Reegan's Edible Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Snack

Dry Mixture

3/4 Cup Flour

1/2 Tsp Cornstarch

1/4 Tsp Baking Soda

1/4 Tsp Baking Powder

1/4 Tsp Sea Salt

Wet Mixture

1/4 Cup Unsalted Butter, Softened

1/4 Cup Brown Sugar, Tightly packed

1/4 Cup Granulated Sugar

1/2 Tsp Vanilla Extract

1/4 Cup Milk

1/2 Cup Chocolate Chips

(or Coconut, Raisins, Candy, Nuts)

Put in the fridge to chill before eating, for best results.  

   

Caramel Popcorn

Coat a large roaster with non-stick spray and 

fill it with popped popcorn.  

Coat a pot with non-stick spray and add 1/2 cup corn syrup, 1 cup butter and 2 cups brown sugar. Melt together, stirring with a large spoon coated with non-stick spray.  Boil while stirring for 5 minutes.  Take off heat and stir in 1/2 tsp. baking soda, a pinch of salt and a pinch of cream of tartar.  

Pour over popcorn, mixing well.  Put roaster in oven for 2 hours, stirring every half hour.

Baked Brie

1/2 cup blanched almonds

pinch of ground cayenne, ground cinnamon, ground nutmeg and salt

1 wheel (350 g) Double Cream Brie Cheese

3 tbsp. apricot jam

1 tsp. chopped fresh rosemary

1.  Preheat oven to 375. 

2.  Toast almonds in a skillet over medium heat, stirring until golden brown, about 5 to 7 minutes.  Turn off heat and stir in spices and salt.  Reserve 2 tbsp. almonds for garnish and roughly chop remaining nuts.

3.  Slice brie in half horizontally.  Place bottom portion in the Brie Baker, spread 2 tbsp. jam on cut surface and sprinkle with chopped nuts and 1/4 tsp. rosemary.  Top with remaining cheese, spread remaining jam on top and sprinkle with the reserved whole nuts.

4.  Place covered Brie Baker on a baking sheet.  Bake for 15 to 20 minutes or until cheese is melted.  Garnish with remaining rosemary and serve with crackers and sliced apples.

Enjoyed this for lunch today with Oma.  We both thought that this recipe is worth repeating.

Homemade Microwave Popcorn

We have been enjoying this easy treat for our Family Movie nights.  Our air popper has been acting up for a couple of years now and it was getting scary to use.  We were buying store-bought microwave popcorn for a couple of months, but I wasn't happy with the quality of the snack.  There is many mystery ingredients in microwave popcorn and I saw something on Oprah about the dangers of store-bought microwave popcorn.  My friend Lina who grew up in Quebec says that 'everyone' does their own popping in the microwave with a brown paper bag, thus the experimenting started on the proper technique.  After a few burnt batches, the following recipe works well for our family.  Give it a try!

Love Twin B

1.  Take a brown paper bag and fill with 1/4 cup of popcorn kernels.

2.  Fold top of bag down three times and place in microwave.

3.  Cook on High for 2 minutes but listen carefully for popping to slow down.
Each microwave cooks differently.

4.  Pour popcorn into a bowl, add butter, salt etc.  ENJOY!

Pepitas

Happy Halloween!

We visited the pumpkin patch a few weeks back.  Checked out tons of pumpkins and picked out our favorites.  The littles loved the drama of searching the field for the roundest, tallest or silliest one.  Good job Daddy for diving into the muddy field, we appreciated the effort!xxoo

Pumpkins start out GREEN!

Impressive.

The Wagon was super fun!

First pumpkin for our little pumpkin.

What a dude.

What a doll.

We had a laid back actual Halloween evening (the best kind!) after a busy weekend.  We carved our pumpkins by a roaring fire (thanks Daddy!), watched the first snow flurry of the season and tried to get the kiddos together for the official Halloween 2010 picture.  Roasting the seeds from the pumpkins is a family tradition for us.  The hubs and I have done it every year since we got married.  We may have never gotten a single trick or treater EVER (not in Boston, New Haven, San Diego, or this year), but we have always had a jack-o-lantern and pumpkin seeds (and the odd Halloween candy, just in case!).  Some years they are over-salted, sometimes they are burned because we forget about them and sometimes they are too raw.  This year they were just right.

Roasted Pumpkin Seeds

1 1/2 cups raw whole pumpkin seeds
2 teaspoons butter, melted
1 pinch salt

Preheat oven to 300 degrees F (150 degrees C).
Toss seeds in a bowl with the melted butter and salt. Spread the seeds in a single layer on a baking sheet and bake for about 45 minutes or until golden brown; stir occasionally.

Our snow sprinkled white pumpkin.

The big little's pumpkin.

The little little's pumpkin.

Free-handing style.

Serious stuff, we had to take off the clothes.

 Scooping the goods, the "boys" are focused.

 The "girls" free-hand theirs too!

First Jack-o-lantern.

The Caterpillar.

 The Forest Frog.

Happy Pepitas munching!

Sending Love,

Twin A

A mighty fine pot-luck.

Okay, so we've been busy with life.  Had friends over last week and made my yummy "magazine chicken", red cabbage and spicy sweet potato wedges.  Didn't take any pictures, but believe me, it was good.  Will post the recipes next time I promise.  Our evenings consisted of a couple of art projects, and some frozen pizza & tuna sandwich dinner nights and one scrounge around in the fridge & dig out something edible feat.

Fall Leaves

Friendly Ghost Family (thanks SD Mamas for the idea!)

Of course I was chosen to be the foot!xxoo

I did manage to remember to take pictures of us making "Moons" since my big little is in LOVE with the Moon.  We talk about it every morning, noon & night.  Reading the book "Goodnight Moon" until we have it memorized and the cow jumps over it and the old lady whispers "hush".
Here is us using store bought pie dough, cutting circles with a glass ("_ircles Mama"), filling them with some strawberry jam, folding them over and making "pinches".  Baked them until they were brown and crispy.  Thought these might be fun to bring to the park the next day for a picnic, but they didn't last the night.  The M_O_O_N_S were just too good.

On Sunday we had a BBQ potluck to attend, so I made two new salads to try.  Both really yummy.  Again, no pictures of the actual food that we brought, I barely had time to get us out of the house on time and in the car in one piece.  CONFESSION: I showed up at the "event" with my shirt on not only inside out, but backwards.  Gotta love that Mommy-brain.  So, no there are NO photos of the salads I made, nor the dessert.  Use your imagination.


The first was a Waldorf Salad.  Since it is the fall and apples are in season, I thought it would be a nice change.  This recipe was adapted from the The Food Network.


1/2 cup toasted walnuts
1/2 cup plain yogurt (I used greek yogurt)
2 TBSP mayo
Minced fresh flat-leaf parsley
1 tsp honey
1 lemon zested and then juiced
fresh ground black pepper
2 large crisp apples
2 ribs celery chopped
1/4 cup golden raisins
1 head Boston lettuce

Whisk the yogurt, mayonnaise, parsley, honey, and lemon zest in a large bowl and season with pepper.  Halve, core, and cut the apples into 3/4-inch pieces, leaving the skin intact. Add the apples, celery and raisins to the bowl, and sprinkle with the lemon juice; then toss with the dressing. Cover and refrigerate if not serving immediately.  When ready to serve, toss walnuts into the salad. Arrange the lettuce leaves on a large platter.  Spoon salad on lettuce.  Enjoy!

The second was a Cucumber Salad.  Sounded like a "pickled" type that my hubby likes.  This recipe was also adapted from the The Food Network.  It was still tasty the next day.  I actually made this up the night before the BBQ.

3 large cucumbers sliced very thin

1 TBSP salt

1/2 cup water

3 TBSP apple cider vinegar

1 tsp sugar

paprika, as much as you wish for flavor & color

minced green onions

Place sliced cucumbers in a bowl. With your hands, mix the salt into the cucumber.  Cover and let stand for at least thirty minutes.
The Dressing: While the cucumbers are marinating, prepare the dressing which consists of water, vinegar, sugar and paprika.  Squeeze out all the juice from the cucumbers AND RINSE WELL to remove excess salt.  Mix the dressing into the cucumbers.  Sprinkle the green onions over the cucumbers.  This will keep for several days in the fridge.

We also brought Chocolate Chip Cheesecake Squares which I knew would be a hit with the kids at the BBQ, young AND old.  I should have made these earlier in the day so they had a little more time to cool and set up.  I ended up bringing them in the pan that I baked them in.  If you want to be able to remove them from the pan and serve them in squares, make sure that you allow them enough time to cool completely in the fridge.  So so so good.  This was a recipe that I had gotten when I worked at FCH in Boston.  A really good fake-out and perfect bake sale treat.

2 rolls of re-fridge slice & bake cookie dough

3/4 cup sugar

two 8oz pkg softened cream cheese

1 tsp vanilla

2 eggs

Grease and flour a 9X13 pan.  Spread 1 roll of dough on bottom of pan (don't worry if it seems thin, do as best as you can without leaving holes).  Cream together sugar, cream cheese, vanilla & eggs.  Pour on top of 1st layer of cookie dough.  Press 2nd roll of cookie dough out flat on wax paper to a 9X13 shape. Place on top of cream cheese layer.  I "flip" it over, don't worry if it is a little messy, it is very forgiving.  Bake @ 350 degrees for 35 to 40 min.  Cool, then refrigerate completely.  Cut into squares.  Serve with plenty of milk!

Sending Love,

Twin A

Have fun out there on the trails.  My littles are loving their hand-me-down ride (thanks Toronto crew)!  We LOVE NY in the fall.