Recipe Review - Yummy stuff other people created

I haven't been experimenting much with new recipes of my own design lately, but I have been trying out a number of recipes I found online. Here are a few that I particularly enjoyed over the last couple of weeks.

First off we have Pesto Hummus from Debbi Does Dinner... Healthy and Low Calorie

I know what you're probably thinking. Pesto AND Hummus?! If it sounds like a winning formula for

Yum + Yum = Super Yum

you are absolutely right. I left the consistency kind of thick, more like a sandwich spread than a creamy dip. I never made it to the sandwich though. Once I tried it with a couple of crackers I couldn't stop eating it long enough to bother with the rest of the sandwich fixings.

Next, there was Golden Gazpacho by Real Simple Recipes.

I know it's not really the season for cold soups any more, but there have still been lots of heirloom tomatoes in my local store begging to be used up so I couldn't resist. This was one simple, quick and easy recipe. SchmoopyBoy was happy to help out with this recipe. (Well, he enjoys helping with any recipe that involves the blender, but I digress.) My only modifications were leaving out the feta and prosciutto or salami to make it vegan-friendly for the hubs. I actually would have been happy to add feta to my bowl, but I didn't have any, and I honestly thought it was good enough without it. Look how beautiful it turned out.


Last but not least, dessert! Vegan Chocolate Zucchini Muffins by Happy Herbivore.

You wouldn't think that chocolate ad zucchini would go so well together, but they totally do! I've been itching to try my hand at some chocolate zucchini muffins since a friend of mine in California sent some to me after my dad died. I don't think this is the recipe she used, but this recipe sounded so good I had to try it. It did not disappoint. It was also a fun (albeit messy) project to do with SchmoopyBoy. I was very glad I remembered to put newspaper on the floor before starting. Made clean-up fast and easy. For modifications, I used 3/4 cups sugar instead of the whole cup. In the chef's notes, it says you can reduce it even more to just 1/2 cup. Here's a shot of the muffins cooling, just out of the oven. You can see a certain someone's aim was not always quite on target when spooning the batter into the tins.
These muffins were very moist. I had to bake them for the full 25 minutes and probably could have baked them a couple minutes longer without causing any damage. This was likely due to having a huge banana and a little extra zucchini that I added. I will admit that I hand-shredded the zucchini with a peeler out of laziness and not wanting to bother with washing my food processor, but I think it would have been better to go ahead and get the zucchini more finely shredded. Next time I will break out the food processor for that part of the preparation.

Good eats.

This post is linked up with Vegetarian Foodie Fridays!