A Milestone....and a GIVEAWAY!

Alright folks, today Confections from the Cody Kitchen hits 100,000 views.  This is of course a bit exciting in and of itself, but the part of it that excites me most is that 47,000 of those 100,000 views have come in the last 5 weeks.  A bit nutty when you think about that knowing that my blog was started way back in February 2011.   I definitely remember days when I was doing good to get 18 views.  No joke.

I've worked really hard over the past few months to step up my game and hopefully you all have been able to tell a difference.  I got serious about being more consistent with my posts, and probably the biggest difference can be seen in my photos.  Now I spend much more time setting up a shot and then editing it.  The photos from even just a few months ago are downright scary!

Lord knows I have SO far to go though.  When I see other powerhouse blogs out there getting 400K+ views a month it makes my measly view count look, well, measly.

But the whole point of this is to say thank you.  Thank you from the bottom of my heart.  This blog started out as a fun way for me to share my endeavors in the kitchen and has turned into so much more.  As a lot of you have read, my relationship with food hasn't always been healthy, but this blog has brought me further than I could ever have imagined on that journey.

* If you haven't read my story, I would encourage you to do so.  I think it will give my posts a slightly different meaning.  Here are the links to Part One, Part Two and Part Three.

Thank you for reading.  Thank you for hanging in there when I miss a post.  Thank you for your encouraging comments.  And thank you for making me feel so incredibly welcome here in the blogosphere.  It warms my heart and makes me excited to hit the "publish" button each morning. 

And of course this milestone means a giveaway!  What fun would it be if there weren't something FREE??  Up for grabs is a wonderful $35.00 gift card to one of my favorite stores, Bed Bath and Beyond.  BBB is one of my go-to's for cooking and baking supplies and I'm sure you won't have a problem finding something there either.

To enter you need to do 2 things:

1. Become a fan on Facebook OR follow us on Twitter.  Or both if you're eager beaver :)

2. Leave a comment below stating what you would buy with the gift card were you to win it.

You must complete the entry requirements by tonight Tuesday, July 31 at 10PM Eastern Standard Time.  The winner will be announced at that time via random draw.

Only one entry per person.

Good luck!

Gluten Free Breakfast Cookies

You're thinking one of two things:  No way do I want to start my day off with a sugary sweet! ....or..... Cookies for breakfast?  Heck yes!


The good news is that these gluten free breakfast cookies will please you no matter your viewpoint.  These cookies have barely enough sweetness to put them into the "cookie" category, but the sweetness comes from wholesome sources such as bananas, shredded coconut, honey and cranberries that will keep your tummy happy until lunch rolls around.

I, myself am not one to crave loads of sugar in the morning (don't worry, that definitely comes a few hours later right after lunch and lasts until, oh I don't know...bedtime?).  If I eat something sugary first thing in the morning that's all I'll crave the rest of the day.  Not sure why, but it happens every time like clockwork.....I eat a cinnamon roll for breakfast and by 10:30AM I'm dreaming of chocolate.

But these cookies fit the bill when it comes to my idea of a perfect breakfast.  Good quality natural ingredients that are both tasty and filling (due to the protein and fiber content) are what separates these cookies from those that you are likely to find at the grocery store: cookies with 20+ ingredients, many of which you have no hope of being able to recognize much less pronounce.

Do you want one or all four in

that stack?

The version below is gluten free, but if you wanted to add whole wheat flour in place of flaxmeal you certainly could.  Just know that it negates the gluten free factor.

Along those same lines, you could also switch up a lot of the ingredients below......olive oil for coconut oil, raisins or dried blueberries for cranberries, pecans for almonds.....you name it, it could probably be done and turn out just as tasty.

Oven Roasted Cabbage

When you think of a delicious and flavorful veggie side dish, what comes to mind?  Probably sweet potato casserole, green beans, roasted zucchini, garlic mashed potatoes, etc.  But what about cabbage?  Yeah, I didn't think that one was very high up on your list.

I'm all about eating healthy, but when I see cabbage I usually think "rabbit food".   That or I wonder what kind of slaw is fixing to be made.  And I don't like slaw.

But this cabbage recipe just might change your mind.  It's the easiest side dish you'll ever make.  It takes next to no time to throw together and gives you a bit of time to prep other parts of your meal while it's roasting.

And since it's summer and there is plenty of fresh produce to be found, there's no excuse not to make this.

And since all you need is a head of cabbage, that means this dish can be prepared on the cheap.

And since you roast it on a pan lined with tin foil there is virtually no clean up.

Okay, there are four reasons right there to make this dish!  Do you need more convincing?  If so, hopefully these pics will do the trick :)

Those lightly browned parts are where the

flavor is.

Zaxby's Style Sauce

At the beginning of this week I posted some yummy sweet potato chips.  Along with those chips I made some Zaxby's style sauce that I served with the chips and on the burgers we ate that night. 

I'm not sure how far the Zaxby's franchise stretches, but I'm guessing it isn't too far out of the southeast.  Zaxby's is a chain restuarant known for it's chicken-centric menu and A-mazing sauce that diners generously douse their sandwiches, wings and fries with.  There's still a lot of debate over what all goes into it (and in what quantities), and I'm pretty sure that even the best copy cat recipe still doesn't quite hit the nail on the head.

I did some digging and found the below recipe hailed as the best copycat around.  While it didn't taste exactly  like Zaxby's sauce, it was really good and therefore worthy of sharing.

Post-dinner that night curiosity got the best of me and I hopped back onto the computer for an online search for the exact list of ingredients in the sauce.  I'm not sure why I didn't think of this before.  Geez.

The Zaxby's website was gracious enough to list the ingredients as follows.....

Soybean oil, water, tomato paste, high fructose corn syrup (!!!!), corn syrup, distilled vinegar, salt, egg yolks, Worcestershire sauce concentrate (distilled vinegar, molasses, corn syrup, water, salt, caramel color, garlic powder, sugar, spices, tamarind, natural flavor, sulfiting agent), spice, sugar, garlic*, potassium sorbate (preservative), xanthan gum, calcium disodium EDTA to protect flavor, natural flavor. *Dehydrated.

Let me interject and ask: WHY is high fructose corn syrup in EVERYTHING?!  I had expected that it was in there, but it's frustrating to see that it's very high up on the list and is therefore in the sauce in a pretty large amount.  Sigh.

Despite my sauce not matching up to Zaxby's tit for tat, I still loved the outcome and didn't have any problem slathering my burger with it :)  And hopefully you won't either.

Tuesday's Tips, Tricks and Tid-Bits ~ How to Identify a Bad Egg

You've got a bad egg there.  No, literally.  How often have you wondered whether or not the eggs you have on hand are fresh?  You can't exactly smell them (unless they're rotten, that is), but luckily there are a few dead giveaways that you need to toss them ASAP.

from This Week for Dinner

First you need to.....

1. Fill a fairly deep bowl almost to the top with cool water.
2. Gently place an egg into the bowl, being careful not to break it.  If the egg floats, it's a bad egg.  If it sinks, proceed to step #3.
3. If the egg lays flat along the bottom of the bowl it is fresh.  If it stands on one end, it's still fresh, but less so than if it laid flat.  Both of these would be safe to eat, but you should eat the egg that stands on one end first.
4. If you're even the least bit hesitant about a carton of eggs, test each one just to be on the safe side. 

Last one to do so is a rotten egg!  Sorry, had to do it :)

Homemade Sweet Potato Chips

Last weekend the hubs and I opted to cookout at home versus heading out for dinner.  Those nights are my absolute favorite.  Don't get me wrong...I definitely enjoy eating out, especially at local restaurants, but there's just something about the smell of the grill and spending the afternoon chopping and dicing away to prep a delicious dinner that night.

Sweet potatoes were on special that particular Saturday, so we decided to try our hand at some homemade sweet potato chips.  We received a deep fryer as a wedding gift that I have been DYING to use, and this proved to be the perfect opportunity.

I pulled out my vintage mandoline slicer that I had picked up a few weeks ago at an antique store and started slicing away.  I wish I had been able to slice the chips more evenly, but for my first go at it I didn't think it was too shabby of a job.  Plus, this thing is a few decades old so it probably wasn't all my fault, right?

*Make sure you have a mandoline slicer on hand for this task.  It's practically impossibly to slice these thin enough with a knife.

These chips were so bright and vibrant in color...

loved them!

I also whipped up a Zaxby's style sauce that we used for both the chips and the burgers.  I'll post the sauce recipe on Wednesday, so make sure to check back!

Mile High Biscuits

Every Friday growing up my dad would take me by Stoney's, home of the best biscuit in our tiny little town, for a bit fluffy one all wrapped up in tin foil to keep it warm until I got to school.  I would always get mine plain with just a bit of butter.  Not too much though. (For what it's worth, my taste has definitely changed and I now get one packed with bacon and egg.)

Is it crazy that the most distinct thing I remember about ordering those biscuits at the end of each week was that "desserts" was misspelled on Stoney's menu posted at the drive thru?  It was spelled with only one "s".  [Face-palm] Ugh.

I found these biscuits on (you guessed it) Pinterest.  These are apparently the very famous biscuits from Ruth's Diner in Salt Lake City, Utah.  According to Pinterest these are "the best biscuits EVER".  Well if Pinterest says it then it must be true.

Look at those butter, flaky layers.

I can't put my finger on what exactly about the texture is different, but it is distinctly different from the buttermilk cathead biscuits I posted a while back.  These are a bit sweeter because of the sugar and tey are definitely chewier.  But maybe that's because I rolled the dough to 1 1/2 inches thick versus 1 inch as was suggested.  Hey, I like my biscuits big.

One thing to note is that my biscuits never turned golden when I baked them.  They stayed a very light cream color  Yours may, but just make sure you keep an eye of them in the oven and use another gauge of doneness other than just color.