New Recipe--Lemon Cornmeal Pancakes with Candied Myers Lemons

For Easter Sunday it was raining sideways in Portland, so we took the opportunity to stay home and inside all day. I made breakfast at a luxurious 1pm, so I decided I needed a recipe worthy of the day.

I'll start with the candied Myers Lemons. These aren't an original recipe obviously, but I was especially excited about everything that came out of the recipe.

This recipe is very showy so is PERFECT for entertaining. You could even bring these to a brunch. The candied lemons could be microwaved for a couple of seconds if you want to warm them, and the pancakes can be kept in a warm (200 - 250 degrees) oven until ready to serve.

Note: You can use regular lemons as well, but slice them VERY thin. Myers lemons are more forgiving because they are a little sweeter and the skins are very thin, like a tangerine vs. an orange.

Candied Myers Lemons

1 Myers Lemon
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup sugar

Slice 1 Myers Lemon in thin rounds, discarding each end. Remove any seeds.
Boil the slices for one minute. Remove from water.

1st detour--I then used the water that the lemon slices had been boiled in to make tea--I just added a tea bag and a teaspoon of sugar--so yummy.

Heat the 1/2 cup water and sugar over medium heat, stirring until the sugar is dissolved. Add the lemon slices and cook over medium/low heat for 12 - 15 minutes.

Remove from pan--they are ready to go.

2nd detour--the left over sugar syrup that the slices cooked in had turned into a yummy lemony syrup. So I put it aside and will come up with a reason to use it later this week. It would be good over waffles, or over a melon salad for dessert.

We then used the candied lemons instead of syrup with our pancakes.

Lemon Cornmeal Pancakes

1/2 cup lemon cakemix
1/2 cup cornmeal
1 cup soy milk (or regular milk)

Stir the three ingredients together and let sit for a couple minutes while your pan heats a little. Cook in a flat skillet on medium heat.

Makes 5, six inch pancakes.

New Recipe--Key Lime Bars

I love recipes that seem too easy to be true, I guess that's why I like working creatively with cake mixes so much. This recipe is so impressive and so wow-how-did-you-do-that-ish that you shouldn't feel guilty if you keep the simplicity a secret. Just let people think that you magically have 28 hours in your day instead of the mere mortals' 24 hours.

These key lime bars are sweet, not tart. The texture is perfect for bars, the cut really nicely and hold their shape.

Key Lime Bars

1 white cake mix
1 stick butter (1/2 cup)
1 14 oz can sweetened condensed milk
5 egg yolks
1/4 cup Nellie & Joe's Famous Lime Juice

Preheat oven to 350
Throw the cake mix and the stick of butter in a bowl and microwave it for 1 1/2 minutes, then stir together with a fork. When it is mixed well, press into a greased 13 x 9 pan.
I then wipe out the bowl with a paper towel and then throw in the 5 egg yolks, milk and lime juice and mix together and pour evenly over the cake mix mixture. Use a spoon or fork and spread the lime juice mixture so it is truly even, reaching the edges and corners.

Bake for 17 minutes. Let cool nearly completely or you'll have a mess on your hands. It needs to be cool to be firm enough to cut into bars. I then cut into about 1 1/2 inch x 1 1/2 inch bars.
They stay yummy in the refrigerator for 3 or 4 days, the crust doesn't get soggy.

Now, a word on Nellie and Joe's Lime Juice.

I discovered this product about 7 years ago while living in Virginia Beach--Trader Joes carried it. When I moved to the west coast, I used to have people bring me back bottles of it in their suitcases. Now I seem to be able to find it anywhere. It's in every store around Portland, OR.

I would never use any other lime juice for anything. It really is yummier, not as acidic, and has a nice lime flavor. It's the secret in my guacamole.

New Recipe--Apple Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

Or Oatmeal Apple Raisin or Oatmeal Raisin Apple--I can't decide.

These are a cakey cookie, hee-hee, that's fun to say. They are very moist on the inside, while the oatmeal gets a little crisp on the outside. They are sticky in that good way. They feel wholesome, almost a breakfast cookie, except I've never had a "breakfast cookie" that I actually liked, so I won't call them that.
They use a can of Apple Pie filling which makes them the honor student of the apple cookies out there. They shame any applesauce cookies right into detention for lack of lusciousness.

AOR Cookies

1 Spice Cake Mix
1 21 ounce can of Apple Pie filling
1 cup quick oats
1 cup raisins

Mix everything together. The dough will be a little more moist than most cookie dough. Put ping pong size globs on the cookie sheet. You'll be tempted to make bigger cookies, but don't. They turn out better if kept smallish.

Bake at 350 for 25 minutes. Makes 2 dozen cookies.

New Recipe--Irish Stout Chocolate Cupcakes

Sorry, I don't have a photo for this recipe, I tested it quite a while ago and held on to it for March.

Don't let the beer snob in your life stop you from making these cupcakes. Yes, the recipe uses one of the "expensive" beers, but that's ok, they are worth it.

These are a great St. Patrick's Day treat, to be authentic, use Guiness Stout. Or if your refrigerator reads like the bar menu at the Horse Brass (famous bar in Portland, OR with over 100 beers on tap) use any "stout" or very dark--VERY dark beer.

The flavor of these cupcakes is rich and deep and a little complex--in a word, they are really yummy--ok, two words.

The alcohol bakes out of these, so they are fine for all ages.

Frost these with chocolate fudge frosting, or white chocolate frosting dyed with green food coloring.

Stout Chocolate Cupcakes

1 chocolate , or chocolate fudge cake mix--not devils food
1 cup plus 1 Tablespoon of stout beer
1 cup of mini chocolate chips--regular chocolate chips work too, but I like the mini ones better with this recipe

Mix cake mix and beer in a large bowl with an electric mixer. Mix for 2 full minutes.

Pour into greased cupcake tins, filling 2/3 of the way full. Bake for 24 - 27 minutes. Let cool for a couple minutes before removing from pan.

Happy St. Patty's day

New Recipe--German Chocolate Cookies

With a twist

I had to try a couple of versions of these before I got them right. The challenge for me was getting that butter/brown sugar flavor in a cookie. I tried wrapping the dough around "Sugar Babies" candy, but they just tasted like weird jelly beans in the middle of a cookie--no good. I also tried the plain square caramels, but they also ended up a little too hard once cooled. I finally landed on Rolos. That's right, Rolos--those little chocolate covered caramels that come in the tube, wrapped in gold foil--what's not to love.

German Chocolate Cookies

Recipe tip--you'll get dough all over your fingers making these, so unwrap 18 - 20 Rolos first (16 - 18 for the cookies, plus a couple to eat while the cookies bake).

1 box of German chocolate cake mix
1/2 cup of soy milk (or real milk)
1/2 cup sweetened shredded coconut
1/2 cup chopped pecans
18 - 20 Rolos, unwrapped

Preheat oven to 350
Mix the cake mix and the milk together first with a big spoon, then mix in the coconut and pecans. The dough should be just moist enough to stick together. Take a ping pong size glob of dough, stick a Rolo in it, then with your fingers, spread the dough around the bottom of the Rolo until there is no evidence that the Rolo is there.

Bake for 14 - 16 minutes. Let cool for a minute, then remove from cookie sheet to complete cooling. Eat at least 2 while still warm--they rock.

Makes 16 - 18 cookies

New Recipe--Buffalo Chicken Pizza

First note, whenever I say "chicken" I mean some sort of fake chicken, but of course, real chicken could be used as well.

I'd been craving that "Buffalo Wing" flavor for a couple of weeks, so last week I bought a bottle of Franks Buffalo Wing Sauce. Then I had to figure out what to do with it.

Partner this with the fact that one of my favorite cooking tricks is to highly supplement cheap frozen cheese pizzas, and my plan was almost set.

I interviewed a couple women I work with about what they might put with Buffalo chicken on a pizza and we decided that broccoli and sauteed onions would work.

It was really, really good. I make BBQ chicken pizza often--Buffalo is even better. This recipe is interesting enough to share with guests, yet just one step up from "bar food." The flavors go together perfectly.

I'm a weenie when it comes to spice, so this is a mild version. The sauce is not overly fiery and calms nicely when mixed with all these other ingredients.

Recipe
Buffalo Chicken Pizza

1 Frozen Cheese Pizza for 2 (Whatever brand you like)
The equivalent of one chicken breast--about 5 oz of fake chicken, cut into small chunks (cook first if real chicken)
Between 1/4 cup and 3/4 cup of Buffalo Wing sauce depending on your desired level of spice
1/2 cup of raw broccoli cut into very small florets
1 medium yellow onion, sliced thin and sauteed in oil until just cooked through
1 cup of shredded mozzarella
1/4 cup of blue cheese crumbles

Layer all of the ingredients, topping with the shredded cheese last, so it melts and holds all the ingredients down. Drizzle the final product with a little bit more of the Buffalo sauce before it goes in the oven.

Cook according to directions on the box, except:

1. I lower by 25 degrees and cook for 5 - 8 minutes longer to make sure it gets hot all the way through with the extra ingredients.
2. put a piece of foil on a lower rack in oven to catch any dripping cheese, then cook the pizza right on the next rack up.

For BBQ Chicken Pizza I use Sweet Baby Ray's BBQ Sauce, fake chicken, carmelized onions and pineapple chunks. Also, I mix some cheddar with the mozz that I put on top.

May you never look at a frozen cheese pizza the same way again.

First ever snow camping--pics and dinner

Snow camping was on my list and I got to check it off this weekend--my Valentine's day present from my S.O. We took our dog, Chaos, and camped Saturday night. It was cold as you may expect, and it was really fun. We camped near the location of the fire lookout from 2 weeks ago--SE side of Mt. Hood near Dufur, OR. There was a lot more snow than last time we were there.

It was snowing when we arrived and pretty much didn't stop snowing until Sunday morning.

It was gorgeous and great skiing once we got rid of the giant backpacks.

You can see the rest of the pics here http://www.flickr.com/photos/mhextreme/sets/72157613876471742/

For dinner, I put together campers' spaghetti.


It was 18 oz to carry in (not including water). It made a ton of food and was really yummy. I forgot a can opener, so my S.O. opened the can with his knife--whew.

Recipe

A handful of angel hair pasta, broken in half --use angel hair instead of traditional spaghetti because it takes only 3 min to boil instead of 10 min, conserving fuel
I brought about 2 inches in diameter of pasta for the three of us
1 can of tomato paste
1 envelope of spaghetti seasoning
1 oz of chili flavored oil (I usually carry flavored oil when camp cooking, to cut down on extra ingredients)
1 cup of shredded cheese--I used mozz/parm combo--the beauty of snow camping--cheese isn't going to spoil.

Boil the pasta for 3 - 4 minutes with a little of the oil in a large sauce pan (large for camping)
Drain.
In the same pan throw in the spice, the paste, a 1/2 cup of water and the rest of the oil.
Mix over the stove on low. Once it's all mixed together, throw in the cheese, stir through and serve.

I pulled out about 25 % of the pasta first and added some cheese and that was Chaos' dinner. He loved it.

By the way, we use a Primus brand camp stove and wow it works well. You have to keep the fuel warm, we laid the fuel can on one of those pocket hand warmers. It boiled the water in just a couple of minutes--did I mention we were in the snow?

We later supplemented the evening with Little Debbie heart shaped chocolate cupcakes since it was Valentine's Day.

New recipe--roasted red pepper soup--easy squeezy

When the person you make dinner for whoops and cheers about the meal like he's watching a football game, you know you've got a hit. My S.O. is easy--he loves soup. So whenever I want a sure hit, I include soup in the meal.

Last night we did roasted red pepper soup and BLAT's (Bacon--fake of course, lettuce, avocado & tomato sandwiches).

The roasted red pepper soup is about the easiest recipe I have. It's only 4 ingredients and takes less than 10 minutes. It's also pretty and it will sit on the stove as long as you need it to, so it's great to serve at a dinner party. One of the keys to its ease is using a hand blender. If you don't have one, you should get one--easy to use, super easy to clean up.

This recipe serves 2 people and is easily doubled

Roasted Red Pepper Soup

2 12 oz jars of water packed roasted red peppers
1 vegetarian bouillon cube
1 cup unsweetened soy milk or regular milk
1 T of dehydrated onions, or 1/2 t of powdered onion seasoning (no salt) or 1/2 white onion diced and sauteed until just cooked through
water as needed

Dump the peppers and water into a medium sauce pan over medium heat, add bouillon cube and onion spice. Heat for about 4 minutes. Then either pour into a blender and blend until all the big chunks are broken down--or stick the hand blender right in the pan and blend until all the big chunks are broken down. It's kinda nice to leave some smaller pieces, the peppers will be soft--it's a nice texture.

Return to the stove and let simmer on low for at least 10 minutes or until you are ready, adding water as it reduces. In the end you should have 1 1/2 to 2 cups of soup in the pan.

In a mug, microwave the milk, just to take the chill off--about 1 minute.

Pour the soup into two bowls, then immediately add the milk 1/2 cup to each bowl and serve. You can stir it in or leave it swirled. You can also top with a dollop of sour cream if you like (i just like saying "dollop").

New recipe--white bean chili

I love this recipe. The flavors are complex and somehow meld perfectly together. It's a really great comfort food meal, but light enough that it isn't just a "winter dinner."

I use a couple kinds of fake meat in this recipe which could easily be substituted if fake meats aren't your thing.

For the fake chicken you could use extra firm tofu instead. For the fake bacon, use a 1/2 teaspoon of liquid smoke (or to taste) instead.

This recipe is enough for 2 people plus one person gets lunch the next day. It is easily doubled.

White Bean Chili

3 - 4 T of olive oil
2 cans of white beans, very well drained--I use 1 can of Cannelli beans and 1 can of navy beans, i've also used white kidney beans or just "small white beans" They are all lovely.
1 - 2 bottles of a light-ish beer
4 - 6 oz of fake chicken, thawed and cut into small chunks
5 - 6 slices of fake bacon
1 4 oz can of mild diced green chilies
1/2 large white onion diced
1 t red pepper flakes
1 T green Tabasco sauce
garlic salt to taste

In a large sauce pan dump in the beans, the green chilies, a 1/2 bottle of beer, 2 T of olive oil and the spices and let simmer on medium heat.

In a separate pan, fry the bacon until crispy. Once it is cool enough, break it up with your hands and add it to the beans. At this time, add the other 1/2 bottle of beer.

In the same pan you just fried the bacon in, saute the diced onions in olive oil on medium heat until just cooked through, about 5 minutes. After about 2 minutes, add the chunks of fake chicken so it all cooks together for a couple of minutes.

Then as Guy Fieri from Diners, Drive-ins and Dives would say "Everyone in the pool." Throw all of it in the pan with the beans and cook until someone else has finished setting the table. At least 10 minutes or up to an hour, on low. That's what the 2nd bottle of beer is for. Keep thinning it down as needed.

Yum.

Singing the praises of Harry & David again

I guess I am a food freak when I get THIS excited about my monthly fruit delivery from Harry & David. But, no, really, this was unusually exciting again, I swear. I got the note on the box again that said "we're sending you something even more special that your normal delivery."
This time it did say "you are getting pears" and they also admitted that it was because they had a LOT of them.

So, once again, I had to take photos of my mail. The pears are huge and really tasty and feel like an exciting treat every time I eat one.

I took a photo of one of them next to a mandarin orange (or tangerine, I can't keep them straight), to show just how robust they are. I don't have plans for these pears other than eating them. I might put one in a greens/pear/blue cheese/walnut salad.

Dinner and Breakfast tips/products from the "camping" trip

This dinner was 15 oz to carry in my backpack and gave us Thai food for dinner while camping!


I used 4 of the packages in the photo above and 5 one ounce fake chicken strips (Trader Joes). I put the strips in a zip loc bag and added some lemon juice to marinate in for the two days before we cooked it.

This recipe also took two pans. I sauteed the fake chicken in one pan with some vegetable oil (i filled a 3 oz travel bottle with vegetable oil to bring with us) and followed the recipe on the package for the noodles.

It was REALLY yummy and filling. It was great. It felt gourmet out in the woods, I recommend it.

For breakfast on Sunday, I discovered an amazing product that I've never seen before.

I bought it and didn't really believe that it would work well. I mean, really? Hashbrowns out of a mini milk carton? I followed the directions on the carton exactly and they turned out really well.

You fill the carton with hot water and let it sit for a 1/2 hour, then dump it into a oiled skillet and brown--that took about 10 minutes. Then I brought 4 packets of ketchup stolen from Burgerville. It's kind of a one sided breakfast since eggs aren't going to make it in a backpack, but it's still better than pop tarts or a Cliff bar (they get old) and only 4 1/2 oz to carry and equaled enough hashbrowns to fill up two people! I brought instant oatmeal too, but my S.O. really wanted just the hasbrowns so there you are.

Fire Look Out "Camping," Skiing, and Cooking

Well, the blog says "adventures in vegetarian food." Here's my first "adventure" installment.

We stayed two nights at the Five Mile Butte Fire Look Out near Mt. Hood in Oregon.

It was SO much fun. If you live in Oregon, I would recommend staying there to anyone. It was clean, well stocked and so cozy. The views were amazing.
The rest of the photos from the weekend can be viewed here http://www.flickr.com/photos/mhextreme/sets/72157613276187536/ . You can reserve it from the government when they aren't using it. During fire season, it is still used as a look out. It was only $69 for two nights.

We had to cross country ski three miles to get there, so the meals I chose to prepare had to be very light, like back packing type food.

Friday night I made Shepherd's Pie which is the S.O.'s favorite dinner. I brought
a packet of dehydrated vegetarian gravy, Haines brand
a packet of dehydrated Idahoan instant potatoes,
A cup of frozen peas and carrots (we were in the snow, so it was ok in a back pack) in a zip loc bag
A 1/2 a tube of GimmeLean vegetarian "burger" crumbles also in a zip loc bag

I used two pans. I made the gravy in one then threw in the crumbles and peas & carrots to cook right in the gravy. The gravy called for one cup of water, but I used closer to 1 1/2 cups so it could cook the other items. Then made the potatoes in another. I forgot to take a picture of the finished product. I spooned the potatoes over the gravy mess on a plate. Normally with Shepard's Pie of course, I'd bake it all in a casserole dish. But for the camping version, I kept it simple. It turned out really well. The meal was about 16 oz worth of food to carry, cooked up very quickly and was very hearty and tasty. It fed two very hungry skiers. We camp and backpack quite a bit--I enjoy coming up with yummy, light & packable recipes.

Dad's Birthday, plus a couple recipes

One of dad's favorite foods is German Chocolate Cake frosting, except, he doesn't eat chocolate. He hasn't eaten chocolate for years, it bothers his stomach. So for his birthday, which we celebrated last weekend, I made him cupcakes that were yellow cake mix and then homemade pecan/coconut frosting--the frosting that traditionally goes on German Chocolate Cake.

I'd never made that frosting from scratch before, so a little bit of a new adventure for me. Here's the recipe I used--note, this is not an original recipe, I pulled it off another website, I didn't not retain which one.

German Chocolate Cake frosting--just the frosting

I just gotta say about this frosting, wow it's good. You could frost an old hiking boot with this stuff and it would taste good. You could make up a batch and carry it around using it as currency it's so good. Seriously, I'm pretty sure if you took maybe 4 of these frosted cupcakes, you could get someone to trade you for a tank of gas, just a suggestion...

3 egg yolks
1 cup evaporated milk
1 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup butter
1 cup pecan pieces
1 1/3 cups shredded sweetened coconut

combine the egg yolks, milk and sugar in a sauce pan and cook over low heat. Stir constantly until thickened. Ok, on this step, I swear it never looked thicker to me. I waited until it was boiling even while I was stirring, then let it boil a little while, then decided it was long enough. I kept track, I stirred and cooked it for about 12 minutes straight. I think it's a good thing to cook it longer vs. shorter because I watched it get a little darker which just makes that brown sugar flavor richer.
Then remove from heat and stir in pecans and coconut.

Let cool to room temperature before frosting the also cooled cupcakes.

BTW, for the cupcakes, I just used one yellow cake mix with 1 cup of soy milk and mixed with an electric mixer for 2 minutes, then baked at 350 for 24 minutes. It made 12 cupcakes.

New recipe--Tangerine Spinach

Do you buy the giant boxes of tangerines, or clementines, or mandarin oranges that come out in the winter? They are the new little ones that are really easy to peel and usually don't have any seeds. They are yummy, but I probably didn't need 6 lbs of them.

So looking at my fruit bowl that had been completely overtaken with these cute little "I want to be an orange when I grow up" creatures, I decided to use one in my dinner.

So here's the recipe I came up with:

Tangerine Spinach

Any citrus that is vaguely related the tangerine would work in this recipe. The quantities below served two adults, one who really likes veggies (me) and one who is admittedly ambivalent to them (my S.O.).

The S.O. did say he really liked it. The tangerines made the spinach suddenly special or fancy. The flavors went together really well, and it is very pretty to serve. This would make a great side with any asian dish like teriyaki tofu over rice, but it isn't too asian-ee in flavor. It would go well with bbq'd skewer, or any meal really that needs a quick green side to round it out.

1 Tablespoon of vegetable oil
1 teaspoon of sesame oil
1 tangerine peeled and separated into it's little natural sections
1 bag of baby spinach (sold with the bagged salads)
2 Tablespoons of toasted sesame seeds

Put the oils in a medium frying pan over medium/low heat and saute the tangerine sections for 3 or 4 minutes, a couple minutes on each side. Dump in the bag of spinach in the pan. The spinach will slowly wilt down. I used tongs to grab the mass of spinach and rotate it top to bottom a few times until everything was evenly wilted. While you are tossing it, be rough with the tangerine sections, fork them, or tong them, so some of their juices mix in with the rest of the spinach. Sprinkle generously with the sesame seeds and serve immediately--this does hold up well in the oven on very low if the rest of your dinner isn't quite ready.

Sliced almonds would work instead of sesame seeds too.

New recipe--Carmelized Pear Skillet Cake

I promised an elegant fate for the Harry & David pears, here is how I used one last night.

Carmelized Pear Skillet Cake
Oh wow, this cake is good. The juice from the pears mixes with the sugar and butter and creates a beautiful natural caramel sauce. This cake tastes as good as it looks. Once you make this, you'll come up with reasons to have potlucks so you can share this with friends.

1/4 cup butter
1/3 cup brown sugar
1 large pear, sliced very thin, at least 26 slices

1 yellow cake mix
1 cup soy milk or regular milk

Preheat oven at 350.
You are going to cook the whole cake in the skillet that you use on the stove, so start with a 12 inch skillet.

Melt the butter over medium/low heat, add the brown sugar and cook for about a minute. Arrange the pears over the butter/sugar in a pretty circular pattern. Use more pear slices vs. less, it's ok if they overlap. The more pears you use, the prettier the top looks later.

Lower the heat to just barely above "low" and let it cook while you mix the batter. Mix the soy milk and cake mix for 2 minutes with an electric mixer. Remove the skillet from heat. Spoon the batter carefully over the pears, trying to not disturb your pear pattern. You want the batter to cover the pears, maybe leaving just a little bit showing around the edges. The batter will spread some during baking.

Bake for 24 - 26 minutes, the top (soon to be the bottom) will be slightly browned.

The hardest part of this recipe is finding a platter big enough to hold this cake. I used one of those plastic party platters that's about 18 inches across.

When the skillet is cool enough to handle, put the platter over the pan and flip the whole cake onto the platter. If some pears are left in the pan, pull them out and arrange them in the blank spaces.

Serve same day if possible. This cake looks & tastes nice the next day as well, but because of the fruit, is really best fresh.

I heart Harry & David

And apparently they heart me too. I've received the fruit of the month club for several years, my mom gets it for me for Christmas every year.

When I received this giant box and the note on the outside, that basically says "we love you and want you to have a much bigger more expensive package this month..."I was initially dubious. I've received "replacement" packages from them in the past and it was a box of shortbread cookies or something--lame when you are expecting a whole pineapple, or 5 fresh nectarines.

So I opened the box and here's what I found--boo hoo...


Summer sausage is only so exciting to a vegetarian, and I don't want candy and cheese from Harry & David, I want FRUIT! But then I kept digging and found these--yeah!!!

So in the end it was a great surprise and much bigger than the normal little box of pears I would have received. I wonder what the real reason was for them sending me all this stuff, leftovers from a slow holiday season? That's ok with me.

I'm going to try an upside down pear cake, so the fate of a couple of those pears is hopefully an elegant one.

BTW, the movie night bars were a HUGE success. Maybe the second best reception ever, second only to the chocolate crinkle cookies.

New recipe--Movie Night Bars

I have two potlucks today, so a great excuse to try another new recipe. This recipe I call:

Movie Night Bars

1 chocolate cake mix
1 stick of butter
1/2 cup of Hershey's Syrup
1 cup of broken (not crushed) pretzels
about 1 1/2 cups of popped popcorn
about 1/2 cup Milk Duds candy

Do you see where I'm going with this?

Melt the stick of butter and mix it with the cake mix. It'll be dry and crumbly. Press the mixture into a greased 13 x 9 pan. Add the Hershey's Syrup, spreading evenly-ish over the mixture.




Then add the popcorn and pretzels evenly over the mix. The MilkDuds' placement is key because they will melt and hold the pretzels and popcorn to the bar when it is complete, so place them evenly across the whole mess, trying to sit them kind of on top of or right up against the pretzels and popcorn.

Bake for 18 - 20 minutes at 350 degrees.

Let cool almost completely before removing from pan. These need to set up before they will act like a bar. If you try to eat them warm, you'll have to use a spoon, they won't hold their own weight.

So now the dilemma, which potluck do I take them to...
Well, I have a chocolate potluck at work today at 3pm, and an Odd Tuesday potluck tonight (friends have a potluck at their house every Tuesday that is an odd number date). I brought some Truffles and other chocolates that I got for Christmas that I don't want in the house for the 3pm one today. I think I'll save the bars for tonight. I'll let you know how they are received.

Welcome to my blog

I've been writing a cookbook for three years now, I'm hoping to finalize it in the next couple of months and then work on getting it published. The working title is "Rootbeer Cupcakes." It'll be about 50 or so baking recipes. This blog will include some recipes from that cookbook as well as recipes for another cookbook I'm considering, plus simply chronicle food as it relates to my life.

I'm a vegetarian and what I would call an adventurous cook. I'm a big fan of food overall, our relationship is a positive one. The recipes posted here are my original creations unless I state otherwise. Of course with the Internet and 6.7 billion people on the planet, I don't know how many truly original thoughts are left, but my recipes are not directly/consciously copied from anywhere else.

I'll have lots of recipes, plus successes, failures, even the occasional disaster, which is just fun for the whole family.