Almost Healthy Gingerbread

This week I pulled the book Healthy Homestyle Cooking by Evelyn Tribole off my cookbook shelf. I wasn't in the mood for cookies and I'm low on supplies for savory items, so it was the Gingerbread recipe that caught my eye.

I think I bought this book at a yard sale or a thrift store or something. It's one of my older ones and it is chock full of lots of good recipes that are on the healthier side of things. I'm still working on my holiday weight, so it was nice to pick out a few things that wouldn't break the calorie bank.

I love gingerbread. I find it hearty and comforting. I like how after it sits for a little bit, the top always gets sticky and you have to lick it off your fingers. I like how it almost develops a little more flavor with age.

I did play around with the original recipe a bit. I upped the spices, added salt, switched buttermilk for yoghurt and added a little milk. I used apple butter instead of apple sauce because that's what I had on hand.

It came out very well and I'd definitely recommend you try it! Next time, I'll probably try and figure out a way to get some booze in there somewhere.

Almost Healthy Gingerbread
Adapated from Healthy Homestyle Cooking

1 Cup All Purpose Flour
1/2 Cup Whole Wheat Flour
1/4 Cup Brown Sugar
1 Teaspoon Ground Ginger
3/4 Teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
1/2 Teaspoon Baking Powder
1/2 Teaspoon Baking Soda
1/2 Teaspoon Salt
2 Egg Whites
1/2 Cup Yogurt
2 Tablespoons Fat Free Milk
1/2 Cup Apple Butter or Apple Sauce
1/2 Cup Molasses

Preheat the oven to 350F. Spray or grease an 8x8 Baking dish.

In a large bowl, mix the dry ingredients together until well combined. Add the egg whites, yogurt, milk,  apple butter and molasses and stir well until combined. You should have a nice thick batter.
Spread into your pan and bake for 30 minutes until the cake has set. Let cool in the pan, then store in an airtight container.

This is great right out of the oven, but if you let it mellow out for a few hours it's even better.

Eat at work at your desk, lick the sticky top off your fingers and try not to get anything on your keyboard.

Makes 9-12 pieces.

If I Could Eat At Other Tables...

I wish I could eat everything in the world right now. I see all of my fellow bloggers creating completely fabulous food and I want to be munching away in their kitchens. I'd love to be pulling up a chair and talking to them about their food and their heritage and what they really love to eat when no one is looking.

If I could eat from my fellow bloggers tables today, here is the meal I would want.

Starter

Perfect Potato Soup from The Pioneer Woman

Main Course

Ravioli Nudi in Tomato Sauce from The Sweets Life

Dessert

Chocolate Speckled Salted Shortbread from Bake or Break

What do you want for dinner?

Greek Chicken Thighs

I'm not going to lie, I mostly made these Chicken Thighs because I wanted to use my new baking dish.
My office does Secret Santa every year and it's no secret that I'm big into cooking. I was really delighted to get this dish, not just because it is super pretty, but because it's the perfect size for the portion sizes I tend to make. I have a lot of bakeware and trying to find room for this dish made me realize that I seriously need to go through my cabinets and organize what I have and possibly re-home some duplicate pans.

In case you are curious, I gave my Secret Santa Beer, Chocolate and Coffee. It seemed like a good choice. 

I stumbled across this recipe in the 2012 wrap up from the blog Everybody Loves Sandwiches. I changed it just a smidge, but the recipe is pretty straightforward. These chicken thighs get marinated for a couple of hours, then baked in a good hot oven until cooked. Although they get cooked uncovered, the chicken thighs stay nice and moist. I took the skin off mine, but the original recipes says you can leave them on if you wish. This dish is really light and tangy. The flavor of the chicken shines through nicely.

Greek Chicken Thighs

Multiply this recipe as many times as you like to fit your preferred portion size!

2 Boneless Chicken Thighs
4 Tablespoons Lemon Juice
2 Cloves Garlic, smashed
1/2 Teaspoon Oregano
1/4 Teaspoon of Salt
Black Pepper

In a small bowl, mix together the lemon juice, salt, oregano, garlic and a few good grinds of black pepper. Put your chicken thighs in a ziploc bag and pour over the marinade. Let sit for at least a couple of hours, flipping the bag over a couple of times if you can. You can also let it sit in the fridge during the day to cook at night if you like.

When the chicken is marinaded, preheat the oven to 425F. Pour the chicken and the marinade into a shallow non-stick baking dish. Bake for 45 minutes.

Eat with some lightly buttered boiled potatoes off your favorite plate on a Sunday afternoon.

Serves two for lunch or one for dinner.

Banana Rum Cake for Larry

New Year's here in the Valley was a really nice experience this year. I had a lot of fun on the 51st floor of the Cosmopolitan drinking wine and champagne, playing Cards Against Humanity (which, incidentally, is the best game every) and hanging out with friends.

My friends Larry and Justin were staying with me over New Years. They were in from California and were using my guest room while I'm between roommates. They both love food, which makes them the perfect guests.

I'm going to try something new this year. It isn't exactly a resolution, just a way of keeping me busy. I have a lot of cookbooks. I consider myself a collector and I love getting books for my birthday or Christmas. I'm going to go ahead and try and aim to make and adapt one recipe from a different book every week. This could be interesting for sure, as I've got several books that I've never made anything at all from.

So since it's the first week of the year, I asked Larry to give me a hand picking out a book. The happy result was the Joy the Baker Cookbook. After skimming through the recipes, we settled on one for Banana Rum Cake. When I went to Antigua I can back with a bottle of Antiguan rum and have been looking for a good excuse to open it.

I adapted this cake a fair bit from it's an original version. Instead of making it a layer cake with frosting, I went for a simple bundt cake.... a good excuse to break out new pans.

Banana Rum Cake
Adapted from Joy the Baker Cookbook

3 Cups Flour
2 1/4 Teaspoon Baking Powder
3/4 Teaspoon Baking Soda
3/4 Teaspoon Salt
1 1/2 Teaspoon Cinnamon
1/2 Teaspoon Nutmeg
3/4 Cup Butter, softened
1 3/4 Cup Dark Brown Sugar
3 Bananas, mashed
4 Tablespoon Rum
3 Eggs
1/2 Cup + 2 Tablespoons Buttermilk
1/2 Cup Walnuts, chopped
1/2 Teaspoon Vanilla Extract

Preheat the oven to 350F and grease a Bundt pan.

Cream together the butter and sugar, add in the eggs and vanilla. Add in the bananas, rum, cinnamon, nutmeg, buttermilk, salt, baking powder and baking soda until well combined. Fold in the flour and the walnuts. Pour into the pan and bake for fifty minutes. Turn the oven off and leave the cake in the oven for another 10 minutes. Check that the cake is cooked through. Let cool in the pan.

Cut into nice big chunks and eat at your desk at work after a busy couple of hours. Resolve to drink more tea.

Salted Spoon: The eBook!

Almost a year ago now, I started working on a little side project. I wanted to put together an eBook of my favorite recipes, something small and cute with both new recipes and the popular ones from this blog.

Over a few months, it started to take better and better shape. I had a few times where it stalled out, but one fine day in the fall I was able to close my laptop, turn to my guy and say "It's done".
Tweaking, editing, formatting, cover designs and life intervening meant that it took me just a tad longer than expected, but yesterday it was finally published.

It's got 30+ recipes in it and the stories behind them and I'm really really happy with it.

You can pick it up on Amazon at the link below or the link in the sidebar! Thanks so much for being here and helping me make this possible!