Zucchini-Potato Pancakes... Sort of

We've eaten this recipe before, but I don't see a recipe on my blog for it. Hmph. Laziness is keeping me from posting the details of the recipe. The gist of it is that you shred equal parts potato and zucchini, add egg, onion/scallion, tarragon, salt and pepper. Lightly fry as pancakes. It's a variation on latkes, and the last time I remember our making this, they were GREAT!

Tonight was a more frustrating experience. Tasted great but more trouble than they were worth. I should have had another meal of the pumpkin soup. :P Since the recipe is a Weight Watchers recipe, it doesn't call for much egg. I ended up adding eggs, which of course means that the ones I made are not 2 points per serving (a serving being 2 pancakes). So much for that controlling my food thing. Even after adding the egg to make the mixture hold together, the pancakes were still pretty flimsy when I would flip them. In other words, what started as a pancake which looked like it would hold its shape ended up being a pile of shredded vegetables. I had a plateful of fallen pancakes before Aaron came home.

Fortunately, I had not exhausted the supply of "batter" by the time he arrived. I handed over my spatula and refused to do any additional work on the dinner. Aaron asked if I wanted a different job, and I angrily refused that too since I had been listening to increasing levels of whine from a certain adorable 2.5 year old for the previous hour. While Aaron saved dinner, I watched the end of Toy Story with Caleb.

All of this frustration does have a happy ending. Caleb ate many of the pancakes, which is not terribly surprising. Ellie ate more than one serving, which is a huge surprise, and had applesauce (another surprise as she has been rejecting applesauce this month). And she looked at me in the middle of dinner, and unprompted said "This is EXCELLENT!" in a perfect imitation of her brother's usual food praise.

Proof of Life's Balance

Tonight I made fish and chips. It's easy from an ingredient perspective, and it's a bit time consuming to clean and cut potatoes and bread the fish. However, our neighbor brought us haddock he caught, so I couldn't pass up the opportunity to use something so fresh.

Kid review: 2 thumbs down. Ellie ate ketchup and a few bites of the chips. She told us that they were not chips but in fact potatoes. Caleb complained about not being able to pick up the food with his fork and then tried to convince me that the fish was too spicy. The spiciest spice is black pepper followed by deli mustard, so this is not a spicy dish by most standards.

I suppose I need to remember that my son will eat fruits and vegetables happily so that I don't want to stop cooking for him.

Bath time has arrived and the natives are beyond restless. Would someone please try the recipe (see link at top!) and let me know what you think?