Italian Shredded Beef

This is a recipe from my bishop's wife ... I think she has divine inspiration.

Place a 3-4lb beef roast into crock pot with 1/2 cup water and a beef buillion cube. Cook on low for 8-10 hours. Remove meat from pot, shred with a fork, and return to pot. Add about 1/2 to 1 cup Italian salad dressing to meat & meat drippings, mix.

The first go-around, we ate the meat with mashed potatoes, and then the leftovers were AWESOME the next day on top of a taco salad.

The key to a tender roast is cooking it for a long time, apparently. I cooked mine for a full 10 hours, and dang, was it tender. I always have trouble getting pot roasts to be tender, they always turn out dry and tough. But this was juicy & great! Yay!

Pound Cake

I have never attempted to make an angel food cake, or a pound cake, but I love Paula Deen's recipes so much I had to give this one a try. I snuck a tiny piece while it was still warm, and it was fantastic! I served it to my girlfriends with strawberries and fresh whipped cream, and it was even better. Not bad for a first try!

Southwest Georgia Pound Cake
Yields 16 to 20 servings

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, softened
3 cups sugar
6 large eggs
3 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup heavy cream
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract (you may use lemon or almond flavoring instead)

Generously grease and flour a 10-inch bundt pan. Do not preheat the oven.

Using an electric mixer, cream the butter and sugar together until fluffy. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt. Alternately add flour mixture and heavy cream to butter-sugar mixture, beginning and ending with flour. Stir in flavoring.

Pour batter into prepared pan. Put into a cold oven and set the temperature to 325 degrees F. Bake for 1 hour 15 minutes without opening the oven door. Bake for an additional 15 minutes if necessary. Remove from the oven and cool in pan for 15 minutes. Invert cake onto cake plate. For a real treat, serve yourself a slice while it's still warm.

Manicotti meets enchiladas

I thought this sounded pretty tasty and thought I might give it a try...

Maniladas with White Cheese and Roasted Tomatillo Sauces

Yields 4 to 6 servings

1 (8-ounce) package manicotti shells

2 tablespoons olive oil

1 Vidalia onion, chopped

2 cloves garlic, minced

1 rotisserie chicken, shredded

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

4 Roma tomatoes, seeded and diced

3 tablespoons chopped cilantro leaves

1/2 cup sour cream

For the Tomatillo sauce:

1 pound tomatillos, quartered

1 small red onion, quartered

1 jalapeno, halved

2 garlic cloves

2 tablespoons olive oil

Salt and freshly ground black pepper

For the cheese sauce:

3 tablespoons butter

3 tablespoons all-purpose flour

2 cups heavy cream, room temperature

2 cups grated fontina cheese

1/4 teaspoon grated nutmeg

Salt

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

Boil manicotti in salted water for 8 minutes. Drain, reserving 1/2 cup of pasta water and set pasta aside.

In a large skillet, heat oil over medium heat. Sauté onion until translucent, about 3 minutes. Add garlic and sauté 1 minute more. Remove pan from heat and mix in chicken, tomatoes, cilantro and sour cream. Set aside.

To make the Tomatillo Sauce: Place tomatillos, onion, jalapeno and garlic in a baking dish. Toss with oil and season with salt and pepper. Roast until tomatillos turn golden around the edges and are soft, about 45 minutes. Remove from oven and blend ingredients together until smooth. Use reserved pasta water to thin sauce, if necessary. Season with salt and pepper, to taste.

To make the cheese sauce: In a medium saucepan, melt butter over medium-high heat. Add flour and cook 2 minutes. Whisk in heavy cream and bring to a simmer. Add cheese and nutmeg and stir until melted. Season sauce with salt, to taste.

To assemble: Reduce oven temperature to 350 degrees F. Stuff manicotti tubes with chicken mixture and assemble in a 9 by 12-inch baking dish. Pour cheese sauce over the top. Bake 30 minutes until cheese is bubbling. Drizzle tomatillo sauce on Maniladas before serving.

And another one

Aaron will love this one!

Chili Chocolate Cupcakes

Cupcakes
~24 regular cupcakes / 350 degree oven

4 ounces unsweetened chocolate, chopped
1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1-1/4 cup water
1-1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon ground pequin chilies
2 sticks butter
1-1/2 cups dark brown sugar
3 large eggs
1/2 cup sour cream
1 teaspoon vanilla

1. Boil water in a kettle then measure out 1-1/4 cup.
2. Combine chopped chocolate and cocoa powder in a medium sized bowl, add boiling water, whisk until smooth, set aside.
3. Sift flours, baking soda, and salt into a bowl. Add the ground pepper, set aside.
4. In a standing mixer, beat butter until creamy.
5. Add the brown sugar and beat until fluffy, about 3 minutes.
6. At medium speed, add eggs one at a time, beat well between each.
7. Add sour cream and vanilla and beat until combined.
8. Add about a third of the flour mixture, beat briefly until combined.
9. Add about half of the chocolate mixture, beat briefly until combined.
10. Repeat, adding flour, chocolate, then flour. Beat until just combined. Scrape down bowl if needed.
11. Fill cupcake papers about 3/4's full. Bake at 350 degree oven for 22-25 minutes or until cake tester comes out clean

Chili Chocolate Ganache Frosting

1-1/2 cup heavy cream
3/4 teaspoon ground pequin chilies
12 ounces bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, chopped
1/2 stick (4 tablespoons) butter
2-3 cups powdered sugar, optional

1. Heat the cream over medium heat until it bubbles around saucepan edge.
2. Place pepper and chopped chocolate in a medium sized bowl.
3. Pour heated cream over the chocolate
4. Let the mixture sit for about 30 seconds then start whisking it until smooth.
5. Add butter in pats and mix until combined.
6. set aside mixture and stir occasionally with a wooden spoon until cool.
7. Beat with an electric mixer until smooth. Optionally you can add sifted powdered sugar and beat until combine. This will sweeten the frosting and make it less rich and intense. Also helpful if you are low on chocolate and want to stretch the frosting a bit further…

Assembly
1. Frost cooled cupcakes.
2. Top with something red.

Grape Cupcakes

I got this recipe off of a fantastic blog, http://cupcakeblog.com/ and they sounded pretty interesting. Grape is one of my favorite flavors, so I thought I might have to give them a try some day.

Vanilla Bean Cupcakes
26 regular cupcakes / 350 degree oven

1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
2 cups sugar
4 large eggs, room temperature
2-3/4 cups flour
1-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 vanilla bean, seeds scraped out

1. Beat butter until softened. Add sugar and beat until light and fluffy, about 3 minutes.
2. Add eggs, one at a time, beating until well combined.
3. Measure the flour, baking powder, and salt into a medium bowl and whisk to combine.
4. Measure out the milk and vanilla and stir to combine. Scrape out the vanilla bean seeds into the milk.
5. Add about a third of the dry ingredients to the butter/sugar and beat to combine. Add about a half of the milk/vanilla and beat to combine. Continue adding, alternating between dry and wet and finishing with the dry.
6. Scoop batter into cupcake cups about 2/3’s full. Turn oven down to 350 degrees and bake cupcakes for about 22-25 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean.

Tart Grape Filling

10 ounces concord grape juice, unsweetened
6 ounces grapes, black and seedless
2 teaspoons sugar

1. Add juice and grapes to a medium saucepan and bring to a boil. Stir in the sugar.
2. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer.
3. After 10 minutes mash the grapes in the pot with a potato masher.
4. Continue to simmer until almost all the liquid is reduced about 20 minutes.
5. Cover and refrigerate until cool about 2 hours.

Grape Cream Cheese Frosting

3/4 cup concord grape juice, unsweetened
1 stick (1/2 cup) butter, room temperature
1 package of Philly cream cheese
3-4 cups sifted powdered sugar

1. Bring juice to a boil in a small saucepan. Allow to boil until reduced to a syrup about 15 minutes.
2. Beat butter and cream cheese at medium speed until creamy.
3. Sift 3 cups of the powdered sugar into the butter and cream cheese. Add the grape syrup. Beat until combined.
4. Add more sugar until you get to the consistency and sweetness you like. I used 4 cups.

Assemble
1. Fill the cooled cupcakes using the cone method.**
2. Frost.
3. Top off with a grape, a grape jelly, or whatever decoration you have on hand. Chopped, salted peanuts might also be nice.

**The cone method:

Fill Cupcakes
1. Cut out a cone from each cupcake. Flip the cone and cut off the excess. Set the top aside.
2. Fill each cavity with the filling.
3. Replace each top.

My sad, sad attempt

A lot of you have made beautiful cakes using the Marshmallow Fondant recipe in the family cookbook, and for Isabelle's upcoming 5th birthday I thought I'd give it a shot. Let me just say how much I look forward to NOT doing it again. I made such a mess, and it was such a pain - here's my sad attempt...from a distance. I'm obviously not a cake decorator!