Hello, gorgeous!

Last night I returned from my surprise trip to Pittsburgh.  Spending time with family and old friends always inspires me to do new things and continue to do things that I love.  It's like anti-depressants except it requires 4 plane rides and a $40 dollar cab ride home.

So today when I woke up and I wasn't scheduled for work, I got moving as soon as I could.

One of the first things I needed to do was go shopping.  Thankfully it was a gorgeous day, and I walked to Safeway.

I wanted to give frozen yogurt another try so I bought blueberries and a tub of Fage 2%.  So this is the recipe I came up with:

3 cups Fage 2% strained Greek yogurt
approx 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 cup blueberries.  Mine were fresh but you're freezing this so why not use frozen?

1/2 cup black raspberries.  They're a bit easier to find frozen.

honey and/or agave nectar to taste.

I threw this in my ice cream maker and went to town.  My first impressions are that it really is much creamier than the other version, but I think I like the texture of the low-fat regular yogurt I used the first time.  I like ice-y ice cream, and the first was more like soft-serve.  This is more like slow-churned ice cream.  It has a higher fat content but is nowhere near the fat content of ice cream.  I love the gorgeous pinkish purple color it came out to be after I mixed it.  It could really use some cookie pieces or graham crackers on top, but I don't have any.  Should be great for breakfast.  Balloon had some, she approves.  As soon as she realized I was eating one of her favorites, she raced over to try to steal my bowl!  She was pleased to finish it up when all the berries were gone.

The second thing I tried today was some crusty French bread. Using the easiest recipe I could find on Google, I made my first loaf in forever.  The only changes I made were to add some dry milk and also to use quick rise yeast instead of regular.  I find almost no difference, except for speed (for pizza dough, that is).  Do as the recipe suggests and spray some water during the baking of your loaf.  The crust will come out thick and delicious.  

 

It sure looks professional, but I haven't tried it yet...so I'm off do do that.  I'll  let you know!

Addendum:  Not the loftiest bread I've ever eaten, maybe a bit heavy. Maybe I should have let it rise a lot longer? Didn't stop me from eating about 1/5 of the loaf immedately.  Olive oil + oregano + sea salt makes a fabulous dip.  This bread will definitely keep me trying new stuff.

3/10:  Makes decent (albeit small) toast.

The big 64

The other day I bought 64 ounces of plain yogurt.  I've been eyeing up this jumbo tub of Nancy's for a while, but searching for something new to inspire me I went right ahead and bought it last week.  So, other than eating it covered in honey and frozen black raspberries (they were much more delicious-and a whole lot less money- back when I got them from grandma's back yard!) what in the world do you do with that much yogurt?

Well to start, you're going to want to whip yourself up a batch of this amazing low-fat pasta salad.  Its a bit summery, but that's what one needs in late January.  I found when I was making it that I had only about two tablespoons of mayonnaise left, so I just used more yogurt to replace it.  I also only had tomatoes, onions, and celery, but those seemed to work really well in this. I added feta cheese, and believe me, you'll want to.  It adds such a great texture to the yogurt dressing.  If you don't like feta, I'd still try adding just a bit of Parmesan cheese.  Don't forget lots of salt and pepper, but other than that it doesn't need much!  Its very similar to a pasta salad they sell where I volunteer and I'm constantly addicted to it.

This was great but I'll probably never eat red onions again...talk about two days of the worst stomachache possible!

Remember that cheap ice cream maker I bought last year? That's right, I'm way ahead of myself in terms of the seasons!  The husband and I happen to frequent those by-the-ounce frozen yogurt shops that cost a fortune.  Let me tell you, for less than one trip to a yogurt shop you can make yourself a pint and a half of creamy goodness and it is incredibly easy.  I found this recipe, and quickly whipped some up.  In less than an hour I had amazing frozen yogurt.

They claim you can't use low-fat yogurt, but guess what? You can. And its good.  Maybe not as creamy as ice cream, but it certainly beats those soft-serve places.  The yogurt plus the toppings ran us under 10 dollars, and we still have some left after a delicious and healthy dessert.

The recipe calls for greek yogurt but I used regular american-style plain yogurt.  Its very tangy and delicious and I can only imagine what using Fage would do for this yummy stuff.

The toppings are mini-mochi...we got them at our local asian market.  They're soft and chewy and make a great topping for ice cream and fro-yo.

So now maybe I feel a little snazzier than I did last week...but I still have some yogurt to eat!