Bacon Chocolate Chip Pancakes

Just look at that beautiful crispy bacon.  Is there anything more delicious?

No. No there is not.

It took me a long time to come around to bacon.  It actually took me until my senior year of college.  As I said before, I was a late-comer to meat, and I hadn't gotten around to breakfast meat yet.

One beautiful evening when I was just a bit under the influence a bacon-extra bacon-pizza was delivered to Joe's dorm room.  I cannot possibly explain the amazingly mind-blowing experience it was when I tried it for the first time, so suffice it to say I am in love.  Also, because it took me so long to find and love bacon, I feel that I am justified in making up for lost time by eating lots of it.

Now, I know this is total insanity, so just bear with me.  I don't like pancakes.  I didn't grow up in  pancake family- I grew up in a french toast family (we were also a toaster family- not a toaster oven family).  BUT when I went to Stax I felt compelled to try their bacon chocolate chip pancakes.  Because for Pete's sake if there is a pancake I would love it is that one.  And holy moly are they delicious.

So Joe and I had our own go at them for dinner one night. (He is from a pancake and toaster oven family- we're total breakfast opposites).  They turned out great.

 Obviously, the first step is to make your pancake mix.  If you've got some top secret family recipe that's delicious- use it.  We just use bisquick because we're lazy, poor, and it's good enough for me.  Plus, as I said, I didn't grow up amongst pancake people- they're only for camping as far as I'm concerned.

Just follow the directions and you end up with this:

Step Two:  prep your add-ins.

In this case that's chocolate chips (I like the minis as they're not too overwhelming) and BACON!

Chop your bacon up.  Not bacon bits tiny- just chunks.

God that looks delicious.  I'm getting hungry for Second Dinner just looking at it.

Butter your pan, heat it up, pour your batter:

Add bacon:

And chocolate chips:

Getting puffy on top and crispy on the bottom?  Flip it!

Yummy yummy pancakes!

And yes, I do add more butter to these heart-cloggers.  If you're already going down, might as well go all the way!  Tomorrow you can drink water and eat salad.

Triple time!

 Even I can't serve just carbs for dinner, so we made some sides.

Green beans sautéed in bacon fat:

 jar-o-bacon fat

The bacon fat crisps them on the outside without making them shriveled and soggy.

Plus fried eggs:

one for two!

For hashbrowns we use those pre-shredded ones by Simply Potatoes and sauté them in butter or bacon fat, depending on the mood that strikes me.

The Plate!

And the spares:

We ate everything.

Raspberry Almond Coffee Cake

As mentioned previously, Joe's family does food in bulk.  Between having a six-person immediate family and being part of an Italian extended family that often comes together for meals, every meal involves twice the necessary amount of food. There are always delicious leftovers to be had.

To supply daily feasts, Joe's mom frequents an Amish auction to buy produce in bulk to freeze for future use.  Last time Joe's parents came up for a visit they brought us a tub of frozen raspberries from the auction.  Because of the limited space in our freezer, they went in the fridge so I wanted to use them up before they turned.

I found this recipe for raspberry almond coffee cake on allrecipes.  It is absolutely delicious.
The full recipe is typed out at the bottom.

 they seriously look so good!

Baked Sweet Potato Fries

I was never a sweet potato person growing up.  My dad detests them, so we only had them on Thanksgiving.  We make them in a casserole with brown sugar and marshmallows melted on top- and it never really appealed to me.  

Fast forward to a few months ago, and we were given sweet potato fries by accident instead of tater tots while out at dinner.  I was hungry and they're in french fry shape so there's really no arguing with trying them, and I found out how very delicious they are.  

They were on sale at our grocery store, so I figured it couldn't be that much more complicated than baking potato chips.  Turns out it's easy and delicious and it's actually fairly healthy.

Saturday Shenanigans- College Flashback

Okay, so this took a little while for me to post a follow-up to the Friday post, but I have been crazy super busy this week, so hopefully I'll fill you in on that later today.

So we last left off with us being slightly over-served on Friday.  I am a firm believer that a big greasy diner breakfast is the prefect cure for a hungover tummy.  We met back up Saturday morning at Jack & Benny's diner on High Street and had an incredible breakfast.  Joe and I have always been diner-enthusiasts, so I became familiar with the midwestern breakfast that is slathered in gravy but never tried it since I'm a late-comer to the meat party (read more about that here).  Now that I don't live here I try to take advantage of Ohio's best features (more on that soon), and one of those is gravy-covered everything.  So I finally tried it!  I don't remember the name on the menu, but I had hash browns, bacon, and fried eggs smothered in bacon with toast.  It was seriously amazing.  Hannah was equally pleased with her choice of eggs Benedict.

We split after breakfast, and Hannah and I headed up to Denison to meet up with some old college friends from the rugby team.  On the way was one of the best, most delicious Italian markets America has to offer (they also have a restaurant, which is obviously scrumptious).

 Carfagna's!

 Hannah stocked up for her trip home- big jars of sauce with a free pound of pasta with each jar!

Beef Teriyaki and Heart-Shaped Carrots

Joe and I were fortunate enough to have his parents come up to visit this weekend!  And even better, we didn't have an imminent school work so we could relax and enjoy their company without the pressure of looming deadlines.

Joe is from what he would call suburbs, but is really very much the country of central Ohio.  One of the many benefits of living in the country is that the food is seriously amazing.  There is nothing as good as getting all that meat, fruits, and veggies as fresh as is physically possible. Add to this the fact that Joe's family is Italian, and therefore cooks at least double what you need and you end up with a mind blowing amount of food.

So back to this most recent trip- we made out like bandits with an amazing freezer full of meat flash frozen from the butcher's.

And a box full of thin mints for good measure!

(Thanks again for all the food!!!)