No Bake Cookies

The No Bake Cookie, its a classic that will never be forgotten. I made dessert in my home probably every Sunday growing up because my mom didn't care much to make dessert but I always wanted it. These were the dessert I made most often, probably from the time I was about 5 years old. We always called them Uncooked Cookies, which is actually more fun to say than No Bake Cookies. These are the perfect 5 minute dessert to make when you are craving chocolate, something deliciously sweet or when you open you flour jar only to find there are only a few tablespoons remaining. Since I've made these countless times I've learned a few tips along the way. The amount of time you boil the mixture determines how set/dry they will be, margarine is out, it's banned =) butter only in these babies, NEVER substitute old fashioned oats in place of quick oats and the best way to serve them up - in paper muffin cups. 
This morning I set out to create my own version of the classic No Bake Cookie. I tried three ways, with buttermilk, coffee creamer and with real cream. Which did I like best? Real cream of course! They all had their own unique and delicious flavor but the cream version was my favorite. My mom always taught me every thing is better with a bit of cream in it. I think it gave the cookies just a hint of creaminess and richness. I hope you love this version! If you don't have cream you could just add an additional 1/4 cup milk in it's place to stick with the original version. Enjoy!

No Bake Cookies
Yields about 2 dozen


Ingredients:
1/2 cup salted butter
2 cups granulated sugar
1/4 cup cocoa powder
1/8 tsp salt
1/4 cup heavy cream*
1/4 cup milk*
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup creamy peanut butter
3 cups quick oats (DON'T use old fashioned oats)


Directions:
In a medium saucepan combine butter, sugar, cocoa, salt, cream and milk. Bring mixture to a rolling boil over medium heat, stirring occasionally, then allow mixture to boil 45 seconds without stirring. Remove from heat, add in vanilla, peanut butter and quick oats. Stir mixture until combine then, working with 2 large spoons, immediately divide mixture evenly among 24 paper muffin cups (for bigger cookies you could do about 16). Allow to rest at room temperature until set.


*alternately you can use 1/2 cup half and half in place of 1/4 cup cream and 1/4 cup milk. I just always keep milk and cream on hand rather than half and half so it's what I used.

Brazilian Limeade

Hello Summer! Nothing welcomes summer like an ice cold, refreshing beverage does such as this Brazilian Limeade. This drink is simply incredible! I got inspiration for this drink from a Brazilian "Lemonade" recipe I've been making for a few years that came from Sunset Magazine. Yes, indeed that recipe was good, but I always felt like it could use something more. So, here is my version of Brazilian Limeade and why would I call it Brazilian Limeade you may ask? Because the ingredients it uses are Brazilian colors of course =). It also uses the flavors of Brazil. 
Send yourself on a mini vacation by lounging out in the sunshine and enjoying a tall glass of this amazingly refreshing Brazilian Lemonade. It may just become a new summertime favorite!
Feel free to adjust this drink to suite your personal taste. Add more or less sugar to reach desired sweetness (1/2 cup was perfect for me). You could even add more lime juice if you want it a bit more tart. I think one of these times I'm going to have to add a few tablespoons of cream because how can I resist =). Enjoy!

Brazilian Limeade
Yields about 3-4 servings


Ingredients:
5 cups cold water, divided
1/2 cup coconut milk
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1 large overripe banana, peeled (peel should be speckled, not too overripe)
1/4 cup fresh lime juice
Zest of 3 limes
1/2 tsp coconut extract


Directions:
Combine 4 cups cold water (if your blender fits 5 cups well enough then you can add all 5 at this point), coconut milk, sugar, banana, lime juice, lime zest and coconut extract in a blender. Cover with lid and blend on low speed for one minute. Pour mixture through a fine mesh strainer into a pitcher, then using a rubber spatula press and rub lime zest back and forth against strainer to release oils from the zest into pitcher. Pour in remaining 1 cup cold water and stir. Serve over ice. Store in refrigerator and stir each time before serving.


Recipe Source: Cooking Classy

Slow Cooker Chicken Teriyaki

Slow cooker meals, aren't they just amazing? Throw the food in, say goodbye, then several hours later say hello to dinner. It really doesn't get much easier. I saw this photo/recipe on foodgawker.com and new I had to try it. I think I've finally realized another reason I love slow cooker meals, because I always have dessert after dinner so if I'm making dessert it's nice to have a simple dinner to throw together. Also, I can never get over how tender and flavorful the meat is that's been slowly simmered all day in the slow cooker. 
You will noticed if you follow the link that the recipe is nearly entirely different, yes I will admit rarely do I ever stick to someone else's recipe. It's just too fun to add my own twist. Feel free to try it either way I'm sure the original rendition is amazing too. Enjoy!

Slow Cooker Chicken Teriyaki
Yields 4-6 servings

Ingredients:
3 lbs boneless skinless chicken breasts
3/4 cup low sodium soy sauce (regular would work too)
1/4 cup + 2 Tbsp apple cider vinegar
1/3 cup packed light-brown sugar
1/4 cup honey
3 Tbsp orange marmalade
1 tbsp finely grated fresh ginger
2 cloves garlic, finely minced
1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
1 1/2 Tbsp cold water
1 1/2 Tbsp cornstarch
Cooked long grain white rice, for serving
Sesame seeds, for garnish (optional)

Directions:
Place chicken in a slow cooker, set aside. In a mixing bowl, whisk together soy sauce, apple cider vinegar, light-brown sugar, honey, orange marmalade, ginger, garlic and pepper. Pour mixture over chicken in slow cooker, cover with lid and cook on low heat 5 - 6 hours. Remove chicken from slow cooker and shred. Strain sauce from slow cooker through a fine mesh strainer into a medium saucepan. In a small mixing bowl whisk together 1 1/2 Tbsp cold water and cornstarch. Pour cornstarch mixture into liquid in saucepan and heat mixture over medium high heat, stirring constantly, until mixture begins to gently boil. Allow mixture to gently boil about 20 seconds until thickened. Return chicken to slow cooker and pour teriyaki sauce from saucepan over chicken. Toss mixture gently to evenly coat. Serve warm over cooked rice garnished with optional sesame seeds and serve with diced fresh pineapple if desired.

Recipe Source: slightly adapted from Lake Lure Cottage Kitchen

Perfect Breakfast Potatoes

If you've been following my blog you've probably noticed by now breakfast is kind of my thang. I love a delicious breakfast meal served up any time of day. I mentioned before how I've posted all these main entrees for breakfast but I've never posted the sides I serve with them. 
I've been making these potatoes for many years, so I'd hope I can say I've perfected the recipe. I've tried different cooking methods, different oils, played with seasonings and now here are the exact results I was looking for. Perfectly tender interior, with a gorgeously browned exterior, slightly moist, with just the right amount of flavor and seasoning. You can use plain old salt and pepper (if you want to be boring =) or you can add some pizzazz with the delicious seasoning blend listed. Below are a few things I wanted to list, that in my opinion, make the perfect breakfast potatoes:


1. Pre-bake the potatoes. If they are cooked halfway before you fry them then they don't end up under cooked in the middle.
7. Leave the skins on when dicing. Less work (no peeling necessary), more taste and more vitamins. With that said why wouldn't you?
2. Extra Virgin Olive Oil was my favorite oil for frying. I've tried butter, bacon fat and vegetable oil and EVOO is where it's at. Not only do the potatoes taste better fried with EVOO but they are much better for you.
3. Season generously. I'm not saying over salt your potatoes, I'm saying a little flavor goes a long way. I love the flavors that garlic and onion powder add to these. Alternately if you love Potatoes O'Brian you could add diced onion, and diced green and red bell pepper.
4. Cover potatoes with a lid while frying, this helps the potatoes maintain some of the moisture as well as helping them evenly cook through.
5. Don't over-stir. If you stir too often you won't get the perfectly golden edges. Just think of flipping a pancake, you don't want to flip it before it's golden, it's the same with breakfast potatoes, you shouldn't "flip" them until they are golden.
6. Serve immediately. Potatoes get soggy after sitting too long after cooking. It's a silly thing but I always get frustrated when people are late for a breakfast meal I'm serving. Breakfast meals/sides aren't nearly as good cold or reheated. This includes breakfast potatoes.


All the above are my personal opinion. I'm not a professional chef (just wannabe =). They are tips I've found through personal experience through trial and error. I hope you love these potatoes and maybe even make them as often as I do (I make them at least once a week, sometimes even three).

Breakfast Potatoes
Yields about 5 servings 


Ingredients:
5 small Russet Potatoes (total weight should be about 1.5 lbs)
1/4 cup Extra Virgin Olive Oil 
1 1/2 - 2 tsp Herb Seasoning, to taste (recipe can be found here)


Directions:
Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Meanwhile rinse and scrub potatoes then pierce each potato several times with a fork. Bake potatoes in preheat oven for 35 minutes. Remove from oven, allow to cool 30 minutes then chill overnight (alternately you could dice and cook potatoes immediately, I've just found it's more convenient to bake them ahead of time when I'm already making baked potatoes for dinner or baking another dish. Also, potatoes seem to cut cleaner if they've been chilled). 
Dice chilled potatoes into 1/2" cubes. Pour extra virgin olive oil into a 10" non-stick skillet and heat over medium high heat. Once oil barely begins to smoke, carefully pour diced potatoes into hot oil. Immediately sprinkle with Herb Seasoning then toss potatoes with a heat proof spatula. Cover pan with lid and cook potatoes, stirring every few minutes as they begin to lightly brown on bottom, about 8 - 12 minutes until potatoes have reached desired tenderness. Serve immediately. 
Note: sometimes I like to sprinkle them with a few tablespoons of Parmesan cheese after frying (cheese is good over nearly everything). Also, they are delish drizzled with ketchup, yep I'm all American with my side of Ketchup =). It's like french fries without ketchup, it just shouldn't be done.

Crusty Rustic Bread (it's no knead!)

Everyone reading this, please, you need to make this bread! I'm telling you, this is the best loaf of yeasted bread I have ever made! I've baked many o' things, but funny thing until today I've never made my own loaf of no knead rustic bread. Seriously, why I have not tried it until now I can never tell you! I had no idea that such an incredibly quick and easy recipe could yield such amazing results. It is the perfect loaf of rustic bread, wonderfully crisp and chewy on the outside, while tender and even slightly moist on the inside. I can now officially say I've made a loaf of bread as good as a professional artisan bread baker thanks to the wonderful post over at Simply So Good. I'm so happy I found this recipe (from my countless hours of Pinterest gawking. Seriously I could spend my whole day on there, it's dangerous). Never again will I pay $5 to buy a loaf of rustic bread at the store or bakery. Astoundingly I liked this even better and it had to cost less than .50 cents to make. 
I also can't wait to try many different variations on this simple recipe. Thank you thank you to Simply So Good for posting such an amazing recipe. Head over there for step by step photos, mix in ideas and to browse through the over 1,000 comments posted (when I saw there were over 1,000 comments I knew this recipe had to be good). I hope this recipe becomes a staple in your home too!

Crusty Rustic Bread

Yields 1 loaf

Ingredients:

3 cups all-purpose flour

1 3/4 tsp salt

1/2 tsp active dry yeast

1 1/2 cups warm water (about 110 degrees)

Directions:

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together flour, salt and yeast. Pour in warm water and stir mixture with a wooden spoon until a shaggy ball forms. Cover bowl with plastic wrap and allow to rise for 12 - 18 hours (on the counter at room temperature).

Heat oven to 450 degrees. Once oven has reached 450 degrees, place a cast iron pot covered with lid into preheated oven, heat pot for 30 minutes. 

Meanwhile, turn dough out onto a heavily floured surface then shape dough into a ball. Cover dough with plastic wrap and allow to rest while pot is heating. Remove pot from oven and with floured hands, carefully drop dough into hot pot (you DON'T need to grease the pot) cover with lid, then immediately return pot to oven and bake 30 minutes (at 450 degrees). After 30 minutes, remove lid from pot and bake uncovered for 15 minutes. Remove from oven and allow bread to cool on a cooling rack. Once completely cooled, bread stores well in an open paper bag (it helps the bread maintain it's crisp crust. I wouldn't recommend storing it in an airtight container or ziploc bag).


Update 7/3/11: 
I made a wheat version of this with 1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour, 1 1/2 cups bread flour, 1 tsp salt, 1/2 tsp yeast, 2 Tbsp honey combine with 1 1/2 cups + 1/3 cup warm water and rise and cook according to directions listed. It was delicious!

Recipe Source: adapted from Simply So Good, thank you for such an incredible post!

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Bites

Oh I don't even know where to start with these bad boys! This is one of my favorite posts yet! I had family over today and served these for dessert, I think they went quicker than any dessert I've ever made. Who doesn't love cookie dough? Okay okay so truthfully I wasn't that into it (what was wrong with me!? =) until just a few months ago, then I got a more refined palate and became obsessed with it, and now with these I'm dangerously addicted. I can't stop eating them!
Of course I made these to be egg free, and to replace the moisture from the lack of eggs (I also didn't want to add more than a stick of butter) I decided to add what better than heavy cream! My life motto: every things better with cream haha kidding (kind of). If it wasn't so fattening I'd pour cream over my cold cereal replacing milk for breakfast, I love the stuff. The cream gives these cookie dough bites the perfect texture. Ah don't you just wish you had one now to sink your teeth into and let it slowly melt in your mouth? So go make them, you won't regret it (well maybe you will a little when you can't stop eating them... but it's worth it. I'd rather run a few extra miles to enjoy a few more of these).
Make these and where ever you take them they will be worth more than gold, seriously they should replace money. Bonus, less waiting for baked cookies and less mess. I'm going to be seeing a lot of these around my place.
Note: I know many cookie dough truffles/bites use mini chocolate chips but I never keep the minis on hand that's why I used regular chocolate chips and just chopped them up a bit. Plus I love how it gave them the little slivers of chocolate throughout the cookie dough bites, but if you don't want to do the chopping and you have minis feel free to use that. You could even use mini M&M's. I listed in the recipe my personal preference which is half milk chocolate chips half semi-sweet but if you prefer one over the other then use that. Add extra if you'd like too. Enjoy! Hide them from everyone, I think next time I'm going to. Sometimes, just sometimes it's okay to be greedy =).

Creepy, do you see the little guy looking up saying "eat me"?

 Now I can't stop looking at it...

 That serving will be mine...

Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Bites
Yields about 30 (so barely enough for 2 people =)


Ingredients:
1/2 cup salted butter, softened
3/4 cup packed light-brown sugar
1/3 cup granulated sugar*
1/4 tsp salt
3 Tbsp heavy cream
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup milk chocolate chips, chopped (the idea is to get them to be about 1/2 - 1/3 their original size)
1/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips, chopped


Optional Topping:
1/3 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips


Directions:
In the bowl of an electric mixer, whip together butter, brown sugar, granulated sugar and salt until pale and fluffy about 3 - 4 minutes. Stir in cream and vanilla extract. Add in flour and mix just until combine (dough will seem dry at first but it will come together). Mix in chopped chocolate chips. Scoop dough out 1 equal tablespoon at a time and roll into balls. Place on parchment or wax paper. If drizzling with chocolate, place 1/3 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips in a microwave safe container and microwave on 50% power in 30 second intervals, stirring after each interval until melted and smooth. Pour melted chocolate into a small ziploc bag, seal bag and cut a very small tip off the corner of the bag. Drizzle chocolate over tops of truffles. Place truffles in freezer for several minutes until chocolate sets and hardens (mine only took about 3 minutes), then enjoy! For more firm cookie dough bites, chill 1 hour in refrigerator. Store in refrigerator in an airtight container.


*for an even creamier truffle omit 2 Tbsp of the granulated sugar and replace it with 2 Tbsp coffee creamer powder. It's delicious!


Recipe Source: Cooking Classy

My Idea of the Perfect Scrambled Eggs

After posting banana bread pancakes the other day I realized I haven't even posted the sides I always serve with my breakfast entrees. Well it's about time I do. Most often I serve the the entree with a side of these scrambled eggs and breakfast potatoes, then on special occasions with bacon. 
This is one of those recipes I had to actually had to sit down and measure out what I put in it because it's always been a little of this and a dash of that. I believe one of the most important factors to perfect, fluffy scrambled eggs it stirring/folding them constantly. Every cook has their opinion on what temperature they should be cooked at, some say low and slow and other say high and quick. In my opinion medium - high is perfect. 
The seasoning used for these is one I've been using a lot lately, most often in breakfast dishes. I think I would say it's slightly Italian. It compliments eggs perfectly. You can use the remaining seasoning for burgers or chicken. It's a quick, simple way to add delicious flavor. Enjoy!


Scrambled Eggs
Yields about 4 servings


Ingredients:
8 large eggs
1/2 cup milk*
1/2 Tbsp butter
2 oz grated Cheddar or Monterrey Jack cheese (I use 1 oz of each)
1 Tbsp grated Parmesan cheese
1 tsp herb seasoning, recipe follows or salt and pepper to taste


Directions:
Preheat a 10" non-stick skillet over medium high heat. Crack eggs into a blender, add in milk  (cover with lid) and blend mixture on low speed for 10 seconds. Melt butter in saucepan by spreading it along bottom and edges of skillet. Once butter has lightly begun to bubble, pour blended egg mixture into pan and immediately sprinkle with cheeses and seasoning. Stir eggs CONSTANTLY (a key to perfect eggs) with a spatula, making sure to scrape along the surface of the pan to prevent bottom from browning and a skin from forming. Cook eggs for 3-4 minutes to desired wetness/dryness of eggs (note: they will continue to cook slightly once removed). Remove from heat and serve immediately.


*sometimes I like to do 1/4 cup milk and 1/4 cup buttermilk


Add in ideas:
Diced ham
Fresh salsa (reduce amount of milk if adding this)
Sliced mushrooms
Diced tomatoes
Spinach
Diced avocados
Crumbled bacon


Herb Seasoning


Ingredients:
1 Tbsp salt
1 1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper (call it your workout for the day)
2 tsp onion powder
2 tsp garlic powder
1 tsp dried parsley
1/4 tsp dried oregano
1/8 tsp dried basil
1/8 tsp dried thyme


Directions:
Whisk together all ingredients in a mixing bowl. Store in an airtight container for up to several months. This seasoning is also great for burgers, chicken, twice baked potatoes and breakfast potatoes.