Living in a Cereal World

I know I haven't shared a dinner recipe in months; I've just been overwhelmed with everything else. But everyone seemed to like this  Dijon Turkey Dinner  we had last week. It was a good and easy weeknight dinner with ingredients we already like: turkey cutlets, peas, potatoes. We didn't have any Yukon gold potatoes so I bought a bag of little steamable ones; all we had to do was halve them before boiling. No need to peel, either. And the amount of smoked paprika looked like a lot once spread on the turkey but the flavor isn't predominant. I would not have though to combine that with Dijon mustard but it worked. And of course, leftovers as a sandwich...

...than buried under thirty inches of snow? That is not even an exaggeration. The original forecast called for maybe a foot but then the system came and sat over us all day yesterday. I don't need any more snow this winter. I just happened to have decided last weekend to make a pie for National Pie Day, so not being able to leave the house worked out, didn't it? I chose this Peach and Blueberry Crumble Pie  for two reasons: I didn't have to cut up any fruit and I really wanted a crumble topping. Plus this crumble topping had oats and almonds--two of my favorite things. Of course it would have been even easier if I had a food processor but I made it work. I think it was just sweet enough although I may have lost some sugar in the blueberry juices. I don't know why I worried about draining all of it when the tapioca would solve my "wet pie" problem. Also of note: I used a pastry brush for the first time! I know that's a silly thing to get excited about b

Don't feel like putting chia seeds in your granola or, like me, you consistently forget to add chia seeds to your yogurt? Well, there's plenty of granolas on the market now that helpfully have chia seeds in the mix. I decided to try this one mainly because it was on sale but also I don't think I've had any granola with coconut. The clusters in this granola are almost uniformly small and studded with chia seeds. They also don't have that dark overbaked look that other brands have. I don't recall having that many flakes of coconut in my serving but every pour is different. This was an especially good flavor to have with my mango yogurt this week--and totally unintentional. Sometimes it just works out that way.

It occurred to me that I never mentioned what I did with the rest of my bag of cranberries from  last month . I could have frozen them but if I'm being honest with myself this is only time of year I'm in the mood for cranberries. It helped that there was a recipe for  Cranberry Nut Bread  on the side of the Ocean Spray; the less thinking I had to do right after the holidays, the better. Also this bread was delicious and gone in three days (my brother hadn't left yet). Was it the orange juice balancing out the tart cranberries? I really don't know. And that still didn't use up all the cranberries so I had to find this recipe for  Fresh Cranberry Scones . As usual I'm working without a food processor so they turned out really, really "rustic." Not that anyone cares as long as they taste good. I think someone ate one for dessert last night. I still can't believe I waited so long to try making scones.

I know I should be getting to the actual new products but I'm also working my way through the Barbara's line. The multigrains in question are wheat, corn, oats and rice and that rice combined with the aftertaste of the maple brown sugar flavor gave me serious Chex flashbacks. Like old school Ralston-Purina Rice Chex. Amazing what your taste buds can wake up in your brain. For a more current comparison, think Vanilla Chex. It's along that line and I like it enough to keep going with Barbara's cereals.

It's been so long since I wrote a hot cereal entry I can't remember if this is how I usually do it. But I do like the chewiness and nuttiness of steel cut oatmeal so I thought I'd give this a try. Also it was only one cup so I didn't have to make a box commitment. I'm always thinking about things like that. So I actually didn't like the consistency of this as much as the  box of Steel Cut Oatmeal  I reviewed a few months back. Also cooked in the microwave but somehow creamier. Maybe the tiny almond bits made a difference, I don't know. I also didn't realize 'til I reached the bottom of the cup that I didn't stir it fully and there were chunks under a little fold in the cup. On the plus side, there were nice-sized cranberries, not little bits of who-knows-what. So it was just okay.

This should've been my first post of the year. Of course this is what you're really here to read. Let's start with what I've already seen in stores: Special K Nourish -- you know the hot cereal, now here's a cold offering. Available in Apple Raspberry Almond and Coconut Cranberry Almond. I will be trying both. Nature Valley -- they've already branched out to granola and muesli; it was only a matter of time before they added cereal. Two flake cereals, Honey Oat Clusters and Chocolate Oat Clusters, and Baked Oat Bites, which is some kind of oat squares. I will also be sampling all of these. Cascadian Farm has new FarmStand Harvest granolas. I've only seen the vanilla coconut & pumpkin seed flavor so far but there's three others. I believe I read that the Cranberry Maple Wild Rice is only available at Kroger so I guess I'll be making an extra stop the next time I visit my grandma. There's also two new Mini-Wheats flavors (that I haven'

So I finally tried a granola recipe that wasn't  from Sally's Baking Addiction: Spiced Gingerbread Granola . Because it's gingerbread season (or it was two weeks ago). It smelled great while I was mixing it and gingery from the oven but the taste...left a lot to be desired. Is it possible that golden raisins could detract from the molasses and ginger flavor? I really don't have an answer. I'm still eating it, though--although it is kind of stale-ish. I'd say two weeks for peak granola consistency.