Creativity in the Kitchen

When it looks like this outside:



It tends to make me want to do something like this...




...Make a big plate of something warm and comforting!


I love being creative in all manner of ways, and one of those is cooking and baking, and generally experimenting in the kitchen. Since Michael and I are both vegetarian, and Puente Genil is not very vegetarian friendly, living in Spain requires more experimentation for us.

Luckily, I find it a great challenge, and although I had to give away my recipe books (very very heavy!), the last few days I have been cutting out little recipes from my mom's box files of recipe ideas, and stashing them in between the pages of the one, little recipe book I kept. And, yes, it is a chocolate recipe book. It contains my old, trusted recipe for making home made chocolate truffles. I make little batches of these as thank you gifts, xmas gifts, or for a nice gesture. They always go down very well! I tend to make my own little boxes for them out of black card as well. 

So now, I am looking forward to trying out new things. Especially pies. I love how Americans have so many different sweet pies. 

Like sweet potato pie:

Or pecan pie:

And let's not forget, the Mississippi mud pie:

Mmmm...

I have been baking a pumpkin pie every year for the last few years on Halloween, and am looking forward to making this again, this year:

But of course, I am still on a diet (most days), and I still need to fit into my wedding dress! So I am going to be making different main dishes that are lighter and healthier. 

Like a traditional Spanish tortilla:

Other favourite meals, I shall be finding new ways to cook, to replace the quorn, like my invented lasagne. It looks something like this:

And instead of having the two classic layers of minced meat in a tomato sauce, and bechamel sauce, I used red peppers and garlic in a tomato sauce, and red onion and spinach cooked in a mixture of fat free natural yoghurt and cream cheese. It's very yummy! You build the layers up as normal, then top with a light spread of cream cheese and grated cheese. 

Although I have taken these pictures from Google images, I shall be taking my own photos of my creations soon and posting them here!