Gingerbread cookies

I don't recall having much (if any) gingerbread growing up, but over the past few years, I have developed a reverence for the stuff. I was fortunate enough to find this recipe, titled "The Most Wonderful Gingerbread Cookies," on my first attempt at making gingerbread. It always turns out beautifully for me.

I like my gingerbread cookies nice and soft. I also like to use my special Williams Sonoma Message In A Cookie Cutters to stamp Christmas messages into them. They make the perfect neighbor gifts. I make several batches of this each December.

Gingerbread Cookies
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 Tbsp ground ginger
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground cloves
6 Tbsp unsalted butter, at room temperature
3⁄4 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup molasses
2 tsp vanilla

1. In a medium bowl, whisk dry ingredients until well blended. 
2. In a large bowl, beat butter, brown sugar, and egg together until blended. Add molasses and vanilla; mix until well blended. 
3. Gradually add dry mixture to wet ingredients; mix until smooth. 
4. Divide dough in half and wrap in Saran wrap. Let stand at room temperature for at least an hour.
5. Preheat oven to 375°F. Line cookie sheets with parchment paper. 
6. Lightly flour a work surface and rolling pin. Roll out one portion of dough to about 1/4" thick. It helps to also sprinkle a bit of flour on the dough. 
7. Use cookie cutters to cut out shapes, and place them on parchment paper-lined cookie sheets about 2 inches apart.
8. Bake 7-8 minutes for soft gingerbread.

Pizza dough

We eat pizza on about a weekly rotation. We all love bread and cheese and tomato sauce, so it definitely gets a presence in our diet. Our daughter even requested to eat pizza for her 2nd birthday!

This is my go-to pizza dough recipe over the last year or so (found originally at Chef In Training). It's pretty straightforward and works well for me. If I find a better recipe I'm not opposed to updating, but I'm not actively searching for one. When I make pizza, I often make a couple batches of dough so I can make pizzas to freeze as well. Here's where I originally learned the process for freezing pizzas.

Pizza Dough
yield: dough for 2 pizzas

2 cups warm water
1 Tbsp yeast
1 Tbsp salt
1/4 cup oil
5 cups flour

1. Proof yeast in warm water for a few minutes. Add salt and oil; stir to mix.
2. Add flour and stir well to combine. When it begins to form a sticky dough, pour out onto well-floured surface and knead until smooth, adding flour as needed to keep it more toward smooth than sticky.
3. Return to bowl; cover and let sit for 10-20 minutes.
4. Divide in two. Roll out each ball into a flat circle to fit your pizza pan. If rolled very thin it is possible to make a stuffed crust by placing cheese near the edges and folding in on itself (highly recommended!).
5. Place rolled-out dough onto baking pan (either directly or you can sprinkle some cornmeal onto the pan and place the dough on top).
6. If making to freeze, follow instructions below*
7. If making pizza to eat, generously apply preferred sauce (I just use jarred pasta sauce... easy!) and mozzarella cheese. Sprinkle favorite toppings and bake about 10 minutes at 500°F, or until toppings are bubbly and crust is beginning to brown.

*To prepare pizzas to freeze and cook at a later date:

1. After rolling out the dough and placing it on pizza pan (and stuffing crust, if desired), bake for about 6 minutes at 500°F.
2. Let cool, and if needed, transfer to a surface suitable for freezing. Then generously apply preferred sauce and mozzarella cheese. Sprinkle favorite toppings now or before cooking at a later date.
3. Place in freezer and allow to freeze solid, at least several hours. Transfer to a large ziplock bag or other (preferably air-tight) packaging. 
4. To cook from frozen, simply remove pizza from packaging, place on pizza pan, and bake at 500°F for 12-18 minutes, or until toppings are bubbly and crust is beginning to brown.

Ideas for pizza toppings

mozzarella cheese

pepperoni

sausage

ham

canadian bacon

bell peppers

tomatoes

onions

artichoke hearts

olives

mushrooms

spinach

pineapple

salami

chicken

eggplant

zucchini

pepperoncinis

alfredo sauce

Popovers

I've really come to love popovers lately. They are relatively fast, super easy, and lend a bready, eggy, goodness to a meal without the effort required for homemade rolls. They are kind of magical, the way they change from a runny batter to a puffy but substantive morsel. To me, they're guiltless, too: in my book they are fairly low-calorie (~70 kcal per popover).

It recently came to my knowledge that popovers are basically the same as Yorkshire puddings. I have British ancestry, but I guess my view of pudding has been 100% American (as in, banana pudding, chocolate pudding, tapioca pudding, butterscotch pudding) up until a few months ago. Anyway, these cute little "puddings" do indeed go marvelously with a beef roast... and basically any other meal! I like them alongside my fauxtisserie chicken (we even substituted chicken and popovers for turkey and rolls last Thanksgiving).

Popovers
(yields 12)

3 eggs
1 cup milk
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup flour
shortening to grease muffin tin

1. Lightly grease muffin tin wells.
2. Mix all ingredients together with a whisk or fork. 
3. Fill each well of the muffin tin 1/3 to 1/2 full. 
4. Place in cold oven. Turn to 450°F. 
5. Bake 16-18 minutes, or until popovers "pop over" well edges and turn a golden brown.
6. Remove from pan with a fork and serve hot. Can be refrigerated and reheated in the microwave (as if you'll have leftovers!).

Oatmeal-Chocolate Chip Cookies

I love chocolate chip cookies (seriously... this is the 4th or so variation we've posted). These oatmeal chocolate cookies are scrumptiously soft, and the oats give a great texture.

Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
(Yield: 4 dozen)

1 1/2 cups packed brown sugar
1 cup butter or margarine, softened
1 tsp vanilla
1 egg
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
2 cups quick or old-fashioned oats
1 1/2 cups flour
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 350°F. 
2. In large bowl, use a hand mixer to mix brown sugar and butter until blended. Add vanilla, egg, baking soda, and salt, mixing until light and fluffy. 
3. Stir in oats and flour until uniformly mixed; stir in chocolate chips. 
4. Drop dough by rounded tablespoonfuls about 2 inches apart onto ungreased cookie sheet. 
5. Bake about 8 minutes or until light golden brown. Cool for a few minutes before transferring to a wire cooling rack. 
6. Share with your loved ones!

Chicken Pot Pie

I like a good chicken pot pie, but Mr. B. isn't keen on actual pie dough for most things. Thanks to Betty Crocker, we found an easy compromise that is pretty tasty! It's not exactly Marie Callendar's (which I quite like) and it's definitely not like a made-from-scratch version, but it comes together quickly and has ingredients you can't really go wrong with!

Easy Chicken Pot Pie 
2 cups frozen mixed vegetables
1 cup cooked chicken, diced
1 can (10 3/4 ounces) cream of chicken soup
1 cup Bisquick mix (which is not something I buy; see below for the substitute recipe)*
1/2 cup milk
1 egg

1. Preheat oven to 400°F. Mix vegetables, chicken and soup in baking dish of your choice (I usually use a 9*9 Pyrex).
2. Combine Bisquick, milk, and egg; spread evenly over the top of vegetables/chicken/soup mixture in baking dish.
3. Bake until crust is golden brown (approx. 30 minutes)

*Substitute for Bisquick mix
1 cup flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp  salt
1 Tbsp shortening

1. Mix flour, baking powder, and salt.
2. Cut shortening into dry mixture. Then use in place of Bisquick mix as above.

Lentil & Beef Sloppy Joes (& Cheesy Hamburger Buns)

The sloppy Joe: I hadn't had one in years, but one day browsing recipes I saw one for a lentil sloppy Joe. I was intrigued, and it kind of sounded good. I bookmarked it and came back to it a few weeks later. The original recipe I saw did not suit me, so I looked around a bit more and found this one which was a better match for what I had on hand.

You may notice that the recipe I followed calls for 1/2 cup ketchup. In an odd turn of events, we had used more of our ketchup than I had realized (although, honestly, I hate ketchup and didn't check before I started the recipe. When you dislike ketchup like I do you never dream you'll run out... I only use it in recipes, and the only other thing I've used it in that I can think of is meatloaf, maybe twice. We occasionally have hot dogs or other dishes that Thomas likes ketchup as a condiment on, but I really didn't think we'd have less than 1/2 cup!). Pondering possible substitutions, I came up with barbecue sauce or tomato sauce. I asked Thomas' opinion and we decided to try the barbecue sauce. It was a success! It added a really nice flavor and sweetness that I don't think it would have had otherwise. In the future I think I will always do half ketchup and half barbecue sauce.

Lentil & Beef Sloppy Joes

2 Tbsp. vegetable oil
1/2 cup diced onion

1 small carrot, diced
1/2 bell pepper, diced

1/4 cup ketchup

1/4 cup barbecue sauce
1 clove garlic, minced
1/2 cup dried brown lentils

~1 cup water
1/4 tsp. oregano
8 ounces ground beef
1 Tbsp. Worcestershire sauce

1. Sauté onion, carrot, bell pepper, and ketchup in vegetable oil in a saucepan over medium-high heat until vegetables are tender. Add garlic and continue to cook for about a minute.
2. Add lentils, oregano, and water. Boil about 5 minutes, then reduce heat and cover, simmering about 35 minutes. Check occasionally to ensure there is enough water. Add more water in 1/4 cup increments if necessary.
3. In the meantime, brown ground beef in a skillet. Drain off fat.
4. To ground beef, add Worcestershire sauce and barbecue sauce, stirring until combined.
5. Add fully cooked ground beef mixture to lentil mixture. Continue cooking until lentils are done.
6. Serve hot, on hamburger buns.

I don't keep hamburger buns around, so I made my own to go with my sloppy Joes. I used this recipe. They turned out pretty good, but I did goof up a little: where the recipe said to make 6 buns, I split my dough 6 ways and ended up with 6 buns, but they were such a funny shape I couldn't justify slicing them. The result was basically 6 bun halves. Which was fine, but they were kind of big and it would have been better to have 6 actual buns. So, if you want 6 buns, divide your dough 12 ways...

Cheesy Hamburger Buns

2 3/4 cups flour

1/2 cup finely grated cheddar cheese

3/4 tsp. salt

1 Tbsp. sugar

2 1/2 tsp. instant yeast

4 Tbsp. softened butter

1 large egg

2/3-3/4 cup lukewarm water

1. Mix all ingredients until well combined, sticky, and gooey. Cover and let rise about an hour.
2. Preheat oven to 350°F.
3. Divide dough (taking into account my advice above). Your dough will still be sticky. You can add a little bit of flour to make this process less messy. Place on baking sheet lined with wax paper or parchment paper. Shape into small rounds. The original recipe uses a hamburger bun pan. I used a baking sheet, which resulted in misshapen buns, but it's what I had :o)
4. Let rise another 30-60 minutes, or longer if you have time.
5. Bake about 20 minutes.

Cheesecake Brownies

Recently some friends invited us over for dinner, and asked us to bring dessert. With some cream cheese in the fridge, I decided it was time to try Cooking With My Food Storage's Cheesecake Brownies. Since we had had success with this other recipe for brownies in the past, I combined the two. It turned out delicious, but next time I will cook it a little longer.

Cheesecake Brownies

Ingredients for Brownie portion
1/2 c oil
1 c sugar
1 tsp (+) vanilla extract
2 eggs
1/2 c flour
1/3 c cocoa powder
1/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt

Ingredients for Cheesecake portion
8 oz cream cheese (preferably at room temperature)
1 egg
1/3 c sugar

1. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Grease a 9x13" baking dish.
2. Mix together oil, 1 c sugar, and vanilla (from Brownie portion above). Beat in 2 eggs. In another bowl, combine flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, and salt. Stir into wet ingredients until just blended.
3. Spread brownie mixture into 9x13" baking dish.
4. Use an electric mixer to combine cream cheese, 1 egg, and 1/3 c sugar (from Cheesecake portion above) in a separate dish.
5. Scoop out cheesecake mixture on top of brownie batter in baking dish. Use a spatula to spread evenly across the top of brownie batter. Then, use a knife to swirl some chocolate into the cheesecake.
6. Bake at 350°F for about 25 minutes. Use toothpick to test for doneness. I think I cooked mine for about this long, but my brownies were gooey. Your oven may bake differently than mine, though, so it is a good idea to check on your brownies at this time.
7. Let cool; cut into bars (ca. 12) to serve.

5-Star Sweet & Sour Chicken

 We made sweet & sour chicken for my birthday, and it was delicious. Time-consuming (though we were making some other stuff, too), but so, so, so good. We made a couple of tweaks, but mostly used this recipe from All Recipes. In the future, we are hoping to be able to streamline the process. If we find shortcuts, we will update this page.

5-Star Sweet & Sour Chicken

Chicken & breading
4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves, cut into 1 inch cubes
1 cup and 2 tablespoons self-rising flour (or all-purpose flour plus 1/2 t salt and 1 1/2 t baking powder)
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 tablespoon cornstarch
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon pepper
1 egg
~2 tsp sesame seeds
~3/4 cup water
2 cups vegetable oil for frying (or enough to cover at least half an inch of your chosen pan)

Sauce
20-oz can pineapple chunks, drained (juice reserved)
2 tablespoons cornstarch
3/4 cup and 2 tablespoons water, divided
1/4 cup and 2 tablespoons white sugar
1/4 cup distilled white vinegar
Food coloring, if desired

Added veggies
1 green bell pepper, cut into 1 inch pieces
1/2 medium onion, diced

1. Combine batter ingredients (from flour to sesame seeds). Slowly add water until you have a thick batter to work with. Add chicken pieces and coat thoroughly. 
2. Heat oil in a frying pan of your choice. Oil is ready when a flick of water sizzles on contact. Add chicken pieces a little at a time, slowly. Let cook at a medium-low heat until cooked through. Drain cooked pieces on paper towel while cooking the rest.
3. For the sauce, combine pineapple juice, 1/2 cup water, sugar, vinegar, and food coloring in a saucepan. Heat to boiling. Combine cornstarch and remaining water into a paste and add to saucepan. Stir until there are no more cornstarch chunks. Remove from heat.
4. I sautéed the bell pepper, onion, and 1/2 can of pineapple for a few minutes until tender. You may omit this step if you prefer.
5. Put veggie mixture and cooked chicken pieces (layer or mix) in a large bowl and pour sauce over everything! Stir to evenly coat. Serve warm.

Breading batter

Coating chicken in batter

Frying chicken pieces

Sauce

Final Product! Enjoy!

oxox

Gnocchi (from scratch)

Last week, since we had some potatoes, I decided to try to make gnocchi from scratch. Our first introduction to gnocchi came last year at a visit to La Dolce Vita, the Italian restaurant down the street. Gnocchi is a potato-based pasta/dumpling. Olive Garden has a chicken gnocchi soup, and it's also yummy with marinara sauce.

The recipe I used came from this Food Network recipe I found. While the flavor, with the accompanying sauce, was pretty good, the texture could have been better. I was in a hurry so I didn't mash up the potatoes as well as I probably would in the future (and I peeled them before microwaving, which did not work so well), and I think maybe I did not add enough flour or perhaps I did not let them cook long enough. Lastly, they might have cooked better had I allowed them to sit out for a while to dry a bit before boiling.

Gnocchi
~ 1.5 lb potatoes
a little bit of salt/pepper, to taste
1 large egg, beaten
~1/2 cup flour

1. Pierce potatoes with a fork and microwave until tender. Original recipe suggests cutting tender potatoes in half and scooping out flesh ; alternately, you can peel/chop and boil potatoes.
2. Mash cooked potato flesh. I used a potato masher, but the one we have tends to leave parts of the potato unmashed. I think in the future I would attempt to put the potatoes in a food processor.
3. Mash salt, pepper and egg into potatoes.
4. Knead flour into mixture.
5. Roll dough into a "rope" shape and cut into ~1" pieces.
6. Drop gnocchi pieces (individually so they do not clump together) into pot of boiling water. Cook about 5 minutes. Remove from pot with slotted spoon.
7. Serve like a pasta with your favorite sauce and parmesan cheese, or add to a soup of your choice.

Cinnamon Rolls

"It's Conference once again!" The first weekend of every April and October, the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints hosts General Conference, a meeting where our present-day prophet and apostles address the world.

Last Conference, we enjoyed these yummy cinnamon rolls, found here at By Common Consent. They were very tasty and warm and perfect for a day at home, especially considering it snowed that morning.

Cinnamon Rolls

Rolls
1/2 cup warm water
2 packages dry yeast (4 1/2 tsp)
2 Tbsp sugar
1/2 cup instant vanilla pudding powder
1 c warm water
1/2 cup melted butter
2 lightly beaten eggs
1 tsp salt
5-6 cups all-purpose flour

Cinnamon mixture
1 cup melted butter
2 1/2 cups brown sugar
2 Tbsp cinnamon
Optional: raisins (say, 1/4 cup?), chopped nuts

Icing
8 oz. softened cream cheese
1/2 cup butter
1 tsp vanilla
3 cups confectioners sugar
1 Tbsp milk
(As I recall this made way too much icing so if you can, go ahead and halve this)

1. Dissolve yeast in the 1/2 c warm water with the 2 Tbsp sugar and let rise/froth.
2. In another bowl, combine pudding and water; mix well. Add butter, eggs, and salt; mix well.
3. Add flour; once mixed, knead until smooth.
4. The original recipe says to let rise for 2 hours. We probably let it rise for only half an hour and it turned out well.
5. Once approximately doubled in size (or less if you're impatient like we were!), roll out into a large rectangle. Pour melted butter from "cinnamon mixture" heading over dough rectangle. Combine cinnamon and brown sugar and crumble over the top.
6. Roll rectangle into a nice cylinder. 
7. Slice cylinder into rolls. Ours were probably too tall which made them doughy in the middle when we baked them. The original recipe recommends 2-inch heights.
8. Place in baking dish... leave space in between since they will rise.
9. Let rise. Again, the original recipe says 2 hours, but we skimped on this and it worked out.
10. Bake at 350°F for 15-18 minutes.
11. Combine icing ingredients and spread over the top of rolls when they are out of the oven.

Italian Wedding Soup

For our wedding, we actually had some Italian soup... but it wasn't this. It was minestrone... delicious minestrone made by my family's former neighbor Julie. ;o)

Anyway, we tried this recipe a while back for Stracciatella. I found the recipe in a cookbook I got from my mom for Christmas 2008 called Eating Better. It's a cool book because the recipes have been submitted by Home Economics & Family and Consumer Science (FACS) teachers. Thus you can trust them to be pretty doable and usually tasty.

This is a nice light soup that would be best served as an appetizer. If I were to make it again, I would probably try to stir more while adding the egg, as the egg in our soup was pretty chunky.

Stracciatella (Italian Wedding Soup)
3 1/2 cups chicken broth (I think I upped this to 4 cups, so I could use 4 bouillon cubes)
1 lb fresh spinach, washed and chopped (I had a pre-washed bag of spinach and I dumped the whole thing in as is)
1 egg
1/2 c grated Parmesan cheese (you can probably cut down on this if I recall correctly)
1 Tbsp flour
salt and pepper to taste

1. Bring 1 c of chicken broth to a boil.
2. Add spinach and cook down until soft but still bright green. The spinach will look like a lot at first but after a few minutes you will wonder where it went!
3. Remove spinach with a slotted spoon and set aside. I put all of it in a bowl - you will add it back later.
4. Add the remaining 2 1/2 - 3 cups broth to pot and bring to boil. 
5. Beat egg lightly, add 1/4 cup of Parmesan cheese and flour.
   When broth is boiling, pour in egg mixture, stirring constantly until egg "cooks into rags" as the book says... I pictured egg drop soup from a Chinese restaurant but this is not what mine looked like; again, I probably should have stirred faster or something.
6. Add the spinach back in. Season to your liking (including with the additional Parmesan cheese)

Serves 4-6 according to the book, but I think we finished this much on our own for dinner. If you are serving it with something else (pasta?) you could stretch it further.

Pumpkin Soup

According to the calendar, it is mid June, but the weather we're having today sure doesn't feel like it! With a high of 60°F, this hot harvest-time recipe is sure sounding yummy...

I found this recipe for pumpkin soup a few months ago on a blog called A Little Tipsy. You can see the original recipe and some fun Halloween ideas here. I altered the original recipe just a bit to match the ingredients I had on hand and make it a touch less fattening. This soup is not sweet as pumpkin recipes tend to be; it uses the vegetable more like the squash it is!

Pumpkin Soup
2 Tbsp butter or margarine
~1/3 cup flour
1 medium onion, grated or diced
4 cups water
4 chicken bouillon cubes (or the equivalent in bouillon powder, to make 4 c broth)
1 16 oz. can pumpkin
1 1/2 t. salt
1 1/3 t. lemon juice
1/4 t. pepper
1/4 t. nutmeg
2 2/3 cups milk

1. In a large pot, melt 2 Tbsp butter/margarine. Stir in flour, making it almost doughy.
2. Add onion, bouillon, and water.
3. Stir mixture until smooth and thick - you will need to mash up your doughy flour-butter mixture to combine it with the other ingredients.
4. Add pumpkin, salt, lemon juice, pepper, and nutmeg. Stir to combine - try to break up the pumpkin so your soup has a smooth consistency.
5. Heat to boiling, stirring occasionally.
6. Let simmer 15 minutes.
7. Add milk and heat through but not to boiling.
8. Serve hot! A Little Tipsy has a recipe for pumpkin-shaped bread bowls that would be oh-so-cute as a "dish" for this soup.

Danish Dumplings

I feel weird posting soup recipes at the end of May, but with the cool weather we've been having, that's what we've been eating a lot of! We've tried out several delicious soups lately.

This recipe for Danish Dumplings came to the Bradshaw family through Thomas' dad's mission cookbook. It's a pretty simple recipe, but kind of fattening, especially if you use actual butter (we've been using margarine). So, while I'd like to eat it every day, I've had to hold back ;o)

When we make this, we usually have leftovers, so it could easily serve 3-4.

Danish Dumplings
1 c milk
1/2 c (1 stick) butter or margarine
1 c flour
1/2 tsp salt
2 eggs, beaten
1 packet dry chicken noodle soup (such as Lipton), prepared according to package directions

1. Prepare chicken soup, letting simmer on stovetop.
2. Combine milk and butter in skillet or large frying pan and bring to a boil.
3. Once boiling, stir in flour and salt. Stir, cooking until mixture slips away from sides of pan.
4. Let cool for a few minutes (until not hot enough to cook eggs on contact).
5. Beat in the eggs.
6. You will now form dumplings from this mixture, and drop them into the hot soup. Do this by dipping two spoons into the broth, and then using the spoons to scoop out and shape a spoonful of the mixture. Drop into the still-simmering broth and repeat until all of the mixture is in the pot of soup. 
7. Simmer for a few more minutes, until dumplings are cooked through.
8. Serve hot!

oxox