Pumpkin Peach Muffins

(Original recipe calls for 1 1/2 c flour.  I put in 1/2 c wheat flour and 1 1/4 white flour before adding the peach.  I let it sit for a bit to draw some of the moisture out of the peach, then added more flour until the batter returned to the consistency it had before I added the peach.)

Zucchini Scones

A friend gave me a gigantic zucchini the other day.  She told me as long as you didn't use the inside portion where the seeds are, the zucchini is perfectly edible despite its gargantuan size.  So I pulled out one of my favorite kitchen gadgets and went to work on the 1/3 of the zucchini.

I had some of this zucchini spaghetti with last night's delicious dinner, but there was still some left over.  (Not to mention the 2/3 of the zucchini still uncut...)  Today I decided to bake something with the remaining zucchini spaghetti.  My first thought was chocolate chip zucchini bread, but the recipe calls for 3 eggs and I wanted to do something that required fewer eggs.  Then scones came to mind.  I found this recipe online, and then adapted it.  Because we all know I hate following recipes.

Zucchini Scones

preheat oven to 400

1/2 c whole wheat flour

1 1/2+ c white flour

1/2 c sugar

1 tsp sea salt

1 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp cumin

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/2 c butter

1 c spaghetti-ed zucchini

1 peach, chopped

1 egg

1 tsp vanilla

1/4 c almond milk

bake for 20-25 minutes

I mixed the dry ingredients together in my stand mixer.  I used a pastry cutter to cut in the butter until it was in small pea-sized lumps.  I dumped the zucchini and peach on top of the dry ingredients, then, after mixing the wet ingredients separately, I added them and let the mixer do it's work.  The dough was super sticky, so I added flour 1/2 c at a time until it was...less sticky.  I added at least another cup.  Then, I floured my silpat and transferred the dough.  It was still too sticky to spread well, so I sprinkled more flour on top.  Then I was able to pat it down to about 1/2 inch thick.  I cut out the scones and transferred them to a greased cookie sheet. 

The scones were tasty, but not nearly as flavorful as I was hoping.  If I make them again, I will increase the amounts of cumin and cinnamon, and see what happens.  Also, I was going to put chocolate chips in them but I forgot...so that might happen next time too!

Mini Peach-Ginger Pies

Disclaimer : If you have a sweet tooth, this is probably not going to satisfy you.  

If you are like me and prefer your desserts to be less sweet, you might love it. 

preheat the oven to 350

The Crust

1/4 c butter

1/4 c whole wheat flour

1/2+ c white flour

1/4 tsp sea salt

3 tbsp cold water

The Filling

2 peaches, peeled & chopped

1 inch ginger root, grated

1 tbsp brown sugar

1/8 c flour

1 tsp ginger powder

1 tbsp mint leaves, chopped

1 tsp butter

I rolled the pie dough out and then used the mouth of a large plastic cup to cut out circles, which I then placed in 6 cups of a muffin tin, with some dough left over for the pie tops.  I mixed all of the filling ingredients together and then spooned them into the little pie shells.  I used the extra pie dough to put Xs on top of the pies.  

Bake for 20-30 minutes. 

I almost threw out the peach skins, but then I decided that instead of letting them go completely to waste, I could make a nice, refreshing, cocktail out of them.  

Peach-Skin Cocktail

skins from 2 peaches

2-3 sections of grapefruit

2 sprigs of basil

Jameson

Club Soda

muddle together the skins, grapefruit, and basil

add Jameson and Club Soda

add ice

stir well

Peachy Perfect Pasta

Ingredients

1/2 - 1 cups chopped onion

2 carrots, chopped

1-2 cups chopped cabbage

2 peaches, chopped

fresh basil, chopped

Boil water for pasta. When it boils, add the pasta, then:

Saute the onions in some olive oil.  When they are lightly browned, add the cabbage, carrots, some more olive oil, and 1/4 c water.  Put a lid on the pan and let it steam for awhile.  

While the veggies steam, chop up the peaches into bite-sized pieces.  When the veggies are done, remove the lid, turn the heat to very low, and add the peaches. Chop up some fresh basil and add it as well.  

Drain the pasta and toss it with olive oil and just a little bit of mustard and pesto.  

Put some pasta in a bowl, dump some fruit/veggie mix on top, and stir it up.

Eat, enjoy.

Peach-Basil Yogurt Cake

       I'm not a huge yogurt fan, but every now and then when it's on sale I will buy a whole bunch and make myself eat them with breakfast cause I don't completely dislike them, and yogurt is good for you.  I never ever buy the "lite" yogurt though, it's got aspartame in it.  That stuff is way worse for you than the couple of extra calories in the regular yogurt.  Anyway, yogurt was on sale 10 for $6 last week, and for some strange reason I actually bought 10.  Don't know why I didn't just buy 5.  So I ended up with all this yogurt in my fridge, and I just have not been in the mood for yogurt lately.  I've been too obsessed with my bacon pancakes to even think about eating yogurt and granola for breakfast. I mean seriously, who would want to eat boring yogurt when they could eat a bacon pancake?!
     Today, I'm looking at a whole 2 days off in a row (super exciting).  It's muggy and cloudy out, so there's nothing I want to do outside, and I decided it was a perfect day to play in the kitchen.  I've been dying to try something new, and just haven't had time or energy to figure out what.  Until this morning.  I decided I needed to bake something with yogurt in it so I could use up some of the yogurt without actually having to eat it by itself.  I was thinking that it might be a good way to flavor a cake.  So I went to google and typed in "yogurt cake" and found this gem of a recipe.  I meant to use raspberry yogurt, but upon inspection of my fridge, I discovered I had actually eaten all of the raspberry yogurt.  But I had 2 peach yogurts, and I usually don't even buy peach because although I love peaches, I'm really not a huge fan of peach yogurt.  Clearly, I was not in my right mind when I went grocery shopping last week.  I was probably half asleep and thinking about all the work I needed to get done, instead of thinking about the groceries I was putting in my cart.
    So I decided to make a cake with peach yogurt.  And then I had to come up with an herb that would taste good with peaches.  For some reason I feel the need to put herbs in everything lately.  Rosemary has ended up in the last several batches of chocolate chip cookies I've made.  (recipe here...they're amazing)  Lately I've been loving using fresh herbs instead of dried.  The only fresh herbs I have are basil and oregano.  I decided basil would go great with peach.

The Original Recipe

My Adapted Recipe

The Wet Ingredients...and the Basil

*for the whiskey, I used Tullamore Dew

smells sooooo good!

The Dry Ingredients

fold the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients

grease a 9x9 cake pan with butter

pour the batter into the pan

bake at 350 for 30 minutes

cake is done if a toothpick comes out clean

Let the cake sit in the pan for 10 minutes, then loosen the sides from the pan with a knife, and transfer the cake from the pan to a wire rack to cool. 

THE ICING

Yogurt comes in 6 oz cups, and the cake recipe called for 8 oz, so I used the remaining 4 ounces to make the icing.  I don't know exactly how much confectioners sugar it took, but it seemed like an awful lot.  Probably because I started out using a tablespoon to measure it out.  After about 7 heaping tbsps I switched to a 1/3 c measure.  I used about 3 of those.  Then I just started pouring the sugar straight into the bowl. 

 I added some grated ginger and a tbsp of Tullamore Dew in an attempt to cut the sweetness of the yogurt and sugar. 

Once the cake was cool, I transferred it to a glass cutting board (the only flat thing I have that is large enough to hold this cake...) and poured the icing on top. 

one of the corners made its way into my belly

yum