food of the living dead
I know this is a little crazy, but this weekend I'm going to try to make multiple dishes from recipes. And one of them is cookies. It's rare that I stray from my usual cooking strategy (stir fry vegetables, put on top grain product), and many people would argue that I shouldn't.
But just because I've almost never successfully made cookies from scratch doesn't mean I shouldn't try out this recipe for zombie finger shortbread cookies for the first time on the night my book club discusses World War Z, right? What could go wrong?
Before I embark on the cookies, though, I'm making toast. I think I can handle that. The toast will become bread crumbs for the mac and cheese I'm going to make my dad tonight. My dad, like all the Kleins, is not a picky eater and is almost always thrilled to eat anything made by someone other than Trader Joe. So even though this recipe is also new, I'm not too worried about whether he'll like it.
The bigger challenge will be persuading him it's healthy. It's hard to convince someone who never eats more than half a muffin that any recipe which calls for a cup of cream is healthy. He and AK once had a long debate about whole foods vs. highly engineered but low-fat/sugar/sodium foods, my physicist dad coming down on the side of the latter. I can make a case for this mac and cheese being more natural than the blue-box variety, but it's not really low anything.
My sister once said, "Whenever I cook for Dad, I make one low-fat substitution--like I'll use two-percent milk instead of whole milk--and then I can tell him it's a special low-fat recipe I found, even if it still includes a bag of chocolate chips."
So I'm toasting three pieces of whole wheat bread to use among the bread crumbs. The rest of the crumbs will come from the leftover loaves of white bread I froze after our fire-pit pie extravaganza. First bread pudding, now this. "Making my own bread crumbs with leftover loaves of 99-cent bread!" I boasted to AK. "I feel like I live in the '30s!"
Except I think zombie finger cookies weren't invented back then, and girls rarely considered themselves domestic goddesses for being able to make toast. Also, I just Googled "bread crumbs how to" and learned that I'm already making them wrong--turns out you're supposed to dry bread in the oven, not the toaster. But whatever.
But just because I've almost never successfully made cookies from scratch doesn't mean I shouldn't try out this recipe for zombie finger shortbread cookies for the first time on the night my book club discusses World War Z, right? What could go wrong?
Before I embark on the cookies, though, I'm making toast. I think I can handle that. The toast will become bread crumbs for the mac and cheese I'm going to make my dad tonight. My dad, like all the Kleins, is not a picky eater and is almost always thrilled to eat anything made by someone other than Trader Joe. So even though this recipe is also new, I'm not too worried about whether he'll like it.
The bigger challenge will be persuading him it's healthy. It's hard to convince someone who never eats more than half a muffin that any recipe which calls for a cup of cream is healthy. He and AK once had a long debate about whole foods vs. highly engineered but low-fat/sugar/sodium foods, my physicist dad coming down on the side of the latter. I can make a case for this mac and cheese being more natural than the blue-box variety, but it's not really low anything.
My sister once said, "Whenever I cook for Dad, I make one low-fat substitution--like I'll use two-percent milk instead of whole milk--and then I can tell him it's a special low-fat recipe I found, even if it still includes a bag of chocolate chips."
So I'm toasting three pieces of whole wheat bread to use among the bread crumbs. The rest of the crumbs will come from the leftover loaves of white bread I froze after our fire-pit pie extravaganza. First bread pudding, now this. "Making my own bread crumbs with leftover loaves of 99-cent bread!" I boasted to AK. "I feel like I live in the '30s!"
Except I think zombie finger cookies weren't invented back then, and girls rarely considered themselves domestic goddesses for being able to make toast. Also, I just Googled "bread crumbs how to" and learned that I'm already making them wrong--turns out you're supposed to dry bread in the oven, not the toaster. But whatever.
Comments
I prefer my Mom's macaroni & cheese over all others. No bread crumbs in it. Just macaroni, american cheese, and a rue + cheese to make a sauce if I recall. (I have detailed notes. :)
TL: The mom's-recipe idea is brilliant. My only problem is that I take after my mom all too much as a chef. She too was fond of cheap, easy, healthy-ish weeknight recipes, for which her grateful family members coined terms like "falawful" and "spoonful of glop." Karmically, I deserve nothing but thumbs-downs for anything I cook.