Don't Put This In Your Mouth!

I've been undertaking the very risky task of experimenting with new recipes while feeding a toddler. As any parent knows this is a risky proposition. Come to think of it, testing out new recipes is a risky proposition for anyone! If the recipe is a total disaster then you're left trying to figure out what's for dinner with very little time to spare. In my pre-mommy days I would just go grab some Chinese food takeout or order a Papa John's pizza (sans the cheese of course) and call it a night. But that doesn't exactly fly when feeding a little one.

This week has been a week of awful recipes. I decided to finally clean out my big box of recipes I've been meaning to try and go through the recipes I've earmarked in cookbook after cookbook. Unfortunately not one of them, nope not one, turned out well. The worst of all of them was this recipe for Soy-Free Vegan Ground Beef that I found on Veg News website. The picture looked like a warm, savory, delicious dish and despite the very skeptical comments left under the recipe and more than one commentor saying that it turned out awful I still tried the recipe. I figured the folks who didn't like the recipe had bad food processors or just didn't know what they were doing. But in reality, the recipe is just flawed. I have an amazing, large capacity Cuisinart food processor and even with this powerhouse of a processor this stuff just came out a pink mess. I immediately felt foolish for even trying the recipe as more than one of the commentors on it said this happened to them as well.

I soldiered on and tried to bake it up anyway - not willing to accept the fact that I just wasted a perfectly good head of cauliflower that my daughter who had loved and 2 cups of walnuts which are not cheap. But after 1 hour and 15 minutes in the oven I had to accept defeat. This recipe, just wasn't going to work out. It was completely and totally inedible. Although, I have to admit, by the end of the 1 1/4 hours in the oven it did look pretty darn spiffy. So readers beware, don't get sucked into the same false sense of security that I did. That somehow you will be able to outfox this recipe and make it taste delicious. Unfortunately, it just can't be done. Oh well...on to the next one.