Mystery Food Revealed

Thank you everyone for participating in this month’s Mystery Food guessing game. Most of the responses were on facebook, so I will list them here. Here are the guesses:

• canned buttercream frosting
• ice cream
• pudding
• sweetened condensed milk
• Miracle Whip
• caramel ice cream topping

Caramel ice cream topping was SO close! Good job! This happens to be Marzetti’s Light Caramel Apple Dip.



Let’s review these ingredients again:
HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP, CORN SYRUP, NON FAT MILK, POLYDEXTROSE, MODIFIED CORN STARCH, BUTTER (MILK, CREAM, SALT), SUGAR, LESS THAN 2% OF: DISODIUM PHOSPHATE, SALT, PARTIALLY HYDROGENATED SOYBEAN OIL, NATURAL AND ARTIFICIAL FLAVORS, POTASSIUM SORBATE (PRESERVATIVE), MONO AND DIGLYCERIDES.



Is nothing made from good old-fashioned sugar anymore? Everything is high fructose corn syrup based. Notice it’s the first ingredient, meaning, of all the ingredients, this one is the highest quantity.  Then corn syrup. Sugar is the 7th ingredient listed. And then…aaaah!–partially hydrogenated soybean oil–this is the trans fat we talked about, just the other day. Mono and diglycerides are also trans fat.



But you may be thinking, it’s a treat, all treats are bad for us.  We can have a little, right?



There are levels of bad. If you were to make your own caramel dip (not that hard) at home, you would use sugar, butter, cream, salt, vanilla, and maybe a little corn syrup (I use Griffin’s since it lists corn syrup and sugar syrup on the label, not high fructose corn syrup). These ingredients are much better for you. (Note, I did not say “healthy”, but better. For more information, check out my Ladder of Healthy Eating.)



This is an October treat for us, we don’t eat it all the time. I used to buy the Marzetti dip. No more, we are taking our steps up the ladder. Checkout any good cookbook for a recipe for real caramel. Make some at home. I especially like Mark Bittman’s How to Cook Everything and The Joy of Cooking. Real food–this is what grandma lived to 90 on!

Yummy!

I made the most delicious thing the other night–homemade egg nog!  Let me tell you, it was fabulous!



I love egg nog, but it is not something I have had much in the last few years.  I don’t think I’ve bought any in the last year at least, maybe two.  I can’t help but read labels and I can’t bear to buy it when it has all that junk in it–high fructose corn syrup and chemical thickeners, flavors, and preservatives.  Plus in the last few years the store kind is just too sticky sweet for my taste.



I opened up my Joy of Cooking the other day and the recipe for homemade egg nog didn’t seem to fit my needs.  First of all, it was for a very large crowd, second, it was complicated as it called for cooking for egg safety, and third, it called for Rum.  I wasn’t sure if I could cut the recipe down by 12ths or if it would taste like my favorite store brand without the rum.



On a whim I just decided to be creative and create some of my own.  I used the following ingredients:

1/3 cup raw cream
1/3 cup raw whole milk
1 raw egg yolk
1 Tb sugar (you could use honey or stevia, they may impart their own flavor)
dash of vanilla
sprinkle of nutmeg

 

This made one serving (about 7 ounces).  I mixed it with an immersion blender, but I think you could whisk it, as well.  The blender actually made it foamy and I could do without the foam.

 

I did not heat this to cook the egg, I was brave and drank it raw!  I consider myself a brave person when it comes to food.  I cooked a roast one time that I had left on the counter all night to thaw.  I figured I was going to be cooking it for 3 hours, that should kill anything harmful.  :)  I’m sure some of you have nibbled on raw cookie dough, even though we’re told we’re not supposed to do that!

 

I mixed the nog and then had it drank within 30 minutes, it’s not like it sat out for hours.  :)  So procede at your own risk.  Ideally, use eggs that are farm fresh, they are safer.  Or you could look up the Joy of Cooking recipe and follow the instruction for heating it up.  The other day a friend mentioned that this would make good ice cream.  Maybe next year I’ll try that!

 

I am going to enjoy making this every holiday season now.  I hope you enjoy it as well.