Shameless, I Know.

Other than tired, busy, away, lazy, tired, tired and tired, I have absolutely no excuse whatsoever for not posting for the last several weeks. I'm sorry.

Because I know you're all drooling  for my latest kitchen creations, here's some of what I've been up to...
Oh yeah, I've even taken pictures and not posted them! AAARGH!

First, and most recently- I cleaned my sink. Check out Flylady.com. These chicks are awesome. They make me feel so silly for letting my housework slide the way I have. Apparently, it's supposed to be EASY. hahahahahah

Before

After

Now, sad as it may sound, that is the most significant accomplishment of my day so far- after getting out of bed that is.

***

I've also done another awesome cake! Inspired by the countless foodie posts I seem to keep StumblingUpon, I adapted the "from scratch" recipe to fit my lazy assed preference for cake-in-a-box, to create the Original De-Lishes Beer Cake with Baileys Buttercream frosting!

Sigh... I can't rotate the damn picture. You'll get a kink in your neck if you look too long!

So, basically the recipe goes like this...

You take any Devils Food cake mix, and prepare according to package instructions EXCEPT instead of water or milk, you add Guinness or any other stout- be sure not to include foam when measuring. Bake, cool, and don't eat it yet!

The frosting follows my basic version of buttercream icing; one cup butter, one cup shortening, 1tsp vanilla and a crapload of icing sugar- now instead of adding the hot milk, add a good slug of Baileys or any other good Irish Cream liquor. Actually, you could add ANY kind of liqueur. G.Marinier, Amarulo, Kahlua, whatever strikes your fancy I guess! In this case, for extra "POW", I made sure to add too much icing sugar so I could add MORE Baileys!

The cake will bake up super extra moist and fluffy, and the frosting will be DEADLY, and most of your friends will be very impressed! The ones that aren't can go suck an egg- more cake for you!

***

I must have ditched all the other pictures of food... so sad, I had a mean looking French Toast post ready to go! So for now, that's it. Now go make some cake!

HAM- 3 Ways from Sunday

Oh, that's not MY ham, it's just a nice picture of a ham because I was too bloody lazy to take pictures of my ham before it was decimated.

So we started out with a store bought cooked ham. It was huge! I was dreading watching the leftovers rot in the fridge over the next week, so I steeled myself for however many days of re-inventing HAM as it would take to make the boys eat ALL OF IT.

So... First you takes the hams....
Put it in a bowl with a bit of water and NUKE THAT BABY while you whip up perogies.
Perogies- boil them til they float, and fry with BUTTER- lots and lots of BUTTER and maybe some bacon and onions if you like.

Tada! You have HAM Lundi! Slice ham and serve hot with the perogies, sour cream, my brother likes mustard on his ham. Freak.

Day 2 "Ham Mardi" (Oh, so the name of the post implies we started on Sunday. It's a Lie. We had ham on Monday).
Right. So.

Take some more HAM. Decide how much they're gonna eat. Spread the slices in the bottom of a casserole. Spread some pineapple slices or chunks on top of that. Sprinkle GENEROUSLY with brown sugar. Bake in a 400degree oven for about 20 minutes- you're waiting for the sugar to melt.
Now, the feedback I got for this dish was great EXCEPT... the pineapple really changed the texture of the ham, and it was "suggested" that if I made it again, to use thicker slices. "Ham Mardi" was served with cheese smothered Tater Tots. I pretended the Pineapple was a vegetable.

OK, I could be clever and call this one "Jambon Mercredi", but that has no ring to it... We shall call it "Hump Day Ham" LOL
Start the night before by soaking 2-4 cups of split yellow peas in a dish (2 cups for 2 grownups, 4 cups if you have 2 grown men and a bottomless pit child).
The next morning, rinse the peas, they will have soaked up all the water and expanded but you want to rinse them to get rid of the whateverthatis that makes them smell nasty.
Add to slow cooker with at least 2 cups of chicken broth/vegetable broth... hell, there's no reason you couldn't use beef broth if you wanted to.
Chop up remaining ham, 1 medium peeled potato, some carrots and celery, salt and pepper, garlic powder, a bay leaf (to this VERY DAY I have never put a bay leaf in anything, and I'm positive I'm not missing out)... whatever spices you feel like. Top up with water so everything's covered.
Slam the lid on and cook on low for at least 8 hours.

Now, I realize that "traditional" pea soup is made with a pork hock, and I'm sure that it tastes SUPREMELY better, BUT... I'm just trying to use up leftover ham... This would go GREAT with my Cheddar Cheese Muffin recipe! Whip them up before dinner for a fresh hot add on to the soup :)


AAAANNNND, if there are leftovers lord help me, they're GOING IN THE FREEZER!

CHEESE! MORE CHEESE! MUFFINS! CHEESE IN THE MUFFINS!

Now that I have your attention...
Everybody likes cheese, and everybody likes muffins, so why not make some of these awesome little babies!

There's a good chance I might have to make more of these before dinner. I don't think 12 was enough.

 CHEESE MUFFINS!

• 1 cup milk
• 3 tablespoons melted butter
• 1 large egg, lightly beaten
• 1tsp garlic puree
• 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1 tablespoon granulated sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup grated cheddar cheese

Preheat oven to 350, lightly oil muffin pan, or you could use cupcake liners... I think...

In one bowl, whisk together milk, egg, garlic puree and butter. In second bowl sift flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar. Stir shredded cheese in to dry ingredients. Make a well, pour all liquid in at once, stir JUST until mixed- Muffins need lumpy batter to be muffins!

Spoon into muffin pan and bake for 20-25 minutes.
Try not to burn your face on the oven door waiting...

Eat lots... make more!

Ham and Cheese Waffles! AND POOETRY!

There once was a man named Lorne

whose Ideas were quite simply foreign

he put cheese in his waffles

and his magic was awful

yet his passing was something to mourn.

Okay, that's enough of that now! Really, "Uncle" Lorne's magic was AWESOME, but awesome didn't rhyme as well as awful. Even as an adult, I have NO idea how he got the candies to pop out of the side of the game table, and his waffles were simply AMAZING. I remember eating waffles until I thought I would burst! I know Nanny has the recipe somewhere... in the meantime, I have to rely on good old BHG cookbook.

So the basic recipe is like this

1 3/4 cups flour
1 tbsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
2 egg yolks
1 3/4 cups milk
1/2 cup cooking oil
2 egg whites

Stir together dry ingredients. Beat egg whites separately until "soft peaks" form. In another bowl, beat egg yolks and add milk and oil. Add milk, oil and yolks to dry ingredients and mix lightly (still lumpy). FOLD in egg whites. Don't over mix!

Now, heat up your waffle iron and brush with oil or use cooking spray (cooking spray is gross people!)
While your machine is firing up, chop up your ham bits- I used deli slices- and cube the cheese- about 1cm cubes, if it's too big, well, it will be messy.

Once your iron is pre heated, spoon the usual amount of batter on to the bottom iron, and add about a heaping tsp each of ham and cheese. Slam the lid and wait!

*NOTE* Don't put the ham and cheese on the BOTTOM before the batter. It will all stick to the pan and you will be chiseling burnt ham and cheese and batter off of a hot iron while everyone is waiting for the first batch to hit the table! BELIEVE ME! lol

My son LOVES these. I serve them just like regular waffles- butter and syrup. My husband was slightly more skeptical, but then again, he's the picky eater in the house.

There are lots of things you can add to waffles to make them interesting(er) ( like what's more interesting than waffles!).

• banana slices
• strawberries
• blueberries
• really, ANY kind of berries
• different kinds of cheese
• apples
• bran or flax 
• ooh, spinach and feta! 

Mostly though, I like plain cheese.

Now, quit waffling about and go make some waffles!

my camera didn't do justice to the unusual color of the sky... but I'm inflicting the picture on you anyway!

UPSIDE DOWN PEANUT BUTTER CUPS!

This is by far, one of my deadliest kitchen experiments EVER!

I had a craving for peanut butter cups- and it all went downhill from there.

All you need for this is
-parchment paper (tin foil would be ok)
-cookie sheet
-chocolate chips or melting wafers or baking chocolate
-good, gooey, unsweetened peanut butter
-icing sugar
-microwave (or double boiler if you want to make work for yourself)
-mixer (stand mixer is awesome, but hand beater is fine)

Add 1 cup of peanut butter and 1/4 cup of confectioners sugar to mixer. Beat on medium until the PB turns into a firm "thumpy" ball - yes I said thumpy- you want it to stick together and stop sticking to the bowl.
If you need to, add more sugar until you get the desired thumpiness.

I love that new word :) thumpy thumpy thumpy. My spell checker is having a cow.

In a microwave safe bowl or double boiler, melt about 2 cups of chocolate. If using a microwave, cook for short 15-20 second intervals... you can burn chocolate!

Line your cookie sheet with parchment paper or foil, and spoon small (twoonie sized) pools of melted chocolate onto the paper (about 2 tsp chocolate at a time)

Then, use a spoon to make balls of peanut butter mixture, about the size of a cherry. Use your hands if you need to, just don't get peanut butter on your digital camera (oops). The rounder the ball, the easier it is to put the top coat on.

I ended up having to melt a bit more chocolate to put the top on- it's better to start with not enough, otherwise you're left with a giant bowl full of melted chocolate with a spoon in it.... well I guess that's better...
Spoon chocolate over the top of the peanut butter, try to cover as much of the peanut butter as you can, but not with so much chocolate that it starts spreading onto the base.

Once they're all coated, pop the whole tray into the refrigerator- they should only take a few minutes to "set", and maybe 1/2 an hour to firm up the PB.

Package carefully and store in refrigerator- they'll get eaten LONG before they'll go bad! I used squares of parchment to separate them. You could use cupcake liners, but then you may as well have used them in the beginning and they wouldn't be upside down peanut butter cups now would they!

Enjoy!

Mr Magic Eraser, Meet My Stainless Steel Pots!

Ah, the best trick of the week! I have these GORGEOUS Kitchenaid stainless steel pots and pans that my FABULOUS husband bought me for my birthday a few years back, but let me tell you, "stainless" is a LIE!

In a fit of desperation I took the Magic Eraser to my saucepan, and with relatively little elbow grease, the pan scrubbed up like new! It's a good thing!


Now, before you get all antsy, here's what I really came to write about

PIRATE CAKES!!

Sam's cake!

Black forest cake with whipped cream topping, painstakingly hand drizzled dark chocolate palm trees, and a treasure map design on top!

Oh, and not NEARLY enough candles! lol

AARON'S CAKE

Marble cake with buttercream icing- there started to be piping decorations around the sides, but alas, my kitchen was too warm, and I'm just not bloody fast enough! The Chocolate art was again, done by hand, late at night by a crazy lady with a spoonful of melted chocolate in her mouth to keep her hands steady :)

That WAS a ship on the cake, but the sail never survived the move to Emma's house, and the candles (again, not enough by a long shot) turned the whole thing into a "shipwreck" cake.

All in all, the cakes were really tasty, and very much enjoyed by everyone there. Next year, they're gonna share a big ass sheet cake with "HAPPY BIRTHDAY" stuck on top in pre made lettering! haha

In case of emergency, fry with butter and garlic.

Every once in awhile, I get adventurous...

I'll be out shopping in the produce section, and I'll see a bunch of fresh, nice looking vegetables that aren't on our regular menu and buy some.

Then I get them home and they sit in the fridge, getting less and less fresh and eventually not so nice looking, because I have no idea how to prepare them.

I've since discovered, that just about all of these interesting veggies will totally taste good sauteed in butter and garlic. You can use olive oil for the longer cooking foods, as butter will burn; you can add black bean sauce or hoisin or teriyaki; you can add meat (start the meat first)...

Stir fry over rice or noodles is quick, tasty, healthy, and usually a crowd pleaser.

and that's about all I have to say about that today.