Foolish Morsel

My good friend Sandi gave me this recipe, after I begged for it, and that was after she brought us some…Oh my gawd, that’s all I can say. Deceptively simple, and use the “ripest” bananas you can get a hold of, like already getting mushy, you won’t be disappointed…If you like sweeter than sweet, and more dense than dense can be, you will skip meals to eat more of it… >: )

photo ©andi butler

recipe ©sandi cortellassi

Next week, it’s all about cuppies on Martha..hmmm, we’ll see what she’s got!  ; ) The cookies have been working out well anyway!  Owen’s put in his cupcake order for his birthday…STAR WARS, what else, right? Vanilla with cheesecake flavored pudding middles…I don’t know if it will taste good, but I trust Owen’s instincts, he’s usually right about these things!  Buttercream frosting for sure…But I’ve got a lot of SW chocolate heads to make!

Owen and I made these Giant Sugar Cookies last week…They really are giant, and yummy!

a : )

©andi butler

Today is Liam’s Birthday, and these are his cuppies!  He was surprisingly decisive as to what he wanted when he and big brother Owen were picking out their wrappers and whatnot. Liam loves polka dots, wonder who he gets that from?  And sprinkles! I have a lot of work on as of late (as in super late nights! I am shattered…zzzz…) so I didn’t have time to make the lil’ chocolate treasures, I did however make some toppers, in the shape of twinkly little stars (they sparkle)! I am so proud of how hard he’s worked to try to function in our world, he is my star!  He actually chose vanilla cupcakes, and I made an Italian meringue buttercream frosting that I’m also using as a filling.  I added a raspberry purée that I made, just to try something new (can’t be chocolate all the time, can it?) using a Wolfgang Puck recipe (easy, just time consuming)…The taste is tremendously brilliant!!…Happy Birthday sweetheart, we all love you!

© andi butler

Perfect!  Not a seed in sight!  ; )

Nope!

But my hands are!  My friend dropped off all these blueberries she’d picked for me (I was in class, more on that later)!  Notice the size of the bag next to the mixer!  Pancakes and handpies…The rest of the pix speak for themselves…My mum says my little men are never going to leave home if I keep feeding them like this! That’s alright….for now!  ; )

©andi butler

If it sits still too long, then it gets frosted and sprinkled!  My waffle cones from last night…

©andi butler

I put chocolate inside the bottom so the ice cream doesn’t drip…

Then chocolate and sprinkles on the outside!

And, look at this strawberry!  I had to “add” a face!

I broke it out, and broke it in, and I have to say, my first try at waffle cones on my lil’ garage sale treasure turned out pretty damn good!  I used a recipe from Recipezaar, and while the first couple were awkward, I got the hang of rolling them (could they be any flippin’ hotter?) and pinching the bottom closed…They tasted delish!  Time to experiment with chocolate…what else, right?  Yum…Oh, the first pic, is because I’m a complete oddball and take pix of things for the heck of it…This whisk, is awesome, I have two sizes, I love them, and I think they’re just from Target, nothing super highfalutin!

The batter was a little thicker than I thought it would be, a good thing!

Took a couple tries to get the amount right…it spreads out a little!  ; )

Success!

My taste tester…

I keep all my recipes on my (shameless plug warning) MacBook Pro…

I go to the library, check out cookbooks, and take digital shots of the recipes I like (faster than writing them down!) and keep them all in here…It’s greener for one, and so many books aren’t spiral bound, so what good are they if you have to get something else to keep them open?  I do have to make sure it’s out of the way of any liquid, but if something is fantabulous, it’s even easier to share via email, or blog, of course!

While I didn’t make a cake today (but I am doing something tomorrow), we did make grilled pizza!  The dough is from Mario Batalli (recipe to follow), and is outstanding!  We had lots of toppings to pick from, and while Liam was not into it at all, Owen couldn’t wait to put his pizza together!  Oh Yum!!

Had all kinds of toppings, wet and shredded mozzarella cheese, asiago, red pepper…you know the rest!

The sauce we used, outstanding!!

Fresh basil…ahhh…

Liam wasn’t into it at all!

Mario’s Pizza Dough (via my one of my best foodie friends, Aimee.  She cooks, I bake, we share)…

3 1/4 C all-purpose flour, plus extra for dusting

2 t instant or rapid-rise yeast

1 1/2 T salt

1 T sugar

1 C warm water

1/4 C dry white wine, at room temperature

2 T plus 1 t extra-virgin olive oil

In a large bowl, combine the flour, yeast, salt, and sugar and mix well.

Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and add the warm water,

wine, and olive oil.  Using a wooden spoon, stir the wet ingredients into

the dry until the mixture is too stiff to stir, then mix with your hands in

the bowl until the dough comes together and pulls away from the sides of the

bowl.  

Lightly dust a work surface with flour and turn the dough out.  Knead

gently, dusting the work surface lightly with more flour as necessary, for 5

minutes, or until the dough is smooth, elastic, and only slightly sticky.

Oil a large clean bowl, add the dough, and turn to coat.  Cover the bowl

with plastic wrap or a kitchen towel, set in a warm part of the kitchen, and

let the dough rise until doubled in size, about 1 hour.  

Punch down the dough, and it is ready to use.  

I’m not dissing on Nestle® cookie dough out of the tube, it’s saved me from bored children on many a rainy day, but from scratch is pretty easy, and they are so much yummier!

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I have never been one to go to garage sales, not because I don’t think they’re marvy, they totally are, but I never think to go to ‘em, I usually have both boys with me and I have difficulty puttering around, but, my friend is an uber garage sale-r, and she found these for me!!  I got a box FULL of these candy molds, at least 20 years old, for one single dollar…I just couldn’t photograph all of ‘em….and this waffle cone maker, again, probably twenty years old, NEVER OPENED! One dollah…that’s right…and my neighbor makes ice cream, so guess what we’re collaborating on this summer!!  Yay!!  I’m making some Independence Day cuppies too, will post those soon!

all photos ©andi butler

I love vintage stuff, so anything 20 years old (ouch, when I graduated) or older is fantabulous!

This is my favorite mold, do you remember the large lit up ones in peeps’ yards?

Strawberry Shortcake or Hollie Hobby, can’t tell yet…

Crazy solid bunny mold!  There’s a front and a back…

Vintage chick fam!

Victorian looking Santa

See, a dollah!

Ew…got rid of these first thing!  But, they were never opened!  ; )