Monday, February 13, 2012

Potato, Peas, & Bacon

THIS is what we had for dinner tonight!!
This is MY recipe! YAY!

 
All I did was peel & cut potatoes to bite size pieces. Then put them on to boil for about 8 minutes.
Once it started boiling, I started to make the sauce/gravy. In a pan I melted about 1/2 stick of butter, then while stirring with like a w...isk I added flour until it stirred into like a ball. Then I added 2-3cups milk (depending on how many potatoes). And put salt & pepper in (it's a must, or the sauce is bland)
When there is about 1 min left, I added the peas to the boiling water in potatoes.
Drain potatoes. Put back in pan. Dump sauce in. Done & done. :) if the sauce is too thick for you, you can add milk I believe.
Top it with bacon. :) yummmmm

Banana Bread Pancakes

The other night I didn't know what to make for dinner... I looked on the counter, we had bananas! And I had just seen this Pin! PERFECT!!
I was really excited!
And.... They are sooooooo YUMMY!! So so yummy!!
Recipe & Picture from HERE
So, the recipe is for wheat pancakes, I just used the all purpose flour. We also just used good ol' homemade maple syrup for the topping, although the glaze listed sounds heavenly!

Whole Wheat Brown Sugar Banana Bread Pancakes
makes 12 pancakes
2 cups whole wheat pastry flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
2/3 cup milk
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
3 large ripe bananas, mashed
2 tablespoons butter, melted
In a large bowl, combine flour, baking powder, sugar, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg in a large bowl. Measure out the milk and add the vanilla extract to it. Whisk together the dry ingredients and add in milk and vanilla, stirring to combine. The mixture will still be dry. Add in mashed bananas and mix. Add in melted butter and stir until batter is somewhat smooth.
Heat a skillet or grilled on medium heat. Using a 1/3 cup measure, spoon batter into rounds and cook until bubbles form on top – about 2-3 minutes. Flip and cook for a minute or two more. Repeat with remaining batter. Serve hot with butter and syrup, or the vanilla maple glaze.
Note: if you don’t have/can’t find whole wheat pastry flour, use 1 cup of regular whole wheat and 1 cup of all purpose. Or 2 cups of all purpose.

Vanilla Maple Glaze
1/2 cup maple syrup
3/4 cup powdered sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Combine all ingredients in a bowl and stir until smooth. Pour over pancakes.

Crack Potatoes

Made these.
Wasn't a fan.

Recipe & picture found HERE

Sonic Cherry Limeade & Cherry Coke Float Cupcakes

YUM.
Major.

For the Super Bowl, I decided to make these 2 items for our guests.... And they were fabulous!!!
My favorite, Sonice Cherry Limeade. AMAZING. And so beyond yummy!!
I didn't take a picture of it... Darn it.
So here is the website with the recipe & where I got the picture:

1 can frozen limeade concentrate,
1- 2 liter bottle Sprite,
Juice from 1 10 oz jar cherries
Fresh limes (optional, I didn't use them)
Put it all together. Done & done. Fabulous and so yummy!!

 
Next up, Cherry Coke Float Cupcakes
(Recipe found HERE)
Mine looked NOTHING like the pictures on that site, but I don't mind. They were yummy in my tummy. I ate probably 4 a day until they were gone.... No lie. And I thought I'd gain a crapload of weight from it, negative. I actually woke up Saturday and could fit into my skinny jeans. So, WHEW!
Here's the recipe:

For the Cake:

  • 3 cups all purpose flour
  • 6 T cocoa powder
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • 1/2 tsp salt
  • 1 1/2 cups sugar
  • 1 cup unsalted butter, room temperature
  • 2 large eggs
  • 1 cup buttermilk
  • 1 1/2 cups Coke (don’t use diet)
  • 3 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1 can cherry pie filling

For the Glaze:

  • 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
  • 3-4 T Coke
 For the Icing:
  • 1 1/2 cups heavy cream
  • 6 T powdered sugar
  • 1 teas Whip-It (optional*)
  • Maraschino Cherries for garnish

Preparation:

For the Cake: Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and line muffin pans with cupcake liners. Mix together flour, baking soda, salt and cocoa in a bowl and set aside.
In a mixing bowl, combine sugar and butter and beat on medium-high until light and fluffy. Mix in the eggs one at a time, beating well after each and scraping down the sides if needed. In a small bowl, combine buttermilk, Coke and vanilla extract, making sure to let the foam calm down after you mix it in. Foam will do us no good here.
Beginning with the your flour mixture, add to the butter mixture, alternating with the Coke mixture in 4 parts. Beat each addition just until incorporated.
Fill each muffin tin about 2/3 of the way full. Bake for 18-20 minutes until the tops spring back when touched lightly and a toothpick inserted in the center cupcake comes out clean. Cool 5 minutes in the pan and then transfer the cupcakes to a wire rack to cool completely.
Once cooled, use a paring knife to cut out a cone shape in the middle of each cupcake. Add a spoonful of cherry pie filling to each cupcake. You may want to try to chop the cherries up a bit. The whole cherries were a bit hard to fit in each cupcake. Strain and reserve the liquid, give the cherries a quick chop, and then toss them back in the liquid before filling each cupcake.
For the Glaze:
Mix together powdered sugar and coke with a whisk in a small bowl until no lumps remain adding more or less sugar if needed. You want a thicker constancy, one that will glaze the cupcake but not disappear down the sides or into the cupcake.
For the Icing:
Chill your mixing bowl for 10 to 15 minutes before you are ready to make your icing. Beat cream in a chilled bowl with whisk attachment or hand mixer on low speed. If using, add the Whip-it then begin to add the powdered sugar, 1 spoonful at a time, increasing speed as the cream comes together. Whip the cream until it holds stiff peaks. Using your favorite tip, pipe the whipped cream onto cupcakes and top with maraschino cherries.

Doritos Casserole

We LOVE Doritos in this house... So when I found the recipe for a Doritos Casserole, I totally wanted to try it... Well. It sucked. And I won't make it again.
Wish I could find the link... When I do, I'll be sure to post it.
That's all.

Sunday, January 29, 2012

Chicken Rollups & Italian Cream Soda

Tonight we made Chicken Rollups. They look soooooooo yummy on her post!! And sound so yummy too!! But... I wasn't a huge fan. Plus, mine didn't turn out anything like hers looked. My two year old wouldn't even eat them... We had a whole bunch of leftovers. They weren't a vomit, kind of horrible... But they weren't for our "keep" list.
(Chicken Rollup recipe here) 

The YUMMIEST thing for the night was when I made our Vanilla Italian Cream Soda's! They were FANTASTIC!!! Super yummy! These are on the top of our keep list, along with our Chili.
I didn't have a specific recipe that I went with... I kind of just made it up as I went.

What you need:
Tall glasses
Ice
Flavor syrup (I went with Vanilla, it was found on the coffee isle)
Club Soda
Half & half
Straws
Put a couple ice cubes in the glass. Pour flavor syrup over the ice, about an inch of syrup (give or take). Pour club soda in, I stopped about 2.5 inches from the top. Add some half & half. (Just until it looks good)  Add a straw. Stir. ENJOY!!

Thursday, January 26, 2012

Chili & Cornbread

First up, I decided to make a copy cat "Wendy's Chili" recipe. I LOVE Wendy's chili, so I was pretty excited to try this out. It was super simple, and super YUMMY!! My husband & 2 year old daughter both totally enjoyed it! This is for sure on the "keep!" list! 
2 lbs. fresh ground beef
1 qt. tomato juice
1 (29 oz.) can tomato puree
1 (15 oz.) can red beans, drained
1 medium onion (1 1/2 c.), chopped
1/2 C. celery, diced
1/4 C. green pepper, diced
1/4 C. chili powder (you may want to use less, some people find this is too much)
1 tsp. cumin (if you like real flavor, add more)
1 1/2 tsp. garlic powder
1 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. each: black pepper, oregano, sugar
1/8 tsp. cayenne pepper
In a frying pan, brown the ground beef; drain. Put the drained beef and the remaining ingredients into a 6-quart pot. Cover the pot; let it simmer for 1 to 1 1/2 hours, stirring every 15 minutes.

(Wendy's chili recipe found here)
**I didn't use 1/4C chili powder, we used probably 2 tablespoons and I thought that was plenty.**

Next up is the corn bread.
My husband said that his mom always made cornbread to go with chili. Today was her birthday, she would have been 59 years old. Happy Birthday Mom! Since it was her birthday, I found it fitting to have this tonight.
I thought this was just Ok cornbread. It didn't look like the picture on her site. So maybe I messed up somewhere? It was ok, probably won't be making this one anytime soon.
(Cornbread recipe found here)