Day of Cooking

I am officially exhausted! Today I baked until my little heart was content. I started with Deliciously Organic's Pecan Pie without Corn Syrup. Next I was on to brownies, cranberry sauce, cupcakes, sweet potatoes, and a baked chicken.

I ate throughout the day on all my creations. They all tasted rather lovely. Well, the only thing I did not taste was the pecan pie. I wanted to wait 24 hours for it to set before cutting into it. Although the recipe calls for a grain free crust, I used another recipe. I tried 100 Days of Real Food's pie crust. It's pecan pie for breakfast in the morning.

Next in the line up was brownies. I got this recipe from King Arthur Flour. The name of the recipe is kind of silly, but to the point..."Tasting is believing whole grain brownies." What more convincing do you need than that? I will attest that they were quite yummy. I had more than my share for the day.

Homemade cranberry sauce is always a staple on our dinner table for the holidays. My family now reminds me to make it because they have grown to love it. I remember the first year I made it. There was so much left over. Last year, there was maybe a tablespoon or so left. That sure does make me feel good. My daughter will eat it from the ramekin with a spoon like it is peanut butter. No recipe for this one, I wing it every year.

My favorite of the day was and is the cupcake. I used my Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook I got from my wedding many years ago and modified it with whole wheat pastry flour and unrefined cane sugar. I still cannot get over how good these cupcakes are. Here's their recipe for a citrus yellow cake but I omitted the lemon and of course made revisions. Right now they are not frosted. I'm not sure if I will. We are having a Disney Junior Sofia the First: Once Upon a Princess movie premiere party. Maybe I will whip up something Sunday and let the kids frost their own.

Last was the chicken and sweet potatoes. It was good, but after all the snacking on our goodies, our appetites just weren't where they should have been.

You know what I think made my day of cooking really fun and great? The girls helped me. I didn't ask for their help; they just offered. Usually when I ask, they just don't want to do anything, but something was different today. I bet having the girls in the kitchen offering their services helped me get my cooking mojo back. We had FUN! Cooking has become fun again.