2014 - Book 28

"My Life Next Door" - Connecticut

This is a perfect "beach book". Typical boy meets girl-next-door summer romance, but with a really nice storyline behind it too. A little bit too much focus on the physical aspect for my liking, but still PG rated. I really liked the different family dynamics and the main character, Samantha, has a good head on her shoulders, which I appreciate. I don't want to give too much of the story away, but it was one of my favorite books that I've read all year. Every girl deserves a nice guy like Jase :)

For my recipes this week, I have Slow Cooker Sticky Chicken Drumsticks, "Magic" Cake, Crock Pot Applesauce, and Dried Apple Skins (& this recipe for the apple skins too).

For the slow cooker sticky chicken drumsticks, you'd be better off following this recipe. There really is no way to get the good sticky sauce in a crockpot. I found that out the hard way by making it in the crock pot and ending up with cooked chicken and liquid sauce. So I looked over the other recipe and put the chicken in the oven and cooked down / thickened the sauce and then brushed it on a few times in the oven. I put them back in the crock pot on "warm" to serve at a pot luck, and they were SOOO good. I love cilantro too, so sprinkling that and the toasted sesame seeds on the end was a good addition. The first recipe didn't really work, but the flavors are great, just follow the oven procedure and you'll be good to go.

When I made the "Magic" cake, I thought there was no way that I was doing it right. Why would I whip the egg whites and then literally stir them back into a liquid mixture (as opposed to folding them in the make the mixture more light and fluffy)? It just seemed wrong, but I watched the little video at the bottom of the page, and that's what they did, and to my surprise . . . it worked. It kind of had the flavor of flan, minus the caramel part, and it had all three layers . . . amazing. There are lots of other desserts I like better, but I might try a different variation of this, just because it was kind of cool. I think the chocolate version might be good.

Magic :)

I really enjoyed the crock pot applesauce. I used 8 medium apples that we picked at a local farm (not sure which variety because we had four different ones), but I think using different types is a good idea. The addition of the strip of lemon peel was really tasty too. With all of the lifting the cover off and stirring, mine was not nearly done enough after the allotted time, so I let it go quite a bit longer (maybe two hours on low plus on "warm" for the rest of the night . . . I had to let it go overnight since it was too late to stay up and watch it. Programmable crock pots are my friend.) I didn't need to use a blender, because it was so soft at this point that I just stirred it and it was perfect. I warmed it up when serving and put a scoop of vanilla ice cream on top and ate it with graham crackers as my spoon = YUM. I don't really like pie crust, so this was like the perfect apple pie in my book. Give it a try, it was really good.

Since I peeled all of those apples for the applesauce, I had a ton of leftover peels. I didn't want to just waste them, so I read the two recipes I linked above and just sprinkled them with cinnamon sugar and put them in the oven on the lowest temp (170 F I think it was) until they were done. The smaller pieces were done first, but some of the larger pieces took a bit longer. I don't remember how long I had them in, but it was quite a while. Just keep checking them, and take them out when they are fully dry and crispy. They were actually pretty tasty if you are just looking for something to snack on.

I hope you enjoy all of the yummy food this week. Make a big pot of that applesauce, sit down with "My Life Next Door" and have a wonderful day :)