Pintresting Food

When something is super trendy, I try to ignore it. 

Sometimes it works - I've only seen half of an episode of the Kardashians and have never watched Anchorman. 

Other Most times I resist the urge to jump on the trendy band wagon - only to hop on late, become totally obsessed, and LOVE the trend far past its trendy expiration date. A few examples: I still quote Mean Girls on a daily basis, wear a "poof" in my hair regularly, and just recently joined Pinterest.

I really didn't know what the heck it was at first, but everyone said it was addicting. Yes, that's right - I had 100 pins in 2 days and many of them were food related! Pinterest is basically a smorgasbord of ideas, crafts, home projects, fashion, quotes, and inspiration. You "pin" things you like and put them into categories.  It was equally shocking and exciting to find that it would benefit my cooking adventures. Prying yourself away from Pinterest's page is the hard part. I narrowly escaped the computer chair and took the first great idea I'd found into the kitchen. 

Pinteresting Food #1: hash browns in the waffle iron!

Hash Browns in the Waffle Iron

Ingredients

4 medium to large potatoes

Cooking spray

Salt & pepper

Gadgets:

Waffle iron

Box grater

Grate the taters using a box grater. Squeeze the water out of the grated potatoes using your hands, either over the sink or the trash can. Season them with pepper and mix to combine.

Plug in your waffle iron and set it to medium. We put ours on level 3 (of 5). Spray the top and bottom with cooking spray.

Add about 1 cup of potatoes to the iron and sprinkle salt on the top before closing the lid. The hash browns were perfectly cooked about 10 - 11 minutes later. Feel free to ignore the little light on your waffle iron - green, red, green, red! When they were finished they easily came off the iron in one piece. You need not spray the iron after each one. 4 potatoes made 4 hash browns.

Before & after

  

My fear was that they'd fall apart, but they were crispy and intact when they were finished.

We had an impromptu breakfast-for-dinner of these hash browns, scrambled eggs, fruit cups, and milk! This photo was taken before I assaulted the hash browns and eggs with loads of ketchup.

They were so easy and quick to make and tasted delicious - thank you Pinterest! I love that I can get more use out of the waffle iron, too. Next time I'll add some onions for a more authentic hash brown taste.

Pinteresting Food #2: Tooth Cupcakes

Brennan, a good friend of ours, has been applying and interviewing to get into dental school. His girlfriend Molly was planning to throw him a party upon his acceptance. I saw these tooth cupcakes and had to send them to her right away. Brennan got accepted and Molly made the cupcakes perfectly - congratulations Brennan and great job Molly!

 

Brennan with his cupcakes, sister Taea, and girlfriend Molly. 

Pinteresting food #3: Watermelon Jell-O Shots

Molly's birthday was this weekend and she made these adorable watermelon Jell-O shots, complete with chocolate chip "seeds"! She found them on the same website as the cupcakes. So.Much.Fun.

Happy Birthday Molly, and great job with the Pinteresting food!