Finally a Savory Recipe.............not

I have a serious problem.

Its a sugar problem.

Every single thing I make...has sugar in it. OR if it doesn't, I must add it. And if I feel like there isn't enough...I will just double the sugar...shoot.

Anyways. This problem has worked its way into my cornbread. Well I guess I shouldn't say "my cornbread". I didn't actually have a recipe until yesterday, and then I really just used it as a guide line to recreate my own yummier version. So now...I have a recipe that will make...My Cornbread.

The result was definitely corn bread. It looked like corn bread, smelled like corn bread...but tasted like sweet scones. So I guess my statement about it being definitely corn bread could be debatable. But I love scones. Love Love Love scones. Especially made with white flour, white sugar and butter. yum yum yum. I do not like most scone recipes because they only have like...1/4 cup of sugar or something silly like that. My recipe has a whole 1/2 cup (well in my case...1/2 heaping cup) PLUS a very generous sprinkle over the top before it goes in the oven to add a tasty crunch.
We made these scones on my wedding day for breakfast and then we dipped them in chocolate toblerone fondue, but thats a different story entirely.  I was stressed and needed chocolate and carbs. It was a great combo but did not necessarily calm my nerves.

So I made cornbread and basically its a scone with cooked polenta and a bit of cornmeal instead of the flour and then a generous sprinkle of sugar over the top just to remind you that savory is for people who don't appreciate nice white, refined sugar added to everything they eat.

Oh and the whole point of me making this corn bread was to use up all the extra polenta I cooked the other night. I had no idea 1 cup of cornmeal could make such a huge pot of polenta! So this recipe does use cooked polenta. All I have to say is be careful when you cook polenta. You think your cooking 1 or 2 cups and whamo you have a whole huge pot full!

Anyways, here is the recipe!

Marie's Polenta Corn Bread

Dry Ingredients: 

1/2 cups Flour

1/2 heaping cup Sugar ( plus more for sprinkling before baking)

1 tablespoon Baking Powder

1 tsp Salt

1/4 cup Cornmeal

Wet ingredients:

2 Eggs

3/4 cup cooked  Polenta  (Cornmeal) 

1 cup of Milk 

5 tablespoons melted Margarine ( or Butter)

1. Grease a 9x9 baking pan and set aside. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

2. Combine all dry ingredients in a medium bowl. 

3. Combine all wet ingredients except melted margarine in a separate bowl and stir really well. Make sure that all of the polenta is broken up. To make sure there are no polenta lumps, I used my immersion blender and it worked like a charm.

4. Fold wet ingredients into dry stirring only till just combined. Add melted margarine and combine. 

5. Pour into the 9x9 pan and spread out evenly. 

6. Sprinkle top liberally with sugar ( I am sure you could skip this step...but do you really want to miss out on a crunchy sugar top? I don't) 

7. Bake for 30-40 minutes or until top is just getting golden and a tooth pick stuck in the center comes out clean. 

8. Cool in the pan for a few minutes then cool completely on a wire rack

 I eat mine right hot outta the oven though with lotsa butter and honey yum yum yum. 

Dont put in a bag or wrap in plastic until completely cool or else you will get a gummy sugar top which is no fun when you specifically put sugar on the top to have a crunchy sugar top. 

I promise

I promise! New post coming later today!
It has been a busy last few days! Ill tell you alll about it later!

- Marie

Texas Sheet Cake and My Favourite Spatula

Do you have a favorite spatula?
You know, the one that cleans the inside of your mixing bowl like a dream and folds egg whites like no tomorrow and fills a muffin tin without spilling batter all over the place?
Well, I have one. Its perfect. I love it. I don't know where to find another one...but I need a new one...because mine broke...
right in half.

Shoot.

I still use it though...its almost more maneuverable without the handle. 

Actually I was at my grandmas the other day...and she has the same spatula in her drawer...and hers it taped together with duct tape...haha so obviously this was a bit of a design flaw...

I really like is use "..." as my only form of punctuation. I create my own grammar rules. Don't tell my momma 

Texas Chocolate Sheet cake is sooooo yummy....

I eat it right out of the pan with a spoon. 

Have you ever had sheet cake? Basically it is a cakey brownieish thing baked in a large, rimmed cookie sheet and then covered with a really really really thick layer of chocolate icing as soon as you take it out of the oven. This results in a layer of gooey sweetness between the actual icing and the cake. Yum yum yum. 

Nuts in the icing are definitely optional, but something I like to leave out. 

Apparently it is soooo good that this is also the only picture I have of it. So here is the recipe. Adapted slightly from Pioneer Woman :) 

Cake:

2 cups Flour

2 cups Sugar

1/4 tsp Salt

4 heaping tablespoons Cocoa

1 cup of Butter 

1 cup Boiling Water

1/2 cup Buttermilk

2 beaten Eggs

1 teaspoon Baking Soda

1 teaspoon Vanilla

1. In a medium bowl, combine flour, sugar and salt. Set aside. 

2. Melt butter in a pot on the stove, and add cocoa. Stir.

3. Add boiling water and allow mixture to boil for about 30 seconds. Remove from heat and pour over flour mixture. 

4. In a measuring cup, pour buttermilk, eggs, baking soda and vanilla and stir well. Add to chocolate mixture. 

5. Pour into sheet cake pan, jelly roll pan, or any medium large cookie sheet with edges. The recipe says not to grease your pan, which does work just fine, but I like to line all my pans with parchment paper. It just makes clean up 100 times easier and then if I need to use that pan before the cake is gone, I can just slip it right out. 

6. Bake in a 350 degree F oven for about 20 minutes or until the cake springs back lightly. It does not take too long because the cake is not very think!

7.  While the cake is baking, make the icing

Ingredients:

1/2 cup finely chopped Pecans

3/4 cup Butter

4 heaping tablespoons Cocoa

6 tablespoons Milk 

1 teaspoon Vanilla

3 1/2 cups icing sugar ( 1 lb bag, minus 1/2 cup) 

a) Melt butter in a medium pot ( you can totally use the same one as before)

b) Stir in cocoa and turn off heat

c) Add milk, vanilla and icing sugar

d) Add pecans and stir until smooth

e) As soon as the cake comes out of the oven, pour the entire pot of icing over the cake and spread with a spatula. 

Eat is hot, eat it cold, eat it with ice cream or whipped cream or out of the pan with a spoon. Yum. 

Chocolate Mint Snow Top Cookies

So today, early early this morning, ( ok not that early...7am)
Gary and I packed a bag and headed off to Oregon. Since Gary buys and sells hay, sometimes he has to go actually looking for hay. He has gone sooo many times before when we were dating and now that we are married I get to come! yay :)
All day I was thinking about posting and wishing I could post and that I had internet in the car so I could post this recipe...but of course we don't and didn't have annnyyyy time to stop at a Starbucks so I could type this thing up. But now its 7:18pm and we are in....Sweet Home Oregon which is a very small town and has only two restaurants (that apparently they have the same food, but one is fancier and has table clothes...we didnt go to the fancy one) .
We were not going to stay in Sweet Home and instead continue driving to Madras Oregon which is about one or two hours away from here. It is also over a big mountain pass that is verrryy verrry snowy. So we decided not to drive through there tonight.



Anyways... here is the yummy recipe!
Ohh and I took alll these pictures at night time...so forgive the badness of them...


Chocolate Mint Snow Top Cookies.

This is what you need:
1 1/2 cups Flour
1 1/2 teaspoons Baking Powder
1/4 teaspoon Salt
1 1/2 cups Semi Sweet Chocolate Chips (I like to use 1/2 dark chocolate chips and 1/2 semi sweet)
6 tablespoons Butter or Margarine softened
1 cup Sugar
2 large Eggs
1 1/2 teaspoons Vanilla Flavoring
1/4 teaspoon Mint Flavoring (or if you like minty cookies add more till you are happy)
1/4-1/2 cup Icing Sugar

1. Combine flour, baking powder and 1/4tsp salt in a bowl. Set aside.

2. In a saucepan, melt 1 cup of the chocolate chips over low heat, stirring constantly. Remove from heat once melted. Set aside

3. Beat butter with a mixer on medium speed for 30 seconds (or a wooden spoon and get a great arm workout)
4. Beat in sugar until combined. Add in melted chocolate and mix together thoroughly.

5. Add Vanilla, Mint and eggs and stir until well combined.

** So when I made these...I doubled the recipe. Everything was going just great. Until this point. I accidentally added 3 teaspoons of mint flavoring....instead of 1/2 of a teaspoon of mint flavoring. Lucky for me I have the oldest bottle of mint flavoring you have ever seen. Not even kidding...it was covered in dust, and sticky and had a Liquidation World sticker on it. So I figure, my cookies are probably a touch more minty then they were designed to be...but just the perfect amount of minty if you like a nice mint chocolate combo. The last batch I made before this, I put in the right amount of mint...and they were good...but not nearly minty enough for me!**

6. Slowly add flour mixture and remaining chocolate chips and stir until it is all mixed in

And at this point... I stopped taking pictures. I always forget! It is not something I am used to...taking pictures while cooking is a tricky thing!

7. If you mixture is thick enough, you can dump it out onto wax paper, wrap and chill for 3 hours or until firm enough to shape. Mine is usually too sloppy so I just cover the bowl and throw it in the fridge. Both work equally fine.

This is my dough...it looks yellowy...but it was nice and brown and smelled minty 

8. When you are ready to bake, preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
9. Shape dough into 1inch balls and then roll in icing sugar. Place balls on parchment paper lined or greased cookie sheets and press down slightly ( I use my 1/4 cup measuring cup)

10. Bake until tops are crackled and almost set. About 10-12 minutes. Cool 2 minutes on the cookie sheet, then transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.

Makes about 42 cookies... I ALWAYS double this recipe :)

High Valley

Oh have you ever heard of High Valley?
Besides being good looking farm boys....they are Canadian Mennonite boys who play Christian country music.
I am loving their CD these days.
Check them out!
http://highvalleymusic.com/home

Beef Brisket and Creamy Mashed Potatoes

So a couple of weeks ago, a friend asked me to help her make a nice dinner for her husbands business Christmas party. Since then my mind has been over flowing with ideas! It will be a small crowd of 6-8 people so the options are pretty much endless! 

Today we decided on the basics for the menu! 

Pioneer Woman's Beef Brisket 

http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2007/06/brisket_baby/

Pioneer Womans yummy yummy mashed potatoes 

There is a insane amount of butter and cream cheese and cream in this recipe but they are oh so delicious! ( AND make-ahead-able :) )

http://thepioneerwoman.com/cooking/2007/11/delicious_creamy_mashed_potatoes/

and homemade buns (obviously)

and broccoli salad 

and another hot veggie side...hmm any suggestions? 

and dessert... Trifle? Cake? Cheese Cake? Pie? 

ohhh maybe individual trifles in pretty glasses? or individual pies in mini mason jars? hmmm

Anyways, I will document this event and feature all the recipes I decide to make once this fun event takes place :) 

PS. I used the toaster oven this morning and everything went perfectly fine! 

PSS. The Mixer is getting more and more picky...today it wouldn't even stir 7 cups of flour into my gingerbread recipe without a fight. I think it may be on its last legs...sign Hamilton Beach...keep it together for Christmas please.

Nanaimo Bars Are Not A Food Group...

Nanaimo Bars are not a food group. Not that you could tell by their huge presence in my life. If like Nanaimo Bars, you need to make these. If you don't like Nanaimo bars, you should still make these.
 Apparently these are a Canadian treat and are mostly just common in BC. Weird!

AND if you think that store bought nanaimo bars are good enough...I don't even know what to say. They are not. Make homemade ones and then cry because you will never want to eat anything else.

Earlier in November, I found the most amazing recipe for Nanaimo Bars I could imagine. There is a lot of butter, and coconut and chocolate and custard powder. YUM YUM YUM

Shoot.. I did take picture of the whole process...but my kitchen has bad light, and it was dark outside so the pictures are extra yellow and bad looking...so no pictures yet...Next time I make these I will update the pictures! :)

Here is the recipe.
(oh! I usually double this and make it in a 9x13, but this recipe is for a 9x9)

Bottom Layer:
1/2 cup butter
1/4 cup sugar
5 tablespoons cocoa
1 egg, lightly beaten
1 1/4 cup graham wafer crumbs
1/2 cup finely chopped walnuts
1 cup of fine, unsweetened coconut

1) Melt butter in a medium pot on the stove, stir in sugar, and cocoa
2) Beat egg in a small bowl and add a tablespoon of chocolate/butter mixture to the egg and stir quickly. This will warm the egg up a bit and help keep it from cooking when you add it to the pot.
3) Remove chocolate mixture from heat and pour egg into the pot and stir quickly to combine and prevent egg cooking.
4) Continue to stir as the mixture thickens up quite a bit.
5) Add nuts and coconut and stir to combine. Lastly, add graham crumbs 1/4 cup at a time. Sometime you will need less then 1 1/4 cup. You do not want your mixture to be too dry.
6) Press base into the bottom of a tin foil lined 9x9 pan.
7) Chill for 1 hour minimum.

Middle layer:
1/2 cup butter, softened
2 Tablespoons Birds Eye Custard Powder
3 Tablespoons of heavy cream ( whipping cream)
2 cups of icing sugar

1) Cream butter together with the custard powder.
2) Add icing sugar and stir to combine.
3) Add the cream a little at a time until you have a smooth, spreadable mixture.
4) Spread over chilled base, and chill for at least another hour.

Top
5 squares semi-sweet baking chocolate
2 1/2 tablespoons of butter

1) Melt butter and chocolate together in a small pot over low heat stirring frequently.
2) Pour and spread over chilled custard layer
3) Let bars sit in a cool place until chocolate is firm but not hard.


Cutting:
While cutting these bars, you have to be very careful the the chocolate is does not crack. It is helpful to cut the entire bar at the same time when the chocolate is not too hard.
Use a very sharp and large knife and cut into small squares.
These freeze very well in airtight containers with wax paper between each layer.