Been A While…Life and Other Stuff

Hi everyone! Wow, it has been a while since I have been here. I have no excuse really except to say that life got in the way. In June, my fiancé's dad died. Then there was the funeral and all of the stuff that comes after that. So, I have not really been cooking lately. We are packing to move soon and after that I will again be in the kitchen cooking and trying out recipes.

It has been a difficult few months here for us and it finally feels as if we are seeing the light at the end of a long , dark tunnel. I have noticed that I have picked up another couple of readers since my last post, welcome! Thank you all for baring with me and understanding. I am looking forward to getting back into the kitchen and cooking again soon.

Although there will be some changes, my fiancé has always been diabetic, but has not taken care of it. So now, he is on insulin and my journey to find great diabetic recipes has begun! Especially desserts because he has a major sweet tooth! So, I hope that you will join me on that journey and if you know of any websites or recipe sites that has diabetic recipes let me know!! Ciao!

New Readers

I noticed that I gathered a few new readers and I wanted to say hello and thank  you for following my cooking blog. I have many recipes here and I know that I will be posting some new ones in the future. Lately life has been getting in the way of me posting here. Let's face it, there is only so much time in the day! Sometimes I just don't get everything done that I would like to.

I am looking to be posting some healthier recipes here because my boy friend has been put on a diet for diabetics. He was Type 2 but never took care of it  now he is borderline Type 1 and has to use insulin. So, I am on a quest for healthy meals that taste good too. Because most of the healthy for us stuff tastes kind of bad and I don't want to eat it.

I am from the South, so I love Southern cooking and I know that is not always healthy for you. I have to find balance of some kind. Again, please make yourself comfortable here and let's talk cooking!! Ciao!

How Do You Recipe?

Recipes for me sometimes are a necessity because face it, there are times when I am less than creative. I just don’t have it in me to ‘create’ dinner some days. So, what I am asking here is how do you come by your recipes? For me, I kind of get them from everywhere.

I am on Food Network of course. I get several magazines as well. I am on Epicurious as well. My recipe box is a index card box, which is blue. It actually is all nasty because I have had it for a while and there are long periods of time where I do not use it.

If I see a recipe in a magazine that I have, usually I have a box full of old cooking magazines, so I will throw it in there, but if the magazine is not mine, I am not above ripping a page out sometimes. Yeah I am that woman. LOL. But I usually just toss it in the old recipe box to be looked at later. In my recipe box I have several recipes that I did get from Food Network, I printed the cards out and cut them out and stapled them together…. Little Suzy home maker am I.

I recently went through this box and looked to see what was actually in there. I had a couple duplicate recipes. I do that on purpose actually, when America’s Test Kitchen was still a semi free site, I printed a few recipes from them. But I printed more than one of each because face it, spills happen. Now that Cook’s Country and America’s Test Kitchen are the same, that website is pay only. I just bought the America’s Test Kitchen cook book with every single recipe that they have ever shown for less than an annual subscription to the website. I also got all of this years shows on DVD when it comes out for free because I bought the book.

I have tried some recipes from other sites and not had good results, so my advice is to stick to the sites you know and use a lot. I also am on the Kraft website as well. I have to admit that I am disappointed that they changed their policy regarding the magazine, it was free and great! Now it is like $14 for 4 issues. A bit much don’t you think? But you can get a look at the archived ones for free on the website. So, tell me how do you recipe?

A Food Discovery

So in the interest of being honest here, I normally do not like anything diet or fat free. Anything low calorie I normally run the other way from because along with diet, fat free, and low calorie there is normally not any taste. At. All. Which is why I don't like this kind of stuff.


I have recently made a stunning discovery, at least to me anyway. Yoplait puts out this fat free yogurt that I absolutely adore! They have some really great flavors like apple turnover, Boston creme pie, strawberries and bananas, etc... The thing is that they are really good! I eat at least one a day and they are fat free and low calorie. Go figure.

Dinner Last Night

Last night we went to O'Mara's here in Michigan. Now normally we only go there for Sunday brunch because it is $9.99, which in the world of brunches is really cheap. It is all you can eat and they make omlettes and eggs Benedict to order which is included. I had only been there for dinner a few years ago with Doug, his sister, his dad, and her boyfriend. It was good but kind of expensive which is why we had not gone back.

Well, last night was quite a surprise! The menu was retooled from the last time I had been there. It was less expensive and they added some simpler items such as sandwiches and ribs. Last night Doug had a bowl of the clam chowder. Which honestly I am not into that much, but I had a taste. It was delicious! The clams were tender and sweet, not chewy at all. The soup base was very good as well and Doug even found a whole bay leaf.

I had shrimp rumake for an appetizer, which I had never had before. Granted it was $7.99 for 4 shrimp, but they were pretty big and it came on a bed of rice The menu says that shrimp rumake is shrimp wrapped in bacon and has a slightly spicy sauce drizzled over it. The shrimp were amazing and tender. It was slightly spicy, not too much that your head explodes and enough that you can taste it. I brought two of them home and let me tell you even reheated it was good.

For dinner, Doug had the seafood fettuccine with Alfredo sauce. Normally the Alfredo sauce is majorly over powering but his was light. The seafood was tender and sweet, he had shrimp and scallops in the pasta. He reheated it last night and the seafood did not get rubbery or tough as you know happens with reheated seafood. Included with the meal was a salad which was very fresh and not a brown leaf of lettuce.

I had chicken Mackinaw, which is a chicken breast covered with caramelized bacon and mozzarella cheese it was supposed to be topped with mushrooms, but I asked for it with out.  It had a gravy/sauce, which was good but there was so much of it! Maybe a little less next time. I also got french fries with it. I also had the salad.

Both portions were huge! We both had to bring stuff home. My dinner was $13.99 and his was $17.99. We will be going back there again for dinner and not just brunch! It is close to the house and good food. Not many places like that...

More Thoughts on Pineapple Right Side Up Cupcakes

I noticed today that either I did not cook the cupcakes long enough or that the brown sugar/butter sauce dissolved some of the cupcake. So probably the easiest way to make these is to make the cupcakes first and then either use a fork to poke holes in the top of the cupcake and drizzle the sauce over the top.. Or just ice them with a vanilla frosting and put a piece of pineapple on top.

Pineapple Right Side Up Cupcakes

Okay, I made these yesterday and they came out pretty good, but I have to think about how to make these better. I used a pineapple cake mix. Generally, on the side there is a recipe for pineapple upside down cake. So, to make these cupcakes, I took the butter and brown sugar mixture on that recipe, but melted them together on the stove in a pan. Make the cake mix as directed. I use the leftover pineapple juice from the canned pineapple instead of water. In a large can of pineapple, I got a cup of juice. It gives the cake more pineapple flavor.

I filled the cupcake liners too full of the cake batter so that when they baked the sauce on top went everywhere! I am thinking that the next time I make it, I am going to put the butter/brown sugar sauce in the middle of the cupcakes instead of on top. Also, I have to mention that if you put the sauce on top, you need to take these out of the pan, as quickly as possible but definitely before they totally cool or they will stick in the pan.

Doug says they are really good and I have to tell you they smelled amazing when cooking! So, try them and see! If you are having an issue, feel free to leave a comment or email me.