Food Archives - Yearning to Create

Rainbow Jello

My kids (and husband!) absolutely love this jello, but it takes a bit of time (like a day, but don’t worry, the fridge does half the work!) so I usually only make it for special occasions – like Easter or ward potluck dinners.

Choose your jello colours and get two small boxes of each flavour. I went with raspberry, peach, lemon, lime and blue – what is that, wild berry? In the past I’ve used a larger box and split it . . . but this seems like an easier method so here goes:

Make your first layer of jello!

Use 1 cup of boiling water and dissolve one box of jello powder. Then add 1/2 cup cold water. Pour it into your container and then pop it into the fridge. This is when you hope your fridge is level because you want your layers to be even! My fridge is not level yet (my guy apologized later for that and says he’ll level it up for me!) so I stuck a spoon under one side of my pan to make the jello sit evenly.

With the first layer chilling in the fridge, make your second layer:

Again, dissolve your jello powder from one small box into one cup of boiling water. Then add sour cream – I just did about two/three heaping spoonfuls. The whisk works nicely to break up the sour cream. Let this start cooling on your counter until the first layer in the fridge is good and solid – about half an hour. Then carefully pour the second layer onto the first. You must be careful that the warm second layer doesn’t break up the freshly set first layer. I actually pour it slowly into a spoon and let it diffuse out – moving the spoon location.

And then you just start over. Make the third layer while the second is chilling. Note here: I used peach because it’s what I had on hand, but I think orange would be a more vibrant colour. My sour cream peach layer looked a little washed out.

So this jello takes awhile but you can go off and do other things between layers. I like to have it all done a day before it’s needed for the dinner just so those layers will not melt into each other or all over the plate once it starts getting dished out.

While I was doing this, my guy and some of our girls were outside starting to build us a deck!!!

I enjoyed watching their progress through my kitchen windows.

Just before Easter Dinner, Jo made some whipped cream and spread it over the jello – gotta have clouds with our rainbow!

The light shining through the jello cups looked so pretty.

They were a special delivery for someone else!

Here’s the 9 x 13 Rainbow Jello all finished and ready to be transported to our family Easter dinner.

Here’s the Rainbow Jello after the family Easter dinner!

One piece left for me to take a close-up picture of!

And how was the deck progress?

They got the lower level all sheeted, and completed the rest of it on Easter Monday – took three days total. Next: duradeck and railings and stairs . . .

Good job everyone!!!

Banana Cake

I love bananas because they force me to bake something yummy once in a while (or I can throw them in the freezer until I’m ready to deal with them)! This banana cake recipe came from my friend Tammy and I absolutely love it. The cake is light and the icing is fabulous!

I also love the blue star plate that I got in Target a while back. It’s my tribute today to my American friends – Happy 4th of July!

Banana Cake

1/2 cup butter or margarine

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp. baking soda dissolved in 4 tbsp hot water

1 cup mashed bananas (I use 3)

2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

2 cups flour

Cream butter and sugar. Add eggs. Mix soda and water and add to mashed bananas. Mix dry ingredients together. Alternate dry and wet ingredients. (Or if you’re like me and have a Bosch, mix all your wet ingredients and then throw in all your dry ingredients.)

Bake at 350 for 25-35 minutes in a 9×13 pan.

Icing (I double it!)

1/4 cup butter

1/2 cup brown sugar

2 tbsp milk

3/4 cup icing sugar

Melt butter – add sugar and milk. Remove from heat and add icing sugar.

Pour over your cake when it comes out of the oven.

Oh doesn’t that look delicious?

I recently used the cake recipe without the icing and made it into banana bread. I used two tin foil loaf pans and it worked wonderfully. Loaves seem to cook more evenly when they’re baked in tin foil pans – and it’s so much easier to get the loaf out of the pan when your pan is flexible! Next time I might throw in some chocolate chips, or chopped walnuts, or coconut too!

Yup, sure do love bananas!

Campfire Dessert – Roasted Strawberries

Okay all you happy campers out there – I have to share this campfire treat that is so much better than marshmallows (and I love me a few marshmallows burned over a campfire!).

We were at Young Women Beehive camp last week and roasted wieners wrapped in Pillsbury dough strips for dinner. I thought they tasted so much better than regular hot dogs! Anyway, we had lots of strips of dough left over, so Sis. F. went and got the strawberries we were going to have for breakfast, and invented this:

Strawberries wrapped in dough and roasted over the fire. They were soooo delicious! They best way I can describe it would be: it tastes like a little bite of warm strawberry pie on a stick. You have got to try this!!!

When I went camping with my family a few days later, we made them too.

Here’s how to create these tasty morsels:

Cut your dough in strips (ignore the Pillsbury lines in the dough). I believe it was the Crescent Rolls we used. Wrap your strawberry well. We learned a few tips as we went along:

– strawberries like to turn on the stick as they get heated, so use some dough to anchor the top and bottom of each strawberry to the stick.

– pinch the ends of your dough to other dough on your strawberry, or it may unwrap as it cooks.

Roasting time depends on how hot your fire is, or how high you hold it. But it cooks pretty quickly. Once the dough isn’t doughy, it’s done!

Give it a moment to cool down and then enjoy!!!

And if you don’t have dough, even just plain roasted strawberries was delicious. And so are grapes, and pickles – just not together! We found these dollar store sticks worked best for the strawberries because you could easily bend the wire ends to fit your strawberry. Having it anchored on two sides was so much better for roasting, but a little trickier to wrap the dough around.I love a little charcoal on my campfire cooking!

If you weren’t a happy camper before, you will be now!!!

Or maybe you don’t have to camp at all – backyard fire pits are perfect for roasting these beauties too! Enjoy!!!

(Edited to add: This year we discovered that roasted cherries are delicious too – either with the pit, or not. My guy liked to cut a cherry in half and remove the pit then embed it inside a marshmallow, and roast it that way. The somewhat sour cooked cherry mixed with the sweet marshmallow was a fantastic flavour combination.

Another new treat was roasted mandarin orange segments. They don’t need long over the fire but the outside turned crisp, and the inside tasted like sweet warm thick juice. Let it cool down a minute before you bite into its deliciousness!)

Black Forest in a Bowl

This is one of our families all time favourite desserts. And I love it because it’s easy – kids can help!!! And you can make it as big or small as you need so it’s great for feeding a crowd.

All you need are these four ingredients.

And you don’t need this much whipping cream. It was nearing expiry date and I needed to use it – so we just made our Black Forest a little more creamy than usual.

Bake your chocolate cake – we often do this the night before. And you don’t need to grease your pan or anything either.

Have one of your children rip apart the cooled cake into bite size chunks and line all the edges of your bowl. We’re using the lovely huge stainless steel bowl – the one that got dented when Lee used it as a toboggan!

You’ll notice we still have some cake left in the pan once all the bowl edges are lined. We’ll use that later, or eat it!

Make one package of instant chocolate pudding.

Have another kid whip up the whipping cream.

The first batch of chocolate pudding gets poured on top of all the chocolate cake. I find it easier to pour in before the pudding has set too much. Let it set in the pan between chunks of cake.

We put a layer of whipped cream over the pudding because we had all that whipping cream, but usually we don’t – tastes great either way. Now find another kid to spread the cherry pie filling over all the whipped cream. (Lee noticed that her dress matches the dessert!)

And find another kid to rip up the rest of the chocolate cake and throw it in on top of the cherries.

This helps fill up the hole in the middle of the bowl.

Now for the final package of chocolate pudding poured over top of the new layer of cake.

And the rest of the whipped cream goes on top. We added a few chocolate shavings. Cherries also look lovely on top.

We fed twelve people on Fathers’ Day and used just over half the bowl – and they were pretty generous portions. The leftovers tasted great the next day, so no worries!!!

We also love the vanilla version – white cake, vanilla pudding, banana slices, whipped cream and Skor bits. Give them both a try!

Chocolate Pretzel Treats

End of school rolls around and suddenly I have three kids who need treats for the parties they’re having in their band classes. Why couldn’t they play the instruments that are assigned to bring a bag of chips?

Then, suddenly, I remembered something wonderful!!! I remembered that I had pinned something on Pinterest that would be perfect for class parties. You can check that post out here at How Does She. And you really should check it out because she uses Rolos instead of Macaroons and has other yummy ideas too.

The first step is to find a slave willing helper to place all the pretzels on the cookie sheet.

Next you’ll want to give your baby a pretzel so she doesn’t grab some from the perfectly placed pretzel platter. (Skip this step if you don’t have a baby.)

Then you place a chocolate of your choice on each pretzel. Notice I have two different kinds of Macaroons. The light coloured ones I bought but then ran out. So I had to raid my food storage stash where I happen to have a case or two of Macaroons (must have comfort food in storage, and nothing is more comforting than chocolate and coconut!!!).

Okay, this should be the first step – set your oven clock to 8:29 and your oven temperature to 350 degrees. You’re gonna pop these trays in the oven for about three minutes – just enough time to get the chocolate soft, but not completely melted. To save energy, I suggest you might want to do this when you’re baking something else, or you could put them out in the sun if it’s hot out – hey, a new camping recipe!!!

Gather your slaves troops to press the peanut M&M’s into the chocolate while it’s all soft and pliable.

Work fast as they cool down pretty quickly.

You could press anything on top – peanuts, almonds, skittles, smarties, gummy bears, radishes, jujubes, peas, marshmallows, etc. Do specific colours to match special occasions (like Valentine colours Smarties for Valentines Day). Oh the possibilities!!!

Aren’t they cute? And they’re delicious eaten warm or cold. I love the little bit of saltiness from the pretzels mixed with all the sweets.

Now I know what you’re wondering: how did the kids like them at the band parties? Well, Lee reported that they were the biggest hit at the grade 7 party. Min said the kids in the high school band would skeptically ask what they were. After she explained and they tried one, they kept wanting more!

Now here is the rule: You’re welcome to make these for your kids’ parties too unless I have a kid in your kids class. If that’s the case, sorry, but you’ll have to come up with your own treat!!!

Now, once again, I know what you’re wondering: that’s only two band parties, I thought you had three parties that needed treats? Well you’re right, but Jo needed a gluten free treat. But not to worry – I had another pin on Pinterest!!! This one was called Peanut Butter Corn Chip No Bake Cookies. I forgot to take pictures but you can check that out here at Skip To My Lou. Mmmm – so good!

Spaghetti Dogs

Can this really be me doing a post about food? Well, this one intrigued me. I saw a picture of this in blogworld (before Pinterest so I don’t remember who to give the credit to – sorry) and wondered how in the world they got the noodles through the wiener. I was so eager to find out how they did it that I didn’t really stop to think about it – just sped read the blog to figure it out. And then I must admit that I felt a little silly!!!

Do you have it figured out?

Looks kinda scary eh?

Okay, I know you’re all smarter than I was! Here we have the wieners and noodles cooking together in the pot. And here’s the way they looked just before going in the pot.

I broke my noodles in half, but if you want them to look more like squid, leave them whole. I shoved four noodles through each wiener.

Here’s another tip: don’t get distracted while you’re cooking them. I over cooked mine a bit which made the noodles pretty soft, so some of them were breaking off at the point where they came out of the wiener.

So since the wieners are already meat (yeah, right!), I just made up some meatless spaghetti sauce to serve with our spaghetti dogs.

So, go ahead and cook it for your family and see if they can figure it out!

Western Surprise (Rice and Wiener Dish)

I invented a recipe!!! Well, sort of. It’s a combination of something my mom used to make called Western Surprise, and something I found online. And it actually turned out pretty good. Probably still need to tweak the recipe a bit so don’t blame me if you make it and it doesn’t work!

My family loves to eat rice. After spending two years in Korea and eating rice every day, you’d think my guy would be tired of it, but no. And with a gluten free daughter, rice dishes work well for us.

Hope you can read my writing – I just didn’t feel like retyping it!

I guess the first line should say “1 package wieners – thinly sliced” – I don’t think you can find a package of thinly sliced wieners!

The part I like best about this is the “throw it in a pot and let it do it’s thing”. I’m so lazy in the kitchen!

And they all liked it!!! (That orange thing looks like a piece of carrot – don’t think I put any carrots in, but you could throw in anything else you wish. Just remember, if it’s dried, you may need to add a little more water to allow for reconstitution.)

There’s my Mac in pony tails for the first time – kicking back enjoying her lunch, dog waiting for crumbs to fall and sick sister on the couch in the background. A typical day!

Corn Chowder

This is seriously one of the best soups ever!!! Our family loves it so much that it is even requested for birthday dinners sometimes, along with the best ever corn bread that you can read about here.

Corn Chowder

4 slices of diced bacon

1 medium chopped onion

1 can of corn

1 1/2 cups diced raw potato

1 can Cream of Mushroom soup

3 cups milk

1/2 tsp salt

1/8 tsp pepper

Saute bacon and onion together in a large pot until cooked. Drain excess bacon grease.

Add everything else and bring to a boil. Cover and simmer until potato is cooked, but stir it once in a while!

That is the basic recipe, but I usually quadruple it. For example, we use a whole package of bacon, and way more potatoes. We go through so much milk so if I can use something else in cooking, I do. So I usually cook it all in water and then add some cream at the end to make it creamy. I like it even better with the cream than with the milk.

I hear it’s supposed to rain and snow again this week. This will be the perfect meal for that day – and I hope it’s just one day! I always love to hear the happy sounds my kids make when they read Corn Chowder on the menu board (read about that here).

Best Johnny Cake Ever (and Gluten Free)

I love Corn Bread and this is one of my very favourite recipes because it’s so moist. Corn bread can be rather dry at times!

Here it is before going in the oven.

Wow! Corn bread with corn in it!

(Just wondering, why is corn bread often called Johnny Cake?)

Johnny Cake

Mix together:

2 cups corn meal

2 tsp Baking Powder

1 tsp Baking Soda

1 tsp Salt

Stir in 4 eggs.

Then dump in:

2 cups Sour Cream

1 can Cream Style Corn

1/2 cup oil

Mix it all up well and pour it into a 9×13 pan. Bake at 400 for 25 minutes – or until it looks like this . . .

I usually make corn bread when we’re having soup for dinner, and hope there’s some leftover for lunch the next day. It’s especially great for my daughter who needs GF food.

If you’ve never had Johnny Cake before, I like to slice it horizontally through the middle so I have two thin slices. If I’m eating it with soup I just butter it, but if I want it as a treat I’ll put honey or jam or pancake syrup on it too (butter and honey being my first choice!). And of course you’ll want to eat it warm!

Update: I googled it and learned that they were also called journey cakes because they could be carried on long trips in saddlebags and baked along the way. Some historians think that they were originally called Shawnee cakes and that the colonists slurred the words, pronouncing it as johnny cakes.

Hamburger Casserole

Here’s a casserole that our family enjoys. This dish is called Hamburger Casserole – very original name I must say!

I know you’re wondering why I’m making two.

Well, the smaller dish contains gluten free noodles for my Jo.

And the larger dish contains the cheaper noodles for the rest of the family.

I’ll give you the exact recipe – which I never follow. I just throw things in and hope for the best. I think I used too many noodles this time – not that the little kids would complain. They’d be happy with only noodles to eat!

Hamburger Casserole

2 cups cooked small egg noodles – spread in bottom of casserole dish

1 lb. ground beef – scramble fry until brown, drain grease

– add the following five ingredients and simmer gently for 15 minutes

1 cup chopped onion

1/4 tsp. garlic powder (or minced garlic clove)

2 – 7 1/2 oz. cans of Tomato sauce

1 tsp. salt

1/2 tsp. pepper

– pour meat mixture over noodles in casserole dish

1 cup sour cream – spread over meat, smoothing level

1 cup cottage cheese – spread over sour cream layer