Today is your lucky day! It’s time for Beth Fish‘s Weekend Cooking:

weekend cooking Weekend Cooking   Pesto Meatballs

Weekend Cooking is open to anyone who has any kind of food-related post to share: Book (novel, nonfiction) reviews, cookbook reviews, movie reviews, recipes, random thoughts, gadgets, fabulous quotations, photographs. If your post is even vaguely foodie, feel free to grab the button and link up anytime over the weekend. Please link to your specific post, not your blog’s home page. For more information, see the welcome post.

And I have another recipe from my mom…Graham Cracker Bread. Hamburger and I have been snarfing it down all week.

My mom made this for us a few weeks ago and it was so yummy that I actually made some more. I know! I voluntarily baked something…it’s practically a miracle.

Graham Cracker Brown Bread

Cooking spray
4 teaspoons graham cracker crumbs
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup butter, softened
1 cup graham cracker crumbs
1 large egg
1/3 cup dark molasses
1 cup fat-free buttermilk
1 cup raisins (note from softdrink, who generally hates raisins…use the golden raisins, they’re much better :-) )

Preheat oven to 350°.

Coat an 8 x 4-inch loaf pan with cooking spray; dust with 4 teaspoons crumbs.

Lightly spoon flour into a dry measuring cup; level with a knife. Combine flour, baking soda, nutmeg, and salt in large bowl, stirring with a whisk.

Place butter in a large bowl; beat with a mixer at medium speed until smooth (about 1 minute). Gradually add 1 cup crumbs; beat until well combined (about 2 minutes). Add egg, and beat 1 minute. Add molasses, and beat until well combined.

Beating at low speed, add flour mixture and buttermilk alternately to butter mixture, beginning and ending with flour mixture; beat just until blended. Stir in raisins. Pour batter into prepared pan.

Bake at 350° for 1 hour or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan 15 minutes on a wire rack; remove from pan. Cool completely on wire rack.

Go make some…I promise it’s worth it!
 

weekend cooking Weekend Cooking: Granola

Yes, this is me participating in Weekend Cooking, which is hosted by Beth Fish Reads. I know, it’s a shocker. Despite the fact that I can cook, I really don’t like to. Actually, it’s not so much the cooking that I don’t like, it’s the time spent in the kitchen. But my mom made some yummy granola last month, and I thought I would give her recipe a try. So instead of spending the 4th of July making the more traditional ice cream and apple pie, I made granola.

This is the recipe exactly as my mom emailed it to me. I always get a kick out of her instructions and capitalizations.

Granola

325 oven
1 large or 2 small pans with 1 or 2 inch sides. You have to stir it as it bakes so a cookie sheet is hard because of low sides.
In a large bowl mix
6 C. old fashioned OATS
2 C. blanched or toasted Slivered Almonds (you can use any nuts or seed you want or less if you what less calories)
2 C. Cashew pieces
1 TSP. Salt
1/2 TSP. Cinnamon

In a small sauce pan heat on low just until warm
1/2 C. Honey or (you can use Maple Syrup for less calories or 1/2 each)
1/2 C. Canola Oil
2 1/2 TSP. Vanilla

Pour the Wet over the OAT mixture & toss well. Place in pan or pans & spread out. Bake & STIR every 10-12 MIN. Bake until golden brown. It will take awhile. ADD 1 – 2 CUPS DRIED FRUIT AFTER IT HAS COOLED COMPLETELY. Store in air tight container.

002 300x225 Weekend Cooking: Granola

This recipe makes a lot… I have two of the containers pictured above full of the good stuff. I’m thinking yogurt and granola for lunch.

 

Bethany is encouraging people to post a favorite recipe (and be entered in her giveaway contest for a cookbook), so I thought I would help her pass the word. I’m lazy and cooking is not one of my favorite activities. But I do love to look at recipes and occasionally try new things. So I’m going to give you two recipes. The first is my (and my big brother’s) all time favorite Thanksgiving/Christmas side dish (I’m cheating here, becasue I already had the recipe typed up, so it was easy to post). So, first off, compliments of softdrink’s mom, I give you…

Chile Corn Custard
2 c drained corn, frozen or canned
1 1/2 c melted butter
2 eggs, beaten
1 tsp salt
1 c sour cream
1 c diced jack cheese
1/2 c cornmeal
1 4 oz can diced Ortega chiles
2 tbsp chopped celery (optional)

Mix all ingredients together. Pour into a buttered 1 1/2 qt casserole dish, or a 9×9 pan. (Tip from softdrink’s mom: the shallow pans are better than the round dishes with the higher sides, otherwise the middle doesn’t always cook through.) Bake at 350 degrees for 45 minutes, or until set. Serves 6-8, so you might want to double it if you have lots of people, or kids who fight over the leftovers.

For the second recipe, I’ll just give you the link to the Mexican Chocolate Loaf Cake that I found at Baking Bites. Because there is lots of good stuff over there and you should go visit. The cake is absolutely delicious…I took it to work and it disappeared before noon!

Enjoy!

 

Kate, here is your birthday cake. I know it doesn’t look like much, but I promise it tastes good. If you like chocolate-orange stuff, which you said you do. And no comments on the photo.

100 2447 A birthday cake for KateMexican Chocolate Loaf Cake

1 cup butter, soft
1/2 cup cocoa powder
1 tbsp instant coffee*
3/4 cup water*
2 cups sugar
2 large eggs
1/2 cup buttermilk
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups all purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
zest of one orange

Preheat oven to 350F. Butter or grease a 9×5×3.5-inch loaf pan and dust with cocoa powder, knocking out the excess. Line 4 muffin cups with paper liners.

In a large, microwave-safe bowl, melt the butter. Whisk in cocoa powder until smooth, then add in instant coffee and water, whisking until dissolved. Stir in sugar, followed by the eggs, buttermilk, vanilla extract and orange zest, mixing well after each addition.

In a medium bowl, sift together flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt. Gradually add to cocoa mixture, stirring until just combined.

Using a 1/4 cup measure, fill the four cupcake liners about 3/4 full with batter. Pour the remaining batter into the prepared loaf pan. Bake the cupcakes for 18-22 minutes, until a tester comes out clean. Bake the cake for 55-65 minutes (or longer, if you’re my oven), until a tester comes out clean or with only a few crumbs. Cool in the pans for about 15 minutes, then turn out cupcakes and loaf cake onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Makes 1 loaf cake and 4 cupcakes. Serves 10-12, plus cupcakes for the cook.

*Note: You can omit the instant coffee and use 1/2 cup water with 1/4 cup coffee instead, as the original recipe calls for, if you don’t have instant.

I found this recipe at a blog called Baking Bites, which is full of incredible looking desserts (and other things, but I’m in love with the desserts). I made this cake a few weeks ago and took it to work, and it was gone before noon, which I interpret to mean it tasted good. Either that or everyone was exceptionally hungry that morning.

I also made banana bread. Not for Kate, but for Hamburger.

100 2442 A birthday cake for Kate I have no idea what the banana bread tastes like. I had a few really ripe bananas staring at me, and I figured since I already had made a mess of the kitchen, and Hamburger loves banana muffins/bread/pudding, I might as well go all out and bake two things in one day.

 

I don’t like to cook. There, I said it. Unfortunately, I do like to eat homemade food, and I’m actually a decent cook. Not a great cook, and definitely not a fancy cook, but stuff usually turns out (except when I start reading and forget about something and it burns). HB has pretty basic tastes, too, which mean meals around here are fairly boring. However, a few years ago I found a recipe (I think it was in Real Simple) that he really likes, and it’s different enough that I feel like I’m eating a good meal. Since I didn’t have to work today, and I went to the grocery store, and I took a nap (that’s really not related, but it felt good), I decided to make a real dinner. I have no idea what the name of this is, but it only has three major ingredients, so Chicken stuffed with Olive Tapenade and Feta Cheese is a good name. Totally easy, except for the time it takes to bake. Not that baking is hard, it just takes time we don’t have during the week.

Chicken stuffed with Olive Tapenade and Feta Cheese

Olive tapenade (I use Trader Joes)
Feta cheese (2 of those little plastic containers of the crumbled stuff)
4 chicken breasts
oil
salt and pepper

Mix the olive tapenade together with the feta cheese. Slice the chicken breasts so they look like a piece of pita bread (you know, so there’s a pocket). Stuff them full of the olive/feta mixture. You’ll probably have extra olive/feta mixture. Cook (sear? I don’t know, I don’t do technical terms) the chicken breasts in a pan with some oil (oh yeah, and salt and pepper ‘em) for a few minutes on each side, then transfer to a baking dish (also with some oil in the bottom). If you have extra olive/feta mixture, feel free to put it on top of the chicken breasts before you stick ‘em in the oven, because really, that’s the good stuff. Bake at 350 until done. It’s pretty tasty served with couscous.

This recipe is a good example to my approach to cooking. Lazy measuring, few ingredients, fairly easy prep, and I don’t have to drag out a cookbook or recipe file.

I also made cookies. I know, I can’t believe it either. But my mom made these a few months ago and gave me the recipe. Once again, super easy, and bonus…it doesn’t make tons of cookies, so you won’t be forced to eat 10 dozen.

Flourless Peanut Butter & Chocolate Chip Cookies

1 C. Super Chunky peanut butter
1 C. (packed) brown sugar
1 egg
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. vanilla
1 C. miniature chocolate chips (although trust me, regular size chips taste just as good)

Preheat oven to 350. Mix first 5 ingredients in bowl. Mix in chocolate chips. Using moist hands form a generous 1 Tbsp. dough for each cookie into a ball & arrange 2″ apart on ungreased sheet (my mom and I are lazy bakers and after extensive testing we can both say the scoop and drop method works just fine). Bake until puffed & golden on bottom & still soft to touch in center, about 12 min. Cool on sheet about 5 minutes before placing on rack to completely cool.

Consumer alert: These cookies are really good, but they are also very crumbly.

Sorry, no pictures of either recipe. I’m done in the kitchen for the day, and I’m not going back in, not even for the sake of the blog.

 

My new love

100 1866 My new loveThese are ricotta cookies. I know they don’t look like much, but my whole family fell in love with them tonight.

And yes, I made them with my own two hands. I know that may come as a shock, but I figured since it was Christmas and all, I would bake something. I actually tore myself away from a book for the approximately two hours (that includes the baking time) it took to whip these puppies up. They are probably the easiest cookie I’ve ever made.

Ricotta Cookies

2 cups sugar
1 cup butter, softened
1 (15 oz.) container ricotta cheese
2 teaspoons vanilla
2 large eggs
4 cups all purpose flour
2 Tablespoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt

Icing:
1-1/2 cups powdered sugar
3 Tablespoons cream

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In large bowl, with mixer at low speed, beat sugar and butter until blended. Increase speed to high and beat until light and fluffy (about 5 minutes).

At medium speed, beat in ricotta, vanilla and eggs until well combined.

Add flour, baking powder, and salt; beat until dough forms.

Drop dough by level tablespoons about 2 inches apart onto ungreased cookie sheet. Bake approximately 15 minutes or until cookies are very lightly golden (cookies will be soft). Remove to wire rack to cool. When cookies are cool, prepare icing. Drizzle icing across tops of cookies and immediaely sprinkle with sugar crystals or sprinkles. Allow to dry at least 1 hour, preferably longer. Yield: 6 dozen.