With blueberry compote to boot...

I got up this morning a little sleepier than I wanted to. It's one those weekends where no matter how well rested, I still feel sleepy; however, this morning may have been due to some cheer over the Saturday night hockey game with some friends. We made homemade donairs complete with the "special" sauce for dinner last night. This is a recipe from Car's company's employee cookbook compilation. It truly tastes like a donair from Duke's in Edmonton. Anyhow, an afternoon matinee sure woke me up: Casino Royale. All I have to say is hot. Go see it. In the theatre. Ignore the small lull about 3/4 of the way through and just focus (ladies) on what a good James Bond Daniel Craig is...

But I digress: Blender Pancakes. What an easy recipe to make and very easy to clean-up since you just dirty your griddle, blender, and measuring cups. I used real buttermilk as per Car's suggestion and I think that is a good way to go--the resulting batter is thick but silky. Even though the final product is light and fluffy, they are still very filling. They cook super quick, too! Since I realized we were out of Summerland Sweets syrup, I went to epicurious.com and found a lovely little recipe for Blueberry Compote using frozen blueberries and that was definitely a nice touch. I want to add this to my breakfast repetoire and make these babies more often for sure.

Perogies?

...not quite yet. I have decided recipe test #12 will be Lazy Perogies. I had a bit of a holy crap moment when I looked at our list of recipes and realize we are only 10% through. I don't even know how many different people I will be able to pawn food onto when we start hitting desserts, squares or bread. Currently, that category is unchartered.

This Sunday I am doing the pancakes and this recipe test may include a guest (Pat's cousin). An external recipe tester will be a first!

New year, new blender

This whole holiday thang sure put my posts on hiatus but I am raring to go and start recipe testing in 2007! So, the next recipe test is #11 with the Blender Pancakes. Since I missed the pancakes earlier, I will try them this weekend. Now I know my sister and I share a lot of mental telepathy moments, but I am not a mind reader so I hope she can send me the pancake recipe before this weekend. I am quite excited because we are proud new owners of a speedy Cuisinart blender which is smoothie-rific. Big sis is also a proud new owner of an imac so she should be in a blogging frenzy. Now it's my turn: I will have to think of what else I can drum up from "the recipe files" for us to make this weekend so I can get back on track!

Roasting puts cauliflower over the top.....

OK - so in typical Carlyn fashion, I feel somewhat behind in the recipe making. So, I just made the cauliflower soup that Sandy made a few weekends back. I had made the stuff before and it is one of Jason's favorite soups - recall that he said it was the only way one should ever deign to eat "poor man's broccoli". Again, in typical Carlyn fashion, I decided that I should mix it up a bit and screw with the recipe. So, I roasted the cauliflower first in the oven (tossed it with oil, salt and pepper) and then put it in at about 350 for 30-45 minutes - just until it started to carmelize at the edges - and then I continued on with the recipe.

It turned out great. I think that I will need to do a side by side taste test before one could actually pass judgement on whether the original or the roasted versions were appreciably different (or whether the extra 45 minutes of cooking time was worth it) - but I would definitely make again. And, as with all soups, the next day it was even tastier.

Blender Pancakes are easy peasy

Made the blender pancakes on Sunday morning for Nathan and I as Daddy was still sleeping. I do think that you could even make these on a weekday as they are so easy - all you do is throw all of the ingredients into the blender and blend. Then - making it even more user-friendly, you can just pour your pancakes out directly onto the griddle from the blender. There was nothing to wash!

Nathan sucked back a whole 8 pancakes which either means I made them too small or they were REALLY good. Could have been a bit of both. Next time I would be firm on using buttermilk or soured full fat milk instead of soured skim milk as they really were not as fluffy as I remember mom's being.

This weekend's agenda

In the interest of some comfort food and a really great breakfast, I am taking the liberty of adding blender pancakes to this weekend's cooking agenda. I haven't had these in a while, as I am sure that Sandy has not either, so it will likely take us back a few years. If I remember correctly, this recipe is as easy to make as it sounds but makes light and fluffy pancakes. I will have to harass mom for the recipe......