Overnight Refrigerator Oats

I am so sorry that I haven't been posting very much. The summer has been super busy, and then little man and I were sharing some kind of sickie back and forth... not fun.

But I am back and have some fun things to share with you!

Back when I posted my homemade yogurt, I mentioned that I'd been using the yogurt in some yummy recipes, one of which I was specifically excited about. I'd heard all about overnight refrigerator (no cook!) oatmeal, heck, I had even recommended it to my sister in law! But I'd never actually tried it.  It calls for Greek yogurt, and I never wanted to use little man's "good" (ie: expensive) yogurt in something... well... just for me!  But with creamy, thick and delicious homemade coconut yogurt, there was nothing holding me back!

The process is unbelievably simple.

Seriously, just take a few ingredients and put them in a jar.

Screw on the lid, shake the whole thing up, then put the jar in the fridge.

That's it.

The next morning, open up the jar and...

...voila! Breakfast!

This is SO delicious. The liquid is soaked in by the oats, perfectly softening them up to exactly the consistency that you'd expect from perfectly cooked oatmeal. And I added chia seeds to mine, which not only help the oatmeal's texture, but add an amazing health boost to start your morning.

Little man and little miss pretty much refused to try this, which is frustrating, but it's so good that I have made it a few more times, because I really enjoy it, and it's just so quick and easy.  I can't wait to try other flavorings in this, too - it is so easy to customize to any preference or taste.

Trust me - you want to try this!


Overnight Refrigerator Oats
(from The Yummy Life)

1/4 cup old fashioned oats (not quick or steel cut)
1/3 cup milk (I used coconut milk beverage)
1/4 cup Greek yogurt (I used homemade coconut milk yogurt)
1 1/2 teaspoons chia seeds
2 teaspoons maple syrup

In an eight-ounce mason jar (or any small lidded container), combine all of the ingredients. Carefully secure the lid onto the jar and shake well, until everything is well combined. Place the jar in the refrigerator overnight, or up to two days. Eat chilled.

Enjoy!

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Roasted Banana Cinnamon Buns with Maple Glaze

I was recently very honored to be asked by my dear friend Jenni of The Gingered Whisk if I'd like to provide a guest-post on her blog, as she was moving, and wanted to continue to provide new content to her readers, even while in transition between homes and, thus, kitchens.

I automatically said yes - I mean, who wouldn't want to be a part of her awesome blog??

But then I panicked a little.

Her blog is beautiful, and full of amazingly delicious recipes.  I needed to come up with something special for her. 

And that is when I came up with these.  Overnight cinnamon rolls had been intriguing me for quite some time, and I had even found a recipe for sweet dough that looked fantastic. And then to add the sweet deliciousness of roasted bananas to them, and a maple glaze on top... I knew I had something special enough for my guest post.

And I wanted to share them here, too, in case you hadn't seen them yet.

In case you missed their original posting over on The Gingered Whisk, you can check that out here. And be sure to check out all of the other amazing recipes she has while you're there!



Roasted Banana Cinnamon Buns with Maple Glaze

For the Dough:
(from allrecipes)

1 cup milk
1/3 cup white sugar
1/3 cup butter
1 tablespoon active dry yeast
4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
2 tablespoons vegetable oil

In a small saucepan over medium heat, combine the milk, sugar and butter. Heat until slightly warm to the touch then remove from heat and stir in the yeast. I found that I had to let the milk mixture cool a bit before adding the yeast, as the milk got pretty hot in order to dissolve the sugar. Once the yeast has been added, let stand until foamy, about 10 minutes.
In a large bowl, stir together the flour and salt. Mix in the eggs, oil and the yeast mixture. Mix until dough pulls away from the sides of the bowl. Turn dough out onto a floured surface and continue to knead until the dough is smooth and elastic, about 10 minutes. Grease a large bowl with 1 tablespoon of oil. Place the dough into the bowl and turn once to coat. Cover and let stand in a warm place until double in size, about 1 hour.


Roasted Bananas:

3 bananas, cut into 1/2" - 1" chunks
2 tbsp brown sugar
1 1/2 tbsp butter, cut into small pieces

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
Spread the banana chunks into a 1 1/2-2 quart baking dish. Sprinkle with the brown sugar and dot the top with the butter pieces.
Roast the bananas at 400 degrees for 40 minutes, stirring after about 20 minutes.
When the bananas have cooled a bit, mash them with a fork.


For the Filling:
(based on Picky Palate)

1/2 cup brown sugar
1 1/2 tbsp cinnamon sugar
All of the mashed roasted bananas

Mix together all filling ingredients until well combined.


To prepare the buns:

Risen dough
Prepared filling
4 tablespoons butter, room temperature (almost melty is great)

Once the dough has risen, gently deflate it.
Roll the dough into a big rectangle.
Spread the butter over the dough.
Spread the banana/brown sugar mixture over the butter. It will most likely mix right in with the butter, and that is totally okay.
Starting with one long end, roll the dough into a log.
Cut the log into 12 pieces, and place each piece, cut side up, into a 9" x 13" pan.
Cover the pan with plastic wrap and place it into the refrigerator overnight. (Or, let it rest for about 30 minutes and proceed to the baking directions.)
In the morning, take the tray out of the refrigerator and allow it to come up to temperature for at least 30 minutes.
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Bake the cinnamon buns for 25-30 minutes.


For the glaze:
(based on Joy the Baker)

1 cup confectioners' sugar
1 tablespoon maple syrup
2-6 tablespoons milk (I needed more than I expected!)

Measure the confectioners' sugar into a medium bowl. Whisk in the maple syrup and enough milk (adding it a little at a time) to make a good, easily pourable consistency.

Drizzle glaze over finished cinnamon buns.

Enjoy!

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April Daring Cooks' Challenge - Create Your Own Recipe!

Things are a little hectic around here. Between birthdays and parties, active toddlers and busy big kids, and to take advantage of any warm weather that peeks through the clouds and chill, well, it's been hectic.

So when the April Daring Cooks' Challenge was announced, I had really high hopes.

Our April 2012 Daring Cooks hosts were David & Karen from Twenty-Fingered Cooking. They presented us with a very daring and unique challenge of forming our own recipes by using a set list of ingredients!

I mean, how different and interesting is that? They gave us three lists, each containing three ingredients, and we each had to create a meal using (at least) one ingredient from each list.

The lists were as follows:

• List 1: Parsnips, Eggplant (aubergine), Cauliflower
• List 2: Balsamic Vinegar, Goat Cheese, Chipotle peppers
• List 3: Maple Syrup, Instant Coffee, Bananas

The possibilities are interesting, sometime weird, and completely endless. 

My first idea hit me almost immediately, so I got started right away.

The combination of balsamic and vinegar and maple syrup sounded delicious to me, so I immediately thought to create a marinade for some pork chops using just that. I used a 2:1 ratio of maple syrup to balsamic vinegar. 

And, seeing as this is pork, I chose to tie it all together with apple cider. Mix everything up right in the measuring cup with a bit of garlic powder...

...and pour over some pork chops in the crock pot.

Meanwhile, I still needed to tackle an ingredient from list 1 - the list of vegetables. And then it hit me - mashed cauliflower. I have heard of mashed cauliflower being a good substitute for mashed potatoes, and mashed potatoes go so well with pork chops, so why not give the cauliflower version a try here??

I simple boiled a head of cauliflower until it was tender, drained the water, then hit it with the immersion blender until it was nice and smooth!

Before serving the pork chops, I removed them from the crock pot, basted them in some more of my maple-balsamic mixture and put them under the broiler for just a minute.


The results?

Delicious. 


As a side, I made sweet potato fries that I seasoned to complement the pork - with a drizzle of maple syrup and balsamic vinegar! The taste was subtle, but worked really well.


I had full well intended to try other combinations, but the month completely got away from me. But I love playing with different ingredients and flavor combinations, so I look forward to trying my hand at some new recipes really soon.


To see the other creative recipes cooked up in the Daring Kitchen this month, check them out here.




Maple-Balsamic Pork Chops with Mashed Cauliflower
(my very own recipe!)


5 pork chops
1 cup apple cider
1/8 cup (2 tablespoons) balsamic vinegar + 1/8 cup balsamic vinegar
1/4 cup maple syrup + 1/4 maple syrup
1 teaspoon garlic powder
1 medium head cauliflower


In a small bowl (or a measuring cup), combine the cider, 1/8 cup balsamic vinegar, 1/4 cup maple syrup and garlic powder.
Place pork chops in stoneware of your slow cooker and pour the cider mixture over them.
Cook on low heat for about 6 hours.


To make mashed cauliflower, cut the cauliflower into florets, off of the center stem, and boil or steam until it is very tender. Mash the cauliflower with immersion blender (or potato masher) until smooth and creamy. You can add salt and pepper to taste if you choose.


Prior to serving the pork chops, combine the remaining 1/8 cup balsamic vinegar and 1/4 cup maple syrup in a small bowl. Remove the chops from the slow cooker and place them onto a baking sheet or into a roasting pan. Baste the cooked chops with the vinegar/maple mixture and broil the chops for a minute or two.


Serve the pork over the mashed cauliflower and enjoy!

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Carrot Cake

As you may have noticed, I love trying new recipes. As you may also have noticed, I also love cake. So it may surprise you to know that I have never baked a carrot cake before. And it's not that I don't like carrot cake - I do. A lot. But for some reason that I do not understand, I have always assumed that carrot cake would be difficult to make. It always seemed gourmet. Fancy. Difficult. But we decided to make carrot cake for dessert for this weekend's family dinner.

Since I was nervous about this difficult undertaking, I spent a bit of time searching for recipes. Apparently, carrot cakes are pretty customizable - there are so many different recipes that, while similar, each put their own spin the cakes. I finally picked a recipe and decided to just go with it, giving myself plenty of time, in case it really was as hard as I had always worried.

Holy moly, I have never been so glad to be wrong.

This cake was delicious, and not even hard to make.

I started with the hardest part - shredding the carrots.

Yes, I hand grated the carrots. I would have used the mini-food processor attachment to the immersion blender, but the baby was napping and I didn't want to wake him. So my box grater and I got to spend some quality time together.

I then went to the pantry to grab a can of crushed pineapple. That I was certain was in there. Only to find that it wasn't in there. You'd think I'd have known that, seeing as I just totally reorganized the pantry... So I decided that I would make a couple of adjustments and create my own version of a carrot cake. I mean, hey - all the cook kids are doing it...

So instead of crushed pineapple, I found a can of sliced pears (in juice, not syrup).

I lightly mashed the pears with my potato masher and was good to go.

Next it was time to put everything together. In one bowl, I combined all of the dry ingredients.

I always love how the different dry ingredients look together.

Then the KitchenAid did the majority of the work, mixing together the eggs, sugars, oil and vanilla, then incorporating in the dry ingredients.

The resulting batter was super thick.

That was remedied, though, by the addition of the carrots and mashed pears.


I decided to omit the raisins (chocking hazard) and chopped nuts (allergen) (I am sure you can see where I am going with this...) from the recipe, too, so that little man would be able to taste the cake after dinner as well. Because that would just be fun. So that yummy batter was poured into a pan and was ready to go into the oven.

While the cake baked, I turned my attention to frosting. Because half of the reason that I love carrot cake is the cream cheese frosting. Yum. I decided to make one more adjustment to the recipe, making it, too, my own.

Yup. Maple syrup. It was all I could do not to just dig in to the mixer bowl with a spoon...


And, despite the fact that I didn't make the cake fancy in any way shape or form, I still think it looked pretty good by the time we were ready to go.


So the results?

Yum.


The cake was moist and delicious, had a really great combination of flavors, and was absolutely fantastic with the maple cream cheese frosting.

And, while he didn't get to try the frosting, little man certainly enjoyed his cake!

This cake was very easy to pull together, and was a total hit with the entire family. I will definitely be making it again.

Carrot Cake

(adapted from Homemade by Holman)

1 cup sugar

1 cup brown sugar

1 1/3 cups canola oil

3 eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

2 1/2 cups flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

2 teaspoons cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon ground ginger

1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg

1 1/2 teaspoons salt

1 pound carrots, peeled and grated

1/2 cup mashed pear (most of a can of canned, sliced pears, in juice, mashed)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and spray a 9" x 13" cake pan (the original recipe called for 8-inch cake pans, and said that the batter filled three).

In bowl of electric mixer fitted with paddle attachment, combine sugars, oil, eggs and vanilla. Mix on medium speed for about two minutes.

In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking soda, salt and spices and whisk together.

With the mixer on low speed, add the whisked dry ingredients to the sugar mixture and combine until just incorporated. The batter will be very thick.

Fold carrots and mashed pears into batter, mixing until well distributed.

Pour the batter into the prepared ban and bake for 34-37 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. (The recipe indicates that 8-inch round cakes should bake for about 30 minutes.)

Allow the cake to cool completely (on a wire rack).

Maple Cream Cheese Frosting

(from Martha Stewart)

1 8-ounce package of cream cheese, room temperature

1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, room temperature

1 tablespoon maple syrup (I doubled this)

1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract (I doubled this, too)

2 cups confectioners' sugar

In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the cream cheese and butter together until smooth. Add maple syrup, vanilla and confectioners' sugar. Continue beating until well combined and smooth. Just be careful when adding the confectioners' sugar, as it wants to puff out of the bowl as the mixer goes! You can adjust the amount of confectioners' sugar to get the frosting consistency that you want.

Enjoy!

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April Daring Bakers' Challenge - Maple Mousse in an Edible Container

When the April Daring Cooks Challenge was announced as a dual challenge with the Daring Bakers, I was intrigued. When the cooks challenge was revealed as savory edible containers, I was excited. And when I thought about the idea of sweet edible containers, I was even more excited. While trying to think of ideas for my savory containers and their accompanying fillings, I also began trying to think of sweet containers and appropriate fillings, as well.

And soon enough, came the full announcement.

The April 2011 Daring Bakers’ challenge was hosted by Evelyne of the blog Cheap Ethnic Eatz. Evelyne chose to challenge everyone to make a maple mousse in an edible container. Prizes are being awarded to the most creative edible container and filling, so vote on your favorite from April 27th to May 27th at http://thedaringkitchen.com!

Hmm... I had to start re-thinking some of my ideas. Maple mousse sounded delicious, but was definitely a limiting factor for the edible container aspect of the challenge. I had to think of a container that could balance the sweetness of the mousse and that would complement its maple flavor.

I started by making the mousse. The key ingredient, of course, is maple syrup. Evelyne specifically stressed the importance of using pure maple syrup. She is, after all, Canadian, where maple syrup is more than a syrup, it is practically a religion. And, hey, that fake stuff is nothing more than flavored high fructose corn syrup, so I don't at all disagree. I did find it interesting, reading the comments on the forum, to see how regional maple syrup is, globally speaking. There were many who do not have access to real maple syrup, and had never even tasted it. Shows how tucked into my little Northeastern US mind-frame I am!

Anyway, the mousse recipe was different from any other mousse I have tried, more resembling a gelatin-stabilized custard. The first step was to bring the maple syrup to a boil. Meanwhile, I separated four eggs and softened some gelatin in some heavy cream. Once the syrup was boiling, I beat the egg yolks and tempered them with a bit of the hot syrup. The important thing when tempering eggs is to go slowly (when incorporating the heat), yet to keep whisking the eggs (or, in this case, yolks) briskly. The idea is to keep the eggs from turning into an omelet. Once the eggs were fully incorporated with the maple syrup, the whole thing was combined with the softened gelatin.

The last step of the process, once that combination rested for an hour, was to fold in fresh whipped cream. I started out by hand, using a silicone spatula to carefully fold the whipped cream into the thick maple mixture. This actually proved to be much harder than I'd expected. So after a couple of minutes, I transferred the whole thing into my KitchenAid mixer, fitted with the paddle attachment, and let it mix on its lowest speed for a couple of minutes. That certainly did the trick, and I soon had a beautiful bowl of maple mousse, all ready to set in the fridge.

As the mousse cooled, it was time to think about the container. The mousse was very sweet, so I wanted to choose container that could balance both the sweetness and richness of the filling. Evelyne had given a couple of suggestions, including making cups out of bacon and out of nuts. I liked the idea of the saltiness of bacon, but wasn't sure how they would go over with the family. I mean, we all love bacon, but for dessert? I know that isn't for everyone. So, combining the recipe for the nut cups and the salt-factor of the bacon cups, I decided to make cups out of pretzels.

I started by crushing mini pretzel twists into crumbs, though I did leave some bigger pieces for added texture. I combined the crumbs with a touch of brown sugar and an egg white (one of the four left over from the yolks used in the mousse). I then added another egg (beaten), as the mixture was nowhere near the right texture to shape into cups. I then lined the wells of a muffin tin with foil and pressed the mixture into them to form the cups and popped the whole thing into a 350 degree oven. After about 20 minutes or so (checking regularly after the first 15 minutes), they were ready.

The hardest part about these pretzel cups was separating them from the foil. I seriously should have sprayed the foil with cooking spray. It became our pre-dessert activity, trying to peel the foil away from the cups. It was pretty funny, actually. We managed to un-foil all but two of the cups, though, and were soon able to fill them with the delicious mousse. The salty pretzel cups were the perfect pairing for the rich, sweet mousse, and the cups were the perfect single-portion size. Everyone enjoyed them, and most of us found ourselves dipping pretzels in the extra mousse after finishing our portions.

But I wasn't done. The mousse recipe made a huge batch, so, even after filling six individual sized pretzel cups, I had more than half of the batch left over, so wanted to come up with another edible container to pair with it.

One idea that I'd had when I knew that we'd be making sweet edible containers this month was a chocolate cup. I have seen them before, and had even seen (online) demonstrations as to how they are made, but had never had the nerve to actually try. Well, half a batch of maple mousse was all the motivation that I needed!

The preparation of chocolate cups is actually quite simple, considering how elegant they look. You really only need two things.

Chocolate:










And balloons:










These were the smallest balloons that I had. Water balloon sized balloons would have been perfect, but these were as close as I had on hand. And, yes, I actually washed off the balloons (very carefully) after blowing them up.

Making the chocolate cups is very straightforward. Simply melt the chocolate (either with or without a tablespoon of shortening - there are differing opinions on that...) and use it to coat the bottom of the balloons. It is important to melt the chocolate carefully so that it is smooth, but to let it cool a bit so that it is not so hot that it pops the balloons. Most people dip the balloons into the chocolate to make a smooth and sleek cup or bowl. I went for a different approach. Using my silicone basting brush, I brushed the chocolate onto the balloons, giving the cups a striped look and texture. Even little miss got in on the fun, and had a great time painting her balloon. We gave each balloon two coats of chocolate and then let them rest in the refrigerator to cool completely.

Once the chocolate was fully set, it was time to remove the balloons. I was actually a little nervous about this step - if you let the air out of the balloon too quickly, the cup could collapse. But handling the cup too much while deflating the balloon causes it to melt, simply due to the heat of your hand. I snipped a little hole near the knot of each balloon then carefully pulled the balloon away from the chocolate. I then put them back into the refrigerator until I was ready to fill them with the maple mousse.

Since these bowls were larger than the pretzel bowls, little miss, daddy and I shared one bowl. The semi-sweet chocolate paired very well with the maple mousse, and the whole dessert (including the little chocolate garnish that I made with some of the extra melted chocolate) just felt fun and fancy to eat.

And, in case you are curious as to what I did with the extra egg whites from making the mousse, I made one more edible container that I'd been wanting to try - a meringue cup. I almost didn't, since meringue is pretty sweet, and I knew that it would not be a good pairing for the mousse, but hey - I had the egg whites and was in the edible container zone, so I went ahead and made them anyway. But I filled them with fresh strawberries instead of the mousse. And used another chocolate garnish for decoration. This one, if you couldn't guess by the fairy, was for little miss.

And this is how you know that little miss notices everything I do regarding food-blogging:










Evelyne, thank you very much for hosting a great challenge and for sharing this delicious maple mousse with us!

To see the other amazingly creative edible containers concocted by the other Daring Bakers, check them out here.

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