Dessert Wars: Go Green

March’s Dessert Wars challenge is Go Green. To celebrate St. Patty’s Day and the color green, the challenge is to create a dessert using naturally green ingredients. We must use at least one traditional dessert ingredient and at least one non-traditional ingredient.

Traditional	Non-Traditonal
Green Apples	Cucumber
Green Grapes	Green Tea
Limes	Wasabi
Pistachios	Green Chilies
Honeydew Kiwi	Basil or other green herbs
Green Pears	Soybeans/Tofu
Mint Pandan	Vegetables like Spinach or Peas
	Lemon Grass
	Green Cheese
	Avocado

My inspiration came to me in a funny way. I wasn’t sure what I was going to do for this challenge. Then one day I was adding wax to my Scentsy warmer. It smelled so good, and I realized that the scent was Cucumber Lime. Perfect! Now what to make with that? I settled on a granita, something I’ve never made before, but it’s so easy I don’t know why I haven’t yet.

Granita is a Sicilian dessert with many variations. It can either be coarse and crystalline or smooth and slushy. The technique I’m giving provides the coarse texture.

Cucumber Lime Granita

Serves 4

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup water
• pinch of salt
• zest of two limes, divided
• 3 tablespoons lime juice (about 2 limes)
• 2 cucumbers

Directions:

In a small saucepan, add the sugar and water. Swirl the pan to mix. Then bring to a boil on medium-high heat. Reduce to medium-low and simmer for 2 minutes to make a thin syrup. Take the pan off the heat and allow to cool to room temperature.

Now is a good time to zest and juice your limes. Then, using a peeler, peel the cucumber, cut off the ends and slice the cucumber in half lengthwise. Scoop out the seeds using a melon baller or a spoon. Chop the cucumber into smallish cubes until you have 2 cups.

Add to a blender the cucumber, lime juice, half the zest, salt, and 1/3 cup of syrup. Puree until it is nice and smooth. Pour into a shallow dish, cover and stick it in the freezer for 2 1/2 hours.

Remove the dish from the freezer, uncover and rake a fork through the mixture. Recover and return to the freezer for another 1-2 hours. Repeat the raking/freezing process every 1-2 hours until you are left with nothing but tiny ice crystals.

Serve in chilled glass vessels of your choice. Garnish with the remaining lime zest.

Pioneer Woman has a great step-by-step for making granitas. Check it out!

Click here for the Printable Recipe at Tasty Kitchen.

As February’s Dessert Wars Winner, I’m not currently eligible to win any more challenges until December. But I can’t leave you without showing you what this month’s winner will receive.

The March prize package includes:

Whisk and cupcake necklace from Moon & Star Designs

Beanilla Sampler Pack of Vanilla Beans

Lenox Personalized Musical Cupcake

1,000 ideas for Decorating Cupcakes, Cookies & Cakes

Organic Valley $50 Gift Certificate

Organic Prairie $50 Gift Certificate

Theme Kitchen $50 Gift Certificate

BEKA Cookware Crepe Pan

Click here to see the Dessert Wars rules

Pizza Mia

Back in February, my husband and I went to a youth conference in Gatlinburg, TN with some teens from church. We stayed in a townhouse that weekend, so we took advantage of having a full kitchen and I cooked all our meals. Well, that’s not entirely true. I wrangled everyone into helping. That’s right, I got teen guys to cook.

Here’s the details on planning the menu. First, I had to find out if there were any food allergies or special dietary needs. We had one vegetarian, but other than that all the others said they would eat anything.

Next, I decided on meals that were easy to prepare, and could be done in an assembly line. The desserts would be easy too. A lot of the ingredients could be used in multiple dishes too. Here’s our menu:

Friday Dinner: Hamburgers/Veggie burgers with all the good stuff you want on a burger, French Fries and Mocha Pudding for dessert. (Mocha Pudding deserves it’s own post, coming soon.)

Saturday Breakfast: Omelets in a Bag, muffins, and cereal.

Saturday Lunch: Quesadillas, Mexican Rice, Refried Beans, Chips and Salsa.

Saturday Dinner: Pizza Mias, Gooey Butter Cake.

Sunday Breakfast: Pioneer Woman’s Cinnamon Rolls with How Sweet Eats’ Vanilla Cream Glaze, muffins, cereal.

Before going, I made sure that I had as much prepared as possible. Meats cooked, muffins made, ingredients mixed. Hey, I didn’t want to spend the whole weekend in the kitchen. It worked out really well. I’m so proud of how organized I was. Friday night after dinner, I had everyone mix up their omelets and store in the fridge overnight. That made Saturday morning go smoothly. I was so proud of our teens. Not only did they help me out in the kitchen, but by the end of the weekend were taking the initiative in getting food ready. You don’t see that everyday. Thanks guys!

Anyway, here is a recipe that is a crowd pleaser. Nothing fancy here, just something incredibly easy that can be adjusted to your tastes and easy to serve to a large group. We call them Pizza Mias, not just because they are personal pizzas, but because the recipe was given to me by my friend Mia. Here’s what you need:

• Sub rolls
• Marinara sauce
• Your favorite pizza toppings
• Shredded Mozzarella cheese, or whatever cheese you prefer for pizza
• Aluminum foil to keep you sane

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees. Line a baking sheet with foil. Slice the rolls into two halves if not already sliced.

Add your sauce.

Then lay on the toppings.

Now the cheese.

Now stick it in the oven for 10 minutes or so until the cheese has melted. See how easy that was, I kinda feel goofy for spelling it all out for you, it’s such a no brainer.

Mia suggests that for a large crowd, use multiple pans so they are ready to go as soon as another comes out of the oven. She also sticks to just 3 options, cheese, peperoni, and sausage. Get an assembly line going and it couldn’t be easier!

Warrior

 

 

I hope you will allow me bragging rights here.  I have won February’s Dessert Wars with my Pain au Chocolat.  This means, not only have I won a great prize package, but I have a spot in December’s Ultimate Competition.  I’ll be going up against ten other Dessert Warriors, eleven runners-up and anyone who participated in all eleven challenges.

Because I’ve already won a challenge, I’m ineligible to win any other challenges until December, but I will still be participating each month to challenge myself and to use each challenge as warrior training. 

If you have a blog and you want to challenge yourself in the dessert arena, go take a look at dessert-wars.com and join the fun!

Congratulations to February’s Runner Up

BriarRose of Flour Dusted

who made 

Dark Chocolate and Lemon Bundt  Cake

Click here to see February’s Dessert Wars Round-Up.

Just Peachy

Here’s another recipe from Nana. Peach Cobbler is one of my favorites, not only because it tastes so good, but because it is simple to make. It would be great as an impromptu dessert, to take to a potluck, or give away to a lucky friend. (A cute little loaf pan such as in the photos can be found many places. Mine came from Michael’s a few years ago, but I’ve seen them all over. They are perfect for gift giving.)

Yummy with vanilla ice cream!

Nana’s Peach Cobbler

3/4 stick margarine	1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 cup milk	1 (29 oz.) can sliced
1 cup self-rising flour	peaches with syrup
1 cup sugar

Place margarine in a 9x13 casserole dish and melt in oven at 350 degrees, (I do this while the oven is preheating). Mix milk, flour, sugar and cinnamon together. Pour mixture into the dish with the melted butter. Evenly arrange the peach slices on top of the batter. Pour the syrup from the can over the entire pan. Do not stir! Bake for 30 minutes.

It’s divine with a little cream poured over!

Click here for the Printable Recipe at Tasty Kitchen!

Milk and Cookies and Milk

Here’s a recipe I found on Tasty Kitchen that I wanted to share with you. It’s for Lactation Cookies. These cookies include ingredients said to increase the nursing mom’s milk supply.

Peaceful Parenting has a nice post telling you about the benefits of oatmeal, flax and yeast in increasing milk supply. Check it out here.

I thought these were some pretty yummy cookies. I diverged from the original recipe by using margarine instead of butter, adding more chocolate chips and because I didn’t have fresh yeast I used 1 1/2 tablespoons dried yeast. I also think that because of the effect the flax has on the finished cookie, these are best on the crispy side. I left them in the oven a little longer to do this, and probably the margarine helped them spread well too. You can store these in a plastic freezer bag. Take one out of the freezer and microwave about 10 seconds before enjoying. Eat at least 1 a day for the milk increasing benefits.

Here’s where you can find the recipe. Of course, if you’re concerned about your milk supply, finding a good Lactation Consultant and/or a breastfeeding support group will be very important. A Lactation Consultant will make sure your baby is getting a proper latch, getting enough milk, and can help with other nursing troubles too.

If you have other family members jealous of your special cookies, by all means share! You don’t have to worry about your husband or children spontaneously lactating. They can benefit from these healthful ingredients too!

Dessert Wars: Dark Chocolate and Hearts

Dark Chocolate and Hearts is this month’s challenge for Dessert Wars. Dark Chocolate is quite possibly my favorite food. So it broke my heart when during my pregnancy with Sophie I had a food aversion to chocolate. I couldn’t believe it! I couldn’t get enough of pinto beans of all things, but chocolate? No thank you! Weird huh?

I can think of several really easy ways to use dark chocolate and hearts, but since the reason to compete in Dessert Wars is to “step outside your comfort zone, push yourself in the kitchen to learn new skills and get your creative juices flowing,” I decided to attempt something I have on my Foodie To Do List. That is to work with laminated dough. Even if you don’t know what laminated dough is, you’re certainly familiar with it if you’ve ever had a croissant, Danish or anything made with puff pastry.

Lamination is achieved by spreading butter over rolled out dough, folding and rolling out again. This rolling and folding process is repeated until the dough has many layers. The butter in between these layers of dough create the flakiness and lift in the baked dough. And it sure makes it yummy too! There’s only one way to make it any better, that’s right, add chocolate…and hearts! I’m making Pain au Chocolat, you can join me every step of the way or just scroll down and see the pictures.

By the way, I love the name Pain au Chocolat. French names sound so fancy, but translated it just means chocolate bread. I think I’ll start naming everything in French. How do you say peanut butter and jelly sandwich in French?

Pain au Chocolat

Makes 20-24 Click here for the Printable Recipe at Tasty Kitchen

Détrempe (Dough Mixture) Ingredients

1/2 cup warm whole milk (110-115 degrees)

1 teaspoon plus 2 tablespoons sugar

4 teaspoons active dry yeast or 1 tablespoon instant yeast

4 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons salt

1/2 stick cold unsalted butter, cut into small pieces

1 cup cold whole milk

Beurrage (Butter Mixture) Ingredients

3 1/2 sticks cold unsalted butter, cut into 1/2 in. pieces

2 tablespoons all-purpose flour

Other Ingredients

1 large egg

1 tablespoon whole milk 1-2 cups dark chocolate, chopped or 24-48 chocolat batons for filling the rolls Writing Chocolate, optional (click for recipe)

Step 1 Make the détrempe: Whisk together the warm milk and 1 teaspoon of sugar. Mix in the yeast and leave until the yeast is activated, around 10 minutes. You’ll know it’s ready when it starts to bubble and grow. In a large bowl add the flour, 2 tablespoons sugar, salt and butter. Cut the butter into the dry ingredients using forks or a pastry blender until the mixture looks like bread crumbs. Add the yeast and cup of milk and stir together with a wooden spoon until the dough forms a ball. Lightly flour your counter and knead the dough until it comes together a little bit more. Don’t knead too much because there will be a lot of rolling and folding done to the dough later. Wrap the dough in plastic cling, but not too tight since there is yeast in the dough it will expand. Refrigerate for at least a half hour or up to an hour.

		Making the Detrempe VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Step 2 Make the Beurrage: Toss the butter with the flour and stick back in the fridge for 20 minutes. Using a mixer, beat the butter with a medium speed until all the butter is smooth and pliable. It must stay cold too! Wrap the butter in plastic cling and refrigerate until needed.

Step 3 Incorporating the Beurrage with the Détrempe: Lightly flour the counter. Place dough on the counter and lightly dust the top. Roll the dough into a tall rectangle measuring 15x12 inches. Try to make the edges straight and the corners sharp. You can gently stretch the dough to achieve this. Brush off the extra flour. (Extra flour will make for a very dry, tough dough so remember this throughout the whole process.) With your eyes, divide the dough into thirds as if each third was a section of a folded letter. Using your fingers, spread the butter over the top two thirds of the dough, leaving a half inch border around the outside of the dough.

Step 4 Using the Letter Fold: Fold the bottom third of dough over the middle third of dough as if you were folding a letter. The empty bottom third of dough will be resting over the butter of the middle third. Finish the letter fold by folding the top third down. Very lightly pinch the seams together and carefully roll your rolling pin over the dough to seal the seams. As long as your butter is still cold, you may proceed with the next step. If not, wrap the dough in plastic cling and return to the refrigerator for an hour.

Letter Fold VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Step 5 Using the Book Fold: Lightly flour the counter. Place dough on the counter and lightly dust the top. Roll the dough into a tall rectangle measuring 20x12 inches. Dust off extra flour. Fold the two short sides of the dough into the middle leaving a space of 1/4 inch between the two. Then fold both sides together like folding a book. Roll the dough gently to seal the seams. Wrap and refrigerate for 1 hour.

Book Fold VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Step 6 Another Letter Fold: Lightly flour the counter. Place dough on the counter and lightly dust the top. Roll the dough into a tall rectangle measuring 20x12 inches. Dust off extra flour. Fold the dough using the letter fold. Gently roll to seal edges. Wrap and refrigerate for at least 2 hours but no longer than 24 hours. You could freeze for up to a month instead.

*This is a really good place to stop for the day. That’s what I did.

Step 7 Cutting and Shaping the Dough: Flour your counter then roll out the dough to a rectangle that is 1/4 inch thick, about 26x14 inches. With a sharp knife or pizza cutter, cut the dough in to 3 1/2 in. x 4 1/2 in. rectangles. For each rectangle, do the following: visually divide the rectangle into thirds as you did with the letter fold before. Place a half tablespoon of chocolate on the top third and fold the top third over the chocolate to the middle. Place another half tablespoon of chocolate where the top third meets the middle and fold the bottom third over the chocolate. Turn the roll over so that the seam is on the bottom.

Making the Rolls VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

*The rolls can be frozen at this point. Just cover tightly with plastic cling and freeze for up to a week. Thaw overnight in the refrigerator before moving on to step 8.

Step 8 Egg Wash and Proof: In a small bowl, beat the egg and then add the tablespoon of milk. Brush each roll with the egg wash. Save the egg wash in the fridge. Set the rolls in a cool spot in your kitchen to double in size for 1-2 hours. Don’t let them get warm!

Step 9 Baking: Move your oven rack to the center of the oven and preheat to 400 degrees. Put the rolls in the refrigerator until the oven is preheated, at least 15 minutes. (You could leave them in the freezer for 10.) Brush again with the egg wash. Bake for 17-22 minutes turning the pan halfway through. You know their done when they are a rich golden brown. Allow the rolls to the rest on a cooling rack before devouring. Drizzle with writing chocolate or pipe decorations.

*Baked rolls will only last one day, but you must keep them unwrapped. To keep longer, wrap each pain well with plastic then put them all together in a large freezer bag. They can hibernate in your freezer for up to a month! Then just thaw them for about 30 minutes then bake them for 7-8 minutes in a 350 degree oven.

Now I know there’s a lot to do here, but nothing is very difficult. I think the hardest thing for me was rolling out the cold dough. As far as it being time consuming, yeah, it takes a lot of time, but most of that is spent in the fridge. Trust me, if I can find the time to do this with a infant and a toddler, then with a little planning probably anyone can. Just make sure you read the instructions really well before you start.

I definitely recommend finding the chocolat batons to use. They should make things easier. I couldn’t find the chocolate that I really wanted to use, so I just used semisweet chocolate chips. Instead of keeping them whole and lining them up on the dough, I tried to chop them in my food processor and it chopped them too fine. It was a mess. So keep that in mind. But I will definitely order some batons for next time. Nevertheless, these were amazing! I will make these again many times.

GREAT NEWS!!! I won this round. Check this post for more info.

Congratulations to January’s Dessert Warrior

Heather of Girlichef who made

Fried Nutella Ravioli.

Congrats also to January's Runner Up

Xiaolu of 6 Bittersweets

who made

Chocolate Nutella Alfajores

Click here to see the January Round-Up.

The February prize package includes:

Whisk and cupcake necklace from Moon & Star Designs

The Smartshopper Electronic Grocery List Organizer

Beanilla Sampler Pack of Vanilla Beans

Lenox Personalized Musical Cupcake

1,000 ideas for Decorating Cupcakes, Cookies & Cakes

Endless Vanilla and Cinnamon Extract

Unlimited Layers: A Recipe for Turning Your Passion into Profits

Organic Valley $50 Gift Certificate

Organic Prairie $50 Gift Certificate

Theme Kitchen $50 Gift Certificate

BEKA Cookware Crepe Pan

Click here to see the Dessert Wars rules.

Good Gravy

Saturday mornings at Nana's means eggs, sausage, bacon, apple butter, biscuits and gravy. I have eaten this all my life. You know you better hurry and get up when you smell the bacon cooking, because you don’t want to miss this!

In my attempt to conquer all of Nana’s recipes, I had to make her Gravy for Biscuits. I tried to learn to make this once, but that was before Nana had figured out the ingredient amounts. “Add a little flour, add a bowl full of milk,” It just wasn’t anything I could replicate without her guidance. But now she has the recipe figured out.

Nana's Gravy for Biscuits

• 4 tablespoons fat drippings from bacon or sausage
• 4 tablespoons flour
• 2 cups milk
• 1 teaspoon salt

Combine fat and flour in an iron skillet on medium-high heat and stir well until lumps are gone and mixture is nice and brown.

Add milk and salt and stir until thick. If it gets too hot it will start to foam, so turn it down a little and continue until thick. (Nana’s gravy is neither too thick nor too thin. It’s just right!)

Serve on top of your favorite biscuits!

* Nana’s Note: “I always make a double batch for our crowd.”

*My Note: Use the skillet you just cooked the meat in and be sure to scrape up all the flavorful bits still stuck to the skillet once you add the milk.

Click here for the Printable Recipe at Tasty Kitchen.