Recipe Reviews: Donuts, Chicken, and more!

Here's the awesome thing about rainy weekends: they are a perfect excuse to stay inside and do nothing.

Now, I like summer as well as the next person, but all this push to BE OUTSIDE, and ENJOY THE WEATHER, and SOAK UP THE SUN, man, that's just not me. I'm an inside kind of person. The kind who likes to sit their lazy butt on the couch and watch TV and read all day.

Children have ruined this for me.

But still, summer is so OVERWHELMING with activities. So when it rains, I'm secretly happy. Or maybe not so secretly anymore. But I don't mind a rainy weekend now and again. My regular life is busy enough; I don't feel the need to add extra activities on the weekends. Let's just all CHILL, MAN.

However, here's the thing. The thing is this: I can only do nothing for so long. Then I start to go crazy. Literally on Sunday I started wandering around my house trying to think of something to do.

I mean, something that I WANTED to do. Because Lord knows, there were a million other things I SHOULD DO.

I did A LOT of baking and cooking over the last few days. Thursday I stayed home with a diseased child, and made a giant batch of The Best Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies. These babies are delish...I think I ate about 30 over the weekend.

I am not joking.

Also on Thursday I SLAVED over homemade BBQ meatballs with Homemade BBQ Sauce from the Pioneer Woman. Confession: I only made this because I was out of the store bought stuff. I want to try it again, this time NOT substituting Tabasco for Worcestershire. I also made Herb Bubble Bread, which is out of this world, and my MIL's garlic mashed potatoes. And corn on the cob, which doesn't require to much effort other than boiling water and remembering to take butter out of the fridge.

But that wasn't it, man. Thursday was just a teaser for things to come over the weekend. I have a list a mile long of new recipes I want to try, and I am making a conscious effort this year to expand my go-to meals. Sometimes new recipes turn out to be total duds (like most of the freezer-to-crockpot meals I tried this year), sometimes they turn out so-so but aren't worth making again for one reason or another, and every once in a while I find a real winner.

Saturday morning I got up at the crack of dawn to make homemade donuts for my family. Because that's how awesome I am.

Just kidding. I actually slept in until 7:30 or so, and these took just minutes to whip together, so I can't take credit for too much. I have tried one other donut recipe in the past before, and I'd have to say I did like that one better, but these Cinnamon Baked Donuts weren't too bad, just very sweet. Darren ate half of one and said he felt his heart clogging up. Easton and I ate two each, and Natalie just licked all the cinnamon sugar off. Clearly we all have different tastes.

One thing with the donuts: do not DREDGE them in butter and then DREDGE them in the cinnamon sugar mixture. It is TOO MUCH. The butter flavor is overwhelming, and they are plenty sweet without all the extra sugar. I want to try them again, but take it a little easier on the toppings.

After I made the donuts I set about making homemade cinnamon rolls. Because, why not? I used the Buttermilk Cinnamon Rolls with Cream Cheese Glaze recipe from Mel's Kitchen Cafe, which is quickly becoming one of my favorite recipe sites. Okay, here's the thing with homemade cinnamon rolls:

(1) Pillsbury are just SKETCHY. I mean, have you ever looked at them and seriously considered how that whole process works? You beat them out of a CAN, for crying out loud! (I actually do really like these, but if I think about them too long they start to sound really weird. Like, why would I eat that?! Kind of like hot dogs.)

(2) No one in their right mind is getting up FIVE HOURS before breakfast time to make these. That's be like two in the morning! Fortunately, God invented the freezer. Here's what you can do with homemade cinnamon rolls: FREEZE THEM. You can freeze them after baking, or, my personal preference, you can freeze them right before the second rise. Then, easy peasy, take them out to thaw and rise 8-10 hours before you need them (a.k.a., the night before) and pop them in the oven in the morning. Thirty minutes to fresh homemade cinnamon rolls! Now does that knock the little dough boy out of the park or what?!

(3) I haven't actually baked them yet. This could all be wishful thinking. I will most definitely keep you posted.

Finally, the last new recipe I tried was Grilled Lime Coconut Chicken with Coconut Rice. I'm not crazy about white rice, and it wasn't anything fancy, although it complimented the chicken pretty well. But the chicken. OH, THE CHICKEN. This chicken was GOOD. The marinade was delicious! So much flavor! So much goodness! This one is DEFINITELY a keeper.