Focaccia Tiles

I made this for Thanksgiving along with the crescent rolls (click here for that post) and forgot to show you how it turned out. At first I thought this was a "fail" because I baked it too long, but turns out it still tasted good and is pretty so I'll pass the recipe along if you want to try it. As usual it's much easier to make than I anticipated, yeast bread is still intimidating to me but the more I make it the more I realize it's pretty easy.

• 4 cups all purpose flour
• 1/4 teaspoon active dry yeast
• 1 1/2 teaspoon salt
• warm water
• olive oil
• toppings such as toasted pumpkin seeds, oil-packed dried tomatoes, pitted olives, thinly sliced limes, and/or thinly sliced roma tomatoes
• seasonings such as smoked paprika, ground cumin, oregano, or sea salt

1. In large bowl combine 3 cups of the flour, the yeast, and salt. Add 1 2/3 cups warm water (120' to 130'F). Stir until all is moistened. The mixture will be a soft, sticky dough. Cover and let stand at room temperature 12 to 24 hours.

2. Line a 15x10x1" baking pan with parchment paper. Brush parchment with olive oil. With a fork, stir remaining 1 cup flour into the dough. Turn dough out into prepared pan. Using well-oiled hands or a rubber spatula, gently push dough into pan (dough will be sticky). Loosely cover; let rest for 1 to 1 1/2 hours or until puffy.

3. Preheat oven to 400'. Using a sharp, floured knife, score dough into 6 portions. Gently press desired toppings into surface of dough. Brush lightly with olive oil. Sprinkle with desired seasonings. Bake for 30 to 35 minutes or until golden brown.

4 Transfer to wire rack. Cut into 6 tiles. Serve warm.

Makes 6 tiles, 12 servings. each serving 212 cal, 6g fat.

Prep: 20 min.

Rise: 1 hour

Bake: 30 minutes

Stand: 12 hours

Before baking. Next time I will put way more seasonings on!
And don't bake it so long - watch for it to just start to turn
golden brown. Oh, and I scored mine into 8 squares so I could
try more toppings!

Crescent Rolls

Here's the recipe for the rolls I made to take to Thanksgiving dinner - I wasn't sure if I loved them but then they got such rave reviews I've decided to keep the recipe and will make again for sure. These are quite easy to make and didn't take nearly as long as I thought - I made them the day before thinking they'd need more time but after reading the directions thru I see that they only need 3 hours start to finish so next time I'll make them the same day and time it to bake them shortly before dinner is ready so they'll be hot and fresh. Apparently they were an even bigger hit for breakfast the next morning!

This recipe is from howdoesshe.com, I printed their recipe below but click here if you want to see their step by step directions.

proofing the yeast

super sticky wet dough

let it rise, then split into 4 equal sized rounds

roll out to an approx 12" - 14" circle 

let 'em rise again for about 30 minutes before baking. 

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups of milk
• 3/4 cup + 1 Tablespoon Sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 Tablespoon salt
• 2 Tablespoons yeast
• 2 cups of warm water
• about 9-10 cups of all purpose flour
• at least 1 cup of butter

Instructions

1. Scald 1 1/2 cups of milk, 3/4 cup sugar and 1/2 cup of butter, in a microwave safe bowl, for about 2 minutes. Cutting the butter into pieces helps it melt faster. There will probably be some little cubes of butter still floating in the hot mixture, they will melt.
2. add yeast to this hot mixture, but it will be too hot to just dump the yeast straight in (it would kill it!). To cool it down stir in 1-2 cups of flour, then add 1 egg and 1 Tablespoon of salt, and leave it to cool for a couple of minutes. Meanwhile, in a measuring cup dissolve 2 Tablespoons of yeast in 2 cups of warm water and 1 Tablespoon of sugar. Let it sit for a couple of minutes until it is bubbly.
3. Make sure your milk mixture is just warm, not boiling and add the yeast mixture!
4. Using a fork or wooden spoon, gradually stir in 9-10 cups of flour (counting the flour you have already added to cool it earlier). I would recommend only adding 2 cups at time and stirring in between. These rolls turn out so much better when they are mixed by hand.
5. At the end the dough will be dense and sticky, and may be hard to stir, you can use your hands to incorporate the rest of the flour if needed. Be sure not to add too much flour. Then smooth the dough out and cover the bowl with plastic wrap. Leave it in a warm place and let it rise.
6. When your dough is close to raising completely, butter 2 cookie sheets and set them aside.
7. Let the dough raise until it has doubled in size.
8. Cover your working space with flour to prevent the dough from sticking. Dump your dough out and divide it into 4 balls. Eyeball the sizes, then lift them up and feel the weight of each ball. Try to make them even, but they don’t have to be perfect.
9. Using one ball of dough at a time: roll the dough into a circle on a floured counter. Once it is rolled out spread the top with butter from edge to edge. You will use about 2 Tablespoons per circle of dough.
10. Cut the dough into quarters using a pizza cutter.
11. Then cut each quarter into 3 pieces. You should end up with 12 triangles from each circle of dough.
12. Roll the dough starting with the wide end of the triangle
13. Tuck the tail of the triangle under the roll and place it on the buttered cookie sheet. You will make 3 rows, with 8 rolls per row. This will give you 24 rolls per pan. Two balls of dough will fill 1 pan. You will get a total of 48 rolls!
14. Pre-heat your oven to 350 degrees. Place the pans of rolls in a warm place (on top of the oven if possible) to let them rise. Once they are touching and full in size, cook (one pan at a time) in the oven ’till they are golden brown. About 10 – 15 minutes, It may take longer depending on how hot your oven cooks. Keep a close eye on your first pan to get the right time for the second.
15. While they are still hot and fresh out of the oven run a stick of butter over the tops of the rolls for a delicious buttery glaze.

Mummy Meatballs

I had a busy week and got a little behind making stuff this week - so you get a repeat of one of my favorite Halloween recipes originally posted 10/27/15 (an oldie but goodie!):

Saw this idea a few places online, they are too cute and I had to try them. Not only are they a super cute idea, they taste and smell really good! My husband came into the kitchen as I was finishing putting the eyeballs on and started eating them - in between bites he said "I feel guilty eating them, they're so cute", but he managed to eat the whole plate so I guess he didn't feel THAT bad haha!

I bought turkey meatballs in the freezer section and 1 can of refrigerated low-fat crescent roll dough (turkey and lite dough - I'm trying to make them a little healthier!). Remove the dough from the tube, press the triangles all together, don't separate them; cut into 4 rectangles. With a pizza cutter or knife, cut each rectangle lengthwise into narrow strips. Wrap dough around each meatball to look like mummy bandages, leaving a place open for the mummy eyes, and bake. 

To make the eyes I sliced a mozzarella cheese stick into thin rounds (less than 1/4"), cut out small rounds with a large straw (this is the white eye part), then cut a smaller hole in that with a little straw and inserted a black peppercorn. Use anything you can find that will fit in the small hole that you have around - pieces of black olives would work,  mini chocolate chips (might not taste great haha but you just need a dark center for the eye), just look around and you'll find something. The recipe I followed dotted on mustard or ketchup for eyes but I like the white eye with something dark in it.

You could serve these many different ways - use your imagination! Could be with spaghetti for dinner, dipped in marinara as dinner or appetizers, standing at the counter inhaling them like someone I know, whatever you want. They taste good, are easy to make, come together quickly - all good! I'm going to take the 2 that I hid from my husband for my lunch tomorrow - I think they'll even taste good cold :)

Original recipe (I only changed the eyes):

• 1 can (8 oz) refrigerated crescent dinner rolls 
• 20 frozen cooked meatballs, thawed
• Ketchup or mustard, if desired
• Marinara sauce, as desired

Heat oven to 375°F. Line work surface with cooking parchment paper. On parchment-lined surface, unroll dough and press perforations to seal; cut into 4 rectangles.

With knife or pizza cutter, cut each rectangle lengthwise into 10 pieces, making a total of 40 pieces of dough.

Wrap 2 pieces of dough around each meatball to look like "bandages," stretching dough slightly to cover meatballs.

Separate "bandages" near 1 end to show meatball "face." On ungreased large cookie sheet, place wrapped meatballs.

Bake 13 to 17 minutes or until dough is light golden brown and meatballs are hot. With ketchup and mustard, draw "eyes" on mummy bites. Serve with warm marinara sauce.

Sponsor recipe courtesy of © 2015 ®/™ General Mills All Rights Reserved
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