Honey French Bread

This is one of our favorite bread recipes, originally from allrecipes, love that site! This bread is so easy and turns out a perfectly crispy crust and soft exterior. It is such a versatile recipe and can be made in the bread machine if you halve the ingredients, the ones listed below make two loaves...and with bread this delicious you will want two loaves :)

1-1/2 cups water
1 tablespoon and 1 teaspoon honey
1 tablespoon and 1 teaspoon olive oil
1-1/4 teaspoons salt
1-1/4 teaspoons white sugar
4 cups bread flour
1 tablespoon active dry yeast

From there you can do the dough by hand or put it in your bread machine for the dough cycle, if you want to actually bake the bread in there you need to halve the ingredients, I know I already said that, but I don't want anyone to try and make a big mess and be mad at me :) Shape the loaves, bake at 350 for 30-35 minutes. So easy and just an amazing bread, great for paninis, or just to serve with a meal with some butter and/or jam.

I'm posting this recipe for My Kitchen My World, this week we could do a recipe from our home country or a recipe from a country we enjoy watching in the Olympics. I am not French but have to say that I enjoyed watching Alain Bernard in swimming. He kept it interesting :) My kids and I have really enjoyed watching the Olympics this past week, especially the swimming (Go Michael Phelps!) and gymnastics. I am so proud of our American medalists, we have so many amazing athletes from around our country and it is a joy to watch them excel.

I'm not sure how authentic this "French" bread is, but it has French in the title, and we love it, so I hope you all don't mind me sharing it for My Kitchen My World. I just saw that next week we will be visiting Jamaica with our taste buds and am super excited about making a Jamaican meal, what fun!

My First Panzanella

I have been wanting to try a panzanella (bread salad) for a few years but never had, so I was really excited when as Melissa of It’s Melissa’s Kitchen picked Ina's Panzanella for us to try over at Barefoot Bloggers.

Barefoot Contessa Panzanella

3 tablespoons good olive oil
1 small French bread or boule, cut into 1-inch cubes (6 cups)
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 large, ripe tomatoes, cut into 1-inch cubes
1 hothouse cucumber, unpeeled, seeded, and sliced 1/2-inch thick
1 red bell pepper, seeded and cut into 1-inch cubes
1 yellow bell pepper, seeded and cut into 1-inch cubes
1/2 red onion, cut in 1/2 and thinly sliced
20 large basil leaves, coarsely chopped
3 tablespoons capers, drained

For the vinaigrette:
1 teaspoon finely minced garlic
1/2 teaspoon Dijon mustard
3 tablespoons Champagne vinegar
1/2 cup good olive oil
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

Heat the oil in a large saute pan. Add the bread and salt; cook over low to medium heat, tossing frequently, for 10 minutes, or until nicely browned. Add more oil as needed.

For the vinaigrette, whisk all the ingredients together.

In a large bowl, mix the tomatoes, cucumber, red pepper, yellow pepper, red onion, basil, and capers. Add the bread cubes and toss with the vinaigrette. Season liberally with salt and pepper. Serve, or allow the salad to sit for about half an hour for the flavors to blend.

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I live in a rural area and our grocery selection is very limited, I do a lot of grocery shopping online and quickly placed an order on netgrocer for a few ingredients for this recipe, champagne vinegar, capers, dijon mustard, and kosher salt. I have no problem buying special ingredients for recipes, because it is always nice to have a well stocked pantry and who knows what new recipes I can find that will call for my new ingredients, maybe I'm crazy but I think it's so much fun trying new foods and flavors.

I had some trouble with the fresh basil and you might notice it's missing from my panzanella, undoubtedly altering Ina's desired result, sorry! I sent my husband out to get fresh basil from 'a big city' on his way home from work, he came home with a basil plant, no soil, just roots in water, in a little pastic baggie. The baggie said "keep on the counter and tear off leaves as needed" or something like that, but this poor basil plant must have been sitting in the produce section forever because it was barely edible looking, it has been planted in the front flower bed -- it was either that or just throw it out since I really couldn't use the leaves. Hopefully there is some life left in that little plant and I will have fresh basil of my own (I have hopes of my own little veggie and herb garden next spring...we'll see)

The flavors were a little strong for me, I enjoyed this salad but doubt I'd make it again with that dressing. Also tried capers for the first time and not too sure how I feel about those, whoa tastebuds! My one year old loved them if you can believe that! He is my most adventerous eater :)

I was reading that traditional panzanellas don't have cheese but couldn't help but think I would love some feta or fresh baby mozzarella in this. I did add some parmesan to my serving and thought that really added to the flavor combo nicely.

Here are my bread cubes all ready to start toasting in olive oil.

My lovely veggies, subbed green pepper for the onion, and didn't deseed my cucumber, this one was from my mom's garden and the seeds were still nice and soft so they didn't interfere with the overall texture. Also I completely forgot the tomatoes, I bought cherry tomatoes specifically for this recipe and forgot to add them, oops!

The elusive champagne vinegar :)

Yum, yum, yum!

Blueberry Sour Cream Ice Cream -- Tuesdays with Dorie

Don't you just hate it when you find a recipe, it sounds delicious, you love the ingredients, but it just doesn't work for your tastebuds? I hate to say it but that's how I feel about this Blueberry Sour Cream Ice Cream :( I love blueberries, I like sour cream, I like ice cream, it sounded great and I was so excited when Dolores, of Chronicles in Culinary Curiosity , chose this blueberry ice cream recipe for Tuesdays with Dorie group, but I just wasn't happy with then end result, sorry! Maybe I had my hopes up too high? I don't know, this flavor combo just wasn't working for me. I felt the ice cream was way too rich, I could barely handle more than a couple of bites, and the sour cream flavor was too strong. My blueberry loving kids also did not care for this, if you can believe kids don't want ice cream, after a few bites they wanted 'a different' ice cream, and when I offered it to them again they declined!

I wish I had more to report, more pictures of fun things I did with this ice cream, but I don't. It was a beautiful color, easy to make, and got me in the Thanksgiving mood...because when I was preparing the blueberries and waiting for them to 'burst' in the saucepan I was taken to November in my mind, stirring cranberries until they popped and making the cranberry sauce for our Thanksgiving feast. So thank you, blueberry sour cream ice cream, for reminding me of one of my favorite times of the year :)

Crispy Tofu Triangles with Veggies in Peanut Sauce

This is a completely successful leftover make over :) Using leftovers from our Opening Ceremony Chinese inspired feast, this meal quickly came together, and I think I liked it better than the original meal! I used the leftover tofu triangles and leftover sesame 'lo mein' noodles, made my favorite peanut sauce, and added it to some freshly sauteed peppers and zucchini and summer squash, since that's what I had in the fridge.

Here is my favorite peanut sauce, it is slightly modified from a recipe I found on allrecipes a few years ago. At that point I was trying many different peanut sauce variations trying to recreate a sauce served at tiny Thai restaurant, this one was the most similar and satisified our craving.

Best Peanut Sauce

1/2 cup crunchy peanut butter (smooth works just as well, and you can garnish with chopped peanuts if desired)
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 teaspoon white sugar (I do not use this, it really doesn't need any extra sugar if you are using "regular" peanut butter)
2 drops hot pepper sauce (I used more like 5 drops of tabasco)
1 clove garlic, minced (I use garlic powder)
1/2 cup water

I also add a splash of seasoned rice vinegar before whisking all together. That's it, super easy and delicious, and ingredients that are always in the pantry!

Look at those lightly sauteed -- still kind of crisp because that's how I like 'em -- veggies swimming in peanut sauce, probably one of my favorite meals!

I just love this sauce and hadn't used it in a while so making this dish with leftovers was a real treat! I have a feeling I will be on an Asian inspired food kick for a while :)

Black and White Banana Loafies -- Tuesdays with Dorie

The recipe of the week was Black and White Banana Loaf, chosen by Ashlee of A Year In The Kitchen . I was planning to use my 8 by 4 loaf pan for Dorie's lucious Banana Loaf but at the last minute I decided not to and went foraging through the attic for my mini loaf pan. I haven't used it in a couple of years even though I love the little baby loaves it produces, and thought my kids would really enjoy the little loafies, and they sure did! I will have to use this pan more often :) My changes to the recipe were to use two bananas, replace the milk with buttermilk, and use 3.5 ounces of chocolate. I also used 1 tsp rum extract instead of rum. Why? Because I had some to use up on my lazy susan of extracts and flavorings, and I did not have rum.

We are frequent banana bread consumers in this household, I almost always buy two bunches of bananas at a time, and hope that a couple don't get eaten so we can whip up some banana bread. My husband loves banana bread, just banana though, no chocolate, no nuts, nothing fun. I love it with just about anything and everything, I think my favorite banana bread ever was a "tropical" banana bread which had pineapple, coconut, macadamia nuts, and chopped up maraschino cherries along with the yummy nanas (or ninas, as my children used to call them). Yum, yum!

This recipe came together easily, I used buttermilk instead of milk because we had some in the fridge to use up and I think buttermilk makes just about every baked good taste better than just using milk. Banana bread is no exception, I love the ultra moistness it gives with just a little tang.

As I was reading the TWD website post on this recipe I noticed a few people had trouble with a crispy exterior and an underdone almost gummy middle, after they baked the full time in a loaf pan. For me, using the mini loaf pan, I had to kind of guess and check with the timing. They tested done, looked done, and were pretty much done but I did have a little almost underdone feeling in the middle of my little loafies. At first I thought I must have messed up with the baking time since I didn't have anything to really go by, but when I read others had this issue I thought that maybe it had something to do with the recipe? I don't know honestly, but you know, I actually like my middle a little soft and gooey like that, is that so wrong? Now I'm not talking "underdone" I'm talking so so so moist that it fakes you into thinking for a second it's underdone, and those who did not actually bake these might think they are underdone, but they are really just super moist. Yeah, I like that :) While this is considered a recipe flaw to some, I actually like it, and in this recipe, in addition to my guessing on baking times my supermoist middles could have also been caused by the fact that I used buttermilk instead of milk, used half an ounce more chocolate, and also used half an extra banana. So I'm not going to fault Dorie's recipe one bit on my end, and even if I had stuck to the recipe 110% and still had the supermoist middles, I would have LOVED them hehehe.

Underdone? Nah, just super moist, and yeah, I did test them with my OXO cake tester, of course. And I know that sounds like the most unnecessary thing to buy but I had been using thin bamboo skewers as cake testers and tossing them so really, buying the OXO cake tester was good for the environment. I try to help out when I can.

This recipe is a for sure 'make again' for us. The kiddos loved them! I might play around with the chocolate type, try to add an element of peanut butter for a "triple" flavored loaf (or baby loafies), and I will leave out the rum because it just didn't do anything for me in this recipe, and I do like rum flavor even though I don't drink it a lot, but it just isn't working for me flavor wise with this, maybe it is in there to "sophisticate" the homey banana loaf? I don't know, but in our house, nina bread needs no sophistication, just a quick spread of butter, and a tall glass of milk :)

Pineapple Pepper Pizza

When our very sweet 90 year old neighbor brought us some green peppers from his garden the other day they begged to become pizza toppings. Green peppers used to be on my 'do not like' list, I had tried them here and there and just didn't enjoy them, then, when I was pregnant with my son I started craving green peppers! I suddenly loved them, couldn't get enough, ate them raw, in stir fries, and even ordered them as a pizza topping for the first time in my life. Isn't it crazy what those pregnancy hormones can do? I'm happy to report that my taste for green peppers has remained long after the birth of my first son, and now I enjoy them all the time.

The kids and I were planning a pizza night, and knowing they were a little wary of peppers on pizza I decided to pair them with something I knew they would love, pineapple! I'd never had that combination on a pizza before and was surprised it turned out as well as it did. We all loved our new pizza creation, the pineapple giving some sweetness and the peppers giving some crunch and bite, just perfect with lots of freshly shredded mozzarella and paremsan. The fresh from the garden green peppers made this pizza over the top delicious!

For the crust I used this recipe from allrecipes:
3/4 cup water
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tablespoon white sugar
1 tablespoon dry milk powder
2 1/4 cups bread flour
1 teaspoon active dry yeast
(I always add a shake of pizza seasoning, this time I used Chef Paul Prudhomme's Pizza & Pasta Magic Hot & Sweet Seasoning Blend, which I love, we also have the Herbal Pizza & Pasta Magic, they are both great)

Place ingredients in the pan of the bread machine in the order recommended by the manufacturer. Select Dough cycle; press Start.
Remove dough from pan after rise cycle and use for your favorite pizza recipe.



It is one of two favorite pizza crust recipes I have, I use this one a lot because the ingredients are always on hand in my house and it's easily doubled to make two big cookie sheet sized pizzas. I'm always trying new crust recipes but this one I know will produce a crispy outside, soft inside, perfectly chewy crust. Before toppings and cheese I added homemade red wine pizza sauce, a recipe I'm still perfecting and love so much, I really like pizza sauce in general and this one is just delicious! The pineapple was half an 8 ounce can of crushed pineapple, drained.

Mexican Dinner

We love Mexican style food, it is one of my favorite meals to prepare and my picky husband even enjoys it, yay! This week Natashya of Living in the Kitchen with Puppies chose Mexican as our country to visit with our tastebuds for My Kitchen My World.

We have had a really busy week and I wasn't able to do the huge Mexican meal I wanted and try a bunch of new recipes, sorry :( Homemade tortillas and churros were in the plan but never got accomplished, but I promise, I will try them soon, and let you all know how they turned out.

Please excuse my boring photography of this food, even though the pictures aren't the greatest the food was delicious!

This is a simple Mexican rice recipe adapted from allrecipes.com. I know some people love their rice chock full of veggies like onions and peppers, but we like our rice plain, just nicely seasoned, so the flavor doesn't take over other dishes. In this recipe you sautee 1 cup of rice with 2 tbsp oil until it's slightly crisped and puffy, add 1/2 cup tomato sauce, 1 can vegetable broth, and some garlic and onion powder, from there you can add any other Mexican spices or seasoning blend to taste. Bring to a boil then reduce heat and simmer until the rice is thoroughly cooked but not mushy about 15-18 minutes. Perfect Mexican rice! All ready to be stuffed into a tortilla or eaten as a side dish. If you wanted to make this rice a 'meal' add a can of rinsed drained black beans, some corn, tomatoes, peppers, etc. and then you have a substantial filling for burritos or just to be served as it.

This is probably my worst picture but the taste is beyond compare. These are the main filling for my pepper mushroom fajitas, pop these perfectly seasoned veggies in a tortilla, top with lettuce, queso fresco, and a touch of sour cream and you have a fajita rivaling anything you can get in a restaurant. In fact, after being served unsatisfactory "veggie fajitas" on numerous restaurant trip I came up with this recipe using things I liked about restaurant style fajitas and leaving off what I didn't. I just need some of those little cast iron fajita serving skillets, they are on my 'want' list of kitchen stuff :)


Another bad pic of good food, these are another dish I created after having some at a restaurant. Mexican roasted potatoes, pretty simple, cube potatoes, toss them with some olive oil, spice them up with a Mexican seasoning blend, and roast at 400 for about 50 minutes until tender and crispy on the outside. Now when I first saw these I thought roasted potatoes weren't really "Mexican" I still have no clue, but they are delicious, and a great side for a fiesta of a meal!


Lastly here are some baked 'smothered' burritos! These contain beans, corn, and chopped tomatoes, all sauteed together and seasoned, then rolled into flour tortillas. In the bottom of my glass baking dish I have a thin layer of taco/enchilada sauce. Some people like their burritos floating in sauce, which is fine but I prefer mine a little less saucy before baking that way the tortillas don't get mushy. I would rather top mine with extra sauce *after* baking.


Top your burritos with more sauce after you put them seam side down in the baking dish, not a lot, but don't be too skimpy either, you want to have most of the burrito covered in a thin layer with a little extra on the sides. Then top with cheese, use whatever cheese you'd like but if possible add a little mozzarella to your cheese of choice, here I used extra sharp cheddar, some pepper jack, along with a bit of mozzarella. The mozzarella really gives the cheese a nice 'melty' consistency, I know it doesn't sound like it would add a lot but there is an extra dimension when you add a touch of mozzarella, it just adds depth, or something, just try it, trust me :) After the cheese I add some black olives, bake at 375 for about 30 minutes, after that I always broil the top just for a second to get the cheese golden brown, YUM! Serve with all of your favorite toppings, guacamole, chopped tomatoes, shredded lettuce, extra cheese and taco/enchilada sauce, mmmmm! This is one of my favorite meals ever and you can personalize it by adding any kind of filling, cheese, toppings, etc. it is a family favorite for sure, you could even add different fillings to each burrito per the tastes of your picky eaters and bake them all together, just remember which burrito is yours :)