Archive for the ‘The Recipes’ Category

Before I could share this recipe with you, I had to ask permission from my mom because this is one my family has made for literally as long as I can remember and I wanted to make sure it was okay to share. It is one of my all time favorite foods ever in the whole world. It’s just SO good. I cannot even imagine winters without fresh lemons off someone’s tree and subsequent loaves of lemon bread.

Several people who are not my family members tend to call this lemon cake because yea, it’s pretty sweet, but in our family, it’s bread. And it can be eaten any hour of the day. It’s not tough to make, but there is a little prep time involved and I can promise you, it’s worth it.

Seriously. I’m really sad I don’t have more of it right now. For that I blame my cat (explanation of that at the end).

Lemon Bread

Ingredients
Bread:
3/4 cup butter (original recipe called for margarine, I just can’t do it)
1 1/2 cups sugar
3 eggs
2 1/4 cups flour
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. soda
3/4 cup buttermilk
zest of 4 lemons

Glaze:
approximately 3/4 cup sugar
juice of 4 lemons

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Butter and flour one large loaf pan or several small ones. I made a double batch, so I did all of the above.

2. Cream butter and sugar until well mixed.

3. Beat in eggs.

4. Mix flour with baking soda and salt. Alternately add flour with buttermilk, mixing well. Stir in grated lemon zest (dude, if you’re not using a microplane grater, you’re making your life so much tougher).

5. Pour batter into pans and bake for an hour and 20 minutes if making a large loaf and somewhere between 45 minutes and an hour for the small ones. They’re done when a toothpick comes out clean. If you’re using a light colored pan they may be pretty light in color (like all my little loaves you’ll see in a minute). If using a darker pan, you’ll have a darker crust (like my big loaf).

6. While the bread is baking, juice 4 lemons. Add approximately 3/4 cup of sugar. Taste the mixture, it should be more tart than lemonade, but not so tart it makes your face pucker up. The amount of sugar will vary depending upon the ripeness of your lemons. Whisk to help the sugar dissolve.

6. When the bread is done, cool for 10 minutes in the pan and then remove from dish. Using a toothpick (or like me, a skewer, because I didn’t have a toothpick), poke holes all over the top, sides and bottom of the loaf and set in a large pan that has sides. This is an essential step to get all that beautiful juice in.

7. Pour juice over loaf. I usually go through and try to get some juice on the sides and lift up the loaf (carefully, once juicy it can become temporarily a little soft) and get some underneath. Trust me, you want as much of this juice on the bread as possible. It is one of the best parts. Let it sit there and soak up all that deliciousness.

8. Let cool to room temperature, then slice and enjoy. You guys, it’s out of this world.

You can trust my cat, who not only ate through foil one night…

But then, when I salvaged the remaining loaf, rewrapped it in foil and in a ziplock bag, ate through both of those too. And moved the loaf off the counter and into the dining room.

And then I killed him.

Enjoy!

I don’t think I’ve ever been secretive about my love of all things sweet and this recipe is one of my all time favorites. My mom used to make it all the time when I was a kid and even now sometimes when I’m home for a weekend. It is just endlessly delicious.

I claim zero credit for this recipe though, let’s be clear. This is a lightly modified version of the classic Bisquick coffeecake that used to be on the box. Though it’s no longer on there, I was able to track it down online and boy am I ever glad I did. It’s easy to put together and even easier to eat.

Note: you can halve the recipe and make it in an 8×8 or pie pan, this recipe makes a 9×13 inch coffeecake, but I can’t estimate servings since I would eat half of it in one sitting and I’m pretty sure it serves more than 2.

Easy Streusel Coffeecake
Original recipe from: Bisquick

Ingredients
Batter:
4 cups Bisquick
1 1/3 cup milk
2 eggs
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla

Topping:
1 1/3 cup Bisquick
1 1/3 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
8 tablespoons butter

Directions
1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees, grease a 9×13 inch pan.

2. Mix all the batter ingredients together, pour into greased pan (and there will be some small lumps, that’s okay!)

3. Mix the Bisquick, brown sugar and cinnamon together.

Cut the butter into small pieces and mix in with a fork or your fingers until it’s all well blended together. I recommend fingers over forks, but that’s just me.

4. Pour streusel over the top, then use a butter knife and cut lines up and down and across to get a little of the streusel into the cake. You can skip this step, but I wouldn’t.

5. Bake at 400 for approximately 30-45 minutes, depending upon your oven. Mine cooks insanely hot, so just cook until a toothpick comes out clean, checking regularly.

6. Enjoy!

As someone with an egg allergy, Caesar salad has always been forbidden fruit. It is SO good, but it instantly makes me feel horribly ill. And though I have tried to figure out how much I can eat without feeling the effects, the bottom line is just not very much. And so I had resigned to never eating Caesar salad again.

Until I went to a local restaurant that proudly offers an egg-free Caesar. It isn’t the traditional creamy Caesar dressing, it’s a little more on the vinaigrette side, but it is still similar and delicious. And from there my mission to replicate this salad was born. A few google searches later and I found a recipe that I made that night. And since then it has had a frequent place in our dinner rotation.

It’s best made a little in advance so the dressing can really develop it’s flavor and the lettuce can wilt down a little bit, but you can make it right before eating too. And while it’s not necessary, I also make my croutons from scratch. They absolutely taste better than the box ones and they are really easy too. I promise.

Homemade Egg-Free Chicken Caesar Salad
Adapted from: Cooking Light
Serves: 4-6

Ingredients
2 bags of romaine lettuce
1/2 small loaf of bakery bread (I used rosemary, it was awesome)
6 tbsp olive oil
juice from 2 lemons
4 tsp Worcestershire sauce
4 tsp Dijon mustard
1/2 tsp sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp black pepper
3 garlic cloves, minced
Parmesan cheese (I prefer to shred my own so it’s a little thicker)
Chicken

(not pictured: olive oil, because I forgot and was WAY too lazy to take another picture)

Directions
1. In a food processor or a bowl with a whisk combine olive oil, lemon juice, Worcestershire, Dijon, sugar, salt, black pepper and garlic.

Pulse or whisk until well combined. I use my mini chopper because it helps emulsify the dressing and because I am lazy. Taste the dressing and adjust as needed. I had very juicy lemons today, so I added an extra tsp of Dijon and Worcestershire to balance it out. Just play around, the recipe is very forgiving.

2. Put lettuce and parmesan cheese in a very large bowl, pour dressing over, mix and refrigerate for as long as you can.

3. To prepare croutons, cut up bread into crouton sized pieces, place on cookie sheet. Drizzle with olive oil and toss to coat the pieces and the pan.

My oven bakes really hot, so I baked mine at (allegedly) 350 for 16 minutes and they came out like this.

I checked them at 10 minutes, don’t go far because it doesn’t take long to go from golden to burnt. Make sure that they are completely cool before you store them in an airtight container or the heat will soften them up again. And soft croutons are just not great.

4. Just before you’re ready to eat, prepare your chicken as you normally do. I season mine with garlic salt and pepper and cook on the stove, nothing fancy. To assemble, put a serving of salad, sprinkle with croutons and top with chicken. If you put the croutons in the salad too early, they’ll get mushy, so keep them out until you’re ready to eat.

5. Enjoy!

Seriously, if you like Caesar, you’ll love this. Don’t be put off by the ingredients (I haaaaate Dijon), the combination is great and the salad is even better the next day.

I have one firm rule when it comes to baking and general sweet stuff making: I do not use candy thermometers. Once, early in my sweets obsession I decided to try to make candy, which required me to boil sugar and water to a precise degree with a candy thermometer. Three tries and a HUGE mess later, I swore I would never do it again. I also refuse to cook sugar and then drop it into a cup of water to see how hard the ball ends up.

Basically, I’m lazy. If you take nothing else away from this blog, it should be that.

So anyway, my hatred of all sugar boiling rules and tools has long kept me away from making candy or caramels. Until I found a recipe for caramel corn that required no thermometer and no dropping of balls of sugar. In fact, it required you to get something boiling and then WALK AWAY. Now, that is my kind of recipe.

I made it for the first time last winter and I’m pretty sure I made it again a week later. And a week after that. It is really, really addictive. I have taken a hiatus, but at my husband’s request and a desire to share this awesomeness with you, I made some today. I wish you could smell my house right now.

The recipe is a bit messy and because it involves hot caramel I strongly recommend that you not do this with kids in the kitchen, but aside from that, it’s not complicated and the results are consistently awesome. If you can boil, stir and spread things out in a pan, you can make this caramel corn.

Homemade Caramel Corn
Recipe from: Allrecipes.com

Ingredients
20 cups of popped popcorn (this sounds like a ton, but it’s really just 2 full sized bags, popped)
1 cup butter
2 cups brown sugar
1/2 cup light corn syrup
1 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp vanilla (I don’t really measure this)
1/2 tsp baking soda

Directions
1. Preheat the oven to 275, line two large shallow pans with aluminum foil. Put popped popcorn in the biggest bowl you can find. If it doesn’t fit it all, then two big bowls.

2. Melt butter in a medium or large saucepan over medium heat. When melted add brown sugar, corn syrup and salt. Bring to a boil, stirring constantly.

3. Once the mixture is boiling, stop stirring, take your spoon out and set a timer for 4 minutes. Do not stir. Seriously, do not stir. It’s going to go from relatively boring to increasingly, well, puffy for a lack of a better explanation.

This is when it started boiling:

This is after 4 minutes of boiling:

4. When the 4 minutes is up, add vanilla and baking soda. The carmel will froth up a little with the baking soda, just as a warning. Stir in completely, the caramel will be kind of puffy when you’re finished.

5. Pour caramel over popcorn and stir well. Don’t rush and be aware that the caramel is EXTREMELY hot. I usually keep a potholder on the hand holding the bowl just to be safe from pouring caramel on myself. I usually pour a third of the caramel, stir, pour another third, stir well and then pour the last of it, trying to get it evenly distributed. Like I said, don’t rush, but don’t be slow, you don’t want the caramel to seize up yet. I did not take a picture of the process of pouring and stirring caramel because I have a serious attachment to both my camera and my skin.

6. Pour the popcorn into the two lined pans and spread them out. I will usually pour it into the pans with a spoon and then use wax paper over my hand to spread it out. Just be careful, the popcorn is still really warm.

7. Put the caramel corn into the preheated oven (one pan on each of the top two shelves) and bake for 1 hour, but stopping to stir, break apart clumps and switch the top/bottom pan every 15 minutes. The baking process makes your caramel corn nice and crisp instead of the soggy mess it would be without the baking. Trust me, do not skip the baking step.

8. Remove from oven, allow to cool and enjoy! Store it in an airtight container or it will get stale relatively quickly. If it sticks around that long, at least.

I know the name is a little overwhelming because most people don’t look for banana bread with 2 other strong flavors, but this is an awesome combination.

I came across the recipe a few years ago and it’s been my favorite non-traditional banana bread recipe ever since. I made a few changes to enhance the lime flavor because I cannot ever get enough citrus, but I promise it doesn’t overpower the banana.

I’m not going to pretend to understand the people who hate coconut because coconut is AWESOME, but if you’re a coconut hater, it’s entirely optional in this recipe. You don’t have to include any coconut at all. It’s not going to be nearly as awesome, but it’ll still be pretty damn tasty.

There is a small amount of prep involved, you need to zest 4-5 limes (which is a fancy way of saying using a grater or microplane to shave off the outside layer of the lime peel. It’s got AMAZING flavor.) and mash 3 very ripe bananas, but other than that, all you have to do is measure things. It’s really not bad.

You can do it. I promise.

Banana Lime Coconut Bread
Adapted from: Cooking Light

Ingredients
Bread:
1/4 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
3 large very ripe bananas, mashed
3 limes, zested
1/4 cup lowfat yogurt (I used key lime, you can use plain if you want)
3 tbsp dark rum
1/2 tsp vanilla
2 cups flour
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 sweetened flaked coconut + 1 tbsp for topping the bread

Glaze:
Zest of 2 limes
Juice of 2 limes
1/2 cup powdered sugar

1. Preheat your oven to 350, spray a loaf pan with cooking spray (or butter/flour it).

2. Cream together butter and sugar until well mixed.

3. Add eggs and mix well.

4. Add bananas, zest, yogurt, rum, vanilla. Mix well.

5. Add flour, baking soda and salt. Mix well. Add coconut. Yea, it’ll look really gross.

6. Pour into greased pan, sprinkle with remaining 1 tbsp coconut.

7. Bake for approximately 1 hour, until a toothpick inserted all the way into the center comes out clean. Let cool for 10 minutes in the pan, then carefully remove from the pan to a cooling rack.

8. While bread is cooling, prepare glaze. Combine remaining zest, juice, and powdered sugar. Whisk together.

9. Pour glaze over the warm bread. Let it soak in for at least 10 minutes.

10. Slice bread and enjoy. Store in a airtight bag or container and enjoy!

Once you’ve had this tropical banana bread, you’ll never want the traditional stuff again.

This salad is a creation based loosely off a variety of restaurant salads that I love. You know, the ones with noodles, nuts and blue cheese. They are SO good and really easy to recreate.

I haven’t made this since getting pregnant because of the no soft cheese rules, but I found Gorgonzola made with pasteurized milk, and so I jumped at the opportunity. I don’t think I can begin to explain how good it was. It’s kind of the only thing I want to eat now. All the time.

Anyways, pretty much every part of this salad is personalizeable and adjustable if your tastes don’t match mine. I served mine with chicken, but it’s certainly not necessary and you could also easily serve it with beef or other proteins. You can use blue cheese or Gorgonzola, or any other cheese you might like.

Homemade Chopped Salad
Ingredients:
1.5 bags of Romaine lettuce
Green onions (optional, I forgot them)
Walnuts or Pecans, regular or candied
One bag Top Ramen noodles, seasoning package discarded
Small container blue cheese or gorgonzola
Small apple (optional, I just forgot to take a picture)
Balsamic vinegar and olive oil, or your favorite vinaigrette dressing

Directions:
1. Cook Top Ramen noodles. I don’t usually cook them quite all the way through because I don’t want them to be too mushy, but I’m pretty sure the world won’t end if you cook them according to the package instructions (except without the seasoning package).

2. Put lettuce, onions, walnuts and cooked noodles into a big bowl. Mix to combine.

3. Add as much blue cheese/Gorgonzola as you want. I added a whole lot. Mix to combine.

4. Either pour your dressing or balsamic vinegar and oil to taste, over the top. Mix to combine (yea, I didn’t take a picture after I mixed it. Sorry).

5. To serve: I personally really like my salad with a chopped up apple in it. My husband does not. I chop it up right before I serve it so it doesn’t get brown, but I find the apple adds another nice crunch and tart taste.

The flavor combination here is just totally awesome, and it doesn’t take long to put together either. I personally like to let my salad chill for about an hour before I serve it, but it isn’t required and this time it only chilled as long as it took to cook the chicken. And it was freaking delicious. And the leftovers are also fantastic the next day because the flavors have melded together even more.

I strongly recommend you give this one a whirl. It’s really, really, really good.

A few weeks ago while I was racking my brain for any dinner item that sounded remotely edible, I came across a recipe for baked potato soup. Though it sounded delicious, the idea of waiting for a soup to cook when I got home from work was just not happening. So when I stumbled across this recipe a week later, I knew I had to try it. And you guys, I was not disappointed.

I made a few minor adaptations to the recipe, starting with cutting it in half since we only have two mouths to feed, and I found that though simple, it’s a really great recipe and the result is pretty fantastic. It does work best if you have a blender, particularly an emersion blender, but either a regular blender or a potato masher and patience should work too.

Crockpot Baked Potato Soup
Adapted from: Mama Loves Food
Serves 6

Ingredients
4 large Russet Potatoes, washed, peeled, diced into small cubes
1/2 a large yellow onion, diced
5 cloves of garlic, minced
4 cups chicken stock/broth
1/2 tbsp season salt (I used Creole because it’s all I had)
8oz cream cheese (I recommend the tub, not the box, it’s a little less firm)

Toppings
Bacon, cooked and crumbled
Green onions, diced
Shredded cheddar cheese

Directions
1. Put potatoes, onion, garlic, chicken broth and season salt in crock pot. Turn on high.

2. Cook! I had mine on high for 4 hours and on low for one, but I would imagine on high for 4-5 OR on low for 6-8 would work out just fine. Basically you want your potatoes to cook until they’re soft. If you cook it too long you risk evaporating too much liquid, but this can be easily remedied by adding more broth or water to thin it out later. This is just before I blended it.

3. Add cream cheese and blend! Either take 1/3 to 1/2 of your soup and the cream cheese out and put it into a stand blender, or use an emersion blender to blend approximately half of the soup. I probably blended a little more than half, but you want a relatively smooth and creamy soup, but some chunks in it for texture.

If you don’t have a blender, I read in the comments that someone used a potato masher and smashed it up by hand. If that’s the case, you may need to drop the cream cheese in a little earlier and let it cook down because the blender speeds up its incorporation to the soup.

4. Serve! Top the soup with your choice of potato toppers and enjoy. It is one of the homiest meals you’ll ever taste.

The soup reheats really well, but it can thicken up a little. I added about a tablespoon of water to each bowl before I put it in the microwave to return it to the creamy, but not too thick, soup texture I was going for.

Earlier this year, my mom took us to a new restaurant in my hometown where I had a really fabulous salad. Conincidentally, my dad had planned to take us there the very next day, and though we happily went back, I ordered something different that time. But ever since that first visit, I’ve wanted to make this salad myself. It’s that good. The flavor combinations are just really great. I was reinspired when we went back to the restaurant earlier this month. It’s just so good.

(And seriously, if you’re ever in my hometown, I strongly recommend this place. They had me when they served sweet potato fries with both delicious spicy ketchup and a cinnamon marshmallow fluff dip. Seriously, so so good.)

So I decided to make the salad at home. I made a few adjustments- I used granny smith apples instead of the kind they use because I like the tartness, I candied my pecans, (though I failed to take any pictures of this, sorry) and I served it with steak because I needed some protein. I normally would’ve gone with chicken, but the chicken aversion rages on. This baby does not like chicken at all.

The recipe is pretty loose and therefore, very flexible, but it’s a really great salad and pretty quick to toss together. If you’ve never had Manchego, it’s pretty inoffensive, and considering my current cheese aversions, this is saying a lot. It’s milder than cheddar, but still has a nice flavor. I found mine in the cheese section of my local Trader Joe’s.

Arugala, Apple and Manchego Salad
Ingredients
Arugala
Granny smith apples
Pecans (candied if you want, plain if you don’t)
Dried dates
Manchego cheese
Red wine vinegar
Olive oil
Protein of your choice, or none, if that’s how you roll

Directions
1. If you’re going to make a protein, get it going before you prepare your salad. The apples especially won’t wait well once cut. You’ll see this from my pictures shortly.

2. Begin assembling your salad. I layered a generous portion of arugala, sliced the apples thinly, diced up the dates, sprinkled the pecans on and then cut the Manchego using a potato peeler so it would be in thin strips instead of chunks or little bits like a grater would do. Here’s my artwork before dressing and protein.

3. Prepare the dressing. I didn’t measure, but I used maybe 2/3 vinegar to 1/3 olive oil and then whisked it quickly with a fork. Taste it and see if you want more/less of either component and feel free to toss some salt and pepper into the mix. Or you can buy red wine vinaigrette at the grocery store. I just usually keep the vinegar and oil on hand because I hate paying for people to mix them together for me. Pour it over the salad, or toss it if you’re fancy.

4. If you’re serving it with protein, toss it on top and enjoy!

p.s. For those who have never candied nuts, I do it a very easy/lazy way. I put the pecans in a sauté pan, add 4 tbsp brown sugar and about 1-2 tsps of water, just enough to barely moisten the sugar. Then I cook, over medium, until the sugar/water begins to bubble and it’s all smelling good. You CANNOT walk away from this while it’s going though because it’ll burn in a heartbeat. I’d also recommend letting them cool a few minutes before tasting/using, because damn the nuts get hot and yes, they will burn the crap out of your mouth.

So go forth, enjoy a new salad!

I know that quesadillas are not revolutionary or really recipe worthy. But a few years ago my brother-in-law made them for me this way and they blew my mind. I almost didn’t try them because I don’t like cream cheese and he warned that they contained cream cheese, but I did, and oh my God they’re good.

These quesadillas are a go to meal for us, they’re easy and delicious and reliably good. And though lately I’ve been anti-chicken, these have continued to sound totally edible. And those kinds of meals are few and far between.

Even if you’re not a cream cheese person, I strongly recommend giving these a try. They’re so damn good, you’ll be amazed.

Easy Delicious Quesadillas

Ingredients:
Chicken breast filets
Flour tortillas
Plain cream cheese
Shredded cheddar/jack cheese
Canned diced green chiles

Directions:
1. Cut up the chicken into small pieces, season with salt and pepper and cook over medium heat until cooked through- between 5 and 7 minutes.

2. Spread a small amount of butter on one side of a tortilla. This will keep it from sticking to the pan.

3. Spread cream cheese over half of the non-buttered side of the flour tortilla. Top with cheese, peppers, cooked chicken.

4. Cook in preheated saute pan for 2 minutes until the tortilla is crispy, then flip. Cook on the opposite side until brown and crispy and the cheese is all melty inside. Don’t walk away for long because these will burn quickly.

5. Take out of pan, cut, and enjoy.

Easy and delicious. You’ll never leave cream cheese out of your quesadillas again.

Though I’m not normally a spicy food person, this pizza was exactly what I was craving the other night and it did not disappoint. I’ve made it a few times in the past and while the flavor has always been amazing, the dough has gotten soggy in the middle. It hasn’t stopped us from eating it, but still, it could be better. So I made a few adjustments this time and was really happy with the results.

If you’re one of the chicken on pizza haters know that the chicken is in no way required. In fact, I’m in the midst of a bit of a chicken aversion and so I picked it off when I ate it last night. It was still totally delicious. And the leftovers don’t have chicken on them because I left them out on the counter for 30 minutes and my cat went by and ate most of the chicken off the pizza. It’s a good thing I love him so much.

Anyways, it’s pretty easy and totally delicious. Warning, it’s spicy, so only for adventurous kids and adults with good taste. I mean, spicy tendencies.

Pepper Jack Pizza
Adapted from: Sargento

Ingredients:
Pizza dough
1/2 medium yellow onion, chopped
2 medium or 3 small bell peppers, chopped
1/2 cup salsa
Shredded pepper jack cheese
Precooked chicken breasts

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 425. Stretch dough into two small rectangles. You can make one large pizza, but the problem with the soggy crust was greatly alleviated by making 2 small pizzas instead of one large one. It’s your call. Cook them in the preheated oven for approximately 8 minutes, you’ll cook them more later.

2. In a large saute pan heat a little bit of oil, cook onions for 2 minutes. Add bell peppers (I actually only used two, both because two were enough and because the yellow one was molding inside…) and cook 5-6 more minutes.

3. Add salsa to the onions and peppers. I recommend using a salsa that’s more blended than pico de gallo-y like I did this time. I grabbed the wrong one. Because this is going to be like your pizza “sauce” you want it to have a little body. Mine totally ended up fine as made, but I think I prefer the more blended salsas.

4. Spread pepper/onion/salsa mixture evenly over the crusts. Top with cheese and chicken. Place in preheated oven.

5. Bake for 10 minutes or until cheese is melted, bubbly and starts to get golden brown around the edges. My oven cooked it faster, but it cooks way too fast, pretty much always.

6. Let cool slightly, cut and serve!

You guys, this is just so good. I’m not going to lie, I totally had a 3rd piece. And let’s pretend like I ate it with vegetables, because yea.