A shameless non food plug!

Those of you who know me in real life know that my husband is an artist, a darn good one if I do say so.  I’m a little biased though.  If you read his review of Starbuck’s new instant coffee a few weeks ago you might have seen his website with his art and his own blog, King Sheep Productions.

I recently showed him the fabulous site called Etsy, with all it’s hand made goodness, and encouraged him to put up some of his art work.  He will also have some drawings that his sister has done on the site soon, too.  If you’re curious, go check it out here.

Support your local artist!

Enjoy!

Self Frosting Nutella Cupcakes

I was in the mood for cupcakes and I remembered seeing  a recipe for Nutella cupcakes in my Google Reader.  I decided that would be the perfect way to use up some more of the large container of Nutella we have in the kitchen.  I sent a shout out to the ladies on The Nest and one person suggested buying a yellow cake mix and adding the Nutella into the cups of batter.  Someone else sent me over to Baking Bites.  Wow!  There is some wonderful stuff on that site!  Go look! I’m going to make some apple muffins from the site too.

I had forgotten how easy it is to make cupcakes or cake for that matter from scratch.  I will making more cupcakes from scratch again very soon!   My husband has a birhtday coming in May.  Hmm!  Enjoy!  These came together quite easily and you don’t even have to bother with frosting them.

Nutella Frosted Cupcakes

source: Baking Bites

10 tbsp(140 grams) butter, softened
3/4 cup white sugar
3 eggs
1/2 tsp vanilla
1 3/4 cups (200 grams) sifted all purpose flour
1/4 tsp salt
2 tsp baking powder
Nutella, approx. 1/3 cup

Directions:

Preheat oven to 325F. Line 12 muffin tins with paper liners.

Cream together butter and sugar until light, 2 minutes. Add in eggs one at a time, until fully incorporated. Don’t worry if the batter doesn’t look smooth. Add vanilla. Stir in flour, salt and baking powder until batter is uniform and no flour remains.
Using an ice cream scoop, fill each muffin liner with batter. They should be 3/4 full, if you’re not using a scoop. Top each cake with 1 1/2 tsp Nutella. Swirl Nutella in with a toothpick, making sure to fold a bit of batter up over the nutella.
Bake for 20 minutes.
Remove to a wire rack to cool completely.
Makes 12.

Lemony Tortellini with Peas and Prosciutto

When I was making this week’s menu I was thumbing through last month’s issue of Everyday Food.  I remembered that there was a recipe section about different types of pasta.  This recipe reminded me of Giada’s Lemon Spaghetti recipe.  I love that this recipe had peas in it.   It was pretty funny to see all the gadgets that I had out when I was making this recipe.  I had the lemon zester out, the garlic press, and the lemon juicer.

This recipe does go together pretty fast.  I made a few small changes to the ingredients.  I didn’t use frozen tortellini but instead I used fresh.  I also didn’t use prosciutto but used 4 slices of bacon instead.  I also ommitted the 2nd tablespoon of olive oil, because I felt that there was enough fat in the pan from the bacon.

I think this will make great leftovers for my husband’s dinner tomorrow.  He’ll love the bacon!

Enjoy!

source: Everyday Food

Ingredients

Serves 4

• Coarse salt and ground pepper
• 1 1/2 pounds frozen cheese tortellini
• 1 package (10 ounces) frozen peas
• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 4 ounces thinly sliced prosciutto, chopped
• 2 garlic cloves, minced
• 1 teaspoon grated lemon zest, plus 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

Lemony Tortellini with Peas and Prosciutto

source: Everyday Food, Martha Stewart

Directions

1. In a large pot of boiling salted water, cook tortellini until al dente. Reserve 1/2 cup pasta water. Add peas to pot; drain pasta mixture, and set aside.
2. In the same pot, heat 1 tablespoon oil over medium-high heat; add prosciutto and garlic. Cook, stirring frequently, until browned, 2 to 4 minutes.
3. Add pasta mixture, pasta water, 1 tablespoon oil, and lemon zest and juice; toss to combine. Season with salt and pepper.

Peanut Butter and Jelly Bars

A few months ago I received Martha Stewart’s Cookies cookbook for my birthday.  I must confess that this is the first recipe that I’ve made out of it.  Something put me in the mood for peanut butter cookies but then I remembered that I had a recipe in teh cookbook for Peanut Butter and Jelly Bars.  The idea of bar cookies appealed to me so much more than drop cookies.

My husband and I both agreed that these tasted like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich that was baked.  I suggest that you have a glass of milk and a napkin handy when you eat these cookies.  My husband took a small plate of cookies to a coworker who also enjoyed them.  I took a plate to my mom and she loved them.  I suggest bringing these to your next gathering.

source: Martha Stewart Cookie cookbook and marthastewart.com

Ingredients

Makes about 3 dozen

• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature, plus more for pan
• 3 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for pan
• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 2 1/2 cups smooth peanut butter
• 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups strawberry jam, or other flavor
• 2/3 cup salted peanuts, roughly chopped

Directions

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease a 9-by-13-inch pan with butter, and line the bottom with parchment paper. Grease the parchment, and coat inside of pan with flour; set aside. Place butter and sugar in the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Beat on medium-high speed until fluffy, about 2 minutes. On medium speed, add eggs and peanut butter; beat until combined, about 2 minutes.
2. Whisk together salt, baking powder, and flour. Add to bowl of mixer on low speed; combine. Add vanilla. Transfer two-thirds of mixture to prepared pan; spread evenly with offset spatula. Using offset spatula, spread jam on top of peanut-butter mixture. Dollop remaining third of peanut-butter mixture on top of jam. Sprinkle with peanuts.
3. Bake until golden, about 45 minutes. Transfer to a wire rack to cool; cut into about thirty-six 1 1/2-by-2-inch pieces.

Barley and Beef Soup

I saw this recipe in my latest issue of Cooking Light and knew I had to give it a try.  I’ve made Barley and Beef soup but it was in the crock pot.  I found this recipe to be really easy after the prep of chopping the vegetables.  I think that I liked this recipe better than the crock pot one but I do think that this one needs a bit more spices.  I definitely will be making this soup again.  Fair warning because it does make a lot.  I put half of it in the refrigerator for dinner next month.

Enjoy!

source: Cooking Light

Ingredients

• Cooking spray
• 2  cups  chopped onion (about 1 large)
• 1  pound  chuck steak, trimmed and cut into 1/2-inch cubes
• 1 1/2  cups  chopped peeled carrot (about 4)
• 1  cup  chopped celery (about 4 stalks)
• 5  garlic cloves, minced
• 1  cup  uncooked pearl barley
• 5  cups  fat-free, less-sodium beef broth
• 2  cups  water
• 1/2  cup  no-salt-added tomato puree
• 1/2  teaspoon  kosher salt
• 1/4  teaspoon  freshly ground black pepper
• 2  bay leaves

Preparation

1. Heat a large Dutch oven over medium heat. Coat pan with cooking spray. Add chopped onion and beef to pan; cook 10 minutes or until onion is tender and beef is browned, stirring occasionally. Add chopped carrot and chopped celery to pan; cook 5 minutes, stirring occasionally. Stir in garlic; cook 30 seconds. Stir in barley and remaining ingredients, and bring to a boil. Cover, reduce heat, and simmer 40 minutes or until the barley is done and vegetables are tender. Discard bay leaves.

Irish Soda Bread

Happy St. Patrick’s Day from your favorite little Irish redhead!  My husband and I went up to my mom’s house for the weekend to celebrate the holiday with her and Lance with a traditional feast of Corned Beef, carrots and cabbage.  I must confess that this is only the second time we have had this traditional meal.  This year we even celebrated with some Guinness too.  The first time that I had a glass of Guinness was in Ireland with my friend to celebrate our graduation from college.  The trip was a present to ourselves.  We toured the factory in Dublin and at the end of the tour you get a pint of Guinness.  If you’ve been to Dublin then you’ve seen the River Liffey and it makes you a little scared of drinking the dark stuff!

I decided that the meal wouldn’t be complete with out Irish Soda Bread.  My mom found a bunch of recipes for all of the foods that would be part of a traditional Irish meal in the local newspaper.  I was in luck!  Soda bread was there too.  I thought that soda bread was supposed to be pretty bland and heavy but this bread did not turn out bland at all!  I was amazed at how sweet it was and I loved the raisins too.

Enjoy!

source: www.frugalvillage.net

Ingredients:

3/4 cup raisins
3-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 pint sour cream (2 cups)
1 tablespoon caraway seeds

Preheat oven to 350 F. Soak raisins in warm water for 20 minutes to plump them. In a large bowl, combine dry ingredients. In a small bowl, beat eggs and stir in sour cream. Add the egg mixture to the dry ingredients, and stir with a wooden spoon or use hands. Stir in the raisins and caraway seeds. Place dough in a greased 9-inch springform pan. Dust the top with flour to prevent hands from sticking, and pat the dough evenly in the pan. With a knife, make a shallow crisscross slash on the top. Bake for 50 minutes.

Tex Mex Calzones

I will be the first to admit that I subscribe to too many magazines!  A few of them are gift subscriptions though.  It usually takes me some time to get through them all though.  Some I page through when I’m running on the treadmill and others I scour when my husband is hogging the TV and I still want to be near him so I read a magazine.  I was paging through my latest issue of Cooking Light and spotted this recipe.  As luck would have it I was in the mood for calzones and recipes for them had been popping up in my Google Reader a lot lately.

On Sunday my husband and I went to Borders bookstore and sat in their cafe.  My husband drew and I leafed through magazines that I wasn’t going to buy and made the menu for the week so we could go the grocery store after we were done at Borders.  My husband was so cute when I told him we were having Tex Mex Calzones for dinner.  You would think that I had told him that we were having dinner with Joss Whedon!  He was so excited!  It was too funny!

The stuffing in the calzones smells wonderful while it is cooking.  The parts that were the most tedious were chopping the vegetables and rolling out the dough for the calzones.  I over loaded the calzones a bit but they turned out fine. I think I stuffed them with about 2/3 cup of filling instead of 1/2 cup.   I still have about a cup or so of the filling left.  We plan on using it for filling for some left over tortillas that we have from tacos last week.  Don’t be turned off by the Tex Mex part of the recipe, because it really is not that spicey at all.

Enjoy!  Good luck!

source: Cooking Light

Ingredients

• 8  ounces  ground turkey breast
• 1/2  cup  chopped onion
• 1/2  cup  chopped green bell pepper
• 1/2  cup  chopped red bell pepper
• 3/4  teaspoon  ground cumin
• 1/2  teaspoon  chili powder
• 2  garlic cloves, minced
• 1/2  cup  fat-free fire-roasted salsa verde
• 1  (11-ounce) can refrigerated thin-crust pizza dough
• 3/4  cup  (3 ounces) preshredded Mexican blend cheese
• Cooking spray
• 1/4  cup  fat-free sour cream

Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 425°.

2. Heat a large nonstick skillet over medium-high heat. Add ground turkey to pan; cook 3 minutes, stirring to crumble. Add onion and next 5 ingredients (through garlic) to pan; cook 4 minutes or until vegetables are crisp-tender, stirring mixture occasionally. Remove turkey mixture from heat; stir in salsa.

3. Unroll dough; divide into 4 equal portions. Roll each portion into a 6 x 4–inch rectangle. Working with one rectangle at a time, spoon about 1/2 cup turkey mixture on one side of dough. Top with 3 tablespoons cheese; fold dough over turkey mixture, and press edges together with a fork to seal. Place on a baking sheet coated with cooking spray. Repeat procedure with remaining dough and turkey mixture. Bake at 425° for 12 minutes or until browned. Serve with sour cream.

Dutch Baby Pancakes

Well, I’ve made Dutch Baby’s before but when I saw this recipe in my Everyday Food magazine I decided to give it a try because it was different than the one I use.  I really think that I like this recipe better than my old one.  This one turned out much thicker and a lot sweeter. I know both of those things have to do with the ingredients and the size of the pan.  The recipe suggests using a cast iron skillet but I don’t have one but I did melt the butter in my Pyrex pan in the oven.  I loved using the blender to mix all the ingredients.  It was so easy!  My husband and I split this pancake but we could see how it could be split among 4 people if you also serve some fruit with it.  My husband topped his portion with butter and syrup and I topped mine with butter and raspberry jam.

This recipe will go into our breakfast rotation for sure.  Enjoy!

source: Everyday Food

Ingredients

Serves 4

• 3 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature
• 3 large eggs
• 3/4 cup whole milk
• 1/2 cup all-purpose flour (spooned and leveled)
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon sugar
• 1 tablespoon fresh lemon juice

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. In a medium cast-iron or ovenproof nonstick skillet, melt 2 tablespoons butter over medium heat; set aside.
2. In a blender, combine eggs, milk, flour, salt, vanilla, and 1/4 cup sugar. Blend until foamy, about 1 minute. Pour batter into skillet; bake until pancake is puffed and lightly browned, about 20 minutes.
3. Working quickly, dot pancake with 1 tablespoon butter, and sprinkle with 1 tablespoon sugar and lemon juice. Slice into wedges, and serve immediately.

How Fun! I need these!

I spotted these cute pancake molds while browsing the Williams Sonoma website.  I would love to have them!  Okay, I don’t have any children.  My husband and I are both big kids at heart though, does that count?  I was a little bummed though, they don’t have a giraffe.  The giraffe is my most favorite animal in the world.  I also collect anything giraffee.  Just check out our living room!  It’s full of giraffe pictures.  I might just have to pick these up!  I love looking at all the wonderful new things at Williams Sonoma in the store or online.  I even have a gift card to WS that I might have to use.

Winter Squash & Sage Sausage Chili

I found this recipe in my most recent issue of  Better Homes and Gardens.  I had quite the stack of magazines to read through when I spotted this one.  Why do all magazines seem to come around the same time of the month??  In all honesty, some recipes in Better Homes and Gardens are hit or miss.  I’ve tried some doozies!  I made a casserole with hotdogs in it.  I should have known but I thought my husband would like it because of the hotdogs.  I don’t think we ate any of the leftovers from that casserole.  So, you can understand why I was a  little leary of this recipe.

I read the ingredients and they all sounded great.  I really was surprised by the flavor in the chili because of the lack of spices and the fact that there are only 5 ingredients too.  When I was reading the recipe the ingredient that sold me was the winter squash.  I love squash!  The chili came together quite quickly and would be great for a work night when you don’t want to spend a lot of time cooking after dinner.

Enjoy!

source: Better Homes and Gardens magazine

Ingredients

• 1 lb. bulk sage sausage or your favorite sausage
• 1 15-oz. can cannellini beans, drained
• 1 12-oz. pkg. frozen winter squash puree, thawed
• 1 cup chunky-style chipotle salsa or other salsa
• 1-1/2 cups water
• 1 3.5-oz. pkg. herb-flavored goat cheese, crumbled
• Fresh Sage (optional)

Directions

1. In large saucepan cook sausage over medium heat until brown and no pink remains, stirring to break up; drain fat. Stir in beans, squash, salsa, and water. Bring to boiling; reduce heat. Simmer, uncovered, 10 minutes, stirring occasionally. Serve in bowls; sprinkle goat cheese and fresh sage. Makes 4 servings.