Strawberries and Biscuits

Our summer vacation just started at the end of last week.  Friday was our first full day of summer vacation.  I wanted to do something big with the kids.  My husband had taken the day off.  My youngest daughter had other plans.  She decided that staying up to about ten o clock the night before was more important than her day with the family doing a fun summer outing (usual bed time being 8 during the school months).  This has only happened umpteen times.  We have tried everything to get her to sleep.  Extra activities to tire her out, a positive reward calendar, a negative reward system, sleeping with her sister, going to bed even earlier the next night ...  On and on it goes.  Finally, I said to my husband that we really had to put our foot down.  She had been told that if she did not to sleep, she would lose out on the activities.  And she did.  I made it as boring as possible for her and I at home, while my other daughter and husband went out and enjoyed the day.  Dang, I was sad.  I really was looking forward to the family having an outing together.  She is doing better but there is still room for improvement.

One of the things we had hoped to do was some more strawberry picking but that just did not work out.  Lucky for us we had a lot of strawberries the first time we went out picking.  We made this simple, lovely dessert.

Strawberries and Biscuits
Biscuit recipe from Epicurious

3 cups all purpose flour
2 tablespoons sugar
4 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 cup (1 1/2sticks) chilled unsalted butter, cut into 1/4-inch pieces
1 cup buttermilk

Preheat oven to 425°F. Whisk flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and baking soda in large bowl to blend. Using fingertips, using a pastry blender or a fork 3/4 cup chilled butter into dry ingredients until mixture resembles coarse meal. Add buttermilk and stir until evenly moistened. Using 1/4 cup dough for each biscuit, drop biscuits onto baking sheet, spacing 2 inches apart. Bake until biscuits are golden brown on top, about 15 minutes. Cool slightly. Serve warm.

My Strawberry Mixture

Slice 4 cups strawberries and sprinkle with 2 tablespoons of sugar.  Scrape a vanilla pod and add the seeds to the strawberries.  If you want to spice things up a bit more, add a tablespoon or two of Grand Marnier. Let sit at least 15 minutes to marry.

I dolloped the top with a bit of vanilla yogurt.

Ice Cream Sandwiches

I had been wanting to make ice cream sandwiches but was a bit ambivalent about it because I really wanted a soft cookie.  All the recipes I had tried in the past were a crisp cookie.  The bad part about eating an ice cream sandwich with a crisp cookie is that when you bite it, it kind of oozes out all over.  I had heard that adding more sugar to a recipe will make it softer.  That was how I approached these cookies.  Certainly if you want it crispy I recommend not adding the extra sugar (take away a 1/4 of a cup). 

Ice Cream Sandwich Cookies

1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted

3/4 cup sugar

1 large egg

1 teaspoon vanilla

1/2 cup all purpose flour

1/4 cup cocoa powder ( I will add more next time)

1/4 teaspoon salt

Line a 10 x 15 baking sheet with parchment paper. Spray with non stick cooking spray.

Whisk together the melted butter and sugar.  Whisk in egg and vanilla extract.  Combine dry ingredients: flour, cocoa, and salt.  Add to butter mixture.   Whisk until incorporated.  Spread evenly over parchment paper.

Remove from oven after about 10 to 12 minutes.  Score immediately.  I used a pizza cutter which worked very well.  Let cool.  Remove from parchment and place the squared up ice cream on top of cookies.

I used a store bought ice cream.  I have way too much quilting/creating to do to make ice cream at this moment.  Yes, notice there is a scoop missing.  It still worked.  I made about half the sandwiches and had to slip the ice cream back in the freezer because it was softening rapidly.  If you have two people helping and have the sandwich halves all lined up and ready you should be fine.

There were more but they were eaten up pretty quickly.

Graham Cracker Frozen Treats

This is a crazy easy one.  Of course you can get all kind of creative with this one- 1000's of options and combinations.  No recipe really.  Easy Peasy 1-2-3.  Mix a 1/2 bag of mini marshmallows with a 1/2 of a container of cool whip- or even better whipped cream (with some kind of stabilizer in it). I say half because you will end up with a ton of these sandwiches if you do the whole bag and container. Next you fold in some mini chocolate chips.  Sandwich the mixture between two layers of graham crackers.  Freeze and eat!  Ungodly sweet to eat before freezing I must say.  Something about the freezing action makes it a bit less sweet. 

Frozen Treats: Jello Pops

Hard to snap a good picture of a waving hand. She was so wanting to eat it instead of photographing it.

These pops are like, wow, easy and fun and very lip slurping delicious.  Very versatile too.  So many diffferent flavor combinations and things you can do with them.  I love that you can control the sugar in these.  You can even make them sugar free if you like. 

I have two more frozen treats that I want to share with you over the next couple days.  Stay tuned...

Jello Pops

I used cherry flavored jello with strawberry flavored kool aid for a berry pop.  So many flavor combinations and so easy on the pocket book.

1 (3 oz.) pkg. Jello, any flavor

1 (.14 oz.) pkg. unsweetened Kool-Aid

1/2 to 3/4 c. sugar

2 c. boiling water

2 c. cold water

Dissolve Jello, Kool-Aid, and sugar in boiling water. Add cold water. Pour into ice cube trays or popsicles molds. Insert sticks. You can wait until mixture is partially frozen to insert sticks. Freeze until firm, about 2-3 hours. Makes 20-24 pops.

I stored the extra juice in the fridge until the popsicle containers were empty.  Yup that didnt take too long. It did become a little gelatinous but it still froze well.

Pork Souvlaki

One of my most favorite things to order at our local Mediterranean restaurant, souvlaki.  Chicken or pork, doesn't matter, so delicious.  I really never thought I could replicate it at home.  Thanks to Peter of Kalofogas, I was able to replicate it.  AMAZING taste! I am so making this in the near future.  Great grill food!

I am so flippin' mad at Blogger right now.  In the past few days I have been working on getting all of recipes catalogued.  I went through nearly all of a year.  I have been so bad about doing it.  I worked very hard.  Went to save it and POOF, it was gone.  Gloom, despair and agony on me, deep dark depression excessive misery... oops sorry, I always end up singing that song at times likes these.  For those of you that do not get my reference... Hee Haw was the show and this was the skit.  Crack me up. I love You Tube so I can reminisce. 

Anyway, here is what I did.  Check out Kalofogas if you have not.  He is amazing.  Lots of good food and the man has a good sense of style.

Pork Souvlaki
Largely adapted from Peter's recipe at Kalofogas

2 1/2 pounds pork butt, trimmed and cubed into uniform pieces.
1 onion roughly chopped
1 tablespoon oregano
6 cloves of garlic, crushed
1 generous teaspoon salt
1 generous teaspoon pepper

1/4 cup canola oil

Combine all into a stainless steel or glass bowl and mix well.  Let sit overnight in the refrigerator.
Next day skewer the meat.  I used metal skewers but if you are using wood, make sure you adequately soak the wood before applying the meat to prevent major burning.

Trust me, I will know when you try this recipe because I will hear you saying, "hmmmm, oooh, ahhhh" and whatever other expletives you may care to say.

Strawberry Freezer Jam

Strawberry picking just opened on Friday at our local farm.  My children were especially jazzed about strawberries this year.  I did not buy a single pack of strawberries from Florida or California this year.  I had heard that those two states still use a pesticide that is banned in NY state.  My youngest daughter would come home from class talking about how so and so got to eat strawberries and how come his Mom bought him the strawberries.  I replied that I am sure she did not know otherwise she would not have bought them.  Doesn't that suck!  I am sure there is lots of stuff I don't know that I am inadvertently giving to my kids. There are just so many ways to screw up as a parent- how can you avoid it?

The day we picked these I froze some, made some jam and left some for chowing on.  Talk about fresh!

If you use lite pectin you dont have to add as much sugar and of course you can add Splenda if you want to go that route- I don't.  I also like to do freezer jams when it comes to strawberries.  Although this Margarita Strawberry Preserves is an exception to the rule.

Lite Strawberry Freezer Jam

2 cups water
1 – 1.75 oz. box of No or Low Sugar pectin
Sugar or non-sugar sweetener (to your taste preference)


Clean strawberries. Crush strawberries. Measure out 2 cups strawberries, 1 cup water and add up to 1 to 3 cups of sugar or a non-sugar sweetener (to your taste), if desired. Mix thoroughly and let stand 10 minutes. In a saucepan gradually stir in 1 package of No or Low Sugar pectin into 1 cup water in a small saucepan. Boil 1 minute, at a full rolling boil, over medium-high heat, stirring constantly.  Pour the hot pectin mixture into the strawberries. Stir for 3 minutes. Ladle jam into jelly jars or some type of freezeable container, leaving ½ inch of headspace. Screw or place lids on tightly. Let jam stand in refrigerator until set, about 24 hours. Store in freezer.

If you use regular pectin you need to do something like this. 

Strawberry Freezer Jam

2 cups crushed strawberries
1 – 1.75 oz. box of No or Low Sugar pectin
2 tablespoons lemon juice, freshly squeezed
4 cups sugar

Clean strawberries. Crush strawberries. Measure out 2 cups strawberries and add sugar and lemon juice.  Mix thoroughly and let stand 10 minutes. In a saucepan gradually stir in 1 package of  dry pectin into 3/4 cup water in a small saucepan. Boil 1 minute, at a full rolling boil, over medium-high heat, stirring constantly.  Pour the hot pectin mixture into the strawberries. Stir for 3 minutes. Ladle jam into jelly jars or some type of freezeable container, leaving ½ inch of headspace. Screw or place lids on tightly. Let jam stand in refrigerator until set, about 24 hours. Store in freezer.

If you go no pectin than you will have to use a ton more sugar and have to cook it for long periods of time. 

Anyway you decide, you will be rewarded with some summer goodness in the middle of winter.

Coconut Snowballs

Some more pink.  Hey, what can I say,  I have female children.

Such a busy time of year, the end of school.  Plays, concerts, tours, celebrations, picnics, not to mention graduations and Father's Day.  Its fun stuff but its busy.  My young daughters concert was yesterday.  A Too Te Tah, a too te tah, ah to tee tah tah (click to see what I am talking about if you are not familiar) is completely etched into the far reaches of my brain.  I simply cant stop singing that song.  Its driving me coo coo.  I will say it was utterly fantastic to see my husband and mother, who are completely serious type people being all goofy holding their tongue with their eyes closed singing 'to te tah'!  Absolutely priceless people! SO wish I had a camera.  And me, my friend, my daughter's teacher had me pouring lemonade while the whole auditorium was acting all goofy!  I love her!

Snowball in June?  Yup. catch!

Coconut Snowballs


4 egg whites (1/2 cup)
8 tablespoons unsalted butter
1 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon coconut oil
zest of one lemon
2 cups cake flour, sifted
1 tablespoon baking powder
2/3 cup milk

frosting:

2 egg whites
6 tablespoons cold water
1 1/2 cups sugar
1/2 teaspoon cream of tartar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
 2 cups sweetened shredded coconut

Whip egg whites until stiff peaks form but not dry.  Set aside in the refrigerator.

Preheat oven to 350F.

In a mixer or large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar.  Let run five minutes.  Add vanilla, coconut oil and lemon zest.

In a medium bowl combine sifted flour and baking powder. Add a third of the flour mixture.  Then add half the milk.  Add another third of the flour mixture and then the other half of the milk.  Finally add the remainder of the flour.  Fold in egg whites to the mixture.

Spoon into greased and floured muffin pan or dome pan.  Bake for 20 to 25 minutes.

In a stainless steel bowl combine egg whites, cold water, cream of tartar and sugar.  Beat until combined.  Place bowl over a saucepan with boiling water or in a bain marie.  COntinue beating for about ten to fifteen minutes. Remove from heat and whisk in vanilla.  Let cool.

Once cupcake sand frosting are cool, dip in frosting and then in coconut.  You can color the coconut with food coloring if you like.