Blogging my house-wifing attempts

So I made a blog. Hopefully I can live up to the title of "blogger", I guess we shall see.

After discovering the beautiful website called Pinterest.com (feel free to follow me, I do enough pinning for everyone) I decided I needed some place to record what I find/try from Pinterest, what better than a blog!? So, this blog is mostly dedicated to cool or complicated recipes I discover, not only from Pinterest, but recipe books, other's blogs, or maybe even make up on my own (if I get feeling daring).

I also have this weird faddish with healthy things, especially for healthy desserts, even ask my husband--it is almost out of control. So the majority of the recipes I try will hopefully be lower calorie or short on sugar and fat. 

So, let's cut to the chase, BLOG #1... hopefully of many.

Macaroni Grill Rosemary Bread

paired with
Carrabaa's dipping Herbs/Spices

My sister Tara sent me an email with 5 recipes to try. I decided, like any good sister would, to make an effort to try making all of them. Not all at once of course, but over time. Yes, I know, 5 recipes? I could do that in a week! But if you know me at all, you know that I eat in fads. Maybe fads isn't the right word, but I get a meal and eat it for weeks and weeks and then switch. It's weird I know. Last Spring semester I had spinach wraps for lunch for 5 weeks straight--using different dressings of course--but you get the point.

So last week on Thursday, January 19 I made my first of these 5 recipes, the Rosemary Bread! And again, if you know me at all you know that I would start with the bread, I have a serious weakness for carbs. So here is the recipe, complete with pictures of my tasty creation, of which my husband and I loved so much I made it again 3 days later!

Rosemary Bread

Ingredients

1 T. yeast

1 T. sugar

1 c. warm water

2.5 c. flour

1 t. salt

1 T. rosemary

1 T. butter

Directions:
Place yeast, sugar, and water in bowl of mixer. Wait about 5 minutes to let it get bubbly. Mix in 1 Tbs. butter, salt, and 2 c. flour.
Add 1 Tbs. of the rosemary. Knead for about 10 minutes by hand or 5 minutes by bread mixer. until smooth and elastic. Add more flour if necessary.

Oil a bowl, put dough in bowl and cover with a towel. Let dough rise in a warm place for one hour or until doubled. Punch down dough and divide in half. Let dough rest about 5 minutes. Spray baking pan or cookie sheet with cooking spray (I use my stone for this) Shape the dough into 2 small rounded oval loaves. 

Brush loaves with remaining 1 Tbs. butter and sprinkle remaining 1 Tbs. rosemary over loaves and sprinkle with sea salt. Let loaves raise again until doubled (about 45 minutes. Preheat oven to 375 and bake for 15-20 minutes, until lightly browned. 

can you say, best smelling kitchen ever

While I was cooking up these tasty loaves I mixed up some spices for dipping with olive oil and balsamic vinegar! If you haven't had fresh bread dipped in olive oil and balsamic vinegar, you definitely need to get our more... or just try it. So here is the recipe. (Found this one on Pinterest, which was pinned from macaroniandcheesecake.com, which apparently stole it from recipelink.com--maybe check them out for other ideas?)

Dipping Spices

Ingredients

2 T. chopped Italian flat leaf parsley
1 T. minced garlic
1 t. dried thyme
1 t. dried oregano
1/4 t. dried basil (or 1 tbsp. fresh-if using fresh reduce parsley to 1 tbsp.)
1/8 t. dried rosemary (or 1/2 tsp. fresh)
1 t. ground black pepper
1/2 t. kosher salt
1/8 t. ground red pepper (or 1/4 tsp. red pepper flakes)
1/2 t. extra virgin olive oil
1/8 t. fresh lemon juice

*This is the recipe, although I didn't have any garlic on hand so I used garlic powder, I think it worked just fine. Also, I didn't have ground red pepper so I just didn't add any. First time we made it I also didn't add the olive oil and lemon juice, didn't really notice a difference when I did add them the second time.

Perfect drowning in olive oil and balsamic vinegar! I suggest not using a black plate, the majority of people won't have that problem, but it is nice to see how much vinegar you have (I LOVE vinegar) and a black plate makes it a tad difficult.

There it is folks, the first blog! Enjoy. I know will, again and again!