Food from Argentina

This past week marked one year since my daughter came home from Argentina.  She lived there for fifteen months and loved the people, the food, everything. 

 

 
 So in remembering her days in Argentina and that she has been back for one year, we stopped at "La Brioche Argentina Bakery", an authentic panaderia.
We bought some yummy pastries and empanadas.

 They had three kinds of empanadas:  ham, chicken, beef.

 This is the beef empanada.

 We tried several of the pastries.

 This one was filled with dulce de leche.  

We should have bought a can of dulce de leche and eaten it by the spoonful!

 Here is one with crema and one with dulce de leche. 

 This is a "besito de novia", a cookie with dulce de leche and dipped in chocolate!

Delicious!  All of it!  What a treat!  Thank you, Argentina!

 

Congratulations, Graduate!

We just celebrated Daniel's college graduation, and in another two weeks it will be Landon's high school graduation. 
 



 

Here's a couple of ways we celebrated in delicious style:

 

Luckily the "York Bites" are just the right colors.  

This the quote I put on his card:

Congratulations!

Today is your day.

 

"You have brains in your head.

You have feet in your shoes.

You can steer yourself 

any direction you choose. 

You're off to Great Places!

You're off and away!

---Dr. Seuss

 

 These edible ice cream bowls were delicious, and they were fun to make.

We melted white chocolate chips to paint the inside of the purchased waffle bowls,covered with sprinkles, then added some food coloring to the rest of the melted white chocolate to decorate them. 



 

Ready to eat and I know you can't see all the art work we did, so be sure everyone sees the bowls before you fill them.  You will taste the art work!



In another couple of weeks we will be celebrating Landon's high school graduation.  I think I can find purple and gray m&m's at a specialty candy store and I will be makes some purple filled jars for him and some other special graduates. 





 

Veggies ! ? ! ? !

Sometimes we have too many sweets!

Sometimes you can't get any better than healthy!

But when I told my boys I was going to take this veggie tray to a church youth activity for the young women they told me I was going to have "a reputation".    So be it.    I took the veggies.    It's always good to have a healthy option!

Birthday Dinner

 

 menu

Winger's Chicken

rainbow jello

homemade rolls with butter and jam

popcorn

cheesecake for dessert

Every year on this birthday the menu is the same.  Sometimes I'll fix a salad, but it's not necessary.  The table might look bare but my kids think the meal is perfect. The main dish is Winger's chicken.

This year I couldn't find Winger's sauce at the store but I found a recipe that is just as good.

Winger's Sticky Fingers Recipe:

6 Tbl. Frank's Hot Sauce (It has to be Franks Hot Sauce, no other sauce will taste as good)

4 Tbl. water

1 1/2 c. brown sugar

Heat hot sauce, water and brown sugar in a saucepan over medium heat, until sugar is dissolved.


Here is where I found the recipe and you can find more details on how to make it:  (I used popcorn chicken instead of chicken strips.)

http://www.sixsistersstuff.com/2011/12/wingers-sticky-fingers-copycat-recipe.html


Here is the fun part of the meal. We don't usually play with our food but rainbow jello sculptures are the exception. Not only is it food but it is the entertainment!!!

And for dessert:

This year it was store bought cheesecake, and of course, ice cream!  The kind of cake is the only thing that changes from year to year.  The rest of the menu always stays the same.

I made a candy poster with starbursts and small Reece's peanut butter cups for a decoration.

  It turned out so well I think I will make one for every  birthday this year and choose the birthday person's favorite candy for the poster. 

Happy 18th Birthday Landon!!! 

Happy Valentines Day !

At our house, Valentines Day is family time.  Food is always important and the last couple of years it has been a heart shaped pizza . . .  and of course treats.  

Here's the spread, and the entertainment.

As a mom, I know that is a really unhealthy meal, but hopefully it all balances out when you look at previous and future meals. And honestly, no one even ate even a bite of their cookie that night!  And it was a fun evening watching a movie and the Olympics all together.

They were giant cookies.  My 18 year old son told me were too big and too much sugar! I consider that a successful moment in motherhood to have my son realize that.  We ate them, but not all at once and there are still several pieces in the freezer to eat another day.

 Raspberry sherbet in 7-up, mmmmmm!

Chocolate dipped pretzels were a fun addition and a real hit!

Happy Birthday !

Today my middle child turned 20.  Even though he is in Michigan and isn't living at home right now, I made his favorite cake, Almond Poppy Seed, so we could celebrate.

This is the picture I took with his 3 younger brothers before we dug in. 

I also made a cake mix and sent it in his birthday package so he can have his favorite cake 
too.

To make the cake mix I put all the dry ingredients in a bowl and mixed them together. I put that in a ziploc bag and included directions for how to make it.  He has made it on his own at home many times so with the recipe he can easily make it.  In this picture I added the milk before I took the picture.  But you get the idea, only put the dry ingredients in the mix!!!

This is the cake, ready to bake.

And here is the finished product.  Not too fancy, but oh boy is it delicious.  The trick is poking holes in it and getting the glaze to seep down in it.  

Now, the recipe:

Almond Poppy Seed Cake

                                         3 cups flour
                                         1 teaspoon salt
                                         1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
                                         2 1/4 cups sugar
                                         1/4 cups poppy seeds
                                         1 1/2 cups milk
                                         1 cup oil
                                         3 eggs
                                         1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
                                         2 teaspoons almond extract

     Mix all the dry ingredients.  Make a well in the center and add the wet ingredients.  Beat until smooth.  Put in a greased 9"x13" pan, or 2 loaf pans, or a bundt pan.  Bake at 350*, about an hour for the bundt pan, less for the others.  When it comes out of the oven, poke holes with a toothpick or a skewer and pour the glaze over slowly so it goes down into the cake.

GLAZE

                                          3/4 cup powdered sugar
                                          1/4 cup orange juice
                                          2 teaspoons melted butter
                                          1/2 teaspoon vanilla
                                          1/2 teaspoon almond extract

 
 
 

Cinnamon Flake Biscuits

          When the weather turns cool it is time to start baking again.  That's the advantage of cold weather.  This is a recipe that my mom made when I was young and I make it for my family. These biscuits are oh so tasty.

One of my sons is an expert at this recipe and when he is around I don't even attempt them.  If we need these biscuits to go with some soup for dinner I just ask him and he makes them.  But currently he is living away from home and so I have been making them again.  

Sometimes I double the batch because even if we don't eat them all at once, they tend to disappear.  Here is how to make them.

You start with a batch of baking powder biscuit dough.  You can use any recipe and in a pinch you can even use bisquick.  My mom's original recipe is at the end of the post.  

Once you have the dough, roll it out into a 10"x24" rectangular shape, about 1/4 in thick.  Spread with melted butter. Sprinkle with about ¼ cup of cinnamon-sugar mixed together. 

 Cut lengthwise into 5 two inch strips.  As you can see my edges are kind of scraggly and I never measure to see if the dimensions are exact.  The important thing is to get it rolled as thin as you want and get the butter and cinnamon-sugar all over it!

Stack the strips one on top of another. Cut the long stack into 12 pieces. 

 

Place edge side down, in greased muffin tins. Bake at 450* for 10-13 minutes, watching closely so they are browned on top but don't let them burn. 

Mmmmm! now you have a yummy snack or biscuits to go along with dinner. 

Cinnamon Flake Biscuits

Stir dry ingredients together. Cut in shortening until mixture resembles course crumbs.

3 Tablespoons sugar

2 cups flour

4 tsp. Baking powder

½ tsp. Cream of tarter

½ cup shortening

2/3 cups milk – add all at once

Mix wet and dry together and put the dough on the floured counter. Knead a minute, and then roll out into a ¼ inch rectangular shape, about 10”x24”. Spread with melted butter (about ¼ cup). Sprinkle with ¼ cup of cinnamon sugar mixture. Cut lengthwise into 5 two inch strips. Stack the strips one on top of another. Cut into 12 pieces and place edge side down, in greased muffin tins. Bake at 450* for 10-15 minutes, watching closely so they don't burn.

I use butter instead of shortening in this recipe.  I also use less butter when spreading it over the rolled out biscuit dough. 

 

A Birthday!

Always a wonderful reason to eat cake.

 

My son turned 15-years-old and decided on a peanut butter-ice cream cake.  

Other than that he left the details up to me and this is what I came up with.

I started out with a layer of cake.  I used a yellow cake mix and swirled in 1/2 cup peanut butter.  It was good but I think chocolate cake with peanut butter chips would have been really good too.  I baked the cake in a spring-form pan, and there was enough batter to make some cupcakes as well.  You could simply bake it in a round pan, but a spring-form is especially convenient for ice cream cakes.  Since I had one, I used it. 

After baking and cooling I took the sides off and sliced off the top of the cake because I didn't want too thick of a layer and I also wanted it flat. Then I put the sides back on to assemble the rest of the cake.  

I made up a batch of fudge sauce (see recipe below)  and spread some over the top of the cake.  I put it in the freezer to harden it up a bit and then spread softened ice cream over the top of the fudge layer.  I used an entire container ( I think that is 1.5 quarts) of peanut butter cup ice cream.  Then another layer of fudge sauce.  After that I left it in the freezer to harden up.  

Now for decorating the cake.  First, for the sides I used cool whip.  

Then for the best part, I made a peanut butter frosting to decorate and write "happy birthday".  (recipe below).  This frosting was seriously so good, I could eat it plain!  I should have used a lot more of it, it made the cake.  You can tell I am a peanut butter lover.  I also used some reece's peanut butter cups for decorations.  Then I wrote happy birthday.  It was difficult since my peanut butter frosting was getting a little thick by then.  

Mmmmmmm!  With only 5 of us at home nowadays we didn't finish the entire cake off  at once.  That still amazes me that a cake can last more than a day.  It made great after school snacks the next afternoon.  

 Delicious!

Fudge Sauce

1/2 cup butter

1 cup chocolate chips

1 12 ounce can evaporated milk

2 1/2 cups powdered sugar

Melt  butter and chocolate chips.  Add other ingredients

 and boil over medium heat for 6 minutes.  Makes 3 cups.

 

Peanut Butter Frosting

Use equal amounts of peanut butter and butter.  I used 1/4 cup of each, but next time I will make more.  
Soften the butter and the peanut butter ( separately so you can get them the right amount of softened - not liquid just easy to stir.)  Mix together and then add powdered sugar  gradually until you have it the thickness that you prefer working with.  You could drizzle it but mine was thicker and I piped it through a decorating bag.   

Very simple, that's all there is to it!

Backyard Pizza Oven

Every Friday night we have pizza for dinner.  Usually home made, sometimes take out, or take and bake.  But the very best is when my 17 year-old son fires up the out door pizza oven he made and cooks home made pizza.  

This is the brick lined pizza oven.

 

 

 

 

He heats up the oven, then using a pizza peal with the pizza on parchment so it slides easily, loads a thin crust pizza into the oven.

 

 

 

 

 The oven is really hot so it cooks quickly.

 

 

 

 

 

We cook several pizzas and then enjoy!!

 

 

We don't do this type of cooking very often but it is a lot of fun and makes a special pizza!

 

 

 

Bread: the staff of life!

We eat a lot of bread.  Without it my children might have starved, or at least been malnourished, since their other favorite food group is sweets.  Since it is a staple at our house I often make it, that way I know just what goes into it.  After several years of doing this they have learned to eat wheat bread and even like it! 

 

 

This is how it looked a little while after coming out of the oven, and a short while later the loaf was almost gone.  

Here is the recipe I use.  It might look like a long process but when you make it regularly you get the process down and it is not difficult at all.

Whole Wheat Bread 

7 cups wheat flour     (* see note at the bottom about wheat flour)
2/3 cup wheat gluten
2 1/2 Tablespoons yeast,  I use saf-instant

mix that all together in your mixing bowl.  

Then add 5 cups very warm water  (110-115 degrees)
Mix well  for a minute and then let it sit for 15 minutes or until it starts to rise up in the bowl.

Then add the rest of the ingredients:

1 1/2 Tablespoon salt
1/3 cup oil
1/3 cup honey or sugar if you are out of honey
2 1/2  Tablespoons dough enhancer
2 or 3 cups wheat flour

Mix it all up until it is thoroughly combined and then add white flour (about 2 to 3 cups) until you get it to a good bread consistency.  If you are using a bread mixer the dough starts to pull away from the sides and bottom of the bowl.  Keep mixing it in the mixer, or kneading it,  for 6 to 8 minutes.

Dump it out on a lightly floured countertop and form into loaves.

 

Put in greased pans, cover and let rise until it's over the top of the pan. This batch made 4 regular loaves and one smaller loaf.
Bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes.  

* I have a wheat grinder and for this batch I used hard white wheat.  The white wheat doesn't look as "wheaty" so my kids like it better.  I grind a lot and keep it in the freezer because I don't like the grinding and the less often I have to do it, the easier it is to make bread.  You can use all wheat flour instead of combining wheat and white flours.