Homemade Strawberry Shortcake

Sooo good!

Cheri, Gail and I went to Bakesale Betty's, where we ate fried chicken sandwiches, and then we made strawberry shortcakes, inspired by the ones they sell at Bakesale Betty's:

Cheri put a lot of effort into the dough (ended up being more like a scone than a cake)!:




With sugar:


Here's the recipe Gail found (original here from Allrecipes.com):

• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/4 cup white sugar
• 4 teaspoons baking powder
• 3/4 teaspoon cream of tartar
• 1 cup butter
• 2/3 cup heavy cream
• 1 egg, beaten
• 3 cups sliced fresh strawberries
• 3 tablespoons white sugar

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).
2. In large bowl, mix flour, 1/4 cup sugar, baking powder and cream of tartar.
3. Cut in butter with pastry blender or two knives.
   
4. Stir in cream and egg.
   
5. Turn out onto a lightly floured surface and knead for 2 minutes.
   
6. Press into a half-inch thick sheet, cut into squares, and place on baking sheets.
7. Bake in preheated oven for 20 minutes or until golden.
8. Sprinkle 3 tablespoons sugar over sliced berries.
9. Let shortcakes cool before splitting and filling with strawberries.

--> Instead of splitting and filling them, we just put the hand-whipped cream Gail made on top of each square and then topped that with strawberries (as you can see in the picture above)

Here's the recipe for the whipped cream (from Bakesale Betty's site):

"Wash, hull and slice strawberries. Sprinkle with 1/4c. sugar and sit for 30 mins.

Whip cream, sugar, and vanilla until soft peaks form.

Top shortcakes with a dollop of cream.

Spoon strawberries over cream."

Baking With Daniel & Vong

Daniel and Vong came over to bake on 5/20/09, and we decided to try adding marshmallows to espresso chocolate chip cookies. Didn't work out so well...but they didn't taste awful. Too sweet though.

The Food Network's Espresso Chocolate Chip Cookies

Made these for our Psi Chi chapter's last Cookies 'n' Cram (name stolen from Clovis West High School's Link Crew's old study group. No one was there at 6:30pm, and our room's door was locked anyway, so I sat in the Psi Chi office and studied by myself. :)

Like the teeny one? lol




This is how Kurtis and I sift our flour without a sifter:






RECIPE (from The Food Network's website:

• 1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, softened
• 1 cup light brown sugar
• 3 tablespoons granulated sugar
• 1 large egg
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/2 teaspoons instant espresso coffee powder
• 1 1/2 cups semisweet choc chips

Preheat oven to 300 degrees F.

1. Cream butter with sugars using an electric mixer [I just did this by hand] on medium speed until fluffy (~30 seconds).
2. Beat in egg and vanilla extract for 30 seconds.
3. In a mixing bowl, sift together the dry ingredients and beat into the butter mixture at low speed for about 15 seconds.
4. Stir in espresso coffee powder and chocolate chips.
5. Using a 1-ounce scoop or a 2-tablespoon measure, drop cookie dough onto a greased cookie sheet ~3 inches apart.
6. Gently press down on dough to spread out into a 2-inch circle [I didn't make them this big].
7. Bake for about 20 minutes or until nicely browned around the edges.

Bread Pudding Muffins

Baked on 3/8/09 for the third Psi Chi study group (they're not cookies, but we had Oreos there too).

These are really easy to make (recipe below). The most complicated part is cutting the bread slices into cubes. Haha.





Soak time!:



I know...switching between flash & no-flash makes the coloring inconsistent, but the flash version of this pic didn't reveal the texture very well:


I hadn't baked in ages!

Original recipe here.
Here's the recipe I used:
* Changes I made:
1) 2% milk instead of non-fat -- yeah...I usually only use non-fat, but I had extra from the first
Psi Chi Cookies 'n' Cram study group thing, which was a failure)
2) Chocolate chips instead of raisins

• 1 1/2 cups milk
• 2 tablespoons melted butter
  
• 4 egg whites
• 1/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
• 12 slices whole wheat bread (diced into 1/2-inch cubes)
• 2/3 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips (I used Guittard)
  
  Directions:
  
  1) Preheat oven to 350 degrees F
  2) Spray a standard-size muffin tin with nonstick cooking spray
  3) Combine all ingredients but the bread and chocolate chips in a large bowl and mix well
  4) Stir in the bread and chocolate chips and let soak for 5 minutes
  5) Mound the mixture into each of the 12 sprayed muffin tins
  6) Bake for about 30-ish minutes or until firm and nicely browned
  7) Cool on a wire rack
  

Kurtis's Gramma's Molasses Cookies

Kurtis and I made these two nights ago. Last night we made cookies with Corn Flakes & walnuts, but I had to send my camera in to get fixed (Note: this time it wasn't my fault).

I put a Cheerio in one of them (to see what it would look like), but we didn't keep track of which one it was, so I have no idea where it is or what it looked like. I also made a snake-ish shape, but I didn't take a picture of it. Mmm...spicy and flavorful.

Blueberry Muffins

Baked 1.2009

Found this recipe when searching for a good blueberry muffin receipe. Glad I did!

Makes nice muffin tops...not too sweet...lots of blueberries.


Blueberry Muffin RECIPE (original here):

* Note: Flour and sugar are listed twice because you use different amounts of the same ingredients at different times

* 2 eggs
* 1 cup milk
* 1/4 cup melted butter
* 1 1/2 cups flour
* 3 tsp baking powder
* 1/2 tsp salt
* 2 tablespoons white sugar
* 1 cup fresh or frozen blueberries
* 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
* 1/2 cup white sugar

1) In small bowl, beat eggs, milk, & butter
2) In large bowl, mix flour, baking powder, salt, & 2 tablespoons of sugar
3) Stir liquid ingredients into dry ingredients
4) In third bowl, mix together the blueberries with remaining sugar & flour
5) Gently fold blueberry mixture into the muffin batter in large bowl
6) Fill cups & bake at 400 degrees F for ~20 min

Lawsuit Buttermilk Muffins

Baked 1.16.09

I had some extra buttermilk after making apple muffins...so I decided to try this Lawsuit Buttermilk Muffins recipe (because Ivonne said they were "the best muffins ever") from Cream Puffs in Venice, who is now at this site. The original recipe actually comes from Marcy Goldman, author of The best of BetterBaking.com, which is, of course, based off of BetterBaking.com recipes. These are really good, but I didn't follow the recipe exactly. The orange zest gives it a nice tart, orange-y flavor. Maybe next time I'll add more almonds (I was just experimenting with those on the tops). They don't stick to paper liners!



RECIPE:

* Changes I made from the original recipe):
1. I didn't make the streusel topping, although I did sprinkle the tops with chopped almonds and brown sugar
2. I used a bit less than 1 cup of brown sugar (instead of 1 1/3 cup packed brown sugar)
3. I only used about 1 tablespoon of orange zest (instead of 1 1/2 tablespoons)
4. I used 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour & 1 cup of whole wheat flour (instead of all all-purpose flour)
5. I added 1 cup of blueberries and an apple for the fruit (instead of measuring out 1 3/4 cups fruit)

Muffin recipe that I used (without streusel):

* 1/2 cup vegetable oil
* ~ 1 cup brown sugar
* 1 tablespoons grated citrus zest (I used orange)
* 1 egg
* 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
* 1 cup buttermilk
* 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
* 1 cup whole wheat flour
* 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
* 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
* 1 3/4 cups of fruit (I used 1 cup of blueberries & almost a full small apple)

1) Preheat oven to 400 degrees F & line muffin tin with paper liners or spray with oil & flour (or spraying oil made with flour!! it's awesome)
2) In large bowl, mix together dry ingredients (flour, salt, baking powder, & baking soda); set aside
3) In smaller bowl, mix together oil, brown sugar, citrus zest, & egg. Once combined, stir in buttermilk & vanilla extract
4) Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and mix well.
5) Gently mix in fruit. If batter too liquidy (mine wasn't), then add a little more flour
6) Spoon batter into muffin cups to the tops
7) Bake for 15 minutes at 400 degrees
8) Lower the temperature to 350 degrees and bake for an additional 12 minutes.