Cheesy Beer Bread

A while back I stumbled upon a recipe for Honey Beer Bread over at Gimme Some Oven. I was making chili that night and I was purposely looking for a fast and easy beer bread recipe. This one was great. Buttery and delicious and I was able to whip it up in 6 minutes. My husband loved it and just couldn't get enough!

The first time I used a stout beer and of course took GSO's advice on the cheese, I chose mild cheddar. The thing I loved most about this bread is that it can carry a variety of flavors just by changing the beer. Of course that is where my experimenting began...

After playing with several different beers, I settled on Blue Moon. It blends really well and adds a light mild flavor, of course if you don't want to use Blue Moon most any Belgian style wheat ale will give the same result.

This time I used a blend of extra-sharp and mild cheddar. I have been experimenting with different seasonings and whatnot, so in went the garlic, onion powder and fresh ground pepper.

Even the batter smells fantastic!

In addition to the advice on the cheese, I also listened to GSO when they suggested doubling the butter of their recipe.

Cheesy Beer Bread

(this recipe makes 2 loaves, feel free to cut it in half)

6 Cups AP flour

4 Tbsp Sugar

2 Tbsp baking powder

2 tsp salt

3 Tbsp Garlic

2 Tbsp onion powder

freshly ground pepper (to your liking, I used a peppercorn medly and ground a healthy amount)

8oz extra sharp cheddar

6oz mild cheddar

4 Tbsp orange blossom honey

2 - 12oz btl Belgian style wheat beer

2 sticks butter, melted

1. Preheat oven to 350 and grease and flour two 9" x 5" x 3" loaf pans

2. In a large mixing bowl, whisk together all dry ingredients and cheese until well combined

3. Using a silicon mixing spoon, stir in honey and beer until everything is mixed and moistened.

4. Pour half of the melted butter into the bottom of both loaf pans. Divide the batter and spoon into the pans. Pour the remaining butter over the tops of the batter in each pan.

5. Bake for 60 minutes, until bread is golden brown and a tester stick comes out clean.

Now I probably don't have to tell you that this is best if served immediately or at least warmed...of course, Phil just rips pieces off of it at room temp and enjoys! In fact, once this batch was out of the oven and served, he told me to STOP messing with the recipe because it was finally perfect and suggested we open a restaurant centered around this stuff. I do admit that this recipe has finally been typed and stored in my recipe file, which in my kitchen means I finally got it right! Enjoy!

Lemons and Berries and Cakes! OH MY!

Earlier this week, I made a lemon pound cake for a friend of mine. I used a recipe I found on one of my favorite sites, Foodgawker.com and it was absolutely delicious! Very moist and just the perfect combination of sweet and tart. For the original recipe click here.

So as I was garnishing the center of the cake, I began to think about the glut of strawberries that I still had from my berry picking adventure. With this thought I sat down to sip on the lemonade I had made myself from the leftover juice for the cake...and from that point on I was completely unable to get the thought of Strawberry Lemonade Cake out of my head! So today I set out to make that thought a reality. I tweaked the original recipe for this delicious lemon cake to include strawberries and went straight to work experimenting in my kitchen.

Great Success! The final product definitely exceeded my expectations, though it did take 2 attempts to get the lemon to pop the way I wanted. This cake finally turned out with just the right mix of flavors. It is dense and moist and perfect with a cup of coffee for breakfast or with ice cream for dessert, mmmm! So enough tooting my own horn (toot! toot!) below is my adapted recipe. Enjoy!

Strawberry Lemonade Pound Cake

2 3/4 cups all purpose flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

3 sticks unsalted butter - at room temperature

1 3/4 cups sugar

6 large eggs

1 cup milk

2 Tbsp lemon zest

1 1/2 tsp pure lemon extract

1 1/2 cup fresh chopped strawberries

Strawberry Lemon Syrup

1/2 cup fresh lemon juice

1/4 cup fresh strawberry juice

3/4 cup sugar

1. Preheat oven to 300 F.

2. Butter and flour a 12 cup bundt pan (or 12 mini bundts)

3. Sift the flour, baking powder and salt together twice.

4. Cream the butter and sugar together until pale and fluffy, about 5 minutes. Add the eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Reduce the speed and add the flour mixture, alternating with the milk, beginning and ending with the flour. Stir in the lemon zest, strawberries, and lemon extract, stirring well after each is added.

5. Pour the batter into the prepared pan and bake for 1 1/2 hours, or until a tester inserted in the middle comes out clean. Allow cake to cool in the pan for 15 minutes.

6. While the cake is cooling in the pan, prepare the strawberry lemon syrup by bringing the lemon juice, strawberry juice and sugar to a boil in a saucepan, stirring constantly until the sugar is dissolved.

7. Invert the cake onto a rack positioned over a baking sheet. Poke holes all over the top of the cake with a wooden skewer. Very slowly pour the syrup over the cake, it will seep through the holes and into the cake. Allow cake to cool to room temperature. Slice and enjoy!

Spongebob Cakepants

A few months ago a co-worker of mine asked me to make her niece's birthday cake. She basically gave me free range creatively, which I love, and all she wanted was a Spongebob theme. So I began thinking about what this cake was going to look like and decided on making Spongebob's pineapple house.

The cake is French Vanilla with vanilla buttercream icing. I covered the round cake base with a healthy dusting of crushed up Nilla Waffers to look like sand. All of the decorations are made of fondant and attached with royal icing. I have a 'Big Top Cupcake' mold that a good friend of mine gave me for christmas and after looking at all of my baking pans and briefly contemplating carving the Pineapple out of sheet cake, I decided to make 2 bottoms and stack them on top of each other. I was really pleased with the outcome!

Spongebob, Gary, & Patrick

Flowers

I had loads of fun making this cake and the recipient was equally pleased. Apparently I will be making many more birthday cakes for her...Can't wait to see what else she can come up with for me!

Oh How I Love Strawberries!

I thought I'd kick this blog off with one of my favorite fruits, the strawberry. I recently discovered a 'Pick Your Own' farm not far from my home and I am in love! Fruits and veggies for all seasons at unbelievably low prices, so I hopped in my car and headed out with a mission to obtain 2 gallons of fresh delicious strawberries....Mission Accomplished!

The next question is 'what to make first?' As I always like to begin with the obvious, I of course made jam. This is a very sweet jam with only 2 ingredients and no pectin. I did this in 2 batches and added lime pulp to the second batch for delicious Strawberry Lime Jam!

Strawberry (& Lime) Jam

4 Cups mashed strawberries (you can use a potato masher, but I used my food processor)

4 Cups sugar divided

2 Cups fresh lime pulp (Optional)

Mash the strawberries (and lime). If you are using a food processor, you want the berries to be chunky, not smooth. Mix the berries with half of the sugar and cook on medium-high heat for 5 minutes. Add the remaining sugar and cook for an additional 10 minutes. Strain off the excess juice (Do Not throw this away.) Place the jam into jars and seal tightly!

So there you have it, super fresh, from vine to jar in 2 hours, quick and easy strawberry and strawberry lime jam!

Now remember that sugary strawberry juice I told you to save? I hope you did because if not you are about to miss out on a truly refreshing delight...the freshest strawberry mojito you have ever had! By the way, you can make these virgin for an equally delicious and refreshing spritzer, just cut out the rum!

Strawberry Mojito

4-5 Chunks fresh lime with peel

Fresh mint sprigs

Fresh strawberry juice

1 1/2 oz rum

Club Soda

Ice and a tall glass

Muddle the mint, lime and strawberry juice in the tall glass. Top with ice and rum and fill with club soda. Garnish with a strawberry or lime wedge if desired. Enjoy!