Chocolate-Cherry Layered Cupcakes

Chocolate-Cherry Layered Cupcakes Recipe

 

INGREDIENTS:

1 box devil’s food cake mix
Water, vegetable oil and eggs called for on cake mix box
1/2 teaspoon almond extract, if desired
1 can (21 oz) cherry pie filling
2 containers (4 oz each) vanilla pudding
1 container (1 lb) creamy chocolate frosting

DIRECTIONS:

1. Heat oven to 350°F (325°F for dark or nonstick pans). Make and bake cake mix as directed on box for 24 cupcakes, using water, oil, eggs and almond extract. Cool in pans 10 minutes; remove from pans to cooling racks. Cool completely, about 30 minutes.

2. Just before serving, remove paper baking cups. Cut cupcake in half horizontally with serrated knife. On bottom half of cupcake, spoon 1 tablespoon cherry pie filling; top with 2 teaspoons vanilla pudding. Replace top of cupcake.

3. Remove lid and foil cover from frosting container. Microwave frosting on High 30 seconds. Stir thoroughly until very soft and smooth, microwaving an additional 5 to 15 seconds if necessary. Spoon 1 tablespoon frosting over top of cupcake. Top with 1 cherry from pie filling.

4. Repeat steps 2 and 3 with remaining cupcakes. Serve immediately.

Just the two of you? Bake and cool cupcakes as directed. Make desired number of layered cupcakes. Wrap remaining cupcakes tightly in plastic wrap, and freeze for up to 2 months.

Recipe & photo source : Pillsbury Recipes

 

Julia Roberts and Why Cooking Shouldn’t Kill

What do Julia Roberts and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton have in common? They both think Cooking Shouldn’t Kill!

Toxic cooking smoke claims 1.9 million lives a year – making it the fifth worst threat to public health in the developing world – with women and young children most at risk.

Every 16 seconds a life is lost to one of a range of deadly illnesses caused by inhaling fumes emitted from traditional cookstoves and fuels. In the Congo, that equates to one death for every 68 people.

Reliance on dangerous cooking methods forces women and children to spend countless hours a week collecting fuels like firewood – when they could be going to school or starting a business. Women are at risk as they collect fuel, especially in environments like refugee camps and in conflict zones.

Inefficient cookstoves can also put pressure on environmental resources like forests and animal habitats, and contributes to climate change.

About the Issue of Clean Cookstoves

The Solution

The use of clean cookstoves and fuels can:

Reduce acute and chronic illnesses and lower the number of deaths from early childhood pneumonia, emphysema, cataracts, lung cancer, bronchitis, cardiovascular disease, and low birth weight caused by exposure to cookstove smoke.

Decrease time needed to collect fuel and the money spent on buying fuel, increasing the time that families have available to start small businesses and educate their children as well as freeing money for the purchase of necessities like medicine and school fees.

Create economic opportunities at the local level for men and women in manufacturing, distribution, sales, and service of improved cookstoves and fuels.

Decrease harmful emissions and pressure on natural resources.

Development of a global clean cookstove industry that is constantly innovating to improve design and performance, while lowering the cost of stoves, can lead the way to widespread adoption of affordable clean cooking solutions.

Learn more here: http://www.cookingshouldntkill.org/

Brought to you by The Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves, a public-private initiative to save lives, improve livelihoods, empower women, and combat climate change by creating a thriving global market for clean and efficient household cooking solutions.

http://twitter.com/cookstoves

Julia Roberts

Global Ambassador for the Global Alliance for Clean Cookstoves

http://twitter.com/JuliaRoberts

Banana and Blueberry Pancakes with Cinnamon-Vanilla Butter

Two of my favorite fruits in one pancake! The addition of the cinnamon-vanilla butter makes these already amazing pancakes extra special. We love breakfast and I’m always looking for new ways to change up pancakes! YUM! They turned out as beautiful as they look and absolutely delicious!

Ingredients

1-1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tablespoons sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg, lightly beaten
1-1/4 cups fat-free milk
3 medium ripe bananas, mashed
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1-1/2 cups fresh or frozen blueberries (If using frozen blueberries, do not thaw)
Maple syrup, optional
Powdered sugar, optional

Cinnamon-Vanilla Butter

1/4 cup unsalted butter, softened
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions
For cinnamon-vanilla butter: Combine softened unsalted butter, cinnamon and vanilla extract in a bowl. Mix until well combined. Set aside.

For pancakes: In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. In another bowl, combine the egg, milk, bananas and vanilla; stir into dry ingredients just until moistened. Gently stir in blueberries.

Coat a large flat pan with cooking spray. Turn pan to low heat. Pour pancake batter by 1/4 cupfuls onto the pan. Turn when bubbles form on top; cook until second side is golden brown.

Serve with maple syrup, sifted powdered sugar and/or cinnamon-vanilla butter, if desired.

Enjoy!

Banana and Blueberry Pancakes adapted from Taste of Home. Source & photo by Georgia @ thecomfortofcooking.com

Creamy Seafood Mac-n-Cheese

Don’t let the work intimidate you.. it is SO easy and worth it! This mac and cheese is a fantastic one-dish meal — rich and creamy and so cheesy! Lobster goes great in this recipe, but if that seems too luxurious, use any combination of seafood that you love!

Ingredients

For the seafood

1 small live lobster
1/2 medium onion
10 peppercorns
2 bay leaves
1 tablespoon salt
8 large shrimp, chopped into chunks, reserve the shells
8 medium scallops
1 teaspoon Old Bay Seasoning
1 tablespoon butter

For The pasta

1 lb macaroni
1/4 cup butter
1/4 cup flour
1/4 medium onion, finely chopped
1 garlic clove, minced
2 cups whole milk
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon Old Bay Seasoning
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard (I used truffle Dijon)
1 1/2 teaspoons thyme leaves
1 1/2 teaspoons chives, chopped
1 cup mixed grated cheese (I used mozzarella, provolone & parmesan)
1/2 cup mascarpone cheese
salt and pepper to taste

For the topping

1/2 cup panko bread crumbs
1 1/2 teaspoons thyme leaves
1 tablespoon butter

Directions:

1.) Fill a large pot with enough water to cover the lobster. Add onion, peppercorns, salt & bay leaves and bring to a boil over high heat.

2.) Kiss the lobster goodbye and put it head first into the boiling water. Cover the pot, reduce the heat to medium and cook 10-15 minutes.

3.) Remove the cooked lobster from the water and drain it on paper towels. (Keep the cooking water to cook the pasta but remove the onion, bay leaves and peppercorns.)

4.) When the lobster has cooled enough to handle, remove the meat from the tail and claws and cut into chunks.

5.) Heat a frying pan to medium high and add 1 tablespoon of butter. Sprinkle both sides of the scallops with the old bay seasoning and sear the scallops in the butter for 1 minute per side. This will give the scallops some color but not completely cook them.

6.) Remove the scallops from the frying pan and cut each of them into quarters. Set aside with the other seafood.

7.) Add the lobster shells and shrimp shells back to the cooking water and bring to a boil. After it has come to the boil, remove all the shells and discard.

8.) Preheat oven to 400F. Add the macaroni to the boiling lobster/shrimp water. Cook the macaroni until it is almost al dente (remember it will cook more in the oven) or about 8 minutes. Drain and rinse with cold water. Set aside.

9.) While the pasta is cooking, melt 1/4 cup of butter over medium heat in a large saucepan.

10.) Add the onion & garlic to pan and cook until softened (3 to 5 minutes).

11.) Add flour to the butter, onion & garlic and cook for 1 minute while stirring.

12.) Add the milk and whisk until smooth. Bring to a boil then reduce to a simmer, and cook until sauce has thickened (2 to 3 minutes).

13.) Add the nutmeg, old bay seasoning, Dijon mustard and herbs.

14.) Remove the pan from heat. Stir in the cheeses and mix until smooth. Season with salt & pepper to taste. Fold in the cooked macaroni then gently fold in the seafood.

15.) Transfer the pasta to a shallow baking dish big enough to hold the pasta.

16.) To a frying pan over medium, add 1 tablespoon of butter. Add the panko & thyme leaves. Toss to coat the panko in the butter and toast slightly. Top pasta evenly with the panko mixture.

17.) Place baking dish on a rimmed baking sheet. Bake until the topping is golden and sauce is bubbling, 15 to 20 minutes. Let cool 5 minutes before serving.

_____________________

Adapted from marthastewart.com Recipe & Photo source: www.thedragonskitchen.com

Sticky Lemon Rolls With Lemon Cream Cheese Glaze

These rolls are amazing! These are my new go-to breakfast rolls. They are modeled after the classic cinnamon roll, with a buttery yeast dough flecked with nutmeg and lemon. Inside each roll is a rich filling of sugar and lemon that bakes into gooey, oozey sweet-tart deliciousness. The cream cheese glaze puts it over the top, with more lemon tartness and not too much sweetness.

Lemon Roll Dough

Starbucks Cinnamon Dolce Latte

This is a surprisingly low-calorie treat, and it will give you the same delicious flavors that you could get from a Cinnamon Dolce Latte at Starbucks!  If they still served them. This is an easy homemade version to make, and it won’t even add too many additional calories – definitely a guiltless treat.

Ingredients:

• 1 shot Espresso
• Dusting – 1/8 teaspoon of ground cinnamon
• 1 cup Milk (for steaming)
• Splenda or sugar to taste
• 1 shot Smuckers Butterscotch (or Caramel) Sundae Syrup
• Whipped Cream (optional)

Start out by freshly brewing the shot of espresso, and then mix it with the cinnamon, and stir well. Add the sugar-free caramel syrup, and then mix in any additional sweetener to your taste. Steam your milk until it is 160°, and pour it in with the espresso to create your professional latte treat!

Variation: Leave out the ground cinnamon, but instead put a large cinnamon stick, some cloves and green cardamom pods in the milk. Leave as it comes to a boil, set aside and let it infuse for a couple minutes. Then strain out the seasonings and pour into the coffee.

Starbucks does still offer the Iced Cinnamon Dolce Latte

Intuitive Cooking: 5 Ways to Find Your Inner Chef

I write a lot about intuitive eating. Just as important, and the first step in the process, is intuitive cooking. But it’s hard in our world.

We’re pressed for time, and accustomed to looking outside ourselves to the experts — the celebrity chef, the cooking show stars, the cookbook authors —for the latest word on what to buy and how to cook it.

Don’t get me wrong: I’m all for education in culinary and nutritional topics; it’s how I make my living. At some point, though, it’s exhilarating to rely on an internal compass rather than external directions. It’s not like celebrity chefs or we food writers have cornered the market on cooking.

Food preparation is the most natural, instinctive activity in the world, right up there with nest-building and baby-making. And I believe it’s as important as intuitive eating in terms of our relationship with food.

Cooking by availability and intuition — shopping the market, choosing produce that looks fresh and appealing, and then combining it with ingredients on hand, according to taste and personal preference — is perhaps the oldest and most authentic way of food prep. My southern grandmothers cooked this way, without recipes or elaborate meal planning. They simply gathered vegetables from their garden, combined them with ingredients on hand, and added a pinch of this and a dash of that until it tasted good. At the end, it was invariably a feast.

Cooking without a recipe requires only a little skill, plus a lot of imagination, and a willingness to be bold and inventive. These five steps will get you started:

1. Head to local farmer’s markets. That’s where you’ll find an abundance of fresh, seasonal produce. But don’t write off our local grocery stores; Whole Foods can’t be beat for its high-quality organic produce selection and vast array of herbs, spices, oils, nuts, cheeses and specialty items. Vitamin Cottage has wildly competitive prices and a full selection of organic produce. And some mainstream grocers are doing a pretty good job of offering more organic and local produce.

2. Start with color. It will be one of your main guides for choosing ingredients. Begin with one main ingredient — asparagus, for example — then look around the market or produce section for seasonal produce that would compliment their bright-green color. Look for what appeals to you–the pale hue of green onions, for example, and the soft tan-gray of wild morels.

You could sauté these in olive oil, then top with a little black sea salt and shaved Asiago cheese. How would you cook them? Maybe make them into a soup with a light broth, a little cream and nutmeg? Or sauté them in sesame oil with garlic and ginger, and top them with black sesame seeds? You get the idea; anything is possible. Don’t overlook fruit; pears, berries or citrus fruits compliment many vegetable dishes with a subtle, fresh sweetness

3. Try something new. The first time I saw a rutabaga, I was consumed with curiosity. I purchased the monstrosity, which looked something like a mutant potato. At a loss, I chopped it up, boiled it and served it with butter, salt and pepper. It was delicious — sweet, clean, with a mildly nutty, cabbage like flavor. Try something new — celery root, cardoons, chanterelle mushrooms, tomatillos, fiddlehead ferns, chayote squash, kumquats. Ask for cooking suggestions at the market. Start by seasoning simply with a little salt and pepper, and branch out from there. You’ll know.

4. Stock up on basic cooking ingredients. An artist needs the proper paints, brushes and canvas upon which to express her creativity. You’ll need an assortment of oils, vinegars, salts, spices, fresh herbs and other ingredients, to make the most of your cooking artistry. Basics include:

• A good olive oil and grapeseed or other neutral cooking oil
• Balsamic, sherry and red wine vinegar
• Kosher or coarse salt, sea salt and, if you like, a finishing salt, such as fin de sel, to be added after cooking.
• Seven or eight spices you love (try cumin, cinnamon, cayenne, chili powder, black pepper, white pepper, paprika and curry powder) and a wide selection of fresh herbs, garlic and onions.
• A selection of dried beans, lentils, grains, nuts and seeds.
• Canned tomatoes, canned beans and a good, basic broth or stock.

5. Start with a great recipe. It sounds counter-intuitive, but having guidelines for a dish you love — pasta, salad, soup — creates a basic framework, the scaffolding upon which you can lay your own original design. A basic soup recipe, for example, might be 6 cups of broth, 2 cups of vegetables, 1 cup of beans, 2 tablespoons of oil or butter, and 1 tablespoon of fresh herbs.

Start with a recipe you love, head to your favorite market, and be willing to be bold. At the very worst, you’ll discover what doesn’t work — and that’s a valuable life lesson in itself.

By: Lisa Turner

Lisa Turner is a widely published food writer with more than 25 years of professional experience. She has written five books on health and nutrition, and hundreds of magazine articles. Her diverse background in food and nutrition includes studies in macrobiotics, raw foods and vegan regimens, as well as classic culinary training. In addition to writing books and magazine articles, Lisa combines 20 years of yoga, meditation and mindfulness practices to help her clients understand and change emotional issues behind their eating habits. Currently, she’s a faculty instructor at Bauman College of Culinary Arts and Nutrition in Boulder, Colorado, and hard at work on her next book. Visit her websites at www.TheHealthyGourmet.net and InspiredEating.com.

Nigella Lawson’s Ginger Glazed Ham

This is the food of the Ham Gods. No more boring cloves for our hams! This is a really easy recipe that is juicy and tastes incredibly delicious, but isn’t the ham your grandma used to make.  Great for a Super Bowl party too! Serve hot or cold.

Ingredients

* Cook’s Note: If you can not get hold of ginger preserves, you can use ordinary orange marmalade and add 1 teaspoon of dry,  ground ginger.

Recipe courtesy Nigella Lawson www.nigella.com

Cheesy Tater Tots Recipe

Oh no, I didn’t! LOL, yes I did   Snack time on a Friday night!  In addition to french fries and mozzarella, tater tots are another one of my guilty pleasures. But do you know how hard it is to find a decent plate of tots? Cheesy tater tots are the food single-handedly responsible for the Freshman 15 I put on in college because the dining hall sold them all the time. Now that I know how to make them on my own, I’m in serious trouble.

Ingredients

* 2 medium russet potatoes, peeled , chopped
* 1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
* 2 green onions, chopped
* 1 teaspoon seasoning salt
* 1 egg, beaten
* 1/3 cup flour
* oil for frying

Directions

1. Preheat 1 inch of oil in a pot.

2. Place chopped potatoes in a food processor and pulse about 8-10 times or until potatoes are roughly chopped but not mush. Do not over process, you don’t want mashed potatoes.

3. Transfer processed potatoes to a bowl. Add in cheddar cheese, green onions, seasoning salt, egg and flour. The mixture will be thick. Place some of the mixture on a spoon, if you can gently push it off with you finger and it falls in one piece it is ready to go. Add more flour if needed.

4. Once oil reaches 375 degrees. Carefully spoon rounded teaspoonfuls of mixture into oil. Fry until golden brown, about 3 minutes.

5. Sprinkle with more seasoning salt. Serve hot with creamy ranch dip.

Serves 2-4

Notes:

* I had had a couple of disasters making homemade tater tots before. I had originally tried using parboiled potatoes thinking that if I started with raw potatoes I would have raw potatoes inside the tater tot. Well, the result of that first round was a glop of fried potato in the bottom of the frying pan. Not so good. This time around, I decided to start with raw potatoes and it seemed to work perfectly. The potatoes were crispy on the outside and soft on the inside.

* Another thing I learned while making these is to not make them a head. The first time that I made them, I prepared the mixture about an hour before dinner, put them in the refrigerator and thought nothing of it. When I went to begin frying, the potatoes had released a lot of water and my mixture was total mush. To avoid this prepare the mixture just before you are about to fry them.

Southern Pecan Sticky Buns

These are REALLY good! I love tugging pieces off the roll. So feathery and airy. If you’re going to go through all the trouble to make these, it’s probably best to make the whole recipe. You can freeze or give away the extras to friends and family and they’ll love you for it!

Ingredients

Sticky Buns with Pecans, recipe for a 9 x 13 pan

Dough

3 eggs, room temp
3/4 C buttermilk, room temp
3 Tbsp granulated sugar
1 1/4 tsp salt
Package of instant yeast, 2 ¼ tsp
4 to 4 ¼ C AP flour
6 Tbsp melted butter

Caramel Glaze

5 Tbsp butter
1/2 C brown sugar
3 Tbsp honey
1.5 Tbsp milk
Pinch salt

Cinnamon Sugar Filling

1/2 C brown sugar
2 tsp cinnamon
Pinch salt
1 Tbsp butter, melted

Pecan Topping

3 Tbsp butter
3 Tbsp brown sugar
3 Tbsp honey
1 pinch salt
1 tsp vanilla
3/4 C pecans, toasted and chopped

Directions

1. Whisk together the eggs, buttermilk, sugar, salt, and yeast.

2. Add half of the flour and melted butter and stir into a loose batter. Using the dough hook of a stand mixer, add all but 1/4 C of the flour, and knead on low speed for 5 minutes then check the status of the dough. Dough should be moist but not sticky. The dough should be sticking to the bottom of the bowl (the little round divot at the bottom of the bowl) but should not stick to the sides. If it sticks to the sides of the bowl, add more flour. Knead for another 5 minutes. Then turn the dough out to a lightly floured board and knead another minute by hand and bring the dough into a ball. Dough should be smooth and a tiny bit tacky. If you do not have a stand mixer, you can knead by hand but knead twice as long, for 20 minutes.

3. Transfer the dough to a bowl lightly sprayed with nonstick spray. Then spray the top of the dough so it doesn’t dry out. Cover tightly with plastic wrap and put in a warm, draft-free place until doubled, about 2 to 2 1/2 hours. I use my huge 2 quart pyrex measuring cup to measure dough rise. The markings on the side are perfect for telling me when my dough has doubled.

4. For the glaze, combine all the ingredients in a small saucepan and whisk together over medium low heat until the butter has melted. Pour into your baking pan and spread the mixture evenly over the bottom of the pan and set aside.

5. Combine all the ingredients for the cinnamon sugar filling and set aside.

6. When the dough has doubled, gently turn it out to a lightly floured surface. Roll it out to a rectangle. If using a 9 x 13 pan, roll out into a 16 x 12 rectangle. If using a 9 x 9 pan, roll out into a 12 x 12 rectangle. Melt a tablespoon of butter and brush the dough, leaving a 1/2 in border on the top edge. Using the remaining butter to butter the sides of the baking pan.

7. Spread the cinnamon sugar evenly over the dough, leaving a 1/2 in border along the top edge. Smooth and gently press the filling on the dough. With the edge closest to you, start rolling the dough into a cylinder; keep the roll very taut and tight. Pinch the seam shut. The log may be thick in the middle and taper out to the sides. Press the ends in and gently roll and stretch out the log until you have a log of uniform thickness, 18 inches if using a 9 x 13 pan or 13 inches if using a 9 x 9 pan. Using a serrated knife, gently saw through the log to cut even rolls, 12 for 9 x 13 or 9 for 9 x 9.

8. Place each bun, cut/pretty-side down on the filling in the pan. Cover with plastic wrap and let the rolls rise until they are puffy and pressed against each other, about 1 1/2 hours. At this point you can put them in the fridge overnight and bake them the next morning (overnight instructions are at the end).

Note: The original recipe specified to bake these on a pizza stone, but since I was using a Pyrex pan I was a bit wary of putting Pyrex on a hot stone so I didn’t use one. If using a pizza stone, adjust your oven rack to the lowest position and preheat the oven to 350°F while the dough rises. The pizza stone takes a while to warm up. If not using a stone, adjust your oven rack to second lowest position and preheat the oven to 350°F but you don’t need to preheat as early.

9. Bake the buns for about 25 to 30 minutes, the tops should be golden brown and the center should read 180°F. If you’re using a glass pan, you can sneak a peek at the bottoms to make sure they’re done before you take them out of the oven.

10. Cool the tray on a wire rack for 10 minutes. While the buns cool, you can toast your pecans in the oven if you haven’t toasted them earlier. Then invert the pan onto a platter or cutting board. Scrape any goo in the pan onto the buns.

11. Prepare the topping as the buns cool. Heat butter, brown sugar, honey, and salt in a small sauce pan over medium heat whisking occasionally until bubbly. Then off heat, stir in vanilla and toasted chopped pecans. Spoon a dollop over each bun and serve.

Enjoy!

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