Sugar Cookies

Sugar cookies are one of the best cookies. And this recipe IS the best sugar cookie recipe ever. Anyone who eats these loves them. I made them for O.E. (Outdoor Education, where the high school students go to a village for 2 weeks) and I’m hoping they like them. This recipe comes from my great friend, Hannah Harper at http://createdwithjoy.weebly.com/ Here is the link to the sugar cookies,  http://createdwithjoy.weebly.com/3/post/2012/06/sugar-cookies.html. Thank you so much, Hannah, for letting me put this on!!! Here it is!

        Sugar Cookies

½ cup butter, softened
¾ cup sugar
1 egg
2 teaspoons vanilla
1½ cups sifted flour (to give it a light texture)
¼ teaspoon salt

·         Cream butter and sugar together. Mix in egg and vanilla, then add flour and salt gradually and stir until well mixed.

·         If you want to use a cookie cutter, put it in the fridge for 30 minutes. Otherwise, use a spoon and drop little dollops of dough onto the baking sheet.

·         Preheat the oven to 180C (350F).

·         Bake in a preheated oven at for 10-15 minutes. 

Substitute for..... Buttermilk

You can’t get buttermilk here (at least I don’t think so). I’ve never really needed buttermilk ‘til I found the great blog http://sweetpeaskitchen.com/. She has a couple of recipes I’ve needed buttermilk for. And each recipe has turned out great. It’s so simple to do this. My mom says this is what you do (no idea where it came from). So here is the sub.

        Substitute for….. Buttermilk

For 1 cup: Pour 1 cup milk into a measuring cup or whatever and add ½ Tablespoon cuka (Indonesian vinegar).  If you are in Indonesia and have the vinegar/water mixture, add 1 Tablespoon of that to the milk.  If you are in America... add 1 Tablespoon of normal vinegar.  Mix together and use. That’s it. 

Oops!

 Sorry for the extra emails or any confusion.  Some things accidentally posted while I was working on them.  The buttermilk substitute is coming soon (in the next day or so).  The Apple Sweet Bread won't post until this Fall with other apple recipes!  You'll have to stay tuned for that one!  Thanks for following my blog! -Abrielle Lindsay

Esquites (Mexican Corn)

This recipe is pretty good even though I didn’t like it much when I first had it. Bu the second time, it was awesome. We had friends over and one of them had to have this recipe. We got it from Buns in my Oven,http://www.bunsinmyoven.com/2012/08/21/esquites/ Here is what we did.

        Esquites (Mexican Corn)

5 ears corn on the cob

¼ cup butter

1 clove garlic, finely minced

1 Tablespoon mayo

1Tablespoon sour cream

juice of ½ lime

 ¼ cup feta, cheddar, Kraft, or whatever 

2 teaspoons chili powder (if using Indonesian chili powder, just a pinch or two)

salt and pepper

·         Slice the corn from the cob and set aside.

·         Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat and add the butter.

·         Once the butter is melted, add the corn to the skillet and stir once.

·         Let corn sit undisturbed for about 5 mins, or til’ corn starts browning on bottom. Stir again and let corn sit til’ it begins popping a bit and is charred.

·         Place corn in a medium bowl and add mayo, sour cream and remaining ingredients. Toss to coat.

Substitute for..... Heavy Cream

I’ve never been able to make anything that has heavy cream in it. Never. Pitiful, right? Then I want to make some kind of baked French toast. I look up a substitute for heavy cream. And here it is, just TWO things everyone is supposed to have. Here is where I got it from. http://lifehacker.com/5933953/substitute-butter-and-milk-for-heavy-cream. And here it is.

         Substitute for….. Heavy Cream

For 1 cup. All you do is mix ¾ cup milk with ¼ cup melted butter. Stir for a couple mins. That’s all. And then  cook with it.

Enchiladas

My whole family will eat Mexican. Even my little brother likes it, when he thinks lots of things are spicy and they aren’t. He says, ‘I’m gonna’ make the recipe.’ Which we think is hilarious of coarse (Baldwin sisters from the Waltons).  But we have enchiladas seldom because it takes AGES!! So it’s extra good when we have them. This is one of those recipes you kinda' change as you go. So you might not always do the exact measurements. Here is the recipe.

        Enchilada Sauce

1/3 cup oil

¼ cup flour

***1 Tablespoon chili powder***

1 (8oz) can tomato sauce

½ cup water

***¼ teaspoon cumin***

3 cloves garlic

¼ onion

salt to taste

        Enchiladas

chicken OR beef (cooked & shredded/ground)

½ cup sour cream

1 cup of mushroom or chicken soup

1 cup enchilada sauce

½ cup of cheese or more

extra enchilada sauce for the pan and the top

tortillas

more cheese for the top

·         ENCHILADA SAUCE: Heat oil in a skillet over medium-high heat. Stir in flour and chili powder (or Taco Seasoning), reduce heat to medium, and cook til’ lightly brown, stirring constantly to prevent burning flour.

·         Gradually stir in tomato sauce, water, cumin (if using a packet of Taco Seasoning, don't add anything), garlic, and onion into the flour mixture til’ smooth, and continue cooking over medium heat approximately 7 mins, or til’ thickened slightly. Season to taste with salt.

·         ENCHILADA: Mix all ingredients with the meat & stir. If needed add more sauce or soup.

·         Oil the bottom of the casserole dish (we use 9x13). Pour a little enchilada sauce in the bottom of the dish.

·         Spoon meat mixture into the tortillas and roll up and place in the casserole dish til’ the dish is full. Drizzle extra enchilada sauce on top. Then sprinkle with cheese.

·         Bake at 180C (350F) for 20- 30 minutes. 


      ***If you would rather this not be spicy, use one packet of Taco Seasoning.***

Substitute for..... Cream of Tartar/Baking Soda

Hello! This is the very first substitute. I will post them on Tuesdays. I am always searching for a substitute for almost anything. This one is about a substitute for baking soda/cream of tartar. Since we just got back from Bandung I discovered this trying to make something (I will post itJ). I searched and searched for cream of tartar. I couldn’t find any. So I searched on the internet for some kind of substitute. This said I could just use baking powder to substitute the baking soda and the cream of tartar. Cool, right? I thought it was since we had plenty of that. I got this from http://frugalliving.about.com /Cream-Of-Tartar-Substitute.htm. Here is the substitute.

        Substitute for….. Cream of Tartar/Baking Soda

Use 1 teaspoon baking powder for every 1/3 teaspoon of baking powder and 2/3 teaspoon cream of tartar. It’s ok if you go a little over. I did this and the recipe turned out fine, but don’t add a whole teaspoon more if it was all right

Oatmeal

  Ok, oatmeal is not one of my favorite foods. I’m just posting it because it is SO different then sticking some oats and water in the microwave. This is so much harder than that. So here it is.

       

        Oatmeal

Six cups water

Six cups oatmeal

2/3 cup palm sugar

1/3 cup white sugar

¼ block (1/4 cup) butter

1 cup milk
1 Tablespoon salt

·         Heat water til’ almost boiling.

·         Add sugar and butter and stir. Turn off the heat. Return lid to pot. Let sit til’ butter and sugar are melted and dissolved.

·         Then slowly add oatmeal one cup at a time. Stirring well between each cup. Add salt too and stir well.

·         Then add milk. Return lid and let sit til’ desired thickness. Maybe 5 mins.

Pumpkin Squares

This recipe is excellent. I brought it to my Bible study, a full 9x13, and I only had SIX small pieces when I got home. Everyone loved them. So I brought the six pieces back home and my family thought they were great too. I sprinkled sifted powdered sugar on top of the pumpkin squares when they were cut. All I did was add one more oz of pumpkin and used fresh pumpkin. Here’s the link to the original, http://allrecipes.com/recipe/pumpkin-squares/. And here’s what I did.

       Pumpkin Squares

4 eggs

1 cup olive oil

2 cups white sugar

2 cups fresh pumpkin puree

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons cinnamon

½ teaspoon ground cloves

½ teaspoon ground ginger

½ teaspoon ground nutmeg

1 teaspoon baking soda

2 teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons powder sugar, optional

·         Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease a 9x13 inch baking pan.

·         In a medium bowl, mix together the eggs, oil, sugar and pumpkin until smooth. Sift together the flour, cinnamon, cloves, ginger, nutmeg, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Stir into the pumpkin mixture.

·         Spread evenly into the prepared pan and bake for 25 to 30 minutes. The bars should spring back to the touch when done.