Cooking with Country Crock

I know you're really not supposed to because there seems to be something like a water base, but I needed butter in a pinch as to make some crepes. I know I've used it before (in fact, I think last time I made crepes) but this time it just didn't come out quite right.

Could one of my foodies that check in from time to time let me know why one isn't supposed to cook with things like Country Crock? Can one use stick margarine? This is where my lack of training comes into play. I guess I could look it up to find out, but I get distracted when I start looking things like that up.

If I find the answer, I will come back and update.....but right now I have to go an recruit some Java developers...as opposed to coffee makers. (ha!)

Right now...

....I'm eating Potato Salad from a bucket.....directly from the bucket.

(I am so "Fleetwood".)

Flat Bread Mania

OK....so, don't ever watch Jack Bauer's hero, Bobby Flay. He'll make you want to try things that you really have no business trying. I did it and pulled it off.....barely.....none of the kids would eat it....well, the eldest did, but she may have just been nice to me about it.

I made Flat Bread dough and cooked "flat bread pizza" on the grill.......it was cool. I wish I had taken photos. I did meatball, garlic and tomato w/mozzarella and did a bbq chicken pizza w/homemade bbq mulberry honey bbq sauce.

Check out Chef Flay's recipes for it...it isn't really hard, just friggin time consuming. I swear I may have wasted my day just waiting on the stuff to rise. I think next time, I will add something to the dough to give it a little more flava-flav. (yeah, boi!) sorry...that was sad.

At any rate, I didn't turn on the Grill-master Flay today because I was running around like mad trying to get a bunch of stuff taken care of that I only got half done.

Top Chef: Howie???

OK...so I don't have time for a lot of links here, but if anyone watched Top Chef (my favorite show) Wednesday night....how in the heck can Howie keep going up and down each week? One week he's a mess and the next week he's winning. Also, since when did he and Joey kiss and make up from their fight a couple of weeks ago.

The worst part about this show is how long it is taking them to get rid of the dead weight.

CJ is hardly even there.
Sara (non-Asian) is consistently bad, but not as bad as others
Dale is a dimwit that some how thinks he has what it takes.
Asian Sara just doesn't do well under pressure and they should put her out of my misery.
Thanks to the Holy Chef that fool from Mississippi got the boot the first week as well as the Rainbow Warrior with a Mohawk two weeks ago.
I think they're making the right decisions on who to shoo away, but it's just taking so long.
Heck, I even think Hung needs to go. I think that leaves Tre, Howie and Joey.....oh and Casey....but who gives a rat's butt about her....she's consistently bad too.

I'm not saying I could do any better than these people, but they're the ones going on the show. I'm still practicing for The Next Food Network Star. HA! (I'm working on my cupcakes....I hate making desserts -unless it's a cobbler)

Food on TV: Top Chef 3

Does anyone else watch Top Chef on Bravo? I really enjoy watching, but they put it on at a time that makes me hungry late at night. I'm not sure who I like on there this season. I think it's going to have to be Tre because he likes to cook bbq. Dale is just a whiny little beeyotch! (IMHO) and most of the women on there just need to go. I couldn't be a judge on there because I'd send everyone home right away. Hung and Tre would be there the rest of the season getting in to food battles for the rest of the season.

Let me know what you think about it?

Top Food Searches that get people to the Caddywampus

Boysenberry Cobbler - wouldn't have thought that
Chicken Parmesean - has been beaten out by the cobbler

Insta-Lunch

So, on Sunday, I was hungry for something.....but not the usual, like a PB&J or anything. Julie (my food photographer) asked me if I wanted a quesadilla with the left over grilled chicken. That sounded good to me. So, I chopped up a chicken breast while the "carb smart" tortilla was grilling and melting cheese....tossed the chicken on there...added some more cheese another tortilla on top....FLIP the whole thing to let the other tortilla grill. (oh yeah....slather the tortillas in butter so they gets nice and crispy) The whole time my wife and I were also chopping tomatoes, avocados and some red onion for guacamole.

Anyway, we turned out a nice filling lunch..........I even have proof of me eating my own food.

Caddywampus in your home

This 4th of July was fun. We, the fam-damily, went to Oceanside to my in-laws' house. They have a place in a retirement community called Ocean Hills and is pretty nice. It's like a self contained town....pretty cool, actually, which is better than the "retirement homes" that I'm used to seeing in my home town. Well, I got to cook for my in-laws in their home. I did not prepare all the food, but I did BBQ the ribs and corn and I also made a cobbler.

I started out seasoning the ribs with garlic salt, chili powder and pepper (coarse ground). Then they went into a 275 degree oven for 2 hours. Next we went to play paddle tennis and drove the boys around in the golf cart. (hey, we had to keep them busy) Then we went home, removed the hair from the corn on the cob so they wouldn't get all burned and just threw the corn, husk and all, on the grill. (LOL, I almost typed "on the girl"....ha!) While those started, I brought out the ribs and tossed them on the grill for about 5 minutes before slathering them down with BBQ sauce. (keep turning your corn to make sure it cooks evenly) Now, flip your ribs slather more sauce. Close grill and let the sauce set for a few minutes. Remove corn. Flip ribs once more, and turn off the grill. Let the heat set the glaze and remove from grill.



Serve with some homemade potato salad (mother in-law makes this very yummy like) and watermelon and salad and you have yourself a plate that you're so hungry to eat, you'll forget to take a photo. (hence, no photo).



Once you're all stuffed from that, who can even think of dessert? Well, since we made a special trip to the store, I cannot forget about it. I made a boysenberry cobbler. (see previous entry) It was good and the boys even ate their food.

With that being said, we went to the Legoland parking lot and watched their fireworks for $2 worth of parking.

It was a good 4th and I look forward to next year...........I think.