Make Me Cook

Oh sweet summer, the time to think of the garden freshness and all the bounties of the ever-giving Earth. Mmmm tasty, exciting and delectable morsels shall emerge from what some might consider… mundane. Oh yes, it’s not as boring as you might think… our main ingredient. Leafy, green and chock full of vitamins. The platform for salads and the uneaten wilted garnish on every greasy diner burger plate. We will transform our main ingredient into something special, so rise to the occassion our new main ingredient, Lettuce. Be as delicious as we know you can be!

The Main Ingredient: Lettuce

Get Your Leafy Freak Vote On!

This poll will close on Monday June 5th.
The recipe will be posted between Tuesday June 6th - Friday June 16th.
The next poll featuring Pizza Dough will begin Monday June 5th and run until Monday June 19th.

Ahhh happy days, a new challenge!! *the crowd goes wild yaaaay* Something seasonal, something easy, and hopefully something delicious will come from this fruitacular challenge.

Now while our challenge says it’s a fruit challenge, our main ingredient will be something entirely different than fruit. The challenge here will be for our fruit winners to use the main ingredient as a platform to showcase the lovely succulently sweet fruity gems.

The Main Ingredient: Cream Cheese

Get Your Fruity Vote On!

This poll will close on Monday May 15th.
The recipe will be posted between Tuesday May 16th - Friday May 19th.
The next poll featuring will begin Monday May 15th and run until Monday May 29th. (actually a little longer due to an upcoming birthday)

Since we didn’t get to use all of the ingredients the last time I asked you guys and gals for suggestions for the first Reader’s Choice poll, I’ve grabbed the leftover ingredients that didn’t get picked the last time and put them into this challenge. I added a couple more based on email suggestions of what you folks would like to appear in future polls as well. Remember, feel free to post here what you would love to see in future polls, as I will be running Reader’s Choice polls on a regular basis and I’d love to be able to use your inspiring ingredients to create something delicious!

Now the main ingredient I picked kind of out of thin air with no rhyme or reason to it. Maybe it’s just been a little while since I had a Pork Chop and I have a secret hankering for one. Who knows! But it goes without saying that our Main Ingredient is: Pork Chops.

The Main Ingredient: Pork Chops

This poll will close on Monday February 20th.
The recipe will be posted between Tuesday February 20th - Friday February 24th.
The next poll featuring Fun With Fruits (this will be a short poll) will begin Monday February 20th and run until Monday Febraury 27th.

BAM! In this our latest round of challenges we will go jet-setting and globe-trotting for ingredients from six of the continents on the little old planet we call Earth. What are we after with this miss matched list of goodies? Fusion baby! You are going to make me create something exciting and ecclectic and totally bizarre… but tasty! Expect something elaborate, something that when you set it on the table will make people go “Oooo Ahhh” and when they put it in their mouth they will be saying “Mmmmm!”.

Okay, since most everything in the world is now cultivated… well everywhere in the world I had to do a little research. I looked back to find the historical cuisine and food history of each of the continents we pulled from for this challenge. Did you know that Watercress was indigenous as a wild weed in North America? How about that Beans, along with corn and squash, were staples of most (and still are today) diets in South America? In Africa the Plantain is a staple starch food, along with the yam. Lemongrass is found in found in cuisine throughout Asia, used as a spice in marinades or speared through meat to flavor it. Truffles have a long, rich history, the earliest recording of such date back to the Roman era. And Macadamia Nuts are native to the Australian continent, despite the fact that they widely farmed elsewhere. How’s that for a bit of learning for ya! Now I would have picked Antartica, but I somehow think that “Snow” would not have made for a great ingredient choice

So along with your vote… I would LOVE to hear what ingredients instantly come into your mind when you think of these six continents and post them here to share!

Oh boy… I almost forgot to mention our Main Ingredient!
Our Main Ingredient will be Halibut

This poll will close on Monday January 23rd.
The recipe will be posted between Tuesday January 24th - Friday February 3rd.
The next poll featuring Reader’s Choices will begin Monday January 23rd and run until Monday Febraury 6th.

Voluptuous? Vegetarian? Those two words are not readily associated with one another when talking about your everyday ideas of the vegetarian meal. But who said that vegan means you are regulated to only eating alfalfa sprouts with the bunnies? You won’t hear that sentiment around these parts, and to prove it and to honor my wonderful vegan friends out there we will be dedicating this next challenge and recipe to our compassionate eaters.

I have consulted with several vegetarians and vegans on the ingredient choices for this poll, all of whom have been extremely helpful and to them I want to say Thank You My ultimate goal is to prepare a dish from your choices that will be “safe” for even the most discriminate Vegan diet and making the flavor so voluptuous and succulent that it would make the carnivores out there drool. The main ingredient, probably predictable, for this challenge will be: Tofu

This poll will close on Monday January 9th.
The recipe will be posted between Tuesday January 10th - Friday January 20th.
The next poll featuring Atomic Fusion choices will begin Monday January 9th and run until Monday January 23rd.