Tiny Pies

Here is yet another recipe I'm crazy excited to share with you (because I could probably eat all twenty-four in one night if I didn't have plenty of people to share with). Miniature fudge-cream pies. Look how cute they are! If you like dark chocolate, these are a huge win, and not very difficult to make.

Mini Fudge-Cream Pies

Makes 24 mini-muffin-size pies

Total time about 48 minutes
Time to cook: 18 minutes

Prep time about 30 minutes

Ingredients

• 1 cup of unsalted butter, softened (two sticks)
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 8 oz semi-sweet baking chocolate (comes in bars, sectioned into squares. I bought two, 4-oz bars)
• 1/4 cup milk
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 8 oz frozen whipped topping (thawed. more if you want to go crazy with the whipped topping)

Instructions

When I first read this recipe, I decided to put off making it because it sounded like a lot of work. Make the crust. Form the crust. Bake the crust. Press the crust. Bake the crust again. What kind of magic, bored and lonely housewife do you think I am?! But I promise it's worth it... in part because the results are delicious, but also because it's not nearly as tedious as it sounds. 

Crusts

1. Preheat your oven to 350. 
2. Coat a mini-muffin tin (the kind with 24 tiny cups) with non-stick cooking spray.
3. Beat butter and sugar until well combined. (You can use a hand mixer or a stand mixer. This is basically a less-sweet sugar cookie crust you're making)
4. Mix in flour and salt until dough ball is formed. 
5. Make 24 dough balls, about 2 teaspoons in size.
6. Press one dough ball into the bottom of each mini-muffin cup and spread the dough up the sides of the cups a bit. 
7. Bake for 10 minutes.
8. Remove from oven and press center of each crust with a spoon. (I do not recommend using your finger. I used a plastic measuring spoon and it got a little uncomfortably hot in the bowl of it)
9. Return pan and crusts to the oven for 6-8 minutes, until edges start to brown.
10. Remove from oven and let cool while you make the delicious filling!

Filling

1. Load your chocolate and milk into a large, microwave-safe bowl and microwave for 30 second intervals until chocolate is totally melted. (this only took two microwave sessions for me)
2. Let melted chocolate mixture cool for 10 minutes.
3. Stir in vanilla and 1-1/2 cups of thawed, whipped topping. 

Combine

1. Scoop (or pipe with a piping bag if you're really ambitious) chocolate mixture into the crust cups, while they're still in the pan.
2. Scoop (or, again, pipe...) a bit of the remaining whipped topping on top of each pie.
3. Scatter some chopped chocolate, or sprinkles, or... whatever... on top of your adorable pies.
4. Remove from the pan and serve immediately or store, covered, in the fridge. 

Let Me Tell You About Quiche

Last week, I made my first quiche. I didn't take a picture. I really should have. But it went over with the kids so well that we made it again this week. I took lots of pictures this week. I just couldn't wait to share it with you. 

We decided on this recipe because we wanted to find something our kids could help make. As homeschooling parents, we assume the responsibility of teaching our students to be self reliant. We need to teach them to cook. They need ample time in the kitchen, using tools that might make us uncomfortable to see them using, starting when they're fairly young. At least, that's my policy. Honestly, we've been pretty short on the time the kids spend in the kitchen lately because of the general level of craziness. 

Not only was it a great source of kitchen experience, but it was delicious. The kids all devoured it. It even satisfies the Cub's persistent desire for scrambled eggs. However, there are no vegetables in this particular quiche, so we serve it with steamed broccoli. 

Ham and Swiss Quiche

Makes about 4 Servings

Total time about 1 hour
Time to cook: 45 minutes

Prep time about 15 minutes

Ingredients

• 1 package roll-out pie crusts (two crusts per box. we make two quiches. You could make your own crust, of course)
• 4 large eggs
• 1 cup half and half
• 1-2 cups diced cooked ham (you can buy it already diced, by thick-sliced ham from the deli, or dice up some leftovers)
• 1 1/2 cups grated swiss cheese
• 2 tablespoons grated parmesan cheese
• 1 tablespoon dijon mustard
• 1/8 teaspoon pepper
• 1/8 teaspoon salt

Instructions

This recipe is super simple. As I mentioned, I picked this one so I could involve the kids in the preparation. There are many other quiche recipes. You can put almost anything (within reason) in a quiche. So far, this is the only one we've tried. I can vouch for this recipe being kid-prep friendly and kid-approved for level of deliciousness. 

1. Preheat your oven to 350. 
2. Take the pie crusts out of the box and let warm to room temperature. Put one in the fridge for later if you're only making one quiche. (The crusts are rolled up and wrapped in plastic, so I set them outside, briefly, on my covered patio to warm)
3. Beat eggs and half and half until combined, then add salt, pepper and mustard. Mix well. (On our first attempt, I didn't supervise the mustard mixing quite well enough. One of my quiches wound up with surprisingly mustardy parts.)
4. Roll out your room-temperature (or close) pie crust and press it into a greased pie tin.
5. Layer ham cubes and swiss cheese into the crust, pour egg mix in, then sprinkle parmesan cheese over the top. 
6. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes: until crust is golden brown and eggs are fully set. (Remember that eggs are still wet on the inside even when they're fully cooked, but you should see no mucous-consistency yellow stuff when you cut into the quiche.)

 Found this recipe here: ham and swiss quiche 

Ham and Veggie Chowder

I got this recipe from a recipe book my mom has called "slow cooker favorites". It's super easy, visually appealing, and delicious. It's also full of vegetables, so who can complain? I didn't want to add anything to mine (not even salt and pepper!) but salt, pepper, grated cheese, and crackers would be good options to make available when you serve this stuff.

Ham and Veggie Chowder

Makes 6 Servings

Total time 4 to 5 hours (on high) 7 to 9 hours (on low)
Time in the slow cooker 3.5 to 4.5 hours (on high) 6.5 to 8.5 hours (on low)

Prep time (probably not even) 30 minutes

Ingredients

• 2 cans condensed cream of celery soup, undiluted
• 2 cups diced cooked ham (you can buy it already diced or dice up some leftovers)
• 1 10oz package frozen corn, thawed (You can also use strained and rinsed canned corn. I haven't tried fresh, but I imagine that would also work)
• 1 large baking potato, cut into 1/2-inch pieces
• 1 medium red bell pepper, diced
• 1/2 teaspoon dried thyme leaves (I used thyme powder, and it turned out fine)
• 2 cups small broccoli florets (I used fairly large ones, I recommend you don't. The broccoli does not get soft enough to break apart with a spoon easily, so larger pieces are pretty inconvenient.)
• 1/2 cup milk

Instructions

DO NOT PUT THE MILK IN YET!
I had Papa helping me with this dinner. I was chopping potatoes and peppers while he was putting other things in the slow cookers (we used two and made a double recipe). He didn't read to the end of the instructions before he put the milk in. Do not put the milk in until 15 to 30 minutes before serving. I know it looks like an unreasonably dry pile of vegetables and you want to add some liquid. There's not a lot of liquid in this recipe, especially in the early stages. Your milk will probably curdle if you add it too soon. In fact, it definitely will if you try to cook it on high for 3 or 4 hours. 

1. Combine condensed soup, ham, corn, potato, bell pepper and thyme in your slow cooker. Mix well.
2. Cover and cook on low for 6 to 8 hours or high for 3 to 4 hours.
3. THEN stir in broccoli and milk.
4. Cover and cook on high for 15 to 30 minutes or until broccoli is warm and tender, but not falling apart. 

Papa was tired and not feeling well when he was helping me. When he realized he had made a mistake, he wasn't sure how to fix it. I wound up sending my sister to the closest grocery store to get some new cream of celery soup while we dumped the slow cooker contents into a sieve and used the shower-like setting on the sink tap to wash all of the liquids off of the solid ingredients. 

It turned out fine; delicious even.

M's Birthday Cake

Some things went wrong with M's birthday cake. The royal icing rainbow crumbled when I tried to remove it from the wax paper on which it was drawn. The icing I originally used to write on the top of the cake melted into the frosting. The piping frosting I made for the clouds and edging was chunky and I had to use store-bought stuff instead. But it tasted amazing, and the cake and base frosting were perfect.

For her cake, I knew I wanted a batter that would produce a very white cake. My plan was to create a six-layer rainbow cake, so I needed a white base to fill with food coloring.

To make this delicious white cake, you will need:
2 1/4 cups cake flour
1 cup milk at room temperature
6 large egg whites at room temperature
2 teaspoons almond extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 3/4 cups granulated sugar
4 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 sticks unsalted butter softened but still cool

I doubled the recipe to make six, thin layers.

Directions:
Make sure milk and eggs are room temperature. If you have a lot of time, just sit them out over night. I put my eggs (still whole and in their shells) straight into a bowl of warm (not hot) water and poured my milk into a measuring cup with a handle, hooked the handle over the edge of the bowl, and partially submerged the measuring cup. I gave it about an hour and all were room temperature.
Preheat your oven to 350. I didn't do this until near the end of making the batter. I'm a rebel when it comes to preheating.
Prepare pans you intend to use. I used cooking spray on the two round pans I have. Needing to make six layers, I cleaned, sprayed and reused my two pans three times.
Mix wet ingredients. In a medium bowl, mix milk, egg whites, and extracts by hand until blended.
Mix dry ingredients. In a separate bowl (the bowl of your stand mixer if you have one), combine cake flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt with an electric mixer on medium speed.
Add butter. Cut butter into cubes and add to dry ingredient mixture. Beat on low for 1-2 minutes.
Combine wet and dry ingredients. Add all but 1/2 cup of wet ingredients to dry ingredients. Beat on medium speed for 1 1/2 minutes, then add remaining wet ingredients and beat for 1 additional minute.
Pour batter evenly in pan(s).
Bake for 27-30 minutes or until toothpick comes out clean.

For my cake, I separated my batter (a double batch) into six different bowls and added a different color of food coloring to each bowl. Also, keep in mind that I had to bake my six layers in three separate sessions. My last two colors of batter sat on my counter for almost an hour before being baked and turned out just fine. If you only have one cake pan and want to make layers, you can just bake two or three layers separately.

The base frosting I made was much easier, but still tasty.

To make this super easy frosting, you need:
Vanilla Instant Jello pudding mix (I used two large boxes)
Milk
Whipped Cream

Directions:
Empty Vanilla pudding mix into a bowl. Add half the amount of milk that the box recipe calls for.
Whisk until it begins to thicken.
Add whipped cream until frosting reaches desired consistency

This frosting is light and delicious. It holds well as a spreadable frosting but lacks structural quality (after all, it's made of jello pudding) and probably won't hold a piped form very well. It also cracked in my refrigerator after about a day, but that could be touched up easily.

White cake recipe adapted from www.epicurious.com 

My Favorite Chocolate Chip Cookies

D calls these the perfect cookies. They're not too sweet, they cook perfectly and have a great texture, and the amount of chocolate chips is perfect. I made a batch of these for D's family when they visited and got quite a few compliments. Actually, I make these more often than any other cookie because my kids love them. Don't all kids love chocolate chip cookies? I make them in such a way that results in uniformly sized and shaped cookies, too, so there aren't any arguments about who got the bigger cookie (although D sometimes complains that some of them didn't get as many chips as others). 

Chocolate Chip Cookies

Serves about 3 dozen

Total time 2 hours 50 minutes
Bake time 8-10 minutes per sheet
Freeze time 2 hours

Prep time 20 minutes

Ingredients

3/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 cup sugar
1 egg
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups flour
2 tsp cornstarch
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup chocolate chips

Instructions

Prepare a cookie sheet or two. I use 2, and bake 3 sets of cookies in rotation. You can use cooking spray or parchment paper.

Cream together butter and sugars. Add egg and vanilla and blend. I use my standing mixer for all of the mixing in this recipe. You can do it by hand (I did, before D got me the mixer).

Mix in flour, cornstarch, baking soda, and salt. Stir in chocolate chips.

Use a tablespoon, cookie scoop, or round cookie cutter to portion the dough into cookies of the desired size. 

Place portioned dough onto cookie sheet and freeze for a couple of hours. This will harden the dough and keep it from spreading out so much when baking.

Preheat oven to 350F.

Once frozen, arrange cookies on a prepared cookie sheet, at least 1 inch apart. Bake for 8-10 minutes, until barely golden brown around the edges (do not wait for tops to brown).

Let cool on the cookie sheet, on a cooling rack for about five minutes.

Lemon Drop Cookies

I'm always looking for the perfect lemon cookie. I do love the fresh, simple flavor of lemon desserts. My kids love chocolate, so we make a lot of chocolate chip cookies. I guess I feel like a good lemon cookie helps really break up that pattern. I'm not sure that these are the perfect lemon cookies for me, but they are pretty good. They're small, light, and just a little sweet. 

Lemon Drop Cookies

Serves about 24

Total time 50 minutes

Prep time 20 minutes

Ingredients

2 Cups Flour
1/3 cup sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
1/4 cup shortening
1/2 cup milk
1 egg, beaten
2 tsp lemon extract

Instructions

Preheat oven to 375F.
Prepare a cookie sheet or two. I wound up using two. You can use cooking spray or parchment paper.
Combine flour, sugar, and baking powder in a large bowl. Cut in shortening. Stir in milk, egg, and lemon extract. Mix until well blended. I started out with a regular mixing bowl and an electric hand-mixer, but ended up transferring the dough into my standing mixer because my hand-mixer just wasn't up to the task. Honestly, I'm pretty sure I just have a sub-par hand-mixer.
Roll 1-inch dough balls with floured hands (dough is quite sticky). Place the cookies on the prepared cookie sheet(s) about 1-inch apart.
Bake for 10-12 minutes or until golden in color. Let cool completely on cooling rack while you prepare the frosting.

Lemon Frosting

Ingredients


1/3 cup shortening
2 cups powdered sugar
1/4 cup warm milk
1 tsp lemon extract

Instructions

Combine shortening and sugar in a medium bowl. You're going to want to use some sort of mixer for this. I used my hand-mixer (this was a task it could handle). 
Stir in warm milk, 1-2 tablespoons at a time until frosting reaches desired consistency.
Stir in lemon extract.

To get the "drop" shape, I pushed the top of each cookie into the frosting, wiggled it around a bit, then pulled it straight out. 

Amish Bread

For Christmas dinner, the night before I went to the hospital to deliver the cub, we had a friend over and had a nice, smallish, homemade meal. We made salmon, broccoli-cheese soup, deviled eggs, and mini cheesecakes. We also made this "Amish white bread" with the kids. It's straight-forward, fun, doesn't require a bread machine and it's actually quite delicious; a great first bread recipe for kids. The flavor, consistency and crust would lend itself well to making a bread bowl, in fact.

Amish White Bread

Serves 2 9x5 loaves

Total time 2.5 hours including rise time

Prep time 2 hours including rise time

Ingredients

2 cups warm water (110 degrees F/45 degrees C)

2/3 cup white sugar

1 1/2 tbsp active dry yeast

1 1/2 tsp salt

1/4 cup vegetable oil

6 cups bread flour

Instructions

Dissolve sugar in warm water, then mix in yeast. Let sit until yeast creates a froth on the surface of the water. This takes a few minutes. I used this time to talk to my kids about yeast as a living organism, and that it eats the sugar, etc.

Mix salt and oil in to the frothy yeast water.

Add flour, one cup at a time. I used 5 cups of flour in the bowl, then used the rest to flour my table to knead the dough. In the process of kneading the dough, a lot of that 6th cup gets incorporated. 

Knead dough until smooth. I let the kids do a lot of this. They had fun, punching, poking and otherwise abusing it.

Place dough mass into a well oiled bowl and roll to oil surface of dough.

Cover dough mass with a damp cloth and let rise for about 1 hour. It should double in size.

Punch dough down and knead for a few minutes. Divide in half and form into loaves (or balls if you want to make bread bowls).

Place into well-oiled, 9x5 bread pans. The bread ball in the picture at the top was baked directly on an oiled cookie sheet.

Allow to rise for 30 more minutes. Bread mass supposedly should expand to about 1 inch above the top of the bread pan. Mine did not, but it turned out fine.

Bake at 350 degrees F/175 degrees C for 30 minutes.

Applesauce Cookies with Caramel Icing

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

These cookies are light, moist and not terribly sweet. The icing is very sweet and excessively decadent on it's own if you ask me. Together, they make one very enjoyable cookie. In fact, everyone in my house loved them.

Applesauce Cookies
Serves 30 cookies
Total time about 1 hour

Ingredients:


2 cups sugar
1 cup shortening
2 eggs
2 cups applesauce
4 cups flour
2 tsp. baking soda
2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp. ground cloves


Instructions:

Heat the oven to 375 degrees.
In a large bowl (you will need two large bowls all together) mix together flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, and cloves.
In a separate large bowl (you will need to fit dry and wet ingredients together in this one) cream together shortening and eggs.
Add eggs and applesauce. Mix well.
Mix dry ingredients into wet ingredients and mix until well blended.
Drop small spoonfuls of batter onto prepared cookie sheet (spray, grease, or parchment paper. I love parchment paper, personally).
Bake for 8-10 minutes. 

Caramel Icing

Ingredients:


6 tbsp. butter
1/2 cup heavy cream
1 cup packed brown sugar
2 tsp. vanilla
2 cups powdered sugar


Instructions:

In a medium saucepan, over medium heat, combine butter, heavy cream, and brown sugar. Stir occasionally until mixture begins to boil. Immediately remove from heat and stir in vanilla. Let cool, then add powdered sugar.

Spread icing over cookies.

Original recipe found at redtri.com with nutrition facts. Modifications made to instructions, based on my experience.

Caramel Apples

These were quick and easy. They were also quite fun. I want to come up with or find some new, different, maybe even better ways to decorate them next time. This year, though, with 3 kids under 6 years old, this was simple and satisfactory for everyone. Now they want to know when we’re going to eat them. :)

Caramel Apples
Serves 5
Total time 30 minutes
Prep time 30 minutes

Ingredients:

5 apples of your choice
1 package (14 ounces) individually wrapped caramel cubes
2 tbsp milk

Other required items:

Skewers
Cooking spray
Cookie sheet

Optional:

Chocolate chips
Sprinkles
Other decorations

Instructions:

Remove stems and wash apples
Push skewers into centers of apples (one per) through dimple where stem was

Freeze apples on clean cookie sheet while you prepare caramel
Unwrap caramel squares and pile in a bowl
Microwave caramel squares for 2 minutes, stir once halfway through
Stir caramel again, until smooth
Remove apples from freezer
Spray empty cookie sheet with cooking spray
Dip apples one at a time, turning sideways for higher caramel coating 
place on cookie sheet
Return to freezer or place in refrigerator

At this point, you can call it done, or you can decorate. I microwaved some chocolate chips (the same way you microwaved the caramel) and used a spoon to spread chocolate over the top half of the apples 

so the kids could decorate the apples with sprinkles. Freezing the apples before I dipped them in the caramel helped the caramel coat better and puddle less at the bottom, but also made it almost instantly lose its sticky texture, so sprinkles wouldn’t stay.

Apple Muffins

Slightly sweeter than the previous muffin recipe I posted (Applesauce Oatmeal Muffins), these muffins still only have ⅛ cup of sugar per batch. Most of the sweetening is from applesauce and fresh apple pieces. My family found them delightful. Another hit for breakfast, lunch, or snack time, and pretty easy to make.

Apple Muffins
Serves 6 reg size or 12 mini
Total time 20-25 minutes
Prep time 10 minutes

Ingredients:

3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp cinnamon
3 tbs butter
1/8 cup brown sugar
3/4 cup applesauce
1 egg
1/4 tsp salt (optional)
1/2 apple peeled and chopped very small

Instructions:

Heat the oven to 350 degrees.
Spray a muffin tin with non-stick cooking spray, set aside.
Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and cinnamon in a small mixing bowl (but large enough to add other ingredients to, later), set aside.
In a microwave-safe bowl, melt the butter on high for about 30 seconds; add sugar, applesauce, egg, salt and apple pieces. Mix until consistent.
Pour the apple mixture over the flour mixture. Gently stir until just incorporated, do not over mix.
Fill the muffin tins about half full with batter.
For 12 mini-muffins: Bake for 8-9 minutes. For 6 standard size muffins: bake 15 minutes

Original recipe found at redtri.com with nutrition facts. Modifications made to instructions, based on my experience.

Pinwheel Sandwiches

These are fun and easy, and customizable like any sandwich. If you have a picky eater, this is a great solution because you can put almost anything they want on it (and sneak in what they need). We also found that they make great picnic foods because they stay together pretty well, unlike other sandwiches, and you can make them in advance and wrap them in foil. I’ll share the version we made.

Pinwheel Sandwiches
Serves 2 adults and 3 kids as far as I can tell
Total time 20-25 minutes
Prep time 20-25 minutes

Ingredients:

2 large tortillas
4 leaves romaine lettuce
10 slices American cheese
1 box cream cheese
Turkey
Cajun seasoning (to taste)
Garlic (to taste)

Instructions:

Combine cream cheese, Cajun seasoning and garlic in medium mixing bowl. This will require mashing with a fork for several minutes, but will soften the cream cheese and warm it up for the next step.
spread cream cheese evenly on one entire surface of each tortilla.
Layer cheese, lettuce, and turkey evenly on each tortilla. This will probably require creative cheese shaping. IMPORTANT: Leave cream cheese exposed on the edge of the tortilla that will be on the outside when you roll it up.
Roll the tortilla. If the end edge has no exposed cream cheese, cut away some of the other ingredients until it does. The cream cheese will seal the wrap.
Now cut slices of the wrap to expose the spiraled colors.
Serve.

Remember, this one can be manipulated to your liking. Season your cream cheese however you prefer; use ham or chicken or beef if you so choose. I’ve seen some with diced tomatoes, peppers and onions or hummus. This is less a recipe and more an idea.

Applesauce Oatmeal Muffins

These are excellent muffins for breakfast or for lunch on the go. They’re not too sweet, and they’re very moist. They might also make a great base for a cranberry oatmeal muffin if you add dried cranberries or something of that sort. If you want a bit more sweetness, you could try making extra topping.

Applesauce Oatmeal Muffins
Serves: 12
Total time: 30 minutes
Prep time: 10 minutes

Ingredients:

Muffins
1 ½ cups quick oats
1 ¼ cups flour
¾ tsp cinnamon
1 tsp baking powder
¾ tsp baking soda
1 cup unsweetened applesauce
½ cup milk
½ cup brown sugar
3 tbsps vegetable oil
1 egg white

Topping
¼ cup quick oats
1 tbsp brown sugar
⅛ tsp cinnamon
1 tbsp margarine or butter (melted)

Instructions:

1. Heat oven to 400
2. Line muffin tin with paper cups or spray with cooking spray
3. Combine oats, flour, cinnamon, baking powder and baking soda
4. Mix in applesauce, milk, brown sugar, oil and egg white until batter is consistent
5. Fill muffin cups almost full - remember they will rise
6. For topping combine remaining ingredients in small bowl (quick oats, brown sugar, cinnamon, melted margarine or butter)
7. Sprinkle evenly over batter, press in slightly with finger
8. Bake 20-22 minutes until deep golden brown and toothpick comes out clean

 Original recipe found at food.com with nutrition facts. Modifications made to instructions, based on my experience.