to try it.

However, if I were you, I’d either make the Parmesan Chicken or maybe some of these Snickerdoodle Brownies, and then you could bring some over to my house and surprise me with them!  And we could be best friends forever.

5 comments:

stephanie said...

Bummer about the cauliflower recipe. I almost pinned that too! Glad you tried it first.

Deb said...

Haha -- I LOVE that recipe. I found the same one and made it a couple times -- and ate the whole shebang myself. I even used skim milk, and just plain old walmart brand cheddar cheese because I can't be bothered to follow directions or shop. No one else would ever even think of touching it, much less eating, but I liked it. Sorry you didn't like it. I think we talked about it before, so if I misled you, my apologies. I'm known to not have good taste.

I have that chicken on my list to make next week. I was going to try to yogurt. I know it would change the recipe, but I wonder how it would do.

Beth said...

Deb, one of the commenters on the chicken asked the oiginal blogger if she thought she could substitute Greek yogurt, and she thought yes, but that they might want to add a little lemon in with it to give it more zing. Which is a little silly because, really, mayo has no zing.
I'd like to add that the thought of slathering my chicken with mayo just about made me want to barf. I'm not a huge mayo fan. But I really did like this.

You didn't recommend the cauliflower to me...I just mentioned to you that I was going to make it. Maybe I had grainier than average cauliflower?

Stephanie--glad you were able to dodge that Cauliflower Bullet! Or go to Deb's house. Hers is apparently better than mine. Whatevs.

Tara said...

The chicken looks good and reminds me of a tilapia recipe I have that my family inhales. As for the cauliflower, I just saw a recipe for loaded baked potato soup using cauliflower; I wonder how that would be? The bigger problem here is why can't we just eat all the freaking potatoes we want and not get bloated and gain weight? Why does the potato hate us so much? And why can't I have the same metabolism as John? And will I always have this love/hate relationship with food my whole life? I expect an answer to all of my questions.

Deb said...

Me too, Beth. I want the same answers as Jane, including why can't I have John's metabolism and why do potatoes hate us so much.