BakeAwayGirl

We had a ton of cherries that we just could not eat them all before they were going to go bad.  I always wanted to bake with cherries, but I don't have the patience to pit them.  Luckily, I have the best, most patient husband in the world, and he said he would pit 6 cups of cherries for me!  Perfection!  That was the right amount for my very first cherry pie, something I've wanted to do forever. But the group we were having over had a gluten-free member.  She never expects anyone to accommodate her, but a life without dessert just sounds terrible, so I always try to make some dessert she can have.  Seriously, I'd never go to a party if I couldn't ever have dessert.   So instead, I found two similar recipes, one gluten-free.  That one was supposedly with blueberries, but the topping was a sort of lemon shortbread topping, which would work just as deliciously with cherries.  So I made double the amount of cherries needed for the crum...

This is a childhood staple for me.  Anytime we have uneaten bananas that have gone beyond edible in our eyes, we would mash up 3 of them and make banana nut bread.  It was always a breakfast food, but it's definitely dessert-like.  It's delicious and even moreso now that I usually incorporate chocolate chips as well! Banana Nut Bread 1/2 cup butter 1 cup sugar 2 eggs 1 tsp baking soda 2 cups flour 1 1/4 cup mashed bananas (3) 1/2 cup chopped nuts (walnuts) - Optional 1 cup chocolate chips - optional Cream butter and sugar.  Beat until smooth; add eggs. Stir in flour and baking soda, one cup at a time.  Mix until fully incorporated. Add bananas and any extras such as nuts and/or chocolate chips. Line a bread pan with parchment paper, or wax paper.  Pour batter into the pan. Bake at 350* for about 1 hour and 10 minutes.  This varies.  The edges finish first, but the very center usually is still doughy.  Bake until it's to ...

When we first moved into our house, we embarked upon the adventure of discovering all the plants in our yard.  We played "Weed or Legit Plant" for pretty much the whole summer.  Turned out, the giant growth of plants in our arbor was raspberries!  Jeff had some for breakfast every day for a few weeks.  The next year, the plants grew, but no berries, so I gave it one more year to produce or I was cutting it all out and seeding over the area. This year, Jeff picks about 4+ cups of raspberries every single day. So we immediately took to Pinterest to find baking ideas including fresh raspberries, and this bread was our first foray into it.  It's named "bread" but make no mistake; it's a cake.  A delicious, lemony, raspberry-filled cake.  Yummmmm Mini Loaves Raspberry Lemon Bread Adapted from here Bread 1 cup butter 2 1/4 cup granulated sugar 4 eggs 2 1/2 cups flour 1/2 tsp baking powder 1/2 tsp baking soda 1 cup sour cream 1 tsp vanill...

I have admired trifles from afar for a while now, and then my cousin told me about one she made and I was very jealous.  But as it's not a baking dessert, I generally steered clear.  Also, I didn't have a trifle dish and wasn't about to buy one for something I wasn't sure I even sure I would like. So when we were browsing the shelves of Bed, Bath, and Beyond to register for our wedding, I somewhat sheepishly added a trifle dish.  Secretly, I think, I hoped that being a grown married woman would encourage me to make fancy desserts, like trifles. Well being a grownup married woman didn't have much to do with it, but hosting my first book club in our first house sure inspired me. That, and having a 10 pound box of fresh Michigan blueberries in the fridge. It was easier than anticipated and certainly a crowd-pleaser.  It's rare when you have a group of women that every one goes up for seconds!  But I will admit I was slightly disappointed in my first adv...

Strawberry-topped version from this summer A few years ago, a friend of mine was getting married and asked if I would make cupcakes for her wedding.  As an amateur baker, I was both incredibly flattered and terrified.  What if people were just indulging me and my cakes were secretly garbage?  What if I messed up?  What if I forgot an ingredient?  What if.. what if... what if! I immediately set to Pinterest to find recipes.  Originally I had grand ideas of espresso frosting with chocolate cupcakes and lemon cupcakes with a light raspberry frosting.  But I abandoned those ideas pretty quickly as 200 cupcakes was daunting enough without getting fancy beyond my capabilities.  So I decided to do 100 white cake cupcakes and 100 chocolate cake cupcakes.  I had a chocolate cake recipe , but I didn't have a quality white cupcake recipe.  So to Pinterest! They turned out wonderfully, and all my "what if"s were put to rest.  One of the...

This recipe was a find years ago, but I never remembered to take a picture for the blog until this last time.  It combines two delicious things into one.  As the name indicates, it is a combination of taco salad and pasta salad.  I will admit, I was skeptical at first.  First off, I'm not a fan of French or Western dressings (which this recipe uses), however it does work with the other ingredients. I've played with a few different ingredients, but the nice thing about both tacos and pasta salads is that you can add anything you'd like.  Besides the basics (taco meat, lettuce, pasta), I use cheese, black beans, and tomatoes.  You can do corn, any kind of peppers, or other types of beans.  This practically begs  for black olives, but I hate them so... no. Important:   We ate this the very first time without the crushed fritos.  We decided we wouldn't make it again.  Then we ate the leftovers with  the crushed chips and i...

Jeff's work has an awesome tradition of taking turns to provide Friday lunches.  Everybody who wants to participate signs up with a small group for a couple of Fridays during the year so that every Friday, one small group is providing lunch for everyone.  He really enjoys it and frequently comes home to brag about the delicious food he had that week.  Our recipe this week comes directly from his Friday food. Last June, Jeff came home raving about a fantastic soup he had at work that Friday, and he wanted me to make it.  I have a thing about "winter food" and "summer food," so I didn't make it over the summer.  But with the nice cool weather lately, I suggested we try it this week.  We had the ground beef, but we were low on all the canned veggies this recipe calls for, so I hit the grocery store. Now, I like mine very savory, so I went a little heavy on the spices.  The original recipe called for one packet of taco seasoning, but I used an equivile...

So it's been a long time!  My Pinterest-ing this year has mostly been wedding related and staring at all the delicious food on Pinterest certainly doesn't mesh with that.  But today, Jeff suggested I browse for dinner options, and the one I stumbled on required ingredients we always keep on hand, such as chicken, rice, black beans, and chicken broth.  However, the original author states (and I agree) that you can make this with whatever veggies you have on hand.  So feel free to take a little creative license with this! The burrito bowl originally requires chicken, but we both said it would be easy to make it with ground beef.  If you do, brown the ground beef in a separate pan, drain it, then add it to the sauteed onions.  It was quite delicious with chicken, and probably would be good without any meat, though you'd need to add many more veggies.  I also added some seasoning to the raw chicken, then a little more to the uncooked rice, and then abo...

I had my cousins over for an annual party, and needed some appetizer ideas.  Of course I was browsing Pinterest, and I had stored away a little beauty of Buffalo Chicken Pinwheels.  As if the name weren't enough to convince me it was delicious, the author's admission that it was her, more than her husband, that enjoyed going to the dive bar food places really sold me.  Jeff loves burgers and wraps and all that, but hands down, I am the driving force for beer and wings.  Judge all you'd like, but man oh man, nothing tastes better. So I pulled my ingredients together and read the directions.  The only issue is that it only made a handful of pinwheels, and that just was not going to cut it.  I decided to use the ingredients in a different way and make a pizza instead of rolling the dough. It's the same general concept, but more flatbread and less dough pinwheels.  We found it almost a little too sweet, with the mozzarella and green onions.  I ...

I know, it sounds heavenly, doesn't it?  Pesto grilled cheese... is there any part of that that sounds bad?  Nope.  This recipe is actually a rediscovered one for me.  I tried it for the first time before Jeff moved out here, in my first couple of weeks in the apartment.  I always pesto on hand, mozzarella is never difficult to get, and (here's my mistake) I used whatever bread I had around.  I was all excited for the deliciousness that I expected, and I was disappointed by the mediocrity that followed. I forgot about the recipe, but somehow it came up this past fall, and Jeff thought it sounded fantastic.  I acknowledged that the bread I used wasn't great and I was a little skimpy on the pesto, so we decided to try again with our favorite bread from the best bakery.  It was a success! Now we make it with some regularity and have tried on a couple different breads (like roasted garlic bread), but the key thing is the bread has to be pretty hea...

There's two go-tos for me when cooking, Mexican and Italian.  Both are easy to do meatless, and, while we're not vegetarians, I like to try to do some meatless meals.  With Mexican, we use a lot of black beans, and in Italian, we load up on carbs.  Screw Atkins, I'm a carbaholic. Anyway, what could be better than mixing my two favorite types of food together?  The answer is nothing, nothing is better. I've never made enchiladas, but Jeff wanted me to try, so months ago, he bought me some enchilada sauce, "just to have on hand, in case."  Uh huh.  But then I stumbled on this recipe on pinterest, which included taco meat, beans, cheese, and enchilada sauce.  Can't go wrong!  I filed it away for another day. Well as we hit the stores before the Polar Vortex Round 2, I found jumbo shells on sale, and immediately knew what we would have for dinner.  It was a little time consuming, just because it's cooking a few different things and then put...

Guest blogger:  Chef-Wannabe Jeff! Blueberry Pie Syrup For Christmas, Molly's parents got me a Sodastream machine, something I have always wanted. I had made several of the sample pack flavors when I decided it was time for me to start tinkering. I looked through our supplies and noticed the frozen Michigan blueberries from the summer. So far, we had only used them in pancakes so I decided that needed to change. While this syrup would be great on pancakes, ice cream, or in cocktails, I wanted to make a soda. I used the Sodastream to carbonate a liter of water and then added what would be a serving of concentrate (about 50 ml) of the blueberry syrup. It proved to be not enough so I added a second serving and that gave it a good strong flavor. 1 cup water 1 cup white sugar 2 tsp vanilla extract 1/2 cup frozen blueberries Combine all ingredients in a small/medium sauce pan. After that, it was a simple matter of keeping the temperature at a even simmer and ...

Salad from the top view You may have noticed that I love Southwestern American food.  I love Mexican food, but I think I like the Tex Mex better.  It has a lot of spice and flavor and cheese.  The best way to do this, in my opinion, is salads.  They taste so fresh but have so much more flavor than your every day salad. Last month, we had a potluck at work.  Potluck at my work is code for snacks and desserts, but usually no real food.  I had a recipe in my To-Do List Pinterest board, and decided it was perfect for a more substantial aspect of the potluck.  The recipe made way more salad than I anticipated, but it was no problem!  The recipe was a hit, and I even sent the bit of leftovers home with people because they loved it so much. Here's the catch.  The recipe for the dressing wasn't very good, in my opinion.  Some people really liked it, but I wouldn't do it again.  I'll include it here because some people loved it. ...

Before I start this one, I'll preface it with a simple breakdown of this recipe:  If you don't like mint, move on, this one isn't for you.  If you care for mint at all, make these. Now, mint lovers, this is the best cookie for Christmastime.  The original recipe I found was not specifically for Christmas, but it uses Andes mints, and those scream Christmastime to me.  This tastes exactly like mint chocolate chip ice cream in cookie form.  So delicious.  Jeff even suggested we put two together around a scoop of vanilla ice cream to make ice cream sandwiches. In the original recipe, it calls for Andes mints chopped.  That was way too time consuming for my liking, so I just broke them up with my hands.  They break pretty easily, so that wasn't a problem, but it was still time consuming and uneven, so there were some that were still very large.  I vaguely remembered that Andes mints came in chocolate chip sized pieces, but I didn't see them a...

Couldn't even wait to take a picture! My favorite way to find a new recipe isn't actually Pinterest.  I prefer accidentally discovering a food I love (by eating it of course) and then asking someone for the recipe.  This past summer, at my cousin's birthday party, her roommate brought out a chocolate cake.  Me and chocolate are besties, so of course I took a piece.  After the first bite, I decided I had discovered my new favorite chocolate cake! This cake is luscious.  Decadent.  Sinful.  Devil's Food Cake, you naive child, you haven't tasted sinful yet. There is so much chocolate, but it is balanced out by enough moisture that it never becomes cloying and overdone.  It's just delicious.  Every bite is worth the calories.  I will admit I have only made it once because we had company in town and I wanted something to wow the crowd.  Simply making it for Jeff and I, or even a small party, feels too gluttonous.  After all...