The Harvesty Spirit

Happy thanksgiving everyone! I hope you enjoyed it the way I did. I had an especially good time because after millenniums of begging, my grandmother let me bake the cornbread. I can safely say that this was the quickest, easiest, and best cornbread that’s ever been made. So, to get in the harvest spirit, I’ve decided to share it with y’all.

                         Grandmothers Buttermilk Cornbread:

 

1/2 cup butter

2/3 cup white sugar

2 eggs

1 cup buttermilk

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1 cup cornmeal

1 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease an 8 inch square pan.
2. Melt butter in large skillet. Remove from heat and stir in sugar. Quickly add eggs and beat until well blended. Combine buttermilk with baking soda and stir into mixture in pan. Stir in cornmeal, flour, and salt until well blended and few lumps remain. Pour batter into the prepared pan.
3. Bake in the preheated oven for 30 to 40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

See, plain and simple. Trust me, if you do what this recipe says, you will have some amazing cornbread.

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You’re stuck with me again

Hello everyone! Wow, I disappeared for three months! I hope that’s ok… Anyway, I have a very good reason for why I’ve left, so bear with me here. Anyway, it all started the week I left. I was photographing a rather large and beautiful blue flower.

He’s very mean, so I was doing it in secret. Suddenly, though, the lens cap slipped out of my hand, and got covered I dirt from the ground. When I reached down to grab it, I lost my balance, and tripped down the cliff behind me!

When I landed, I wasn’t really hurt. But I was stuck down there, and since I had been photographing in secret, no one knew I was there! So there I was, at the bottom of a cliff, and darkness was coming it was all I could do to build a fire and roast hot dogs.

When I woke up in the morning, I knew I had to do something. So I reached down, took a rock, said “Here goes nothing” used it to put out the fire, and walked up the stone escalator behind me. Needless to say, when I got back my parents were surprised. They’d thought I’d left for good this time. They had already turned my room into a study, and my art studio in the living room was gone!

I was obviously very mad at my parents. They did seem to feel bad about it, but still. I forced them to remake everything I had done, including my paintings, and have it done within the week. However once they realized how expensive that would be, they realized they couldn’t do it. So they decided to put me in a nursing home.

Unfortunately for them, I wouldn’t allow that. Once I was officially enrolled, I hatched a plan for my escape. As it turns out, the patients are allowed into the kitchen. So, using that old guy’s medication from the next room, I made a cake for the guards that would put them to sleep (this was a high security nursing home).

As I’m sure you can imagine, once I was out, there was no stopping me. The first thing I did was break into a butterfly greenhouse and steal all the butterflies, then sell them to myself for 50,000 dollars (can I help it if I like butterflies?)

After a few weeks of that, though, I realized something was missing. Sleeping on a sidewalk just wasn’t comfortable. So then I thought of people that care about me. Family had given up searching for me after a few hours, so they clearly didn’t. But then I thought, you guys have said that you care about me, or at least my posts! So if any of you wouldn’t mind if I stay at your house until I turn 18, I’d really appreciate it!

Thanks,

Simon

P.S. It’s good to be back.

P.P.S. Sorry to which one of you I stole this computer from.

P.P.P.S I took ALL of those pictures!

Tiramisu – The stuff of legend

Oh it’s amazing. It’s the best thing I’ve ever made. Its. I’d elaborate, but mere words can’t describe it. I think I’ll just share the recipe, and let you see for yourself.

First off, I’m glad to be back. I made this recipe days ago, and I’ve been waiting to post this ever since I made it. I’m sure you’ll enjoy it,

I DEFINATELY DID!

Secondly, it’s from my trusty recipe book , and it still has yet to fail me. If you enjoy baking as much as I do,

GET THIS BOOK!

Thirdly, here is the recipe. I did make some changes, but only minor ones:

1 cup of hot espresso or strongly brewed coffee

3 tablespoons of brandy

2 tablespoons of sugar, as well as 1/2 cup of sugar

24 Italian lady fingers             1/2 cup of milk

1 cup (16 to 17 1/2 oz.) mascarpone cheese

3/4 cup heavy whipping cream

Unsweetened cocoa

There is a garnish of chocolate curls. They make an excellent edition, so you should use them:

6 oz. semisweet chocolate

2 table spoons of vegetable shortening

 —–

First for the

1. In a large bowl, stir coffee, brandy, and 2 tablespoons of sugar until sugar has dissolved. (I re-wrote the following part, so be sure to read it carefully to make sure you understand what the heck I’m talking about): Place several lady fingers in at a time into the coffee mix. once they’ve soaked through completely, probably about 5 seconds time, take them out. They break apart easily, so be careful. place the “mush” at the bottom of a large square dish (the book says 8 inch baking dish, but I have no Idea if that’s the size I used). Keep repeating this proses until there are 12 lady fingers worth of mush at the bottom of the dish. Flatten the mixture out into a single even layer of mush (I hope you can figure out what I meant).

2. In large bowl stir milk and remaining 1/2 cups of sugar until sugar has dissolved. Then stir in Mascarpone cheese until evenly blended.

3. In a small bowl, with mixer at high speed, beat cream until soft peaks form. Gently fold then stir cream into Mascarpone mixture. Spread half of this mixture onto the ladyfinger mush.

4. Now, repeat the ladyfingers step with the remaining 12, then place onto the mascarpone mixture. Then, place the remaining mascarpone mixture on top of that. Dust this lightly with the cocoa, and proceed to the chocolate curls.

—–

1. In a heavy sauce pan, heat chocolate chips and vegetable shortening over low heat, stirring frequently until melted and smooth.

2. Pour chocolate mixture into a small foil lined bowl, and refrigerate until chocolate has set, about 2 hours.

3. (I obviously re-wrote this part) Use a peeler, and peel the chocolate into curls.

IF YOUR TIRAMISU LOOKS ANYTHING LIKE THIS, YOU DID A GOOD JOB:

A delicious dessert that will make you want to go camping now!

Hello! I’d like to take the time to quickly say that I’m taking a short break from Deutche today and tomorrow, maybe more… anyway, now that school’s started, I’m starting to take it again, so soon you may not be able to understand a word I say. Anyway, about 3 weeks ago, I went on a long camping trip. There are still two posts (including this one) in which I need to bring up that camping trip. I will explain this post by quoting the title: “A delicious dessert that will make you want to go camping now!”

This is a very basic recipe, from:  and It’s really only possible to do over a campfire, if you follow my instructions, instead of the recipe itself (mine are better, especially if you have a campfire).

Ingredients:

8 cups Chex cereal (any kind)

1 cup (6 ounces) semi-sweet chocolate chips, melted

1/2 cup smooth peanut butter nutella, melted

1/4 cup butter , melted

1 -2 teaspoon vanilla

1 1/2 cups  confectioners sugar

Before I go on, I’ll explain about the smooth peanut butter nutella. My mother and I both hate peanut butter, so we felt compelled to change it (without my fathers peanut-butter-loving permission). If you like peanut butter, though, you can use peanut butter, and I’m sure it’ll taste just as good. But, if you don’t (and you use nutella), I recommend going easy on the confectioners sugar. I don’t mean that you shouldn’t add 1 1/2 cups  confectioners sugar (as the recipe suggests), I just mean that you shouldn’t add extra, since nutella is sweeter than peanut butter, and it will taste really sweet if you add too much. And if you want, I recommend adding a pinch of salt to the nutella, to give it a sea-salt-caramel sort of taste.

step 1:

Measure cereal in large bowl.

my Thoughts:

It doesn’t matter if it’s perfectly measured, as long as you don’t use more

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step 2:

Set aside.

my thoughts:

(No comment)

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step 3:

Microwave chocolate chips, peanut butter nutella, and butter for 1 minute on high.

my thoughts:

Microwave?!! No!!! Add the ingredients into a large bowl, and set over the campfire.

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step 4:

Stir.

my thoughts:

Stir them wile they are on the fire, or else they will cool off, and it will be harder to blend them.

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step 5:

Cook for 30 seconds longer or until smooth.

my thoughts:

This step isn’t really important.

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step 6:

Add vanilla to mixture.

my thoughts:

(no comment)

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step 7:

Pour mixture over cereal, stirring until coated.

my thoughts:

The cereal is really easy to break, and it doesn’t look as perfect if it breaks, so I recommend

using your hands (and washing them first, If you want happy guests)

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step 8:

Pour mixture into Ziploc bag and add confectioners sugar.

my thoughts:

Large Ziploc bag.

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step 9:

Shake until well coated.

my thoughts:

(no comment)

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step 10:

Spread on waxed paper to cool.

my thoughts:

This step is really not important.

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step 11:

Store in Ziploc bags or large sealed bowl.

my thoughts:

This step is only important if you don’t plan to eat it right away. But it’s much better if you eat it

immediately, so if you want to enjoy it, you should ignore this step.

Well, now you can go camping with a delicious dessert that everyone will love, even the people who like peanut butter!

Surrounded by Cream and Dough!

Hallo bloggers! If you’ve visited my 4th, 5th, and 6th (I think) posts, you’ve seen how my 86 year old computer deals with posting pictures: horribly. Das ist why Ich Kann nicht post pictures untill I get this sorted out. I had scanned a picture of the cream puff recipe that I was going to share today, but I’ll just have to write it from scratch. I got this recipe from Hearst Books Best Loved Desserts. Yesterday I already shared the back story of this recipe book, so I’ll just get straight to es.

First we have the dough recipe called The Choux Pastry dough:

This dough is a delicious treat that is good even if it doesn’t have anything along side it, in this recipe’s case the cream part is what’s along side it. This can be used for a variety of things, so if you don’t like cream puffs, use your imagination! I have included some things to be wary about, so if you see something in parentheses, take heed of it!

1/2 cup of butter (1 stick) or margarine, cut into several small peices

1 cup of water     1/4 teaspoon salt

1 cup of all purpose flour     4 large eggs

In a three quart saucepan, heat butter, water, and salt over medium high until the butter has melted and the mixture boils (but don’t let it simmer away or else the dough will be dry). Add flour all at once (try to add it in two separate portions) and with a wooden spoon vigorously stir until mixture leaves side of pan and forms a ball. Add eggs to mixture, one at a time (two at a time works better) beating well after each addition, until mixture is smooth and satiny.

The way we bake it depends on the recipe for the cream puffs themselves:

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Grease and flower a large cookie sheet.

2. Prepare Choux Pastry dough. Drop slightly rounded 1/4-cup (It doesn’t matter if they’re all perfectly 1/4-cup, since it’s incredibly sticky to work with, as long as they’re all equal) in eight large mounds, 3 inches apart, on prepared cookie sheet.

(Once they’re in the oven, try to treat them as if they’re souffle’s. They sink really easily, which kind-of takes out the purpose of cream puff.)

3. Bake until golden, 40 to 45 minutes (It took me less than thirty, but be sure to check before taking them out that early). Let cool, and cut horizontally in half.

I am going to stop there because the rest of the recipe is kind of pointless. The recipe says to put vanilla ice cream in the middle, but I personally like cream puffs with actual cream. I wanted to find a decent recipe for cream, especially if it included gelatin, that way it would last a bit longer. I found a great, and delicious one on yahoo answers, and I have to thank whoever put it there. I’m going to try to add a picture, so lets hope it works:

Yeah, it worked!

Double every ingredient. If you use any less than double, you wont have enough.

Just so you know, you can ignor the 24 hour rule. That just means you can’t get it straight from a cow.

I also suggest that you make sure that the gelatin is completely dissolved, or else you’ll get weird jellow like lumps in the cream. But be sure that you DON’T OVERHEAT THE GELATIN! That ruins it!

I’m sure you can figure out how to add the cream. Trust me, this is an amazing recipe, and you’ll definately enjoy it. I hope you enjoy it!