Tag: homemade

Culinary

Can’t believe it’s the first time I’ve made lasagna!🍜🧀

Zina Hermez

I can’t believe that at this age I’ve never made lasagna, but I do consider myself naturally a good cook – take a look at all my other recipes in this category! I love to cook! So I gave it a try yesterday – and it came out yummy good! See the pics below meant to be from start to finish – and then I will add a quick recap on how to cook it yourself at home. Don’t sweat the small stuff, as there are many different variations to making a great lasagna – but I will let you know the ingredients and steps that I used!

So this is the meat mixture, first I caramelized a chopped onion, then I added the Bob Evans, Italian pork sausage – cooked it up real well – and of course, added some salt and pepper. After this was cooked, I added Prego meat sauce.
With the Prego meat sauce! All you need to do is bring this to a boil for a few minutes!
You’re going to need to boil about 15 to 20 of these lasagna noodles, at the minimum, 12 because that will make for three full layers.
Chill the noodles before you bake, it does make for tastier lasagna noodles.
You can use baking spray – cooking spray should work also – I happen to like real unsalted butter. So I just spread it!
This is the meat sauce, a.k.a., Prego sauce with meat and Italian beef pork sausage mix (in the pic above) – it was mixed with caramelized onions, and some salt and pepper, remember?! What a combination!
After you add the first layer of meat sauce (visible underneath), then you add the FIRST layer of lasagna (chilled) noodles.
Then I topped it with Mozzarella and Parmesan, shredded cheese! So: 1) the Bottom layer is the meat sauce, 2) and then add the first layer of noodles 3) then add another layer of meat sauce and THEN the RICOTTA cheese, and finally, your layer of Mozzarella!
Repeat! I believe I’m on noodle layer two or three, so finally, just top it with Mozzarella and Parmesan cheese!
Take a look at the beauty ready to go into the oven at 350-365 F, for a minimum of 45 minutes. Please note: cooking times may vary.
And Voilà! You have a yummy delicious baked pan of lasagna. I’m so thankful for my pizza slicer. Lol 🍝
Always store in Tupperware or glass. You can keep it in the fridge for up to 3 to 5 days and you can even freeze.

I hope you enjoyed the photos, and I hope that gives some explanation! The idea is to make it the way you like. To summarize, I first chopped an onion, and then caramelized it, and then I added Italian beef pork, and sausage, and after that, I cooked it together with the onion and added some salt and pepper. Once you’re finished, you can add Prego meat sauce and mix it up really well. And there you will have your meat sauce layer. Then you add that to a greased baking pan as noted in the photo. After you add that to your greased baking pan, you add the next layer, which is the layer of boiled lasagna noodles. Once you add your layer of boiled lasagna noodles, you add another layer of meat sauce, then a layer of ricotta, then a layer of Mozzarella and Parmesan, shredded cheese. And you repeat the process by adding another layer of noodles, more meat sauce, more ricotta, mozzarella, etc. There are many variations to making a great lasagna. Typically you have three layers. I was very pleased with how mine turned out.

About Zina

Zina Hermez has authored the books, Not Without God: A Story of Survival, and Not Without God: Hope In the Storm. She has written hundreds of blog articles and her website has had more than 100,000 viewers! Zina has been in education for 22 years and has helped people of all different backgrounds and cultures. When she is not writing or teaching, she enjoys cooking and baking and spending time with family or friends. You can reach her at zinahermez@outlook.com.

Culinary

Healthy Whole Wheat Homemade Cookies 🍪🎄🤶

Zina Hermez

Don’t these look yummy?! They are, especially with a warm cup of coffee or tea. I like to have tea or hot chocolate in the evenings sometimes.☕️

Ingredients

3 cps. All purpose flour (whole wheat or white, I used wheat)

2 eggs

1 cup brown sugar

2/3 cup white sugar

1 cup or more ;) walnuts, chopped

1/2 tspn baking soda

1 tspn salt

1/2 cup, softened, butter

2-3 tblspns vegetable oil

First, mix the butter (softened, I usually melt it for 20 -30 seconds) and then add both of the sugar ingredients and the eggs all together until you have a smooth mixture.

Well – I actually just mixed everything together all at once! So you can do it that way too.

Mix all the ingredients together!

They won’t be smooth at first. You’re working with bread dough. You don’t want your butter completely melted either, the idea is for the butter to be ‘creamy.’ So don’t completely melt it. You will have to dilute the ingredient combination with water after you put it all in a bowl. I don’t recommend adding more than a cup of water – use your best judgment – also add a few tablespoons of vegetable oil (included in the list of ingredients above). This is how your cookie dough should look after you add the water to smoothen it.

As you can see, I rolled them into balls, each one about half of an inch apart. They should make at least two dozen cookies! It’s such a delicious combo with the sugar, walnuts, and flour, and they turn out great if you make them correctly.

Don’t be afraid to use your hands!!! Clean hands can take you much further than trying to beat the mixture with a machine or even with a spoon. First I used a wooden spoon, the mixture was still pretty powdery and not coming together well. Then I used my hands to mix the batter and roll them into cookie balls.

Put them in the oven at 350 F for at least 10 to 12 minutes. You want to use parchment paper or aluminum foil. If the bottoms or sides are golden brown, then they are done!

Voila! Now you can cut them into shapes. I’ll be honest. Making cookies homemade from flour is not the easiest. But the more used to it you get, the easier it becomes. Again, you can add water to smoothen the batter. Not too much though. Too much water will make them liquidy and they will not form. Here’s some more pics!

Best of luck!🤶

These turned out delicious!🤶🍪☕️🎄

About Zina

Zina Hermez has authored the books, Not Without God: A Story of Survival and Not Without God: Hope In the Storm. She’s been featured in numerous articles, guest posts, podcasts, websites, newsletters, and magazines. Zina’s written several hundred articles and has appeared in Christianity Today, the Suite T blog, and the Southern Writers magazine among other places.

Zina writes on faith and overcoming adversity. She also likes to write about health and science and loves to help others. Zina has created notwithoutgod.net as well as the Not Without God series/brand. She’s written articles for healthcare and she’s the creator/leader of Writing Because I Can’t Not Write – For aspiring and seasoned writers.

Each week she invites one author and hosts free masterminds for the public while showcasing bestsellers and award winners. She also teaches a free Zoom course each week to assist the public with improving their writing. Zina’s been an educator for nearly twenty years and has taught multiple subjects to thousands of students of all ages from many different backgrounds and parts of the world.

She’s been invited to speak at the Harvard University Faculty Club’s Business Expert Forum and holds a B.A. in English with a minor in History from Oakland University in Rochester Hills, Michigan. Zina says the reason she majored in English was not primarily to teach; it was to write. When Zina is not writing or teaching, she enjoys cooking, listening to music, exercising, or socializing.

Culinary

Homemade wheat walnut cake!🌾🥮🌰

Zina Hermez

One of the things I love about making this cake is that you can just combine all the ingredients at one time and mix them. It doesn’t take a lot of preparation time; you mainly have to gather all your ingredients and mix. This is my own recipe.

Pics are in order, and here’s a trick! After I buttered the cake pans, I also added sesame seeds to them. That put some nice sesame seeds on the bottom of the cakes when I flipped them over!👩‍🍳

So delicious. I’m going to add the link of a previous post I wrote when I first made this cake. It went viral. As a matter of fact, if you search this cake my blog post comes at the top of Google. Here it is: https://notwithoutgod.net/2022/07/06/assyrian-chaldean-cake%F0%9F%92%9F%E2%98%A6%EF%B8%8F/

Keep in mind when you follow this recipe there has to be a good balance between dough and cake. What I mean is, your batter can’t be too doughy. If it is, you are making more of a bread. Remember, this is a cake. You can add an extra quarter to a half cup of vegetable oil to smoothen out your ingredients if needed. You can also add up to a half cup of water. First I recommend the water. A little vegetable oil won’t hurt though.

I am not a fan of vegetable oil and always cook with extra-virgin olive oil instead. However, when it comes to baking vegetable oil is sometimes needed. Be sure not to add too much water. There has to be a good balance, It will smoothen your batter out. Just make sure you are not making wheat bread!

Here’s a pic below that shows how your batter should look before the cakes are baked:

Also, keep in mind that if you have that even balance and do this right – you may even be able to add a little bit of extra whole wheat flour. It may be half of a cup to one full cup. Don’t get too carried away with extra flour because then the cake will lose its flavor. Here’s the recipe from my initial post, again: https://notwithoutgod.net/2022/07/06/assyrian-chaldean-cake%F0%9F%92%9F%E2%98%A6%EF%B8%8F/

A little extra flour will give you more cake!🥮Here are some more pictures below, and I’m going to try to add the pics that show the steps from start to finish. Refer to the recipe link I gave you in my previous post – I will also add the ingredients below. That will tell you how much of each ingredient to use in your cake. Enjoy it!🌾🥮🌰

Three cups of whole wheat flour. One and a half cups of sugar. 2 teaspoons of baking powder or baking soda. Three eggs. One cup of milk. Again, you can add up to a half cup of water to smooth it out. Also add a tablespoon of vanilla extract. Finally, don’t forget one whole cup of chopped walnuts. Very important. Again, a quarter cup of vegetable oil won’t hurt and will smoothen it.👩‍🍳🥮
This is how your cake batter should look.🥮
A nice trick is to add sesame seeds to the cake pans just after you butter them.😊
Voila!
Yumm!👩‍🍳🥮🌰🌾

About Zina

Zina Hermez has authored the Best-selling-book, Not Without God: A Story of Survival. Zina’s written several hundred articles and has taught thousands of students from all over the world from many different backgrounds and parts of the world. She’s appeared in Christianity Today, the Suite T blog, and the Southern Writers magazine among other places. Last August she created the “Writing Because I Can’t Not Write Group” meetings and workshops where aspiring and seasoned authors can network and learn together. Ask about her meetings if you are interested in attending. Zina writes on faith, science, and overcoming adversity. She also likes to write about health and diet and loves to cook and bake. Her latest book, Not Without God: Hope In the Storm was published last year.

Culinary

Cornish hen premium style!🐔

Zina Hermez
It’s a first of its kind!

This Cornish hen is a first of a first! You can see the delicious ingredients on and around it. The one ingredient you can’t see is the spinach and garlic stuffed inside of its creases. Yummy, so healthy and good. I can’t wait to dig in! And get this, I sprinkled walnuts over it. I bet you that’s the first time you’ve heard of that? Have you ever heard of anyone sprinkling walnuts over a Cornish hen? Only I. Don’t forget to sprinkle with kosher salt, some table salt, and pepper at first. I’m sure it’s going to be delicious, send me a message if you’d like the recipe,

It is fairly simple just rinse it briefly, make sure there’s nothing inside, you can stuff the inside of it with stuffing or any vegetables you’d like. Preheat to 350. Monitor, check on it, at least every 5 to 10 minutes and adjust the heat as needed. This took me almost a whole hour to cook. Oh yeah, don’t forget to put one cup of water beneath it so it doesn’t stick to the pan. Also, if you’re not using oil, use unsalted butter. I used unsalted butter cubes in and all around it.

I like butter because I think it’s much safer to cook with and even better for you than some oils.🧈🌽🍃

About Zina

Zina Hermez has authored the best-selling book(s), Not Without God: A Story of Survival and Not Without God: Hope In the Storm. She’s been featured in numerous articles, guest posts, podcasts, websites, newsletters, and magazines. She’s also been featured on The Neil Haley (media giant’s) Show, The Intuitive Edge podcast, and on ESPN’s ‘Solutions from the Huddle’ broadcast as well as Grace and Truth Radio World!

Zina’s written several hundred articles and has taught thousands of students from all over the world from many different backgrounds and parts of the world. She’s appeared in Christianity Today, the Suite T blog, and the Southern Writers magazine among other places. Last August she created the “Writing Because I Can’t Not Write Group” meetings and workshops where aspiring and seasoned authors can network and learn together.

Zina writes on faith, science, and overcoming adversity. She also likes to write about health and diet and loves to help others. Her latest book, Not Without God: Hope In the Storm was just published last year.

Culinary

Homemade chicken tenders!🐣🥔👩‍🍳

Zina Hermez

Today I made homemade chicken tenders and it was so easy too. Get three separate bowls: one for a half cup of flour, one for one egg mixed with 1 tablespoon of water, and the other bowl will be for the chicken tenders. You can make 6 to a dozen, first sprinkle kosher salt and table salt along with some ground black pepper onto the chicken tenders. Then dip each chicken tender into the flour mix, then dip it into the egg/water mix, and move it over into a heated skillet with vegetable oil or classic olive oil. You should only need one cup of oil keep the heat on high and keep flipping over the tenders continuously until they’re golden brown and cooked! It should take 4-5 minutes. Don’t burn. Use a smaller burner it is safer. They are delicious and yummy!🐣🥔🥚 #homemade #food #foodie #chickentenders #potatoes #delicious #food #cook #connossieur

About Zina

Zina Hermez has authored the best-selling book, Not Without God: A Story of Survival. She’s been featured in numerous articles, guest posts, podcasts, websites, newsletters, and magazines. She’s recently been featured on the Intuitive Edge podcast! She’s also been on ESPN’s “Solutions from the Huddle” broadcast and on Grace and Truth Radio World! Zina’s written several hundred articles and has taught thousands of students of all ages from many different backgrounds and cultures. She’s appeared in Christianity Today, the Suite T blog, and the Southern Writers magazine among other places. She writes on faith, science, and overcoming adversity. She also writes about health and diet and loves to help others. Her latest book, Not Without God: Hope In the Storm is live and for sale! You can order your copy here: https://www.amazon.com/Not-Without-God-Hope-Storm-ebook/dp/B09P9T2DLT

Culinary

Homemade Whole Wheat Raisin Cookies!🍪👩‍🍳❤️‍🩹

Zina Hermez

Last night I made some yummy cookies. As you know, wheat is a much better alternative to white. Wheat bread and wheat rice are better for you in terms of balancing blood sugar. If you’re going to have a grain, it should be wheat or a darker color, such as Rye. Rye bread also is rich in B vitamins (1, 2, and 3).

I will post some pictures below. I also want to share the recipe in case anyone would like to make them. They came out to 25 cookies all together. What’s great about making a large batch of cookies is you can refrigerate them for up to 1 week and then freeze what you have not consumed for 1-3 months.. I like to put each cookie in its own plastic baggy.

Ingredients:

3/4-1cup of unsalted OR salted butter, and partially melt the butter in a pan

1/4 cup of white sugar

1/2 cup of packed brown sugar

2 eggs

3 1/2 to 4 1/2 cups of Whole Wheat flour (all purpose flour)

3/4-1 cup of raisins (I used mixed raisins of different kinds)

1/2 tspn of vanilla extract

1/2 tspn salt

1/2 tspn baking soda

AND, this recipe is so easy. STEP 1: basically MIX all ingredients together (in no particular order!). It is fun. Now, there may be excess flour that doesn’t want to mix in. So you will have to add about 1/2 cup to a full cup of water, a little at a time, to smoothen the mixture out.

You want the mixture to have a dough like form but to be smooth enough to scoop onto a cookie sheet. Use parchment paper for best results. Scrape up all the excess flour. You can scoop with a tablespoon, and set the cookies about 1-2 inches apart.

This should come out to 20-25 cookies.

Voila! You have Whole Wheat Raisin cookies! By the way, chopped walnuts would be great to add too but are not necessary. It’s optional. Some people like to add 1 cup of uncooked cooking oats. Oats are also great for helping to regulate blood sugar!

Bake at 375-400 F. You may have to go back and forth between the temperature. Check on them every 2 minutes. They only need 10-12 minutes. But cooking times will vary. When the outer rims are golden they are done. But don’t burn! Once you leave them to sit for at least an hour, they will continue to form.

Enjoy!🍪🍪👩‍🍳

About Zina

Zina Hermez has authored the best-selling book, Not Without God: A Story of Survival. She’s been featured in numerous articles, guest posts, podcasts, websites, newsletters, and magazines. She’s recently been featured on the Intuitive Edge podcast! She’s also been on ESPN’s “Solutions from the Huddle” broadcast and on Grace and Truth Radio World! Zina’s written several hundred articles and has taught thousands of students of all ages from many different backgrounds and cultures. She’s appeared in Christianity Today, the Suite T blog, and the Southern Writers magazine among other places. She writes on faith, science, and overcoming adversity. She also writes on health and diet and loves to help others. Her latest book, Not Without God: Hope In the Storm is live and for sale! You can order your copy here: https://www.amazon.com/Not-Without-God-Hope-Storm-ebook/dp/B09P9T2DLT