Steakhouse Pizza

23 May

I couldn’t fall asleep tonight, so a blog post it is.

Pizza. Steak. Pizza. Steak. Used to be a tough decision to pick one, right? No longer my friends, these two are combined into a fantastic, delicious, utterly divine concoction. This is another Pioneer Woman recipe, so you wouldn’t expect anything less. Right?!

Try to not drool while watching this pizza come to fruition. There may be a tad bit of drool on my keyboard before I’m done writing. Don’t judge me.

Here we go.

Ingredients:

  • 1 homemade or store bought pizza crust (We used a great store-bought dough, but you can make this from scratch if you’d prefer to be more legit. If you do want a good store-bought  type, look over in the cheese/bagel section, which I know sounds weird. That’s where we found our gem and it was GREAT.)
  • 1 whole skirt steak or flank steak (Big enough to have chunks scattered consistently around your pizza. You don’t want three sad little pieces. Get a new big one.)
  • Salt And pepper, to taste
  • 2 whole red onions, sliced thin (Trust me. This sounds like a lot. It won’t be.)
  • 3 Tablespoons butter
  • 4 Tablespoons balsamic vinegar
  • 1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
  • 2 cups marinara sauce (Plain marinara if you can)
  • 12 ounces, weight fresh mozzarella cheese, sliced thin (Fresh mozzarella if you can!)
  • Shredded parmesan cheese (Yes, this one you want to shred yourself. It’s so much better that way.)
  • 1/2 cup good steak sauce (If you’re a 57 sauce person, A1 person or whatever other steak sauce person, use that. This is where you get to personalize it a bit.)

After seeing that list of ingredients, I hope you’re already trying to keep in the drool. I know I am.

How to Make:

Before you do anything – grab your beverage of choice.The blackberry margarita was the perfect cooking beverage, but you may prefer something different.

Next grab that pizza dough…grab the pan it’s going on (have the debate with yourself of circle or rectangle?) and roll out your dough. I prefer the hand-roll/press method. It helps to throw a little flour on the dough and on your hands as you spread it out on the pan. (Please note I do have my tasty margarita close by.)

Just don’t take your floured hands and wipe them on your dark jeans. Who does that?!

Once you have your dough successfully pressed into the entire pizza pan, you may move to the next task. Onions!

Slice and slice some more. Try to keep them in rings. It’ll look prettier on your pizza than diced pieces would.

While you’re already slicing, slice up your fresh mozzarella. Don’t worry if it falls apart a little bit…it’s all getting melted anyway.

Back to the onions. Once sliced, you’re going to caramelize. Saute them up in your 3 Tbsp of butter and 2 Tbsp of your balsamic vinegar. Cook ’em up over medium-low heat until they look “dark and caramelized” (according to P Dub). This will take just about 10 minutes. Once they’re finished, bring ’em off the heat and set them aside.

If you’re exceptional at multi-tasking, you can grill your steak while the onions are caramelizing themselves. OR, if you have a sous chef like my wondrous SIL Laura, you can have her do this while you watch your onions and stir them, drink your margarita, realize you have flour on your dark jeans and then attempt to wipe them off, drink more margarita, stir the onions. Either method works however. I think you know my preferred method.

We unfortunately didn’t have a working grill, so we used the stove top. It was a great plan B. We cooked the steak until it was medium rare. Set it aside for a few minutes before you slice it up.

Last step before the assembling begins – make your sauce. So, because this is not your ordinary pizza, it doesn’t get an ordinary sauce. Mix your marinara with the Worcestershire and the remaining 2 Tbsp of balsamic vinegar.  Then….spread all that goodness on your awaiting pizza dough.

I was a very poor manager of my cooking surfaces, and resorted to using a chair for this sauce spreading. It happens. The chair worked very well. You must be flexible, right?

You may have a great spreading mechanism, but I’ve learned from a few people that by using the bottom of a large spoon or the bottom of a soup ladle works very well.

Once your dough has been properly sauced, it’s time to layer on your onions. Spread these out into a nice, thick layer. The caramelized onions will have a less stringent ‘onion-y’ taste so don’t stress about the vast quantity of onions. It’ll be delicious. Have faith.

Now you’re going to layer on your slices of mozzarella. Spread those out nicely so that when they melt, it all melts nicely together into one layer of cheesy wondrousness. (That’s not a word, I realize.)

Admire your work. Sip your beverage. Now, lets bake it!

Pizza needs to bake for 12-15 minutes. Look for the mozzarella to be nice and melty and the crust should start to look golden brown.

Now it’s time for steak! (You may have snuck a few pieces prior to this step. No one will know. It’s ok.) Make sure you cut your steak up into edible pieces so when you’re biting into a pizza slice you don’t choke. That would put a damper on the meal.

My brother Doug was very excited about this pizza. Or the steak. Perhaps both.

One more step before you dig in, shred your fresh parmesan all over the top to give the pizza  a nice dusting.

What a beauty this is! Shall we eat?

Before you slice this up, you can pour on your BBQ sauce of choice. We were all so dang hungry, we completely forgot about adding in the sauce. Silly. I partially blame the margarita.

Either way, this pizza is divine. It’s tangy…its got great chunks of delicious meat…melty, perfect cheese and if you’re not forgetful like me, you’ll have the sweet taste of the BBQ sauce intermixed too.

Make some steakhouse pizza tonight!!

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Parmesan Knots

21 May

What a Monday! Gorgeous weather in Minneapolis – car windows down and sundress weather. Country music on the car radio. And the best part of today…grocery shopping!

I don’t believe I’ve shared how much I truly enjoy grocery shopping. I could lazily walk around the aisles in a grocery store for hours. I don’t know why I find it so cathartic, but it is hands down, one of my favorite things to do. I realize that’s a tad bizarre.

For instance, at a work function on Friday we had to do our normal round of introductions (who you are, how long you’ve been with the company etc. etc.) plus a fun fact that no one knows about you, that is memorable. I had to go 2nd and was frantically trying to think of something quirky and memorable. When I stood up, this was the first thing I thought of “I LOVE to grocery shop. Anytime. For anything. Sometimes for nothing at all. I would do it for other people for free, I love to do it so much.” There was a lot of laughter and a few people who harassed me from across the room to do their grocery shopping. It was memorable and it was TRUE. So fun fact for your Monday, I love to grocery shop.

Today was a mighty expensive trip as I was stocking up for the next 10 days at home instead of just a few weekend days. I’ve mentioned before I travel for work, so many times I don’t keep too much food in the fridge as it will usually spoil before I get to it. Today was all about buying lots of vegetables and protein – shrimp, steak, ham and turkey. To get good meat, well, cost a lleeeetttllee bit more than normal. But I’m STOCKED and ready to cook up a storm this week!

So enough about my weirdo tendencies, you’re reading this for FOOD.

Parmesan knots. What are those? Sent straight from heaven these bad boys are. Wow. Simple and mouth-watering. This was the side for the Doug and Laura dinner (thus far I’ve documented the blackberry margaritas and pico de gallo we also had) while I was visiting in Chicago.

I found this off of Pinterest (surprise, surprise). It’s from a great website for tasty, easy dinners. That’s my style. Another good one to explore.

Ready for some knots!?

Ingredients:

  • 1 tube (12 ounces) of refrigerated biscuits ( I used an off-brand but any brand will do – Pillsbury was recommended in the original recipe)
  • 1/4 cup canola oil
  • 3 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese (It’s way tastier when it’s fresh – but if you must, the canned stuff can work too. But my personal challenge to you is to grate your own. Do it.)
  • 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
  • 1 teaspoon dried oregano
  • 1 teaspoon dried parsley flakes

How to Make:

So these look way more complicated and fancy than they actual are. Perfect to make as a bread side dish for any big or small meal where you’d like to do a little bit of impressing. Just a suggestion.

First things first – preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Locate a cookie sheet and spray it with some non-stick spray. Pam is my bff for this task. You may have a different bff.

Take your tube of biscuits and open it up. You’re going to take each of the round biscuits and roll it out into a foot long cylinder.

Once in their cylindrical shape, tie them into a knot…like you would your shoelace. (Unless you tie with two bunny ears, you may struggle.) You just need one “around and through” with these. Tuck the ends under and you’ll have a fancy knot that required 3.2 seconds of effort. Be impressed with your skills. Then tie another one.

Once you’ve finished with your whole tube of biscuits, pop ’em in the oven for 8-10 minutes. You’ll know they’re done with they’re golden on top.

While your biscuits are cooking, mix up your remaining ingredients in a small bowl. When you take the knots out of the oven, you’ll want to put this on right away so the warmth of the biscuits melts this fantastic concoction all over the top. It’s hard to knot lick your fingers while working away. (See what I did there? Ha.) If you have a pastry brush – that works best. Otherwise, drizzle on the sauce with a spoon.

Eat these babies while warm and try to not have two…or three. Seriously, these are so good. And it’s just refrigerated biscuit dough shaped funny. I don’t know why that makes it taste SO. MUCH. BETTER.

Try the recipe and prove me wrong! 🙂

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Pico de Gallo

20 May

This is an extremely easy and tasty recipe to make as an appetizer or snack. I’ve made this many times myself and realized it would a great one to share on the blog.

While visiting my brother Doug and my SIL Laura in Chicago, we had this to munch on while enjoying the blackberry margaritas as we created the remainder of dinner.

If you’re a guacamole person instead of a pico de gallo person, all you have to do is add some avocado and perhaps a little additional lime juice to this pico de gallo and POOF – enter the world’s best guacamole. Ok, maybe it’s not THE best, but it’s pretty darn close.

This is a recipe from my bff – Ree, the Pioneer Woman. That wondrous lady has so many easy and delicious recipes that I make quite a bit. What a genius she is.

Ingredients:

  • 5 whole Roma tomatoes
  • 1/2 of a large white onion
  • 3 whole jalapeño peppers
  • a hearty bunch of cilantro (or for you weirdos out there who think cilantro tastes like soap…you can leave this out. But this MAKES it true pico de gallo. In my opinion. But we don’t want anyone thinking this recipe tastes like soap. So if you’re anti-cilantro…you’re weird…but you can leave it out. And we’ll still like you. Maybe. )
  • Lime Juice (fresh or bottled…whatever is on hand)
  • Salt To Taste

How to Make:

Depending on the ratio you’d like of tomatoes to onions, you can play around with how much you’d really like to use. We made slightly less than the full recipe version Ree created with the ingredient quantities above…with three tomatoes, just under 1/2 of the onion (I like onion, what can I say) and one big and one small jalapeño.

But the best part of this recipe is, all you must do is dice. Dice your little heart out. Well, don’t dice the lime juice or salt, but everything else. Once your dicing is complete, toss everything together in your serving bowl of choice. Sprinkle in the amount of lime juice that you’d like and the same with the salt.

Find some thick and delicious tortilla chips to dip – we used a really thick corn variety from a local Chicago spot. It was perfectly salty and a great compliment to the spice, lime and salt in the pico.

If you need something a little salty, with a good amount of veggies and want something most everyone will dig into and devour quickly – this is the perfect dish.

Grab a chip and dig in!

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Blackberry Margaritas

13 May

I’m baaacck! (Please say that in the voice intended). I realize I’ve been on a bit of a blogging hiatus, my apologies about that. I hadn’t been in the mood to cook or blog in the last few weeks, but I got my groove back last night. Let me explain…

I’m visiting my brother and sister-in-law in Chicago this weekend. My brother Doug just had a birthday and my present to him was to cook up some tasty items over the course of my visit. A total of five items were made last night and I think they all turned out and tasted awesome. The key piece were these babies: blackberry margaritas. Nothing gets you a little excited and a little energized in the kitchen more than a tasty libation – am I right?!

We had the music up, the margaritas in hand, and made a real tasty dinner. That dinner will be shared over the course of the next few blog posts. Get excited. These are things you WILL want to make. I think. (I know.)

I found this recipe on pinterest (where else, right?). The picture was very enticing, plus I’ve had this recent curiosity about blackberries. The pin took me to this wonderful website. This looks like another cooking blog that I must regularly explore!

This recipe has only a few ingredients, but one part involves a little elbow grease. Ready? Lets make some margaritas!

Ingredients (makes 4 servings):

  • 1 cup Tequila (we used José but I’m sure any brand will work just fine)
  • 1 cup blackberry juice (where does one buy blackberry juice? Not sure…so we’re making our own. Read on.)
  • 1/3 cup fresh lime juice (we used bottled lime juice, but you may prefer fresh lime juice)
  • 1/2 cup Cointreau (we used Triple Sec instead – still gives a nice orangey flavor)
  • ice cubes
  • sliced limes (1 lime for every 4 servings would be sufficient)
  • salt

If you don’t have blackberry juice…

  • 2 cartons of blackberries
  • 1 piece of cheesecloth or a fine mesh strainer
  • a potato masher

How to Make:

Ok, so the blackberry juice is the only piece that requires a bit of effort. At the little specialty grocery store we shopped at they didn’t have any blackberry juice. Not sure if a big grocery store has any either. However, I knew that I could use real blackberries and smash/strain the juice instead. So my little creative experiment began.

We used cheesecloth, a strainer (which didn’t have small enough holes to be used on its own), a potato masher and a plate to catch the juice. This was my first experience with cheesecloth and it worked fairly well.

Prior to the mashing, be sure to rinse your blackberries…

Picture this…strainer sits atop a large plate…cheesecloth is draped inside the middle of the strainer…blackberries sit atop the cheesecloth. My sister-in-law Laura is wielding her potato masher and the rest…history. If you can’t picture that – here’s a visual:

Really all we did was mash the berries and press against the bottom of the strainer/cheesecloth bottom as to press the juice out on to the plate. We used two small crates of blackberries which equaled exactly 1 cup of juice.

It was very entertaining and really not as messy as it sounds. When we were finished, we just lifted the cheesecloth and berries right into the garbage. Everything else got rinsed. Success!

Now…add your cup of blackberry juice, Tequila, Cointreau (or Triple Sec if you have it instead) and lime juice to a pitcher. Stir. Stir. Stir! Add in ice cubes and if you want to be fancy…sliced limes. We went the route of slicing the lime into wedges for the edge of our glasses instead. But you could easily put them into the liquid instead. The lime’s green webbing WILL be stained though, just as an FYI.

Grab your margarita drinking receptacles and use lime slices to wet the entire edge of the glass. Pour salt in a flat dish and then take your lime saturated rims and rub them in the salt. Fancy schmancy results. Take your glass, pour in your margarita, pour in any extra ice cubes if needed and garnish with a lime slice. Ta Da!

Cheers!!

 

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Crab Cake Sliders with Pineapple Kiwi Salsa

20 Apr

Crab. Spice. Kiwi. SLIDERS. Need I say much more? Are you in? That’s how I felt. All I needed was to see this picture and I knew it was the perfect dinner for a warm April night.

Similar to the Quinoa Salad I posted yesterday, this has three concoctions that you need to make which all combine to make the most delicious, delectable, mouth-watering sliders. The recipe is from one of my favorite sites – How Sweet It Is. Definitely high on my list of blogs to read every week. Love her blog, recipes, ramblings etc. Love. It. All.

Read it.

Ok, good chat.

Ready to make some crab cakes?!

Ingredients:

For the crab cakes (I halved the original recipe) – makes 4-5 sliders:

  • 1/2 pound lump crabmeat
  • 4 saltine crackers, crushed (I used large, textural multigrain crackers…which was perfect)
  • 1/2 large egg (I know what you’re thinking, but if you crack it in a separate dish and only use roughly half…it works.)
  • 1/2 tablespoon Dijon mustard
  • 1/2 tablespoon plain greek yogurt or mayonnaise (If you go the greek yogurt route I put emphasis on plain yogurt. No vanilla yogurt. That’d be weird)
  • pinch of cayenne pepper
  • salt & pepper to taste
  • 1/2 tablespoon olive oil (for cooking the crab cakes…NOT for mixing in with the crab cakes)
  • 4-5 whole grain slider buns or dinner rolls

For the pineapple kiwi salsa:

  • 1 kiwi, peeled and chopped
  • 1/2 jalapeño, chopped
  • 2 pineapple rings, chopped (I bought a can of pineapple rings – this is the easier route than using an actual pineapple)
  • 2 tablespoons chopped red onion
  • 3 tablespoons chopped fresh cilantro
  • the juice of half a lime (about 1 Tbsp)
  • salt and pepper to taste

For the spicy lime sauce:

  • 1/4 cup plain greek yogurt (Again, no vanilla yogurt. Gross. Just plain.)
  • 1 teaspoon Sriracha sauce (or more if desired)
  • zest of half of a lime
  • juice of half a lime

How to Make:

I worked backwards, making the salsa first, then the sauce and then the crab cakes. I didn’t want any cold crab cakes! That’s just not right. So, salsa first.

Chop up your kiwi, red onion, jalapeño, pineapple rings and cilantro. Toss them all together in a bowl and then douse them with the half of the lime.

Set it off to the side and marvel and how fantastic it looks. Sprinkle with salt and pepper. Perhaps have a taste test. Or two. Or seven.

Now for the sauce! Measure out your plain greek yogurt and pour it into a separate small bowl. Juice the other half of your lime and dribble in your Sriracha sauce. (I am not a huge fan of Sriracha sauce and now have a giant bottle in my refrigerator. If you live nearby, come and grab it. It’s yours. I only needed it for this recipe and have no idea when I’ll ever use up the entire bottle. It will take 27 years. Serious.) Zest your lime and sprinkle it in with the rest of the sauce and stir it all up. I popped this in the refrigerator while we made the crab cakes.

Crab cake time baby. Combine all ingredients except for olive oil (I was a moron and didn’t read the directions and combined this with my ingredients. Don’t be like me. Read the directions.) in a bowl and stir it all up until it’s all thoroughly mixed together. A spatula works best for this task.

Heat up a skillet on medium heat and drizzle in your olive oil. While it’s heating up, form the crab cake mixture into small, thick patties. You should have enough for 4-5  patties. (Note my awesome plate below…it’s from one of my best friends and says ‘big’ and then a picture of a giant smiling cheese. I giggle every time I use it. The end.)

Place them in your skillet and cook until they turn a lovely light golden color. This takes just about 4 minutes on each side. Your kitchen smells just grand at this point. Mmmmm…crab.

Once the sliders are ready to be eaten, put ’em on a plate, grab the salsa and sauce and begin assembling!

I slathered the sauce on both top and bottom buns and then placed the salsa in a nice, round heap on top of the crab cake patty. Bun on top and you are about to taste heaven.

Mmmmmmm….

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Blueberry & Mango Quinoa Salad

19 Apr

Have you ever had quinoa (pronounced keen-wah)?! I never had, but have been hearing about it for quite some time. It’s usually in any list of ‘super foods’ due to its many health and nutritional benefits. But what are those benefits and why is quinoa so great?!?

Get this…it has twice the protein of rice. Wow! It also has all nine essential amino acids, contains vitamin B12, B6 and E, magnesium, iron and zinc. It’s also high in dietary fiber AND….it’s not technically a grain (no gluten in those seeds!) so those gluten-free can still enjoy these tasty little guys.

I found all of these fun facts in my Power Foods cookbook. It also has tons of quinoa recipes which I’ll need to start trying out! The cookbook has both delicious recipes and fantastic photos so I highly recommend it to anyone who wants to start cooking healthy but is not into giving up taste. (Here, here!)

So, enough on the health lesson, quinoa is good for you but how does it taste? Similar to a rice or couscous, it’s all about how you cook it. I found a delicious looking recipe on pinterest that caught my eye and gave me the incentive I needed to buy and eat quinoa for the first time.

The pin took me to a great vegetarian blog, Veggie Belly,  that I encourage you all to look through, no matter if you’re a vegetarian or not. If this recipe is any indication of the taste of her other recipes, it’s bound to be a great site to explore.

Here we go…let the quinoa experiment begin!

Ingredients:

I didn’t alter the ingredients from the original recipe at all, so below is exact wording from Veggie Belly in all aspects of the ingredients and amounts. There are three separate things to make for this salad, broken down below by the ingredients needed for each:

For the quinoa
1/2 cup quinoa
1 cup water

For the fruits and veggies
½ cup fresh blueberries
½ cup cubed ripe mangoes
½ cup cubed cucumbers
1/2 tablespoon dried cranberries

For the lemon basil dressing
1½ tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
2 tablespoons lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon lemon zest
10 Basil leaves, chopped finely
Salt and pepper

How to Make:

Combine the quinoa and water in a skillet and bring it up to a boil.

I had mine at medium/medium high heat. Once it’s boiling, reduce the heat and cover. I had mine moved down to low heat for this. You’re going to now let it simmer for just about 15 minutes. You’ll know it’s ready to go when you lift up the lid and all that you see is quinoa and no water. You’ll then “fluff the quinoa” according to Veggie Belly – aka – stir it up from where it’s set in on the bottom of the skillet. You can let it cool completely or eat it slightly warm if you’d like too.

While you’re waiting for the 15 minutes of simmering time to pass…instead of the usual distractions of Hulu, making your bed or pinteresting (maybe that’s just me that does those things while killing time?!), you’ll want to chop your fruits and veggie.

Now, I had absolutely no idea how to slice a mango. As you can see, it was a day full of new experiences for me. You may be well-versed in mango slicing and can then skip this next piece. My sous chef for the day shared some wisdom about how this is done properly. Slice the mango the long way, on either side of the long, skinny pit. For each side you sliced off, you can then cube it as my super, expert sous chef does in the pictures below. We then decided the leftover middle chunk left around the pit was best for gnawing at instead of trying to also cube it for the salad. But up to you and how you like to use all parts of your mango.

Ok, I expect you know how to cube the cucumber and well, the blueberries just have to be measured. Combine those three things (and I even threw in the dried cranberries too) in a small bowl and refrigerate until you’re ready to add them to the quinoa.

Last step – the dressing. Add your lemon juice, lemon zest and olive oil to a small bowl.

Chop up the basil – which I do by rolling the leaves all up together and the chopping them all at once. Add your basil to the rest of the dressing and set it aside until you’re ready.

We were eating immediately and were doing so by the lake I live by. We plopped all three mixtures into little Tupperware containers and then once we got to our designated eating location, mixed everything up together in two bowls, one for each of us.

If you’re a person who likes only a bit of dressing, you don’t have to add it all. We used about 91% of it though (It was yummy and I couldn’t resist. At all.) and I didn’t find it too liquidy or oily in the slightest.

This was perfect for a light lunch for two – great for any Spring or Summer day.

Let me know what you think of the quinoa – I liked it and am looking forward to trying another recipe with it soon!

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White Sangria

15 Apr

This is the last of the Easter posts and a short one at that. No fear though, short or wordy, all posts are still worthwhile of you reading. 🙂 There are plenty of other posts ready to be written after these Easter posts too, don’t you worry about that!

We hosted a larger group than normal at the Vose house for our Easter this year, and instead of offering our normal array of wine, beer and pop, I thought it’d be fun to add an additional ‘fun’ drink for everyone to enjoy prior to our mid-afternoon dinner.

I’ve made this once before for a bunch of my girlfriends – and that version I made the way the original recipe was written. This new version was created out of lack of pomegranate seeds and using the selection of alcohol available. I think white sangria can truly be a great experiment for anyone and you can throw in different fruits and liquids until you’ve found the concoction that suits you and your guests.

I found the recipe on Pinterest and it caught my eye because it was so pretty. It’s always more fun to serve a fancy beverage when it looks as great as it tastes, right?! The pin took me to this website (which I can’t wait to explore more!) and the recipe below:

Ingredients:

  • 1 bottle white wine (I used a different variety for the two times I made it and even for the different batches I made at both occasions. So, just pick a white wine that you like best.)
  • 3 cans 7up or Sprite (The first time I made this I had extra ginger ale leftover from another recipe…it works just as well if you don’t have 7up or Sprite on hand)
  • A splash of Grand Marnier (I didn’t have any for the Easter crew, so we used Triple Sec instead and I think it worked just fine as a substitute)
  • Seeds of 1 pomegranate (We couldn’t find a pomegranate or any seeds in the Mankato grocery store, so we got creative and used frozen strawberries to be consistent with the pop of red color. However, highly recommend using pomegranate seeds if you can find them!)
  • Two limes, sliced
  • Ice cubes
  • (For the Easter version, as we lacked pomegranate seeds, we used a splash of pomegranate juice…just so that subtle flavor was still in the mixture…but not necessary to include this if you in fact find the seeds.)

How to Make:

Ready for it??!? All you must do…mix everything together in one large punch bowl or glass pitcher. (Well, I do hope you slice up your limes first and if you do happen upon a pomegranate, seed it and then transfer the seeds into your concoction. However, it all ends up mixed together to create one pretty and one very tasty libation.)

A few recommendations, beyond the ingredient substitutes above…

  • I do recommend using either a clear bowl or pitcher – this is too pretty to not have on display.
  • Don’t forget to pour extra ice in as needed to keep it cool (Disregard I didn’t add ice yet to the pitcher in the pictures above…I did add that right after. I solemnly swear).
  • You may need two pitchers to house all the liquid, as for us at least, we didn’t have one pitcher quite big enough and the 4th of July themed punch bowl just didn’t seem suited to Easter with its American Flag design. So, no worries if you have a ‘back-up’ pitcher in the fridge while the other is out for your guests.

Enjoy (and don’t forget to enjoy the pomegranate seeds or frozen fruit substitute too)!

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PB&J Potato Chip Thumbprint Cookies

14 Apr

Were you the cool kid who put potato chips on your peanut butter and jelly sandwich? I bet you were! There’s just something great about the mix of the sweet jam and the salty chips…not to mention a nice, satisfying crunch every bite would create.

However, if you’re thinking – what the heck!? Chips and PB&J? Who ARE you?! I hope you take second to gather yourself, and then read on. These are cookies that bring the best of the sweet and salty worlds together and I sincerely believe you’ll like them. I made them over Easter and my sample group of friends and family (who are extremely blunt) told me they were very tasty. I even doubled checked with a few to be sure they weren’t ‘just being nice’. I wouldn’t dare blog about a recipe unless it would be delicious for YOU to try!

When the results were in – these were a winner. They’re not hard to make, but are more fun when you have sous chefs or visitors to chat with while making. You’ll see what I mean.

This is a recipe from a blog I LOVE to read – Spoon Fork Bacon. They have it all with great pictures, tasty recipes and my kind of humor.

Ok – lets get to the cookies:

Ingredients:

  • 1/2 cup butter
  • 1/2 cup sugar
  • 1/3 cup light brown sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1 1/2 cups flour
  • 3/4 teaspoons baking soda
  • 1/8 teaspoon salt
  • 2/3 cup creamy peanut butter (I don’t think crunchy would work as well for baking, but if you’re a rebel, give it a go!)
  • 1 egg white, lightly beaten
  • 2 cups potato chips, crushed (pop the chips into a Ziplic and pound them onto the counter top or roll on top of them with a rolling pin. Or find other demolition possibilities.)
  • ½ cup jam of your choice (I used a classic [in my opinion] – strawberry. Go with your favorite PB&J jam flavor and I’m sure it’ll be an excellent choice.)

How to Make:

Preheat your oven to 375. Don’t forget this step! (We all know I tend to do that. Oopie.)

Grab your hand mixer (if you’re a sad person like me) or a stand mixer (if you’re one of THOSE people…yes, yes we know I want to BE one of THOSE people…) and cream your butter. I highly recommend you don’t attempt to cream together very cold butter. That would be a rookie mistake right?!? Who does that?! I’m sure you see where this is going…don’t be like me. Work with warm, room temp butter or if needed, pop it into the microwave for a few seconds to soften it up. Butter creams so much better when it’s not cold. (Your butter should not be clumpy like my cold butter in the pic below. I did microwave it a bit after this pic and it actually ‘creamed’ instead of ‘clumped’ after that.)

Add in both of your sugars and cream those in with the butter (I was a space cadet and just added the white sugar…as you’ll see in the pictures. Don’t worry, I did eventually come to my senses and add in the brown sugar. But avoid this moment by just adding in both at the right moment.)  This will take you approximately 3 minutes to cream everything together.

Add in the 1 whole egg (save the 1 egg white for later) and vanilla. Keep up the mixing so these two new ingredients are thoroughly mixed in there.

Grab yourself another bowl and “sift together” (Those are the words of gals on Spoon Fork Bacon. I don’t sift due to lack of sifter and just mixed in all ingredients like normal. If you want authentic cookies as SFB describes…sift your little heart out.) your flour, baking soda and salt.

Once it’s all mixed together well – add it  into your other ingredients and stir it all up to combine, just right. At this point add the PB and make sure it’s thoroughly mixed in. You don’t want any cookies to not have the proper PB taste…so mix well people!

Now, the fun part! Find a little bowl for your egg white – this will be station #2. Put your crushed chips out on a cutting board or a big plate – this will be station #3. Spray your cookie sheet with some Pam and lay it nearby – this will be station #4. Ready?

Roll your dough into a ball (station #1)…

…drop into the egg white (station #2)… [ignore the terrible pic…I’m posting just to show what station #2 looks like]

…then pull it out and roll it in potato chips (station #3) … (the below pic is like ‘Where’s Waldo’ except it’s ‘Where’s the Cookie’?)

then place it on your baking sheet (station #4). Rinse, repeat. Oh wait, that’s something else. You know what I mean…repeat until you have 12-15 balls on your baking sheet. Make sure they’re all evenly spaced (laying them in a 3×4 or 3×5 pattern works best I think).

Now for the finishing touch – find your pinkie finger…the left one…or the right one…or your Mom’s…doesn’t matter. Gently press the pinkie into the center of each cookie ball. Now, they’re oven ready!

Put them in the oven for 12-15 minutes. With the egg white coating, you’ll know they’re done when they start to get that golden hue on top. When I pulled out my first batch, the little pinkie prints hadn’t remained as imprinted as I would have liked, so I just went through and gently pressed each one back down again. No fear if this happens to you too!

Place the cookies on a cooling rack or cutting board until they’re cooled completely.

Once they have, NOW is the time for the jam! Fill each cookie with a small amount of jam, just enough to fill up the pinkie indent. Let them sit with their jam filled tops for about an hour, so they can ‘set’ as best as they can. We covered them in Saran wrap (as these were made the night before Easter) and the jam sticks just a bit to the top of the  plastic. But make sure to leave them out for about an hour before wrapping – that should help.

Fill up a glass of milk…grab a cookie (or two!) and enjoy the goodness of sweet/salty heaven. 🙂

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Mustard Sauce

12 Apr

Ok, before you cringe and make a face and wonder what in the WORLD mustard sauce is….I encourage you to take  a deep breath and read on. It’s delicious and the perfect condiment for your Easter ham. To be fair, as a little kid, this was not my favorite recipe. I wasn’t a big mustard person. But I had one of those food epiphanies about mustard (also had a similar experience with countless other fantastic foods with a list too long to put in a blog post…) and I encourage anyone to give this a try. Even if you look at mustard and go “meh”…this isn’t so overwhelmingly mustardy and it’s the perfect tang to go with a juicy ham. Just try it. Ok? You promise? Ok!

This is actually similar to a hollandaise sauce in that there’s butter involved and you do a lot of stirring. Put on some music, some Downton Abbey, or make sure you have other folks in the kitchen to harass while stirring. That’s how I cope. You may have a different coping mechanism.

Ingredients:

  • 4 Tbsp dry mustard
  • 1/2 c. of sugar
  • 2 eggs
  • 1/2 c. milk (skim if you’re a cool kid…just putting that out there)
  • 1/2 c. vinegar
  • Butter the size of an egg. (Really. The size of an egg. This is as the recipe dictates. No more, no less. Egg size.)
How to Make:
Add your dry mustard and sugar together in a medium-sized mixing bowl until they’re thoroughly intermingled. Otherwise known as ‘mixed’. I like using other words. As you’re probably well aware.

Moving on! Take your two eggs and beat them! (Not like that.) Beat them until you’re satisfied they can’t be beaten anymore…and then add them to your mustard/sugar concoction. (I hope your egg beater is as hysterical as this one.)

Now add in the milk and vinegar. Stir…stir…stir.

Now…the butter. I know, the size of an egg?! What?! So I grabbed an egg and measured. It’s ABOUT 3.5 Tbsp of butter – as you can see in my picture. Perhaps you have bigger or smaller eggs, but I’d say 3.5 Tbsp should be approximately correct. I sliced up the butter into small pieces to aid in the melting/boiling process.

Pour your mixture into a saucepan and bring it to a boil on low/medium heat. You cannot stop stirring. CANNOT! Ok, perhaps to scratch your nose or give a high five…but that’s it. No excuses. Stir baby stir!

When it comes to a full boil, give it about 20 or so seconds before removing it from the heat and letting it cool to room temperature. You’ll see that the sauce has really thickened up at this point and it smells pretty dang good. If you’re into buttery mustard (Which I think you will be after tasting it…if you aren’t already).

We pour this into a gravy boat for serving and keep in the refrigerator prior to and after serving if needed. It can be reheated easily prior to eating and can be served warm or cold. It does only keep well for a day or so, but we usually go through the majority at Easter dinner (which usually involves 4-7 hearty servings total). Unless it’s just you enjoying this sauce all by your lonesome, you shouldn’t have too much leftover.

I hope you give it a try! It’s delicious with ham, but could be great with a chicken breast too I suppose.

Please let me know what you think if you do try this or any of the other recipes I’ve posted thus far! I love to hear your comments (even if they’re making fun of me…I can take it)!

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Esther’s Lemon Poppyseed Bread

8 Apr

Back to a “Vose Favorite” recipe – this is my great-grandma Esther’s recipe…one of my holiday favorites. We have this bread at Christmas and Easter, almost every year. It’s always a hit – I don’t think there’s anyone who doesn’t like it (at least in my family). You can see the recipe card has gotten some use over the years!

It’s quick and simple to whip up too, usually made the night before the day of the ‘big meal’.

Ingredients: (Makes 2 loaves)

  • 1 package of Duncan Hines lemon cake mix (this is the brand we usually use, but I’m sure any brand would do…as you can see it was Betty Crocker this time)
  • 1 package of instant lemon pudding (make sure it’s instant!)
  • 4 eggs (yes, 4)
  • 1 cup of hot water (not warm, not scalding, but hot)
  • 1/2 cup Crisco oil (I used vegetable oil and you could too…unless you’re really into Crisco.)
  • 1/4 cup poppyseeds (This is one entire thing of the small 1.25 oz containers)
  • 1/4 cup chopped nuts (I used walnuts – but experiment with whatever you’d like!)

How to Make:

Preheat that oven to 350 and then locate your hand mixer or if you’re extra special, electric mixer. (Again, very very very very jealous if you have the latter.) You are going to mix up everything (yes, even the nuts).

You’re going to mix everything for 4 minutes. Little arm workout in for those of us without the fancy schmancy electric mixer. (I had to find a bigger bowl because I was a moron and used a little, small one. Mom kindly suggested I use a bigger bowl to mix in. She’s so smart.)

Grab your two pans and spray them with Pam or rub them down with vegetable oil. Sprinkle flour into the pans and get all sides and the bottom coated in flour.

Pour your batter evenly amongst the two pans…even if you have two pans that aren’t quite the same size, like me. You want everything to cook evenly in the oven!

Try to restrain yourself from taste testing the batter….it’s soooooo tasty. But there are raw eggs in there, so it’s probably not a good idea.

Put the timer on 40 minutes, pulling the bread out to test for doneness at that time. It may need a few more minutes if your toothpick/wooden skewer/other doneness-testing device doesn’t come out clean from the top of the bread.

Here’s before the oven:

Once your breads are done, let them cool for a few minutes in the pans. Then gently slide them out to cool on a wire cooling rack or cutting board to finish cooling completely.

Here’s a slice, cooled and ready to be enjoyed. This is a perfect bread for holidays – easy to make ahead of time and it seems somewhat fancy, which is ideal for a festive occasion! It’s also extremely good to boot. Just sayin. 🙂

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