#72 - Try 12 new recipes (and actually use the recipe). (6/12)

I also made these on Sunday at the request of my boyfriend, Mike. I had threatened him with making them without any nuts what with walnuts being so expensive right now, but I ended up caving and getting walnuts anyway. Turned out that probably 1/2 cup of walnuts would have been enough. 1 cup was really too many. Did not do the optional espresso/coffee.

INGREDIENTS
3 or 4 ripe bananas, smashed
1/3 cup melted butter
3/4 cup sugar
1 egg, beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla
1 Tbsp espresso or strong coffee (optional)
1 teaspoon baking soda
Pinch of salt
1 1/2 cup of flour
1 cup chopped walnuts (toasted or raw)


No need for a mixer with this recipe.

1) Preheat the oven to 350°F. With a wooden spoon, mix butter into the
mashed bananas in a large mixing bowl.
2) Mix in the sugar, egg, espresso and vanilla.
3) Sprinkle the baking soda and salt over the mixture and mix in.
4) Add the flour, mix until it is just incorporated. Fold in the
chopped walnuts.
5) Pour mixture into a prepared muffin tin. Bake for 25-30 minutes.
Check for doneness with a toothpick inserted into the center of a
muffin. If it comes out clean, it's done. Cool on a rack.

Makes 12 muffins.

source: http://www.elise.com/recipes/archives/004229banana_nut_muffins.php

#72 - Try 12 new recipes (and actually use the recipe). (5/12)

Sunday, I was on a bit of a baking spree. I made this yummy "Easy Lemon Pudding Cake". I got the recipe from an online-friend of mine. It turned out really well, but I have GOT to figure out where the lemon zest is in the store. I zested my own lemon this time. It was easy to throw together and would have been good with some summer berries on the side (raspberries would have been the best, I think).

Here's the recipe:

INGREDIENTS
Cake
- 1 cup flour
- 3/4 cup sugar
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/2 cup milk (or soy milk)
- 2 tbsp vegetable oil
- 2 tbsp lemon zest
- juice of 1 lemon

Sauce
- 1 cup sugar
- 1/4 cup flour
- 1 cup boiling water
- juice of 2 lemons

METHOD
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Get water boiling in a kettle.
1. (cake) Whisk together flour, sugar, powder, soda, and salt in a
bowl. In a smaller bowl, whisk together soy milk, oil, zest, and lemon
juice. Add to flour and stir with a spoon until just mixed. Pour into
a 8 x 8 pan and spread evenly.
2. (sauce) Whisk together sugar and flour, then sprinkle evenly over batter.
3. Pour boiling water and lemon juice over top. Do not stir.
4. Bake for 40-45 mins, until top is golden and cake is cooked through.

#23 - Take my brother to the laserdome.

Mike & I took Albert to Laserdome on 4/12/2008. Here's what I wrote about it in my personal blog:

4/12/2008: Albert's 15th Birthday! Mike & I were supposed to take him to Laserdome for his 14th birthday, so we thought, better late than never. I called ahead in the morning to make reservations for lasertag ~3:30pm. Mike showed up around 2:30 so I started getting ready to go. Mom dropped Albert off and we headed in a south-easterly direction to Laserdome!

We ended up playing Halo (in the "virtual arena") first. After 4 games of it, I had only managed to kill 5 people. That is major suckage. Of course, I guess since it was the first time I played and it took me 'til halfway through the 3 game to figure out how to stop walking into walls with any consistency. It ended up being about $13 each to play for 20 minutes, so next time we go, I'm all for skipping that. It was interesting, though. 10 people playing all at once was neat.

Right after we were done with Halo, it was time for lasertag! They did a pretty good job at explaining how everything worked and what to do in their training session. Since we had to change our lasertag time when we showed up, our group was called last. And since my code name (tenthz, of course) was last alphabetically, I was the absolute last person to get called for a vest. As is tradition with me, I was picked last for a sport. :-P We were on the Red team (the other team was blue). It was way a lot of fun and for 3 of the 4 games, Albert had the highest score across the board (out of a total of 40 players!). Mike was in the top 10 of all the scorers the whole time. They kept making runs on the other teams base which is what made their scores so ridiculously high. I only did that a few times and the rest of the time I spent guarding our base which I attribute to the fact that we won every. single. round. By a LOT (like 10,000 to 3,000). It was a ton of fun and would definitely do that again.

We each got 44 tokens when we got there so we also spent some time playing in the arcade with those. Albert and I played a lot of the games that you get tickets from and he ended up hitting the jackpot (750-ish) on one of them with his last token. Whoa. He ended up with 1300-ish tickets, so he got a nifty disco ball thing that plugs in and lights up with different colors.

It was a lot of fun, and the next time we go, I think we'll probably just do lasertag and arcade games.