Culinary Endeavors

So the last week or so, I've tried some new recipes. Okay, two new recipes. Okay, one new recipe and another one I've tried before that had never turned out quite right. :) The first one was from the Amish cookbook I got for Christmas. It was chocolate cream pudding, and there were probably five ingredients. Less ingredients is bad for me because if I mess one up, it'll have a lot worse effect than a recipe with fifteen ingredients.
Anyways, obviously one of the main ingredients in pudding is milk. And, like the newbie cook that I am, I forgot that you should always check and make sure you have all of the ingredients before you start. So I mixed my cocoa powder and corn starch together with some salt and sugar. And then I realized we had no milk.
Now, if I was anyone but me, I would have sensibly put the ingredients in a bowl or something and saved them for a later time. But, being me, I remembered that we had powdered milk packets in the pantry (leftover from some sort of craft). So of course, I mixed up the artificial milk.

Gracie found a nice little box to sit in while she hoped that I would drop something for her.

After that, I poured it into a double boiler and cooked it until there was a semi-skin on top. I started to have doubts about this "milk" right about now.

Looks perfectly innocent, doesn't it?

 After the milk was ready, I mixed it into the cocoa powder mixture.

 Then I whisked it all together, quite vigorously, and ended up with this.

Ooh, bubbly!

 So I covered it with plastic wrap, stuck it in the fridge, crossed my fingers, and hoped like nobody's business that it would turn  out. While I didn't get any pictures the next morning after it sat in the fridge all night to set up, it really doesn't make any difference, because it looked exactly the same after twelve hours in the fridge. Chocolate soup, anyone?
CULINARY ENDEAVOR #1: FAILED


Last night, I decided to try something a little more in my comfort zone: cinnamon rolls. I used my cousins' grandma's recipe to mix them up. You combine the yeast, flour, milk, sugar, salt, eggs, etc... and let it sit overnight. Then the next morning, you roll it all out and spread the delicious things on it: butter, sugar, cinnamon. Then you roll it all up and slice the giant log of doughy, cinnamony goodness. You stick all of those delectable goodies in their respective pans and let it sit for a while longer, until you can't stand to wait  any longer. Then you bake them at 350 degrees for about fifteen minutes.
I decided to make a caramel sauce to go on top.
That turned out pretty well.

YUM!! Breakfast....

I poured the caramel sauce over the top until it looked like the rolls were sitting in a giant hot tub of caramel sauce. Now, I'm done and I can go eat one!!!!!
CULINARY ENDEAVOR #2: DOMINATED!!!!!!!