And the Award for Worst New Food Product of the Year Goes to…

With all the Italian cooks on this site, you think I could get some recipes? My favorite food is Italian and there are ZERO Italian restaurants within 100 mile radius of where I'm living. It's awful. What's worse is that the other night I told my husband I really wanted some pasta and he swung to the store and picked up a stouffer's lasagna. They're OK... and I didn't have the heart to tell him that IMO that's not "real" pasta so we ate it.

My favorites are pasta primavera, mushroom stuffed ravioli (Olive Garden dish), and spinach tortellini. There was a restaurant in my hometown that had homemade Italian with the BEST spinach tortellini I've ever had, but they closed down after Olive Garden moved in. (And yes, I do like Olive Garden. Their salad is delicious.)

I've made my own spaghetti sauce a couple times, it turned out good. (Just got it from online recipes.) The problem I have with online recipes is that there's a 50/50 chance. Some are good, some are not so good. But I LOOOOVE sauces. I'm a big sauce person. I love tomato sauces, cream sauces, pesto - all of it. Mmmm, now I really want Italian again.

Put It Out There Baby wrote:

Theophilus wrote:I deleted my last post. I went way off topic and was bitching about the trucking industry.

Before the economy went south, I used to be able to go into truck stops and order the soup and salad bar. Now a lot of truck stops don't have that anymore. They make you purchase soup by the bowl, and the salad bars have fewer food choices than they used to have.

One truck stop I went to had french toast stuffed with apples, now that's what I call healthy eating.

I missed it. I think it's okay Eric. We all need to vent some. Hey you could tell us about what you feel in the thread about keeping in touch how was your day. Anything is okay there as it relates to our lives and our days. I'd like to hear more about your job and the industry in general and feel free to post that over there if you like. It's hard as I said living on the road. And then there is all the "sitting" and not always the chance to get any decent exercise as well. I was lucky as that most of the hotels I stayed in had pools to swim in and exercise rooms, plus I could walk on my time off. I spent more time trying to rest/sleep, eat some decent meals and make some semblance of my bio rhythms. lol If the weather was crap, there went the walking.

I love french toast. I make it almost every week. Stuffed with apples sounds wonderful. Bananas would be good too. I always use bisquick and not flour, and whole milk and two eggs, a little sugar and a little vanilla extract and whip that up into a pretty thick batter and dip the bread in that and then cook them with Smart Balance. I put a little mixed fruit jam on top and just a touch of syrup.

We're french toast people as well, I usually make it. I'll have to try your way out. I just use eggs, a little bit of milk, vanilla extract and sometimes I put in a little bit of frozen oj concentrate. Sometimes I'll use cinnamon as well, and during the Christmas time I try and get pecan syrup. Mmmmm.

I know the problem for me is mostly, I have very few recepies written down anywhere. I just create food. After cooking for so many decades I just know how to cook and I improvise a lot and I change up what I am cooking often. After you have the basics down, you then just wing it and create whatever you want to. I experiment quite a bit with new things. And the stuff I have been cooking forever, I just "know" it and have nothing written down. I used to refer to and use cook books in my 20's and 30's but gave all that up. I watch some cooking shows when I have a chance and sometimes make a few notes. But's that's it. I just go in the kitchen and cook. I don't follow recipes for the most part. I know how to make what I want to and then just wing it withother things I want to try, unless it is some specific new dish that I have never cooked. But once I have cooked it, I wind up changing it a bit anyways, I remember the basics of the dish and again just wing it.

I know HP seems to have a ton of recipies and she is good about writing the ingredients and the steps for them. I am lousy at that. I use herbs and spices and the amounts that I prefer, the types of spices that I enjoy and adjust everything to taste as I am cooking.

Now, I will tell you that I really like Mario Batali and his cooking and I have learned quite a bit from him. Loads of his recipies and instructions are available on the net for free:

http://www.mariobatali.com/food_wine_recipes.cfm

His food and recipies are very consistantly good and there are hundreds of them on that link. He is an excellent chef. His recipies include food from all the regions of italy and fron Sicily as well.

I also like Emeril Lagasse quite a bit and watch his show when I can and have for years. Here is the link to all of his Pasta recipies which again are all free on the net and he has hundreds of them.

http://www.emerils.com/recipes-categories?category=Pastas

You won't go wrong with any of both of these chef's recipies. Trust me. I like them both very much and have used many, many of their recipies.

Cooking is a funny thing. For me it's vey very creative and fun. It needs to be stress free and fun. It's like a play. You start with a miss mash of stuff, you don't know the plot yet, you may have some ideas, there are all kinds of possibilities, but in the end it all comes together for a great enjoyable experience. You need to take your time and not rush either. It's a process. You use the ingredients that you like and in the amounts that you like.

The bisquick is wonderful. It's the only "battered" food I like and Bisquick is so much better than flour. The sugar adds a bit of sweetness, I use like two teaspoons if I am making a big batch. And I always use two eggs. You want it to be thickish, not runny. Sometimes I change up the extracts from vanilla to almond extract or to orange extract or to lemon extract as well. Cook it on not too high a heat so that the batter and the bread are done trough and through and I flip and turn the bread often.

I use Bisquick for my crepes as well and not flour. It's actually the same exact batter and ingredients but much thinner.

Gross looking food?