Showing posts with label food&dessert. Show all posts

The top 10 recipes ever published on The Food Charlatan!

Nutella Stuffed Brown Butter Blondies: I don’t really feel like I need to explain this one. NUTELLA.

Cilantro Lime Cucumber Salad: This recipe is perfect for anytime of year when you need a healthy side dish! It has a little kick to it, but nothing too crazy. We love this one!

Beef Barley Soup: This recipe is from my mother-in-law Kris, who got it from her mom. Kris told me this a while ago after re-reading the post, “I read all the comments on this soup, and I have to say I got a little teary eyed thinking about how well received my mother’s delicious soup has been, and how many families now love it and consider it a favorite. Really, I was blown away by all the positive comments after people made it!” This continues to be one of the most-made and most-loved recipes on the blog. (Update 2017: This recipe just hit 1 million page views. aaahhh!!)

Roasted Sweet Potatoes and Brussels Sprouts: You would not believe how easy and tasty this recipe is! Poor little Brussels sprouts often get a bad rap (I used to hate them) but that’s because people don’t know the secret about roasting. It takes them from “this smells like feet” to “Oh my goodness I’m going to eat this whole pan single handedly.”

For More Read:Thefoodcharlatan

HEALTHY GARLIC SZECHUAN SHRIMP

This Garlic Szechuan Shrimp is huge on flavor, while maintaining a healthy profile. It takes only 10 minutes and is immensely better than takeout. Dazzle them with this healthy and succulent Szechuan Shrimp tonight.

This past weekend was Chinese New Year. If you knew that, you’re already way ahead of us.

Hubby and I have an annual habit of forgetting Chinese New Year until it’s come and gone. Sometimes I would only remember because one of the Littles would come home from school with some artwork or notice about the Lunar New Year.

Totally sad, I know. My mom would so not be proud of this. Please, nobody tell her.

In my defense, we’ve now lived across the country from our extended family for nine years. I no longer have Mom nearby to tell me it’s time for The Big Potluck. Silent tears.

However. I did have just enough time on Chinese New Year to redeem myself an itty bitty bit by whipping up a wok full of succulent Garlic Szechuan Shrimp…

HEALTHY GARLIC SZECHUAN SHRIMP

SAVE PRINT

PREP TIME

5 mins

COOK TIME

5 mins

TOTAL TIME

10 mins

From: Chew Out Loud

Recipe type: dinner, main

Cuisine: Chinese, Asian

Serves: 4

INGREDIENTS

12 oz raw large shrimp, peeled and deveined
2 TB olive oil
8 cloves garlic, minced
1 tsp freshly minced ginger
For the Sauce:
¼ cup Asian rice wine
¼ cup water
¼ cup ketchup
2 TB soy sauce (regular or light)
4 tsp cornstarch
1 TB pure honey
½ tsp crushed red pepper
Garnish: ¼ cup thinly sliced green onions

For More Read: Chewoutloud

MAPLE CINNAMON BAKED OATMEAL (GLUTEN-FREE)

This Maple Cinnamon Baked Oatmeal is bursting with mouthwatering flavor. It’s loaded with nutrients, it’s gluten-free, and a delicious way to start the day off right. Bonus: it’s can easily and completely be made the night before.

Hi, we are The Oatmeal Family.

Recently, our tribe fist-bumped each other for successfully completing our second annual 30-day sugar fast — woo hoo! Right after that, the first thing we inhaled was oatmeal. Like, whoppers and heaps of yummy oatmeal.

Friends, it wasn’t just any old oatmeal we enthusiastically feasted on. It was this glorious Maple Cinnamon Baked Oatmeal recipe that happens to be gluten-free and refined-sugar free. We weren’t even trying for a gluten-free, sugar-free baked oatmeal recipe, but it’s just how this oatmeal bake naturally rolls. [See what I did there?

]

Made with the natural goodness of raw unfiltered honey and Kemps® Probiotic Milk, this Baked Oatmeal is worthy of your Every. Single. Bite.

Bonus: it tastes jaw-dropping delicious.

I love that I can use Kemps Probiotic Milk in all my cooking and baking like I do with regular milk. It’s also fantastic over hot or cold cereal.

Speaking of cereal…this Maple Cinnamon Oatmeal Bake has become famous with friends and family for being soooo delicious.

Y’all who know me know that I am the polar opposite of a morning person and need make-ahead breakfasts. That’s why I’m wild about baked oatmeal. It can 100% be made the night before. And I don’t mean you still have to get up a little early to pop it in the oven in the morning. Not at all.

Literally toss together the simple ingredients, bake it, and let it cool at room temperature overnight while you get your zzzz’s and press the snooze button as many times as you like.

MAPLE CINNAMON BAKED OATMEAL (GLUTEN-FREE)

SAVE PRINT

PREP TIME

10 mins

COOK TIME

40 mins

TOTAL TIME

50 mins

This Maple Cinnamon Baked Oatmeal is bursting with mouthwatering flavor. It's loaded with nutrients, it's gluten-free, and a delicious way to start the day off right. Bonus: it's super easy and can be completely made the night before.

From: Chew Out Loud

Recipe type: breakfast, brunch

Cuisine: American

Serves: 6-8

INGREDIENTS

2½ cups old fashioned rolled oats
1 TB ground cinnamon
½ tsp ground ginger
¼ tsp ground nutmeg
1 tsp baking powder
½ tsp table salt
2 cups Kemps® Probiotic milk (I used 2% variety)
½ cup pure maple syrup
1 large egg
2 heaping TB applesauce
1 TB pure vanilla extract
Top with: toasted nuts, fresh berries, or pure maple syrup.

For More Read: Chewoutloud

BACON AND EGG BREAKFAST CASSEROLE:

This Bacon and Egg Breakfast Casserole is loaded with your morning favorites. Easily prepared the night before, this is sure to become a family favorite. Breakfast or dinner, your choice.

The weather’s nippy, it’s November, and we’re all gearing up for busy weeks ahead with the holiday season. With all the upcoming holiday weekends, we’ve got something good on our minds: Brunch with a capital B.

We used to make Brunch with the kiddos every weekend possible, but somewhere along the way something called sports happened. In our case, it’s soccer and basketball and Boy Scouts. Plus all the other life things. So Brunch kinda went to the wayside.

But with the holidays fast approaching, we’re bringing back weekend mornings with a hot breakfast casserole. Not the kind of meal you’d have to wake up early and fuss over.

No, not that kind. More like the kind of hot breakfast casserole you make the night before and that lets you sleep in.

For More Read: Chewoutloud

Strawberry Brownie Skewers

These strawberry brownie skewers couldn’t be any easier! Seriously. Aren’t skewers the best? You can pretty much throw anything you want on them, and you end up with this wonderful treat. Drizzle them with melted chocolate and magically they become classy enough to serve to people who come over! I love how beautiful this dessert is!

I didn’t serve these to guests because, well, who has time to clean the house well enough to invite guests over!? I did serve these to my kids and they loved them, if that counts for anything?

Not that you need a step by step photo tutorial for this, because I know you are smart enough to figure this out on your own – but start by chopping off the end of the strawberry. Or slice the strawberry in half, or cut it however the mood strikes you.

You might need to cut your skewers to size, depending on long they are. Spear a strawberry, a bite sized brownie, a large marshmallow and another strawberry onto the skewer. You can make the brownies if you are ambitious – that would be a particularly nice touch if you plan to serve these to guests! Since these were only going to my kids, I stuck with store bought brownies.

Melt some semi-sweet chocolate chips. I like to use the microwave on a very low setting.

Take a small zip lock bag and turn it almost inside out. This will help you get the melted chocolate into the bag without making a giant, gooey mess of the bag. (I’ve been there.)

Cut off a small corner from the zip lock bag. Be careful, because the chocolate will start oozing out quickly once you cut that hole!

Place a cooling rack on a cookie sheet and place your skewers on top of the cooling rack. I put a silicone baking mat in there too because who has time to pick off hardened chocolate from a cookie sheet? Not me!

My girls are going through a huge marshmallow phase right now (and a Jello phase too… they are little sugar addicts), so they were totally on board for this.

They picked off the chocolate and ate the marshmallow first. They still don’t quite get that you aren’t supposed to eat skewers like corn on the cob, but oh well. It was still pretty fun to watch them!

These would be great as a single serving dessert at a barbecue, wonderful to send to a school party, or even as a special Valentine’s Day treat. Or of course, you could just make them for fun too! They take about 10 minutes to put together, and best of all, the clean up is super easy!

For More Read: One Little Project

Lemon Cheesecake Mousse

Could there be a better spring dessert?? In my opinion this one is hard to top! It’s three of my favorite things in one bright, luscious, rich, heavenly dessert! I absolutely love cheesecake, I love lemon flavored everything and I could eat mousse for breakfast lunch and dinner. So, what I’m getting at is this dessert was made for me, quite literally :). I originally had tried another lemon mousse recipe earlier this week (this one here) that I thought I’d love. The flavor was oh so fresh and lemony buuuut the texture was nothing like what I think of mousse to be. It was more of a droopy whipped cream texture with just a little more density to it. So of course I set of to come up with my own so I could end satisfied with a perfect lemon mousse, one worthy of sharing here (yes I am picky about what I’ll share, there are many things that don’t make the cut. If I didn’t feel it was worth my time and ingredients then why should it be worth yours?).

This Lemon Cheesecake Mousse is everything I’d hoped it would be an then some – even though it does use a store bought lemon curd (which have you added it to a s’more yet? It’s dreamy times one thousand! Just graham cracker, fire roasted marshmallow and a generous slathering of lemon curd as done here). These individual mousse cups would be perfect for Easter and Mother’s Day or for any get together. And of course they are also perfect for a weekend treat! I made these just a few days ago and I’m already dreaming about when I’ll be able to make them again (I’m glad Easter is coming up soon!). I asked my mom to try one bite, she insisted on just one bite since she was trying to eat less dessert, but of course after one bite she continued to polish the whole whole thing off. I’d reach in the fridge too intending on just one bite but it never ends there. No one will be able to resist these! Try them and you’ll see what I mean.

Lemon Cheesecake Mousse

Yield: 8 - 10 servings

Ingredients

Crust

3/4 cup crushed graham crackers (6 full sheets)

2 Tbsp (26g) granulated sugar

3 Tbsp (42g) salted butter, melted

Mousse

2 1/2 Tbsp fresh lemon juice

1 1/2 Tbsp water

1 1/2 tsp unflavored gelatin powder

1 1/2 cups (355ml) heavy cream

1 cup (110g) powdered sugar, divided

Yellow food coloring (optional)

12 oz (340g) cream cheese, softened

1 (10 oz) jar lemon curd (tested with Dickenson's)

Sweetened whipped cream, lemon wedges, blueberries and mint for garnish (optional)

Directions

In a mixing bowl whisk together graham cracker crumbs and sugar. Pour in butter and stir until evenly moistened. Divide mixture among 8 - 10 dessert cups and lightly press into an even layer, set aside.

Pour lemon juice and water into a small bowl. Sprinkle gelatin evenly over top, let rest 5 minutes. Meanwhile, whip heavy cream in a medium mixing bowl until soft peaks form. Add in 1/3 cup of the powdered sugar, tint with yellow food coloring if desired and whip until stiff (but not lumpy) peaks form (shake cream from beaters, no need to clean). In a separate large mixing bowl whip cream cheese until smooth and fluffy. Mix lemon curd and remaining 2/3 cup powdered sugar into cream cheese mixture.

Heat rested gelatin mixture in the microwave on high power for 30 seconds. Whisk for 1 minute to thoroughly dissolve gelatin, then let cool 3 minutes (no longer or it may start to set then you could end up with little lumps in the mousse). While mixing cream cheese mixture with hand mixer, slowly pour in gelatin mixture then blend until thoroughly combined. Gently fold 1/3 of the whipped cream mixture into the cream cheese mixture to lighten, then add remaining whipped cream and gently fold until combined. Spoon or pipe mixture into dessert cups over graham cracker layer. Cover and refrigerate 2 hours (or up to 1 day ahead if desired) to set. Garnish as desired. Serve cold.

Recipe source: Cooking Classy

For More Read: Cooking Classy

BOSTON CREAM CUPCAKES

If you like Boston Cream Pie, you’ll flip over these yummy Boston Cream Cupcakes! Tender, moist, and filled with golden custard.

While standing idly in long checkout lines of grocery stores, I’m usually torn between thumbing through either the Food Network glossy or People mag. Decisions, decisions.

Yet. The other day, a kiosk of die cast cars near the checkout lanes instantly nabbed my attention. I gazed long at the 5-inch metal fire engines and yellow school busses.

I’m not normally mushy over die cast cars; I fully prefer chocolate cookies over toy wheels 😉

But I got silly nostalgic over all those tiny trucks, because our home overflowed with loads of them not too long ago.

At certain points in our Littles’ toddler years, there was standing room only in the family room. Their colorful Hot Wheels were regularly strewn across the floor, courtesy of imaginary car crashes.

Never thought I’d one day miss the bright green, paint-chipped Hot Wheel pickup truck that a certain pair of chubby little hands clung to everywhere he wobbled.

And now he’s 12.

As in, Twelve.

On his 12th birthday this month, our not-so-little Little knew exactly what kind of cake he wanted to blow candles off of.

Boston Cream Pie. Which isn’t really a pie at all, but who cares about such trivial matters when it tastes that dreamy.

I happily obliged that request, and made these cute individual sized Boston Cream Cupcakes for the birthday boy, candles and all.

These Boston Cream Cupcakes are ridiculously irresistible, guaranteed. The cake portion is golden, buttery, and tenderly moist.

The topping is none other than a beautifully rich chocolate ganache, drizzled as generously as you wish. It sets upon cooling, transforming into a rich, fudgy layer on top.

One bite and you’ll sink your teeth into the magnificent golden custard within.

Like so ↓↓↓

Not only did Birthday Boy inhale these cupcakes in a heartbeat, but apparently nobody else could keep their hands off these baby cakes either. The entire batch of cupcakes vanished by the next morning.

Hot Wheels may come and go, but these cupcakes are for keeps.

Enjoy.

For More Read: Chew Out Loud

The top 10 recipes ever published on The Food Charlatan!