Jenni Speaks

My daughter is a good cook.  She gives me lots of ideas and has gotten me to move away from recipes and 'wing it'.  She sent me an email about her weekend cooking along with a photo and I wanted to share.

See this lovely cinnamon toast snack I have here? Would you believe I made that bread from scratch using nothing but my own two hands and a wooden spoon?? Must say, making homemade bread is pretty satisfying! I made my first batch this weekend from the starter that Kat gave me. It's not perfect by any means, but it is edible and even pretty tasty so I'm darn proud of my efforts :-) Did not get much rise, I'm blaming the cold for that, but the texture is still pretty decent. It's a full 24 hour process, and a little messy, but not that much work overall surprisingly.  (Nan speaks:  I am really looking forward to tasting this bread she is now baking.....hint, hint, hint)



Also had one more kitchen success this weekend that I have to share because it was easy and amazing - baked coconut shrimp! Really simple, don't even need a recipe really - take the peeled, deveined shrimp (we also took the tails off, although I know it's prettier presentation with them on). Coat them in flour, then egg, then a mixture of panko breadcrumbs and shredded coconut seasoned with S&P. Place on a baking sheet lined with foil and sprayed with cooking spray and bake at 400 for 10 minutes (I ended up flipping mine and giving them an extra minute at the very end).

 For dipping sauce I used a mango coconut sauce from HT (its basically mango puree with chilis and coconut) thinned out with a touch of rice vinegar and soy sauce. Seriously, amazing, came out nice and light and crispy -and the leftovers were good, too. Next time will chop up the coconut shreds a bit since they were a little large, but beyond that wouldn't change a thing!

Nan again:  (I found a photo from a similar recipe on about.com.)  This recipe is so going in my recipe queue.  I have some lovely Mexican Wild Blue shrimp from Trader Joes'....they are from Gulf of Mexico of course, so have that sweet pop in your mouth).