Taste and Create - Babka Cake

For Taste & Create this month, I was paired with Vanillastrawberryspringfields. This is quite the picture blog. She has a ton of awesome photos and is quite talented!

I chose the Babka Cake because I thought it looked interesting. I am Polish and my great aunt makes Babka frequently but I know that she uses yeast in it. Or I am fairly certain that she does? I didn't know that there was even such a thing as Babka Cake.

The original recipe called for a custard filling in the middle. There was not a custard recipe posted and I didn't want to look any further for a custard recipe. So I decided to just go ahead and make it without. While it was baking I figured that I could put some strawberries on it with Cool Whip and it could be very tasty. This is the perfect cake for strawberry shortcake.... That is for sure. It is a great cake and I am very glad that I chose it.

Chicken and Wild Rice Soup

This month I was paired up with NO REASON NEEDED for Taste & Create.

I immediately chose the chicken and wild rice soup recipe that she has posted HERE. We have been eating a lot of soup this fall. I have made stuffed green pepper soup and chicken tortilla soup that were both very good. This chicken rice soup did not dissapoint either. It will be made again.

I used a box of Uncle Ben's long grain wild rice with a seasoning packet. I also used a pound of whole, boneless, skinless chicken breasts. After everything cooked in the slow cooker for approximately 7 hours, I took the chicken out, shredded it and then put it back in the cooker for another hour. SIMPLE. DELICIOUS!

CHICKEN AND WILD RICE SOUP
3 cans (14½ ounces each) chicken broth (I used reduced sodium)
1 pound boneless, skinless chicken breast or thighs, cut into bite size pieces (I did not cut up the chicken until it was done and then just shredded it)

2 cups water
1 cup sliced celery
1 cup diced carrot
1 package (6 ounces) converted long grain and wild rice mix with seasoning packet (not quick-cooking or instant rice)
½ cup chopped onion
½ teaspoon black pepper
2 teaspoons white vinegar (optional - and I skipped)
1 tablespoon dried parsley flakes (I also skipped)

1. In crockpot slow cooker, combine broth, chicken, water, celery, carrots, rice and seasoning packet, onion and pepper; mix well.
2. Cover; cook on LOW 6 hours to 7 hours or on HIGH 4 to 5 hours or until chicken is tender.
3. Stir in vinegar, if desired. Sprinkle with parsley.

MAKES 9 SERVINGS

Strawberry Shake

For Taste & Create this month I was paired with My Kitchen Treasures. She has a delicious blog with lots of yummy things. However, I started Weight Watchers a week ago and have been very good. No baking and no cheating.

I had a hard time choosing something from her archives of deliciousness. But I finally found something that I could have.....Strawberry Shakes!

This was perfect, pretty and tasty. As well as simple. Strawberries, ice, milk and a blender.

Banana Cookies - Taste and Create

For Taste & Create this month I was paired with Quick & Easy, Cheap & Healthy. Anne does an awesome job reviewing recipes, products and ingredients for quickness, easyness, cheapness and healthiness. After searching through her blog I couldn't pass on the banana cookies. I always have issues with bananas going bad. I have recently started freezing those nasty black bananas that attract fruit flies in my kitchen. I was getting quite a collection of these nasty black things in the freezer and had to do something about it.

This is a very good recipe for banana cookies. What I really like about it is that the cookies are very light and soft. I added some toffee chips that I had leftover and they were perfect. Everyone seemed to enjoy them here and they will make a perfect after school snack!

Banana Cookies

Ingredients
1/2 cup of unsalted butter, room temperature
1 cup of sugar
1 egg, room temperature
1 cup of mashed bananas (about 2 ½ large bananas)
1 teaspoon of baking soda
2 cups of flour
pinch of salt
1/2 teaspoon of ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon of ground mace or nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon of ground cloves
1 cup of pecans (walnuts and chocolate chips are fine alternatives) I used toffee chips

Method
1 Preheat the oven to 350°F. Cream the butter and sugar together until light and fluffy. Add the egg and continue to beat until the mixture is light and fluffy.
2 In a bowl, mix the mashed bananas and baking soda. Let sit for 2 minutes. The baking soda will react with the acid in the bananas which in turn will give the cookies their lift and rise.
3 Mix the banana mixture into the butter mixture. Mix together the flour, salt, and spices and sift into the butter and banana mixture and mix until just combined.
4 Fold into the batter the pecans or chocolate chips if using. Drop in dollops onto parchment paper-lined baking sheet. Bake for 11-13 minutes or until nicely golden brown. Let cool on wire racks.
Makes about 30 cookies

Pretzels - Taste & Create

For Taste & Create this month, I was paired with foodie plus 4. There were lots of yummy recipes to choose from. But I couldn't resist the pretzels. I love stadium pretzels and these looked so good. I was going to make some mustard dip to serve with them but have been very unmotivated lately...especially with my blogging. So we are eating them plain. They are good. And so easy too. I was shocked at how much they taste like the real thing.

Pretzels
Makes about 12 medium pretzels.

1 package active dry yeast
1/8 cup warm water
1 1/3 cups warm water
1/3 cup light brown sugar
5 cups flour
6 cups water (for boiling)
12 Tbsp. baking soda
lots of coarse or kosher salt

Preheat oven to 475°F.
Sprinkle 2 baking sheets with coarse or kosher salt and set aside.
In a mixing bowl, dissolve yeast in 1/8 cup warm water.
Stir in remaining 1 1/3 cups warm water, brown sugar, and flour.
Mix until smooth, then knead dough (with the kneading attachment on your mixer or by hand on a floured surface) until smooth and elastic (about 3 minutes).
In a wide saucepan, boil the water with baking soda.
Divide the dough and start rolling the pieces like a pencil. Shape as desired.

Gently lower pretzels into boiling water (we did two at a time) and let cook for about 20 seconds or until dough is slightly yellow in color.

Remove pretzel with a slotted spoon and place on salted baking sheet. Sprinkle with salt, and bake for 8-10 minutes.

Thanks for the delicious recipe my fellow Taste & Create partner. I am also going to have to try that poundcake that I had a hard time passing up too. It sure looks like a diet killer and I just couldn't do that one since I have been a good girl and working out all week. But I will someday soon.

My VERY late Taste and Create

I need to apologize to Eat Me, Delicious. I am sorry for my tardiness for Taste & Create. I had such a hard time picking something to make from your delicious blog (I enjoyed your blog with all the pictures of your cat. We are big kitty lovers here and yours is adorable). There were so many potential choices that I wanted to make and narrowing down my pick was difficult. I have numerous bookmarked to make in the future. I actually did bake my selection on time but I didn't get around to posting it last week.

In the end I chose the Cinnamon Swirl Buttermilk Pound Cake. This is one fantastic recipe. I am a sucker for poundcake. But this specific poundcake is the absolute best I have ever tasted. Seriously. It was that good. It may not look like anything from my picture but we finished every last crumb. Please check out the link above for what the bundt cake should look like. Her cake looks wonderful and beautiful. Mine not so much!

I obviously didn't follow the recipe and tried to remove it from the pan way before it was ready to come out. I had to get my son to T-Ball practice and was rushing around. I tried to get it un-molded almost immediately upon taking it out of the oven. Big mistake. Huge. The cake came apart into numerous pieces. At the end of the day it really didn't matter though. It was so DELICIOUS! The boys loved it and my husband and I couldn't leave it alone. I will be making this one for my dad who is a poundcake hound as well.

Here is the recipe:

Cinnamon Swirl Buttermilk Pound Cake

Makes one 10 inch bundt cake, serving 12

Cinnamon Streusel Swir
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1/3 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
pinch of salt
3 tbsp unsalted butter, melted

Buttermilk Pound Cake
2 cups all purpose flour
1/2 cup cake flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/8 tsp ground cinnamon
1 cup unsalted butter, softened
2 cups granulated sugar
3 large eggs
2 tsp vanilla
1 tsp finely grated orange zest
1 cup buttermilk

1. Position a rack in the center of the oven and preheat the oven to 325F. Grease the inside of a 10 inch Bundt pan. Dust the pan with flour.

Make the Cinnamon Swirl:
2. In a small bowl, whisk together the flour, brown sugar, cinnamon, and salt, breaking up any large lumps of brown sugar. Add the melted butter and stir until blended and crumbly. Make the Pound Cake
3. Sift together the flours, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon into a medium bowl. Whisk to combine, and set aside.
4. In the bowl of an electric mixer, using the paddle attachment, beat the butter at medium speed until very creamy, about 2 minutes. Gradually add the sugar and beat at medium-high speed until well blended and light, about 4 minutes. At medium speed, add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition and scraping down the sides of the bowl as necessary. Beat in the vanilla extract and orange zest. At low speed, add the dry ingredients in three additions, alternating with the buttermilk in two additions and mixing just until combined.
5. Scrape half of the batter into the prepared pan and smooth it into an even layer. Sprinkle the streusel mixture evenly over the batter. Scrape the remaining batter on top and smooth it into an even layer.
6. Bake the cake for 65 to 75 minutes, until a cake tester inserted into the center comes out clean. Cool the cake in the pan on a wire rack for 15 minutes (obviously this is so important!!).
7. Invert the cake onto the rack and cool completely.

Lucky Chicken - Taste & Create

This was my second round of participating in Taste & Create. I was paired up with Fun Foods on a Budget. I enjoyed reading Stephanie's blog while searching for a recipe and laughed when I read that she considers herself "an extreme tightwad". I should take some lessons. There are some really good things on her blog that I have bookmarked and am going to make.

In choosing my choice for T&C I simply couldn't get past the Lucky Chicken. I love Chinese food was excited to make this. And we need a little luck at our house. The. recipe. did. not. disappoint. This was phenomenal! A taste sensation and so much better than any Chinese carryout that I have ever ate in my life. After looking at the recipe and the ingredients I thought that it would take like chicken in BBQ sauce. WRONG! It tastes exactly like sweet/sour chicken. And it is super easy. Especially since I chopped up the ingredients the night before for lunch today.

Here is the recipe:

Ingredients:

1 lb. boneless chicken breast, cut into chunks
1/2 cup flour with salt and pepper to taste
2 Tbsp Oil (for cooking)
1/2 cup celery, chopped
1/2 cup green pepper, sliced
1/2 cup onion, chopped
1 Tbsp melted butter
2 Tbsp packed brown sugar
1/2 cup ketchup

Directions:
Dredge chicken in flour and coat completely.
In large hot pan heat oil and brown chicken. Add vegetables.
Mix melted butter, brown sugar, and ketchup and add to chicken and vegetables.
Cover and simmer for 30 minutes, stirring occasionally.

Serve over steamed or fried rice.

The only modification that I did was to add 20 oz. of chicken and added just a heaping 1/2 cup of onion, green pepper and celery and thinly sliced carrots sticks. And I also added about 1/4 cup of dry roasted peanuts to the dish a couple of minutes before removing it from the heat. I served it over white rice with chow mein noodles.

This is a keeper and I have a feeling it will be made over and over again in our house. The Hubster thought that it was as good as I did. Next time I have a craving for Chinese I will be making this easy peasy recipe. Thanks Stephanie and your husband, Jeff!

Now the only question that begs an answer......does this chicken have enough lucky power to help us win Powerball tonight? We'll see.

Spicy Crab Chowder - Taste and Create

I decided to participate in another cooking/blogging activity this month. This event intrigued me because after you get paired up with another blogger, you pick something from their blog to cook/bake. And vice versa....How fun!

I was paired up with LK from Healthy Delicious. She has numerous healthy food recipes on her blog. I did have a hard time deciding between the crab chowder and the Thai Noodles with Shrimp.

In the end I decided on the chowder. I love soups and unfortunately last week it was still a bit chilly....I thought that it would make a good dinner. It was!

Spicy Crab Chowder

INGREDIENTS:
1 T. olive oil
1 T. butter
1 large potato, cubed
1 onion, chopped
2 ribs celery, chopped
1/2 red pepper, chopped
bay leaf
old bay
cayanne
3 T. flour
1/4 c. sherry
3 c. chicken broth (I used fat free, reduced sodium)
1 can lump crab (I used a package, not sure of the oz. I don't think that it matters though. The more crab the better, in my opinion)
1 can shredded crab (Again, I used a package (actually 2), the more the better)
1 bag frozen sweet corn
3 c. FF half and half

DIRECTIONS:
1. Heat oil and butter in a large pot.
2. Add vegetables, bay leaf and spices to taste. Cook until soft, about 5 minutes.
3. Add flour, and stir to coat. Cook about 1 minute.
4. Add sherry. Cook about 2 minutes.
5. Add chicken broth, crab, and corn. Bring to a boil. Reduce and let simmer about 5 minutes.
6. Add half and half, and cook another minute or two to thicken.
7. Season with more old bay and cayanne.

YIELD:
Makes 10 bowls full.

Thanks LK for the delicious chowder. I think that I am really going to have to try those thai noodles some day too. I can't wait to see what you choose to make from my blog. I certainly do not cook as healthy as you!