Recipe #57: Migas

One of my New Year's goals for this blog is to blog better.

I know it sounds like a cliche goal, but both of my blogs began because of my passion for writing. This blog simply mixes that passion with another: my love of food and everything food related.

However, I find that sometimes I fall into the blogger mentality of just trying to get SOMETHING posted that I'm not always putting out writing that is of the quality that I want to represent.

No longer.

That said, hold on to your butts for the final five posts of my Pioneer Woman Cooks recipe challenge and then the final summation.

Recipe: Migas

Source: The Pioneer Woman Cooks

Time: 1 hr

Ease: 3

Taste: 5

Leftover Value: 4

Down the Drain or Keep in the Strainer: Keep in the Strainer

I like this recipe. 

I know, great way to start off better blogging, right?

Yet, it must be stated.

You must understand that I really, truly did like this recipe before I go any further because, unfortunately, for as much as I like this recipe, I also dislike it.

At breakfast time, I am not ordinarily coherent enough to be giddy with excitement over a meal that has more than three steps. 

There are several, as in more than two or three, vegetables that require dicing for this breakfast.

Then, if all the dicing weren't enough, there are eggs to be mixed and corn tortillas to be fried and then cut into strips.

While dicing and frying aren't quite so complicated, (and I fried the tortillas in the same pan I eventually made the migas in--so there wasn't a too-many-pans issue) it is all very time consuming.

For breakfast.

Early in the morning.

With a cranky chef who would rather be still ducked under the covers than getting to work chopping, dicing, and frying.

Naturally, the veggies need time to soften a little.*

*Right here, right now, I'm going to rat myself out.  There are no red peppers in this dish.  There are supposed to be.  The rule was no substitutions, but red peppers make my heart throb and pound in my chest--and not in a swoon! type of way.  So, I used extra green pepper.

Here is the even more time consuming part of this dish:

After spending all that time dicing, after frying the tortillas, after waiting for it all to cook together, the eggs are poured over it all, gently mixed, and left alone to set.

I'm the type of person that stands over a pot of water as if my presence will make the water boil faster. 

That said, by this point, I couldn't contain myself and had to help the eggs along a little bit by mixing them a little and raising the heat a tad.

I made these on Christmas Eve Eve and Hubby had work to get to so I may have been a little anxious and served the eggs a little too soon.

They weren't horribly runny, but they could have gone a little longer.

The cheese, which is added at the very end, adds a nice punch of flavor to the mixture.  The dollop of sour cream was absolutely necessary and I'm not too proud to say that I added another heaping scoop to my bowl after I snapped this picture.

All in all, this was a fun way to experience eggs. I was afraid the jalapeno would be overpowering, but it added an interesting little kick to the eggs without too much heat. Hubby ate his eggs with the sour cream and hot sauce.

My only note would be to make these on a morning where you have a healthy hour to spend on breakfast.

Bananas for Bread

Recipe: Sour Cream Banana Bread

Source: The Old Farmer's Almanac: Everyday Recipes

Time: Approx. 1 hr 15 min (includes baking time)

Ease: 3

Taste: 7

Leftover Value: 9

Down the Drain or Keep in the Strainer:  Keep it in the Strainer!

I hate bananas.  However, I say this with great woe.

I wish I liked bananas.  Of all fruit, they seem to be the heartiest and the most durable to being carried around in a purse.  But yet, I cannot eat them.  It is usually when I am extremely starving and I find them sitting on my kitchen table that I choose to give them another try.  To which I am always greatly disappointed.  Something about the aftertaste of a banana makes me wish I'd never met such a creature.

I am fortunate though.  I can bear the taste of banana bread.  So long as it is accompanied by chocolate.  Lots and lots of chocolate.

When the recipe for "Sour Cream Banana Bread" oddly did not involve chocolate at all, I substituted the 1/2 cup of chopped pecans for chocolate chips.  My initial intention was to double the called for chocolate.  However, if you know anything about the average bag of chocolate chips you know that it is approximately two cups worth.

And I just couldn't let that one cup sit alone in the bag without it's counterpart.

The bread turned out as decent as can be, all things considered.  The top of the loaf sort of sunk in as it cooled, but I've made peace with the fact that it might have been the chocolates' fault.

The taste was still delightful, much better than if it had been made with only pecans.
 

Pancakes and Sour Cream?

Recipe: Edna Mae's Sour Cream Pancakes
Source: The Pioneer Woman Cooks
Time: 30 minutes total (includes cooking time)
Ease: 2
Taste: 5
Leftover Value: No leftovers
Down the Drain or Keep in the Strainer: Down the Drain

It was not until I reached adulthood that I discovered the delight that is sour cream.  Growing up, the only thing I knew about sour cream was that it was an essential ingredient in my mom's chicken paprika.  We never used it for anything else.  However, once I realized it actually had other uses, suddenly quesadillas, nachos, and potato skins all made sense.

Still to this day I cannot understand what it is about sour cream that makes these things suddenly more wonderful than they are on their own.  I would never crave just sour cream (and I truly hope there is not a soul out there who does) but the thought of it spread on my potato skin or mixed with salsa on a meaty cheesy bite of nacho makes my mouth start to salivate.

I have recently learned though that sour cream is not the answer to improving all foods.

Because of my gained attraction to sour cream, the recipe for "sour cream pancakes" stood out.  And since on Monday I was stuck home waiting for Hurricane Sandy to hit, I decided to give them a try.

The fact that sour cream made up about half of the combined ingredients should have been a warning sign.  To be honest, it was but I had already started making the pancakes when I realized just how much sour cream was in them:

On one end of the scale we have: 1 cup of sour cream

On the other: Approximately 9 tablespoons of other ingredients and 2 eggs

The recipe yielded nine pancakes and they were very thin.  The taste was much lighter than your average Bisquick pancake.  The problem was, even though they were clearly cooked through they still had a very wet (not moist, wet) taste about them.

If that's what floats your boat, give them a try.  But for me, I'll stick with my sour cream free box of pancakes until something better comes around.

Blueberries and Sour Cream

Recipe: Wild Blueberry-Sour Cream Muffins
Source: The Old Farmer's Almanac: Everyday Recipes
Time: 30 minutes total
Ease: 2
Taste: 8
Leftover Value: 10
Down the Drain or Keep in the Strainer: Keep it in the strainer!

I'm supposed to go blueberry picking at some point this summer.  I had hoped to have fresh blueberries hand picked with love from a local farm for the first time I made this recipe.  Unfortunately, I had to go with farm fresh blueberries packaged up at our local farmer's market instead.

Same thing, they just weren't picked with love.

This recipe is fantastic.  But then again, what recipe including sour cream isn't fantastic?  It gives that perfect amount of moisture to any baked delight.

And to think that I wrinkled my nose to sour cream during my years as a youngster.

What I particularly love about the page this recipe is found on is that on the opposite page there is a section that gives a formula for making "Muffins As You Like Them".  So, you could choose to make an awesome recipe like the Wild Blueberry-Sour Cream Muffins, or you could create your own masterpiece of a muffin recipe.

More to come on that later, perhaps.

The recipe for the blueberry muffins was simple and quick to do.  If you're being leisurely, perhaps it could take you 45 minutes total, but being leisurely is totally overrated for me.

The recipe said it yields 12 muffins.  I made 12 muffins, plus had enough batter left over to make about 12 mini muffins.

Mini muffins are good.  They have less calories, even if you end up eating exactly 10 zillion of them, like I did.

Shhh, that's our little secret.