Flexible

I watched on in horror as my son put the bowl of corn muffin mix under the faucet and turned it on. Why on earth wasn't he using a measuring cup?!? What if he ruined the whole thing?! My worry was for naught, the cornbread turned out perfectly. It just so happens he cooks like his dad--dump in ingredients until it looks right.

Then there's me: I follow recipes right down to the perfectly leveled and measured ingredient. It's hard for me to go "free-style" when it comes to trying out something new. Maybe it's from years of taking chemistry labs, but perfection is hard to shake.

But I'm slowly getting more flexible. I'll look for substitutions when I don't have an ingredient, add an extra ingredient or two and I even came up with a variation on one of my favorite recipes: Caramel Apple Purses.

Recently featured in the Hint of Autumn theme, this recipe is amazingly delicious. The problem? I didn't have filo dough. But I really wanted to make the amazing filling and topping. So I improvised. Yes, that means I was flexible.

We really love crepes for breakfast at my house; usually filled with fruit and sweet cream cheese filling. I snagged some apples my neighbor gave me from her tree, a bag of dried blueberries and cranberries, and the rest of the ingredients and went to work creating Caramel Apple Crepes.

Using a tool I recently bought: an apple peeler and corer, I made beautiful apple spirals quickly, which I cut in half. I whipped up the rest of the filling and while it simmered I made homemade caramel sauce. The recipe from Expert Hostess used heavy cream--which I didn't have--so I found a recipe that used whole milk--which I didn't have--so I substituted evaporated milk and called it good. At the end of making it, I added the juices from the strained filling for an extra special treat (and because that's what Expert Hostess did).

Letting the filling cool, I made crepes and sweetened cream cheese (which is cream cheese, powdered sugar, milk, and sometimes vanilla). This sweet cream cheese went inside my crepe under the filling, with drizzled caramel sauce and dusted powdered sugar on top. It was heavenly! And I didn't even have to use filo dough.