Venison vegetable pie

I browned one portion of ground venison and added one can vegetarian vegetable soup and the leftover carrot cashew soup. A touch of pepper. About 1/2 cup water. Extra greenbeans, peas, and California blend.

Pour into pie crust, top with another.

Bake until golden and crisp.

Downtown Easton Lunch

Yesterday's lunch was the result of walking around downtown Easton. We got two sandwiches from Josie's: one roast beef on rye and one ham and cheese on a pita accompanied by two bags of Herr's chips-- one plain and one salt and vinegar. $11

The three of us split them and we were all still full at dinner time.

For dessert, we shared two malts from the Purple Cow-- one peanut butter and one chocolate (and we still have some left for today)

Pesto chicken, summer salad & honey corn

Today's dinner contains one stick of butter. Only one!

My dad and his wife are coming for dinner to bring my daughter her birthday presents. I had my husband get sine chicken out of the freezer. I thought I had three packs of 2 breasts but when my husband thawed them all, I realized each pack had three whole breasts which = a heckuva lot of chicken.

My husband and daughter picked some lettuce and herbs from the garden.

First course:
SUMMER SALAD
- greens (from the garden)
- French sorrel (from the garden)
- 2 strawberries for each salad
(one sliced, one whole)
- one cucumber, sliced
- choice of dressings: Newman's own raspberry walnut dressing

Homemade biscuits
Honeyed corn
Leftover rhubarb cobbler
Chocolate Berry Earl grey iced tea

PESTO CHICKEN:
- 1/4 cup parsley
- 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
- 1/4 cup roasted sunflower seeds
- about 4 cups basil
(mix in food processor to form a sauce)

Slather chicken breasts with sauce and brown in butter.

Salad

We're having salad for lunch since we plan on filling our bellies with rhubarb cobbler. :-)

Daughter wanted chicken soup, but we didn't have any but I found canned spaghetti and meatballs from when I could not chew. Gave her a side of romaine with cowgirl ranch dressing and my rye croutons, but she didn't like the dressing.

Husband and I are having big salads with croutons, sunflower seeds, broccoli and hot bacon dressing from his mom that I had in the freezer.

Curried tofu

I grabbed a chunk of tofu out of the freezer last night. I haven't prepared tofu in years, but it was cheap at Target...

I pressed it between two plates stacked with cookbooks to weigh it down. For about two hours, draining periodically.

I decided on Eileen Breslin's curried tofu recipe from the vegan cooking class I took with her. About a decade ago. She got it from "Tofu Cookery."

- 1.5 pounds extra firm tofu, drained and cubed
MARINADE
- 1.5 tablespoons peanut butter (I used 2 teaspoons peanut butter and 2 teaspoons tahini)
- 1/4 cup oil (I used canola)
- 3 tablespoons soy sauce (I used two, and used the low sodium)
- 1 tablespoon maple syrup
- 1 tablespoon curry powder (shoot-- I think I used more)
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper

Marinate at least one hour. Spread on oiled cookie sheet and bake at 375 for ten minutes, turn and repeat.

Now she suggests serving with a sauce of:
- 1 cup water
- 2 tablespoons soy sauce
- 1 tablespoon corn starch

Heat, stirring, until thickened. Then top with slivered almonds.

Rhubarb crumble

The finished product

The rhubarb

We made a rhubarb brown sugar crumble based on this recipe from cooks.com:

the filling

http://www.cooks.com/rec/view/0,1813,150175-250200,00.html

We greased my Le Creuset skillet and I chopped about 3.5 cups of rhubarb.

Daughter made crumbs with the following:
- 1 stick melted butter
- 1 cup unbleached flour
- 1 cup brown sugar
- 3/4+ a little oats
- cinnamon to taste

Adding the sauce

We put half the crumbs in the skillet.

I mixed about 1/2 cup fresh strawberries and frozen blueberries into the rhubarb. Then I sprinkled some brown sugar on the fruit. (I don't have any granulated sugar in the house)

We put the fruit/rhubarb over the crumbs and I drizzled honey over it.

In a saucepan we made a thickened sauce of:
- one cup water

final crumbs

- 3/4 cup brown sugar
- 2 tablespoons corn starch
- 3 tablespoons honey
- 1 teaspoon vanilla

(gradually heat to almost boiling stirring constantly until it gels)

We poured that over the rhubarb filling, covered with remaining crumbs and more cinnamon and baked in the oven at 350 for one hour.

Breakfast for dinner

I looked in the cupboards and in the fridge and felt uninspired. So, I started brainstorming with the family.

Soup. Something breakfasty. Pasta.

"Oh!" the child exclaims. "Breakfast for dinner."

Husband suggests omelets. I remember the fresh broccoli I bought at Target and all the cheese I have leftover from yesterday's spinach dip. And the last round of that HUGE bag of tator tots from Aldi.

Bingo.

Ingredients:
- leftover blueberry cobbler coffee in the carafe
- one teaspoon vegetable oil
- one teaspoon garlic powder
- two tablespoons fresh chives, chopped
- 1/2 teaspoon pepper
-1/2 teaspoon salt
- 2 tablespoons heavy cream
- 5 eggs, beaten
- ridiculous amounts of fresh broccoli
- 2 ounces sharp cheddar
- 2 ounces mozzarella
- tator tots

Preheat oven and cook tator tots while preparing eggs. In pan, spread oil, garlic and chives. Stir until chives are fragrant.

In separate bowl, combine eggs, cream, salt and pepper. Pour into very hot pan. Add broccoli, cover with cheese, fold when eggs solidify.

Serve with coffee, tots and a side of 50/50 Frank's Red Hot and ketchup for dipping tots.

Taco rice?

For breakfast, we had leftover scones, bananas and Greek yogurt.

For lunch, daughter requested rice. I put some in the steamer with chili powder and fresh cilantro from the garden.

Then in my skillet I put about a teaspoon of extra virgin olive oiland a teaspoon butter. I threw in frozen corn, the taco meat I made in March (thawed via the microwave)and the last of the black beans I have cooked.

Rhubarb!

My friend Gayle just sent me the link for a cool food blog and it has a recipe for rhubarb cobbler AND Gayle offered me rhubarb if I want to try it. Um, yeah! This blog has a really witty voice and I look forward to checking it out more...

http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2011/06/rhubarb-cobbler/

And look at her take on cinnamon toast! It's too much and too delicious!

http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2010/04/the-right-way-and-the-wrong-way-to-make-cinnamon-toast/

A Special Tea Party

Today we had some friends to our home for a tea party, though the tea was iced. We wanted to thank our friends Bart and Phyllis for being one of my sets of friends who made soup for me when I couldn’t eat.

The menu was planned by my daughter. I made the iced teas. The first tea was decaffeinated organic green tea with rose (the Tazo rest I adore). Two bags of Tazo Rest to three bags of Bigelow organic decaffeinated green. The second pitcher was Archer Farms Earl Grey with berry and chocolate. Good stuff.

I didn’t take many photos, because in the thrill of entertaining I forgot.

My daughter wanted peanut butter crackers and so she selected Market Pantry sandwich crackers, the Ritz style, and a box of Keebler Club multigrain crackers. We saw spinach artichoke dip in Target and got inspired to make our hot spinach dip.

We bought some Market Pantry bagged frozen cut spinach (and it had a lot of big stems with no greens, a bit of a turn off).

We ended up making a platter of sandwich crackers, club crackers and rye crackers with sides of peanut butter, almond butter and cashew butter on the side. We had a big bowl of whole strawberries. A dish of unsalted almonds and cashews.

Then we made spinach dip in the crock pot and scones. Phyllis made heart shaped cupcakes with chocolate icing and my daughter made some cake in her Easy Bake Oven.

TODAY’S SPINACH HERB DIP:

In the crockpot
drizzle some cold pressed extra virgin olive oil
add garden fresh herbs. In my case, today, I used about
        2 teaspoons oregano
        5 large stalks of chives, chopped
        2 teaspoons parsley
        3 large leaves French sorrel, shredded
        3 leaves basil, shredded
        1 teaspoon dill
add 1/4 cup minced garlic

Cook about twenty minutes.
Cook spinach until thawed in microwave. Does not have to be hot. Reserve 3/4 cup of the liquid. Add spinach and liquid to crockpot. Cook at least one hour on high. Preferably 1.5 hours (more is fine, though you may have to reduce heat.)

Thirty minutes before serving, add cheese. Today I used about 4-5 ounces mozzarella, 4 ounces sharp cheddar, and 2 ounces pepper jack. It tasted sweet, so I added a tablespoon of garlic powder.

SCONES

We made two kinds of scones, adapted from the Betty Crocker 25th Anniversary Cookbook. One was honey walnut. One was blueberry.

From memory:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Mix together 4 tablespoons butter and 3.5 cups unbleached white flour, 4 tablespoons sugar, 3 tablespoons honey, 5 teaspoons baking powder, 1/2 teaspoon (?) salt. Use a pastry blender to make it the consistency of crumbs. Then add one beaten egg and four tablespoons applesauce. Add milk by the tablespoon until the dough becomes soft and dough like. I used one tablespoon vanilla silk, then 4 tablespoons heavy whipping cream, then about 3 tablespoons unsweetened soy milk and one tablespoon water.

I divided the dough in two, and added blueberries to one half and lots of honey and walnuts to the other. Turn dough out on floured surface and press to 1/2 inch thick. Cut into diamonds. Bake 10-12 minutes. My honey walnuts started to burn on the bottom after 10.

Peanut butter and honey

While my daughter was struggling to recover from her ear infections, I fed her some peanut butter and local raw honey sandwiches. She fell in love with peanut butter and honey, which we mix at a 50/50 ratio. Peanut butter and honey was a trick I learned from my college roommate. We've had several recent breakfasts of peanut butter and honey on Archer Farms breakfast bread-- like the blueberry streusel or apple fritter.

Daddy's Oatmeal

My husband made delectable oatmeal this morning. He used:

- old fashioned oats
- vanilla soy milk
- cinnamon
- brown sugar
- finely chopped dried pears
- golden raisins
- finely chopped banana

Too much of a good thing?

Too much of a good thing?

I've spent almost $228 on groceries in June and I don't anticipate returning to the grocery store again until mid-July... Especially if my garden produces.

We spent $12 at Target café for family dinner-- while I pride myself on making the healthiest choices I can in just about any circumstances, tonight's dinner was a nutritional bust (though my daughter did have apples!)

I then went shopping, in one of those  moods where I disregard budget and stock the house. Unfortunately, I used my Target Red debit card to pay, completely forgetting that the water bill is due Monday. I assumed I could transfer the money from savings and it would be fine.

It might be-- I keep my savings in an online bank and my checking in a local bank. It takes 2-3 business days to transfer money back and forth. It also takes 2-3 days for Target to deduct the money from my account.

Fingers crossed. Borrowing money from daughter ($60), since she has an account in the same bank as my checking so the transfer will be immediate...

So, what are these deals I could not resist?

For daughter to take to camp:
- Johnson & Johnson baby shampoo, trial size, 97 cents
- cheap flip flops, $1
- travel toothbrush and toothpaste, 97 cents
- travel size bar of Dove soap, 97 cents
- travel size of hand sanitizer, 99 cents

For the kitchen:
- three small plastic tumblers, $2.61 each
- four large tumblers, $2.98 each

For the lady of the house:
- Two 36 count boxes of Playtex tampons, $6.99 each BUT with $2 off coupon AND a $5 Target gift card if you buy two
So, depending how you look at it, that's buy one get one free

Groceries:
- the one pound jar of roasted, unsalted cashews, $10.99
- club crackers, $2.40
- Market Pantry sandwich crackers, $2.74
- Fresh Express romaine lettuce, $2.49 (which I wouldn't need to buy if the darn tortoise would eat the lettuce in my garden)
- nasoya tofu, two one pound blocks of extra firm, regularly $2.75 on clearance for $1.39
- fresh broccoli, $2.29
- two large jars of JIF Natural peanut butter, $4.12 each, which was cheaper than Market Pantry creamy peanut butter
- Smuckers Seedless blackberry jam, the fruity kind, $1.67
- regular bag of brown rice, $1.17
- Barilla Plus multigrain angel hair pasta, $1.84
- Perdue chicken breasts, all sell by tomorrow, with $3 off coupons. 3 packages, normally $6.26, $6.42, and $6.62.
- New England Blueberry Cobbler coffee, (this is an expensive habit) $6.59
- Traditional Medicinal Breathe Easy Tea, normally $4.99, $3.99
- Archer Farms Chocolate Berry Earl Grey tea, $3.99
- peaches packed in juice, 2 cans, $1.09 each
- large can of tuna, $2.09 which... the cashier rang me up for two when I only bought one. The other can was chicken
- one pound of strawberries, $1.79
- bananas,  6 at 19 cents each
- Green Giant frozen broccoli with cheese sauce, $1.83
- frozen spinach, cut leaf, $1.27
I thought I bought two bags but the receipt only has one
- market pantry frozen snap peas, $1.27 (I bought a bag of these the other day and they were yummy-- didn't taste frozen)
- old orchard frozen cranberry juice concentrate, $1.47
- old orchard frozen apple raspberry  juice concentrate, $1.47
- Market Pantry frozen OJ, with calcium, $1.37
- one dozen eggs, $1.39
- quart of half and half, $2.14
- pint of heavy whipping cream, $2.29
- Archer Farms yogurts, four at 62 cents each
- Chobani kids honey-nana Greek yogurt, $3.49
- Chobani lemon yogurt, two at $1.29 each
- three 8 ounce blocks of cheese, one sharp cheddar, one extra sharp and one pepper jack, $2.49 each (I thought the sharp was on sale for $2.25)
- Breyers ice cream, $3.25 (regularly $4.19)
- Morningstar breakfast patties, two boxes at $2.99 each (regularly $3.69, though there had been a $1.99 sale that ended 6/16 and I missed it! )

Total: $158.03
Team member discount: $15.54
Red card savings: $6.87
Tax: $1.64
New total: $137.26
(and a $5 gift card!)

Pesto ravioli primavera

I started a cream sauce while browning beef kielbasa (which I divided into four segments and froze three of them) but I never got the cream sauce done... So, I made this:

- about 1.5 cups diced beef kielbasa
- 2 tablespoons butter
- 1 teaspoon extra virgin olive oil
- 2 teaspoons flour
- about 2 tablespoons garden fresh dill
- 1 large leave sorrel
- about 7 basil leaves
- 2 cups peas
- 2 cups cauliflower, carrots and broccoli
- 2 packages trader Joe's ravioli

I put the butter in my Le Creuset skillet and browned the meat. I carefully pushed the meat to the side, added the oil, and incorporated the flour as if I were going to start a cream sauce. I added all the herbs.

Meanwhile, I cooked the ravioli and added the vegetables so it could all cook at the same
time.

The sauce smelled so fragrant I opted not to make the cream sauce after all. The family ate it all.

Sun pickles

Got this message today from a friend:

"My sister brought up "sun pickles". I thought, what fun. Think E and mommy would love it.

I have quart jars if you want to do this...

Use qt size canning jars. In the bottom of each jar place
1 piece of dill weed stem
1 clove of garlic

Now pack into the jar as many whole pickle cukes as you can. (Our mom used the little ones.)

Add 1 tsp kosher salt
1/4 cup vinegar
water to fill jar

Close jar with canning lid (got those too!) and put out in the sun for the afternoon.  You'll have nice crispy pickles. I don't know about long term storage. Ours never lasted that long.

I looked online for others.

Naturally knocked-up slices hers:
http://www.naturallyknockedup.com/recipe-dill-sun-pickles/

And this one from cooks.com uses a sun tea jar. That's a lot of pickles!
http://www.cooks.com/rec/view/0,1836,144160-245199,00.html

there is many, many more on the web.

If you make them, blog it. I'll come over and help eat them!"

I was very much looking forward to this, and almost went out to the garage to look for my jars when I discovered with horror that my tortoise ate all but one of my 12 cucumber plants. Don't worry, she got the last one the next day. :-(

Insta-lunch

I had no plan for lunch, so I whipped this up:

- 3 wegmans Belgian waffles that my father-in-law brought
- organic maple syrup
- Morningstar breakfast patties
- raspberries
- strawberries

Broiled shrimp and salad with homemade croutons

We were given a bag of shrimp which I broiled, five minutes each side, and sprinkled with it's a dilly seasoning.

I had a chunk of homemade rye bread beyond its prime but not reduced to breadcrumbs or compost yet... So I had daughter slice it, oil it lightly and sprinkle it with herbs and heated at about six minutes at 475, flipped them, five minutes more and then turned them one more time.

Took a packaged salad I got at Target ($2.49)and added lettuce from my garden, sorrel, golden raisins, raisins and mandarin oranges. Topped with Newman's Own Raspberry Walnut dressing.

Peanut butter muffins

Yesterday I adapted this recipe for breakfast:

http://www.mrbreakfast.com/superdisplay.asp?recipeid=461#

First, I doubled the recipe. I replaced the sugar with honey, replaced the milk with 1 cup vanilla Silk, replaced about 1.5 cups of the flour with oats. I used 2 eggs and replaced the other eggs with applesauce.

Summer café

We have officially opened our summer breakfast café-- our little table by the front door.

Daughter had eaten breakfast with husband, zucchini bread from the freezer that I purchased at the library bake sale and canned tropical fruit salad she shared with the tortoise.

For "second breakfast," I made my rose tea and four slices of last week's hearty rye bread, toasted, two with margarine, one with cheddar and one with peanut butter and local raw honey. Cheddar for me. Peanut butter for child.

Cheeseball broccoli buffalo mac and cheese

To celebrate the end of the school year (and use up some very stale utz cheeseballs), I wanted to make cheeseball/buffalo blue cheese dip broccoli. I thought I could mix it into a Mac and Cheese for a one dish meal, but I had some ingredient malfunctions.

My daughter helped me, and by the end I was sure we had invented something inedible.

It was surprisingly incredibly delicious.

Ingredients:
- 7 ounces whole wheat rotini
- 2 tablespoons Earth Balance margarine
- 5 fresh stalks of chives from the garden
- 1 1/4 cup unsweetened Silk soy milk
- 1/2 cup vanilla silk
- salt
- pepper
- garlic powder
- 6 ounces extra sharp cheddar
- 2 ounces mozzarella
- 1/4 cup Archer Farms buffalo blue cheese dip
- 1 cup chopped spinach
- 6 broccoli spears
- 2 cups crushed Utz cheeseballs

Preheat oven to 375. grease skillet withthin layer of canola oil. Cook pasta. Drain. Set aside.

Melt margarine and cook chives in a 3 quart saucepan. Add salt and pepper. Reduce heat. Add milks, cheese, and dip. Stir constantly until well melted. Add spinach.

Pour 80% of the sauce over the pasta. Pour pasta into skillet. Sprinkle a light layer of garlic powder over the pasta.

Add broccoli artfully on top. Cover with remaining cheese sauce. Sprinkle cheese ball crumbs over everything. Cover skillet with foil and bake for 25 minutes. Remove foil and bake 10 minutes more.

Pork with apples without apples and with peaches

I made an incredible lunch today from last night's leftovers and that made me realize that I didn't blog yesterday's meal. So, to try and remember...

- 5 thin boneless pork chops
- apple juice
- brown sugar
- canola oil
- country herb blend
- one can sliced peaches
- 1/4 cup Archer Farm lemon dill mustard

Cook the pork chops in one tablespoon canola oil, five minutes each side in the Le Creuset skillet.

Add about 1 teaspoon country herb blend, one cup apple juice, 1/2 cup brown sugar, the peaches (drained) and the mustard. Heat to boiling. Reduce heat and let simmer about 15 minutes. Add frozen greenbeans, serve when the greenbeans are cooked.

Now, with the leftovers, I chopped the pork and the peaches very small. I put them and the leftover juice in the skillet. Cook until. Add about 1-1 1/2 cups cooked spaghetti. Swirl with about 2 teaspoons sesame oil. Cook until noodles are hot, stirring constantly. Sprinkle liberally with sesame seeds.

Summer fruit and fresh herb chicken salad

This is to accompany that bread I have on the rise. A perfect cold meal for a hot day.

-12.5 ounces chicken
- one cup fruit (I used local strawberries, local raspberries, a handful of red grapes and a three by two inch chunk of watermelon)

Dressing:
- 1/8 cup vegan mayo
- 1/8 cup Chobani mango yogurt
- two teaspoons Newman's Own Raspberry Walnut Dressing
- one teaspoon country herb blend
- 1/4 teaspoon fresh ground black pepper

Stir then add from the garden:
- 3 large leaves French sorrel, chopped
- about four tablespoons parsley
- one tablespoon dill

Rosemary rye bread

Bread dough and tropical tortoises love heat and humidity. So, today, as temperatures soar toward 100 degrees farenheit, I will make rosemary rye bread.

Here is the link for the first time I tried to make French country bread:
http://angelfoodcooking.blogspot.com/2010/04/french-country-bread.html

Today, I did a typical me. Started the recipe without reading all the directions and double-checking my ingredients. I ran out of white flour.

My sponge:
- 2 cups warm water
- about 1 teaspoon local raw honey
- 1 teaspoon yeast
- 2 cups unbleached white flour
- about 1.75 cups stoneground rye flour

Stir. Cover. Let rise at least two hours. Preferably six. Possibly overnight.

Now, I measured out my flour and had
- two cups unbleached white
To which I added
- four cups rye
- about three teaspoons chopped rosemary from my garden


From here I pretty much followed the original recipe although I added extra herbs leftover from my chicken salad. This recipe combines the sponge with a dough (more yeast, salt, sugar, etc) and then rises again. [See the link listed above.] Shape and let rise again.

Because I ran out of white flour, my final rise didn't have as much ooomph as I would have liked, despite leaving the dough on the steamy sunporch. It was dense but yummy.

Target shopping again

We spent about $575 on food in May. $344 on groceries and $229 on dining out. This sickens me. We're bleeding money in every area of our lives: my tuition, the car, my dental bills, a fuel oil drop, our quarterly bills. I wish I could eliminate that dining expenditure, but it's my stress relief. I expected our grocery bill to be higher than usual because we bought $30 worth of Carnation Instant Breakfast and probably $50 in yogurt and probably $25 on those Bolthouse Farms immunity boost smoothies in an attempt to feed me when I could not chew.

But now it's June. Clean slate. (We won't think about the $84 I've spent on dining already...)

I spent about $44 on groceries at Target yesterday. Was there to buy my daughter make-up for her dance recital. I'll recount my entire list:

From groceries:

• 100% apple juice, $1.84
• New England Blueberry Cobbler coffee, 2 packages, $11.98 (I must abandon this habit. I estimate we spend $200 a year on this coffee)
• Del Monte pear halves (poire tarte tartin anyone?), 2 big cans, $4.58
• Dole mandarin oranges in juice, two regular sized cans, $2.78
• two cans of Market Pantry peaches, $2.18
• Market Pantry tropical fruit salad, $1.09
• Valley Fresh chicken meat in a can (the big can), $2.29 
• Market Pantry tuna, two big cans, $4.18
• A big old seedless watermelon, $4.99 (my daughter asked very sweetly for this)
• boneless pork chops, two packages on sale for $3.49 each (regular price $4.99) minus $1 off coupon, $5.98
• Silk soy milk, unsweetened, $2.79
• Market Pantry half and half, two pints, $2.58
• greens: Fresh Express, one spring mix and one romaine, $2.99 each, buy one get one free

From cosmetics:

• foundation, $3.59
• lipstick, $1
• mascara, $3.99

From pets:

• 27 pounds of cat litter, $8.89

Other:

• kid flip flops, $1
• 32 count thin maxi pads, $3.79 minus 75 cent coupon
• alcohol (the first aid kind, I use a lot of the high percentage stuff for cleaning) $1.87 minus 50 cent coupon

TOTAL: $73.13
Team Member discount: $7.33
Red Card discount: $3.28
Reusable shopping bag discount: 20 cents
tax: +94 cents
NEW TOTAL: $63.26

Venison loin in the crock pot

My mother gave me some venison so I soaked some in brine this morning. I placed a loin in a solution of water, vinegar, pepper and salt. In a fit of indecision, I added apple cider and balsamic vinegar.

After a couple hours, I tossed it in my skillet with a couple tablespoons of canola oil and seared it on medium high for about three minutes on each of three sides.

I tossed it in the crock pot on low with water, a touch of garlic powder, a few shredded leaves of fresh sage and sorrel and a hearty squirt (about 3 ounces?) of Newman's Own Raspberry Walnut dressing.

Vegan Brownies

I used to make killer vegan brownies all the time, but I haven't made them in years. My daughter needs to contribute to her Daisy crossover today, so I volunteered to make brownies to protect her dairy-free status.

The original Betty Crocker recipe:
Melt
2/3 cup butter
5 ounces unsweetened chocolate

Mix separately
1 3/4 cups sugar
2 teaspoons vanilla
3 eggs

Add chocolate
One cup flour

Mix and bake in greased pan for 40-45 minutes at 350 until brownies pull from side of pan
My version

2/3 cup margarine
3 ounces semisweet chocolate
1 ounce dark chocolate (in candy bar form because I ran out of the other)
3 tablespoons cocoa powder
1 tablespoon canola oil

For pre-batter:
3/4 cup sugar
3/4 cup applesauce
2 teaspoons vanilla

And the flour as directed