Peanut Butter Sauce

Just because you need another delicious topping for ice cream! This peanut butter sauce was unbelievably good!
1 cup packed brown sugar
1/2 cup light corn syrup
3 Tbsp butter
1 cup peanut butter
1/2 cup evaporated milk

Combine brown sugar, corn syrup, butter, and salt in a small saucepan. Bring to a boil, stirring occasionally. Add peanut butter and stir till smooth. Stir in evaporated milk. Serve warm over ice cream. Sprinkle with peanuts if desired. Cover and store leftovers in refrigerator.

S’more Brownies

Pat traded a batch of ooey gooey brownies for a gym pass…  I know, go figure.  Anyway, these are the brownies he came up with…  S’more Brownies.  If you are looking for a pan filled with a days worth of calories… this is your ticket.  They were so good!!!  He just baked a pan of brownies according to the directions of the box.  Then he topped them with marshmallows, chocolate chips and crumbled up graham crackers.  He then put the pan back in the oven under the broiler to melt and brown the marshmallows.  Oh.  My.  We had to hurry and take a picture before they were devoured!  I mean… look at the smile on Claire’s face as she eats her piece.  That says it all. 

Lemon Strawberry Sorbet

Last Sorbet Recipe! I promise! This one was good, but it tasted a lot like freezer strawberry jam. A little too similar.

We ranked our favorite sorbets tonight and surprisingly, this is how they ranked:

#1 - Lemon Sorbet

#2 - Raspberry Sorbet

#3 - This one (Strawberry Sorbet)

Here's the recipe:

Strawberry Sorbet

1 lemon, seeded and roughly chopped

2 cups sugar
2 pounds strawberries, hulled
Juice of 1 to 2 lemons

1. Place the chopped lemon and sugar in a food processor, and pulse until combined. Transfer to a bowl.
2. Puree the strawberries in a food processor, and add to the lemon mixture, along with the juice of 1 lemon. Taste and add more juice as desired. The lemon flavor should be intense but should not overpower the strawberries. Pour the mixture into an ice cream machine and churn until frozen.

Chocolate Sorbet

I'm currently on a huge sorbet kick! I love it! Especially Raspberry! Actually, maybe I'm just in love with my new ice cream maker. So far, we've made homemade ice cream and sorbet at least a dozen times! Recently, I tried coconut sorbet, which was good and thick and creamy, but nothing to write home about (or post on a blog). So, when I saw this chocolate sorbet, I had to try it!

Oh, and I wanted it to be soooo good. I mean, it's chocolate! How can it not be great? I even took lots of photos to document this dessert. But when I tried the finished product it left me wanting to eat something else and not something with chocolate in it.

It's made from a lot of semisweet chocolate and unsweetened cocoa powder. Because it's sorbet it does NOT have any milk in it. So there it is. I should have known I wasn't going to be in love with it. Semisweet chocolate and no milk. It tastes just like it sounds. Don't get me wrong. It tastes very chocolatey. Just the wrong kind of chocolate.

Chocolate Sorbet

2 1/4 cups (555 ml) water

1 cup (200 g) sugar
3/4 cup (75 g) unsweetened cocoa powder
Pinch of salt
6 ounces (170 g) bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, finely chopped
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract

In a large saucepan (yes, you must use a large one or it will bubble over. Trust me.), whisk together 1 1/2 cups (375 ml) of the water with the sugar, cocoa powder, and salt. Bring to a boil, whisking frequently. Let it boil, continuing to whisk, for 45 seconds.

Remove from the heat and stir in the chocolate until it’s melted, then stir in the vanilla extract and the remaining 3/4 cup (180 ml) water. Transfer the mixture to a blender and blend for 15 seconds.

Chill the mixture thoroughly, then freeze it in your ice cream maker according to the manufacturer’s instructions. If the mixture has become too thick to pour into your machine, whisk it vigorously to thin it out. 

*Recipe from one of my favorite cooking blogs, Smitten Kitchen.

Raspberry Sorbet

Holy Cow! This was amazing!! I know that by telling you how much I absolutely loved this, that I'll be setting your expectations super high; but I think that this recipe will totally live up to it's expectations. It was so delicious!!

Forget that Lemon Sorbet recipe I gave you a while ago. It's no good. You are only going to want to make this Raspberry Sorbet every week from now until eternity! Wowza!

I made this in my ice cream maker, but if you don't have one, you could probably make this similarly to the instructions for lemon sorbet.

Makes 5 cups (ten 1/2 cup servings)

• 2 cups water
• 1 1/2 cups sugar

Prepare a simple syrup with the water and sugar by combining both in a saucepan set on medium low heat. Cook until sugar is fully dissolved.

• pinch of salt
• 4 cups frozen raspberries, thawed

Add the raspberries and salt. 

Blend until smooth. Strain the mixture (half at a time) through a fine mesh strainer to remove the seeds. Use a spatula to help. Cover and refrigerate 2-3 hours (or overnight).

 

Pour into ice cream maker and let mix until thickened. (about 15-20 minutes). Serve!

Brownie Volcano!

The other day to celebrate summer ending, we headed to the Rainforest Café. During dinner we discussed their dessert – the Volcano. It looks something like this.

 

It was $15. With tax and tip, we’d be up to almost $20 for dessert. So, we decided to make one at home. Ourselves. Here’s how ours looked. Yup. We even put a sparkler on top. Or two.

Here’s how I made it.

Ingredients:

• Box of Brownie mix
• Vanilla Bean Ice Cream
• Hershey’s Chocolate Sauce
• Sparkler. Or Two.

This is pretty self-explanatory, but here it goes. I made the brownies in an 8x8 pan. I let them cool and then sliced them in half. I put the two pieces on a plate in the freezer for about half an hour. or until they were a little firm. Then I took the 4x8 piece of brownie, set it on it’s side and cut in into 2 wedges by slicing lengthwise. I repeated this with the other side. Now, I have 4 brownie wedges. I put these back in the freezer for an hour until they were firm enough to work with.

When the brownie wedges were firm enough, I got out a plate and piled up 3 scoops of ice cream. One on top of the other.  Then I leaned three of the pieces against the ice cream, building the sides of the volcano. I put the thickest part down on the plate as the base. One more scoop of ice cream topped it off. Then I poured Hershey’s Syrup all over it and stuck in my Sparkler. We were ready to rock n’ roll!

Pass out spoons and enjoy!

I know the brownie cutting is hard to understand. Let me know if you have any questions.

Want To Try Something Crazy?

Today I made this.

But this isn't a lime pie. Or a vanilla pudding pie with some green dye. It's an Avocado Pie. Yup. You read it right. Avocado. These babies:

And it was so yummy. Yup. Yummy. Happy Saint Patrick’s Day! {Yes, I know it’s not April Fools Day. This really isn’t a joke.}

Here’s how you can take a trip to Crazyville as well. {This is a better photo than mine, since I have no sunlight at my house.}

 

Ingredients
2 peeled avocados
½ cup fresh lemon juice
14 oz. can sweetened condensed milk
9" graham cracker crust
whipped cream

Instructions
In a blender put the peeled avocado and ½ cup lemon juice. Pulse a couple of times. Add condensed milk and blend till creamy. Pour into the pie shell and refrigerate for 1 hour. Add whipped cream when serving.

gluten free... no problem

As you all know, I was very nervous about cooking for Laurie with her diet restrictions, so I did some creative cooking. We love our holiday pies, and I found a receipe for pie crust without flour. Here is a Banana Cream Pie with the new crust. I think this is a great option. Rice Krispy Treat Crust. This one was butter, melted chocolate chips and Rice Krispies. I also think the marshmellow treat kind would be a great option as well... maybe better. Just line your pie dish with the treat and add your pie filling.

Monkey Bread

INGREDIENTS

1/2cup granulated sugar

1teaspoon cinnamon

2cans (16.3 oz each) Pillsbury® Grands!® Homestyle refrigerated buttermilk biscuits

1cup firmly packed brown sugar

3/4cup butter or margarine, melted

( I DOUBLED THIS)

DIRECTIONS

1. Heat oven to 350°F. Lightly grease 12-cup fluted tube pan with shortening or cooking spray. In large -storage plastic food bag, mix granulated sugar and cinnamon.

2. Separate dough into 16 biscuits; cut each into quarters. Shake in bag to coat. Arrange in pan

3. In small bowl, mix brown sugar and butter; pour over biscuit pieces.

4. Bake 28 to 32 minutes or until golden brown and no longer doughy in center. Cool in pan 10 minutes. Turn upside down onto serving plate; pull apart to serve. Serve warm.

"Homemade" Donuts

I made these yesterday. They were so much better then any time I have ever made donuts. I think it is because I bought the Pillsbury Buttermilk Biscuits.

(Fried in Veg. Oil on low heat)

Alma came home and was like WHOA they are so much better then any other time I made them.

The powder sugar made like a glaze on them, and i just cut them in forths and I did not roll them. I left them fluffy, I think that made them better. And NUTELLA on them... yum.

Enjoy!

Sweet Potato Casserole

Since Thanksgiving is coming up (and we already had a trial run) I am listing my favorite recipes, just in case you want them. So – let the Thanksgiving Baking commence!

Sweet Potato Casserole
Sweet Potatoes {approx. 4 cups} -bake at 350 for 1 hour. Peel.
½ cup sugar
2 eggs
½ tsp salt
4 Tbs butter
½ cup milk
½ tsp vanilla
Mix together with an electric mixer. Pour into a 9x13” pan. Mix topping ingredients (below) in a bowl and sprinkle on top.
½ cup packed brown sugar
1/3 cup flour
3 Tbs butter
½ cup pecans, chopped
Bake at 325 for 30 minutes.

Cookie Bars

I can't be the only one not to post... Even though I was the last one. So here is a Pato recipe for you. We got tired of having to bake so many trays of cookies, so we decided to make cookie bars. A big hit at our house.

Disclaimer: Pato rarely uses recipes and he slightly changes the ingredients pretty much every time; but here is the base recipe.

3/4 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup white sugar
1/2 cup butter (one stick)
1/2 cup shortening
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups flour
1 cup oats
1tsp salt
1tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder (if you feel like it, it's not necessary)
Chocolate chips (we mix in a few butterscotch chips sometimes too)

Standard cookie recipe here. Cream butter, shortening and sugar. Add eggs and mix. Add dry ingredients and mix. Tip: Mix in the chocolate chips by hand, a Kitchen aid will just smoosh them between the bowl and the mixing paddle. Take a small portion of the dough and give to any kids that helped.

Baking: This is where the fun begins. We have a convection oven and Pat cooks it at 320 degrees for about 25-28 minutes, depending on how it looks. I'm guessing that for a regular oven you could put the temp to 325 degrees and bake it for about 32-35 minutes or so (pull it out earlier if it burns).

Voila!! Cookie bars.

Lemon Sorbet

This year instead of cake, Jayna wanted Lemon Sorbet for her birthday dessert. And who could blame her? This tastes like a refreshing, frozen lemonade. It takes a few hours to freeze, but only a few minutes to whip up nice and creamy. With only 3 ingredients, you probably have everything to make this right now.

3 cups sugar

5 cups boiling water
2 cups lemon juice

Combine sugar and water, stirring until sugar dissolves. Stir in lemon juice. Pour into a shallow pan (I use a 9x13) and freeze overnight. {Since there's alot of sugar, it won't freeze completely hard.} When frozen put chunks into a food processor or blender and blend until fluffy. You can serve it now, or refreeze. Makes about 8 cups.

UPDATE: We have started using our ice cream maker to make this in, and it has turned out better than ever! 

Chocolate Chocolate Chip Poundcake

Cake:

Chocolate Cake Mix + 3 T. flour
4 eggs
3/4 cup hot water
3/4 cup oil
1 sm pkg instant chocolate pudding
1 cup sour cream
6 oz chocolate chips


Blend all ingredients except sour cream and chocolate chips at medium speed for 4 minutes.
Add sour cream and chocolate chips. Pour into greased bundt pan Bake at 375 for 45 -50 minutes.


Glaze:

1/4 cup cocoa
3 T. water
2 T. shortening
3 T. light corn syrup
2 cups Powdered Sugar
1/4 tsp vanilla



Combine cocoa, water, shortening and corn syrup in medium sauce pan. Stir over low heat until shortening melts and mixture is smooth. Remove from heat and beat in sugar and vanilla. Drizzle (or spread) over cake.

Jessie's Chocolate Chip Cookies

I thought I'd make a recipe card for Jessie's cookies. If you click on it, you should be able to read it better or print it. {Just an experiment. I won't be doing this with other recipes I post.} But I can send you the blank template and you can use them to print your recipes on if you want.

Hello Dollies

2 cups graham cracker crumbs
1/4 cup white sugar
1/2 cup butter, melted
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
1 cup flaked coconut
1 cup chopped pecans
1 (14 ounce) can sweetened condensed milk

Preheat oven to 325 degrees F

Combine the graham cracker crumbs, sugar and melted butter. Press into the bottom of an 9x9 inch baking pan. Layer the chocolate chips, coconut and pecans over the crumbs. Pour the sweetened condensed milk over the top.

Bake for 25 to 30 minutes. Let cool and cut into squares.