Sunday, July 31, 2011

Green Cake






It took me a couple of years to weasel this secret family recipe out of a friend... you simply MUST try it... immediately!

Green Cake
Courtesy of: Angela F.


Preheat oven to 350F
Grease 11x13 cake pan & sprinkle 1 tbsp cake mix to "dust" pan
Cake:
1 box white cake mix
1 jello pistachio pudding mix
1/2 cup oil
3/4 cup water + 1 tbsp
4 eggs
1-2 cups pecans, finely chopped (or your favorite nut)
Mix ingredients until smooth, and pour mixture into prepared cake pan. Sprinkle 1-2 cups finely chopped pecan pieces evenly over cake. (If you don't like pecans, I would expect that any nuts would work beautifully here.) Bake at 350F for about 45 minutes or until toothpick inserted comes out clean.
Frosting:
2 tbsp butter
1/4 cup water
2 cups packed powdered sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla
Mix ingredients while cake is in the oven. When cake is done, remove it from oven. With a fork, puncture the cake several times until surface is evenly "poked". Gently spoon frosting mixture evenly over entire cake (pouring on frosting makes it pool & doesn't coat evenly). Bake the cake for an additional 5 minutes so the frosting becomes flakey. Cool to room temp and enjoy!
** I considered warming the frosting ingredients before putting them on the cake and to make sure they mix evenly... we didn't do it, but I wonder if it might work better than ours did. 
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Thursday, July 14, 2011

Lasagna Roll-Ups






Lasagna Roll-Ups
Courtesy of ME!

Package of Lasagna Noodles
1 container of ricotta cheese
1 egg
1 medium zucchini, grated
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 pound ground beef
1 medium onion, diced
1 tsp Italian Seasoning
1 jar of your favorite spaghetti sauce (I used Classico Spinach)
1-2 cups grated mozzarella cheese

This recipe makes about 9-10 rolls - which for our family is plenty because currently John and I only eat about 1 roll per meal. For larger families, or if you think your family will eat more - you might want to double up on the ingredients in the filling mixture. I had quite a few lasagna noodles left over - so you should be fine with one package. 

Boil your lasagna noodles. Drain and rinse with cold water. Separate the noodles and lay them out on a towel lined cookie sheet. We had more than one layer - so I just covered each layer with a separate towel and kept stacking.

In a skillet, brown your ground beef with salt, pepper, the Italian seasoning, and onion. Once browned, allow the mixture to cool. In a medium bowl, mix the ricotta cheese, egg, Parmesan, 1/4 cup of the spaghetti sauce, and beef mixture.

In the bottom of a baking dish, spread a few tablespoons of the spaghetti sauce. You want to make sure that the bottom of the dish is covered lightly so that the noodles don't dry out.

Lay out 1 lasagna noodle on a cutting board, spoon some of the ricotta mixture on the noodle to cover it.


Then roll up the noodle.


Ideally, the rolls would stand up in the pan. Mine wasn't deep enough - so I had to lay them side by side. You will want to pack the rolls in tightly so that they can keep their moisture. If they stand up in the pan, you will be able to fit them all in one dish - I had to use two in order to bake mine.


Once you get all the rolls made up, cover them with the remaining sauce - a little bit on each roll so that the noodles continue to have plenty of moisture so they don't dry out. Top them with mozzarella cheese and bake for about 20-25 minutes until the mozzarella cheese is melted and the rolls are warm.
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Thursday, July 7, 2011

Margarita Pie



Margarita Pie
Courtesy of: A grocery store cookbook (my son ripped off the cover and I'm not sure who's it was)

1 1/4 cups crushed pretzels
1/4 cup sugar
6 tablespoons butter, melted
1 can (14 oz) sweetened condensed milk
1/2 cup lime juice
1 envelope KOOL-AID Lemon Lime Unsweetened drink mix
1 tub (8 oz) COOL WHIP Whipped Topping, thawed

For the crust:
Mix pretzel crumbs, sugar and butter together. Press into bottom and up the sides of a 9-inch pie crust. For best results - use a glass or metal pie plate instead of a disposable one. Refrigerate until ready to fill.

For the filling:
Mix the sweetened condensed milk, lime juice, and KOOL-AID drink mix together in a large bowl. Whisk in COOL WHIP. Pour the contents into the pie crust, and freeze for 6 hours.

Remove the pie from the freezer 10-15 minutes before serving, let stand at room temperature until slightly softened. Use a large knife dipped in warm water to cut the pie into slices. I dipped the knife in the water after each cut. You can top the pie with more COOL WHIP if desired.

My crust came apart a bit - so I sprinkled the pretzel crumbs on the top so no one missed any of their salty bite with the sweetness of the filling.
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