Homemade Oreos

Sometime I get the urge to bake something and recently that urge lead to these homemade Oreos. So I grabbed my favorite little helper and got to work making these. The cookies were supposed to be thinner, but it was really hot that day and the oven was on in the kitchen so even though the dough had been refrigerated to firm up it was hard to slice thin wafers that would stay together. We had to use our hands to form them together.

I'd have to say the best part of making your own Oreos is that you get to control how much filling you get. The creme filling definitely my favorite part of an Oreo, and apparently it's also my niece's favorite part.  You can see that the cookies got a bit messy. That's because creme filling was disappearing from the bowl as I was assembling the cookies. I had to work fast!

If you make these cookies watch out for little creme filling monsters.

Dutch Baby Pancake

I get bored of certain foods after eating them a few times, so I'm always on the lookout for new meals. We were in a breakfast rut of the usual waffles, pancakes, cereal, oatmeal variety so I needed something to change it up. I was flipping through my copy of Cook’s Country 2010 Annual when I came across this pancake. I thought it would be worth a try.

The pancake grew way taller than we were expecting, and it was great. We've done this a few times since then. You can use any kind of milk, but low fat or skim milk is preferably. The original recipe says that higher fat milk affects the crispiness of the pancakes. We've done it once using 1 % milk and another time using whole milk. I didn't see a major difference in the crispiness, but I think the pancake did rise higher with the low fat milk.

DUTCH BABY PANCAKE

INGREDIENTS:

2 tbsp. canola oil

1 cup all-purpose flour

1/4 cup cornstarch

2 tsp. grated lemon zest

2 tbsp. lemon juice

1 tsp. salt

3 large eggs

1 cup milk (preferably skim)

1 tbsp. unsalted butter, melted and cooled

1 tsp. vanilla extract

3 tbsp. powdered sugar

DIRECTIONS:

• Preheat the oven to 450 degrees. Brush the skillet with the oil. Place skillet in the oven and heat for about 10 minutes, until the oil is shimmering.
• In a large bowl, mix together the flour, cornstarch, zest, and salt.
• In a different small/medium bowl, whisk the eggs for about 1 minute, until they are frothy and light.
• Whisk the milk, butter, and vanilla into the eggs. Pour about 1/3 of the milk mixture into the flour mixture and whisk until completely combined.
• Add the remainder of the milk mixture to the flour mixture and whisk until the batter is smooth.
• Pour the batter into the skillet. Bake for about 20 minutes, until the edges are golden brown and crisp.
• Place the skillet onto a wire rack. Sprinkle the powdered sugar and lemon juice over the Dutch baby pancake. Cut into slices and serve.

Source: Cook’s Country 2010 Annual

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Table for 7

Portuguese Rice with Lima Beans

This is a very common variation of Portuguese yellow rice.  It's an easy way to add some vegetables to your meal. In addition to lima beans you could add carrots or peas.

Portuguese Tomato Rice

I've said before that Portuguese rice is an important part of Portuguese cuisine. It makes an appearance at just about every meal (if you're not having rice you're having potatoes). Having plain rice regularly can get boring so it's nice to put a little variety into your rice. I don't enjoy tomatoes, but I like this rice. This is a good way to sneak some lycopene into your or your kid's diet.

Croissant Breakfast Sandwich

A simple breakfast sandwich. This is great for busy mornings. You can easily adapt this to fit your taste. For me,  I prefer the sandwich with a fried egg and no cheese.

Super Mario Birthday Party- Cloud Jello

For a quick treat for my niece's Mario birthday party we whipped up some cloud jello. It's a quick and simple treat that fits the theme of the party nicely. 

Homemade Fudgesicles

This is a guest post by my wonderful sister. She's been pestering me to let her post something so here is her post on some homemade fudgesicles that she made recently. Having been part of the unofficial taste testing panel I give these my stamp of approval. This the popsicle mold used to make these fudgesicles.

Hi There!!!I am guest posting today and I am very excited!! Woot Woot!! I have never blogged before in my life.  So growing up, these were one of my favorite ice cream pops to eat. I am a chocoholic and love anything flavored with chocolate.Any who, as a mom, I try to make anything and everything possible from scratch.  I have made chocolate and vanilla ice cream at home and the results exceed anything store bought.  It's a win win situation when I can make something homemade,  the quality of the flavor can't compare and you know what is going into what you are making.  I first saw these on Brown Eyed Baker, one of my favorite blogs, and I couldn't wait to try them.   I substituted a couple of things because I used what I had in the kitchen.  It was daughter and kid sister approved, it doesn't get any better than that :).

Mario Birthday Party: Chocolate Mario Mustaches

When looking for ideas for my niece's Mario themed birthday party on Pinterest I saw chocolate mustaches. These fit the party theme so perfectly that we had to make them. The problem was we didn't have a mustache mold to make them. So the first thing I did was look online for a mustache mold. I chose this one from Amazon. It had good reviews and a good price at only $4.99.

These are so simple to make, but make a great addition to any Mario birthday party.

First, I made a double boiler using a sauce pan full of boiling water and a small bowl. I melted about 1 1/2 cups of chocolate chunks. Then, I cut some sticks that we had left over from making cake pops so that they would fit inside the mold. I poured the chocolate into each mustache in the mold and put it in the refrigerator to harden for a few hours. Once they had hardened we excitedly popped them out and had fun acting like we had fancy mustaches.

Cinnamon Roll Pancakes

Today is my niece's birthday and as you might be able to tell, she requested a Mario theme. You'll see a few Mario themed posts in the next couple of days, but this post focuses on the start of our birthday celebration: breakfast.

My sister and I wanted to make her a special treat for breakfast and we narrowed it down to either cake batter pancakes or cinnamon roll pancakes. The cinnamon roll pancakes won partly because we were having trouble finding cake batter pancakes appealing and partly because we didn't have the cake mix that we needed. It was a successful victory. Even grandma (my mother, a non-pancake eater) enjoyed these pancakes. And the birthday girl definitely approved of them ... particularly the icing. Overall, it was a great start to a great day.

Bread Machine Pizza Dough / Pizza Bites

When we purchased our bread machine I thought it was just going to be an easy way to have homemade bread. Instead, it has proven to be a way to quickly mix up a variety of things. I like to keep a supply of pizza dough in the fridge for when we need something that doesn't take too long to make for dinner, but making homemade pizza dough can be a fairly tedious process. You have to mix the ingredients, knead the dough, and wait for the dough to rise. Using the bread machine streamlines the process nicely. You just add the ingredients and enter the correct settings.

I love these pizza bites because they are quick and simple. My niece loves them, and if you can get her to eat something I think any picky eater will approve. I like to change up the filling in these. Sometimes I do pepperoni and cheese, sometimes just cheese, and sometimes I like to put some chourico and cheese.

Homemade Bomb Pops

I picked up these popsicle molds a few weeks ago because of their fun shape. I was planning on using them as molds for regular popsicles, but today being the 4th of July I decided to use them to make homemade Bomb Pops. Most of my memories with Bomb Pops come from the ice cream truck. I was more attached to the ice creams shaped like characters with the little gumballs for the eyes, but on hot summer days sometimes nothing would cool you down quite like a Bomb Pop.

These are a healthier version of Bomb Pops. Instead of food coloring and syrups these popsicles are made of fruit, yogurt, milk, and agave. I changed things up a bit and made the red layer strawberry rather than raspberry or cherry.

You can use fresh or frozen fruit to make these popsicles. The original recipe actually called for frozen fruit, but I when it came time to build the red layer the only red fruit I had on hand was fresh strawberries. I pureed those as the recipe instructed and the popsicles turned out well. You can see in the picture where some of the blueberry drizzled into the yogurt mixture. This is where I pulled the popsicles stick out to pour in the yogurt mixture. The blueberry puree wasn't as frozen as I had thought it was so to be sure that you don't get any runny colors make sure that the purees have frozen completely before you remove the sticks to add the next layer.

Azorean Fried Beans / Acoreano Feijao Frito

I guess you could say that I'm a Portuguese mutt: half my relatives are from the Azores and the other half are from the continental part of Portugal.  The Azores and the continent are both part of Portugal, but they definitely have unique cultures. My mother is from the continent, but she took the fairly common Azorean dish of fried beans and adapted it. The result is this delicious recipe, the best of both Portuguese worlds. The best part is that these beans are very versatile. They are great served by themselves with a side of rice, or made into a sandwich (in a papo seco of course).

Ooey Gooey Brownie Sundaes

When I made these brownies I was hit with inspiration to make a completely homemade brownie sundae. The great thing about homemade food is that you know where all the ingredients are coming from and everything tastes better. I made some modifications to the ice cream recipe and the fudge sauce recipe because we were out of some of the ingredients. For the ice cream I substituted an extra cup of heavy cream for the 1 cup of whole milk that the original recipe calls for. This made the ice cream extra rich. I also modified some of the steps because we didn't have any vanilla bean so I adapted the sections of the recipe that pertained to that. For the chocolate sauce, we didn't have any light corn syrup or golden syrup on hand so I used light agave nectar.

As you can see in the picture the sundae melted rather quickly (our AC wasn't working!), but I think that it adds to the deliciousness. If  you're like my niece you can add some sprinkles (jimmies!) on top. Though I'm not sure you want to use as many as she does...

Fudgy Triple Chocolate Brownies

On days when I'm craving a dessert I tend to make these brownies. I think these are the perfect brownie. They are rich and are so chewy that they are like a cross between a piece of fudge and a brownie. Recently I decided to incorporate these brownies with homemade vanilla ice cream and homemade chocolate fudge sauce to make a super rich brownie sundae.

When I find a recipe I like I tend to stick with it for a while, so this I haven't really tried any new ones. Do you tend to stick to the same recipes or are you more adventurous?

Waffles of Insane Greatness

With a recipe name like Waffles of Insane Greatness you can't go wrong. These waffles live up to their name. They are crispy on the outside, but light and fluffy on the inside.  I like to change up how I serve them. Sometimes I just use plain maple syrup, other times I will use blueberry syrup or spread cream cheese on the waffle. The original recipe says you should let the batter rest for 30 minutes before cooking the waffles, but I've never done this and the waffles have come out excellent every time. The only negative point about this recipe is that it makes a small amount of waffles (about five on my waffle iron), so you may want to double the recipe depending on how many people you are feeding.

This is my favorite waffle recipe and I think it is the best waffle recipe out there. Do you have a waffle recipe that you think can beat this one?

Waffles of Insane Greatness

Ingredients

¾ cup all-purpose flour

¼ cup cornstarch

½ tsp. baking powder

¼ tsp. baking soda

½ tsp. salt

1 ½ tsp. sugar

½ cup whole milk

½ cup buttermilk

1/3 cup canola oil

1 large egg

¾ tsp. vanilla extract

Directions

11.  Combine flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and sugar in a medium-sized bowl.

22. In another bowl, add the milk, buttermilk, canola oil, egg, and vanilla extract. Whisk until well combined.

33. Add the flour mixture to the milk mixture. Whisk until the ingredients have combined.

44. Heat your waffle iron. Once it has heated spray the waffle iron with cooking spray before filling the wells with the waffle batter. Cook until the waffles are a light golden brown in color.

Source: Adapted from Annie's Eats

Vegetable Soup/Sopa de vegetais

I’m not a big fan of soup, but on cold days during the winter in New England this soup was always great for warming up.  It's not so cold down south, but sometimes you just need a nice warm soup for dinner. This soup is great because it has a lot of flavors. The broth is tangy, you get some meatiness from the hamburger, and a burst of sweetness from the corn. I like to enjoy a ground chourico sandwich, kind of like a Portuguese tomato soup with grilled cheese. It could even be good enough to make a fan out of the non-soup lovers out there.

Thick and Chewy Chocolate Chip Cookies

These cookies made their rounds on all the major food blogs a while ago, but I’ve posted them here anyway because they’re that good. I have a goal of finding the best recipes for certain foods and this, in my opinion, is the best recipe for chocolate chip cookies. These cookies are chewy, so if you like your cookies crispy you may not be a big fan, but for me they’re just the way I like a cookie.

There’s an unusual method for making these cookies “thick” as it says in the title of the recipe, and at first I found most of the instructions for how you’re meant to make the ball of dough a little confusing. Essentially, you take a ball of dough, separate it into two balls, and then stack the two balls on top of each other and press them back into one ball. It seems counterproductive, but it works. In addition, you can use either light or dark brown sugar with this recipe. I’ve tried the recipe with both and I slightly prefer the light brown sugar, but the dark brown sugar still makes great cookies.

Portuguese Chicken With Spaghetti / Espaguete Com Galinha

This is another dish that makes frequent appearances at the dinner table, particularly because it has been successful with the little picky eaters in the family.  This recipe is different from some of the other  Portuguese chicken with spaghetti recipes out there because it includes potatoes (we like our potatoes) and carrots. If you wanted to change this up you could add other vegetables or some sliced chourico. Of course, I would serve it with a roll for dunking.

Portuguese Beef Stew (Carne Guisada)

This beef stew has made regular appearances at the dinner table for as long as I can remember. It is an adaptation of the Portuguese carne guisada. It has some additions such as the pasta and the vegetables that are not commonly found in a traditional carne guisada, but make it a heartier meal. This is a great stew; broth is slightly spicy, the potatoes fall apart when you poke them with a fork and the meat is tender. This is a great dish on a chilly day in the winter or on any day that you just want a fairly quick but filling meal. I suggest serving the dish with a piece of bread for dunking in the broth.

Cubed Steak Sandwiches

These sandwiches were adapted from The Pioneer Woman's recipe Marlboro Man's Favorite Sandwich. The great thing about these sandwiches is that you can add thing or remove things to make the sandwich as you would prefer it. I found the recipe in her book The Pioneer Woman Cooks where she lists the ingredients without measurements so the recipe here is approximately how I make it. I like to serve the sandwich on toasted French rolls, but you can use whatever sandwich roll you prefer.

Portuguese Yellow Rice

A lot of Portuguese people serve rice with just about any meal. This is my family's take on Portuguese rice. It is a simple recipe, but it has gotten a lot of praise from others. We enjoy it with a variety of meals from pot roast to beans. 

Crispy Chicken Tenders

This recipe actually was inspired by my favorite fish and chip recipe (Found here). I noticed that the fish had a very crispy coating that reminded me of the chicken tenders that you can find at just about any restaurant (particularly on the kids menu). I've been looking for a good crispy chicken tender recipe for a while so I decided to try making some chicken using a similar technique. This is definitely a kid-friendly recipe.

Heavenly Hots

I was first introduced to these by my sister. When I saw them I thought to myself, these aren't pancakes. It only took one bite for them to win me over. They are soft, sweet, and just delicious! These pancakes are different from normal pancakes because they take more sour cream than flour giving them a custard-like consistency. 

The most difficult part of making them is cooking them. The softness of the batter makes them difficult to flip. Make sure your griddle or skillet is nice and hot before you add your butter (I used butter cooking spray and found it a bit easier to flip the pancakes.) Even if they don't come out looking perfect they still taste fantastic! Enjoy!

Pudim flan (Portuguese caramel flan)

Welcome to my blog!

Being of Portuguese descent I thought that I should start out with a common Portuguese recipe. This flan features an ingredient that is well-attributed to the Portuguese, port wine. It is typically served during the holidays and other special occasions. Being that this is my first post Ithought that this was a pretty special occasion.You can serve this flan warm, cold, or room temperature depending on your preference.