Renee Marie Recipe Reviews (Pg. 1) - Allrecipes.com (18258253)

Gingersnaps III

Reviewed: Nov. 9, 2007

I didn't have any molasses, so I used dark brown sugar for half the white and corn syrup. I imagine molasses would have made them even better. I also added a bit of butter flavoring. The cookies were extremely soft right out of the oven, but they firmed up pretty quickly, and days later they were still as tender as the poster of the recipe promised. (This recipe makes a lot, by the way- they weren't around days later for lack of consumption!) They're perfect seasonal cookies for the colder months. I served them at a gathering, and everybody said they were wonderful- even my husband, who insists that a cookie isn't a cookie unless it has chocolate chips in it.

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2 users found this review helpful

Cuban Green Soup

Reviewed: Oct. 18, 2007

Not having any salt pork, I kind of improvised a bit. I added some crushed garlic, a diced hot pepper, and sliced turkey bacon in with the onion. Then I made a broth of diced tomatoes and water, to which I added a little bit of soy sauce and some hot sauce. The turnip greens were fresh, and I used Great Northern beans. Served with cornmeal muffins this made a full meal- enough to fill my husband up, which is saying something!

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9 users found this review helpful

Veggie Brown Rice Wraps

Reviewed: Sep. 27, 2007

I made a very loose adaptation of this recipe consisting of brown rice cooked with cumin and tomato, leftover black bean and corn salsa, (which included onion, tomato and hot peppers, among other things,) a sliced avocado, sharp cheddar cheese, a few dollops of nonfat yogurt cheese (as a sour cream substitute), and a squirt of hot sauce. Then I sent one off in my husband's lunch, and had one for lunch myself. It was neat enough to eat on the go, substantial enough to keep us both going until dinner, and it tasted great cold, which is a big advantage if you don't have access to a microwave oven at work.

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6 users found this review helpful

Butterscotch Apple Dumplings

Reviewed: Sep. 25, 2007

Mmm. Maybe it's just that I only made two of these, but I didn't find the recipe to be difficult or time consuming. I skipped the peeling step, though, and I patted the dough into rounds rather than rolling it out. It yeilds a crispy, biscuit like crust, and a soft, warm apple. (Braeburn, in my case.) I rubbed the cinnamon sugar mix over the inside of the dough before wrapping the apple in it, and used a bit of allspice, rather than nutmeg. I also stuffed them with golden raisins. They would be lovely with vanilla ice cream, but if you haven't got any, a cold glass of milk will do. Incidentally, if you scale it down to two servings like I did, you might want to double the sauce.

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15 users found this review helpful

Broiled Tilapia Parmesan

Reviewed: Sep. 13, 2007

I was cooking for myself, and making a pretty thin filet, so I just dumped the sauce on top of the fish and broiled it two or three minutes. It came out great.

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1 user found this review helpful

Egg Foo Young

Reviewed: Sep. 10, 2007

Very easy to prepare. I used ham instead of shrimp, chives instead of onions (added toward the end) and left out the salt.

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2 users found this review helpful

Amish White Bread

Reviewed: Aug. 23, 2007

I've tried several white bread recipes, and this is my favorite. I reduce the sugar to 1/4C to make it lighter, and it yields a nice, evenly textured loaf, which is good for sandwiches. Update: I tried it with 1/3 whole wheat flour the other day, and it came out a bit softer than the all white flour version does, which turned out to be a problem when making lunch box sandwiches with it. It was really good, though.

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4 users found this review helpful

Banana Muffins I

Reviewed: Jul. 26, 2007

I didn't have enough banana, so I added applesauce. My other alterations were pretty standard: cinnamon, and vanilla yogurt for the sour cream. To the reviewer who used 1/4C extra banana rather than sour cream, and got poor results: baking soda requires an acidic ingredient to cause it to act. By removing the sour cream and replacing it with fruit, you removed that acidic ingredient, and the baking soda remained inactive.

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31 users found this review helpful

Tomato Bacon Squares

Reviewed: Jul. 26, 2007

I made mine as a meal, on homemade crust, and it served two people nicely. I used mushrooms rather than bell pepper, onion powder in the mayonaise rather than onions, turkey bacon, and a mixture of montery and pepper jack cheeses. It turned out really well. I think the pepper jack gave it a nice kick.

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5 users found this review helpful

Cornmeal Mush

Reviewed: Jul. 10, 2007

I did as JewRican suggested: halved the cornmeal and made it with milk. Served with honey and a pat of butter, it was delicious.

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1 user found this review helpful

Juicy Butt Steaks

Reviewed: Jul. 5, 2007

My husband bought the meat, so I'm not sure what kind of cut I was using, but I think it was a pork shoulder blade steak. Whatever it was, 16oz of liquid was enough to cook it in. Rather than using a cup of ketchup, I used an 8oz can of tomato sauce, and mixed in about 1T brown sugar, 1T vinegar, 1/4t cinnamon, 1/4t dry mustard, a of pinch allspice, and a pinch of cloves. (Essentially a ketchup recipe, except with tomato sauce instead of tomato paste.) I then used the can to add 8oz water, put in the onion, and let it cook away. Every half hour or so I used a pair of tongs to rotate it. About three hours later I took out the meat, removed the fat and bone, tore the pork into chunks, and served with with the sauce over gnocchi. It was tender and flavorful, and quite easy to make.

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18 users found this review helpful

Cinnamon Raisin Swirl Bread

Reviewed: Jun. 16, 2007

I made 1/4 of the recipe and baked it in two mini loaf pans. It looked quite different from the picture on this site, but was no less attractive. My husband ate his entire loaf in ten minutes, and said it tasted like something you'd get at a bakery. He suggested that next time I put some kind of fruit filling at the center- I'll have to experiement.

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0 users found this review helpful

Cake Mixes from Scratch and Variations

Reviewed: Jun. 11, 2007

I used canola oil instead of shortening, and made chocolate, yellow and spice cupcakes. They came out the perfect consistency, and they all tasted very good. One batch of batter made 21 cupcakes.

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1 user found this review helpful

Nancy's Chocolate Fudge Pie

Reviewed: May 1, 2007

I'd give it five stars for taste, but the directions are alarmingly vague. The only way I know of to get a meringue on top of a pie is to bake it on, but the recipe says nothing about this, and when I did the fudge part liquified underneath the meringue. I put it in the refrigerator hoping it would solidify, and the meringue detatched from the crust and began floating. After a day in the fridge, the filling is still pretty runny. The whole mess tastes great, but the presentation leaves something to be desired.

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27 users found this review helpful

Never-Ever-Fail Meringue

Reviewed: May 1, 2007

I burned off enough calories beating this with a hand mixer that I didn't feel guilty about my dessert! ;-) Seriously, it turned out wonderfully. I had to bake it a little longer to get it to brown on top, but there was absolutely no weeping.

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0 users found this review helpful

Weiner Winks

Reviewed: Apr. 26, 2007

If you have round top bread, just tear off the crusts and roll it flat with a rolling pin. I used two flattened slices per frank, and it worked nicely.

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0 users found this review helpful

Baked Custard for Two

Reviewed: Apr. 24, 2007

I had never had baked custard before, but it was something my English husband grew up with, so I decided to give it a try. It couldn't have been easier to make, but after 45 minutes of cooking it was still quite liquid. I decided to take it out of the oven and refrigerate it, and in a few hours it had set nicely. Being new to custard I wasn't sure what to make of it, but my husband assured me that it looked and tasted just right.

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3 users found this review helpful

Cottage Cheese Perogies

Reviewed: Apr. 19, 2007

I filled mine with a mixture of peppered cottage cheese and ham, and fried them in a little canola. Then I used to oil to make country gravy (from this site), and covered the perogies in it. They make a great breakfast item that way. My husband thinks they would also be good filled with apple, so I'm going to try that later.

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3 users found this review helpful

Gourmet Thai Chicken Pizza

Reviewed: Apr. 11, 2007

I suddenly found myself making this when I discovered I didn't have any tomato sauce. I had already made my pizza crust, so I ad-libbed my way through this recipe. I had no chicken breast, so I made a vegetarian version using mushrooms. The sauce looked runny, so I thickened it by mixing in finely grated mozzarella, and then topped it with a little extra mozzarella once I had all the toppings in place. My husband thought it was great, and he wants me to make it again. I'll have to try it with chicken.

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1 user found this review helpful

Easy Garlic Broiled Chicken

Reviewed: Mar. 22, 2007

I scaled it down to two servings and used four chicken legs. After thirty minutes in the broiler, they were done perfectly. (I turned them once halfway through.) My husband and I thought that they tasted great.

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1 user found this review helpful