Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Bars

This is for you, Melody! These are the cookie bars I made for game night on Thursday. They are ridiculously easy and so good.

The first time I made them I followed the recipe exactly. When I made them for game night I used unsalted butter, quadrupled the salt, reduced the chocolate by 2 or 3 ounces and pressed it all into a 7x11 pan instead of 11x13. That ended up being my favorite iteration, it definitely needs a little more salt and a little less chocolate and I liked the taller bar that came from the smaller pan. When I made them again on Saturday for a BBQ I used regular salted butter, doubled the salt and did half chocolate and half butterscotch chips, which was also really good.


The original recipe is copied from here (an AWESOME recipe blog. If you're not already reading you might want to start. Everything I've tried from her blog has been a winner).

Oatmeal Chocolate Chunk Bars
adapted from 24 Hour Menu

1 3/4 cup flour
3/4 tsp soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 cup oatmeal
3/4 cup butter
1/2 cup sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
12 ounces semi sweet chocolate chunks
1 cup chopped walnuts (optional – I left these out)

Preheat oven to 375. Whisk together dry ingredients and set aside. Beat butter, sugars, egg and vanilla till fluffy and add dry ingredients. Stir in chocolate chunks and walnuts. Press into a greased 9×13 inch pan and bake for 18-20 minutes until light golden brown. I have also doubled the recipe and pressed into a large sheet pan (11X17) with great results.

A few tips: Don’t overbake!!! I overbaked them the first time I made them and when I actually baked them correctly the second time (perhaps even underbaked by a minute), they were 100 times better. Also, the second time I made them, I doubled the recipe and instead of adding two bags of chocolate chunks, I added one bag of chunks and one bag of mint chocolate chips. Fabulous!

Chicken Tortellini Bake

I made this for dinner tonight and it really just hit the spot. It's fairly easy and really satisfying.

We're not mushroom people so I left those out, but as we started eating I mentioned that I thought it would be good with chopped broccoli and Aaron thought that would have been perfect. So if you don't do mushrooms, maybe try broccoli?

Also, you'll probably want to salt and pepper the chicken sauce part of it as it's cooking. I didn't think about it since the recipe didn't say to, and we ended up salting it at the table. Which is always kind of annoying.

Recipe here.

Also, if you're not reading My Kitchen Cafe, you might think about giving it a try. I swear every single one of her recipes sounds absolutely fabulous. None of them are too complicated. Just basic, every day type cooking.

Chicken Artichoke Pesto Calzones

We had these for dinner tonight and they were SO GOOD. This recipe is going on The List of Foods We Need to Eat Frequently.

Pizza dough (I used my favorite recipe and got 2 calzones out of it)
shredded mozzarella cheese
cooked chicken (I used leftover from this recipe)
pesto
chopped artichoke hearts (I used about half of one of the little jars from Frys)
olive oil (for brushing)

Preheat oven to 500. Put cookie sheet (or pizza stone, if you're fancy) in while it preheats. Divide pizza dough in half and roll into 7 or 8 inch circle. Spread each with pesto, stopping about 1/2 inch from the edge. Add mozzarella, chicken and chopped artichoke hearts to one half. Fold other half over and fold edges over to seal. Transfer to hot cookie sheet, brush with oil, and bake for 13-15 minutes.

Recipe adapted from here by here.

Sister Crites' Wheat Bread

From Sister Crites' baking class at Women's Conference.

5 cups warm water
add 2 T yeast
add 3-4 cupes whole wheat flour and mix well
add 2/3 cup oil
and 2/3 cup honey
add another 3-4 cupes whole wheat flour and mix well
add 2 T salt
add 4 cups white flour and knead 10 minutes
If using hard red wheat you may want to add 1/2 cup gluten or dough enhancer
Mix together, cover and let rise double. Punch down and form into 6 loaves. Let rise again. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes.

Homemade cost: $2.66 for 6 loaves
Purchased wheat bread: $1.88-$4.50 for one loaf, depending on brand


These loaves freeze really well..I just made a whole bunch and stuck them in the freezer so we can pull them out as we need them. Plus they're really good!

Blender Whole Wheat Pancakes

My friend Kristi posted these pancakes forever ago on the other recipe blog I'm a part of. I finally made them this morning and discovered that I should have been making them all along. They are a good way to use food storage items (you can use your wheat without grinding it!) and they're tasty and healthy and Wes snarfed 'em right up. Kristi told me they freeze well and easily reheat for quick breakfasts and snacks.



1 C whole wheat kernels
1 C milk (or 1 C water and 1/3 C dry milk)
2 Tbs Oil
2 eggs
2 Tbs honey
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp baking powder

Put 1 C whole wheat kernels and 1 C milk in blender. Blend 3 minutes. Add eggs, oil, honey and salt, blend for 30 seconds. And baking powder and pulse three times. Make pancakes immediately.

*I also added a little cinnamon and vanilla to my batter since that's how I roll.

Zucchini Bread

You can get zucchini for a steal at Superstition Market right now. Which means I'm buying WAY more than we could ever eat. BUT, as it turns out, you can freeze grated zucchini! Which means you can have zucchini bread all year round! Yay!

Bread:
3 eggs
1 cup vegetable oil
2 cups white sugar
2 heaping cups grated zucchini
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
3 cups all purpose flour
3 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup chopped walnuts (optional)

Streusel (because adding that much oil and sugar to a vegetable doesn't make this unhealthy enough):
3/4 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup flour
4 tablespoons melted butter
2 teaspoons cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg

Throw it all together in a bowl. I like to squish it around a bit with my hands so you get some lovely little clumps.


Preheat oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour 2 8.4 inch loaf pans.

In a large bowl, beat eggs until light and frothy. Mix in oil and sugar. Stir in zucchini and vanilla. Combine flour, cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and nuts. Stir into egg mixture. Divide batter into prepared pans. Top with streusel mixture.

Bake for 50-60 minutes or until done.


Kayla's Notes, or, What I've Learned Through Trial and Error Using This Recipe, or, Things You All Probably Already Know But I'm a Little Slow:

-Beat the eggs on high for a long time. Underbeating makes the loaves flat

-Grate the zucchini (skin, seeds and all) right before you add it to the batter. If its left out for long, it starts to lose some of the moisture and it makes for a drier bread. Which doesn't taste as good.

-This makes for really good mini muffins. I use mini muffin paper liners in a mini muffin tin and bake for about 15 minutes. I usually get one loaf and about 3 dozen mini muffins per batch, depending on how generous I've been with the batter.

-Home teachers really like mini muffins.

Korean BBQ Chicken Marinade

We made this tonight at my parents' house...it was soooo good (we did it on the grill but it's good in the oven as well). Makes quite a bit of marinade. Could reserve some, thicken with corn starch, and use as a sauce to pour over chicken and rice.

1 cup white sugar
1 cup soy sauce
1 cup water
1 teaspoon onion powder
1 teaspoon ground ginger
2 cloves minced garlic
4 tsp hot chili paste (optional)

In a medium saucepan over high heat, whisk together all ingredients except chili paste. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat to low and simmer 5 minutes. Remove from heat, cool, and whisk in chili paste. Place chicken in mixture. Cover and let marinate in the fridge for at least 4 hours before preparing chicken as desired.

Ruth's Casserole

Named for my late Great Aunt Ruth, who used to serve this all the time. It's kind of like a stew version of Shepherd's Pie.

1 lb ground beef
2 large or 3 small potatoes
2 cans tomato soup
1 can green beens

Cook potatoes in oven or microwave, whichever you prefer, until soft. Peel and slice into bite sized chunks. Brown ground beef with a little garlic, drain fat. Add tomato soup, potatoes, and can of green beans (my mom doesn't drain the beans. I drain them about halfway. Totally up to you). Let simmer for a few minutes on the stove. Add salt, pepper, and garlic powder to taste.

Almond Danish Swirls

We had these at my baby shower and they were really fantastic. The recipe is by Paula Deen and I just grabbed it from here to share with you all. Enjoy!

6 oz cream cheese, softened
1 teaspoon almond extract
1/2 cup confectioner's sugar
1/2 cup slivered almonds, finely chopped
2 8oz cans refrigerated crescent dinner rolls
1 egg white
1 teaspoon water

Glaze:
1/2 cup confectioner's sugar
4 teaspoons milk
1/2 teaspoon almond extract

In a small bowl, beat the cream cheese, almond extract, and sugar until fluffy. Fold half of the chopped almonds into the cream cheese mixture. Separate 1 can of dough and assemble into 4 rectangles. Firmly press the perforations to seal. Press or roll each piece of dough to form a 7 by 4-inch rectangle, and spread each with about 2 tablespoons of the cream cheese filling to within 1/4-inch of the edges. Starting at the short end, roll each rectangle tightly into a cylinder. Repeat with the other can of dough and remaining filling.

Place on a plate, cover with plastic wrap, and chill until firm, about 30 minutes.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F while the rolls are chilling.

Remove from the refrigerator and cut each roll into 4 slices. Place 1/2-inch apart on ungreased baking sheets. In a small bowl, combine the egg white with 1 teaspoon water. Brush over the swirls. Sprinkle with the remaining chopped almonds. Bake for 18 to 20 minutes, until light brown.

While the swirls are baking, combine the glaze ingredients in a small bowl. Cool the swirls for 3 minutes on wire racks placed over a sheet of waxed paper. Drizzle the icing over the warm swirls.

Steak Marinade

This recipe came to us from Aaron's mom and it's good enough to have saved tough/overcooked/bad cuts of steak for us numerous times. And when it's on GOOD steak, it's really phenomenal. Melody, I saw that you asked for chicken marinades, maybe with Montreal Chicken seasoning this could work? It might be worth a try!

1/2 cup olive oil
1/4 cup soy sauce
4 teaspoons Montreal Steak Seasoning
2 lbs steak

Mix first 3 ingredients in large plastic bag or glass baking dish. Add steak and turn to coat. Refrigerate 30 minutes or longer (we usually let it marinate for at least a couple hours, preferably over night). Remove steak and discard marinade. Grill.

Homemade Marshmallows

I got a couple requests for this recipe last night, so here ya go!

Vegetable oil (for brushing)
4 packets unflavored gelatin (equals 3 tablespoons plus 1 1/2 teaspoons)
3 cups granulated sugar
1 1/4 cup light corn syrup
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups confectioners sugar

Brush a 9x13 inch glass baking pan with oil and line with parchment. Leave a 2 inch overhang on the long sides. Brush parchment with oil. Set aside.

Put granulated sugar, corn syrup, salt, and 3/4 cup water into a medium saucepan. Bring to a boil over high heat, stirring to dissolve sugar. Cook, without stirruing, until mixture registers 238 degrees on a candy thermometer (about 9 minutes or so).

While mixture is cooking, put 3/4 cup cold water into the bowl of an electric mixer. Sprinkle with gelatin. Let soften for 5 minutes.

Attach bowl with gelatin to mixer fitted with a whisk attachment*. With mixer on low speed, beat hot syrup into gelatin. Gradually raise speed to high, beat until mixture is very stiff, about 12 minutes. Beat in vanilla. Pour into prepared dish and smooth with an offset spatula. Set aside, uncovered, until firm (about 3 hours).

Sift 1 cup confectioners sugar onto a work surface. Unmold marshmallow onto sugar and remove parchment. Lightly brush a sharp knife (or cookie cutter!) with oil then cut marshmallow into 2 inch squares. Roll each marshmallow in the remaining confectioners sugar to coat. Can be stored in an airtight container for 3 days.

Kayla's notes:

-I don't have a stand mixer, but my hand mixer does have a whisk attachment. This got very tiring (12 minutes is a long time to stand there with a mixer) and I'm not sure the syrup and gelatin got beaten enough. Maybe if you do it by hand, mix it longer? It was marshmallowy when I finished but probably needed to be a bit thicker.

-If you're planning on using cookie cutters, maybe try refrigerating it for a couple minutes for you get started to firm it up a bit more. I had a heck of a time wrestling with the marshmallow and my cutter and my gingerbread men weren't very pretty (they tasted good though!).

Cinnamon Rolls

The recipe I tweaked says these should take about 90 minutes. They usually take me a bit longer, but not much. Which is why they're awesome. Makes 14 pretty cinnamon rolls and 2 funky looking ones (don't you hate the ends of the roll?).

Cinnamon Rolls:

3/4 cup milk
1/4 cup margarine (softened)
3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 (.25 ounce) package instant yeast
1/4 cup white sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup water
1 egg
1 1/2 cups brown sugar (packed)
1 1/2 tablespoons ground cinnamon
3/4 cup margarine (softened)

Icing:
4 oz cream cheese (softened)
1/4 c butter (softened)
1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/8 teaspoon salt

Cinnamon Rolls:

Heat milk in small saucepan until it bubbles, then remove from heat. Mix in margarine. Stir until melted then let cool until luke warm.

In a large mixing bowl, combine 2 1/4 cup flour, yeast, sugar, and salt. Mix well. Add water, egg, and the milk mixture; beat well. Add the remaining flour, 1/2 cup at a time, stirring well after each addition. When the dough has just pulled together, turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth (about 3-5 minutes).

Cover the dough with a damp cloth and let rest for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, in a small bowl, beat together brown sugar, cinnamon, and softened butter.

Roll out the dough into a large rectangle (my best batch came from a 24x14 rectangle). Spread dough with the brown sugar and butter mixture*. Working from a long edge, roll up dough to form a log and pinch seam to seal.

Cut into 16 equal size rolls* and place in a greased casserole dish. Turn your oven on to about 150 and let rise in warm oven for 30 minutes. Then crank up heat to 375 and let bake for 15-20 minutes.

Icing:

If you don't have leftover Cinnabon icing kicking around, blend all ingredients. Serve on warm cinnamon rolls.

Kayla's Notes:

-If you're not careful, the brown sugar mixture can make it hard to roll the dough nicely. So I finally figured out that you want to spread it pretty close (within about 1/2 inch) of all edges except one of the long edges (leave like 1-2 inches). Let that edge be the outside of your roll. That way, you're not trying to seal the edge with butter and sugar squishing out (gets messy real quick). Start rolling from the long edge with a 1/2 inch margin and by the time you get to the 1-2 inch edge, it should be easy to pinch it all closed without squishing filling everywhere. This probably seems really obvious to everyone else, but I'm a little slow and was really excited when I discovered how much easier this made things.

-I've heard using dental floss is a really great way to cut this stuff. My serrated bread knife did the trick just fine, but I thought I'd pass that along since a lot of people swear by it.

Pain au Chocolat

A rather non-authentic French pastry that's great for breakfast or dessert. Also, proof that we eat more than just Japanese food at our house. I lost the recipe for this long ago, so I'm kind of approximating. It's pretty hard to screw up though.

1 sheet puff pastry, thawed*
3 Hersheys chocolate bars broken along the lines
1 egg white, beaten
flour
butter for greasing the cookie sheet
powdered sugar for dusting

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease cookie sheet with butter. Unfold puff pastry on lightly floured cutting board. Dust with flour. Roll out slightly with a rolling pin.

Cut puff pastry as follows (more or less..it got really complicated as I tried to write it out so I decided a diagram was probably preferable to my confusing instructions):

Each pastry piece should be about as wide as a piece of the broken chocolate bar is long.

Brush each piece with the beaten egg white and place a square of chocolate about 1/2 inch from the end of the pastry piece. Roll it up into a log, using your fingers to squish the end into kind of a seal. Leave the sides open. Place the log seal side down on the cookie sheet. Repeat with each pastry rectangle.

Brush tops of each log with egg white then pop them in the oven until the tops start browning. Make a note of the time because I have no idea how long these are supposed to bake (15 minutes, maybe?).

Dust with powdered sugar and enjoy!

Kayla's Notes*

-Find puff pastry in the freezer section of the grocery store. Each box usually comes with 2 sheets. It dries out kinda fast, so make sure you wrap up the other sheet in plastic wrap and put it back in the freezer pretty quick so it doesn't get ruined. Make sure it's puff pastry and not phyllo dough (easy to confuse).

-There should be a few squares of chocolate left. Since they didn't make it into the recipe the calories don't count. Enjoy some guilt free chocolate while the the pain au chocolat bakes!

Gyoza

One of my all time favorite foods. It's usually served as an appetizer but makes a good entree too. There are a lot of different ways to prepare gyoza (aka potstickers), so you can adjust the recipe to suit your tastes.

1 package won ton wrappers*
1 tablespoon sesame oil
2 tablespoons soy sauce
2 cups chopped cabbage
1/4 cup chopped onion
2 cloves garlic, chopped
1/4 cup chopped carrot
1/2 pound ground pork
1 egg
1 tablespoon vegetable oil
1/4 cup water

Heat sesame oil and soy sauce in a large skillet over medium high heat. Mix in cabbage, onion, garlic and carrot. Cook and stir until cabbage is limp. Mix in ground pork and egg. Cook until pork is evenly brown and egg is no longer runny. The filling can be a little bland, so salt, pepper, garlic powder, ginger, etc. to taste.

Place approximately 1 tablespoon of the cabbage and pork mixture in the center of each wrapper. Fold wrappers in half over filling, and seal edges with moistened fingers.*

Heat vegetable oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Cook gyoza approximately 1 minute per side, until lightly browned.* Pour water into skillet and reduce heat. Cover and allow gyoza to steam until the water is gone.

Mix 1/4 cup soy sauce and 2 tablespoons rice vinegar for dipping sauce*. Serve with hot rice.

*Kayla's Notes

-You can find won ton wrappers in just about any grocery store in the refrigerated section. It always takes me like 20 minutes to find them, so just keep looking. They're there, I promise!

-I like my filling pretty minced, so I usually throw everything in the blender for a few pulses after cooking. It makes filling the wrappers easier since you don't have large chunks of pork or vegetables getting in the way.

-The filling does well in the fridge for a few days (probably in the freezer as well). Filling and sealing the wrappers is a little time consuming when you do the whole shebang, so we like to fill just as many as we need for that meal and throw the rest in the fridge. It's pretty quick to fill 5 or 6 at lunchtime the next day and it makes for easy leftovers.

-If you're one of those weirdos who likes their gyoza deep fried instead of steamed (I won't judge), just add a little more oil to the pan and fry. Use a slotted spoon to remove and forget about the water step.

-You can buy gyoza dipping sauce in the international foods sections of all our local grocery stores. We usually like it better than the homemade stuff and it tends to be pretty strong, so a little goes a long way.

Cashew Chicken

One of our favorite easy meals! If you've eaten at our house, we've probably served this to you. It barely serves four though, so if you have a bigger family, want leftovers, or are entertaining more people, you might want to double the recipe.

1 1/3 lbs chicken breasts
2 teaspoons cornstarch
1/4 rice wine (sake, mirin)*
5 green onions
1 piece ginger (3/4 inch)*
2/3 cup cashews (or walnuts, if you prefer [I don't])
1/4 cup olive oil
3-4 tablespoons soy sauce

Cut chicken into 3/4 inch cubes. Stir cornstarch into 2 tablespoons of the rice wine and mix well with chicken cubes (we throw it all in a freezer ziplock and let it sit while we chop everything else).

Remove root ends and any dark green or wilted parts from the green onions and rinse. Cut into 3/4 inch lengths. Peel ginger, slice thinly, and then slice into matchsticks. Break cashews into small pieces or chop coarsely.

Heat oil in a wok or pan, add cashews, and stir fry for a minute or 2 until they start to turn brown. Remove and set aside. Add chicken to the pan and stir-fry for 1 minute. Add onions and ginger and stir-fry for another minute. Combine remaining rice wine, soy sauce, and about 1/3 cup water and add to chicken along with cashews. Stir-fry for another minute, make sure chicken is cooked through and serve. Great with sticky rice.

*Kayla's Notes:

-You can find rice wine and good sticky rice (Aaron is a total rice snob, so only the real good stuff will do at our house) at Lee Lee's. If you don't feel like making the effort, regular white wine or cooking wine works just fine and I can't really tell the difference in taste.

-When I gave my sister this recipe the concept of ginger in plant form as opposed to powdered form was totally alien. So, just in case you read that and went "...3/4 inch?" You can find ginger root everywhere (including Fry's and WalMart) in the vegetable section. It's quite cheap and you really don't need much at all for this recipe.

-I use my onion chopper to quickly chop the cashews. Also, they burn real quick, so keep an eye on them while stir-frying! A slotted spoon works well for putting them aside while stir-frying everything else.

-I like to let the whole thing simmer for a bit at the end. I usually mix a little more cornstarch in some water and add it right at the end to thicken it up, otherwise it tends to be a bit watery.

Thanks to Bethany S for the invite! This is such a great idea and I'm really excited about trying some of these recipes and sharing my good ones!