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Fun Friday: Low-fat Lemon Pound Cake

6 Apr

This was a winner last year, so we brought it back for an encore performance this year.

 

Earlier this week, I wrote a blog post about a new dessert we tried (and tried again) for our Easter meal. In it, I referred to the fact that I also made a second dessert, so today I thought I’d share that one with you. It’s one that can be made all year long, and it’s gotten rave reviews from my family for two years in a row.

Last Easter we did not host, but we did contribute to the meal, and one of the items we contributed was a dessert. I am not even sure now, how I found this dessert from Angel in the Kitchen, but it was fitting for a springtime, Easter meal and it was one we’d all like, as well as one that I could easily transform to be gluten free by switching out the flour for the Bob’s Red Mill 1:1 baking flour that we use here.

When I read through the recipe, I was a little bit nervous because it used real lemon juice and lemon zest, and I’d always been a cheater and used a bottle of lemon juice in my recipes. I was also nervous because the directions start with, “Unload your dishwasher,” and states that this is a five-bowl recipe. So there was that. Additionally, I doubled my recipe both years in order to make two pound cakes—one for the potluck party after church on Saturday night and one for Easter dessert on Sunday. So for me that was ten bowls because in this case, with this particular recipe, it was easier for me to make two of everything than it was to try to figure out splitting it into two at the end.

It was a multi-bowl recipe, but it was worth it.

I have to say, it’s a fabulous dessert, and it gets amazing feedback each year, whether from our immediate and extended family or from our friends at church, and no one can ever tell it’s gluten free unless I tell them. The use of the fresh lemon juice and lemon zest are what make the difference, and it also makes our house smell delicious as I’m squeezing the juice and grating the lemon for the zest.

My one change that I had to implement was in regards to the glaze. Both years I had to increase it. I tripled it this year, in order to have what I felt was the right amount on top of the cake, even though a lot drips down to the plate below.

I used two lemons, one per cake, and it did not make the 1 ½ tablespoons of zest, but it made enough to make it work, and it makes plenty of juice to make what is needed for the cake and the glaze.

I encourage you to give this recipe a try. It’s not fast and easy, but it’s not incredibly hard and it’s worth every step, every bowl, every minute it it takes.

Have a wonderful weekend!

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The taste of success is sweeter after failure

3 Apr

 

It took a lot of perseverance to get to this point.

Throughout their lives, whenever our kids have stumbled, fallen, failed, we’ve helped to support them in getting back up, maybe taking a quick break, and then trying again. It doesn’t matter whether it was learning to walk, riding a bike, passing a class, creating a project or practicing a role. At the end of their journey, we would celebrate their success with them, even if success looked different than they originally anticipated or took longer to achieve than they thought it would. In the end, that taste of victory was sweet.

Cooking can be like that. Sometimes you follow a recipe and make a creation that comes out right the first time. Sometimes you follow a recipe and even though you worked hard and did what you were supposed to do, it ends up having to go into the trash and you need to start all over again. No matter what though, it is my opinion that the taste at the end when you’ve finally gotten it right, is so much sweeter than it would have been the first time around.

It seemed to look okay coming out of the oven.

This Easter I had that experience. I wanted to try out a new recipe for an Italian Ricotta Cake, from “Tornadough Alli,” and to make it gluten free so we could all enjoy it. Because the cake called for using a cake mix, rather than making the entire thing from scratch, it would be easier for me to make a gluten free substitution in the ingredients.

I know that they say not to try out a new recipe for company, and I knew that it’s especially important when it’s for a holiday meal that you’re hosting, but I decided to try it out for Easter anyway. Our guests are forgiving, and really how bad could it go?

Luckily I gave myself an extra day for baking and started on Good Friday night. I had slept much later that morning than usual, so I could cook into the wee hours of the night and get ahead with my baking. It also gave me a buffer of a day or so in case I had to bake an entire cake recipe all over again.

I’m sure you can tell where this is going.

I followed the recipe to a “t” as they say. I only substituted out the white cake mix for a gluten free yellow cake mix so we could all eat it. I used a springform pan for probably the second time in my life.

As it cooled, it looked less and less promising.

However, after I cooked the cake according to the directions and had taken it out to cool, I had a sneaking suspicion that things weren’t going to go my way this time around with this new dessert.

The instructions had specifically stated to be sure the center of the cake was set when taking it out of the oven.

It seemed a little jiggly, but I used a cake tester to test it so many times that it seemed almost like polka dots on top of my cake. Each time, it came out clean, so I figured I was in the clear.

I wasn’t.

As the cake cooled, the center proceeded to sink and I knew the news was not going to be good.

At about 11pm I opted to try to slide the cake off of the bottom of the pan and onto a serving plate to see what would happen.

Not company-ready.

That happened.

Ugh.

I was so bummed out. I was going to have to toss this cake into the trash. There was still raw batter in the center and there was no way to salvage this dessert.

However, as I got ready to toss it, I tasted it. The cooked edges of the cake were delicious! I knew that if it had gone differently, this recipe could have been a keeper.

I still had a half container of ricotta cheese and of heavy cream. I had all the ingredients I needed, I just had to get a new box of gluten free cake mix.

Luckily I had my buffer of an extra day.

On Saturday, my husband picked up the cake mix as I made our other dessert and I mentally prepared myself to start this one all over again. I was determined to make it work.

I followed all of the steps. This time, on the advice of my mother, whom I was frantically texting out of state at almost midnight the night before, I cooked the cake much longer. Her own recipe usually takes almost 20 extra minutes to cook and set properly, so with that in mind, I cooked it until it no longer seemed jiggly in the middle-about 20 extra minutes-and then I pulled it out and crossed my fingers.

Seemed to look much better this time.

It had to work this time or else there was a gluten free bakery down the street that I’d soon be visiting instead.

I left it to cool, went to the mall to get the last kid their Easter dress for church that night (yes, day before Easter and night of when we needed it, I know) and hoped and prayed that when I got back it would still be solid in the middle.

And it was.

We arrived home in time to color our eggs and head off to church that night. I had my two desserts ready to be frosted the next day and I was good to go. I had managed to pull it all off.

On Easter morning, as I was frosting this cake and sprinkling the spring-colored sprinkles on top, I was glad I’d tried out something new, and glad I’d not quit after the first try. Had I not given myself that extra day for the trial run, I may not have had the chance to try a second time, but I’m glad I did.

That evening as we cut into the cake, I was so proud of it and everyone raved about how good it was. It was definitely a keeper, and I definitely think that I enjoyed it more than I would have if it was something I’d accomplished easily. My kids were definitely more proud of me, more complimentary of this particular cake, knowing how much of my time and effort and how many prayers had gone into making it.

I don’t know about anyone else, but for me, I’m pretty sure that this cake had that extra sweet taste of perseverance as it was going down.

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Happy Birthday Don and Alexandra!

23 Mar

So what’s the best birthday gift *you* ever gave someone?

ORIGINALLY POSTED MARCH 23, 2012

Today is a very special day.

Today is Alexandra’s birthday.

Today is also Don’s birthday.

That makes me the best wife ever because seven years ago for Don’s birthday at 1:22 am I gave him our third daughter.

I know, I know, best gift ever, right?! It’s hard to top that one though, so I don’t really try. I’m back to t-shirts, pajama pants and stuff like that for his birthday gifts.

Alexandra’s First Birthday 2006

Since sharing his birthday with his daughter, Don has been blessed with getting to have a Snoopy party, a My Little Pony party, a Dora party, a Purple party and this year…Hello Kitty. Technically they’re not his parties obviously, but you see what I mean.

Birthday crowns all around on Alex’s second birthday.

Thankfully, my parents have this neat tradition that they started with us where we celebrate the adult birthday parties at their house each year and we “kids” get to choose our meal and our cake. I choose….well I won’t tell you what I choose until it’s my birthday this summer. But Don chooses a totally opposite type of meal and cake than I would choose, so I guess it’s good that we each get a chance to choose our own, to choose what we like. Don chooses meatball sandwiches (made with my mom’s homemade meatballs and gravy) with lemon cake for dessert. It’s probably the only time all year we have it and he really enjoys it.

Therefore, today I thought I’d share with you the recipe for Don’s birthday cake of choice each year, the lemon cake. It’s really yummy, I particularly love the corners.

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LEMON CAKE

A cake *just* for Daddy!

INGREDIENTS

1/4 cup oil

1/2 cup water

2 beaten eggs

Duncan Hines Lemon Cake Mix

1 can lemon pie filling (divided)

DIRECTIONS

In bowl by hand, mix together oil, water, eggs, cake mix.

Add 1/4 can of lemon pie filling into the mix.

Put into greased 9×13 dish.

On top, distribute the rest of the pie filling.

Bake 35-40 minutes at 350 degrees.

When cool, glaze with:
1 cup confectioner’s sugar mixed with 1 Tablespoon lemon juice. Add a little hot water if necessary.

THE BIRTHDAY TWINS CELEBRATING THEIR SPECIAL DAY IN 2016

 

 

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The unexpected healing power of the kitchen

7 Feb

Baked oatmeal is one of our family’s favorite meals for breakfast, or any time of the day.

Happy Wednesday, everyone! It’s the middle of another week, and February is flying by.

We have had a busy few weeks here, and I’ve been unable to post as frequently as I’d like to. However, today’s post was one I just had to make the time for.

Three weeks ago today, our youngest daughter hit her head getting into the car, after slipping on some slush in a parking lot. Although all of us have bumped our heads getting into the car at one time or another, this bump turned out to be different. She hit it just the right way and ended up with a concussion.

It’s our first concussion from any of our kids and neither of us have ever had one. However, with all of the new emphasis on the proper treatment of brain injuries and brain damage, we knew of many kids her age who have had them. What we did not know, however, was just how long a recovery it could be. Each injury is different. Some recover in a matter of days, others in a matter of weeks, still others take many months and there is no way to know which kind you have until you’ve fully recovered.

When it first happened, a friend of mine whose daughter has had several sports injury concussions warned me, “She’s going to be SO bored.” She was SO right. There is not much they can do. No screen time, no reading, very little writing, no bright lights, no loud noises. Sometimes even normal-level noises seem too loud.

Initially she didn’t want to do a ton. For the first five days or so she was spending her waking hours in total darkness, sometimes listening to a book, sometimes sleeping. About a week in however, as she started to feel slightly better, she was awake more. She’d already listened to about 20 hours of audio books and was downloading eight more. She could listen to a TV show in the background, but not watch it. She was bored out of her mind. We each tried to find things to entertain her. Her sisters would do her nails, her hair, her makeup. They’d listen to a movie with her. We’d take her for rides. She’d clean her own room. Then we’d find her cleaning a sister’s room. She was bored, bored, bored.

“When I am sitting here doing nothing, I am stressed,” she said to me more than once. “When everyone is doing something, and I can’t do anything, it makes me crazy.”

I get that.

However, as time went on, the one thing she could do, and truly enjoyed, was cooking. One week in, she was asking to make something in the kitchen–anything at all, she didn’t care what. She could measure, mix and stir, and watch something bake, and then she could share it with everyone as they came home at the end of the day. All I had to do was read out the ingredients to her as she went along.

Here, finally was something she could do. She had a new apron and a new purple cooking set, courtesy of a Christmas gift from her oldest sister, and she was going to put it all to good use. Although our kitchen renovation project from the summer is still awaiting the next round of its finishing touches, it’s fully functional, even though it’s not fully beautiful.

She made baked oatmeal for our weekend breakfast one week, and homemade stove-top oatmeal for an after school snack another week. She made green pancakes for breakfast and then purple ones another time for dinner. She made cupcakes from scratch with homemade frosting and she made a carrot bread with glaze. She chattered on and on about fractions as she measured: double 1/8 and  it’s 1/4 and half it to get 1/16 and on and on and on.

As she cooks, she’s in her happy place and her stress about all she’s missing out on momentarily disappears. The lights are low, and the things she can’t do turn into something she can do and enjoys doing. Never have I been more thankful that we’ve raised our kids to know their way around the kitchen. Not only is it a life skill, but for the past few weeks it’s truly been a life saver. It’s had a healing power that I had never thought about.

In the coming weeks she should be continuing to feel better and better, and I hope that when she looks back on this period of time, she’ll not only remember the rough patch she’s been through, but also think back on some of the bright spots mixed throughout the weeks, such as the time she spent in the kitchen creating, mixing, measuring and relaxing.

In her happy place during what has proven to be a very challenging time.

 

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Fun Friday: Gluten Free Cherry Cobbler

26 Jan

20180120_194842Each year in January, I try to make my parents a cherry dessert, reminiscent of the cherry pie my dad always says stole his heart when he first tasted it, made from scratch by my mom for one of their very first dates. Hers was much more decadent than my cherry desserts ever are, with a criss-cross woven pie crust to boot. However, it’s the thought that counts.

Earlier in the week, I wrote about the dinner recipe we tried out when they visited for dinner before leaving for the winter, and I promised to share the dessert recipe we tried out for them as well.

I have made cobblers before, a peach cobbler and a blueberry cobbler, but I was looking for an easy cherry cobbler recipe. I was “cheating” and using canned pie filling rather than fresh cherries, as many recipes call for, but I really just needed the recipe for the cobbler topping.

One of my go-to cookbooks on my shelf here at home is the Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book. I have had it forever, and it always has what I need in it. Sure enough, I found a quick and easy Cherry Cobbler recipe inside. I used Bob’s Red Mill Gluten Free 1:1 Baking Flour instead of All-Purpose Flour in order to make it safe for everyone to eat, and I offered whipped cream, French Vanilla ice cream and Chocolate ice cream for toppings.

20180120_165459The dessert was a hit, and I was pleased with how easily it came together. Since there were seven of us, I doubled the original ingredients list and used two large cans (21 oz.) of cherries.

Here is the Better Homes and Gardens recipe:

Fruit Cobbler

Desired Filling
1 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon (optional, I included it)
3 tablespoons margarine or butter
1 beaten egg
3 tablespoons milk

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Prepare filling, keep hot. (I put my two cans of cherries into the Pyrex dish and put it in the oven for a little while so that the cherries were hot when I took it out.)

For topping, mix flour, sugar, baking powder, and if desired, cinnamon. Cut in margarine till mixture resembles course crumbs. Combine egg and milk. Add to flour mixture, stirring to just moisten.

Transfer filling to 8x8x2 inch baking dish (mine was already in my baking dish). Drop topping into six mounds atop hot filling.

Bake in a 400 degree oven for 20 to 25 minutes or till a toothpick inserted into topping comes out clean. Serve warm with ice cream if desired. Serves six.

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Introducing ‘Forget the Flour’….a new blog from a new favorite blogger

10 Jan

I have a new favorite blog, and I definitely have a new favorite blogger.

If you live life gluten free for any reason, you need to check out “Forget the Flour,” my daughter’s new blog. You can go and visit by clicking here. It might just become your new favorite blog too.

Here’s the back story to how this blog was born:

Early in the fall of 2015, it was determined that our youngest daughter could no longer have gluten in her diet. She had just begun the fifth grade and we had spent the summer on an epic, five-week cross country camping vacation, trying to figure out what was continuously making her so sick, and had been throughout most of the spring before.

If you’re a longtime reader of The Whole Bag of Chips, you have since seen my recipes evolve over time to now include notations with the ingredients as to how we have gone about making our recipes gluten free, if they were not already.

It has not been an easy few years. I have a shellfish allergy, and I’d like to say that I can relate to her struggles, but I truly can’t. I’m much older, first off, so I can weather some of the “trauma” of missing out on favorite foods at favorite events better than a tween. Additionally, shellfish is not contained in my every meal, or at every party, sleepover or at every restaurant I go to.

To say that being gluten free, being young AND gluten free is challenging would be an understatement.

Our third Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Eve all just passed, and it’s always important to make sure we have food for her to eat everywhere we go, and as we sometimes find out, even if we think something is going to be gluten free where we are headed, she finds out the hard way it may not have been, or that cross-contamination may have taken place.

However, for every challenge, there are a lot of successes. Thankfully, we are a family of cooks and we love to try out new recipes. Our kids have all been cooking since they were old enough to roll cookies or to stand on a stool at the kitchen counter and pick beans. We have a love for cookbooks, food magazines, food videos online, food show on television and anything related to cooking and eating. Therefore, we’ve discovered some great new recipes, and we’ve cheered (literally) when we’ve been able to make an old favorite into a new gluten free favorite so as not to give them up.

We’re lucky too, that we live in an internet age where we can find help online, we can Google anything and get a helpful answer about ingredients and substitutions. We are also lucky that in past years the amount of information and availability of ingredients has exploded from what it once was. We even have an allergy-free bakery in our city and we spend a great deal of time there.

Additionally, we have wonderful friends and family. I can’t be more thankful to those who have turned their own recipes into gluten free for her, or to those friends who have chosen to keep things on hand for when she’s there, or to cook entire gluten free meals just because she’s there (and I’m getting a little teary just thinking about it.) I have sent bags of gluten free food with her, only to see them come back with her after an event or visit, and to hear her happily describing all she was able to eat, along with everyone else.

All of that said, one might think a kid could get depressed having to deal with all of this on top of regular life, and she definitely has her moments of frustration and of sadness at times, and we feel terrible about it when she does. However, rather than wallowing in the latest disappointment or challenge, as some might, our daughter asked just the other night if she could create a blog for sharing what she’s learned in the past three years and going forward. It took me just a second to think about it and say yes, and it took her even less time to share with me the one she’d already created, but not published, complete with her first post draft all typed up. She just needed a name that wasn’t already taken, since there are many gluten free blogs out there already. Somehow, and I’m not sure how, she came up with Forget the Flour, and I love it. It wasn’t taken, and so, her blog was born.

She posted her first two posts one night earlier this week and the blog hits just exploded. Although it’s still young, the blog has already received almost 1000 hits in just a couple of days’ time. I told her I have some blog-hit envy already.

I think that as a younger blogger, her perspective is slightly different than those who are blogging about living an adult life gluten free, and I hope it will be a valuable perspective to others as she shares her favorite products, recipes and restaurants, as well as some of her not-so-great experiences in the hopes of preventing them from happening to others.

So if you haven’t yet, go on over and visit Forget the Flour and check out the first couple of posts. Sign up to follow it too, so that you don’t miss a moment of gluten free goodness.

I was thrilled to see this beautiful new blog pop up on my computer screen earlier this week. However, I can promise that not all of the almost 1000 hits were from me.

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Pumpkin Palooza…My grand finale: Here’s to friends and pumpkin pie cupcakes

22 Nov

I’m thankful for being able to stay connected to friends from “way back when” who are both near and far.

ORIGINALLY POSTED NOVEMBER 16, 2012

I went to a high school outside of my hometown, with kids from all over my state and a neighboring state. Therefore, I met people there I would not normally have had a chance to meet, had I attended my local high school. Upon graduation we all went our separate ways, but we always tried to keep in touch.

At first we kept in touch by letters and the occasional phone call, but today with technology the way it is, we keep in touch by email and things like Facebook as well.

We’ve attended and/or been in each others weddings, we’ve visited each other when new babies were born, and gotten together when one or another of us were in town, visiting from wherever we had now settled, and even bumped into each other at the occasional swim lesson or scouting events. Each year though, at Thanksgiving, we try to get together to share a meal, whether it’s breakfast or dinner, just to catch up before another year goes by.

The photo here is last year’s picture after our Friday after Thanksgiving breakfast. We have another one scheduled for this year. Pictured here are high school friends Lia, Jenn, Nicole and I. We missed Bethany that year but she’ll be there this year!

A delicious treat!

My friend Nicole is in the fushia sweater, and today’s recipe was posted on Facebook by her, a couple of weeks back. I printed it right away but I only just got the chance to make it this week. She wrote that she’d made these pumpkin cupcakes by Baker Chick for all of the teachers at her school where she is the school librarian. I bet they loved them! I know I did! They got thumbs up from almost everyone here at our house, and I thought they were even better the second day; just like a slice of pumpkin pie in a cupcake wrapper!

The recipe states that these cupcakes puff up when cooked and then shrink back down, which is exactly what they did. Baker Chick also says that the fact that they shrink down is great because it gives you the perfect place to squirt some whipped cream, and she was right about that as well.

This was an easy recipe and didn’t take too long. I found my cook time to be slightly longer than the 20 minutes stated, but I just kept checking them every 2-3 minutes til they were done.

I hope you get a chance to try these out this week! Thanks to Nicole for sharing, I’ll see you soon! Thanks to Baker Chick for a great recipe!

Two bowls, simple ingredients.

PUMPKIN CUPCAKES
INGREDIENTS

2/3 cup all purpose flour

1/4 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp baking soda

1/4 tsp salt

2 tsp pumpkin pie spice

1 15-oz can pumpkin puree

1/2 cup sugar

1/4 cup brown sugar

2 large eggs

1 tsp vanilla extract

3/4 cup half and half

 

Cupcakes puff up when they’re first cooked….

DIRECTIONS

Preheat the oven to 350F. Line a 12-cup muffin tin with paper or silicone liners. *If using paper liners, lightly coat them with cooking spray.

In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and pumpkin pie spice.

In a large bowl, whisk together pumpkin puree, sugar, brown sugar, eggs, vanilla and half and half until well combined.

Add in dry ingredients and whisk until no streaks of flour remain and batter is smooth.

Distribute batter evenly in the muffin tin. (they should be about 3/4 of the way full.)

Bake for 20 minutes. Cool cupcakes in pan. (They will sink as they are cooling.)

Chill cupcakes before serving. Top with lightly sweetened whipped cream.

…..and shrink down when cooled.

Makes 12

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Pumpkin Palooza Recipe of the Day: Pilgrim Pies

20 Nov

Pumpkin flavored whoopie pies!

ORIGINALLY POSTED ON NOVEMBER 18, 2011

Last year, around Thanksgiving, a friend passed along to me a recipe for Pilgrim Pies, otherwise known as pumpkin flavored whoopie pies. My husband loves whoopie pies and he was laid up in a cast last year at this time, so as a special treat I made these for him and some of his friends who came to visit the night before Thanksgiving. They all gave them a thumbs up, so here is the recipe for you. Thanks to reader Jen B. who told me that this recipe actually originated from “Family Fun,” which is one of my all-time favorite magazines.

Ingredients for the Pumpkin “Cookies”

2 eggs

2 c of light brown sugar

1 c oil

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 (15 oz) can of pumpkin

3 c flour

1 T pumpkin pie spice

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

Ingredients for filling:

4 ounces of cream cheese, softened

1/2 c butter, softened

2 tsp vanilla extract

4 – 5 c of confectioners’ sugar

DIRECTIONS:

Heat overn to 350 degrees.

Beat the eggs, brown sugar, oil and vanilla in a mixing bowl until smooth.

Stir in the pumpkin.

In a separate bowl, combine the flour, pumpkin spice, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

Add the dry ingredients to the egg mixture a half cup at a time, blending each time until smooth.Drop a heaping tablespoon (I use my Pampered Chef medium sized scooper for jumbo cookies, small scooper for smaller sized cookies) onto an ungreased baking sheet.

Bake the cookies for 12 minutes, then transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely.

To make the frosting, beat together the cream cheese, butter and vanilla in a bowl until light and fluffy.

Mix in the confectioners’ cugar a half cup at a time, until the frosting is spreadable.

There is usually extra frosting.

Finally, assemble the pies.

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Fun Friday: InstantPot Apple Crisp from CenterCutCook (with a twist)

3 Nov

Ever have a last-minute craving? The Instant Pot is great for those!

Happy November!

It’s been quite a while since I’ve had the time to do a blog post, although I’ve had the best of intentions. I thought today’s recipe would be a good one to share on this nice fall weekend, now that the weather has that fall feel to it, at least in our neck of the woods.

As you know from my previous posts, we had an addition to our appliance family in September, and it got quite a lot of use right out of the gate. We had added an Instant Pot to our family. I initially shared a few recipes the first couple of weeks that we had it, but I did not get to share this one.

This was a last-minute recipe and it worked out great.

Late in the evening one Friday night, my friend Gina texted the group chat that she and I are in along with my friend Marcia. She’d just tried out a recipe from CenterCutCook for Instant Pot Apple Crisp.

Oooohhhhh…..I thought. I *love* apple crisp.

In fact, I love all things apple. I’d even just authored a special feature on a local apple orchard, Pippin Orchard. (You can read about Pippin Orchard here.) It was apple season, and I just happened to have apples on hand. However, I didn’t have a lot of them and there are five of us here.

It was also a little bit  late, and Apple Crisp takes some time, but since it was an Instant Pot recipe, it meant that I would be shaving some cook time off of the recipe and we’d still be able to have it for dessert that same night. The longest part of making apple crisp is peeling and cutting the apples, which I couldn’t avoid, but the Instant Pot would help with the rest.

Underneath the topping was a warm, bubbly apple crisp, just as if it had come out of the oven.

I decided to add a little twist to the recipe over at CenterCutCook and throw in some pears, just a couple of them, along with the apples I had here, doubling the recipe which said it served 3-4 people.

I peeled and chopped my apples and pears, and followed the recipe over at CenterCutCook’s site to a “t”, doubling the ingredients. In hindsight, I would not have doubled the nutmeg and cinnamon, since we thought it was a bit too savory with twice as much of the spices, but other than that, doubling the recipe and adding the pears to the apples made for a delightful fall dessert.

I encourage you to visit CenterCutCook to check out all their thousands of recipes, and if you have an Instant Pot and are looking for something different to make with it, give their apple crisp recipe a try!

Enjoy your weekend!

 

 

Come and get it! Five apple and pear crisps for dessert on a recent Friday night.

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Fun Friday: One-bowl brownies from Gluten-Free Living

6 Oct

Since finding this recipe at the end of the summer, we have made it at least four or five times.

Recently, I mentioned that when we cleaned out our kitchen to be redone, I had a huge pile of recipes and cookbooks to go through once we were ready to reload. In that pile was also a small pile of Gluten-Free Living magazines that I had put aside as they came in every other month, hoping for a day to go through them with my daughter.

At some point near the middle of August we found a day and we went through and pulled out any recipes we wanted to try, and recycled the rest of the magazines. Today’s recipe is one of the ones we pulled out to try. It’s from the newest issue, the September/October 2017 magazine that had just come in August. It is for a one-bowl recipe for brownies. I love anything that has very little cleanup, so one bowl appeals to me. I also love my new glass mixing bowl that I got in the springtime when my old plastic bowl broke, so I looked forward to the chance to use it as our one bowl.

This recipe was so easy that my daughter, who is 12, could make the whole thing by herself, with very little direction or help from me, other than some clarifying details. Additionally, I always enjoy a good teachable moment in the kitchen, and I loved showing her how the brownie batter doesn’t start out dark, but becomes so when you add in the unsweetened cocoa powder. It’s a simple thing, but when we make them out of a box, they start out chocolatey, so it was unusual for her to see the transition from a plain batter to a chocolate batter.

Like magic, it becomes chocolatey.

 

I’ll never not use parchment paper again.

In the months since we made this recipe for the first time, we have used it at least four or five more times, and we have doubled it depending on how many we were baking for. It’s fast, it’s easy, and it’s delicious. More importantly, people say that it doesn’t taste gluten-free. The brownies are thick and fudgy, just as brownies should be.

We started a new baking habit with this recipe and actually followed the directions for lining the bowl with parchment paper, which we sprayed with non-stick cooking spray. I always skipped doing this in the past, just spraying my baking dish, but my daughter wanted to use the paper, and we had it, and we’ll never go back to not using it again. The cleanup is super easy and the brownies can be lifted out, cooled and cut right on the paper.

Here is the recipe, I hope you’ll give it a try!

One-Bowl Brownies
from Gluten-Free Living magazine

Makes 12 brownies

Ingredients

non-stick cooking spray

1/2 cup (one stick) unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
1 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
3/4 cup gluten-free flour blend (they recommended Bob’s Red Mill 1:1 Baking Flour, which we use as well.)
1/2 cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1/4 tsp. salt

Directions

Preheat oven to 350F.

Line an 8×8 baking pan with foil or parchment paper, allowing the edges to hang over the side. This makes removal easy. Spray the foil or parchment paper lightly with nonstick cooking spray.

Whisk together butter and granulated sugar until combined. Add the eggs and vanilla extract. Whisk until combined. Add the flour, cocoa powder and salt. Switch to a wooden spoon and stir batter until smooth.

Spread batter evenly into prepared pan. Bake until set, about 20 minutes. A cake tester inserted into the center of the pan should come out with a few damp crumbs clinging to it.

Allow the brownies to cool completely in the pan set on a wire rack, about two hours.

Lift the brownies from the pan using the foil, cut into squares.

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