Save yourself the trouble

(Picture from Cooking with Paula Deen magazine)

My parents threw a party at the end of the summer and asked me to bring something to pass. I thought that a dessert would be a good idea because I assumed no one else would bring a dessert and it would be a good chance for me to try something new.

Instead of going to the usual foodnetwork.com or cooking light magazine for ideas, I went for Cooking with Paula Deen! I found a recipe for white peach crumble. I thought it was going to be like a wonderful sizzling apple cobber - but it wasn't......and it was a lot of work.

White Peach Crumble

1/2 cup all-purpose flour
2 Tbs brown sugar - I recommended using quite a bit more
2 Tbs cold, unsalted butter, cut into pieces
2 Tbs sliced almonds
4 white peaches, peeled, pitted, and sliced - This part is the real problem in this recipe. It takes a lot of patients to peal, pit, and slice a bunch of peaches. It was suggested that I use canned peaches...I think it's worth a try :-) (yes you can substitute with yellow peaches)
1/2 cup sugar
1/8 tsp salt
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 tsp orange zest
Vanilla ice cream

• In a small bowl combine flour and brown sugar
• Using a pastry blender, cut in butter until mixtures is crumbly
• Stir in almonds
• In a medium saucepan, combine peaches, sugar, and salt
• Cook over medium heat for 10 minutes or until peaches are tender
• Remove from heat and stir in vanilla orange zest
• Pour peach mixture into a small baking dish
• Sprinkle flour mixture evenly over top and bake for 20 min or until crumble is bubbly and browned - it doesn't say how hot, but I had the oven at 350
• Serve warm with vanilla ice cream

This recipe only serves 2 people, so for the party I had to multiply it a few times. I bought enough for about 2 large peaches per person. This ended up being way too much! We ate this peach crumble for days.
One tip though if you do end up making a lot. Keep the dry crumble part in a Ziploc bag and keep the peaches in a Tupperware container. Then, right before you eat dinner you just throw some peaches in a small Pyrex dish, sprinkle some crumble on top, and put it in the oven. By the time you are done with dinner, your dessert will be ready!

Stupid Sunday food Situation

This past Sunday we were out and about all day, therefore, we were FORCED into eating out for all three meals. While getting ready for the day, I made a call to Perkins and ordered an oatmeal to go. The on the way the freeway we picked up my oatmeal. I mean I probably can't say anything too interesting about oatmeal, but it was good. I added about 2 TBS of brown sugar, which is essential.

Our first showing appointments lasted until about 2:30pm. So we made a mad dash to a fast food joint for lunch. I really hated this, but really it was either that, or eat at Chipotle for the millionth time. The best place on the way to our next stop was Dairy Queen.

(Minor story side-track: When I was in high school I attended a summer fencing training. We did a lot of running and it was hot out which means I was about to pass out! One of my coaches thought the best idea was to sneak me to Dairy Queen and get me cheeseburger. Well, it was the best fast food cheeseburger around. And I still think so to this day)

Well, I got a cheeseburger, Dan got the Flamethrower, and we shared a waffle bowl sundae. The cheeseburger was still good, and Dan said the Flamethrower was good too. I guess I would warn you more on how big the burger is rather than how hot it is. The waffle bowl was such a disappointment. I've been drooling over these commercials for ever and now it's totally ruined! It is possible that the ingredients are right, just that they weren't put together right. Oh well, less ice cream in my diet can't be a bad thing.

After all that, we stopped at Dan’s uncle’s house, and then stopped at my uncle's house. Before I knew it, it was 7:00pm, we were by 76th st, and were still about 35 min from our empty kitchen. Our solution was to go to Outback. Normally this is a good place to go. This time though, we spent $70 and it all sucked!!!!

I had some stupid drink made of rum, gin, vodka, juice, and coke. Sounds good to me, but it was so bad. It was one of those drinks that your friend makes and they think they are some cool new up-incoming bartender and tries to make new and innovative drinks. Long story short – it didn’t work.

Then our waiter convinced us to try the artichoke dip with new chips (rather than the crispy rounds). After we started to eat it, the guy comes over and goes - how is it, a lot of people tell me it's salty. Yeah man, it was salty, nice of you to tell us after we started eating.

For my main course, I ordered the new, Prime Rib and Crab Cake Mixed Grill. ‘Downer Donna’ says the prime rib tasted like a bland pork chop, the crab cake was fishy and over seasoned, and the potatoes were undercooked. BUT the green beans were good.

The positives for the day: We were productive, got to enjoy the sunny weather, and I was motivated to finally go grocery shopping!!