Beef and Blue Cheese Salad

My children have been gone all weekend and haven't given me much to blog about of late so I thought I would post one of my favorite recipes. Beef and Blue Cheese Salad is one of my most favorite recipes of all time. Another plus is that it is SUPER easy to make. Well, I've never actually made it. Ben is the one who always throws it together, but I watch him so I can say for a fact that it is indeed easy. He found this recipe in Men's Health Magazine a few years ago and we (he) make it all the time. Anyway here it is: Beef and Blue Cheese Salad

Recipe Notes: The recipe calls for plum tomatoes, but we use cherry tomatoes when they aren't in season. Also we use Newman's Own Lite Balsamic Vinaigrette and like it just fine. You don't necessarily have to use flank steak either, and I can't say for sure that we ever have. I think we usually use New York strip. Anyway, enjoy!

Pumpkin Sheet Cake

I don't know where this recipe came from other than it was passed down from my mom. She usually makes it for Thanksgiving and it is something I look forward to every year. The cake is extremely moist and it is topped with a cream cheese icing. I made one last night and took it to work today. Some of the other teachers wanted the recipe so I promised to post it for them. Make it for your Thanksgiving this year. It's a nice change from plain old pumpkin pie.

Pumpkin Sheet Cake

1 (16 oz.) can pumpkin

2 c. sugar

1 c. vegetable oil

4 eggs, lightly beaten

2 c. all-purpose flour

2 t. baking soda

1 t. ground cinnamon

1/2 t. salt

In a mixing bowl, beat pumpkin, sugar, and oil. Add eggs and mix well. Combine flour, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt; add to mixture and beat until well-blended. Pour into a greased 15x10x1 baking pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 minutes. Cool

Cream Cheese Icing

1 (3 oz) cream cheese, softened

5 T butter (soft)

1 t vanilla extract

1 3/4 c powdered sugar

3 to 4 t. milk

chopped pecans (optional)

Beat cream cheese, butter, and vanilla in a mixing bowl until smooth. Gradually add sugar; mix well. Add milk until frosting reaches desired spreading consistency. Frost cake. Sprinkle w/ nuts.

Pumpkin Nutella Muffins

6:30 am is too early to be awakened by the sound of a kazoo on a Saturday morning. Especially when it is followed by a screaming, hitting fight over the kazoo... promptly followed by crying and hugging. All of this after a night of little elbows and knees in my back does not a good morning make. So I decided to make my morning a little sweeter by baking some pumpkin nutella muffins. I found and adapted the recipe from the Pumpkin Nutella Bread recipe on one of my favorite cooking sites, Two Peas and Their Pod. The combination of the pumpkin and nutella is out of this world! I wasn't crazy about the actual pumpkin bread recipe itself, but any recipe would do. Please let me know if you have a rockin' pumpkin bread recipe. I tried googling the pumpkin muffin recipe from The Corner Bakery, but I had no luck. I had all the ingredients for this one except the hazelnut extract. I texted or text (Anyone know the past tense of text?) Ben that I had them in the oven and before I took them out he had already stopped by to try one. He agreed about the pumpkin bread and suggested I add more nutella next time. I concur, the more nutella the merrier! The recipe made about a dozen regular size muffins and then I used the rest of the batter to make a dozen mini chocolate chip pumpkin muffins for the boys. They gave them two thumbs up!

Monkey Muffins

Now, I know that monkey bread is no new concept, but monkey muffins? I thought it was genius! My favorite part of the monkey bread is the outside. It is the best part because it has this crunchy, gooeyness to it. So what usually happens is all of the outside of the bread is eaten and then the inside is left to harden and then be thrown away. What a waste! I suspected that these monkey muffins would have this crunchy gooeyness with every bite, and I was elated to find my suspicions were confirmed. Since they are smaller, every piece is an outside piece! Absolutely Genius! For those of you who aren't familiar with monkey bread, it is usually baked in a large tube or bundt pan and served by pulling off a "lump"of bread at a time.

I found this recipe in Home Cooking with Trisha Yearwood. Go ahead and make fun, but this is a darn good cookbook! And no, I'm not a crazy Trisha Yearwood fan who collects all of her memorabilia. I just happened to come upon it one day as I was browsing the book section at Sam's. I am however an avid collector of good cookbooks and would like to think I know a good one when I see it, and I might also be a bit of an impulse buyer. But, nonetheless I don't regret buying it. So I'm posting the recipe for anyone who cares to try them.



This recipe calls for combining maple syrup with the butter. This is the first monkey recipe I have seen that does this and you could definitely make them without it. Real maple syrup isn't the easiest ingredient to come by, at least in these parts, but fortunately I had some, thanks to Billy and P.C.'s trip to Canada. For that matter, you could use any monkey bread recipe to make these muffins. This monkey is flexible.

A great recipe to get your kids involved in the kitchen! Davis had fun helping quarter the biscuits. I tried to get Wilson to help, but he was too busy shooting me with his invisible fire laser.

My monkey muffins

Monkey Bread Muffins

1 12 oz. can biscuits (10 in each can)

3 T Hot Maple Syrup

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) butter, melted

2/3 cup sugar

1 T ground cinnamon

1/2 cup freshly chopped pecans

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F. Place cupcake liners in 12 muffin cups. With kitchen shears, cut each biscuit into 4 pieces. In a small bowl, mix the sugar, cinnamon, and chopped pecans. Dip each biscuit piece into the maple butter, and roll in the sugar mixture. Place 3 or 4 coated pieces in each muffin cup, pressing to compact. Bake the muffins for 15 to 17 minutes. Allow to cool in the pan for 5 minutes before removing to wire racks. Serve warm.

Almost Perfect Pesto

my pesto

Last night for dinner I made Balsamic Garlic chicken and Bowties with Pesto, Feta, and Cherry Tomatoes. The chicken was outstanding and so easy! I made my own pesto, which I was really excited about, because it has been something I've always wanted to do and I was able to use large amounts of the basil we have growing in our garden.

I always have Ben rate my food on a 1 to 10 scale. The chicken was rated a 9.5... I think it was a 10, but Ben argues that chicken can never be a 10. He says "lobster is a 10, a good filet is a 10." "You can't compare chicken to lobster" I tell him, "you have to compare chicken to chicken". He won't budge, but I know deep down my chicken was a 10. The pasta was given a solid 9. I can live with that because it was more than I would have rated it. All three boys liked it better than me. I guess I had higher expectations. I'm not giving up though, I know there are bigger and better things out there waiting for my pesto.

Balsamic Garlic Chicken

4 (6 oz) skinless boneless chicken breasts

1 t salt

1 t pepper

2 T butter

1 T veg oil

1/2 cup chicken broth

1/4 cup balsamic vinegar

1 T fresh lemon juice

3 garlic cloves, chopped

1 1/2 t honey

Sprinkle chicken with salt and pepper. Melt butter with oil in a large skillet over med-high heat. Add chicken and cook 6 to 7 minutes on each side or until done. Remove chicken and keep warm. Add chicken broth and next 4 ingredients to skillet and cook 5 minutes or until slightly thickened, stirring to loosen particles from bottom of skillet. Serve chicken with sauce.