One more thing about cornbread

Remember when I did this post? It was the one about my mom's cornbread recipe that I had posted on Tasty Kitchen and had gotten a lot of reviews, all of them a full five mitt rating. That was the first week in April and at that time it had been on the Tasty Kitchen homepage as one of their five most popular recipes for a couple of weeks already. If you were to go here to the Tasty Kitchen website and scroll down to the "Popular Recipes" section, you would see it there still! Since I posted it on here about back in April, it has been all the way to the top and all the way to the bottom of that list as other recipes become more popular and then mine receives more reviews an gets bumped up. There were a couple of days about a month ago that it wasn't on the list as all, but came back and has stayed since.

The reason I am telling you about this is because about a month after my recipe was put on the most popular list, another one for buttermilk syrup appeared and has been on ever since. It has been higher on the list and, at times, lower on the list as well (like today, for example). But they've both been pretty consistent.

Today I went to The Pioneer Woman's website and saw that the buttermilk syrup recipe was not only the featured recipe on the Tasty Kitchen blog, but it also appeared on The Pioneer Woman's website because of that feature! Not that I think I should get any special recognition for a recipe that started out as one printed on a box and then slightly changed by my mom to become one of the most popular recipes on what is most likely the busiest recipe exchange website out there today, however I can't help but think...does Ree (the PW) not like cornbread? Has she even tried it yet? Maybe it's because my blog is private and I don't have some big fancy camera that takes awesome pictures like everyone else posting recipes does. But, then again, maybe I'm next. Whatever it is, I'll let you know if anything exciting happens.

P.S. As a correction to my information about the recipe that I posted with it on Tasty Kitchen, it is not EXACTLY like the old Albers cornbread recipe. My mom told me since then that she added the melted butter. I can't go in and change it, though, because if I do it has to go back through the screening process and would be unavailable to view for a day or two. That's time I can't afford to lose if I want to make it the PW homepage!

P.P.S. Hey, I just had a thought: maybe if you all go on there, make the cornbread, really like it (as I'm sure you will :)) and then post a full five mitt review (not a comment, but a review--there are two different links and they are ranked differently), that might push my recipe over the top! You don't have to if you don't want to...I'm just sayin'.

Albers Cornbread

Since I tore myself apart in the last post, I wanted to show you that I do have some self-esteem left, thanks to the lovely members of Tasty Kitchen. I post maybe one recipe every six months on that website, but once in a while I go on there to see if anyone has tried my recipes and what they thought. I checked those reviews right after posting my last blog entry and found several more comments on a recipe I submitted last September for cornbread. I was so encouraged by their comments that I wanted to share it with you. So, here it is. Let me know if you try it and how you like it. It validates me. :)

http://thepioneerwoman.com/tasty-kitchen/recipes/breads/albers-original-cornbread-recipe/


P.S. Since I first did this post, I went back to Tasty Kitchen and saw that this recipe was listed on their homepage as one of the most popular because of all the reviews it's received and they are all a full five mittens! I am so honored...I need to explain, though. This was the recipe my mom used for years and got from the back of the Albers cornmeal box, so it is not original. The special part about it, though, is that Albers changed the recipe on the back so it has less sugar and more cornmeal so this is kind of a lost recipe.

P.P.S. While you're there, check out my latest recipe submission for really quick and easy cinnamon rolls. Make them for conference this weekend. Actually, here's the link: http://thepioneerwoman.com/tasty-kitchen/recipes/breads/really-quick-and-easy-cinnamon-rolls/

Halloween traditions begin

Craig is finally getting old enough to begin enjoying some holidays and festivities he didn't really get before. He actually turned 18 months today! Kind of a milestone. Wednesday was one of Robert's days off so we went to a pumpkin patch here in Mesa. It was a lot of fun but windy and therefore very dusty. Ethan didn't do much while we were there, so here's the obligatory picture of him and what he did the whole time:


And yes, that is a hat on him and long sleeves! The weather's been great! It's been down to the 40's and 50's at night and topping off at about 65-70 all week! I think it's perfect, but most people here say it's too cold for this time of year. Whatever!

Craig loved the animals and just wanted to touch and grab and poke them all. This was a cage of little chicks.

They had a little kids pumpkin patch where they pick their own little pumpkin and decorate it. Craig just really enjoyed rearranging them.

In this picture Craig and Robert had just finished the little maze and I said, "Yay Craigers!" and then he clapped for himself. :) He's such a cutie.

Cows are one of Craig's favorite animals other than our cat. I'm glad he got to see one in person.

You can kind of see how dirty he got here.

And here we are walking back out. They gave us these stickers to show we've paid and I put mine on his head as we were walking, just to play with him, but he didn't even notice. I decided to leave it on and take a picture. He didn't realize it was there for about 20 minutes. :)

We took Craig's little pumpkin home to carve and bought a big one, too. This morning we carved them.

Can you guess which one's mine? We had Robert's at the ward party tonight and everyone loved it. :) I'm just amazed that he can do this, just from looking at a picture printed off of the internet.

Robert had to work during the Halloween party tonight, but I was somehow able to get us all costumed and ready to go by myself! I even made cornbread for the party. (Today was a day to be proud of such small accomplishments...it was one of those days.)

We had a skeleton, a tiger (complete with a little velcro tale in the back), and an Indian lady.
(Tiffany and Bonnie--do you recognize my outfit? Diny gave it to me in Chapel Hill. I hope she wouldn't be offended that I wear it for Halloween!)