Weekend Cooking: cornbread, red curry noodles, coffee cake

This week saw me try several new recipes in addition to our old favorites. I made the cornbread out of Make the Bread, Buy the Butter by Jennifer Reese, Bobby Flay's Coconut Red Curry Noodles (as seen on Worst Cooks in America) and this coffee cake.


First, the cornbread. We were having cowboy beans for dinner one night and when I went to mix up the cornbread I discovred we did not have any mix. I usually use Jiffy cornbread mix because it's quick and reliable and CHEAP. I had just read the chapter  about bread, so I opened to the recipe and gave it a shot. It took slightly longer to mix up that the Jiffy mix, but produced a much larger loaf of cornbread. It was very light and fluffy, sweet, and it toasted well the next day at lunch. Reese says cornbread is something to make, not buy, and I have to agree with her. She says making it this way costs about 4 cents more per slice (unless you leave the book in the kitchen where it gets ruined and you have to buy the library a new copy. Then it probably costs more than that.)


Yesterday was Friday and since it's Lent that means meatless. (Or fish, but ew.) Mike and I both really enjoy Worst Cooks in America, and last Sunday they made Asian noodles. We decided that this Friday we'd give Bobby Flay's Coconut Red Curry Sauce and Noodles a try. This one was hit or miss. The boys didn't like it at all. The Princess ate the noodles and some carrots. Mike and I liked the sauce, but wished for a bit more curry, more cabbage, less ginger. Mike thinks it needs beef instead of tofu. I stupidly added cilantro, which I hate, and it ruined the whole dish for me. It was, for us, an expensive meal, but we do have leftover ingredients to try again some time with the modifications.


This morning I had a wild hair and decided to make coffee cake instead of eggs. I did a google search and landed on this recipe at Allrecipes.com and since it had good reviews and I had all the ingredients, I went with it.  I did not take the time to compare and I only looked at one or two comments. This one was terrific. You do have to cut butter in twice, which is a pita with a fork, and I was having doubts, but it turned out really good. If you make it in a 9x13 pan, as she does, it seems that it won't spread all the way out, but it does and turns out terrific. It's not super tall, but you could do it in a 9x9 and cook a bit longer if you wanted. One of the few reviews I did read said that the topping would melt into the cake, so I waited until about half way through the cooking time to add that. I'll be pinning this one.
What new things did you try this week? What would you have done differently for the noodles? Are you a cilantro lover or hater?

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