As many of my formative years were spent in a mecca of homemaking and domesticity, I always assumed certain skills were mine by right, heredity or at least osmosis. Turns out, not so much.
My first semester of college, I tried. I cooked a few times a week, and was continually baffled by chewy pasta and scorched pans. Eventually I realized that the meals I was trying to make could be easily found in cans or in frozen packages. I still ate fresh fruits and vegetables, but as far as cooking or baking was concerned - all I needed was the microwave. I never needed to clean the oven, and I had plenty of food variety to choose from.
Fast forward to last year: Along came a very innocuous book called Food Rules by Michael Pollan. It was a gateway book. Suddenly I was watching documentaries about where my food came from and the crazy processes it went through before it showed up on my plate. I couldn't bring myself to eat meat for a month, and I began to suspect that Satan was either a majority stock holder, or the actual CEO of ConAgra Foods, Inc. and that High Fructose Corn Syrup was his daily nectar.
Soooo.... I started changing some things. I tried to live more by Pollan's rules "Eat food, not too much, mostly plants". Don't get me wrong, I am by no means a 100%-er (Here's looking at you Whitney N., You are a superstar!). I probably eat about 70% unprocessed, vegetarian meals.
But when I started trying to eat foods that had just come from my food co-op or the farmers market, I hit a familiar problem. I don't cook. I don't bake. Bad things happen when I put things in the real-life, grown-up oven.
Fast forward to present: I own a crockpot, breadmaker, a food processor, and use them on a regular basis! Bad things still happen frequently. Food is still sometimes not good when I mix it with other food and then apply heat. But, I'm growing a database of recipes that I can cook decently, and I occasionally invite others to try (eek!)
END OF BACKGROUND STORY. BEGINNING OF ACTUAL BLOGPOST.
So this week, I decided to make Junior Mints. 'Cause I love them, 'nuff said. Google produced several recipes. I sorted through them and found the shortest one (4 ingredients!). I found it at Cafe Zupa's Blog
And I made them. Here is a list of things I learned:
1. Spatula - This is an amazing tool. I used to utilize a spatula only when I needed to flip things over that were hot and couldn't find my real flippy thing. So you can see my one spatula is now a little melted. But I totally get it now! I used it for scraping the bowl to get every bit of cream cheese off today, and for a pumpkin recipe I made last week. Brilliant. Who invented that thing? They should win something.
2. Continues to amaze me how 3 oz of cream cheese can incorporate 3+ cups of powdered sugar. How does that even work? Pretty sure it has to do with the Law of multiple proportions. Or magic.
3. Powdered sugar - Does it contain magnetic dust? Because my counter, clothes and stove top are covered in powered sugar - garrr!!!
4. I make a pretty mean homemade Junior Mint. They only thing I mourn is that kind of juicy liquid that is inside with the mint. Mine were just a little bit drier. Wonder if that is one of those ingredients the real ones have, but mine don't? Corn Syrup, Food Starch Modified, Invertase (Enzyme(s)), Soya Albumin, Gelatin? I'll console myself with the sense of virtue I get that mine only had 4 ingredients, all of which could be found in my cupboard....
5. Recipe says yield 96. Nope - try 12. Perhaps my sense of candy proportions is somewhat skewed? Can't imagine why :)In sum: Today I like Homemade Junior Mints!
No comments:
Post a Comment