Book Challenge

My friend and fellow book lover Natalie invited me to participate in a Facebook thing to choose 7 of my favorite books, post one a day, and then invite 7 other friends to list their 7 books. No explanations, comments, or reviews - just the book covers. This was hard for me because there are SO many books I love...which ones to choose? Why only 7? And why can't I say why? Hahaha! Anyway - my standard favorites that I always say if anyone asks are Velveteen Rabbit (my most favorite book), and Lovely Bones.

After those top 2 there are so many more I love - some from childhood like Little Women, the entire series of Nancy Drew, the entire series of Trixie Belden, and The Year of Janie's Diary; some that are suspense/action/thriller like the entire series of John Sandford's Lucas Davenport, the entire series of Lee Child's Jack Reacher, the entire series of Vince Flynn's Mitch Rapp, the entire series of Janet Evanovich's Stephanie Plum, the entire James Patterson's Alex Cross series, Anne Rice's Interview with a Vampire series (but only that series of hers); I don't have one particular genre of books that I enjoy reading - some others that come to mind are Bridget Jones' Diary, Little House on the Prairie (did you know there is a more grown up version of these books?), Nora Roberts' Born in Fire/Ice/Shame (just about the only romance books I like!), Memoirs of a Geisha, A Walk in the Woods, Mists of Avalon, Valley of the Dolls, Chronicles of Narnia, Enslaved by Ducks, Gone with the Wind...hmmmm what else... I know there are lots and lots more! 

What favorites come to mind for you? Give me some more suggestions so I can add to my list :)

PS: I recently discovered our library has an app that you can borrow books online - I'm in heaven! 

Texas Chocolate Cream Pie

This recipe is from Janis - she brought it to dinner the other night and even though the entire tableful of people were stuffed and groaning from eating the main course, no one could resist this pie. I kept saying "I'm too full, I can't eat anymore...ok, just one more bite...".

I do question why it's named 'Texas' chocolate pie but whatever, it's delicious.

CRUST:

• 1 1/3 cups chocolate wafer crumbs
• 5 Tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
• 1/4 cup sugar

FILLING:

• 2/3 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup cornstarch
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 4 large egg yolks
• 3 cups whole milk
• 5 ounces bittersweet chocolate, melted
• 2 ounces unsweetened chocolate, melted
• 2 Tablespoons unsalted butter, softened
• 1 teaspoon vanilla

TOPPING:

• 1 cup heavy cream
• 1 Tablespoon sugar
• shaved chocolate for garnish if desired. 

DIRECTIONS:

1. Preheat oven to 350'. Place the chocolate wafers into the bowl of a food processor. Add the melted butter and sugar. Process until smooth. Press onto the bottom and sides of a 10" tart pan or 9" pie plate. Bake until crisp, about 15 minutes; cool on a wire rack.
2. Whisk together sugar, cornstarch, salt, and yolks in a 3-quart saucepan until combined well, then add milk in a steady stream, whisking the whole time. Bring to a boil over moderate heat, whisking, then reduce heat and simmer, whisking for 1 minute. The filling will be very thick.
3. Put the filling through a fine-mesh sieve into a bowl, then whisk in chocolates, butter, and vanilla. Cover surface of the filling with plastic wrap and cool completely for 2 hours. 
4. Spoon the filling into a crust and chill for at least 6 hours.
5. Just before serving, beat cream with the sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer just until it holds stiff peaks, then spoon on top of the pie. Garnish with shaved chocolate. 

Shoelace Tip

I've been having trouble lately with my walking shoes slipping on my foot and causing blisters - went to the local running shoe store and a guy showed me this tip to help tighten the shoe a bit (without making it overly tight, that hurts the top of my foot). This has made a big difference and I thought to myself "I'm a grown woman and have been wearing athletic shoes for my whole life and I never knew this?"...that made me want to share it with you in case you didn't know it either!

Chocolate Souffle

 I'm not going to pretend I've made this recipe, and I might be too afraid to even attempt it - but Janis brought these individual souffles for dessert and they are SO good, and look SO pretty, and everyone loved them SO much I might give it a go. Souffle scares me. But I bet you're braver than me so you should totally make these ;)

6 oz. butter
1/2 lb. semi-sweet chocolate
1 cup sugar
3 T. corn starch
4 eggs
4 egg yolks

Melt butter and chocolate over low heat. Mix sugar and corn starch together in a bowl. Crack the eggs into another bowl, add the yolks in with the eggs. (Set the 4 extra whites aside, you don't need them for this recipe).  When the butter and chocolate is melted, add to the sugar, mix it with a wire whip, then add the eggs and mix it again, just until it looks smooth. Transfer to another container if desired, chill over night. The batter keeps 4-5 days in the fridge.

The original recipe calls for 2" high x 2 3/4" diameter round metal rings, Janis said she has also made these in small ramekins. Just FYI.

Line the metal rings with a strip of parchment paper, set on a 9" pizza pan that is lined with parchment paper, spray with pam. Scoop the souffle base into the rings, 3/4 full. For best results and faster baking time leave it at room temperature for an hour before baking. The pizza pan holds up to 3 rings. This recipe yields about 7 individual souffles.

In a pre-heated 400' oven set on the top rack, back for approx. 20-25 minutes (note: Janis bakes for 18). Because oven temperatures can vary you might need to practice with your oven to see if you need to bake for shorter or longer time. Remove from oven, then with a pair of tongs hold the mold and slide a metal spatula under it, and carefully lift on to a plate. Slide out spatula gently, lift off the mold and remove the paper. If it breaks then you need to bake the next one longer, if it doesn't run out when cut then bake it less). Serve immediately while very hot.

Optional: serve with fresh fruits, ice cream, raspberry sauce...

original recipe is from Roy's Restaurant in Lahaina, Hawaii dated January 1996

Broccoli Cottage Bake...by LeDonna

Today's post is from LeDonna - how good does this look? I'm so going to make this. She said she loves this new recipe and thinks there are other items that could be added to change it up - for instance, add bacon and make it a breakfast casserole...yum. 

BROCCOLI COTTAGE BAKE

1 16oz container cottage cheese  

2 C chopped broccoli  

1 C shredded cheese(I used cheddar & mozzarella) 

1 7oz jar roasted red peppers(well drained) or roast your own and cut 

4 eggs beaten 

3 T Parmesan cheese 

3 T bread crumbs

 PAM  

Mix all ingredients and pour into 9" pie plate sprayed with PAM.  Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes or until center is set.  Let stand 10 minutes before cutting into slices.  I served this with grilled chicken, seasoned with Montreal Chicken.

                              

                           Roasted peppers with olive oil and regular Mrs. Dash at 350 for 40 minutes.

Let cool then cut up peppers.

mix all together

Ready to go in oven

Baked

Ready to serve!

Strawberry Cream Cheese Frosting

This is the frosting I made to go inside Luca's birthday cake - it wasn't strong enough to stand up between the cake layers but it made delicious cupcake frosting!

I pureed a handful of strawberries in my food processor, didn't need that many so next time I'll just do 2 or 3 of them (but the excess didn't go to waste, I added it to my plain yogurt). This is similar to buttercream frosting, adding cream cheese made it super smooth and creamy tho...and the berries turned it pink and delicious! So good.

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, at room temperature
4 oz. cream cheese (1/2 regular size block), at room temperature
fresh strawberry puree
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon coarse salt
3 cups. confectioners' sugar

Beat the butter and cream cheese together until smooth and fluffy. Add the vanilla, salt, and confectioners' sugar until they start to blend together and then slowly add a teaspoon of pureed berries a little at a time (so it doesn't get too runny) until it reaches frosting consistency.

Florian's Sauerkraut

Florian makes the. most. delicious. sauerkraut. ever. It's taken me years and years to like sauerkraut but now I don't mind it every now and then...until I had Florian's. And now I love it and will be making this so often!

I didn't ask him if I can share the recipe, I'm hoping he doesn't care...it's just so good I couldn't wait to share so you'll get to enjoy it too :)

I don't have the amounts, I'll just tell you how he told it to me:

Saute diced onions, carrots, and bacon in clarified butter. Add   some stock (I can't remember how much, I'm thinking like 3 cups). Add sauerkraut (note, depending on the kind of sauerkraut you use you might want to rinse some or all of it. Florian is German and goes to the German market to get the sauerkraut for this dish, if it's too salty or strong he rinses it - not sure how our regular old sauerkraut might differ). Cook that for a while and then add some finely chopped apple, grated russet potato, a couple bay leaves, a few juniper berries, 1/2 teaspoon cumin.

That's all I got and until I make it for myself I won't have better measurements. Feel your way around with how much of everything to use - it all cooks down together so let it go until all the liquid is absorbed. I think he said like an hour (but watch it in case I'm not remembering that correctly!).

Luca's Birthday Cake

Yesterday I told you about using a 5" disposable paper baking pan to make this birthday cake - which made the perfect miniature sized 2-layer cake. I made some strawberry cream cheese frosting to fill the cake with, but when I put the top layer of cake on the soft fluffy filling it basically slid right off! BFF Mary if you're reading this does it remind you of anything? MacArthur's Park maybe? LOL!!! Anyway, I scraped the filling off and replaced it with vanilla buttercream, frosted the whole thing with more buttercream and added lots of sprinkles. Topped with bath toys (I washed them before putting on top of the cake!) and a candle - pretty cute. And it was a hit, literally. He kept smacking his hands on the top of the cake before devouring a large portion of it :)

Disposable Paper Cake Pans

I had a bit of a quandary the other day when I needed to make cake for two back-to-back separate events - and neither of the events needed a whole cake. I offered to make a mini cake for a one-year-old's birthday party (for him to eat and mess up all by himself - his mom requested no chocolate) and I also wanted to have cake for the rest of the people at the party, and the other event the request was for white cake with chocolate frosting. I had the idea to make one big batch of doctored cake mix (added sour cream, an extra egg, instant pudding, a teaspoon of vanilla) and divide it up into separate kinds of cake.

I'll show you the birthday cake tomorrow, but the main point of this post is the disposable paper pan I used to make the small cake. I don't have a small cake pan (just the normal 8 and 9" sizes) but wanted the birthday cake to be bigger than a cupcake. In the way back of my baking cabinet I found a few of these 5" disposable pans meant for baking cakes and bread in and then being able to give them right in the pan. Or for bake sales, etc. I wanted to frost the sides of his birthday cake so didn't want to leave it in the paper pan, so after baking and cooling one 5" cake (I put about 2 cups of batter in the pan so it was pretty thick) I just peeled the paper off, split the cake in half and decorated like a normal layer cake. It was the perfect size - a miniature 2-layer cake.

I've never done this before and wanted to share in case you haven't either! I will definitely be making this size cake again - doing it this way let me have enough cake batter to make 12 cupcakes for the other event and the rest of the batter I made into small mini-cupcakes for the birthday party.

Prosciutto Wrapped Mozzarella Sticks

I'm going on a short trip that puts me in the air almost as long as I'll be on the ground (!) and I want to pack some snacks. Especially since my layover is only an hour in Chicago, no time to grab something before boarding the second flight and even though I'm sure I can make it all day without eating and survive, why take the chance? ;)

The easy route is to pack a couple granola bars or some trail mix, but I won't want those things when it comes time to eat them - good intentions until the boredom and munchies kick in. Hard-boiled eggs are an excellent snack full of protein but no-one wants to smell them (or tuna fish!) on an airplane! Plus I can't eat them without salt and pepper so that's not very practical anyway. Hmmm...

I was going thru my photos and remembered an easy appetizer that Janis brought to our house one day - mozzarella sticks wrapped with slices of thin prosciutto. Very simple to make (the directions are also the name of the dish!), can be made ahead of time, aren't fragile, and taste great. This seams like it'd make a great airplane snack too! Prosciutto is an Italian dry-cured ham sliced super thin, since it won't be out of the fridge all that long I'm not worried about eating it at room temp. In addition to a cut up apple with one of those prepackaged tubes of peanut butter and a small bag of m&m's should keep me from starving. And I'll throw in a granola bar just in case :)