Cooking Week 17: Childhood Biscuits and Gravy

I am firmly entrenched in the Midwest, however my grandparents come from West Virginia and as such I grew up with a number of southern foods despite my physical location.  I absolutely love anything that involves biscuits.  My all time favorite meal that my grandmother makes is biscuits and underwater rice.  As no one else I currently eat with shares that love, however, I made my my second favorite grandma meal- Biscuits and Gravy.

I don't follow a precise recipe, but I start out by browning 1 lb. of spicy sausage (I like the kick but grandma uses regular)

Then I estimate how much fat is in the pan- this time I guessed 2 Tbsp. and add an equal amount of flour.  Whisk together and add 1 c. of milk for every 1 Tbsp of flour.  After I did this I determined that I wanted more gravy than what was there so I added 1 Tbsp. butter, 1 Tbsp. flour and another 1 cup of milk.  Stir all together and cook until it thickens.

Pour your gravy over your favorite biscuit recipe (or in my case quick Bisquick biscuits) and enjoy a taste of the south.

Cooking Week 16: Prosciutto Wrapped Asparagus

Ahh my pickiness strikes again.  I don't like asparagus.  Despite that I gave it a go for the challenge anyway.  I figured- hey its been years since I had it, maybe I like it now.  No such luck.  I'll share the recipe anyway since I think its a good one if its something you might like :)

I found it here.

Really simple.  Take some asparagus, prosciutto, and cream cheese.

Spread the cream cheese lightly on prosciutto and wrap it around a sprig or two of asparagus.

Placed on a lightly sprayed baking sheet and bake at 450 for 15 minutes and enjoy- or in my case don't.
 

Cooking Week 15: One Pot Mac and Cheese

I still haven't managed to settle into a routine at the new place, but I managed to throw together a crockpot mac and cheese for this week's challenge.

I wasn't totally thrilled with how it turned out, it didn't get a great sauce.  I think it may be the dubliner cheese that I used? Who knows.  I'm not going to bother with the recipe, but if you really want it speak up and I'll share!

Cooking Week 14: Sloppy Joes

Ahh Sandwiches!  One of my many many food loves.  I'd say at least half of our meals involve some sort of sandwich.  I wanted to go out on a limb and make something fancy, but as I'm still catching up on real life I went with one of my old standby's- good ol' sloppy joes.

I of course served them on homemade buns (recipe found here)

The joes themselves are one pound of ground beef browned with 1/2 a diced onion and 1/2 a diced green pepper.  Add 1/4c. ketchup, 8oz. tomato sauce, some Worcestershire sauce, pepper, salt, garlic powder, and chili powder.  Mix until heated through and serve!

Cooking Week 13: Russian Piroshki

Sorry I've been MIA this past week or so.  The hassle of moving means no internet and little time for posting once I did get it.  It also means I didn't get to either of my challenges until the very end of the week, but I did get them done.  In cooking this week the challenge was Russian.  After perusing some websites of Russian food I finally settled on Piroshki which is basically a Pasty.  Traditionally there are a variety of fillings that go into these delicious pockets, but I settled on ground beef and onions based on the tastes of the boy and I.

I used the recipe found here and the only thing I changed is I subbed garlic powder for dill and I baked at 400 for 17 minutes instead of frying them.

Basically you whip up a bread like dough

Cook your filling and let it cool.

Fill the pockets

Brush a beaten egg on top to help them brown in the oven.

Then bake and eat!

Cooking Week 12- Cheesy Apple Beer Bread

I move tomorrow.  This means that even though I managed to make the bread on Sunday, this is my first time being able to sit down long enough to write the post.  It also means that I may be able to do the baking challenge a week late, but likely not.  For Cheese I decided to make a cheesy beer bread which I had been planning on making for a while.  

I used a recipe from Cooking light and adapted it slightly to compensate for my laziness.  

Mix 13.5 ounces of all purpose flour, 3 Tablespoons of sugar, 2 teaspoons of baking powder, 1 teaspoon of salt, a shake of black pepper, and a few shakes of garlic powder in a bowl.

Add 1 bottle of hard apple cider and 1 c. of grated cheese.  I used dubliner because it was on sale and I LOVE the stuff :)  Mix until moist and combined.

Spoon into greased 9x 5 loaf pan and pour 1 Tablespoon of melted butter on top.

Bake in a 375 degree oven for 35 minutes.  Pour another Tablespoon of melted butter on top and bake for another 15-25 minutes until deep golden and toothpick in center comes out clean.  

Cooking Week 11- Breakfast Mini Cinnamon Rolls

I wobbled on what exactly to do for this week.  I LOVE breakfast so to pick one is hard, but I finally wound up deciding on these mini cinnamon rolls that I've seen online lately.  I must say, I'm glad I did, they are delicious and easy too!

First you roll out the premade crescent dough (I use Trader Joe's brand) and smush the lines together to make them into 4 rectangles. 

Then you spread butter on them and sprinkle them with cinnamon sugar (I have some premade at all times for cinnamon sugar emergencies).

Roll from the long end to create a cylinder and cut each log into 5 pieces.

Place in a greased mini cupcake pan and bake at 350 for 10 minutes, or follow the baking instructions in the link. 

Whip up the powdered sugar icing in the link (or one one of your own), frost, and eat.  Try not to eat them all! 

Baking Week 11-Savory Potato Bread

Yet another semi-fail from my magazine file.  I grabbed this one from an issue of Cooking Light and I threw out the recipe so I can't tell which one.  It was a prize winning potato bread and staying true to my Irish heritage, I love me some potatoes.  In any and all forms.

I gave this recipe a whirl and while it rose VERY nicely I was somewhat disappointed in the final product. 

It was a little too soft and didn't have enough structure to it.  I also didn't mash my potatoes smooth enough, but that's my fault. 

I think I'll try again with smoother potatoes and a different recipe I think.  Therefore no recipe share.  Find your own with good reviews. ;) 

Baking Week 10: TV inspired Starfleet Combat Rations

Have I revealed myself as a total nerd on here yet?  Cuz I am.  In my quest to watch all of Star Trek, I've been rewatching DS9, which I think is my favorite.  In the episode entitled The Seige (which I will not go into details about so as not to spoil it) Miles O'Brien mentions his love of Starfleet combat rations.  Since I'd been toying around with ideas for this week's baking challenge and simultaneously trying to figure out what snack to make to bring with me on my flight to NYC next week, it was a light bulb moment for me.  I'd make combat rations!  Well in this case granola bars.

I adapted the recipe found here for my preferences and based on the suggestions in the comments.

The honey is in there already because I forgot to take a picture first.

First I mixed 2 c. rolled oats, 1/2 c. brown sugar, 1/2 c. wheat germ, 1 tsp. cinnamon, 1 c. wheat flour, 1/2 c. unsweetened coconut shreds, 1/2 coarsely chopped walnuts, and 3/4 tsp. salt.

Then you make a well in the center and mix in 1/2 c. honey, 1/2 c. oil (I use canola), 1 egg (beaten), and 2 tsp. vanilla.

Pat mixture in a greased 13x 9 pan.  You can see I leave about 2 inches at the end so that my bars are thicker and chewier.

Bake in a preheated 350 degree oven for about 15 minutes, until the edges start to brown.

Cool for 5 minutes then cut and enjoy when you wish.

When telling the boy about my combat ration plan he suggested that I just make him poptarts and pipe the federation symbol on top because he wants everything he eats to be federation approved.  :|  I thought about piping it on the granola bars combat rations I made, but frankly I got too lazy.  I also imagine TRUE combat rations would be a little less sweet and a little more protein-y.

Cooking Week 10: Lord of the Onion Rings

This week's theme is book/movie inspired.  I toyed around with a lot of ideas for the cooking challenge and wasn't particularly happy with any of them.  While talking about my ideas I tossed out Lord of the Onion Rings and its just cheesy enough to thrill me so I went with it.

A quick google of how to make onion rings and I found instructions to try out here.

I cut my onions.

The little bits are drops of batter I used to test the heat of the oil.

Heated up a mix of canola oil and the bacon fat leftover in my skillet.

Made my batter.

Fried the rings on both sides.

And then promptly tossed most of them.  I'm still no good at deep frying things.  I was feeling sick from the grease of the three rings that I ate and they weren't as crispy as they should be.  Perhaps these powerful rings are not meant to be eaten.

Cooking Week 9: Coffee Semi-Fail!

This week's cooking challenge is coffee.  I debated for a while on what to do (I do love coffee) and while I wanted to make an espresso crusted steak, the boy does not eat steak so I didn't want to have to make a second dinner for him.  Instead I decided to make Espresso Crinkles, a cookie recipe in my magazine file from a 2008 issue of Cooking Light.  The cookies were supposed to look like this:

And instead they came out looking like this:

I thought I followed the recipe, but I must have messed something up.  They still taste delicious, and I gave them to my vet's office as a thank you since I've been spending WAY too much time there, but not what they were supposed to be.  Oh well.  If I have the energy this weekend maybe I'll try the steak. 

Baking Week 9: Cookies

I make a lot of cookies.  It's my go-to baking type.  For this challenge I decided to pick a cookie I've been eyeing for a while in my Martha Stewart Cookie book, Grammy's Chocolate Cookies. 

It's so simple, and I maybe should have challenged myself more in the cookie department but I think I've been looking at these cookies and not making them for almost a year now! 

It's a basic mix all the stuff together and chill.

Form it into balls and roll the balls in sugar.

Bake.

Enjoy! 

I have a particular fondness for the style of cookie that is rolled in sugar (or cinnamon sugar) and baked.  It might be the bit of caramelization that you get on the bottom when it bakes that makes it so delicious, but whatever it is, it's awesome.  I gave all of these away so I think I need to make another batch for me!

Craft Fail: Decoupage

I'm wondering if I should just give up on the decoupaging attempts.  This is the second time I've tried a decoupage project to have it fail.  Last time it was design issues.  This time I like the way it looks, but I decoupaged the wrong object. 

I have these plastic partylite clipboards that I thought I could cover up the partylite logo with some pretty decoupage and give them new life. 

I added a full sheet of paper to the back, and decorated it with some flower cricut cuts (and a tiny bit of glitter.  My next step was going to be to add a ribbon to the top but didn't make it that far.

 

Then I covered the front with scrap squares of paper in greens.  It was looking good until a few coats of modge podge later when I realized that it didn't matter how many times I reglued the corners they were still going to peel up.  I give up.  My next decoupage project is a wooden frame, but I just have to wait for my mom to loan me her paints!