Buttercream Syrup

Here's another delicious and unique pancake syrup. We've been having cranberry syrup almost every time we have pancakes, ever since Jeff came up with it. I still love it, but I was starting to get cranberry-ed out. Time to try something new!

I came across this recipe for Buttercream Syrup a while back, and thought that it looked absolutely delicious. After all, a recipe with nothing but butter, sugar, evaporated milk, and a bit of vanilla has to be good, right? So when Jeff made chocolate chip pancakes this morning, I knew it was the perfect time to try it out.

I admit that my pictures of this are not nearly as lovely as the pictures on Jamie's post with the original recipe. But I was in a hurry to get the picture-taking over with, and dig in!


Buttercream Syrup
1 stick butter (1/2 C)
1 cup sugar
1/2-3/4 can evaporated milk (can be substituted with buttermilk for a different, yet yummy taste)
1 tsp vanilla

Melt the butter in a small sauce pan over medium heat. Add the sugar slowly and stirring until it is creamy and thick.

Add the milk a little at a time while stirring. Add the vanilla and let it simmer for about 5-10 minutes while it thickens further.


Rich? Check. Buttery? Check. Delicious? Check. Diet? .... Not so much. :-)

Hodge-Podge Pudding

I made a realization the other day - I have yet to ever make bread pudding using actual yeast bread. I've made it with Irish soda bread, with banana bread, and even with biscuits. And every time, it's been really yummy!

Having already done quite a bit of experimenting with the basic bread pudding recipe, I decided to branch out even further and see what else I could use to make a delicious, custardy pudding. This actually came about because I wanted to make biscuit pudding, but found out after mixing up the custard that I didn't have enough biscuits. What to do?

At that point, I went ahead and tossed in the biscuits, then started improvising, tossing in a bit of this and a bit of that. Leftover muffin, graham crackers, cereal crumbs, all were added with the hope that the pudding would at least be edible.

Turns out, I needn't have worried. It was delicious! It had a wonderfully soft, custardy texture and a delightful combination of flavors. Thus Hodge-Podge Pudding was created. Here is a recipe/formula for making this fun pudding, which can be used for either breakfast or dessert. It utilizes foods that you have on hand, and need to use up, so it saves money while creatively using leftovers.


Hodge-Podge Pudding
2 1/4 cups milk
1/2 cup sugar
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
2 large eggs, slightly beaten
5 cups assorted grain foods (at least 2-3 cups should be bread-like: bread, biscuits, waffles, pancakes, muffins, etc. Fill in the rest with stuff like cold cereal, leftover cooked cereal, leftover cooked rice, crackers, etc.)

Heat oven to 350. Grease a 1 1/2-qt. casserole.

Mix milk, sugar, cinnamon, and eggs in large bowl with wire whisk until well blended. Stir in bread/grains. Pour into casserole.

Bake uncovered 40 to 45 minutes or until knife inserted 1 inch from edge of casserole comes out clean.


I later made another batch of this hodge-podge pudding (pictured above), this time using biscuits, waffles, saltines, and cereal crumbs, and baked it in a 9x13. It turned out really good.

To make this into a great dessert, try topping it with a dessert sauce as found in any of these recipes: cottage pudding, Woodford pudding, Irish soda bread pudding.

Lime Cheesecake with Strawberry Sauce

Our Easter meal yesterday was so yummy. Jeff and I made Pork Chops with Apples and Stuffing (last time we made it we did it in the crock pot, this time we baked it according to the original instructions, it's delicious either way!), Jeff's sister and her family brought homemade rolls and a relish tray with olives and other marinated goodness. It was all wonderfully tasty, but for me the crowning jewel was the dessert.


I'm a HUGE fan of cheesecakes, and this one was great. The cheesecake was rich but not too rich, and the flavors were light and fresh, perfect for springtime. I used this recipe from Southern Living, but used regular lime juice instead of Key lime.


Lime Cheesecake with Strawberry Sauce
2 cups graham cracker crumbs
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup butter or margarine, melted
3 (8-ounce) packages cream cheese, softened
1/4 cups sugar
3 large eggs
1 (8-ounce) container sour cream
1 1/2 teaspoons grated lime rind (skipped this, Jeff hates any kind of citrus rind)
1/2 cup lime juice
Strawberry Sauce
1 1/4 cups fresh strawberries
1/4 cup sugar
1 1/2 teaspoons grated lime rind (substituted lime juice)

Stir together first 3 ingredients, and firmly press on bottom and 1 inch up sides of a greased 9-inch springform pan.

Bake at 350° for 8 minutes; cool.

Beat cream cheese at medium speed with an electric mixer until fluffy; gradually add 1 1/4 cups sugar, beating until blended. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Stir in sour cream, rind, and juice. Pour batter into crust.

Bake at 325° for 1 hour and 5 minutes; turn oven off. Partially open oven door; let stand in oven 15 minutes. Remove from oven, and immediately run a knife around edge of pan, releasing sides.

Cool completely in pan on a wire rack; cover and chill 8 hours.

Just before serving, make strawberry sauce - process all sauce ingredients in a food processor until smooth, stopping to scrape down sides. Spoon sauce over each slice.

Yummmmmm......

Skillet Pizza

I found this recipe in an old Better Homes and Gardens cookbook I got at the thrift store a long time ago. I had to adjust it quite a bit, because it called for a pizza mix, which included a crust mix, sauce packet, and cheese. I just made my own crust, used some spaghetti sauce, and my own cheese. Really, it was the concept of the recipe that got my attention. We love making pizza, and it's so fun to find new ways to do it. This pizza, cooked in a skillet on the stove, turned out really good, much better than I was expecting. Crispy crust, gooey melty cheese. The only downside is that it only made 4 servings. Next time I'll double the recipe and have two skillets of pizza going at once - when I make pizza I like there to be a lot of it!


Skillet Pizza
1 1/4 tsp. yeast
1/2 cup plus 2 tbsp. warm water
1 tbsp. oil
1/2 tsp. salt
2 cups flour
1/2 cup spaghetti sauce (or add Italian seasoning, garlic powder, and onion powder to 1/2 cup tomato sauce)
1 to 1 1/2 cups shredded cheese (preferably mozzarella, but I used cheddar and Monterey Jack because we're out of mozzarella)
Toppings of choice - I used salami

To make crust, combine yeast, warm water, oil, salt, and flour. Knead for a few minutes until smooth. Spread in a cold, greased, 10-inch skillet, pressing onto bottom and a bit up the sides. Cook for 7 minutes over medium-low heat with lid ajar.

Remove lid and spread with sauce, cheese, and desired toppings. Cook for 15 minutes with lid ajar. Remove lid and cook 7 minutes more.

Loosen crust from pan and slide pizza out onto a plate. Slice and serve!

Special Apple Cobbler

I was sooooo in the mood for a decadent baked dessert today! Jeff pointed out that we had lots of apples that needed to be used, and there were several cake mixes (purchased on sale, of course) in the pantry. I did some quick thinking and, by combining an apple pie recipe with the recipe for cake mix cookies, came up with this totally awesome apple cobbler. It turned out so delicious!


Special Apple Cobbler
5 medium-sized tart apples (we used granny smith)
2/3 cup sugar
2 tbsp. flour
Dash each cinnamon and nutmeg
1 tbsp. butter or margarine
1 box spice cake mix
2 eggs
1/3 cup oil

Preheat oven to 375 and grease a 9-inch pie pan. Peel apples and cut into small chunks. Mix with sugar, flour, cinnamon and nutmeg. Spread apples in the pan, dot with butter.

Mix together the spice cake mix, eggs, and oil. Drop by large spoonfuls onto the apples. Bake in preheated oven for 30 minutes.

Too bad we didn't have any ice cream, that would have been absolutely perfect.


I think this concept would work well with other fruit and cake combinations. Peach pie filling topped with yellow cake mix, cherry pie filling with chocolate cake mix - yum!!!

Corned Beef

There's a right way and a wrong way to smoke a corned beef brisket. The right way involves the use of a grill or a smoker. The wrong way involves putting it on the stove to boil, then forgetting about it until the entire upstairs is filled with smoke as the 30-year-old fire alarm emits strange and ethereal gurgles.

Guess which way I did it today.

Well, at least it turned out incredibly delicious anyway.


Though it took me quite a while to clear all the smoke from my lungs.


Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

Biscuit Pudding

I love biscuits - rolled biscuits, drop biscuits, homemade biscuits, pop-the-can biscuits, all of them are so delicious! Hot and steaming, right out of the oven with butter melting down the sides, ooooohhhh, they're just so good.

But what happens when you don't eat them all right away, and they sit around overnight? They get kind of "blah" and unappetizing. No matter what I try, I haven't found a way to make leftover biscuits taste as wonderful as fresh-from-the-oven biscuits. The texture is dryer, the flavor blander. So usually, if we have leftover biscuits from a meal, they just sit around until they get rock hard and we throw them out.

NO LONGER! This morning I decided that I was going to come up with a way to use the golden brown chunks of used-to-be deliciousness left over from last night, a way to turn them into something absolutely wonderful. And I believe I was successful - I now look forward to having leftovers the next time we make biscuits because I'll be able to make this delicious dish again!


All I did was use a simple recipe for bread pudding, and substitute chunks of day-old biscuit for the cubes of bread. And thus I created Biscuit Pudding, a deliciously soft, moist, and custardy dish that is equally good as a breakfast or a dessert. No more bland leftover biscuits sitting around waiting to be thrown away.

Hooray for the frugality and tightwaddery that runs deep in my veins, that allows me to experiment with breathing new life into old foods.


Biscuit Pudding
2 1/4 cups milk
2 slightly beaten eggs
2 to 3 cups day-old biscuits, torn into 1-inch chunks
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. vanilla
1/4 tsp. salt
1/2 cup raisins

Combine milk and eggs, pour over biscuit chunks. Add remaining ingredients, toss to blend.

Spread mixture in a greased 8-inch baking dish. Set dish in a shallow pan on oven rack. Pour hot water around it 1 inch deep. Bake at 350 for 35 to 40 minutes or until a knife inserted comes out clean.