Sunday, May 16, 2010

Adventures in Cooking

So for my birthday this year, my future mother-in-law gave me a cookbook (because I'm always going through her cooking magazines when we come to visit, looking for new recipes), and she gave me this cookbook - "Now eat this: 150 of America's Favorite Comfort Foods (All Under 350 calories" by Rocco Dispirito. Of course, I immediately recognized Rocco from the season of Dancing with the Stars when he danced with Karina "My name is a vodka brand" Smirnoff, but apparently he cooks, too! It's a pretty cool book, and since I'm getting ready for a wedding in 4 months, I'm game for eating healthy. I've been wanting to try one forever, so today, I did it. I picked a recipe and went for it. On today's menu? Brownies. How could you go wrong, right?


Of course, this cookbook is a healthy type of cookbook, and I don't necessarily have a "healthy kitchen" so I had to go shop for all of the ingredients on Monday. I spent an hour scouring the aisles of Kroger looking for things like "sugar free chocolate syrup" and "fat free sour cream." I got most of it, except espresso powder. I wasn't sure if that meant actual espresso or what. Who knows. So I gathered the ingredients...



Yep, that's right. You see a can of black beans in there. In brownie ingredients.



I had my doubts, but the recipe says "drain and rinse the beans." So I thought....maybe some of the flavor that you would have with black beans would rinse out. So I followed instructions:



Combined the ingredients in a food processor, which was something, too, because I didn't remember we had one. Truth be told, my Mom gave me her old food processor back in college or law school, which was way too long ago, but I broke it out and used it.



I think the thing is from the 1970s, too, with the look of it, but it also sounds like a drill at the dentist office which leaves much to be desired. (Note to self: Add food processor to the wedding registry).
So I processed everything, poured it into a baking pan and cooked for 25 minutes...



So this is my final product. And I have to say...it doesn't look a damn thing like the one in the cookbook. Nor am I sure that it resembles brownies. And the recipe says you can't taste the black beans, and I think that would be the case if you burned off all of your tastebuds because I sure taste them. (It's a texture thing) T's response to me after it came out of the oven was "Oh that looks like the top of a roof!" I mean, sure, the thing is edible, but this just goes to show the lowfat substitute is never as good as the real thing. I think I might stick to the Betty Crocker next time fo sho. But we technically haven't had a full brownie yet, and I'm sure the thing will taste just fine after I put ice cream and pour chocolate syrup on top of it. Or is that defeating the whole purpose? Would Rocco approve?

Eh...screw Rocco, bring on the ice cream!

3 comments:

  1. Yikes! Maybe keep looking through the book and pick an entree, the dessert looks like way more trouble then it was worth! Betty would of only asked you to mix in eggs and oil! I actually tried something pretty delicious the other day, pumpkin in a can mixed with cake mix, omit the egg & oil. It turned out super moist and delicious! Not really cake like in the sense that you would add frosting but really tasty for a semi healthy dessert. Also applesauce in place of oil and whole wheat flour has a pretty good result, good luck! I would of added the ice cream too, just after I accidentally tripped and dropped the black bean brownies it the trash. :)

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  2. ha, yes, sadly the brownies made it to the trash. They started sweating, if that's what you call it, but having beads of water on them, and I thought "Um, yesh...I don't think brownies are supposed to do that." Onto the next recipe!

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  3. I always wonder about crazy food substitutions like this. Black beans and brownies? Glad you tried it and not me!

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