Pancakes

It's conference weekend and I love good food to go along with the comforting words.

Today Andrew made his famous pancakes!

Cinnamon Vanilla Pancakes

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder at high altitude (3 1/2 tsp at sea level)

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

1 tablespoon white sugar           1 1/4 cups milk

1 egg

3 tablespoons butter, melted

Directions:

1.         In a large bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and sugar. Make a well in the center and pour in the milk, egg, vanilla, and melted butter; mix until smooth.

2.         Heat a lightly oiled griddle or frying pan over medium high heat. Pour or scoop the batter onto the griddle, using approximately 1/4 cup for each pancake. Brown on both sides and serve hot.

Banana/Persimmon Up-side Down Bread

It's simple, really:

1. Cut up a not-yet-ripe persimmon and mix it with some butter and brown sugar. Lay those out on the bottom of a loaf pan.

Then, make your favorite banana bread recipe. Pour in the batter, and cook as usual. Then upturn the bread and you've got something wonderful and delicious.

Simple as pie...er...banana bread.

Hors d'oeurves: Radish and Salsa Croutons

I just spelled "hors d'oeurves" without looking it up. First time for everything.

Anyhow, a few months ago, Kirsten and I were going to go to an hors d'oeurves party, but then we weren't feeling well, so I had to eat all of these myself. It was tragic.


Radish and Salsa Croutons

Some good, quality bread. Any kind will do.
Garlic
Olive Oil
Greek Yogurt
Cream cheese, or any other soft cheese
Mustard
Radishes

Green Salsa

First, mince some garlic and mix with a small amount of olive oil. Brush the oil on ones side of the bread.

Cut the bread into strips and heat on low in the oven until it is dried out.

While the bread is drying, mix the Greek yogurt and cheese together, in about equal portions. Then season to taste with mustard, salt, and garlic. Really, you could season this any number of ways.

When the bread is done, spread a small amount of the cheese/yogurt mixture on each crouton.

Place a small dollop of salsa in the center of each crouton.

Thinly slice the radishes and cut each slice in half, then gently twist to make the radish helixes, place those on top.

Easy as that, and so delicious.

The yogurt and the salsa will both make the bread a little soggy, so don't decorate these until just before serving, although all the individual parts can be made ahead of time.

Beef Stroganoff

Andrew made this delish dish completely from scratch, he used Amy's (stepmom) recipe as a baseline but of course added a few things here and there. He promised to make me some stroganoff sunday evening right before dinner with Scott and Kirsten, and even after they made stroganoff (completely by chance) as well! Both versions the brothers concocted were spectacular but due to loyalty issues I have to take the side of Andrew, he is my husband after all!

Ingredients Included: 

1/2 onion chopped

2 tbs melted butter

1.5 lb of beef sirloin tip *or any beef really*

Sautee together and add 2 tbs of flour, cook until brown

In a separate pot add:

1/4 cup butter 

8 ounces of fresh mushrooms and 1/2 tsp of dried thyme.

Sautee mushrooms until fragrant *totally the word Andrew used* 

Then add 1/2 cup of flour continually stir until brown. 

2 cups of milk- add more if it seems to thick- then 1 1/2 tsp of chicken bouillon 

and 1/2 tsp of ground onion. 

Add sauteed beef and onion to mushroom mixture, then add 1 1/2 tsp of paprika

and let simmer for 10-15 minutes

in the meantime cook some pasta!

Just before serving stir in 1 cup sour cream 

Pour over noodles add salt and pepper to taste! 

Burnt Walnut Carrot Cake

Written by Andrew- Posted by Laura

This light and fluffy cake would be a great addition to any Easter dinner.


4 large carrots 
2 cups cake flour 
3/4 tsp. baking powder (this is for high altitude, use 2 tsp baking powder and soda at sea level)
3/4 tsp. baking soda 
1 tsp. salt 
1 1/2  tsp. cinnamon 

1/2 tsp. nutmeg

1/2 tsp. allspice

1 1/2 cups sugar 
4 eggs 
1 1/4 cups canola oil 

Grated zest of 1 orange 

Generous amount of vanilla to taste

1 cup walnuts, chopped and then cooked with 1/4 cup sugar until the sugar is melted and the walnuts taste slightly burned 

For the cream cheese frosting: 

1/4 cup butter

12 oz. (1 1/2 packages) cream cheese, at room temperature 

 powered sugar and vanilla to taste

Grate carrots and set aside, then sight the ingredients in order from the flour through the allspice into a medium bowl.  In another bowl mix the sugar through the vanilla.  Beat in the carrots, then fold in the dry ingredients until almost combined, then add 1/2 cup of the walnuts and fold until combined.  Pour into a greased 13" x 9" pan.  Bake at 350 F for 25-30 minutes at high altitude or 35-40 at sea level.  After cake has cooled, spread the mixed frosting onto it and top with remaining walnuts.

Eat lots. 

Green Smoothies in Mason Jars

It works!
I recently saw on pinterest that you can just use a mason jar with your blender so I decided to give it a shot.


Todays smothie consisted of 1/2 green apple, a small mango, some frozen papaya, as much spinach I could stuff into the spaces, and a dash of frozen OJ.

A delicious single serving of green smoothie! It's a bit messy though :)

Honey Cloud Pancakes with Blueberry Syrup

Today I decided to make breakfast in bed for Andrew, but ended up making so much noise that he got up and ultimately started to help.

First I started with a blueberry syrup

1.5 cups of blueberries
1 cup sugar (I would prefer honey, but AJ likes sugar)
3tbs lime juice (you can use lemon too)
1/3 cup water

Bring blueberries to a boil and then let simmer on low until it thickens a bit.

Simply jar the rest!

Now for the Honey Cloud Pancakes, it has a nice ring to it huh?

• 1 large egg and 1 egg white
• 1/4 cup of warmed milk
• 1/4 cup of flour (plain will do, I used 00)
• 1 pinch of salt
• 2 teaspoons of honey
• 1 dash of vanilla extract
• 1 tablespoon of butter
• Soft fruits
• Honey

How to make them:

1. Heat the oven to a little below 400
2. Heat a small 6″ oven proof frying pan
3. In one bowl whisk one egg white until it is white and peaky
4. To make the main batter, in another bowl, mix the the other whole egg with flour, salt, honey, and vanilla then whisk in the warm milk
5. Gently fold the egg white into the batter with a metal spoon
6. Melt one tablespoon of butter in the hot pan
7. Pour the batter in and cook on the hob for a few minutes until starting to set at the very edge
8. Sprinkle some fruit on top if you wish, we decided not to 'cause of the syrup we made.
9. Bake the whole lot in the hot oven for 7 minutes until puffed up and golden
10. Drizzle with honey

I started off with the flour and egg...

Then I freaked out! I've never seen a gross bloody egg before. Andrew insisted we used it but as he was reading something online about how it's perfectly fine and edible I was flushing the thing. 

It pretty much went downhill from there...

 I think I added too much honey.

 It tasted really good- because of the blueberry syrup.

Then I made a meme on indesign! 

I like to think I'm a good cook, but somedays I just don't flow in the kitchen. 

Besos! 

-Lalo