Bacon Wrapped Christmas Presents

Basically, everyone knows things taste better with bacon. Its a fact of the world. 

So when I saw Deliciously Organic's recipe for bacon-wrapped steak bites, I knew that Jonathan would die if I made them. 

 

We tried them tonight and they stand up to their simple, but self-explanatory name of goodness.  I just mixed it up and used some of the apple cider vinegar I had on hand and made the batch bigger for our dinner but it worked perfectly. Even though his mom's chocolate pound cake wasn't so fortunate (it had trouble baking for some reason).

We topped of a big Caesar salad with these bad boys and it was just amazing. We are definitely making these again. I think next week. Or tomorrow :) 

For our after-dinner treat, we baked up some Chocolate Andes Mint Cookies from the Novice Chef (from her Ass Friendly section- so they're less guilt-inducing! So many cookies to try, why make tons of just fattening ones?)

These are going to be my go-to chocolate cookies from now on! They are so light- I'm going to make them with Heath Bar pieces next week too! Go try some- they're amazing. And just replace the Andes mints with something else if you're not a fan. 

It was a great day in the kitchen, except my minor burn from the steam that resulted from cooking my acorn squash for today's lunch with Jonathan's family with water in the pan at 400 degrees. Oops! More on the lunch tomorrow- its time to nom!

4 Hours in the Kitchen: what can YOU do?

Bake 4 types of cookies, of course! We went on a little baking spree yesterday morning to buff up our cookie supplies- we chowed through a bunch over the last couple of days. We made our standby gingerbread, dark chocolate cutouts from Martha Stewart, mincemeat pies (not shown- oops), mini-blackberry pies, and some German cookies with poppyseed filling from the recipe on the can's wrapper.

For the blackberry pies, my mom just thawed out some of the blackberries we picked this summer in a colander to keep them from getting mushy, added some vanilla and sugar and cut out circles from pre-made pie crust. We baked it at 400 degrees for maybe 12 minutes- super simple and it would work with a bunch of different fruits! (See where I get my kitchen experimenting from?!)

Cookies GALORE! And my sister made more after I left to go to dinner... yay! More later on my AMAZING dinner recipe- you'll be jealous!

Fall Break

Yesterday, as the beginning of my fall break, I spent a lot of time in the kitchen! After running around and getting some errands done, I settled in and bought a 16 pound pumpkin from Boone Hall Farms (it was the smallest baking pumpkin they had and it was only $3 or so!) And then I proceeded to follow this recipe and spend over 3 hours making 15 cups of pumpkin puree. I have NO IDEA what to do with all of it, but I froze most of it and a pumpkin pie for Thanksgiving sounds like a good plan!

I also made some butternut squash puree and I have cleaned up the pumpkin seeds to toast tomorrow.

I also made this one-bowl blackberry cake. It was SO GOOD! It sunk in the middle for some reason (I think my oven gets hotter than it says it does and it cooked too fast).

See- it sunk in the middle :(

 I've already enjoyed being at home with a full kitchen and more recipe testing will be happening this weekend :)

Friday Night Brownies

I had a wonderful Friday night with my friend, Kate, because her husband, Paul, was out for the night. After wandering around the mall and shopping a little bit, we stopped by the grocery store to get ingredients for pizza (there wasn't any dough left, so we got a pre-made pizza crust) and made some easy brownies. I have made these once before and they got scarfed up by my co-workers before I could get a picture of them! They are definitely easy to make and don't require melting chocolate (my least favorite part about homemade brownies). Here is the recipe!

Easy Brownie Recipe
from Group Recipes

Ingredients:
1 cup butter, melted
2 cups flour
2 cups sugar
4 eggs
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1 tsp vanilla

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Mix flour, sugar, and cocoa in a large bowl. 

Pour in butter, eggs and vanilla.

Mix well and pour into a greased 9x13 pan. 

Bake for 25 minutes.

I love this recipe- so simple and so delicious. Its not a fudge-y brownie, but it doesn't "harden" until it cools because of the large liquid content in butter and eggs. They taste more like German chocolate to me than a traditional brownie, but I can't wait to try it with dark cocoa powder! Its a perfect dessert to throw together and somewhat instant gratification!

Recent Kitchen Adventures

Last night, Jonathan and I made some homemade pizza (using the pizza yeast with the recipe on the package- wonderful!) and some sweet peppers and rosemary on my side and bacon and extra cheese on his side. It was SO delicious. Every time I make home made pizza, I always regret ever ordering carry-out pizza.

But today, I made some biscuits from scratch for the 52 Weeks of Baking: Week 15 swap. I got the recipe from the Magnolia's cookbook. Just some standard Southern biscuits. So simple to make, but so delicious!

White Lily Cream Biscuits

Makes 24 (1-inch) biscuits

Ingredients:

2 1/2 cups White Lily self-rising flour

1 1/2 cups heavy cream

3 tablespoons melted butter (optional)

Preheat an oven to 400 degrees F. 

Place the flour in the mixing bowl.  Add the heavy cream and mix with a spoon until it starts to come together and forms a wet sticky dough. 

Place on a lightly floured surface, lightly flour the top of the dough and roll out to 1/2 inch thickness. 

Cut the biscuits with a 1-inch biscuit cutter, place on an ungreased cookie sheet and bake until golden brown, about 8-12 minutes. Remove from oven, brush with melted butter and serve immediately.

That made me thirsty, so I made another batch of Iced Moroccan Mint Tea (in an effort to use some of my fresh peppermint!)

I got modified the recipe from Our Red House. Its pretty simple, but tasty.

Iced Moroccan Mint Tea (modified)

Ingredients:

3 green tea bags
1 cup fresh peppermint or spearmint
3 tablespoons sugar or sugar substitute
4 cups boiling water

Pour the boiling water over the tea bags and fresh mint. Let steep for 10 minutes. Strain and then mix in the sugar while still hot and then place in the fridge to chill before serving. Then enjoy!

It makes about 3 servings so it's perfect to make every other day and have fresh tea.

Oh, and I tried to recreate some fantastic juice from Ecuador (jugo de sandia or watermelon juice). It was so simple and turned out great because our watermelons were so sweet to begin with!

I wanted to make it look like something special :) but all it is is mashed up watermelon without the pulp. Super easy and in the blender.

I hope you enjoy these recipes :) let me know if you use them!

More Baking

My mom and I cooked dinner tonight and I made some banana chocolate tea bread for the 52 Weeks of Baking swap (week 7). Both turned out delicious! I used Smitten Kitchen's Ratatouille recipe and a recipe from one of my mom's older cookbooks, Entertaining on the Isle with the Mare Island Officers Wives Club. Its a classic in our house and so delicious! I used up some over-ripe bananas and it was perfect.

Oh, and my Peruvian potatoes we made into mashed potatoes. So pretty and so delicious!

Banana Chocolate Tea Bread

• Ingredients:
• 1/2 cup butter, softened
• 1 cup sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 1/2 cups flour
• 1 tablespoon cocoa powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon vanilla 
• 1 cup mashed banana 
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 1/2 chopped nuts (optional)
• 1/2 cup chocolate chips (I used dark!)

Cream together sugar and butter. Add eggs, the dry ingredients (previously combined) and the remaining ingredients. Bake in a large, greased loaf pan at 350 degrees for 55-65 minutes. Cool in the pan for 10 minutes; then remove and serve.

I bet it would taste fantastic with vanilla ice cream, but I devoured it on its own. Its a classic at my house and doesn't really need any tweaking! It only took about 15 minutes to prepare it, so its definitely easy. I totally recommend it!

Baking

I wanted to share one of my favorite bread recipes! It is so easy and doesn't require yeast or kneading or waiting! Except for the bread to come out of the oven... Its from $3 Meals and the whole book has tons of ideas on how to make delicious and inexpensive food.

I didn't have herbes de Provence, so I used an all-purpose dill mix and it was great! I have also used an Italian mix... I think any milder spice mix would taste fantastic! And I didn't use whole milk; I think anything besides skim should be fine.

I also made a cake; just Funfetti out of a box, but sooo delicious! It was a belated birthday request! But i did make the frosting- just a simple confectioner's sugar frosting with a little milk and a little vanilla extract.

I think it turned out pretty cute and yummy! I will have more adventures in the kitchen to share later, but I am off to the strawberry patch!