Category Archives: things we like to eat

Blueberry Cobbler Bars

Posted in sweets, things we like to eat by

My Daughter and I Blueberry Cobbler Bars (photo 12)

Hey, Happy Day-After-Memorial Day. I hope you are enjoying the long weekend. Travis is home for the summer from college and Alex came home for the weekend- it’s so nice to have all three kids home. We had a fun BBQ to attend Sunday for a friend’s son who enlisted in the Marine’s reserve program. Wow! How exciting! Yesterday we had a pool party to attend, I love weekends like that. Tons of delicious food and hanging out with good friends!

This recipe is great for a BBQ or pool party. It’s hearty and can be served just on napkins- no fork required. Unless you serve it with ice cream or whipped cream! I was in charge of dessert for Bible study the other night and wanted to try something new. I had just picked up some blueberries from the store so that was my inspiration. I also had a pint of fresh blueberry jam that someone had given me, so I was set. I basically just changed up my raspberry bar recipe a bit and voila – blueberry cobbler bars.

My Daughter and I Blueberry Cobbler Bars (photo 22)

I doubled the recipe and put it in a 9×13″ pan. It made it a bit difficult/messy to mix up the ingredients in the mixer, so I would probably do that a bit differently if I wanted to double the recipe again. However, the finished results were delicious and a bit unusual with the jam and fresh berries and the hearty crumble topping. The recipe below is for a single 8″ square pan recipe.

Blueberry Cobbler Bars

2 sticks butter, softened
2 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup light brown sugar
1 cup old fashioned oats, or rolled oats
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 egg, beaten
1/2 cup blueberry jam
1 generous cup fresh blueberries

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Butter an 8-inch square baking pan. I just used the excess butter leftover on the butter wrapping, and smeared it around or spray with cooking spray.

Add the flour, both sugars, oats and salt to a bowl in your stand mixer. Add in the butter and egg and beat at low speed. Stop the machine and scrape the bowl down a couple of times. Keep processing until the mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Keep 2 cups crumb mixture aside.

Press the remaining crumb mixture on the bottom the prepared pan. Spread the Blueberry jam over the top of the crust and then sprinkle the fresh blueberries over that. Crumble the rest of the oat mixture over the blueberries.

Bake until lightly browned, 45 to 50 minutes. Cool completely before cutting into bars.

We served ours with a bit of whipped cream, but it would be great with ice cream or just on its own.

Cindy

Kale Salad with Man Candy and Roasted Tomato Bruschetta

Posted in extras, salads, side dishes, things we like to eat by

kale salad with roasted bruschetta 1 - My Daughter and I

Hey there,
Well we’ve been a bit distracted around here by fires burning all around us. It’s hard to get anything done when you’re constantly checking the news, Ham radio, responding to sweet phone calls and texts etc. So I completely forgot to do Monday’s post. Here it is a bit late-

Several weeks back, after dropping Travis off at school, Jordan and I had an epic food afternoon. First we stopped at this amazing bakery called SweetItaly (their website must be brand new, but the address and phone number are at the bottom) and had a cannoli and an eclair. They were both delicious and worth the drive to Point Loma. Not only were the desserts delicious, but the atmosphere was great – we felt like we had been transported to Italy. Needless to say, we plan to visit that bakery again.

So onto the main course. We headed to Liberty Station to see if we could find some dinner. I know weird – we ate dessert first. Ok, really it’s not that weird for us! We found this cute place called The Fig Tree Cafe. It was adorable. We both loved the interesting decor. We were there a bit early so we had the inside to ourselves. Several people were outside enjoying the patio. We decided to split the kale salad and split the bruschetta- it was the perfect amount of food. The kale salad had something called man candy on it. It is bacon that is cooked with brown sugar and cayenne pepper. I knew we had to try this at home (if nothing else because of the name. I mean, come on- how could you not want to know more?? ;)) It also had a light vinaigrette dressing on it that was just delicious and perfect with the other flavors. The roasted tomatoes on the bruschetta were so sweet and flavorful – it was just an amazing meal. Normally I don’t dream of salads and roasted tomatoes, but have been dreaming of this meal and was excited to recreate it at home. So below is my version of that incredible meal. I hope you enjoy it as much as we did. This recipe was enough for two of us for lunch. We gobbled up the leftover man candy after we finished our salads.

kale salad with roasted bruschetta 2 - My Daughter and I

Kale Salad with Man Candy Bacon
Kale, washed and torn into bite sized pieces – approximately 4 cups
4 to 6 slices of man candy, recipe below
1 green apple, thinly sliced
1/8 -1/4 cup Manchego cheese, thinly sliced. Manchego is a slightly sharp sheep’s milk cheese. If you can’t find it, I would substitute fresh Parmesan, sliced.
Citrus vinaigrette dressing, recipe below.

Wash and tear kale and put into a medium sized bowl.

Start cooking bacon. Put slices into skillet and cook over medium heat until one side is completely cooked. Flip bacon over and top with brown sugar, cayenne pepper combo. I just mixed 1/4 cup brown sugar with 1/4 to 1/2 tsp. cayenne pepper. Using a teaspoon I carefully coated the top/cooked side of the bacon. I continued to cook the bacon, not turning it again. Remove from pan and place on a plate until you’re ready to use it.

While bacon is cooking, slice apple and cheese. Prepare citrus vinaigrette dressing. Once all the elements are ready, toss kale with dressing and serve onto two plates or in two bowls. Top with chopped man candy, sliced apples, sliced cheese. Enjoy!

Citrus vinaigrette dressing
2 tablespoons fresh squeezed orange juice
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
2 tablespoons honey
2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
Salt & pepper to taste

Mix all ingredients together in a jar and shake to mix.

kale salad with roasted bruschetta 3 - My Daughter and I

So the second part of our delicious meal was the roasted tomato bruschetta. When you roast tomatoes they get so sweet and wonderful, but I don’t like to overcook them. They tend to get sort of mushy. With the toasted french bread this was a wonderful addition to our salad lunch.

Roasted tomato bruschetta
4 slices French bread
1 pint grape tomatoes
1 T olive oil
1 tsp. minced garlic
A bit of salt
Basil
Balsamic vinegar

Wash and slice tomatoes. Put into oven safe pan. Add olive oil, garlic and salt and mix well. Cook at 450* for about 10 to 15 minutes until tomatoes soften and sort of pop. Stir and check frequently.

Remove from oven and add about 1 -2 T fresh chopped basil and about 1 T balsamic vinegar. Give it one more quick stir. Serve immediately over freshly toasted, warm fresh bread.

To prepare the French bread, slice 4 thick hunks of french bread from a loaf. I just picked mine up at Walmart, nothing fancy. Mist with a bit of olive oil and put in oven or toaster over until just slightly crisp. You don’t want this to be hard and crunchy- it will be too difficult to eat. Just watch carefully as it is toasting.

Top with the fresh tomato bruschetta mixture along with additional fresh basil if desired and a bit of fresh Parmesan shavings.

This was wonderful with our salad, but would have been a great appetizer on its own.

Cindy & Jordan 

Oatmeal Cookies with Raisins, White Chocolate Chips and Macadamia Nuts

Posted in sweets, things we like to eat by

loaded oatmeal cookies 1- My Daughter and I

The other day I was walking around Target and saw a bag of white chocolate chips and decided I wanted to bake something. I’m not a huge fan of white chocolate, but for some reason paired with oatmeal, I thought it would be delicious. It was! I experimented with several different recipes and ended up with a yummy cookie that was a little unusual. I loved how the cookie held it’s shape, I think that was due to all the chunks of extra goodies!

Loaded oatmeal cookies 2- My Daughter and I

Oatmeal Cookies with Raisins, White Chocolate Chips and Macadamia Nuts

Ingredients
2 sticks unsalted butter, softened
2/3 cup granulated sugar
2/3 cup packed light brown sugar
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 cups rolled oats
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon salt
2 cups white chocolate chips
1 cup raisins
1/2 cup macadamia nuts, chopped

Directions:
Beat the butter, granulated sugar and brown sugar in a bowl with a mixer on medium speed until fluffy. Add the egg and vanilla; beat.

Whisk the flour, rolled oats, baking soda, cinnamon and salt in a bowl. Add to the butter mixture and beat until just combined. Stir in the white chocolate chips and raisins.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Scoop rounded tablespoons of dough and place on parchment-lined baking sheets about 2 inches apart. Bake until the cookies are golden on the bottom, 12 to 15 minutes. Cool on the baking sheets, 10 minutes, then transfer to racks to finish cooling.

Cindy

Chocolate Espresso Mousse

Posted in sweets, things we like to eat by

Chocolate Espresso Mousse 1 - My Daughter and I

Hey there – happy Monday. Have I got a delicious and easy dessert for you. Jordan whipped up this chocolate espresso mousse on Saturday afternoon as a special Mother’s Day treat for me. It took minutes to put together and as chocolate mousse goes, this was relatively healthy. The finished product turned out creamy, rich and super delicious.

The original recipe called for agave syrup which we substituted with equal measurement honey. It also called for sea salt, which we omitted. We also doubled the espresso powder, which I would do again. Since I love anything coffee!

Chocolate Espresso Mousse 2 - My Daughter and I

Chocolate Espresso Mousse
8  &  1/2 ounces  roughly chopped bittersweet chocolate
1 1/2 cups  2% milk
1/2 teaspoon  instant espresso powder
2 egg yolks
3 tablespoons honey
8 ounces  light silken tofu

Place chocolate in a blender. In a medium saucepan, combine milk, instant espresso powder, egg yolks, honey and bring to a simmer over low heat. Cook, whisking constantly, until slightly thickened, about 5 minutes, then pour mixture into blender to melt chocolate. Add silken tofu and blend until smooth. Pour mousse into eight small ramekins. Chill 2 hours and serve cold, garnished with low-fat plain Greek yogurt or a dollop of whipped cream, if desired.

Cindy & Jordan

Colorful Stuffed Bell Peppers

Posted in main dishes, side dishes, things we like to eat by

Colorful Stuffed Bell Peppers 1- My Daughter and I

Hey! I made this delicious and simple recipe to celebrate Cinco de Mayo. Not a holiday I normally celebrate, but really, if there is a holiday that encourages the consumption of beer, chips, salsa and guacamole – count me in!

I had just bought a bag of red, yellow and orange peppers from Costco and thought this would be a delicious meal. The meat filling I used was basically the same filling you would use for tacos or burritos, but I added some cooked brown rice. Jordan said that she thought it was a great alternative to burritos. Donald loved it and said how much he enjoyed the peppers. He remembers when he was a kid his mom would make stuffed peppers using green bell peppers and how bitter they were. These were delicious and sweet and I ate the whole pepper.

Served with a salad and some fruit, it was delicious, hearty and colorful.

Colorful Stuffed Bell Peppers 2- My Daughter and I

Stuffed Bell Peppers
1 pound ground beef
2 cups brown rice, cooked
1 onion, chopped
1 can beans. I used chili beans, so I didn’t drain them. If using black beans, I would drain and rinse.
1 T Taco seasoning
1 can Ro-tel tomatoes
6 – 8 bell peppers. I would highly recommend not using green
1/3 cup shredded cheese
Avocado slices for garnish

Cook ground beef and drain fat if necessary. Put ground beef back into skillet and add in chopped onion and cook until soft. Add cooked rice, taco seasoning canned beans and Ro-tel tomatoes. If the meat mixture is too dry add a bit more prepared salsa. You want the mixture nice and moist since you will be baking it for about 30 minutes.

While meat mixture is simmering start working on your peppers. Wash and cut each pepper in half and clean out the seeds and stuff, so you have a colorful little bowl. Place on a baking pan. Stuff with the meat filling and bake at 350* for about 20 minutes. I wanted the peppers to soften a bit, but I wanted them to stay a bit crunchy. After about 20 minutes, sprinkle with a small amount of cheese and continue baking for another 5 or so minutes. Remove from oven a serve immediately. We garnished ours with sliced avocado and Cotija cheese. Mmmm, delicious!

Cindy