I have been in hospital since the middle of October and dearly miss real food.

Each morning breakfast is either cream of wheat, cold cerial or oatmeal, accompanied by

three of scrambled egg, either half an english muffin, bagle or (each Monday) their

treatment of French Toast. One cup of horrible coffee, half a cup of milk and a fruit

(applesauce dice peaches or oears). Imagine that same menu day in and day out for two

months. And that's the best of the three meals a day.

Monday lunch usually consists of a beef patty, rice, zucchini, sometimes fresh fruit,

bad iced tea I wouldn't serve my dog and a dinner roll.

Tuesday is Salibury steak with mixed vegetables, noodles.

Wednesday is baked chicken breast, rice, yellow squash.

Thursday is again the Salsisbury Steak.

Friday it's baked fish, rice, green breans.

Saturday is beef patty, again.

Sunday is Salisbury steak.

On rare occasions I get pineapple or watermelon--I love those--but those are rare enough

that they don't detract from the lunch.

Monday's supper is the best of the week: a pork chop. usually with noodles and green beans.

Tuesday is Roast Beast (They say it's beef, but what they do to beef folks from the Middle

East wouldn't do to pork,

Wednesday Is Salisbury Steak, again

Thursday is Meatloaf (Memories of Rocky Horror Picture Show do not help.)

Friday is Spaghetti Night. Spaghetti covered with brown gravy and two meatballs.

Saturday is Turkey slices with dressing and carrots.

Sunday is the repeat of Roast Beast.

I must admit that I'm on a restricted diet--diabetic, which I've lived with for

years and a combined renal diet (my kidneys are going south for my personal winter)

but the one thing this combined diet removes is TASTE.

Low salt chicken soup has less taste than stewed cardboard,

Low salt low fat gravy should be avoided.

I really like cooking, I love flavor. Needless to say this is bad food. I have things

snuck in to break the monotony, and occassionally I'll have a bit of pizza delivered

usually on Fridays although I have done it earlier when I just can't stand the offering, but

I don't want to make Pizza Hut a regular diet, it's almost as bad--just different.

I expect to get out of here soon, like this week, and the first thing I plan to do is stop

on the way home for sushi.

Gods, I wish I could introduce these cooks to a spice rack!

By the way, my next foray into the kitchen will be to try out some chinese food recipies. There are lots of decent easy recipies online, I want to try a few out.

I already made these 2 X. Love them!!! I think i will add the coco powder next time. The last time i made them i added about 1/2 cup of the toffee bits. Where did you ever find this recipe?

Raven

I often care for folks with special needs. I can't remember where I got this recipe because I've been making these cookies for years. I found it specifically because I know people who can't eat gluten and I hate leaving anyone out.

(They're also good with butterscotch chips btw.)

Wow – Zen's recipe I could actually make for the family because it doesn't have flour. I'm not even allowed to cook with flour because it hangs in the air for days and if I breathe it in, apparently my immune system will attack. I'll give the flourless PB/choco chip recipe a try.

You and your family will thank me. /smile.png' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':P' /> (Make a double batch because you'll eat like 5 of 'em before you realize it.)

Seeing as I've taken and not contributed I'll do so now here's my recipe for

Taco Soup

Ingredients:

2 packets of taco seasoning

2 packets of cool ranch dressing mix

3 soup sized cans of zesty beans ** i've used all types of red beans, southwestern, even carribean DON'T USE KIDNEY BEANS!

2 soup sized cans of tomato sauce

1-1½ lbs of ground meat

1 medium onion

1 can of corn (you can use a lb bag of frozen corn if you like)

1 small can of diced chiles.

After opening all the cans and dumping them in a soup pot w/about 2 cups of water* (you can add or lessen depending on how thick you'd like it) on a medium flame. Dice up the onion and add to the pot. Brown and break up the meat as best as you can then drain off any fat. I season the meat while it's cooking w/worchestshire sauce and tabasco (about 2-3 splashes of worchest on both sides of meat and about 2-3 splashes of tabasco toward the end…but that's me). When the meat is done add to the pot then stir in the four packets of dry mixes. I would suggest stirring regularly on a low to medium flame for at least 30-40 minutes.

Serving suggestions:

I usually serve it w/some sort of sour dough bread. I've even bought these little round sourdough rolls (about as big around as a 45 rpm), toast them in the oven a little, cut the top off, hollow it out and use that as the bowl. Because we have rice around (spanish household), I sometimes add rice to my bowl which will thicken it up. I've eaten it as dip by adding shredded cheese to it etc. I've also used it to make burritos. Limitless possibilities.

Have fun!

Looks good Monk, I have to drop the Taco seasoning.

I'll give it a whirl.

I just made 2 more batches of those cookies. One without coco powder and one with. They are cooling on the counter as i type…..my son is going crazy over the chocolate ones..hahhaa better on his hips than mine….

I added butterscotch chips last night but didn't let them completely cool and gave myself some wicked bad burns in my mouth and on my tongue